Allow me to introduce myself.

Before I jump in to one of the meatiest, grossest parts of who I am.  I want to inform you all that I will be out of town this upcoming week.  Julie and I are going on a hot vacation!  But don't worry.  I've written a few posts that will be published during this week. There are a lot of folks that keep coming by here.  I thought I'd take this week to talk through my healing after the divorce. Because I will not have internet access, I will be unable to moderate comments.  Therefore, I have closed my comments for the week.

So keep coming by.  I won't be here, but my blogs will be.

Divorce.

It's probably one of the ugliest words I know.  Still, to this day, when someone mentions that word, I cringe.  Cringing is better than hiding.  5 years ago, if someone mentioned the d word, I hid.  A lot has changed in five years.

here's my story of grace and restoration.  It began when the life I led, on my own ended.

I was a student pastor when my wife of a few months left me.  Because of the circumstances of the divorce, my church felt comfortable allowing me to continue to be their student pastor.  I was grateful.  My job, on those 12 or so students, were all I had. One of the recommendations of our church deacon board was for me to share what was going on with our entire church during a Wednesday Night Business Meeting.  It was absolutely horrifying.

I had to air my deepest, dirtiest, most embarrassing secrets, and for the first time, I got to be exactly who I was. I got to walk in absolute truth in who I was – blemishes and all. And I pursued students with absolute authenticity. I got to witness God do incredible things in my life and the lives’ of others. I continued to pray that God would have his way. I petitioned for Restoration for my marriage.  But there was very little correspondence.  And with each correspondence, it became increasingly clear that restoration was of no interest to her.

And then, papers showed up at my house. That day, as I remember it, was the beginning of the end of absolute brokenness. I met with our pastors again, sharing with them that my wife had requested a termination of our marriage. Again, they were quite supportive. Our marriage ended, I was ashamed and hurt, but life continued. 

I continued to work at the church and pour my time in to students. I had a lot of free time – I pursued God with vigor and poured my life in to students. I began to better understand grace and find my absolute value in Christ Jesus. It was no longer in arrogance or pretense that I was pastoring students. It was with humility and authenticity that I lead and spoke. God began to do miraculous things. I got to be a part seeing students and their parents come to know Christ (in about a 3 year period we saw over 150 students accept Christ through the student ministry.) Week after week, God was doing incredible things. It was incredible....

Check back for part 2 of my crazy journey.