Chapter 37 - Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

During these months my security is in Jesus, but sometimes I question him. “Why am I going through this pain, Lord? I gave my life to you, tried to obey your call to be a missionary nurse. I married a man who also felt called to missions. So why am I separated from Zach and stuck on a sandbar in my calling? It seems so unfair.”

The Lord is patient and clear with me. He reminds me of times when I argued a lot with my dad in years past, and later with Zachary. He shows me I have never learned real submission i the small circumstances of life. Now I can learn it, in these rocky times. He also reminds me of the moral impurity during my years of dating Zach. I didn’t commit fornication but compromised sexually many times. “You sowed bad seed that you’re now reaping. If you both had stayed morally pure, Zach would have had a stronger will to resist temptation with Myra.”

I acknowledge this. I have sown the wind, am now reaping the whirlwind.

Continuing to attend Leota’s Bible study, I listen to the women’s stories. Many of them share how the Lord has shown them their “old nature”--how totally lost and depraved they were without God. Somehow, I can’t identify with them. I came to the Lord as a little girl, knowing I was a sinner…then was washed clean.

Meditating on this one evening, a veil is removed from my spirit. The Lord shows me my depraved old nature. Without him, my natural self is a cesspool. Thinking about this I am amazed, horrified! My only standing before God now is Jesus’ holiness given to me because I’ve repented. In the past some had called me naïve—I’d been rather innocent to my own and others’ disposition to evil. I hadn’t even believed Bonnie when she warned me about Zach and Myra. Now I see that my righteousness, my confidence is only due to Jesus’ blood, his forgiveness.

Though I sometimes walk with the Lord closely and have revelation, other times I stumble with blurry vision. A leader from the Christian and Missionary Alliance calls, asking if I believe it would help if my parents were flown home early from Irian Jaya.

“I would love to have them near me,” I confess. “But I don’t think it would change my circumstances. Zach won’t return to me just because they are here. So don’t bring them home now for my sake.”

Little do I realize how much I need their wisdom to steady me. For three different periods while I live alone in Bagley, I date men. I’m lonely, rationalize that soon I’ll be divorced. But--I’m compromising my spiritual life, damaging God’s cause. After each time of dating, the relationship becomes heavy, uncomfortable…so I break it off and press deeper into prayer for Zach. Because I’m still married, it is wrong.

Some days are pierced with more pain than others. I am in the car at Bagley’s only stoplight one day with Nick in his car seat, when I notice Zachary crossing the street in front of me, holding Myra’s hand. He sees me, waves, and walks on. This is my husband…the former pastor! How can he be so blatant, so insulting?

After another incident I become angry. I have dropped Nick off at the babysitter’s house and am driving west to the hospital. Nick has a fever, but I need to work—I can’t afford to stay home with him. Driving closer to the car in front of me, I notice it’s Zach’s Bronco, with Myra sitting close to him.

I begin crying out to the Lord. “God, you see me. I’m seeking you, trying to serve you, to be obedient. And I’m struggling, hurting. They look happy. God, I’m one of your children. I’m yours. I pray you defend me! I can’t defend myself, but you can! Do something!

Two visits break up the long winter months. The first is Jim and Romaine’s wedding after Christmas. I leave Nick with Grandma and Grandpa Hofer in St. Paul and ride with another bridesmaid to the Chicago area. Ro is radiant as all of us bridesmaids walk slowly down the aisle in red velvet trimmed dresses, holding lighted candles. Uncle Dewey gives Romaine away, and Jim’s dad presides over the ceremony…and Mom and Dad share and pray by tape recording.

So special, meaningful, but Mom and Dad are again missing a daughter’s wedding. Such a cost they are paying for the Danis to hear the gospel in Irian Jaya!

The second visit is from Uncle Dewey in late spring. I pick him up at the small Bemidji airport and he sees my house, the church, and the empty parsonage in Ebro. He takes a picture of me holding chubby Nick outside the church. My blond hair is beribboned in two ponytails, and I look happy. But in reality I am barely keeping afloat, with my nose above the waterline of distress.

My uncle and I also drop in on Bonnie and her family down the road, past Myra’s house. Bonnie keeps in touch with Myra, tries to encourage her to come back to the Lord. She gives little hope to Uncle Dewey for our marriage. Later my uncle finds Zach and talks to him.

That evening he tells me, “It doesn’t look encouraging, Marlene. But I see that you’re doing well--and we’re praying for you.”

“Thanks, Uncle Dewey. We’ll come through this…Mom and Dad will be here this summer, and God is with me!”

Winter stretches on and on. I begin working nights. The shifts are quieter, the nursing assistants older than me and very helpful. Zachary is now living in a rented house across the tracks from Ebro, but he still sees Myra. Sometimes he takes Nick to sleep in his house, then in the morning I drive Nick to Jean’s so I can sleep…and pick Nick up in the late afternoon. So—on some days Nick is in three houses.

Bonnie and I meet for coffee at her home occasionally and pray together. One time she seems troubled. “I have news, Marti. Myra’s at a cancer treatment center. She has cancer of the cervix. She’s getting cobalt therapy.”

I sit down in a chair. “She has cancer?”

“Yes. And she’s had two miscarriages…one not long ago. Both Zach’s babies. The second one was five months along.”

I am amazed, at a loss for words.

“I want to visit Myra, but Buck needs the car for work. Could you give me a ride tomorrow? It’s a long drive.”

“Sure, I’m off tomorrow.”

Bonnie and another friend ride with me the long miles to the clinic. I pray as the others walk into Myra’s room. “Such strange circumstances,” I think to myself. “Like a soap opera. I can hardly believe I’m living through this.” I pray for Myra but feel little compassion. “I’m just glad I didn’t find out about the pregnancies earlier. Is God defending me? Will Zachary want to come back to me someday?” Driving home, we are all sober.

The red currant tree in the front yard leafs green, and grass sprouts where snow has melted. It’s invigorating to bicycle to visit friends, with Nick on the seat behind me. Later I slowly ride the small motorcycle Zach and I had bought months ago, Nick holding onto the handlebars.

By summer Mom and Dad, Dan and David arrive home from Irian Jaya via the west coast. Our reunion is so sweet! Dan is now 18, has graduated from Dalat High School, and David 16. Taller than me, I reach up to hug each of them. Dad looks wise in an Amish beard, his eyes showing love and smile lines. I embrace Mom, who looks the most worn--my struggles have exacerbated anxiety. She has trouble sleeping at night.

They visit my little home and later talk to Zachary. He is still adamant about divorcing me, and now has money to finalize it. Our separation has been almost a year. They accept his decision, and in a few days drive back to the Twin Cities, knowing I will later move to live near them.

About a week later I receive a call to come to the lawyer’s office and sign divorce papers. Walking in, I write my name in the correct places, and numbly walk out. Is this how a marriage ends? So much money and effort go into an engagement, marriage, furnishing a home, having children. Years of interaction with family and friends!

There should be a ceremony required to divorce someone, I conclude. The initiator should have to invite all the former wedding guests, stand in front of them, and explain why they aren’t going to keep their vows. The deep pain inflicted on the spouse, children and extended family should be recognized, as at a funeral. Now I understand experientially why it says in Malachi that God hates divorce.

In a few weeks I feel ready to move near Mom and Dad. Zach is bent on staying with Myra…I am finally fully accepting this. And I believe I am scripturally free to remarry.

Driving south I visit Mom and Dad in their apartment in Roseville, a suburb of St. Paul. I find a fulltime position in surgery at Metropolitan Medical Center (MMC), and a one-bedroom apartment near the family. The apartment caretaker downstairs does childcare, offers to watch Nick for me fulltime!

I am amazed how everything slips smoothly into place. “Thank you, Lord…you’re taking care of me!”

Friends have a farewell party…Mom and Dad and my brothers help me move, then unload the U-Haul trailer into my second-floor apartment. Dad hangs a long shelf above the rocking chair, builds a bookshelf with stained boards and sturdy bricks. Gauzy curtains, artful pictures, the gold sofa. The oak table and Nick’s highchair squeezed into the kitchen. And in the bedroom a small bed for Nick across from my large one. I am home! Carvings from Indonesia, rose colored lamps, and Nick’s toy chest. Personal, complete…and my parents a few miles away.

I am rich! With the Lord and my family I am rich.