A Fasting Cry To God

Our marriage had never been ideal. We married out of respect for our faith six years prior. In that time, we had nothing but struggles and incompatibility. I was educated, and I married a man with a seventh-grade education. Our mentality was very different, and so was our character.

I had become a Christian in 1993, and he quickly followed suit, in what I believe was an attempt to pacify me, my faith, and possibly my church. We should never have been permitted to marry. Six long years of disagreements and a life of seeming friends in and out of the home. None of them ever had any good intentions, in my opinion.

Discoveries

I didn't particularly enjoy his friends, and he didn't enjoy mine. To be fair, my friends did not like him much and put up with him for my sake. His friends were a different story.

They enjoyed the food, hospitality, and kindness I offered everyone, and over the years, a couple of them flirted a little too much, which made me uncomfortable and my husband angry. The difference in our relationships with friends was just another indication that we had never been the right fit for one another.

His love of pornography was a displeasure that I was forced to endure day after day, making our intimate life a vile and degrading act each time we were together. So much so was this aversion to our intimacy that I shut down emotionally. We clearly had different views on what lovemaking was in the marriage. Pornography was not something I wanted to enjoy, and he did not want to give it up.

Dying On My Sword

Still, we forged on since we had been married after we were both saved and baptized, making our marriage more than a civil union or secular tradition. We were in a covenant with each other and with God. That covenant is an oath broken only by death or blood. I needed to honor my faith and God, and I was clear on my responsibility to God and the man I had chosen.

The sad truth was that my faith wasn't the same as his, and sooner or later, it became increasingly evident.

The Third One in the Marriage

During that time, a new product was introduced to the world: WebTV. It was a kind of chatroom social media, except the chatting happened in open rooms, for lack of a better term, and people from all over could engage in conversations together and even send pictures back and forth.

The problem with this in our marriage was that we did not share logins, and this led to secrets, jealousy, insecurity, and eventually the dissolution of our marriage.

I cannot place all blame on my husband for seeking an outlet with others, because I no longer felt respected and cherished as a wife, and his touch made me cringe. I could have respected him if he had come out and told me he wanted out of our commitment, but he didn't choose truth as his way of handling the situation.

Soon, he was hiding his chats and waking in the middle of the night to log on and speak to whoever had gained his attention. I’d wake up and peek through my eyelids to see what he was doing, and I’d see his chats with women and the pictures being sent back and forth. That put the nail in our proverbial casket.

Enough

I packed my bags and car and took off to Colorado to stay at a friend’s house while I decided what course to take. The unfortunate thing about running away from your husband is that I was running away from God and the covenant I had made with Him.

Within a month, I had such a heavy weight on my heart that I felt obligated to go back to our marriage, work it out, and do the hard work to fix what we had broken. So I again packed my bag and went home. However, in that month, our dynamic had changed a lot, and it was never going to get better.

Tail Between My Legs

I arrived back home, and he left the next day to move in with one of the women he had been courting on WebTV, in another state. He failed to mention any of this when I had told him I would come back.

Now I was devastated that I had upended my life twice because of this man and this marriage. I had no job and nowhere to live, and I was depressed and a constant wreck. Even so, my church rallied around me and helped me through the hardest time of my life.

I was staying with my sister then, and news had come that my husband wanted to be divorced, which I had anticipated. But I didn't realize the impact it would have on me.

Consequences

I became nervous and edgy, frightened and unsure of almost everything. I questioned everything over and over. This was not a sustainable way to live.

One day, I heard about a book on fasting and its effect on the faster in connecting with God on a deeper level. By the time I purchased the book, read it, and was ready to put it into practice, I was chain-smoking two and a half packs of cigarettes a day.

I had also lost so much weight that I did not look like myself anymore, and all from the stress of honoring my commitment and doing things correctly in the sight of God.

I was being mentored by pastors I love to this day, and instructed that biblical divorce was not an option I had, except for infidelity that could be proven. I would need evidence from two or more sources that my husband was, in fact, committing this act against the union. I was at my wits' end.

The Cry Out

I decided to fast because I needed to hear from God that I was doing the right thing. I began by preparing my mind for what I was going to do: go full-on into a week-long fast from food. I would consume only water and electrolytes for that week, giving up all food and vices.

I felt fine the first day. I prayed and read my bible all day and cried out to God for help, guidance, and a clear indication of what I should do. I asked him to show me plainly what would happen and to give me peace when I encountered the response. I asked God to take away my desire for cigarettes and to provide for me.

Day two, and I still felt decent, but I really wanted to smoke. I didn't, though, and opted to just pray more and read more. I shed many tears those days, but it's said, "God counts women's tears."

Day three came, and I did not have any cravings for cigarettes. Could God have answered this part of my petitions? I wasn’t sure if this was just a fluke, but I was fine with it.

Everything tasted better, richer, more full of flavor, and I had a calm and peaceful presence about me and surrounding me all day. The following day, I got a phone call from my pastor asking me to come to the office, which I did. God was about to reveal the answers to my prayers, though I didn't know it.

The End Will Come

As I entered the office, the first person I noticed was my father-in-law, who had supported me emotionally through all those months. I appreciated the love he and his wife had given me, despite quite a bit of flak from their son.

My pastor asked me to take a seat, and then told me they had news I needed to know. So I listened. Then the words came that numbed me, but not in an anxious way, but rather a completely peaceful release.

My husband had gotten his girlfriend pregnant, which gave me biblical permission to divorce. I asked them to inform my husband that I would not fight it. A child deserves and needs both parents. But I would not pay for it. And my torment ended just like that.

Support

My father-in-law gave me a warm hug and told me that I would not be alone in this and that he and his wife would care for me emotionally through it all. And they did as they promised. They loved me through the divorce with kindness and gentleness. I'll never be able to repay that, or repay God for giving them to me for that time.

The answered prayers opened my eyes to a side of God so few encounter. The very realness of Him and His immediate response to my pleas broke me, my heart. It gave me such a deep love for God, who gave His personal attention to me in my deepest need. I love Him more than I will ever love a man. He is my God, my Father, my protector, and my shield against the bad things in this world.

Onward

I never picked up a cigarette in my life, and I am 57 now, and I was 28 then. He healed me and gave me family, protected my heart, and never left my side for one second.

I always know He is here with me, and over the years He has shown me, again and again. He is, in fact, a God who can do all things, heal all things, and bear all things for me with infinite compassion and mercy. I won’t ever leave Him, and He won’t ever leave me.

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