God’s Faithfulness in the Midst of a Pandemic, Infertility, and Divorce

Photo by Jackson Simmer on Unsplash

Before 2021 began to fully roll out, God gave me the word “refined” as my own personal word for the year. I was not searching, begging, or pleading for Him to rain one down on me; He simply placed it in my lap one day as I spent time with Him. A portion of me was excited about the word but another part of me considered for a moment the process in which things go through to be refined.

The word refine is a verb with the meaning “to remove impurities or unwanted elements from a substance”. In the process of refining gold, the most common method is by flame. This process involves a craftsman sitting next to a hot fire with molten gold in a crucible that is stirred and skimmed to remove the impurities or dross that rise to the top of the molten metal. The flames can reach temperatures in excess of 1800 degrees Fahrenheit.

As usual, I stuffed the idea of living uncomfortably into the closet of my mind and proceeded forward. I did not want to waste time fearing circumstances I could not foresee. I failed to recognize the fear of those unknown circumstances was already well within me, and the rising temperature of the events of my life would only push those unwanted worries to the surface. The time for me to sort through the things I tucked away into the corners of my mind was rapidly approaching.

My husband and I brought the new year in with our states of exhaustion dragging along behind us. We spent our time in two separate rooms doing two different things. What I did not know was we would soon be spending much more of our time in this way. One day in late February, he came home from work and into the room I used as an office and told me he wanted to talk to me. A sinking feeling grew in the pit of my stomach and it was as if I knew what the conversation was going to be about but I kept hoping for something different.

*****

January 28, 2021. I left home to go to the park to run, walk, cry, scream, listen to music, sit in the car…whatever I thought would satiate the seemingly insatiable emotional black hole that seemed to only be growing larger and larger on the inside of me. I allowed some music to accompany me while I tried walking off the heavy burden I was carrying. I did not yet know what it was, but before I could even make it a quarter of the way down the trail Holy Spirit began to speak to me. What He shared with me, I just could NOT bring myself to believe. I abandoned giving Him any further air time in my mind, even the thoughts I knew were my own were silenced.

I finally came back around to the section of the trail I was walking on when I first got word about some of God’s plans for me. I continued to wrestle with it as I aimed to uncover the root of the news. As I prayed to receive clarity on the matter I could hear Holy Spirit telling me to find somewhere to sit down. His tone was stern but loving, like that of a parent when they passionately desire their child to understand something for their child’s own wellbeing and benefit. I found a boulder to sit on and what I heard after that I do not ever want to forget.

Me: Father please help me. I feel like I want to be confused because I feel like what I’m hearing from You feels conflicting and I’m not sure how to navigate this.

I notice how at the start of my marriage with (Person 1 omitted to protect identity) that I felt like we shouldn’t be together but I saw him as safety when it came to a place to live, food on the table, a roof over my head and I have been moving away from that and toward a place where I’m willing to stay with him not because of any of those things but because we are in a covenant together with You and until it is something where he says he doesn’t believe in You and decides the he doesn’t want to live with me or cheats on me with someone else sexually, we will be together, unless he dies.

I’m perplexed because I feel like the things that I have been hearing are not things that I would have thought would be ok with You or things that You would even call me to do.

I feel weird and even silly honestly even writing this but walking and it being that I’m hearing something about (person 2 omitted to protect identity) and it just being this thing that honestly I’m feeling ashamed of and very uneasy about.

Part I think is fear that if this is 100% You that I would be in a relationship that I actually feel like I deserve. I have said that I deserve better than what I’m getting. I also feel like a big part of me is like, ok, all of this just feels very complicated and unnecessary. That’s honestly where my mind goes but You see so much more than I do and though there is this feeling like “Yes!!! Finally!!!” It’s also this feeling like I’m very much afraid to go down that path because of pain and discomfort but it also is very comforting because it’s not that I necessarily give up on the season that You have me in but a thing of really being focused on You and being faithful to the things You have called me to do during this season.

I just really feel so naked but covered. Like being naked before You and You are warming me with Your presence so not even feeling naked but actually feeling covered by You and feeling like I can be 100% open and real with You.

I honestly don’t know how to navigate this and I need Your help. I’m sorry, but You already know this is in my heart. I feel so silly thinking about all of this. I am in a place of seeing the truth and having disbelief but it being that I can’t even refute it: so lead me Lord in the way that I need to go and help me to do exactly what You are calling me to and to focus on You and to then focus on my family after that. However big or small that is…well really, to focus on what You call me to do after focusing on You.

And can You explain to me why this is happening again?

Holy Spirit: “Because your husband wants to go about his own way chasing the desires of his heart. I am the captain but he believes he can do whatever and go his own way, so instead of allowing you to go down with the ‘captain’, I will throw him overboard to drown in his own dismay. I plan to pluck you straight from his hands and remove you from him that my glory may be displayed…You will be retrieved from here to go back to (omitted for confidentiality). Leave this place and do not turn around to return. It is better this way. There is richness and fullness of life on the other side of this. Please accept my hand of help for your life and the life of your future children. Do not be dismayed. Give him, (person 2 omitted to protect identity), time to realize who you are and that I am the One who sent you. Do not be saddened by his responses and actions or questions. Do not flaunt. Be true to who I called you to be. Be authentic but do not flaunt as if you do not know who I am and who you are to Me.”

Me: Please help me Lord because this is such a shock to me. As I keep listening, the more I feel I can see it and believe it; I just, I think I need time and space to mourn what is happening.

Holy Spirit: “What is there to mourn. This is dead. That was your fear right?! That you wouldn’t be able to remarry right?! But I am telling you that that isn’t so and that I have someone for you. I’m literally laying everything out for you and you don’t want to see it! Any other time if I don’t give you enough detail, you want more to move forward. The gate is wide open. The path has been laid and the itinerary set. Just show up daughter. That’s all. Just show up.”

Over the next month I spent so much time with the wheels of my mind spinning as I went through cycles of belief and unbelief. A little less than a month later my husband, now ex-husband, spoke to me about his desire for a divorce. I could feel Holy Spirit surrounding me and blocking every arrow that came my way. I had an impenetrable spiritual force field around me and a comforting embrace from my Comforter. It heightened my awareness of Holy Spirit’s presence and gave me insight to the level of protective layers that have always been around me. I bare witness to the truth that they infinitely supersede that of Fort Knox.

The depth and heaviness of the reality of my circumstance was paralyzing. I began to remember aspirations I left in the burning house of my marriage and wanted so desperately to run back into it to collect them. I still desired children. I did not want to be alone or lonely. I wanted companionship. I wanted a sense of security. I wanted the chance to build a marriage I had always dreamed of. But I wasn’t going to find any of those things within the marriage I now found myself voyaging out of by default. Not only had Holy Spirit already spoken to me a month prior but the main thing I was wanting to stay for seemed to remain out of my grasp; motherhood. I had been so stressed out from the daily ins and outs of our home life that between that and my PCOS diagnosis it was no longer peculiar for me to go a hundred-plus days without a cycle. Despite that, we kept trying for a child during the latter half of our marriage.

Things got to the point where I was willing to do the physical things that needed to be done to bring a life into the world, but I hated myself while I did it. I would actually cry each time we would participate in the preparatory step to having children, but I kept up looks in hopes that all the tears would be worth it in the event I bore a child. Every time that step was over, I would feel like a disgusting rag, as filthy as that of the one a mechanic wipes their hands on after they’re done working with the sludge of a vehicle. I was not living in the light of how valuable I was to God. I did not see myself as He saw me within those moments. I sold myself short for hollowed-out aspirations. I wanted the events of my life to be sewn and harvested in the seasons I preferred rather than in the time God designed for them to be. And for that I suffered pain and affliction I was never meant to have as a part of the fabric of my life in the first place.

Despite not yet being at the finish line of this season in my life, I can honestly say that rejoicing over the good that God is doing in the midst of my circumstances has been the greatest blessing out of all of it. I have learned to move beyond only rejoicing over the Lord and His work when I’m expecting favorable times and when they actually are favorable to rejoicing when things are far from favorable. I consider it a wonderful gift that I have traveled through these valleys and many others because of the wisdom, love, and compassion that the Lord has placed in my life and in my heart. God IS the God of the mountains and of the valleys and I have learned to rejoice over Him at all times.

Whether at the very beginning of a hard season, right in the middle of it, or just honestly in a place of not knowing where we are, God is with us every step of the way. Some times He allows certain things to strengthen our relationship with Him. Some times it’s to help minister to those who are around us, that they may be encouraged or have faith in Jesus. Some times it’s to prepare us for, propel us into, and align us with the purpose and abundant life that God has had planned for us all along. I see now, having an abundant life is being able to have true peace in the midst of all circumstances and being able to give thanks to God, not for what He can do or has done but simply because of who He is.