We all have at some point heard the saying: "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it." It's quite an emotive saying in as much as it can also be evasive, but the harsh reality for most of us is that we are mostly not equipped to deal with the eventuality of getting what we wish for. I learnt that lesson the hard way, and if the truth be told, I was never nearly ready for the discovery or better stated, the realization of what I had asked for.
The context to my experience comes from a request I offered up in prayer.
I am deeply rooted in my faith, as that has been the only constant in my life for as long as I could remember. I am not trying to force feed my faith on anybody, but I had been going through so much in the last year, as I had been ordained as a priest, I was questioning many things and generally just trying to get my life properly together. I have always felt alone and misunderstood in so far as my faith is concerned, and being in that lonely place is not always the best of spaces to be in, especially if your spouse is not on the same page as you. I had always known that having two different viewpoints in one home when it comes to religion would be a contentious issue, and it virtually assures you the perfect grounds for conflict. The situation was bearable for the most part while my kids were little with no real understanding of what religion was or what it meant to them, but then they started Sunday School and the questions started coming. I could see the cracks widening up and the tension started building.
I had for the longest time avoided taking up ministry as I felt I wasn't ready and I knew that my life wasn't right, given that I had had affairs, wasn't actively working on my marriage and I was just generally adjusting to having to deal with the financial as well as emotional reality of having twins.
I was trying to be a good Christian by working on myself, as I cannot change anyone but myself. I was making progress and I was seeing how my Faith restored so many parts of me and by default, many parts of my life in the process. I had become more active in my church work, and I experienced a great deal of joy in doing so, but there was always that one glaring flaw staring back at me and I knew that the fact that my spouse and I were on different spiritual paths would have to be dealt with at some point in the very near future. I continued diligently on my religious path and was eventually approached by the leadership of the church to take up a ministry again, and this time I contacted my father who had himself served in a ministry before to seek out his advice. He was very succinct in his advice to me, and told me simply that there is great blessing attached to it, but it also come with great responsibility. I was told that if I was ready for that responsibility, that I had my Dad's blessing all the way. I jumped right in and said yes, and what a life changing event it was! I was so determined to make my life right and really give myself over to this new path I had chosen, and after having spoken to my spouse, I saw the conflict coming and it was only a matter of time before the judgments started. I was criticized on the music I listened to, the online content I was consuming all under the blanket statement of:"Is that how a Deacon behaves." I just felt deflated and defeated, given that your spouse is supposed to be a source of comfort and strength for you and they are meant to build you up and not break you down. I came face to face with the harsh reality that I was in this on my own, and the criticism escalated due to the fact that I was actually busy doing my religious duties which now appeared to be a deterrent to my spouses' expectations of me. I took the criticism and swallowed complaint after complaint in a bid to not only keep the peace, but also in the knowledge that this was just another mechanism that was being used to build my resolve and strengthen my faith.
We all know that different people are used to test you and that the "entity" responsible for these tests often uses those closest to you in order to test and break you, but I held my resolve and continued on my path. I can't lie, the whole situation was nothing but pain to me and I found myself at various low points asking myself how I could serve someone who would be cruel enough to allow me to be tested in this way, but the one thing that pulled me through was the knowledge that my faith and the one I serve were the only constants in my life.
I had continued on that path for just over two years, putting up with the complaints and the criticism and often feeling really sorry for myself through it all when I was validated in the most unexpected way. My son often accompanied me on some of my duties when preparing the church for a service, and on this particular morning which just so happened to be the morning my parents would receive their silver wedding anniversary wedding blessing at church when a fellow servant happened to arrive at the church while my son and I were preparing the church for the service. He pulled me aside and said to me that I needed to continue on the path I was, as I was setting a good example for my son and also my family and he was at pains to point out the fact that my son was there with me preparing the church for the congregants could only result in great blessing for him as well as my family. I was once again assured that nothing is done in vain and that the blessings attached are carried way into the future based on doing my duty with a contrite heart and a humble disposition. I carried out my duties diligently, and continued to get the occasional sarcastic questioning and judgement I had been enduring all along when all of a sudden I was ordained as a priest, and I could feel a definite shift in the home dynamic. The judgments were more pronounced and the lack of support became even more glaring, indicating that something significant had shifted between my spouse and I, given that I had received my ministry without any family present for support or acknowledgment. I was starting to pick up on some undertones relating to the gulf between myself and my spouse as the months rolled on from that point. I had noticed some pronounced behaviors pointing to the fact that my spouse was just going through the motions by attending the "mandatory" Sunday services, not fully participating in so far as prayers and the like was concerned. One of the spiritual leaders approached her about any concerns she has around the faith, but she was evasive at best and just brushed off the concern. I was later quizzed about it, and I made it clear that the situation was challenging at best for me, given that one of the foremost clerics from the church who was now retired spent a considerable amount of time with my spouse, addressing her concerns and trying to bring about an understanding on matters she was most concerned about. We both sat there just looking at each other, as he was not aware of the journey I had already been on around the faith and with the utmost concern, he expressed to me his thankfulness that I had through all of this still diligently continued to serve in my ministry. I was then able to unburden the load I had been carrying, albeit for just a moment while we spoke, around how difficult the journey had been for me to this point. I had to note how challenging it felt to carry out this task with absolutely no support or understanding from my spouse, as well as dealing with the multitude of complaints around the tasks I had to fulfill relating to the ministry I had taken up. It was noted that none of my family was present when I was ordained as a priest, as well as having no family present when I had my first call-up, conducted my first service and at that point, my leader could then understand not only the lack of support I had been experiencing, but also the pain of having to deal with the situation.
I found that the greatest source of my sadness came from seeing how congregants and my fellow ministers were able to see and derive value from interactions with me, and yet I did not get that from my family and those who are supposedly close to me. I felt so blessed and cared for when I was at church or conducting soul care visits, only to return home to ridicule and exile. All of these experiences were leading me to have deep moments of introspection and the questions and emotions that were being stirred up left me feeling all sorts of discomfort and I found myself seeking out spiritual guidance and enlightenment more and more. The services that were conducted over the coming weeks spoke to me so directly that I had no choice but to sit up and pay attention to these impulses that were flowing within me around how critical support of my faith is to me and how important it is to me to have someone who helps me not only grow in my faith, but challenges me in it as well. I grew up seeing how this faith changed and developed my father, and watching my mother support him romanticized how a strong bond is built when a couple grow together in faith, only to find myself in situation where I was left feeling alone and destitute and basically finding myself alone in the wilderness, trying to navigate my faith. I had now fully unpacked my situation and I had given myself the opportunity to understand fully what it all meant to me and that knowledge was both emancipating and enslaving at the same time! I knew with absolute certainty that my faith was a deal-breaker for me and that I could say with absolute certainty that I would not allow two different paths in my home, and yet that was the prevailing situation I was living under.
It was at this point that I offered up my prayer asking for my maker to reveal his will for me to me, and the revelation shook me to my foundations! I experienced a moment of truth with my spouse, albeit spurred on out of frustration with me.The truths that were revealed really destroyed what shaky foundations we had built simply by having my payer or differently stated, my wish being granted or answered. I am by no means stating that my spouse is a bad person or evil for that matter. The religious upbringing she had was vastly different to mine, and she just couldn't make peace with or understand elements of my faith. She is a diligent mother and wife who serves her family as best she can with all she has at her disposal. The lesson in all of this for me was simply the fact that I truly have to be careful about what I wish for, and added to that, I have to be ready to deal with the prospect of getting what I wish for.
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