My 22 year old (at the time) wife (now ex wife) divorced me 33 years ago because she refused to give up her 15 year old lover. In the end however, she lost both of us. As a result of all of this, I received Christ, was baptised and began the most wonderful and exciting journey anyone could ever have, that of the Christian life.
Seven weeks after the divorce I met a wonderful Christian woman and one year later we were married. For the first 17 years she put up with my male stupidity, ignorance, foolishness, and just general nonsense. But eventually she tired of all the fighting with MR. (Always) RIGHT and we agreed that we both needed some space. So with our pastor's blessing we agreed to a marital seperation.
It was exciting living in an apartment away from my wife, for about two days. Then it began to sink in that I may have just made the biggest mistake of my life. I was on the verge of losing the most wonderful, beautiful, awesome woman God even put on earth, my wife. In counseling with my pastor he said I might as well prepare for a lengthy divorce battle because is his nearly 20 years of counseling he had never seen such a mess in one marriage. If it could be done wrong I did it and I had done it several times.
Living apart for three months though allowed me to step back (with LOTS of help from our heavenly Father) and see things a bit differently. She said I was distant towards her and in our marriage. I said I was not. She was right, I was distant. She said I was more interested in making money than I was in her or our son. I said I was not. She was right, work was # 1, they were 5th or 6th. She said I am not a close to Jesus as I should be. I said I think I am. She was right, I was not only distant with her and our son but also with Jesus. She said I was overly involved in fraternal, civic and business organizations. I said I was not. She was right. I dumped all of them. God stepped in and healed our marriage. 89 days after we seperated, we met at our church altar with our pastor, prayed, wept, thanked God and then I moved back home. We just celebrated our 32nd wedding anniversary in April.
So what did I learn? Women are usually right. I know guys, we absolutely HATE to admit it, but WAY down deep deep deep inside you, you know this to be true. Women are more in touch with their emotions, more in touch with child rearing and just generally better at relationship stuff. Listen to them.
Now guys if you are like the men in my family, you will say "this Ben guy is some sort of a wacko and obviously doesn't know what he is talking about, WOMEN RIGHT?????? GIVE ME A BREAK. I am 60 years old, and I have made virtually every mistake that can be made (or at least every one that one can survive!) :-) Listen to me.
Ben
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