Tom, I'm so sorry about your house but thankful that you are safe. Rest assured, no matter what, you will always have a place in my new Kingdom! Well, I met with my Pastor yesterday and we had a really good talk. Aside from talking about my personal marital situation we talked about my R with God. I told him that I had no problems checking in with God but if he (God) thinks I'm ready to hand it all to him and trust implicitly, well, it ain't happening! Not yet, anyway. Pastor said that Jesus always went to where people were at, he didn't force himself on anyone. He told me that God is with me no matter where I am in this process and will be with me when I take that next step too.He understood completely why I would have a huge difficulty in trusting God right now, "When the person you've trusted and loved for 17 years betrays you and rips your heart out, it's hard to put trust in anyone or anything again for a long time" When we talked about my separation he said that he thought that divorce was more devastating than the death of a spouse and outlined why. I agreed totally, imagine that! We also talked about my misadventures with women since my separation. I said jokingly "Christian women have not been kind to me". I told him about the Coffee Buddy fiasco and his response was "that must have ripped your heart out all over again" It was so nice to hear him empathize with how devastating that was at the time. He also understood about the Plant Lady sitch. He said "what a kick in the gut, here you are after 17 years just trying to figure out this whole dating thing again and you get this kind of response from someone, that must have hurt". Again, nice to feel understood. We also talked about my experience at my last church versus the one I am having at his church. My former church was a much more expressive environment, lots of amen's, hallelujah's, praise the Lord's, and well, you get the picture. I was raised in a very different type of church which was a tad more restrained in their worship style. Heck, we didn't even pray out loud cuz that was the Pastor's job! Pastor laughed very hard when I said that I'd noticed last Sunday when he was up on the stage he had said loudly "amen" and that nobody had responded. I told him my first thought was "Wow, a crowd of tight-assed white people, I think I could fit in here" Anyway, Pastor and I have agreed to meet again and toss around some of these theological questions and doubts I have. Reaching out like this, even in a small way, will help me heal. Btw, I went to my parents last night to watch the English debate between our would be Prime Ministers and while there we got a phone call telling us that another close family friend had just passed away. Before I left I told them "I'm not coming to see you two anymore, every time I'm here somebody else dies!" Even in sad times my family and I can still laugh together, it's in our blood I guess! Later Dbers.
