WHEN THEY WALKED INTO MY church, it took every ounce of grace not to say, “If only you’d met Jesus before her, then you might still be married.” Of course, I never said it. I wanted to, though. I sat in the pew like a burnt biscuit thinking of the things I would say if I got the chance. I also wondered what they were doing at the First Baptist Church. I had heard they were visiting churches, but I figured they would go Methodist, Episcopalian, or Out of Town.
I know exactly why they picked our church. Typical. Let one rogue Sunday school class get a reputation for wife swappin’ at small group, and every Tom, Dick, and Mary wants to see if it’s true. For the record, nothing was ever confirmed. However, one of the couples is now divorced, another moved out of town, and the Sunday school teacher is now Episcopalian, so… confirmed.
Mark was my friend Marcy’s ex-husband. She had caught him running around with another woman three years earlier, which resulted in their divorce. Now he had the gall to show up at my church with his new woman! In my eyes, she was just as guilty as he was. I don’t care how much you pray—the Lord will never send you another woman’s husband. Show me one passage in the Bible where God says, “I’m going to send you a man, but he’s going to be on a trial separation. But really, he’s practically divorced, because his marriage has been over for a long time, and it’s better for his kids that he gets the divorce because it’s not good for the kids to be raised in a home where the parents have fallen out of love. But what you aren’t going to know is that by ‘trial separation’ he means that he’s dipping his toes in the water to see if there is anything better on the market, and his wife thinks he’s at work right now and she’s at home thinking how lucky she is to have such a good husband who is willing to work late and go the extra mile for the family.” Nope.
He may send you a divorcé but not until the ink is dry on the divorce papers and the healing has begun. What was this new wife thinking?
My husband leaned over and whispered, “Be nice.”
I’m always nice, my eyes darted back at him. If looks could kill, he’d be on his back with both legs in the air.
As the service started, I prayed, Dear Lord, let them just be visiting. Please let them hate this church and go somewhere else. This doesn’t seem like the right church for them. Maybe sometimes church, unlike Cheers, is where you go because nobody knows your name.
The congregation started singing “When We All Get to Heaven.” I looked around and… they were singing it too. They seemed just as excited as I was about meeting Jesus. Surely to goodness I wouldn’t have to see Mark’s face in the hereafter.
My plan for after the service was to hightail it to the car and avoid both of them. Lord, let me get through this service so next week I can get back to my regular church service with all of these people that I love! The choir started “Just as I Am” and—Oh, heavens to Betsy, what are they doing? Are they leaving? Going to the bathroom?
Then I realized what was happening. NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!! They are walking toward the front… Please be lost… talking to the preacher… Turn them away, turn them away—NOPE! They are praying. Oh no! It can’t be…
The music ended, and the preacher spoke: “Brothers and sisters, I am so thankful to introduce to you Mark and Shelby Cross.” You wouldn’t be thankful if you knew what I know. “Mark has been looking for a home church for some time now, and I’m thankful that Mark and Shelby have welcomed me into their home for fellowship and to discuss joining our church. I’m excited to see what their future holds as members of our church. Shelby has asked to join based on the promise of a letter from her home church, and Mark has joined based upon a profession of faith and wishes to take part in believer’s baptism. Can I get a motion to…”
Blah, blah. I wasn’t listening anymore. Can I get a motion to let me do the baptism? I thought. Let me dunk him in the water. I’ll make it quick and painless.
The ride home from church was dead silent. I spoke first: “I will not ask her to join the committee on committees. I will not. I’ll be nice, but we’re not decorating the church together or planning potlucks. She can run the shut-in sock drive and collect hard candy for seniors. The church may not be big enough for two mortal enemies, but we’ll find a way to make it work.”
“Are you listening to yourself?” my husband asked.
“Yes! He ruined my friend’s life, and now I have to go to church with him and his jezebel!”
“He messed up big-time, but everyone deserves a church,” Tim reminded me. “Aren’t you the one that’s always saying that WeightWatchers is like church because you are welcomed back no matter what you ate the day before?”
“Don’t use my words against me. I also said that church is like going to the gym because you never want to go, but you’re always glad you did! I’m not exactly a thought leader.”
He did have a point, though. To this day, WeightWatchers has never turned me away, no matter how many times I quit and rejoin. I’ve only heard of one person being asked to leave, and that was my friend Valerie. She was the only person to hop on the scale, gain weight, and protest. Most of us would hear “You’ve gained half a pound,” and then we’d explain that it had been a rough week… there was a buffet… it was a Tuesday, but not Valerie. She would make them reset the scale and do it again.
She could not figure out how she was counting points and gaining weight. She went over her point tracker to show that she was tracking her food with precision. “See? Breakfast was this many points, I had a salad for lunch and got ten points back, so then I had a steak for dinner…”
“Wait.” The staff member stopped her. “Did you give yourself back ten points for the salad? You still deduct points even if it’s a salad.”
“Are you crazy?” she said. “I’m not taking away points for eating a salad! I only ate it because I thought I was getting points back that I could use later in the day! Do you mean to tell me that you take away points for salads and vegetables?”
She left in a huff and has never returned. In all honesty, I’m sure they’d welcome her back. She’s a WeightWatchers legend.
My husband continued, “I know you, and I know that you want to support your friend, and you think that welcoming him into our church is going against her. You girls stick together tighter than the Mafia. But it’s been three years since their divorce.”
“And that makes it right? They get to break up a family, but it’s been three years, so I have to act like nothing ever happened?”
“Well, yeah. It’s church, not the country club. Everybody is welcome at church. Yes, it’s been three years since the divorce, but Mark only met Shelby a year ago and just got married. She’s not the reason for their divorce.”
“How do you know all that?” I demanded.
“Mark is my friend. His running around caught me by surprise, but we’re still friends. Look, I know you won’t be happy until he’s in front of the courthouse tied to a tree so you can throw tomatoes at him, but I promise you—he’s had a rough few years, and he’s just now getting back on his feet.”
I felt horrible. I still hated Mark, but I felt horrible for thinking his new wife was a jezebel. I also felt bad that she had prayed for a husband and God sent her Mark. She is going to have a hard enough row to hoe with him by her side. She didn’t need me shunning her at church. Hey, Jesus, if I’m nice to her, can I please still hate him?
That next Sunday, we ran into Mark and Shelby in the parking lot headed into church. I had talked to Marcy earlier in the week, and she shared that Shelby was great with their kids, and she liked her. She even told Mark that if he messed it up with Shelby, she’d marry him again and make him suffer a second public divorce. If Marcy had found a way to get along with Mark, then I could too.
Service started with that familiar hymn: “When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be…” Instead of looking around to see who should be singing and who shouldn’t be singing, I kept on worrying about my own self and hoped no one was wondering why my judgy self was singing the song.