Wisdom for Families Affected by Divorce

The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy. 

Jen Oshman
Thanks for coming. You are in the panel on wisdom for families affected by divorce, and so we are really thankful that you are here. Obviously hard topic for all of us to dive into for the next 45 minutes, but we’re so glad that you’re here. My name is Jen Oshman, and I’m going to have these ladies introduce them in just a second. But before we even get started, what I want you to hear from the very beginning is we have been praying for you guys for the last several months, and we know that everybody in here represents a hard story. You’re not in this room because of something that was easy or something that you’re going through. Now we know that each person represents a tough story, and we want you more than anything, is to leave, leave any shame or self condemnation at the door. This session is not to be one that brings about either of those things, no shame and no self condemnation. We hope that you receive tons of grace and truth from the Lord, but not condemnation. That’s not of Him. We also want to say that we’re going to be scratching the surface, just barely scratching the surface, of all of the things we could possibly be talking about when it comes to families affected by divorce. And so we want you to hear that disclaimer right from the get go, that there’s so much more that we know needs to be said and could be said, and we just can’t cover it all. But we’re going to, we’re gonna attempt to try to give some good introductory comments, and we hope and pray that they serve you well. So I’ll just start by introducing myself really quick. And again, my name is Jen, and I’m an author and a speaker and a mom, and I am from a family with a lot of divorce. My husband and I just celebrated 25 years of marriage, but we both come from families where our parents were divorced many times over, so I’ll be sharing from that perspective,

Wendy Alsup
I’m Wendy, also I’m from South Carolina and I’m a mom South Carolina mom. I’m a math teacher and an author, and my most recent job is that I’m now working for the South Carolina Aquarium in a dolphin ID study like my dream. I just do it very little, but still, my so cool, and I’ve been divorced since 2015 after about 16 years of marriage, after my husband had the onset of some pretty serious mental health issues, so I’ll be sharing some from that background.

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
I’m beneatha Reisner. I write. I’m an author and a speaker as well, and my experience was of divorce. Was 15 years ago. My husband came home and told me he was leaving for someone else, and that just rocked my world. It was super unexpected for me. I had two adolescent daughters who really just that rocked their world, as well as mine. We were really involved in the church, and so there was just a whole lot of fallout from that for us, and just a lot of just trying to find where is God in this because we felt like we had been faithful. So that’s my story. And then six years after I did get divorced, I met a wonderful guy, Joel, and remarried.

Blair Linne
My name is Blair Lynn. I am a Bible teacher, an author, a spoken word artist, and I am approaching this conversation maybe a little bit differently, because I am the product of a single parent home. My dad never lived in our home, and so I’m speaking for the fatherless child. My parents were never divorced because they never got married. And yet I know that there are a lot of people out there who I think some of the implications are the same, you know, experiencing that brokenness, and so that’s why I’m here. Great.

Jen Oshman
Thanks, you guys. There is a lot of wisdom. These three ladies are bringing a lot to the table. So I’m really grateful that you guys are able to offer your perspective. Okay, the first thing we want to do is just kind of lay a theological foundation. We want to there’s so much that we want to offer in terms of practical wisdom, advice and encouragement. But before we get there, we thought it would be beneficial to lay that theological framework and really ask the question, what is marriage? Why do we get married? What is marriage in the first place? So Blair, kick us off with that.

Blair Linne
Yeah. So you know, marriage is something that’s been instituted by God, and it’s good. It’s a good thing. You know, Scripture says that marriage should be honored by all it’s a union between one man and one woman that’s voluntarily done before God. And unless you’re Adam and Eve before other people, right? We’re making this covenant to show our unity. So there’s a unity as far as the work that God has given you to do as a couple. There’s a unity as far as an emotional unity for companionship and friendship. There’s an intimacy, a physical union, unity as two people, a man and a woman come together, and most of the time or. Able to bear children or to be fruitful and multiply. Christians, we believe that that partnership, it lasts until death, right? So even though it’s temporary because it’s only on Earth, it lasts all the way until death, and it is a reflection of Christ and his relationship with the church. So it’s to be a picture, a pointer to what Christ has done and his love for the church. Yeah.

Jen Oshman
So, okay, Blair, really quick, you just said, only for this lifetime.

Blair Linne
Only for this lifetime are

Unknown Speaker
we going to be married in heaven. We will not be married in heaven.

Blair Linne
We are the bride of Christ if we want to go there. So Jesus our bridegroom. That’s who we’re going to be showing our unity to for the rest of our lives in eternity.

Jen Oshman
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for that definition. I think you know even the Apostle Paul says it’s a mega mystery that that marriage is supposed to reflect Christ and the church, and so we do approach it with this level of mysteriousness and not totally understanding the depth and breadth and importance and magnitude of marriage, but I appreciate that theological framework. Wendy, since we are here talking about divorce, could you give us just a an introduction? I know that so much more could be said. But what are maybe the biblical reasons or the biblical grounds for divorce? Why would a marriage end?

Wendy Alsup
It’s interesting that scripture really only addresses grounds for divorce or separation in two explicit passages, so Matthew 19, and there, the context is that Jesus is talking with Pharisees, and he’s confronting them over their hardness of heart over divorce. So this context, and I think the context is really important, is that they want to an easy divorce. They want to their hearts are hardened to what the covenant vow of marriage was supposed to mean, and so they’re putting away wives. And Jesus confronts them and says, that’s your hardness of your heart, but he but he says, except for grounds of sexual immorality or adultery. And you know the point there is that the covenant has already been broken, broken through adultery or sexual immorality, and then the other explicit mention of separation is in First Corinthians seven, and it doesn’t really mention grounds as much as purpose. And the purpose would be because you really ultimately want to reconcile. But I really found, at the hardest parts for me that the first Corinthians seven passage was really helpful and and in my situation, I want, I didn’t want a divorce, but I was in a position where it was not good or healthy for me or my children, but it also wasn’t good or healthy for my husband, because it wasn’t good for his soul to be sinning against us. It wasn’t good for his soul for us to be, for me to be a verbal punching bag. And so that that scripture around separation was really helpful to me, to give me an opportunity and a path to put myself and my children in a safe place. But then also, you know, some of us have contributed to a divorce, and we may not have had biblical grounds for what we did. And in the Old Testament, in Deuteronomy, 22 that’s the really strict, clear definitions of the marriage covenant and the repercussions of adultery. And it’s interesting that in John eight, it’s like one of my favorite scenes in Scripture in John eight, where this woman is caught thrown at Jesus’s feet because she has been caught in violation of Deuteronomy. 22 she they condemn her. She’s she’s pushed to Jesus’s feet with great condemnation. But Jesus does two things. He writes something in the sand. And I don’t know, but sometimes I wonder if it’s like the names of other people that the Pharisees had sinned against. Maybe like, Well, what about blah blah blah? And what about blah blah blah? I want to ask Jesus when I get there. But also his language to her is, either do I condemn you, I don’t condemn you, but Go and sin no more. Go and sin no more. So there’s great grace at the feet of Jesus for those of us who maybe feel like we didn’t have grounds for divorce, but here we are. And so that’s just the brief summary there.

Jen Oshman
Yeah, it’s so hard because Wendy, what would you say? I mean, obviously, the scriptures are limited. We don’t have this list, this exhaustive list of why a marriage should or could end. So how would somebody in the room pursue an. Understanding their specific marriage, and if divorce should be an option for them, how do you do that?

Wendy Alsup
Well, I would say, do it in community. Do it in community. And for me, it was very helpful to me to have my elders and my pastor speak into my life at that point, because I didn’t have full clarity. I could not see as clearly as they could see what was happening to me. So that’s the first step community. And then don’t be afraid of the word. You know you can be afraid of the word. Maybe God is going to give you permission to do something you don’t particularly want to do, or maybe he’s going to restrict you from something that you really do want to do, but you can trust God, and you can trust the Scripture. So go to him boldly, go to him honestly, go to him in community, and then receive His Word as his good word, and he is trustworthy.

Jen Oshman
I love that. I think if you don’t take anything else away from the session, don’t be afraid of God’s Word. Would be a good, good thing to write, write down Blair, when we were praying about what to talk about and what to share, the terrible topic of abuse came up, and we know we need, we need to touch on that. Would you do that for us now?

Blair Linne
Yeah, you know, when we think about, you know, the biblical grounds for divorce. We think about, as you mentioned, adultery, and we think about abandonment, that’s mentioned in First Corinthians seven. But often people don’t know what to do with abuse. You know, there’s no explicit text, you know that speaks and says, This is a grounds for divorce. So, so what do you do? One of the things that I would say is, I think we need to, again, go back to what is the definition of marriage, right? What is God’s design for marriage? One of the beautiful things when we look at Ephesians five, for example, we see, you know this call for husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church, right? We know that Christ would never abuse or misuse, right? His church, there’s a text also, I believe it’s in First Peter, which talks about living with your wife in an understanding way, right, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, because you are co heirs in the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered. And I just think that that’s so interesting that you know, the Scripture values all people, right? The scripture values women and values wives, and says that wives are worth protecting, that if you don’t honor this woman made in my image, your prayers are going to be hindered, right? And so speaking out, standing against abuse is a good thing. It’s a moral thing. It’s not something that we should shy away from, because that’s not God’s design for anyone here. And so I think even the option that you gave as far as separation, you know, it’s really important, as you do it in community, as you walking with other people, Lord willing, who are wise and who can help you, you know, to keep that option open and and what do you do if you’re in the situation? One of the things I want to say is, you want to call 911, you would like you. You need to report the abuse. So abuse is against the law. You want to report that abuse. Two, you want to reach out to your pastors or your elders and let them know after you have reported it to the police. And then you want to remove yourself. You know, as you mentioned, you want to be safe. God doesn’t just want us to be saved. He wants us to be safe, right? And then also you want to if for any reason, let’s say there is spiritual abuse happening in your church and you can’t reach out to those elders, or you have concerns about reaching out to those elders, I would encourage you to reach out to about five people outside of your local church who are wise, godly and objective, who can help you so that you are safe, and then also to pray that your spouse would repent right, that they would come to know God, if they don’t know the Lord, or if they do that they would be convicted and that they would repent from their sin and from sinning against you and you, Lord willing, can be reconciled right? Divorce is not the always the option. It’s not the only option. But one of the things I’ll say, if they do not, if church discipline is activated, and they do not, I do think it falls into that category of an unbeliever who has abandoned the family and so, yeah. So those are just a few things. I don’t know if you guys have other thoughts, but

Jen Oshman
no, I think that’s really helpful. Blair, I think what we’ve heard multiple times already is this has got to be done in community. Don’t be afraid of the word and also run towards your brothers and sisters in the faith, who can help you. I. But I appreciate you acknowledging that sometimes abuse is present in the church as well and not it’s not a given that every church is safe for this conversation, so we do want to acknowledge that and encourage you to go to other believers if that’s your situation. But yeah, thank you for your hearts and all of that. Okay, well, let’s turn the corner now, obviously we could have said so much more please. You know, I’m going to mention some resources at the end of this that you can dive into for more information. But let’s turn a little bit and move from our theological framework. And I just want to ask you guys to offer some encouragement or some advice for some woman in here who may be considering divorce, Vanitha, let’s start off with you, yeah.

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
So probably my advice is also for somebody who is divorced, so just but I would say your identity is not in your marital status. I really felt that it was for a long time I was a wife and a mom, and that’s what I did. And so recognizing our identities in Christ, and that really, really changed things for me when I recognized that and that you you do belong in the church, whereas I feel like, often there is a sense of shame when you’re divorced in the church, you just feel like, especially for me, I had been really active in the church. My husband had been active. I was teaching Bible study, so there was just a lot of shame that all of a sudden our family didn’t look like it once did. And so I would just encourage people here to not shy away and to recognize that you have so much to offer. I feel like when we see perfect families worshiping in church, we want their life, but when we see broken families trusting the Lord, we want their God. So I think you have an opportunity to witness that’s really pretty unprecedented sometimes in the church, when people see you trusting the Lord, because that’s what it’s all about. It’s not all about having these perfect families. Sometimes it looks like that church, like we’re all dressed up. We all look good, we all say the right stuff. And so I think this way we’re so much more real, because you can’t just act like everything’s fine when you’ve been through a divorce, and you can really talk about hard things. So I would encourage people to embrace this as an opportunity to be real, to get other people to really be real about their own pain. So that’s one thing. I just have a couple and then I’d love to, do you want to talk about lament, actually now, well, at some point, well, okay, go ahead. Well, I

Wendy Alsup
just wanted to say that I’m going to write that down what you said, because that was a really, really powerful statement, but I really struggled for myself even taking off my wedding band like I could feel I had worn it straight for 16 years, and so I had another I transferred my grandmother’s wedding band to that ring for probably another year or two, until finally I got to the place where I didn’t need a ring on it, but there’s a there’s going to be a path always appreciated. Tim Keller’s walking with God through pain and suffering, because it’s you got to walk through it. There’s no around it. Okay? You’re going to have to walk through it. And our companion in that is the laments of Scripture. I found for myself. I didn’t have my own words. I didn’t know how to articulate what I was feeling, and I and a lot of people would want to talk you out of the pain, try to make the relieve the pain. Some people are threatened by your pain, but scriptures not threatened by your pain, and neither is God. And so there are some really great language in the book of Job, there’s great language, and the psalms of lament that I found gave me language. When I was without language, all I could do was cry or groan, but I wanted to go to God, but he hasn’t left us as an orphan. That there is this language in Scripture that that equips us to verbalize to God why this is so wrong, why it feels so raw. What do I do with this betrayal? I don’t even want to go on. I cannot even envision what this next stage of life is going to look like, because everything I thought I was investing in is gone. God meets us in that in Scripture and gives us language to bring to him?

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
Yeah, I would say, Yeah, this the biggest thing that pulled me through, like a lot of depression, was just scripture too. I remember being kind of pulled away from it at first. There was the sense that, do I want to draw near to this God who just let the unthinkable happen. And yet I remember just screaming at God at my bed at night, like, Why do you hate me? And then getting up in the morning and saying, Okay, there’s no other place I have to go though. So opening up scripture and just, I mean, one of my favorite. Passages was Psalm 119 which is weird, because I didn’t like it before, but it just because it was just all it felt very monotonous. It’s not like I didn’t like scripture, but it just felt like said the same thing over and over. But I remember reading Psalm 119, 25 and it said, My soul clings to the dust revive me according to your word. And I said that every single morning, like revive me according to your word, and just looking at the lament Psalms and the rest of Scripture, I just found God revived me through the word in ways that I really hadn’t known before, because I didn’t need God that much. I needed God a lot, but after my divorce, I had nothing but God, and that’s when I learned the beauty of Scripture, and that God was absolutely enough.

Jen Oshman
Vinita, can you say again for us the line that you said about identity? Because I think it echoes what you just said, when we see perfect families,

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
when we see perfect families worshiping in church, we want their lives, yeah, but when we see broken families, broken families trusting God, we want their god, yeah?

Jen Oshman
I mean, what you just shared, what you both just shared, made me want your God. You know, I see your your clinging to Christ. You clinging to Scripture, and that that draws me to him. Vanitha, I know you had a couple other pieces of encouragement that you maybe wanted to share. You started with identity, yes, not

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
being married, scripture, and then the last thing that I’d actually love to talk about with Wendy as well, but it’s the idea of bitterness, because that’s what I knew a lot of people who had been I didn’t know a lot of people, but the people who I knew had been divorced a lot of times, they were really bitter, and the first thing they wanted to tell you was everything that had happened, and I just didn’t want it to be written all over my face. So that was my motivation at first, was just don’t let me be bitter. I just don’t want this to be all that defines me, and I recognize that that really drew me to God, but also just healed me. Sounds like often that it’s well, I can be bitter. I have the right to be bitter. I was hurt, but I feel like letting go of bitterness was one of the greatest things that God allowed me to do. So I would just encourage people to just ask God to help you do that. You can’t do it yourself. We can’t do any of this ourselves. It’s really just throwing ourselves on Jesus and saying, Help me not be bitter and show me how to do it. And Wendy, you’ve written, you know, a lot about forgiveness, and so I’d love to hear Yeah,

Wendy Alsup
and I have a few copies of free books up here, if anybody wants to grab one after the session. But, yeah, one of the misconceptions about forgiveness is that it’s it is reconciliation. But forgiveness and reconciliation are really, really different things. Forgiveness is for you. I mean, like it really is, is necessary for your soul, but reconciliation only can take place if the other person acknowledges their sin and seeks to repair you can’t be reconciled with someone who is still sinning against you. And so sometimes we feel pressured to forgive, and we think, well, that’s that means I need to pretend like what they did didn’t matter, or it didn’t hurt me, or that they’re kind of sweep it under the carpet. But we know that’s not what forgiveness is at all, and Jesus modeled it for us. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. So you know, these folks have not repented. They have not understand stood their sin, but you stand ready to receive them in or you stand ready. The best definition, actually, of forgiveness, I’ve found, is that you let go of your right to exact justice and so, so really, what you’re doing is you’re allowing God to be God. I am God. Vengeance is mine, he says, so I have the right to exact justice, but I’m letting go of that right to exact justice because I believe your sins have been paid for on the cross. Now this does not mean I need to accept you back in my home. I’m not going to make a path for you to abuse my children. I’m not going to make a path for you to abuse me, but I am going to leave vengeance to God, and I’m going to pray for your soul and hope that you will be reconciled to God.

Jen Oshman
That is really good. Wendy, thank you. Blair, what about speak to this from your perspective, not having a father present. I’m guessing bitterness and forgiveness have been themes that you’ve wrestled with. I know they have been so talk to us about that.

Blair Linne
Yeah, it’s been very hard. My story, you know, and it’s interesting, because not only have I. Experience bitterness because I didn’t I had a father who wasn’t there, but also, I think, bitterness regarding some of my mom’s decisions as well. And then in 2019 it was revealed that the person who I was told was my dad wasn’t my dad. And so do you know what I mean? It’s like, what’s happening with my life? Lord, and honestly, what kept me in the midst of all of that change, all of the emotional ups and downs that I experienced, was really clinging to the Lord. It’s really was seeking to find my identity in Christ and and understanding my adoption right that, that Jesus, my brother, has made a way for me to have a father that will never leave me, that will never forsake me, that has really stabilized me. But also, not only do we have to have that vertical relationship, we still have to deal with the horizontal relationships. And so, you know, it really has looked like praying for my parents and realizing that even forgiveness, even this letting go of this justice, which is like it’s right, you know, this isn’t the way that God intended for it to be. So I’m calling to let let this go, but I then need to keep letting it go. You know, I don’t know if anyone has dealt with forgiveness, but it’s not a one and done, you know, it’s, it’s, you know, it’s a continual because sometimes, especially when the relationship is close enough, that wound continues to be opened in certain ways. Sometimes you have to create boundaries that are helpful for you. So learning to forgive over and over again, 70 times seven, asking God for help, calling out, crying out to God, praying for my parents, you know, and asking God to do in them when only he can do, you know, they don’t have it in them, you know. And I don’t have it in me. Right to forgive to the extent that God is calling me to so really, depending upon the Lord, and I found the Lord just show up and give me the grace to be able to love and extend love and the love of Christ to them specifically. So, yeah, so that’s some of what I would what I would encourage is praying for those who have hurt you and continuing to forgive again and again, by God’s help. Amen.

Jen Oshman
Let’s talk now to just the church community. You guys have already alluded to the reality that to be divorced in church feels shameful or feels heavy. How can churches minister. Wendy, why don’t you start us? How can churches MINISTER Well to families affected by divorce?

Wendy Alsup
Yeah, I was in a good situation, and I I’ve talked to my pastors about leading pastoral workshops on this, because I really, I, I number one, I had a very complicated situation that involved schizophrenia, and I did not know how to navigate it, but I had an elder at our church who was a lawyer, and he got me with a Christian divorce lawyer in his practice, and that elder And that Christian divorce lawyer and my pastor all sat down with me around a table in the conference room at the Law Offices, and we just talked through everything, and they were the kind of men that gave me permission to be honest and told me that they were not pushing me. And my particular situation was, I think they could see things were going in a direction that I didn’t want to admit they were going. So they were both trying to let me know that I had options, but while also respecting that I had to be the one, they couldn’t push me into doing something that I didn’t want to do. So I really hope one day, they’ll make do a pastoral workshop on it, because it was really, really helpful to me to have them speaking into my life. I also had to be willing to let them speak into my life. But one of the things that we’ve mentioned before, I think it was one of you talked about saying something to somebody, even in the situation of spiritual abuse, is praying for wisdom for the safe people. And so there’s this phrase in the Gospels of Jesus that he did not entrust himself to someone because he knew what was in the hearts of men, and I’ve always kept that in the back of my mind. It’s like, you know I don’t have to trust myself to everyone, but when I allow a spiritual authority in my life, is that probably my phone with some type alarm, I’m sure I’m supposed to be doing something with my children right now. I. They’ll understand. They’ll understand. Yeah, sorry about that, but be being wise about who you allow to speak into your life. And so people who love God, who love the word, I didn’t want to be influenced through this. And you can be by people who are skeptical of God, you know, who? Well, don’t you don’t have to really worry about what God’s Word says. I wanted people who loved God, who loved me, and who had a reputation of being wise and knowing Christ and grace and so being wise on who you allow to speak into your lives, but then allow them to speak into your life, right?

Jen Oshman
That’s really helpful. Benita, what did your church do?

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
Well, yeah, so my pastor and the elders were amazing. My ex husband had church discipline and I didn’t. I was just not ready to file for divorce, and my pastor and the elders kept coming to me like, hey, you know you can get divorced, like we are not holding you back from that. Because I think they were worried that I was feeling like, wow, I shouldn’t do this. So they were super supportive. I mean, one of the things our pastor did, because I have a disability as well, so I had these adolescent daughters, and he organized a committee of people from our church, and they all had different roles, like we had prayer meetings in our house, like people would just come over and they’re like, we’re coming to pray for you, and like, 10 people would be there, and people came over to change light bulbs mow my grass. I mean, so there was amazing things the church did for me. But as we talked about Jen, they were there were some really hard things in the church too. So I mean, I had an amazing church, but there was a lot of hard somebody went to my pastor and said I didn’t have a right to keep teaching women’s Bible study because my husband had left. And it was just like, wow. And my pastor said I did, but just knowing that there were people in the church that felt like, yeah, I don’t have a role in the church anymore. And I think one of the hardest things was for my kids, because one time, my daughter said she was in the bathroom and people didn’t know that she was in there, and she heard some kids walking in and talking about our family and our situation and things that they really shouldn’t have known about, but they probably heard it from their parents being concerned and talking about it. So I wasn’t really angry about that, but just to have your child hear other people talking about your family and how everybody thought they used to be great and they were surprised, and you know, that was just so painful. And my kids really pulled away. It was just hard for them to have been part of this family that everybody knew, and then wondering what had happened, because I wasn’t telling people what had happened. So there was a lot of questions about that. So I would say that was pretty hard. And then the other thing that was hard was everybody came around me, but people didn’t come around my kids. They wanted my kids to be good for me, and I don’t know you guys might have experienced that too, like everybody was thinking my kids were the problem, because my kids both rebelled, and everybody looked at them like, why aren’t you making your mom’s life easier? And later, I talked to my daughters, and they’re like, it wasn’t even like we had a life, like they didn’t care what we had been through. It was just, are we there for you, me and so, yeah, there was just a lot of hard things through that. But, yeah, so, but I was very grateful for what our church did.

Jen Oshman
Yeah, Blair, what would be a more appropriate way for a church to respond kids walking through something like that?

Blair Linne
Yeah? Well, and before I get there, one of the things that I’m hearing even both of you guys saying, and we know there’s no perfect church, but I was thinking about how important it is for us to be wise when we choose a church. You know, you’re talking about church discipline. And, you know, sometimes those are things that we can be really nervous about, like, I don’t know this church does church discipline, but membership and church discipline are good things. You know, these are means of grace. God has established in Matthew 18 for our good. And when things are going great, it feels like, Well, why do we need this? Or why do we need to focus on that? But then, when things are not going great, we’re grateful. When those those are in place when those helps are in place for us. So I wanted to say that. And with my experience, one of the things that was my case was I was a part of a church. For the first time. It was actually a congregational church, very healthy church. I came from a abusive, spiritually abusive church situation to a very healthy church situation. And it was the first time that I was able to be really welcomed in to the church community. I was able to stay with a family you know, so being, you know, a fatherless child, certainly there. Are certain things that I missed growing up, you know? There are practical things how to change a tire, you know, but also things like sitting around the dinner table and having family worship, those are just things that I had never experienced because my mom was working. We were latchkey kids, and so to be welcomed into this family where this Texan pastor with his cowboy boots and his guitar said, come on around here, you know, we’re gonna sing holy, holy, holy, you know. But it was really sweet and to observe, you know, this wife loving and respecting her husband. It was a sweet treat for me. And one of the things that we see in Scripture is God’s heart for the fatherless child. God has a heart for children, right, who don’t have the proper care. And he has given the responsibility to the church to have that heart too. We see in James, right, true religion is caring for widows and caring for orphans. And so this church was a great model of that to me, and it has helped me. You know, it was a couple months before I got married, and I was seven in a marriage like, I don’t know what I’m doing, you know, and I was really nervous about repeating those cycles, right, of brokenness that I had experienced. So, you know, I think being the church being around a healthy environment where people are coming alongside, not perfectly, but you know that these are people who do have your good interest at heart,

Jen Oshman
was a real help to me. I think a theme that I’m hearing with all of you, that I certainly experienced as well, is just being welcomed in by other families. I think a lot of times in this current cultural moment, we are so afraid to say the wrong thing, or we’re so afraid to intercept, you know, interject ourselves where we might not be wanted. And of course, we want to approach situations with care and respect and some appropriate hesitation, but not to the point where we don’t act like family to each other, and for my husband and I, who went through so much brokenness and divorce as children, I think the most restorative thing that we experienced was being around the table of other families where there was health and there was unity, we were just mentored and discipled deeply in the homes of other people, and so I Guess I want to encourage us to not shy away from that.

Wendy Alsup
Yeah, and it’s been really meaningful to my teenage boys, because we’ve had this conversation over the years. Sometimes they’ll see a family and they’re like, Well, I wish I had a dad like that. And I’d say, you don’t have a dad like that. One day you will be a dad like that, and those families have welcomed my children in in our church, we have a little multicultural church plan, and I think we might have five stay, what we what you might call traditional, stable married couples, and probably six single moms. So the the kids of the single moms weigh more than the kids of the two parent households, but the dads have done such a good job, like, like, we’re family, and so they take my kids, my I was out of town last weekend and called my son. He’s like, Oh yeah, I’m welding with Mr. Paul. And like, oh, and I volunteered at church this morning with them. And, like, I didn’t even know there was a church volunteer, or that Mr. Paul had welding equipment. So it was really beautiful. And so we have, we do have a family, and we do, we have our Father in heaven, but we have fathers in the church too, and so a church can open themselves up, and you can experience stable family life, even as a single parent household.

Jen Oshman
And you know for me, that really weaves into the theme of bitterness and forgiveness. So for me, it has been really helpful as I heal and forgive and relinquish my parents from some of the wounds that I endured because of their divorce, because of the spiritual mothers and the spiritual fathers that have come into my life. I haven’t, I haven’t, then had to sort of inflict on my mom and dad that expectation of something they can’t provide me with but the spiritual mom and the spiritual dad can, and that’s what the Lord intended. So it’s really sweet. Well, I want to get us kind of to the end and share some book titles and some gospel hope. We always want to close out with gospel hope for you guys. But anything else that you’ve been you’re burning to say, I want to make sure that we get

Wendy Alsup
it covered. One thing that to add on to what you said is don’t discount our own as single moms or single women or women involved in situations of divorce, to speak into both other singles and other married couples, we have wisdom to offer still and we have not become. A second class citizen in the church, who’s whose message is discounted. I preach

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
and and I would say, if you were here working with someone who’s going through a divorce, I would say, invite their family over, as we just talked about, as much as you can. And if you are going through it, just be willing to say, hey, I don’t know where I’m going for Thanksgiving. Like just willing to be willing to put that out there. Because, oh, often we don’t want to say that, and we’re alone. And it was interesting. My My daughter, one of my daughters, just got married, and she was showing me some of her thank you notes, because anyway, and she had written to a lot of the people that had invited us in. She wrote when my dad left, thank you so much for having us in. And I was like, wow, that was 15 years ago, and she wrote that in that thank you note two weeks ago. So it makes a big difference to be bold enough to ask and as well as to offer it.

Blair Linne
That’s good. I would just say, even as children you know to make sure that you are bringing your concerns before God, I think sometimes you know the children, they can get lost in all that’s happening, and people assume that it’s only the two married people right that need to work through things. But as a child, you can lament. You can pour out your heart before the Lord, and then I’ll encourage you to to not be motivated by fear. You know, because of my broken home, even before stepping into the idea of marriage, I had so much fear, fear that I would repeat the same cycles. And you know, the gospel tells us that we don’t have to repeat those same cycles, that there is hope, right, that all things can be made new, but we have to deal with the hard things. It’s not enough just to say, I know I don’t want to repeat those patterns. We have to actually deal with it. We have to cast it over to the Lord so that we can walk forward in taking a new path. But also, I want to say, even if you have repeated those cycles, there is gospel hope for you. Do not allow condemnation or shame to keep you from who you are in Christ, because you have been reconciled to God through Christ, and you are seated with Him in the heavenly places that will never change. This is not an unpardonable sin. Do you know what I mean? It will never change. So stand firm in who you are your gospel identity as a believer.

Wendy Alsup
Yep, and the place that I was most struck with gospel identity need was with the pain of my children, and so I wanted to talk them out of their pain. I wanted to explain why they what I why I had to do this thing that led to this pain. But it was really good for me to realize that that pain was in a condemnation of me, and for me just to limit with them. I didn’t have to discount it. I could just say, Yeah, this is really hard, and I am so sorry you’re feeling this pain, and let’s bring it together to God, because this really stinks, and not let it threaten my identity as a good mom and and that was a fork in the road that I was counseled to take, and it ended up being for the health of Me and my children to be able to lament together instead of me being threatened by their pain.

Jen Oshman
Anything else beneath that? You want to add to that?

Vaneetha Rendall Risner
No, these are our final words, yeah, kind of thing, okay, well, I would say my final word is, God is writing a good story of your life like I love this quote from Elizabeth Elliot, which is of one thing I am perfectly sure, God’s story never ends with ashes, so your story will not end with ashes. So just I thought it would when I got divorced, I thought this is not a good story, and yet that would be my encouragement. Just lean into Jesus. He’s doing something beautiful. That’s your life. Yeah, can

Blair Linne
I? I wanted to read Isaiah 63

Speaker 1
is it Isaiah, 6061 verse three. Let me see here, 6161 verse three. That’s what it is. Let me read that here

Blair Linne
to comfort all who mourn, to provide for those who mourn in Zion, to give them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, festive oil instead of mourning, and splendid clothes instead of despair, and they will be called righteous trees planted by the Lord to glorify Him.

Jen Oshman
That is a good word. Thank you, Blair. Okay, well, our time is up, but I want to encourage you to visit the bookstore. Wendy has written a book called I forgive you. Vanitha has a book called walking through fire, and Blair has a book called Finding my. Father and all of them are very related to this particular topic, so make sure you grab hold of those. And let me just briefly close us in prayer, God in heaven. We are thankful for you, and we are thankful for the forgiveness that you have given us, Lord, as we have forgiven, would you help us to forgive? I pray for every woman in here, for wisdom, for grace, for truth, Lord, you know the story of every woman in these seats. God, would you lead her? And as Blair has said, and beneath and Wendy, as they have pointed us to you, over and over and over, our stories are not over. Yet. You are a resurrection God, Lord. So would you bring that which is dead to life? We pray in Jesus. Name Amen.