If you prefer to listen instead, a conversation covering much of the same narrative can be found here:
Hey there, A’s husband here. After reading her Untangling post the other day, I asked if I could add a guest post giving additional context and perspective. So here we go.
As my wife mentioned in her story, we’ve dealt with a lot the last few years with our two youngest – heavy anxiety and mental health issues. It’s been exhausting. Sometime last fall, almost a year ago now, I began really feeling the toll of it on me, on my wife, and on our family. My prayers became very victim-mentality prayers-–Why this? Why that? Why won’t you help us solve this? Etc…
Sometime around the beginning of the year, those prayers evolved from “why” to “what” -– as in, what do you want me/us to learn from this? Still a very selfish and prideful prayer because all I wanted to know was what do I need to do to get through this and move on. What box did I need to check?
Then in March, my prayers evolved again. I felt myself changing but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. My prayers became, “I know I am changing; will you please help me understand how I am changing?”
And then a thought came to my mind, not in my own voice. It asked, “Do you trust me?”
Of course, there in prayer the answer was yes. It came again. “Do you trust me?” And again, my answer was yes. And that was that.
Within a week or two of that experience, my wife and I had some very uncomfortable conversations (for me at least) and she told me attending the Mormon church was no longer fulfilling for her and she was going to attend this other church she had learned about (The Well).
This sent me into a panic and mental state unlike any I’ve experienced (and I experienced diagnosed depression in 2017).
For the next four months, as she attended The Well and as we continued to have discussions about the Mormon church and its doctrine, I was in a continual state of stress, anxiety, and fear. I have the ability to go long periods of time without eating and still feel fine. And unlike some, when I get stressed, I don’t eat. And so for about four months I didn’t eat much. As she mentioned, I lost 20 pounds during this time.
I deal in contracts for a living, and I felt like our marriage contract had been unilaterally altered by one party (her) and that the other party (me) was expected to just go along with it. To put another way, I felt like I was being cheated on (by her attending this other church) and I was supposed to be happy and supportive about it.
I prayed (and cried) more than I ever have in my life. I know God respects agency, so I was very careful not to pray for things that would encroach on her ability to choose. So, I prayed for her heart to soften, for her to remember the positive experiences in the Mormon church that she had had, for her to have experiences that somehow would bring her to a place where she would reconsider and come back. I was trying to spiritually drag her back to the Mormon church and where I was. But the more I prayed, the more conviction she had in the direction she was going.
She would say things about the Mormon church, its doctrine, and its leaders that were hard for me to hear at the time. Things she was learning and feeling.
I was so gripped by this fear and anxiety. The uncertainty of feeling like my world had been turned upside down. That everything I had ever believed, that everything our entire 20-year marriage had been based on, that all of the promises of an eternal marriage and exaltation and all of the effort we had put in over our entire lives to “follow the gospel” had been tossed into a blender and put on liquify. I didn’t know what was going to look like or how it was going to turn out, or if I would be able to handle the outcome.
At one point, I wondered who was going to break first and leave the marriage—me because I couldn’t bear the thought of my ideal family structure being upended, or her because at some point she’d become impatient enough with me and would want to feel unified with her husband.
(If you’ve read more than a few of her posts you probably understand that she’s an incredibly passionate person who moves at 200mph in the direction she’s moving—it’s one of the things I love most about her. But in this case, it was one of the things that struck the most fear in me.)
One morning in July I was praying and had the thought, “You need to forgive her.” Forgive her for what? I thought. She hasn’t done anything wrong. The spirit then spoke to my mind, “You’re praying for healing and peace. She hasn’t done anything wrong per se, but she’s made a decision that has caused you pain. If it’s healing you seek, forgive her.”
Whoa. Hadn’t thought about it that way. And so, I did. I didn’t receive the healing I was looking for, at least not at that point, but as soon as I forgave her (in my prayer—later that morning I would go to her and forgive her personally), I had what felt like a hand and arm around my shoulder, and in a different voice than the ‘Do you trust me?’ voice, heard the words, “I understand.” (Again, whoa).
Things didn’t really get much better for me the next few weeks. Just the same massive anxiety and fear of what might become of my marriage, my family, my eternal family, etc.
And then, on Monday morning July 29th, I knelt beside my bed to say my morning prayers as a broken person. Broken mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. I was exhausted. I couldn’t do it anymore. It was killing me (probably more literally than I realized at the time). And I told God all of it. Not out of anger, but as a child pleading to a father for relief.
I told Him I couldn’t do it anymore. I begged him to take all of the pain and fear and anxiety and uncertainty from me. That I would do anything He wanted me to do. I would give my life to him. Whatever He wanted. I didn’t care what the outcome was, just please take this pain away.
In that moment, I had the spirit rush over me in a way that I don’t know how to describe. I want to be careful how I use this next statement, because I know it means different things to different people, but I believe what I experienced was the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost. As she described in her post, I sat in this space completely consumed by the spirit for more than an hour.
In an instant, all of it was gone. The fear, the anxiety, the worry, the pain. Gone. Purged even.
It’s been 45 days since then and I haven’t felt an ounce of fear or anxiety since. Not about religion, my marriage, finances (which has also been a challenge lately), not about anything. Totally not my nature (or my old nature I should say). Nothing about my external circumstances has or had changed. We still have little girls with some intense challenges. Work is still a little slow.
In that moment, there next to my bed that morning, I was changed. My heart was changed, my desires were changed. Everything changed. I know now that that was the moment that Jesus redeemed me. He saved me. I had been born again.
I used to kind of mock the idea of being saved or born again when people would tell me that they had experienced such an event and had had such a witness (especially when I was serving a mission as a 19yr old). I’ve now prayed for forgiveness for having those thoughts. I owe those people an apology because now I know how real it is.
Since that morning, I’ve continued to feel an outpouring of the spirit teaching me, guiding me, showing me things. My voice has been unlocked (that may sound stupid, but see my wife’s post—I owe her a whole lot of love songs).
The biggest change though is how liberated and free I feel not carrying around all of the baggage anymore. And that liberation, combined with a new-found sense of courage (or lack of fear) has led me to ask questions and to seek to understand things I never thought I’d be asking about—partly out of never having a reason to think about them, and partly out of fear of an answer that maybe I didn’t want or wasn’t ready for. (I believe God gives us answers we are prepared to act upon, so as to not condemn us for the knowledge He gives us.)
I could go on for a few more pages and share all of the things I’ve experienced the last 6 ½ weeks. It’s been the most incredible experience of my life. But this is my wife’s blog, not mine.
I’ll just finish with this: Mormon church history is complicated and messy. Some of the key historical accounts and narratives the church pushes today are (I believe) inaccurate at best and false and misleading at worst (hello, polygamy).
But here’s what I know: God is good. Great even. He pulled me out of a downward spiral and literally saved me in more ways than one. I am the one of the most risk-averse, reluctant to change or challenge, status quo, line-toeing people I know and he has given me the courage to challenge literally everything I knew (or thought I knew) not knowing where things would fall. He has given me the confidence to know He is with me and guiding me.
More than a few times I’ve pled with Him to correct me if I’m off course. But I continue to feel an outpouring of the spirit and know I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.
Last night I prayed, both individually and in our couple’s prayer, and told God that while I didn’t understand all things, He had shown me enough, and taught me enough, and had sent His spirit to me enough to know that He is calling me out of the Mormon church right now. That he’s calling us out right now. (Again, whoa).
With my wife kneeling next to me holding my hand, I told Him we were now ready for whatever He has next for us. That we were ready to be all-in in our new church community. That we are His.
We are so excited for this next phase of our lives together. We have grown so close and are so happy. We wake up in the morning with excitement for life. The kind of excitement that only comes through Jesus, by being born again, and by following His word.
He is a God of miracles. And while he’s always taken care of us and carried us through trials and challenges, He’s been working countless miracles in my life and in our marriage since we just let go and gave our lives to Him.
And I thank God for it.
All I Possess 