Marilynn Griffith - Happily Even After

Although the embarrassment of being ushered out of the sanctuary by my own husband weighed heavy on my mind, it was his words that pressed the hardest against my heart, not his actions.

Get over it.

It was the same thing he told the managers of his company all the time. Still, he’d never said it to me.

Until now.

“Church family, please welcome the newest member of the ministerial team here at Promised Land Worship Center, Ryan Blackman! Many of you will remember his father, Robert, who served here for many years. Ryan is an accomplished businessman, as well. Some of you are running his software on your computers at home. His wife is back there with the baby, but you can shake both their hands on the way out today. Ryan will be heading up the youth division of Christian Education. Give him a hand!”

My tears stopped and the Cry Room came into view again, this time allowing me to see my husband approach the pulpit. Say what? The minister of whom? My heart seemed to stop as Ryan took a seat behind the pulpit, next to the pastor. I could hear Sister Hawkins groaning from where I sat. My heart seemed to stop, but I knew it couldn’t have, because I was still breathing. (I was, wasn’t I?)

“All these years that my Reginald has been a deacon here and then Pastor goes and puts another young guy on the ministerial staff. Well, that’s how it goes, I guess.” Sister Hawkins looked over at me, no longer beating around the bush. “You’d better get your act together though if you’re going to deal with those ministers’ wives…they’ll eat you alive, honey.”

“Like she would know,” my new friend the next seat over whispered, barely moving her lips.

I could only watch in shock as my husband was congratulated. Youth? Was this some kind of joke? Ryan barely had time for his own daughter. How could this be happening?

The woman next to me extended her hand again. (Why couldn’t I remember her name? Probably because I’d been calling her Skinny Woman in my mind since coming here.) Brenna Ross. I’d seen her name and face on the screen as one of the ministers’ wives. Her husband was the minister of music, a dark-haired hunk who all the visiting college girls went crazy for. At least I didn’t have that to deal with. She pulled me toward her and hugged me.

“I hope you were listening to the sermon,” Brenna whispered. “Get the tape and hear it again. See yourself as God sees you. You don’t have to look good in anyone else’s mirror. Keep your eyes on Christ. He’s got his eyes on you. Call me. I’m in the directory.”

I nodded and swallowed hard as she let me go, thankful for what seemed to be my first real friend since coming here. Thankful too that the glass separating me from my husband, the glass that I’d once thought was a mirror, seemed to have a different purpose after all—to make me see a new me, a woman made into Christ’s image instead of her own.

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