Picking Up The Pieces

A family of five found themselves living from hands to mouth in the city of New York

The husband and the wife were both hard workers

The wife was a nurse, and her husband was a shoe salesman

The cost of living was extremely high

They were renting a basement apartment for three thousand dollars a month

The cost of transportation, feeding, and bills for electricity, water, wifi, and so on were extremely high

By the time they pay the rent, other bills, and groceries, they usually have nothing left over to save or for any form of emergency.

They lived like this for fifteen years.

The husband had been in New York since he was twenty.

He got married to his wife at the age of thirty.

He had always lived in a basement apartment because it was cheaper than the other forms of accommodation on offer

After the wedding, they had to move from his previous basement apartment into a bigger one when she got pregnant.

The wife was twenty-five years old when they got married.

The year she clocked forty, she told her husband that, after calculating their income and expenses, and factoring in the children's education and other future expenditures, the most practical thing for them to do would be to move out of New York.

The husband again told the wife that he had lived in New York all his life and his friends and support system were in New York. He was forty-five years old and did not see any sense in leaving New York.

A day after the discussion, the wife applied for a job in Chicago, and she got it.

Without informing her husband, she went to Chicago for an interview and secured the job

She also bought a house and was able to put in the paperwork for the mortgage facilities before returning to New York.

When she got back home, she told her husband she had gotten a job in Chicago and had also bought a house

Her husband was shell-shocked.

He felt his authority was seriously supplanted by his wife, and it became a very big issue

How could his wife resign from her job in New York and unilaterally apply for another job in another city without his approval?

What man wearing the trousers in his own home accepts such behaviour?

Family members waded in.

The wife stood her ground, and the husband stood his ground.

At the end of that month, they couldn't pay the bills in New York because the wife had diverted her resources to Chicago, and the husband's income was not enough to settle the bills.

The wife had also resigned her job in New York, but worked for an extra month in lieu of notice and had a few days to resume at her new office in Chicago

The husband reluctantly gave his consent for the wife to move to Chicago with the children.

He said he would rather move into a smaller apartment in New York than move to a house bought by a woman in a strange city.

That was the end of their marriage.

All the promises by the husband to visit the wife and children in Chicago after they settled down went unfulfilled.

The husband felt betrayed by his wife and swore never to have anything to do with her and the children anymore.

The wife at first thought her husband would see reason and move to Chicago after a month or two.

She knew he loved his children, and even though he was hurt by her actions, that love should count for something.

She waited and waited

The next thing she saw was an officer of the court at her door serving her divorce papers.

It was never in the plan.

She panicked and called her husband. "What is the meaning of this?"

Her husband told her to get a lawyer and meet him in court.

He had changed.

He was angry, cold, and distant

She got a lawyer and told the lawyer she would prefer not to contest anything with her husband

He had always been good to her and their children, but he lacked the foresight to lead them away from poverty, and she was sick of living from hand to mouth

He was sentimental, and it was leading them nowhere

She had worked for over ten years, and she had nothing to show for it

Enough was enough.

The divorce papers were signed quickly. He got visitation rights as agreed by the two of them, and that was it.

She didn't want anything else from him, and neither did he.

Two months after the divorce, her husband remarried.

She knew he did it out of spite, and it really got to her, but she was the one who called for war, and she shouldn't complain about blood being drawn.

She soldiered on with the children for three years.

Financially, she was in a very good place. She also enrolled in several courses to keep her mind busy, and this helped her a lot in terms of getting better jobs and an extra stream of income

The challenges with the children and their adjustment took a bit, but they eventually settled in

They also lived in a nice community where the children made friends easily

The only thing she didn't have was a man

She seriously wanted to find love and happiness in that regard again, but she was a single mother of three, and most of the men she was meeting were sharks.

According to her religion, divorce was not acceptable.

It had been drummed into her from her childhood.

How then do you go to God to seriously pray and ask him to direct a godly, loving, and kind-hearted man to you when you were trained and taught all your life that God would not answer your prayer or forgive you if you ever left your marriage?

When she moved to Chicago, the pastor of their church in New York called her and told her she would regret her actions because her husband was a faithful man who did not cheat on her or deserve the treatment she meted out to him

She carried the guilt in her heart for a long time and found it difficult to pray

She had left a good man in the lurch because he lacked the leadership she required for her life and children

It was not a good enough reason for her to leave the marriage, according to her pastor, church members, friends, and family members.

She was a pariah, and it stung badly.

She reached out to the Brother in Jeans and T-shirt. She explained all that had happened and where she was in her journey

She said she couldn't officially join a church in Chicago as a worker because a letter of reference would be required by the church leadership from her former church, and she knew she would not get anything good from her former pastor.

She said prayer had become monotonous and sadness had taken over her soul, even though she knew she had made the right decision.

The brother in Jeans and a T-shirt told her God is not angry with her.

How can God be angry with anyone over a marital decision?

It was a religious lie that was deliberately indoctrinated into some churches as a deterrent to members, but it was a man-made ideology.

The gift of salvation is not an exclusive right of certain people

Access to God is based on our faith in Jesus Christ and nothing else

The Holy Spirit does not depart from a believer. He is the seal of our salvation forever, and until he presents us faultless before the Father, he abides in us.

The church has a right to close its doors on those who refuse to conform to certain teachings and doctrines for the general well-being of the church, but that does not mean the person the church threw out has been abandoned by the Holy Spirit.

Friends may leave, family members may turn their backs, and pastors may reject your phone calls.

All your earthly benefits from the church may cease, but even then, God is with you.

The prodigal son was always loved, even when he was in a strange land

She couldn't believe it.

All the people she knew who were spiritual leaders told her she had sinned and was condemned to go to hell.

She had carried the burden of guilt and shame for making a decision that any right-thinking person would have made if they were in her shoes.

She opened up her heart and started enjoying fellowship with God again

To make things better, she got baptised in the Holy Spirit and began to pray in tongues.

It was a gift she had coveted for years, but didn't receive

The Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt told her it was for every believer, and it is a seal of approval from God to the believer that he or she is acceptable in the beloved.

She joined the fellowship of believers without borders online. A family where your personal story is not a determinant of how you are loved or how you will be loved

The Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt told her she would begin to see the future God has for her in visions and also in the place of prayer

He told her to call forth the promises of God and frame her world with the Words of Power that would be birthed in her spirit in the place of prayer

Bible reading, praying in the Spirit, affirmations, seeing the right picture and possessing all that the Lord has given to her in the place of prayer.

A year after the fellowship was restored, at the age of forty-six, she met the man of her dreams.

A man who saw no blemish in her.

The outrageous vision she saw was that the man was single and never married

She also saw that the man had no health issues and was only waiting for the fulfillment of the promise of God.

She saw that she was the promise of God unto that man in the place of marriage

It was outrageous and unbelievable when she saw it, but she confessed it and worked hard in the place of horizontal interactions to affirm it.

It came to pass

Her joy was full.

God has settled her on every side

Her husband was a doctor who had lived and worked in Saudi Arabia for over twenty years

He migrated to the USA at the age of 48 on a golden visa and needed a wife

They met at a conference, and it was like tea to a cup

She was the cup, and he filled her to the brim!

Her husband had retired just a year before

He was rich and desired to live a quiet and peaceable life surrounded by love and warmth

He said he had started his career in Saudi Arabia with a determination to defeat generational poverty

God had helped him to do this

The next thing was to get a wife and settle down

He had a lot of options, but she was his choice

Within three months of their initial meeting, they got married.

They joined a community church at the behest of her husband

Everyone saw them as a family

He was a good father to her children and a good husband to her

The challenge was the miscarriages she kept suffering after the wedding

She really wanted to have children for him

Not because he was putting her under any form of pressure, but because she felt it would be the fair thing to do

Her children were growing fast and would all soon leave home

She and her husband deserve to raise at least one child together as they grow old together

She went all out for it

Tried IVF several times and refused to listen to all the naysayers who told her she was too old to have a child at the age of forty-seven

After seven IVF sessions without a good result, she reached out to the Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt on her fiftieth birthday.

"Sir, you are watching me suffer on my own." She said

"Why do you want more children? Isn't that tempting fate or pushing for something beyond your reach?" He asked her

She didn't reply

The following month, she landed in Nigeria with her husband

When the Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt saw her, he shook his head

She said, "I am determined to give my husband a baby. I know you felt I should not do so because of my age or the quality of my eggs and so on.

Doctors have said all that, and I heard them clearly

You are not a doctor, so tell me what the Lord has to say to me on this matter."

The Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt looked at her and laughed

He said, "How many children do you want?"

She said, "A set of twins and I don't want to do IVF again. I have spent so much on it, and the process is not helping me bond with my husband the way I want."

The Brother in Jeans and a T-shirt prayed with her

A few days later, she returned to the USA with her husband

PS: Two days ago, she delivered a set of twins at the age of 50 years and ten months.

The mother, the father, and the babies are in excellent health

The whole of Chicago is agog with joy

As my brother,

@femioladehin

 would always say

"God can be trusted."

We give all glory to God

Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. E

-GSW-