Would you?

I can't remember how this conversation started, but it went a little something like this.

Boy 1: I had the best waitress tonight!
Boy 2: Was she cute?
Boy 3. Did you get her number?

Boy 1: No.  She had a kid...
Me: What if she was single? Single women sometimes have babies...

(Boys 1, 2 and 3 discuss this for a minute)

Me: So what if you were dating someone and you found out that had been married before.  Would that affect anything?

Basically my answer from the three of them was that they didn't want to date someone that was divorced, they would rather date someone who had a spouse die.  You can imagine how that made me feel for a minute.  None of these boys knew that I had ever been married, and none of them knew why I wasn't married anymore, and I wasn't about to tell them, especially after that conversation.  It didn't really hurt me or offend me, and I still love these guys to death, but it did make me think, and it made me a little bit sad for people who are in a similar situation as I am.  Knowing that there are so many guys out there, great guys, that would honestly think twice about dating me because I'm divorced makes me sad for myself because I didn't do anything wrong, and makes me sad for them because of the great women they could be missing out on.

Growing up in the church, we're always taught that divorce is wrong.  Obviously, marriage is a huge commitment that isn't to be taken lightly.  As a young girl, I knew that there were circumstances in which divorce was the best choice.  I knew it was wrong to stay in a marriage that was abusive, or if a spouse cheated, but, of course, I never thought that I would be married and divorced before I turned 20.  But I also never thought that I would be in a situation where I needed to get divorced.

You see, the Lord knows our situations.  He knows us, and He understands us.  I've heard many different explanations as to why I went through what I went through.  Some of them were "maybe you just needed that experience to grow" or "maybe this somehow brought you to who you really were supposed to be with" or "maybe you needed to experience this to help someone else."  While all those reasons are good reasons, and  I appreciate everyone's insight, I want to say that I think it's possible that the Lord has many reasons, but what I think is a bigger possibility is that sometimes the Lord just allows things to happen to us.  People have agency, and their agency affects us.  If you are standing idly by a road, minding your own business, obeying all pedestrian laws, and you get mowed over by a truck, lose your legs, and are permanently blind, do you think it was by any fault of yours? Most likely not.

We live in a mortal world where people have agency, and unfortunately, if someone uses their agency to chop off your arm with a chain saw, you are going to be affected by it.  You most likely will not have an arm.  This doesn't mean the Lord "made" you go through it, but He did "allow" you to go through it, and we should still learn form these experiences.  I don't believe the Lord "made" me go through horrible experiences, I believe He "allowed" me to, and I believe it brought me closer to Him.  I believe that the Lord can pull us through any situation, no matter how dark, and that if we allow ourselves, we can become closer to Him than we have ever been.

A friend of mine told me, after I had told him that I had been married, that if he were dating me, that wouldn't bother him at all, because he knew that the Lord made everything right in the end.  It was awesome for me to hear that kind of a testimony from a man! Because the Lord does! He is so much more merciful and just than we can even begin to imagine! We are so blessed to have such a loving Heavenly Father who has our best interest at heart.  The important thing is that we follow the spirit in all that we are told, even when it doesn't make sense to us.  Remember that we are mortals, and there is so much that doesn't make sense to us, but how can we exercise our faith without stepping into that darkness a little?

I told a friend of mine the condensed story of my short marriage and all the hardships that came with it, and he told me that as he was walking home from class the spirit just confirmed to him that everything I had told him was right.  It's nice to know that I know what I did was the right thing, but it's nicer to know that other people know it, too.

I love the Lord, and I know things will work out happily for everyone who follows Him and has faith in Him and does all that they are supposed to.  :)