September 29, 2006, was one of the hardest days of my life, one I’ll never forget. I watched my wife of just three months standing in the driveway alone as I drove away to catch my flight to Iraq. Even as a ten-year veteran of the Marine Corps with a previous deployment to Iraq under my belt, I was completely unprepared for the emotions I felt that day. The idea of leaving my new wife while I entered a war zone was gut-wrenching. The entire day was really quite miserable. As we laughed, cried, and prayed throughout the day, it was very difficult to find much joy in the situation. We both were struggling with accepting this long separation.
As a newlywed couple who had barely had time to experience married life, we were suddenly faced with a year-long separation with me in near constant threat of physical injury. These were abnormal circumstances for the first year of marriage, to say the least. Normally we should have been figuring out how each other prefers to squeeze the toothpaste tube. Instead, she was going to sleep while I was waking up. The time zone difference alone made communication difficult.
While I faced the uncertainties of a war zone, she faced the challenges of making decisions about our future. During that year she would have to sell our house, move us to our next duty station, and attend to a myriad of issues that normally we would have accomplished together. Needless to say, the situation was ripe for doubt, fear, frustration, and disobedience.
As the deployment progressed, my wife and I learned a great deal about each other. We learned the importance of communicating in whatever form available. By God’s grace alone, she and I were able to encourage and nurture each other through prayer, letters, emails, and phone calls. We found amazing strength that God brought to each of us as we lived our lives with our hearts united, but our physical beings separated by oceans, continents, and time zones.
In a situation cultivated for struggle, God gave us an enormous peace. We learned how to trust our relationship to him. Only his divine control over our lives helped us endure the long, trying separation. We returned to each other with an emotional and spiritual strength that will benefit our marriage petitioning God through prayer for years to come because we submitted to his will and trusted in him. We learned that no matter the circumstance, whether it’s the emotions of loneliness or the practicalities of renting an apartment, we bridged our separation and strengthened our hearts by petitioning God through prayer.
Thank you for the ability to petition you no matter what time zone I live in or what zone of life I’m in.
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” (Philippians 4:6)