7. Life as a Growing Experience: the Tests of Life 1960-1963

Life as a Growing Experience: the Tests of Life 1960-1963
Minnie’s story was beautiful and, for the most part, happy despite the problems and difficulties she encountered as a child, especially with the death of her father. And after she met me and we were married, we were both so very happy and excited about the future and what it might hold. Despite the busy-ness of the first two years of our marriage, they were wonderful and we didn’t mind inconveniences.

And we were so delighted once we were able to start having children. We loved them all so much and they were a major part of our life together. They were a gift from God and we knew it and we were thankful for their good health and intelligence and cute little personalities. But 4 children in 3 ½ years?! What about the mother’s health and the responsibility of caring for them? As Minnie said so often, “There’s never an unwanted child, but sometimes there may be an unwanted pregnancy.”

You’ve seen a lot of happy pictures of a happy family–and indeed we were! but there were adjustments and accommodations to be made and problems to be dealt with in order for that picture to emerge.

We all live as “fallen creatures in a fallen world” and we all have experienced hardship, difficulties, weariness, work that is enjoyable and also work that is difficult and unpleasant or excessive. How do you deal with those things? How do you learn to live? How do you know how to live? How do you come to grips with the basic questions of life: who am I? why am I here? what should I be doing? what purposes should I have in life?

Everyone needs to confront those questions and those issues and Minnie and I did. And we grew in our knowledge of life, of God, of scripture, and of each other. And we ended up loving each other intensely. It was a most beautiful experience and continues even after 54 years of marriage. But there was much to be learned; much to be “adjusted” to; much growing that needed to be done. Minnie was such a mature and beautiful 18-year old girl that I married. I still am amazed that God worked things out that she chose me above all the other boys in her life.

And God was certainly at work in her life and in mine. But He had much more to teach us and one of the tools He so often uses are the “tests of life.” They are difficult but they are designed by God to make us more like Christ and to teach us what attitudes we should have.
We both knew the scriptures and loved them and one thing we were confronted with were Jesus’ words, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also.” John 12:24-26 ESV This is the “gospel paradox.” And anyone who follows Jesus must realize that he or she is called to serve. Jesus told His disciples that we are not to be like the world, but “rather, let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves.” Luke 22:26 ESV “even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Matthew 20:28 ESV

Minnie had learned that lesson well long before we were married. She helped to care for her terminally-ill father and worked from the time she was 10 or 11 years old and brought her earnings to her mother and father to be used to help the family. When her father died and her mother had to go to work in the café so early in the morning, it fell to Minnie to prepare breakfast and get her younger brothers off to school. And then she worked until late at night and still had to keep up with her school work. She knew a lot about serving and giving of herself to the family.

And now she was starting a family of her own. And what a beautiful servant she was to her husband and children. She worked so hard and accomplished so much. You will see that clearly as this story unfolds. But it wasn’t easy for all that to take place. Everyone has his/her own struggles and truths to come to grips with.

Minnie often told people that one of her older, mature friends told her when we first got married, “Don’t try to change your husband. Pray for him and God will either change him or change your attitude towards the point of contention.”

Minnie followed that advice in life and taught me to do the same. And God did exactly what her friend had said He would. In many cases when I didn’t have the right attitude and she prayed about it, God gradually changed my attitude through thoughts that He put in my mind and scriptures brought to my remembrance and things other people said and did. Sometimes I would be confronted with the same topic 3 or 4 times in a single week from diverse sources.

I can remember many times maybe even a bit grudgingly at times, admitting that I had been wrong in one of my attitudes. Other times the better attitude (often demonstrated by my wife) would obviously be so much better that I needed to adopt it for myself. And yet, of course, there were some things that I was convinced (and still am) were the correct attitude and Minnie simply learned to accept me the way I was–and love me anyway!

So there are adjustments to be made in any marriage. But there are also difficulties and problems that had to be dealt with. One of the lessons Minnie and I learned very quickly was “don’t let a problem come between the two of you.” You should both be on the same side looking at the problem together and trying to solve it together. If, instead, the problem comes between you, then there is competition for who is going to make the decision and why was there a problem in the first place, etc.

So you can weigh the options honestly together. And Minnie knew and accepted the fact that God has given the responsibility for the family to both husband and wife but that final responsibility God gave to the husband and told him to love his wife as Christ loved the church and gave His life for her. So Christian husbands are expected to be willing to lay down their lives for their wives, if need be. Surely that would imply that it shouldn’t, then, be too difficult to pour her a cup of tea or help wash the dishes or change the baby’s diaper! Ephesians 5:25-33

But that same passage tells the wife to submit to her husband “for the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body. . . .” “In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church. . . .” 5:28-29

God gave a man his wife because he needs her–and I needed Minnie so-o-o much! After living with her for a lifetime, I know that all the more. She was a “helper suited for me.” (Genesis 1:20-24) And she helped me think through the problems and in the process helped me make decisions. She gave me her advice–and I needed it! “She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.”
Proverbs 31:26

That doesn’t mean I always followed it. I can remember a major issue and several minor ones when I went the exact opposite of what she thought we should do. And here is the most amazing part of that incident (and it had to do with where we were going to live and what she was going to do). After trying to persuade me that I was mistaken and making the wrong decision, when she saw that I had finally (perhaps stubbornly) made up my mind about it and we made the move that I had decided on, she threw herself as enthusiastically as she could into “making the most of” a not-good situation into as pleasant a time for the family as she could. I look back at those few months that we were “off course” and then got back on track as some of the most beautiful in our relationship and pulled me so close to my wife. And when I finally admitted that I had been wrong and God enabled us to get back on track, we entered an especially memorable and happy part of our lives: the six years on “Freckles Road.” But more on that later.

Throughout her life I saw that Minnie had learned the lesson of 1 Peter chapter 3 very well. The passage is directed towards unbelievers, but it certainly has an application to mistaken believers as well. It reads like this: “Wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives— when they see your respectful and pure conduct. . . . — let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious.” 1 Peter 3:1-4 ESV

Part of the spiritual growing process was in meeting the tests of life. God sends tests our way (or “allows them to come”) to build our character and strength and to make us more like Christ. All of life tests us. Testing is central to life itself. Whether it’s the weather or making a living or getting along with other people or meeting our daily responsibilities we’re constantly faced with tests. Some tests are unusual and dramatic and others are routine daily tests to see if we will obey God and be faithful to what He has written in His word.

You have a whole variety of problems in life. Each one is a test for your character and your obedience to scripture. If your car breaks down, how do you react? If someone cuts you off in traffic or is rude to you, how do you react? If someone in your family doesn’t do what you want, how do you react? You have responsibilities and can’t seem to get them all done. What do you do? All these things are tests. And scripture gives guidance, but do we follow it? There’s your real test: “Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” James 1:22

Suffering is a test, too. So we should “rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. . . .” Romans 5:3-5 ESV God produces good from those testings, more valuable than gold. He is making us more like Christ by producing within us the character of Christ.

We also have a very great promise as we face those tests. God has promised that “He will not allow you to be [tested] beyond what you are able. . . .” 1 Cor. 10:13 So He gives us the ability and strength to meet those tests. “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.” Psalm 27:14

How do you recognize a test when you see it? It’s really quite simple. Look at any of the scriptures that tell us how to live and see if you do it. For example, Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.” Is that what you do? Is that your “work ethic”?

Jesus said, “And if anyone compels you to go one mile, go with him two miles.” Matthew 5:41 Do you go “the second mile” when you help someone?

“Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life.” Phil. 2:14-15 NIV Can you pass the “never complaining or arguing” test?

How about “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” Col. 4:6 Do you meet that test?

You can see there are seemingly unlimited opportunities to grow by meeting the many tests of life. And it should be apparent by now that you can’t do that by yourself. And that’s part of the whole plan: that facing tests will help teach you how to walk with and depend on the Lord. After all we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and Christ lives within.

Desperate conditions teach us to depend on God. The Apostle Paul told of a situation in which he and his companions “were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life.” And then he tells why it happened: “But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.” 2 Cor. 1:8-10 NIV
Character is produced by responses to tests. We grow stronger as we respond in the right way to tests. “Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.” James 1:2-3 HCSB

Minnie has told publicly several times of a test she faced and how God enabled her to pass the test. She told it to bring glory to God and to help young women faced with a similar problem. I tell it here for the same reasons.

Picture yourself as a happily married young woman of 22 with 3 children born in 3 successive years. You have your hands full trying to take care of them and your husband and home and you’ve been weakened physically by the three pregnancies so close together. And then one day you realize you’re pregnant again! For the 4th time! And you live a long way from your childhood home and family. And you just simply have too much to do and not enough help in getting it all done. You’re happy and you love your husband and children, but you feel overwhelmed with too much responsibility too soon with inadequate resources. That’s a test!

When Minnie told me she was pregnant for the 4th time, my reaction was the same as with the other three–but much more subdued! “Oh, Honey, that’s wonderful. Children are a gift from God.” Her response stunned me, “Don’t bring God into this! You know how I got pregnant!”

I was at a loss to know how to deal with the situation but I knew she was upset. And of course I could understand–at least partly. But I walked softly and didn’t say much for the next few days and prayed that God would get us through this new situation.

Then Sunday morning I was shocked again. The day began as all Sundays did: Minnie fixed breakfast and I cleaned up the dishes while she got the children ready for Sunday School. Our routine was well-established. When the children were ready, they knew they were to sit in the living room with a picture book or something to play with while their Mommy and Dad finished getting ready. But this morning was different. When I walked into the living room where the children looked so clean and neat as they always did on Sunday mornings, Minnie was still in her gown and robe.

I must have looked totally shocked so she told me, “I’m not going!” “You take the children to Sunday School and church and I’ll listen on the radio.” I was a pretty sad and bewildered young father taking those three children to Sunday School that morning. And when we came home after church, again I was startled–but delighted this time–when Minnie met me at the door, dressed beautifully as she usually was, came into my arms and gave me a big kiss and a wonderful smile and said, “I’m O.K. now! I listened to Dr. McGee and the Lord talked to my heart and everything is O.K. now!”

What a short-lived struggle was that test! I wish all of them could be won that quickly. Minnie told me that the scripture Dr. McGee preached from that morning spoke directly to her heart and that he had specifically said that he wanted to talk to all those young mothers with children who thought they were being kept from serving the Lord by the responsibilities of home and taking care of the children. He told them (and Minnie) that the most important job she would ever do in life was to raise those children that God had given her. A career could be entered later when the time came and if there were other ministries the Lord wanted her to do, those, too, could wait until the proper time.

To this day Minnie and I both always considered that raising our four children was probably the most important assignment God had ever given us. Listen to the way Minnie wrote about that nearly 50 years later:
“I loved each of my children deeply. I enjoyed taking them to the library, to the parks and just being with them.”
“We all loved books and I enjoyed reading to them and listening to them read to me. We encouraged them to bring their friends to our house.”
“I took part in activities at their school–like the mother-daughter style show.”

“As they grew up, I tried to teach them truths about the Lord and to show them God’s love.”
“I always loved to prepare family meals and special food they liked. I love being a mother - I also sewed for them -. “ J-103

And she wrote a few months before she died, “I hope my family will remember that I loved each one of them with all of my heart. I prayed for each of them and ask the Lord to give each of them a desire to know Jesus and to walk close to Him.” J-167

Many years ago not long after we first moved to California in 1958, Minnie told me that she was reading Psalm 37 and came across verse 4 which reads, “Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” She told me then, and she has told me many times since that “the desire of her heart” is to see her children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren walking with the Lord. She loved 3rd John 1:4, “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.” That’s what she desired more than anything else for her whole family–including her brothers and her nieces and her extended family.

She wrote, “As a mother, I wanted to take good care of my family. Cooking for them, sewing special outfits and celebrating holidays was a big part of my life.”

“Another important event to me was our evening meal together. This was a time for family sharing and relaxing. All the children enjoyed the coming together around the table - After dinner we read God’s Word together with prayers that God would give each child a hunger for God’s Word.”
“May my family remember that my strength was from the Lord.” J-167

Jon was born Christmas night past midnight, December 26, 1960. It was a very foggy night and Minnie’s doctor was having difficulty getting to the hospital so they gave her something to slow the labor and that led to a difficult and slow delivery. Minnie wrote, “Now our family was complete –two daughters & two sons all under 4 years of age.” J-92 And their mother was 23 years old!

He was such a cute little boy and his brother and sisters “babied” him and played with him and shared things with him and looked after him, helping him swing, giving him rides in the wagon, and reading to him.

Minnie well understood scriptural teachings on the absolute sovereignty of God and certainly believed them. But the struggle was that she also knew that God had created a cause-and-effect universe in which we have the freedom to make choices and do things that result in both expected and unexpected effects. And many things are beyond our control. Jesus told us “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.” Matthew 10:29-31 ESV

She also loved the scripture that tells us of our inheritance that we have in Christ “according to the purpose of him who works all things after the counsel of his own will.” Ephesians 1:11 And that those “all things” “work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28 It doesn’t say that all things are good but that God can take that which is not good and work it together with that which is good to bring about His purposes and our good.

We learned our lesson well. Minnie’s “unwanted pregnancy” turned out to be her very beloved youngest little boy who became her close companion as she began her school career that eventually led to her college degree and her teaching career. (More on that later.) When that same little boy almost died at 3 years of age we were both strengthened through the uncertainty and pain of the time by the knowledge that his life and destiny were in the hands of God.

Fifty years later when Minnie faced her own personal trial and passed through the Valley of the Shadow of Death while pancreatic cancer was destroying her body, she wrote to her students, so many of whom loved her, two days before her last Christmas: “It is almost Christmas so I need to get Bill to update the facebook. I have appreciated so many of your kind words over the last year. My husband is a wonderful care giver who helps me in so many ways with love and a willing heart.”

“I am getting weaker and more fragile, so I don’t know how long God wants to keep me around. He has given me great peace through all of this–now I feel ready to go Home to be with Him.”

“I remember when the doctor told my father he had 2 more months to live and he lived two years. He died at 39.”

“May the Lord bless each one of you as you embrace the Lord Jesus as your Lord and Savior. I am where I have always been–in God’s hands. I am thankful that He loves me and will give me His grace and peace to face whatever comes next. The way of the Lord is perfect.” “Mrs. B., Gentry, 1980-1990"

God prepared her and she was able to rest in the sovereignty and goodness of God in the midst of the difficulties and traumas of life. “I am where I have always been–in God’s hands.” is surely one of her most memorable statements for all of us to heed. “He has given me great peace through all of this,” she wrote and certainly peace characterized her attitude through it all. I remember it well. She often talked about peace and loved this verse in which Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” John 14:27 Jesus left us a legacy of peace and Minnie left us her own legacy, a wonderful example of someone having that peace of Christ to see her through the valley of the shadow.

In later years Minnie often taught Bible lessons to women’s groups. One of her favorite groups was “Heart and Hand” at Sequim Bible Church in Sequim, Washington. She taught many different lessons through the years we were there and in 2003 when she was given a choice of topics, she chose to teach on the “Sovereignty of God.” In her conclusion Minnie said, “The fact that God is sovereign gives us absolute certainty that our future is secure. God’s plans cannot be derailed. What He has promised will come to pass. He holds eternity in His hand just as He holds us, and we will be joint-heirs with our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Our lives were full of work and happy as a family. I taught the early schedule at a junior high school so that I could get home early in the afternoon. Every day when I got home, the children came running to meet me, “Daddy’s home! Daddy’s home!” Minnie emphasized that was an important event every day. They were happy and well-fed, bathed as needed, in clean clothes and the house was clean. Minnie kissed me and promptly went down the street to our friend’s house for coffee while I had a special time playing with the four children. (She would tell me, “I love my children dearly but it’s nice to talk to someone more than four years old.”)

Then she came back to finish her preparations for supper which was always delightful and filled with happy conversation. Immediately after supper each night we had the Bible story together and then the children could play until bed time. At the end of the day we got the four of them ready for bed and either Minnie or I read them a story, usually a chapter book. That made them a little drowsy and we both took two children and tucked them in bed and “heard their prayers” and prayed for each one. We still had a quiet evening together ahead of us.

But on the last teaching day before Christmas, 1963, Minnie called me at work (which she rarely did) to tell me that Jon had spiked a very high fever and that she had called Dr. Cleveland. He told her to give him a tepid bath and bring him immediately to his office. By the time we got home, they were ready to go and when Dr. Cleveland saw him, he told us that we must immediately hospitalize him so we took him to Long Beach Memorial Hospital where he was tested and diagnosed as having salmonella, (like typhoid fever). He lost 1/4 of his body weight and they could not get his fever down or the diarrhea stopped.

Another little boy was also admitted to the same hospital with the same disease. We found out later that he died. Minnie continued with the story: “That Christmas was so difficult as our almost 3-year old seemed to be near death. On New Year’s Eve he was worse and our doctor had specialists in to see him. They told us that he might not survive. We called all of our Christian friends [and family] and asked them to pray for Jonathan. Many churches had watch-night services that prayed for his healing. The next morning when we got to the hospital, the medical staff were amazed. He had no fever or diarrhea. From that time, he started getting stronger and was soon able to go home.” J-99 We were so thankful to the Lord for bringing him back to health.

Jon had been in the hospital for 13 days, the entire Christmas holiday. He was to eat much protein and fresh vegetables and fruits for his recuperation. Minnie often took him to the local meat market and bought him all the lean steaks and other meats he liked. She and Jon became so close during that period and she did everything humanly possible to make his life pleasant. We were all so-o-o happy to have him home.
Jon had spent Christmas and also his third birthday in the hospital–and was so deathly sick through both of them that he wasn’t even aware of them. So when he finally got out of the hospital, our Christmas tree was already dry and falling apart so I drove around the neighborhood and found a large white flocked Christmas tree that someone had discarded for the trash pickup. I stuffed it into the trunk of the car and we dragged it into the house and decorated it as well as we could for Jon’s special Christmas.

And then the next day Minnie baked him a birthday cake and we had even more presents to give him. He was one happy boy!