Chapter 14

That Sunday was a communion service. I dressed up as though it were Easter. That day had come while Frank and I were still in the mire of our marriage, and I hadn't paid it particular notice. This time I was ready to think of Christ and His sacrifice and His resurrection and His return, and to dress for the occasion. I had never dressed up for communion before, and probably wouldn't in the future, but this was the first time I'd had the chance to partake of the emblems since my confession and I wanted to note that fact.

I wore a white dress with long sleeves that puffed out at the shoulders, and a hem that hit me right at the knees. I put on my white heels again, and tied back my hair with a broad white ribbon. I made up my face carefully, not wanting to appear gaudy but wishing to look my absolute best for the occasion. Then I slipped on a pair of pearl earrings, and put a gold chain around my neck, a chain that held a small gold cross that rested against my dress. I rarely wear "Christian jewelry," but my parents had given me that necklace when I was a teenager and it was special to me.

I looked at myself in the mirror. Lacking a full length mirror I couldn't be absolutely sure, but as far as I could tell I looked very good. I'd continued to gain weight, and was approaching what I'd been at the time of my confession. I would soon have to stop eating so much, or begin exercising, unless I wanted to become bloated, and I certainly didn't want that. I had worn a size 11 for a long time, and that was where I wanted to stay – the size that I'd been naturally before my depression had wrecked my appetite and sent me on a downward slide.

I'd brushed my hair carefully before putting on the ribbon, but suddenly I reached behind myself and fluffed it up, so that below the ribbon's constriction the hair spread out, the curls providing built-in body. I realized that the word "mane," which is a cliché for women's hair, was beginning to apply very well to mine. I had always kept my hair fairly short, and well trimmed, but I was beginning to like this new, thick, half wild growth very well. "Genesis Carter," I told my reflection, "you are once again an attractive woman."

"Yes, you are," came Frank's voice from the doorway. I squealed and jumped, and then my fright turned to anger.

"Frank Carter, how dare you do that to me!"

"I didn't mean to startle you, Gen – it's just that you look so delightful this morning."

I don't know about other women, but a sincere compliment from my husband has the power to defuse my anger, and it worked that time. I ducked my head and felt myself blushing a bit. "Thank you, Frank. It's been a long time since you thought I looked good."

"Do you really think so, Genesis?"

"For so long you refused to even look at me as a woman..."

"It wasn't that I thought you unattractive, Gen. It was the anger I was feeling."

"But I know what I looked like. I lost weight and I got out of shape altogether, and I looked like a slattern..."

"Genesis, when you look like a wrinkled prune, I will still consider you the most attractive woman in the world. How I treated you was because of me, not because of your appearance."

I looked up at him. "Do you really mean that?"

"Yes, Genesis – I really mean that."

I blinked back tears. "Then take me to church, Frank. I think that's the best place for me to experience this gratitude."

Tyrone shortened his sermon that morning. It was a topical sermon, contrary to his usual expository practice, and he discussed the meaning of communion. "It is not our communion together, at least not primarily. The communion of the saints exists always. Whenever I meet a fellow Christian, I have communion with that brother or sister. Our communion together is through the blood of Jesus Christ.

"No, the communion which we will observe today is a communion with God. Paul put it this way: 'Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ?' Our observance of communion is a communion with our Lord.

"And indeed it is merely a symbol of that communion which we always have with Him. Jesus told His disciples, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live forever.' We 'eat' Christ's flesh and 'drink' His blood when we put our faith in Him. It is when we depend on Him that we receive His substance, the Holy Spirit who regenerates us and gives us grace to live as He has commanded. And so when we eat this bread and drink this cup today—" and he pointed to the communion table which sat to the side of the platform "—we are presenting a picture of the communion with God which we have through the body and blood of the Christ who gave Himself for us."

I had always loved communion, but I'd never before heard a sermon which so clearly stated the purpose and the meaning of the ordinance. And as I heard Tyrone's words I looked at the table, with its white cloth covering the dishes which held the unleavened bread and the fruit of the vine, and I realized with fresh power the gift of grace which God had provided. There was a large wooden cross hanging on the wall behind the pulpit, and I shifted my attention to that symbol. I remembered hymns that I'd been singing for years. One spoke of "the cross upon which Jesus died." There was the one which reminded Christians of "the cross, where I first saw the light." The first verse of that hymn, which came to my memory with power, ran,

We hadn't sung that hymn during the service, but it was one that I'd learned by heart when I was a girl, and which had always meant something special to me. Today, however, it was as though I were hearing it for the first time, the message of Isaac Watts' words coming into my mind and my heart completely fresh. I looked back at the table, knowing that under the cloth were emblems depicting the broken body and the spilled blood of the Lord of creation, and I felt tears coming to my eyes. A worm indeed! I had violated my marriage vows, I had betrayed my husband's trust, I had sinned against Almighty God. If I wasn't a worm, who was?

And yet that body and that blood were mine. Jesus had died for me. He had atoned for my sins. I had known this for a very long time, having become a Christian while still a child, but this was almost a revelation to me. The adultery which had almost destroyed my husband, which had nearly wrecked my marriage, which had ultimately come near to costing me my life, that adultery was part of what Christ nailed to the cross. His death was for me – not merely for some great mass of lost sinners, but for a very personal sinner. When Christ died, it wasn't for some faceless mob; He died for Genesis Carter.

In that frame of mind I came to the communion table. Frank had told me that each time MJT had communion it was different, that they tried to ensure that it never became a mere ritual. This time each pew stepped out into the aisle, and we took the bread and the cup from Tyrone's hand, and partook of communion there. It was almost private, standing there in front of my pastor. The whole congregation was behind me, looking on, but for that moment it was just me and God, and I vowed in my heart that I would serve Him forever, and that the promise I'd made to Frank in our back yard I would, with His help, be faithful to for the rest of my life.

Things began to go smoothly for us, or at least more smoothly than they had for a long while. Frank and I were learning how to be more than just polite to each other – we were learning how to act like loving spouses. Frank's reserve was still there, of course. He kept his feelings inside, and I had to read the subtle signs in his expression and his behavior to know, most of the time, what he was feeling. I had, without realizing it, become adept at this during the long months of my confinement. Somehow, in the midst of my apathy, I had learned to see small quirks of expression or action which conveyed things to me that I'd not previously been able to discern.

Perhaps it was a defense mechanism. When Frank retreated behind his wall of ice, I supposed that I'd sought so eagerly for anything else that I'd learned to see the smallest indications. If that theory was correct, then I almost regretted being able to read my husband so well. Some might think it's worth it, but to me the largest and most flawless diamond in the world wouldn't be worth giving up friends and family and health. I might seek the pearl of great value of which Jesus spoke, and sell all that I had to possess it, but merely material wealth wasn't so attractive to me. And as much as I loved Frank – more, I thought, after our trouble than before it – I had paid an awful price to know him so well, and I thought there must have been an easier way.

Along the way, a letter here and a phone call there, I'd regained a tentative contact with most of the friends to whom I'd written back in April. By now summer was fully here – it was early July – and I was talking to them, briefly, two or three times a month. Word of what had happened had gotten out, no one could say from what source, and I could tell that even those friends who were willing to forgive my abandoning them weren't quite ready to become intimately acquainted with an adulteress. That hurt, of course. My repentance was genuine, and I wanted to return as much as possible to where I had been before my adultery. But my friends wouldn't allow themselves to become so close to me again, at least not so soon; to them I was still the preacher's wife who had slept outside of her marriage.

Still, things were good overall. Frank and I were not intimate as often as we'd been before my confession, but we'd found a new desire for each other, and a new tenderness in our intimacy. I think we'd both learned how vulnerable the other was, and sought in our physical relations to show not merely desire, but love as well. I know that Frank's body had become precious to me – not merely desirable, but a thing to treasure and protect. I was beginning to see him as a whole, not as a body and a heart, but as a person who had a body and a heart and who suffered in his entire being if one part hurt. I was learning what Paul had spoken of long before when he wrote, "if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it." The apostle was of course writing of the church, but in the one flesh which is marriage the principle applies equally well, as I now understood. When Frank hurt I hurt, and when his spirit suffered his entire being suffered. And understanding that, I cherished our physical joining all the more, knowing that when I gave myself utterly to him in that way, I was giving all of myself, and that I was giving myself to all of him.