My Ex Took Me to Church. I Got Saved and (Re)married Her - Vince Lewis

Interestingly, there is a—there is another story going on at this time. Uh, my ex-wife lived out in California, and the Air Force, uh, sent me on some training. All we did when we weren't flying was train, train, train. I don't know if it was on, uh, military tactics or the human body or, or whatever, uh, or somebody else's mission, so you knew what they were doing in all this constant. So the Air Force sent me on a training mission out to San Antonio, Texas, and I wasn't too far from Southern California. So I said, you know, I'm going to, uh, buy an airline ticket and just go out there and see my ex-wife. We had two children at the time, and, uh, just for old time's sake, see how things were going, make sure they're, you know, not suffering too much, and then go back to whatever I was doing, but just kind of touch base with them, you know, as, as some people might do, uh, even today.

Lots of people would, would approach it that way. And we weren't enemies. We—this was a, uh, this is what just entered our lives at the time. And so I went out to visit her, and she too had, had, uh, was searching for, uh, things to help her find direction in her life. And through that, she had, uh, come to a church, and, uh, through that, she had found out about, uh, Christianity more towards finding her need for a Savior, given the—the all of us, uh, born into lives that were—we needed a Savior to keep us from the sin that had covered humanity since, um, Adam and Eve had sinned, and sin continued, and we were all caught up in that throughout humanity.

Uh, and I'm getting on to some pretty large things. But bringing that down to the local level, I was in need of spiritual help, and, and through salvation in Jesus Christ, and a lot of material, uh, even growing more and more to support that, uh, she had gone to this church and found, found salvation through Jesus Christ. She'd gotten involved in that. The, uh, the oldest one, Angela, had gotten into Sunday school. Uh, both of them were trying to build this new life. So I came by. Angela had said to my ex-wife, she said, "Could perhaps Daddy go to church with us?" I was just there, uh, visiting for a weekend, and I, I had to get back to the training, and then I'm back to my B-52 base, uh, starting, uh, within a day or two after the weekend.

She said, uh, "I would like to show the other children in my, uh," she would have said, "the other kids in my Sunday school class, who my Daddy is." You know, boy, that really hits home. That's, that's where you're starting to get into, to my core and, and, and touching areas I hadn't touched before. And so, uh, I said, "Okay, um, I'll go ahead and, and go with you that I can do that." And so, um, as, as only God would have it, uh, uh, Charlotte was there. Angela was in Sunday school, and I was there. And there was preached that day, uh, standard, uh, sermon, and, uh, called Standard Sermon. I call it Fundamental Basic Sermon of Salvation Through Jesus Christ, how He had died on the cross to pay the price for our sins, and by acknowledging Him and, and, and declaring and deciding on Him as my Lord and Savior and inviting Him into my life and dedicating my life to Him.

This fundamental message about as basic as you could get it, uh, by God's grace, was preached that day, uh, after the, the, uh, meeting was over. Um, she went to, to get Angela out of Sunday school, and, um, I was, uh, I was standing there, uh, doing, and, and here comes the deacon of the church, and he comes up to me and very deliberately says to me, "Vince, you've heard the gospel preached together today," and, well, I knew it. And he, he said, "Would you like to pray to invite Jesus Christ into your life?" And it just, I had this feeling, you know, uh, fireworks didn't go off, uh, this big explosion in my life.

I just had this inner feeling, you know, I need to do this. I need answers, and this looks like the way to go. So I prayed with him and invited Jesus Christ into my life, not knowing what I was, what changes were coming down the road, but I knew I, this was something I needed to do. And so, uh, that weekend was over. I had done that. I needed to get back to my work in New York after finishing the training. And, you know, before I left there, and this is really significant, my ex-wife gave me a little Bible, uh, New Testament and Psalms, and I took that back with me to New York. Mm-hmm.

So this, I'm guessing, starts a new, uh, phase in your life, a new, um, set of habits, new things coming into your life of, "Oh, wow, this Christianity thing is, you're looking at it pretty differently now," and you have a Bible and you go back to, to your job. Um, but what, what happens from there? Uh, and also what happens to, um, with you and your ex-wife? Well, uh, here I am flying, uh, qualified to fly and, and being stationed with this nuclear bomber, and yet there's a parallel story going on in my life that has to do with Christianity. And I, I went back to this rented house with this other guy, and, and I had this little Bible, just a little thing, and, and you look at the hand of God in some of these things, and I had a bed upstairs in this room and a little nightstand next to this, and I took that little Bible and just tossed it there on the nightstand.

And before I went to bed, I just kind of opened it up and looked at it. Who knows where I looked at? And I'm sure the Holy Spirit had some, uh, impact on this. And I just tossed that thing down on the table there, and, and there was a certain attraction to it, but there it was. I went about my job, back to work, you know, doing whatever I was assigned to do that day, training, studying, uh, working in various aspects of the, of the career there, maybe, uh, going, uh, into a vault and talking about emergency war orders that we call EWO. And yet here's this other life. And I, I come home from work during the day, and there's that little black Bible.

Why would you see that little black Bible there? And yet I saw it, and, and I would open it up and just randomly, I don't know what I'm looking at, and I would read maybe something, I don't know, maybe something simple like Psalms, where it's more able to be, there's a lot of principles about lifestyle, and I'm seeing things in there that I didn't have, but yet I'm seeing things in there I want. So that little black Bible went back on that nightstand, and, you know, quite interesting, night after night after night after night, that same little ritual. I'd come home, get ready, take my flight suit off, my, my boots, uh, off the, that we wore, and yet there was that little Bible.

I picked that thing up and I read it, and I read it, and I read it, and I read it, and I began to come familiar with some things, and I began to, uh, just on my own, reading whatever I could, not having any teaching, nothing, just having this fundamental understanding that there's this truth. I'm seeing this in the world. I'm seeing things like "Thou shalt not kill," and I'm seeing, uh, kindness to others and love and all sorts of things I had never focused on or, or even understood before. And so, again, this is, this is churning, and, and my heart is changing, and I'm realizing after a while, it's the next year, and, uh, I get to a point where, uh, I recognize there's a change here.

And so I called my ex-wife in, uh, California. Uh, this, this is a big step in my life, and I, and, uh, I said, "Do you think you could give thought and consider remarrying me?" And, um, perchance, could you do that? And she says, "Well, uh, I don't know." She says, "Let me, let me think about it a while. I'll get back with you." And, um, we call it putting out a fleece for God, you know, uh, do this to show me I'm making the right decision, or do this to show I'm making the wrong one. And she made it kind of tough for God. She, she named something specific. "God, if this is you, I want him to say these words when he calls back.

I want him to call at this time and say this." And I, and I did, by the hands of God, I did. I, I said that, and, and she said, "I'm, uh, if he'll agree that we're going to go to this, uh, Christian seminar and, uh, start, start our life, we're not going to, you know, the mountains of Colorado or Hawaii or anything like that. We're going to go to a Christian seminar, and we're going to start getting into some of this." And, and I, and I had agreed to do that. And so I flew out to, to Southern California, uh, where she was, and we, uh, walked the aisle and got remarried in that same little church where I had found Jesus Christ.

And, but this time, Christ as the Lord of our lives. You know, things didn't change overnight, but we were going in the right direction for the first time in our, in our lives. And I've, I've told other people, even today, you know, marriage is not, you get to this point and it's smooth sailing. I said, "To the day you die, marriage is an uphill journey.

You always have to put effort into it to keep it going, to keep pleasing God, because you're not doing it on your own power. You're doing it by the grace and, and wisdom that God gives you. And the more you understand of Him, the more you've gone through, the more you realize, 'I can't do this stuff anymore.'" You know, I, I hate to admit it, I, I'd had a, a collection of pornography, which in a military, uh, scenario, that's, uh, yeah, that's, that's kind of okay. You know, you kept it to yourself, and, and, you know, alcohol was pretty common, and, and God just said, "That's got to go."

Well, I took it out. Uh, she knows, she remembers, uh, I lit the barbecue, I got some lighter fluid, and I started shredding these things and putting them in that barbecue. Uh, the flames probably have a symbolism there, but those things were going, they were eliminated from my life for good. And, you know, uh, I've been freed from that since that very day. In fact, I see, it's like the consequences of war. I see the damage that that could do in a man's life, just those images when he looks at some of those, and then he looks at his wife, and, and there's a mental comparison between that image and his wife, and she's airbrushed and, and all the right central things.

And, and you look at your wife and see her, you know, maybe when she's sick and things, and that attraction is deadly. And I said, "No more. Is that in my life? Forever, God, that is gone." And I was freed from that. And the Christianity I was, I was learning about was beginning to have real effects on us.