Redemption Series: Redemption Part 29

"What if Tim doesn't feel the same way?" Ryan had asked. He hadn't been checking his chances. Rather, he had been amazed at the possibility. He had wanted to know how far she'd carry her commitment, how long she'd wait if her husband no longer loved her and refused to change.

Sorrow had filled Kari's eyes as she answered him, and he was immediately pierced with regret for asking. "I won't give him a divorce, Ryan. I can't."

I can't.

Those two words grieved him most now as he turned left onto the highway and headed home. Their time on the beach together the other night had showed Ryan how she still felt about him. It wasn't that Kari didn't want the life she might have shared with him had they stayed together.

She simply couldn't. Her word, her honor, her relations.h.i.+p to G.o.d, her decision to love-all that meant too much to her to risk throwing away. That was just the kind of person she was.

Suddenly Ryan realized where he needed to be that cold Monday night. He turned his truck around and headed for church. Bible studies met there during the week.

The sanctuary would be open for at least another three hours.

Five minutes later he slipped into a back pew and let his eyes adjust to the partial light. In the distance he could hear the m.u.f.fled sounds of people talking and occasionally laughing. He leaned his forearms on the back of the bench in front of him, hung his head, and tried to understand how he'd made such a mess of things with Kari back when he was playing football.

What's wrong with me, G.o.d? I loved her. Why didn't it work out? In response, Kari's words filled his heart once more. "Love is a decision ... a decision ...

a decision."

If that was true, he should have decided to call Kari every day after his accident, even if he was distracted and worried about 257 his injury. He should have decided to pursue her until his intentions were clear. He should have decided to give his love for her as much priority as he gave his football career.

He thought about the way Kari demonstrated her love to Tim, the way she was willing to stand by him even when a part of her hated the man for what he'd done to her.

Ryan fidgeted, lifted his head, looked around. Maybe G.o.d was trying to teach him something about love. Something Kari had already figured out, but Ryan never quite had.

He thought of his life, the coaching, and time he spent with his family and friends. He was pretty sure those things were spurred by love. But only love as he knew it.

Kari's love-the kind of love that could go back to a man like Tim Jacobs and pray that G.o.d heal their marriage-that love was something altogether different.

He reached for a Bible from the back of the pew in front of him. If love truly was a decision, then right here, right now Ryan wanted to get a better understanding of how that could work. Most people Ryan knew were better versed in Scripture than he was, but even he knew where to find the love chapter. He flipped pages to the thirteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians and began to read.

The first three verses could mean only one thing. Whatever else a person did, whatever other sacrifices or acts of kindness or talents that person demonstrated, the entire sum of them meant nothing if he or she wasn't motivated by love.

That made sense. Ryan kept reading.

Verse four was where it started getting good, giving specific definitions of what love was and what it wasn't. The checklist: love is patient, kind, does not envy, does not boast-shed little new insight at first. But then his eyes ran past something that seemed newly written there that afternoon, as if it were intended for his eyes alone.

Love is not self-seeking.

He leaned back hard against the pew, thrust back to those days when he and Kari were not exactly together, the early days 258 of his football career. She had spent that time waiting for him with a selfless patience. Much as she was now waiting for Tim to come to his senses.

"Wait for me, Kari. When I'm not so busy, I want to be with you. Really."

Ryan felt a leaden anchor settle in his stomach. Had he actually said that to her? The memory of his words tasted bitter, as if they'd never fully digested.

He looked at the verse and read once more the part that said love is not self-seeking. That was it, wasn't it? His love toward Kari had been genuine by worldly standards, but it had been completely self-seeking by G.o.d's.

When I'm not busy, I'll call you, and I'll decide when the time is right? That's really what he had been saying. But why hadn't he realized it before?

Ryan read a few more verses. In his mind, he started ticking off all the things, according to the Scripture, that love did. It always protected ... hoped ...

trusted ... persevered. Persevered. That last word hit him square in the face.

If he had persevered in his love for Kari, he would have asked her why she backed off, why she seemed uninterested in him after his accident.

Perseverance? Ryan stifled a sad chuckle. He hadn't come anywhere close. Sure, Kari could have asked him about the woman in his hospital room. But she had persevered for years before the accident and finally walked away only when it appeared Ryan had given his heart to someone else.

His spirit heavy within him, Ryan read the rest of the chapter and slowed down around verse eleven. A growing sense of hope began to fill his heart as the words soothed away his sorrow and frustration: When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.

That's the difference, he thought. He had been nothing but a child back in his football days-at least in thought and 259 understanding. Now, though, he had a chance to do something he'd never done before.

To love Kari the way G.o.d wanted him to love her. To honor her without any thought for himself.

Tears stung at his eyes as the realization took root, because to love her now after losing all hope of being with her would be more painful than anything Ryan had ever done before. But it would be love. Real love. Grown-up love. After all the years of desiring Kari, of wanting her and believing she'd be his wife one day, Ryan knew there was no time like the present to truly love her.

The way he should have loved her back then.

He didn't have to ask G.o.d what loving Kari would mean now that she had gone back to Tim. The Lord had already whispered the answer to him as clearly as if he were sitting beside Ryan in the cool, empty church.

Without hesitation Ryan eased himself onto his knees, wincing slightly as his left kneecap absorbed his weight. Football, he thought wryly. It had taken the best years of his life, ruined his chances with Kari Baxter, and in return left him with a permanently damaged body.

The Scripture verses on love came back, and he corrected himself. Football hadn't taken those things; his own self-seeking actions had. He exhaled slowly and pictured Kari climbing out of his truck, walking away for the last time.

I still want her, G.o.d ... that's something you'll have to help me with. But right now, please ... please, just give me the strength to love her the way you want me to.

Love her as I have loved you, my son.

Ryan nodded silently, closed his eyes, and did the one thing that proved he had a new understanding of love-a G.o.d-given understanding. With a full and sincere heart he begged the Lord to show Kari and Tim a way to make their marriage work.

Quiet tears slipped down his face as he continued to pray. So this was how painful love could be. Painful enough for Kari to 260 stay in a faithless marriage. Painful enough for him to give up all claim to the woman he loved.

Painful enough for Christ to give his life to save people from their sins.

Ryan slowly shook his head, moved to the core by a new depth of understanding.

So this was love. The kind of love G.o.d had for his people, the kind of love Kari had for Tim.

Ryan stayed there for nearly an hour, ignoring the ache in his heart and his knees as he prayed for Kari's marriage. When he left the church that night, he realized that something deep and profound had happened back in the sanctuary, something that would forever change the way he felt about Kari, but also about his own ability to love.

He thought about the professional coaching offer that had come to him the day before, one that would take him a thousand miles from Bloomington and Kari and the marriage she was trying to save. The offer was a fluke, almost unheard-of for a high school coach, even one who had spent years in the pros. Then again, perhaps it was a divine reprieve, a gift of grace.

The job would require him to relocate in February, well after the football season was over. But at first Ryan had balked. His cabin was here, his ranch, his familiar community. He had deliberately chosen to come back here when he left the Cowboys. It would always be home.

But now ... in light of his commitment to release Kari fully, his leaving Indiana might be the best thing for both of them. A way of ill.u.s.trating a love that was no longer self-seeking.

And as he drove off into the night, the pain within him both deep and rewarding, he knew he was no longer a child when it came to the ways of love.

He was a man.

261.

Kari SLIPPED HER HANDS into the pockets of a brand-new pair of navy twill pants, angled her body expertly, and smiled over her shoulder as a series of camera clicks went off.

Eight days had pa.s.sed since she and Tim had gotten home from the intensive marriage seminar, the one Pastor Mark had told her about. Tim had been eager to go, more than willing to rearrange his cla.s.s schedule for the chance to begin what would be a lifetime of healing between the two of them.

The two days had been amazing. She and Tim had talked intently with the counselors until it was clear what motivated each of them and how they affected each other-their dance, the counselors called it. The things they'd learned about themselves and their relations.h.i.+p in those scant forty-eight hours had been more revealing than all their combined communication with each other to that point.

Forgiveness happens once, the counselors had told them. Healing takes a lifetime.

Kari angled her head and smiled for the camera again. Already she knew with every fiber of her being that she had 262.

made the right choice-a painful choice, but the right one all the same. Pastor Mark had connected them with a counselor whose specialty is with marriages in crisis, and they had seen the man three times before the seminar.

The photographer lowered his camera. "Perfect, Kari, beautiful. Now from the other side."

The genius behind the camera was Henry T. Canistelli, renowned catalog photographer, a man Kari affectionately called Hank. Nearly all of Kari's memorable catalog work had come from his hands.

Kari s.h.i.+fted and produced another smile.

"Kari, baby, the camera loves that face. Give it to me over the shoulder."

It felt good to get back to work. The staff at the modeling agency was grateful that whatever issues had caused her to need a break were apparently resolved.

"We'll work you full body until you're showing; then we'll do maternity spreads and face work," her agent told her. "I can keep you busy until you go into labor."

The current job was a six-hour shoot at a desirable studio in Indianapolis.

Despite the hot lights and the demand to look flawless, it was mindless work.

Studio work always was. Outdoor shoots were something else entirely-keeping bugs from being attracted to her hair spray, working with natural lighting and weather conditions, freezing in the winter and sweltering in the summer-and trying to look good through all of it.

With all she had on her mind these days, she was grateful her agent had lined up six consecutive studio jobs. She'd get through those, then take another break for the holidays.

"That's the way, Kari." Hank grinned at her over the top of his camera. He was thirty years her senior, with a New York accent thicker than fog. "Perfect.

Let's try the other shoulder. The friendly-young-mother look you're so good at."

She turned her back to him and glanced over the shoulder as if 263 she were looking back at a trail of children or smiling at a best friend's joke. After Hank finished clicking, Kari relaxed. "It's all you, Hank. I just show up. You make the magic."

Hank adjusted a French beret on his head and chuckled. "You got that wrong, pretty girl. I've worked the business for years, and talent like yours doesn't come along often. Wife, lover, friend, girl-next-door, you name it. Any look you want and ageless beauty to boot-that's what you've got."

Kari laughed, enjoying the easy banter she and Hank always shared. "Well, then, I guess I better thank the good-"

Hank held up his hand and interrupted her. "I know, I know-" he raised his tone in friendly imitation-"'I better thank the good Lord because he made me look like this and I wouldn't be nothin' without him."' Hank nodded his head patiently, as if he'd heard the explanation a hundred times. "Well, you never know, kid. Maybe there's something to that faith of yours." He wiggled his fingers in her direction as if he were casting a spell. "Maybe that explains the unearthly sparkle in your eyes." He shrugged. "Whatever it is, if you could bottle it, you'd make millions."

In response Kari merely smiled and pointed heavenward. Hank's view of G.o.d was jaded at best, but Kari figured she was in his life for a reason-even if only a few times a month at photo shoots. Besides, she couldn't help but like him.

Five more outfits needed to be photographed. Kari gathered up the next one and headed toward the dressing room.

While she was changing, she thought about the second day at the marriage seminar, the day the breakthrough had happened.

"It comes down to your fears," one of the counselors had explained. "When a relations.h.i.+p isn't working, fears are usually the base of the trouble."

He asked them to think about their greatest fears regarding each other, and after five minutes of silence, tears had filled Tim's eyes. He looked at the counselor and swallowed hard.

264 "She loved Ryan Taylor before she loved me. How was I supposed to measure up to that?"

"So what's your fear?" the counselor asked Tim, his voice tender, quiet. Even before Tim could answer, Kari felt a new sense of understanding wash over her.

"I guess-" he s.h.i.+fted his gaze to Kari-"I guess I always thought I wasn't good enough for you. I thought you deserved someone better."

The woman counselor interjected. "And what about you, Kari? What is your deepest fear where Tim is concerned?"

Kari remembered the way Tim's friends had responded to her at the faculty party.

The answer was simple. "I was afraid I wasn't smart enough."

They talked about coping behaviors and how people always responded to their fears one way or another. In this case, Tim had coped by spending time with a woman who appreciated his intelligence. Kari, though, had handled her fear by withdrawing from Tim and busying herself with activities that made her feel competent.

"So you see the dance," the male counselor said to Tim. "The busier Kari became, the deeper your sense of rejection grew, and the more attracted you were to the other woman. It was a dance in which the steps took you farther apart every day."

Tim and Kari had stared at each other, amazed at the aptness of the counselor's description.

"At this point in your marriage," the counselor went on, "there are three anchors available to you, anchors that-if you choose to use them-will keep your marriage from destruction. If you choose to ignore these anchors, you probably can't expect your marriage to survive."

Tim took her hand while the man spoke. Though she still had feelings of doubt and anger and moments when her heart wanted to think about Ryan, the feel of her hand in Tim's was more comforting than she had expected.

The counselor turned his attention to Tim. "First, because of 265 your tendency to binge drink, you should give up any form of alcohol completely."

"I tried that."

"Now that we're making it part of your counseling, if you can't stop on your own, you need to check out one of the Christian treatment programs. We'll give you a list."

He barely paused, but s.h.i.+fted his gaze to include Kari. "Second, you should be completely faithful to each other, both emotionally and physically."

"And most important of all," the woman counselor interjected, "you should both commit to understanding your individual fears and changing the way you cope. And that means the "d-word" -divorce- should not be included in your vocabulary."

The male counselor, nodded. "Remember, each of these anchors is up to you. By making these choices, you will be able to change the steps to your dance and work toward healing."