For Marriage and More — The Hidden Reset Button

The World’s Best Kept Secret 

Mimi and I were in trouble and at my doing. We had just been married, and I had just entered my senior year at Georgia Tech. Mimi — transferring from U. of Ga. — was a new sophomore at Georgia State (like Tech, also in Atlanta). I had been improving on my sagging point average and intended to buckle down after our honeymoon. (We all know about good intentions. The road to you-know-where is paved with ‘em). Our honeymoon was over, but for better or for worse I wasn’t over our honeymoon. Worse, as in: Days went by with me at my desk in a happy honeymoon stupor while my quiz grades got worse. I comforted myself with, Never fear, I’ll pull it out in the end like I always do! But the end never happened. At mid-quarter the unthinkable did. I came down with high fever, chills, and an itchy rash — the measles!

My Predicament

I was kaput. So were my grades after missing ten days of classes. It was over. My zero performance would affect my point average, my graduation, my ROTC appointment, my future, OUR MARRIAGE! — HELP!!!

Sad 

Late one morning — healed but weak — I dragged myself out of our apartment on the edge of campus. The walk to the “Hill” was long where there were offices in which I had never inquired before. How I dreaded the prospect of telling my pitiful story to the people in those offices. I could already see their sympathetic faces and hear their words to match: We’re sorry, Mr. Fulcher, but our policy here at Tech is blah, blah, blah … 

Glad

I went to an official’s window in the lobby of the spacious main office building — the building that lifts high the words Georgia Tech for all Atlanta to see, day and night. The lady smiled kindly as she asked if she could help me. I had no prepared statement so I’m sure my blurted-out story was coming across discombobulated. Suddenly, and with her smile increasing she interrupted me: Mr. Fulcher, we have a policy here at Tech that’s a well-kept secret. You will be happy to know that any student at any time may drop classes for an entire quarter with a clean slate for the quarter — no questions asked. You’re kidding!, I practically screamed. No, I’m not kidding and I’ll take care of that right now if that’s what you want. It struck me at that moment like the best news I’d ever heard other than Mimi saying “I do” just a few days before, and General MacArthur declaring the end of WWII just a few years before — in that order. Hallelujah! I can still see the smile on that woman’s face. She was beautiful! She took care of it, and I ran all the way home.

So What?

You may be — figuratively — where I was in the midst of my predicament. My story is true but it’s meant to be a metaphor — a figure of speech symbolic of something much larger. It could be you feel you’ve messed up your marriage and its useless to try and mend it. Or bigger, you may be feeling you’ve made some bad choices, and along with adverse circumstances to boot you feel this is the bed you’ve made and you’ll just have to lie in it. I’m speaking to anyone who feels their relationship with God is in disarray and it’s affecting your marriage, or education, or business, or your life. There is a way out and it’s a well-kept secret — kept secret for the same reason Ga. Tech’s policy was a secret. It’s too good to be true, so no one guessed that it was. It all has to do with God. I can right now offhand name six or seven top characters in the Bible who discovered God’s secret like I discovered Tech’s secret that day. God calls it grace. It goes like this: If you come to God just as you are, hiding nothing, and give yourself to him, he’ll give you a clean slate and reset your whole life. No questions asked. True, you don’t deserve it. But it’s God’s gift to you. It cost him a lot.

Now What?

Compose a prayer to God. Something like this: My Father in Heaven my life with you is in disarray. It’s not what I want it to be or what you want it to be. So I give it to you right now. Forgive me. Cleanse me and make me into the person you made me to be and want me to be. Thank you, Lord. Amen. Now, click send. God will make good on the transaction. There’s a story in the Bible — a metaphor — of a young man whose life was in disarray with his earthly father whom he had deserted. Though dreading the outcome, he made up a confession to his father. He delivered it in person. His father who was sitting on the front porch when his son started up the driveway was so excited he ran and hugged him before his son could say anything. If you have made up a prayer and sent it, then you are in this Bible story. The son is you. The excited father is God — excited because, though never forcing himself on you, he’s been waiting for you to come home.