December 2004

ARTICLE TOOLS

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Wendy Zoba, a Christianity Today senior writer, reflects on how her life as a pastor's wife ended in divorce just as empty-nest syndrome set in. "One devastating season threw into chaos everything I'd believed … when it came to understanding who I was in this world," she writes.

As she chronicles her emotional, spiritual, and physical anguish, Zoba points to hopeful markers on the journey: learning how to embrace solitude, reading Thomas Merton and Annie Dillard, settling into a new faith community, and coming to realize that "maybe the suffering will end. Maybe, even, happiness will come."

Still floundering, she throws herself into her writing. When pneumonia hits and she can no longer work, the last vestiges of her identity disappear. Zoba then discovers how to live with her wounds during a trip to Assisi in Italy. "I saw in Francis that holy power arises from who we are not; and dependency on God alone covers all we can't do; and if we open ourselves to it (arms wide), surprises await."

Zoba includes a reader's guide for those experiencing their own dark trials.

Copyright © 2004 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

On Broken Legs: A Shattered Life, a Search for God, a Miracle That Met Me in a Cave in Assisi is available from Christianbook.com and other book retailers.

More information is available from the publisher.

Wendy Zoba is editor of God Magazine.