The Big Change - The ‘happy wife’ with a ‘happy lifei

Joseph Smith | 30 July 2007

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My husband worries that people will notice that I am different. I hope that they will.
When I was young I went to Sunday school, did youth group, then I got on with my life. I met Wayne and we had our son Brendan in 1993. When he was six months old I joined the Kids ‘n’ Co play group at St John’s Park (now Smithfield Road). My daughter Taylor was born in 1996.
I enjoyed playgroup and became good friends with Julie Irving, who was one of the leaders from the church that ran the playgroup. When Taylor was about one year old, Julie was talking to some women. She said, “You’ll come too, won’t you, Michelle?” and I said, “Yes OK”, not knowing at the time what she was referring to.
So that’s how I came to do Christianity Explained – by not listening very well.
During one of the sessions God hit me like a ton of bricks. It all made sense. My eyes were opened and my ears could hear. My heart was changed and my eternity was altered. Now that I realised Jesus had died for me and that he loved me, my life would never be the same.
Then the changes came. Firstly, I wanted to get married. Living together with Wayne did not sit well with me now, so we married in September 1999. Wayne is not a Christian but his motto is “happy wife, happy life”.
As life progressed I joined a Bible study group and for several years ran the playgroup. I also ran the PowerPoint for the services on Sunday. My third child, Hayley, was born in November 2001 so I went on a sort of maternity leave from running the playgroup and PowerPoint at church to have a three-month break.
Wayne and I started 2002 with a new baby and the purchase of our first home that we moved into in February.

But then Wayne’s mum died of cancer in July 2002 and my mum died two months later. It was a huge year. I dropped out of Bible study and went to church maybe every second week and didn’t attend anything that was going on.

Then in about 2005 I rejoined a Bible study group. It was nice to be back in community with a small group of women.

Last year I realised I had been a Christian for nine years and had never read the whole Bible. How could I speak with authority about my faith?

I told my Bible study group – just to keep me accountable – that I was going to read nothing else until I read the Bible.

Hayley started school this year and I had mentioned to my Bible study leader and friend, Sonda Mitchell, that I wanted to do something to learn more about the Bible and to understand the people in it, so she suggested a MAC course.

To my horror and surprise I had signed up to do a Diploma of Theology. It was much more than I had imagined, but it was great. We were a group of women of different ages but we all shared a hunger to learn more about God and what Jesus had done for us.

A few weeks ago our children’s minister Craig Thacker rang to ask me if I would like to teach Scripture to the kindergarten children at my daughter’s school. I had all sorts of plans for this year when all three of my children were at school. I was going to go to the gym, do craft, shop, have coffee with friends, play tennis and read all sorts of things. But God had other plans. When I moved closer to Him and listened I found out what God’s plans were for me.

I finished reading the New Testament on February 16, 2007 and was very pleased until I realised that the Old Testament was next. But I am moving through it.

My friends still don’t understand why I want to go to church, study the Bible and teach Scripture. But the more I grow as a Christian, the more I realise that my direction is different from theirs and that our priorities are not the same.

Like I said, Wayne is worried that our friends and people at school will notice that I am different and will somehow single me out. I pray that they will notice what Jesus has done in my life.

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