David McElroy

I looked across the table at Nicole’s face. I was intimately familiar with every single bit of her beautiful face. We had dated for several years and we were engaged to be married. But I suddenly saw her as though it was for the first time.

“I can’t marry you,” I thought to myself. “I absolutely can’t marry you. We’re not right for each other.”

I had known this for a long time, but I had been lying to myself. On the surface, Nicole was everything I could want. She was a tall, beautiful and well-educated woman from the Midwest. She had moved to Birmingham because she loved me and wanted a future with me.

I had been lying to myself about her for quite some time. After I broke up with her early in the relationship and she begged me to give us another chance, I relented — even though I knew better. When she told me she wanted to move down here for us to date full time, I didn’t promise her anything, but I also didn’t tell her what I knew — that it wouldn’t work.

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I know things that I should have no way of knowing. I always have.

This is something I rarely admit to others, because I’ve been taught not to trust what I know. We live in an age when bright people learn that the only things to trust are reason and science. We learn that if something can’t be proven, it must not be true.

And yet — I know things. I’m scared to trust them, but I know things.

Science and reason have brought us amazing things. I have no desire to toss them aside. But I also know that I have knowledge and wisdom which come from somewhere else. I admit this with fear of what you’ll think of me, because I know materialists scoff at such irrational thinking. They see it as magical thinking. But something inside you knows the Truth.

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Ellen was sobbing as she told me her story. She was confused. She said she knew she wanted to leave Andrew, but she felt guilty.

“He kept saying how much he loves me,” Ellen said through tears. “Mostly he talked about how much he needs me and counts on me. He said, ‘Can’t you see how much I need you?’ over and over again.”

I’ve heard this story before from Ellen, because she’s gone through this more than once with the man she’s married to. Andrew ignores her and treats her badly. He’s more interested in spending time with his friends than in building any family life with her. He’s disdainful and critical of Ellen, openly mocking her in front of friends and family.

Being treated this way kills Ellen inside.

She married Andrew because he swept her off her feet and he treated her like a queen in the beginning. But his behavior was erratic. He gave her attention when her devotion to him waned, but he pulled away as soon as she was committed again. This happened several times. She broke their engagement once, but Andrew talked her into going ahead with the wedding. He kept telling her how much he needed her — and Ellen found intense comfort in having a man need her that much.

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