When God’s Grace Meets AIDS

By Ariel Bauder-Klay

My life was directly impacted by the AIDS crisis when my boyfriend, Tim Bauder, revealed with deep regret that he was HIV positive. I knew I would have to give up having children in order to stay in the relationship. Nevertheless, I married Tim on Aug. 3, 1990.

Our life revolved around church, attending all services as well as retreats and conferences. Tim was an enthusiastic worshipper who played the tambourine with perfect rhythm and was a cheerful financial giver.

This didn’t surprise me, because when we were first dating, Tim wouldn’t fully commit himself to me emotionally until I prayed the sinner’s prayer. Then he told me, “Ariel, I want these words to be lit up like fire in the back of your mind: I love you!”

Thankfully, Tim had no symptoms in 1990 and remained healthy over the next two and a half years. However, he became weaker to the point he was unable to work. Then in the late fall of 1993, he was hospitalized with AIDS for the first time.

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“I led Tim in the same sinner’s prayer I prayed six years before.”

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Unexpected Changes

In the hospital, he did not act like himself. He went from being one of the kindest men I ever knew to becoming downright angry.

One day, I must have been coming back from the cafeteria when I learned he made a confession to my dad. Tim insisted my dad read it aloud. In it, Tim said he didn’t love me, never loved me, and had only wanted to use me.

I was completely confused and heartbroken. I had experienced all kinds of bullying and abusive behavior from others, but never from Tim. With my mind swirling with questions, I fell asleep, only to be jolted awake by the telephone in the middle of the night. At my groggy “Hello?” Tim asked frantically, “How do I get saved?”

I was so out of it that it didn’t occur to me to ask him, “Aren’t you already saved?” Instead, I led Tim in the same sinner’s prayer I prayed six years before. Then Tim immediately sounded relaxed and happily said goodnight.

Well, the Tim I saw the next day was a changed man, a living example of 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come. The old has gone, the new is here!”

Peace and Gratitude

The biggest change I saw in this “new” Tim was peace within him I had never seen before. Even the stroke he just had didn’t faze him. Instead he enthusiastically pushed through garbled speech to describe what I suspect was either a vision or a near-death experience.

“I was i-i-i-in this pi-it and these de-e-e-m-mons, were pull-ing mm-ee d-ow-own!” said Tim with his eyes open wide. “I-I-I sai-aid, ‘N-n-o-o-o! A-and th-th-ey l-l-et m-me go!’ S-s-o I c-call-ed y-you t-to g-get s-saved!”

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“I believe his feelings of shame kept him from accepting the free gift of God’s forgiveness…”

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I must admit I was confused, given that as far as I could tell, Tim was a devout Christian. However, I also know Tim also grew up in a legalistic church and a shame-filled home. All his life, no matter how hard he tried, he never experienced his mother’s unconditional love.

Although he said words of the sinner’s prayer as a boy, I believe his feelings of shame kept him from accepting the free gift of God’s forgiveness through Jesus Christ’s death on the cross, and when Tim was hospitalized, he was shaken by how close he was to death.

This led him to take a hard look at his life, and — in spite of every effort to be a good churchgoing Christian — he realized he had been trying to buy his ticket to heaven with his good works. He realized he was not going to heaven like he thought he had for so many years.

But now Tim was at peace and was eager to share how God had saved him, not just from going to hell, but from shame and self-loathing when he accepted the free gift of Jesus’ forgiveness of Tim’s sins. For the first time, Tim truly knew that the word “us” in Romans 5:8 (“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us”) applied directly to him.

Tim’s gratitude to God for saving him poured out to God and everyone around him, especially to everyone who took care of him, from the hospital staff to the team of us who cared for him at home. He used his experience as a retired caregiver to be as helpful to us as possible. He cooperated with us when dressing and feeding him as well as getting him in and out of the hospital bed and in and out of the wheelchair we used to get him out of the house.

Nevertheless, over the last months we had together before his death, Tim’s grace-filled appreciation allowed us to have the best life possible together. I watched Tim save all his strength so he could be wheeled to church, playing his tambourine with a newly discovered peace-filled joy.

That flood of joyful gratitude made it possible to make the most of what would be our last celebrations of our birthdays, holidays, and anniversary. However, what I remember most was our last embrace days before his death on Feb. 20, 1995. Knowing his time was short, leaning over the bed railing, he squeezed me as tightly as he could as if to say, “Ariel, I want these words to be lit up like fire in the back of your mind: I love you!”

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