I was adopted at nine years old into a professing older couple’s home. I went there when I was seven years old, as a foster child. It was an extremely strict home. We couldn’t say “underwear” or talk about anything. I didn’t even know about menstruation. My mom refused for me to attend Sex-Education in school. I literally knew nothing. I got pregnant right out of high school with a professing boy and was told to get married.
I knew on my wedding day that I was making the biggest mistake of my life when I married Jason Lennox. I was pregnant though, and everyone said I had to get married. I was already isolated from everyone. He was verbally and emotionally abusive to all of us and physically to our kids.
We adopted my sister’s daughter (my niece) when she was 4. Jason sexually abused her from age 4 to 11. She didn’t tell me about the sexual abuse until 2017 when she was 15.
In 2012, and after 18 years of marriage, I was finally strong enough to leave my husband. I was pretty sure I was going to be able to move into an apartment I had applied for. We hosted the union meeting, so I asked to meet with the sister workers.
Karen Flood and Lily Kirschvink came. Jason admitted he had done some things abusive. The workers slapped him on the hand basically, and then they attacked me. Lily mainly, saying that a separation wasn’t biblical, and that I shouldn’t hang out with my work friends—which I hadn’t been.
We had put one son in club football because he got in for free because they needed one more player. Jason even wished that he had spoken up and defended me. On their way out the door, they strongly discouraged me from getting an apartment. We told them that we would only be able to go to every other Sunday gospel meeting because gas was high. We had a Suburban, and meeting was two hours away.
The next Sunday gospel meeting, Lily spoke about our conversation. She said that a separation is “the work of the devil.” That if we can put kids in sports, then we can afford to make it to gospel meeting. LOL!
They asked for another visit. I told them that I got the apartment and would be moving out. They said again that it was the worst thing possible for my kids, and that I was going to Hell.
For two years—until I finally divorced him—Jason would use their words against me. He’d cry and beg me to come back. He would threaten me into going back. He said that everyone would know we were separated. I said I didn’t care. I wasn’t pretending anymore.
After I left Jason, two different sets of workers came to visit me and said that remarriage wasn’t biblical, and that they were worried about me. I told them remarriage was the last thing on my mind. Right then, I didn’t know if I even wanted to live. I had had a mental breakdown in 2012 around the time I left Jason after we met with the workers, and another in 2017-2018 when I learned about the sexual abuse of our daughter. I also had shingles several times.
Five years after I left him, Jason was arrested for Child Sexual Abuse. He’s currently serving a 15 year term in prison that began in 2018—no getting out early. I am fearful for our lives when he gets out.
I’m glad I followed my heart and did what God had told me to do.
By Donna (Hogdson) Lennox
June 2023
WINGS report for Jason Lennox:
https://wingsfortruth.info/2023/04/10/jason-lennox-arizona/