Day 16 Dealing with Adultery

Day 16
Dealing with Adultery...

but first a few Restored Marriage Testimonies

 

Restoration after Crisis in Florida

When a young woman began to read in the book the account of Peter being asked to get out of the boat and walk toward our Lord, she realized that she, too, was asked to walk on water. Her husband had just left her. She didn’t know where he was. When she finally heard from him, he then called regularly to speak to the children, but refused to talk to her. As she searched for someone to help her and give her the hope she needed, all said the same thing: “Move on. Your marriage is hopeless. He’s happy where he is.”

She began to read and meditate on the Scriptures in her book. She found the Scriptures that showed she had violated MANY principles in her marriage. Then she learned about God’s presence in the storms she was experiencing. All this helped her to believe that nothing was impossible for God—not even her broken marriage! She began applying the principles found in How God Can and Will Restore Your Marriage. However, things didn’t get any better with her husband. He didn’t seem to care or even notice the changes God was making in her.

After a year of believing for her marriage, she prayed for just one other person to help her make it through. God brought a woman into her life who was also believing for her marriage. Together they began applying the principles found in How God Can and Will Restore Your Marriage.

However, both women’s trials became worse the more they shared the principles in the book with others they met and the more they prayed. A major crisis hit when her husband moved close by to see the children; he secretly brought the adulterous woman to live with him. Then, without any warning, her husband divorced her! Still determined, she applied the principles found in the RYM book even more.

The victory finally came as her husband finally sent the other woman packing and returned home. This woman gives “God the glory for His grace that helped her.” He taught her to keep her eyes on the Lord rather than looking at her hopeless circumstances.

~Teri in Florida, RESTORED

Marriage Restored after SEVEN Years of Separation!!

A woman wrote that she ordered several “sets” of books from us to give out to those she met in marital crisis. She says she noticed something wonderful: that ALL those who “read and applied” QUICKLY got out of their marital troubles!!! Her most recent praise report was of a broken marriage that was just restored after SEVEN YEARS OF SEPARATION!! She wrote, “Praise the Lord, again, and thank you for this ministry!” Then a few weeks later we got HER Restored Marriage Testimony!

~Polly in Wisconsin, RESTORED

I'm Restored and have a New Baby too!

I have to share my story — it is a perfect miracle from God!! My husband told me he wanted a divorce; then only one month later, I discovered I was pregnant with our first child! I gave my husband the news, but it did not change his feelings. I was asked to move out of our home ten days later. I requested prayer for my situation from a fellow Christian in the same situation who told me that I needed to get a copy of Erin's book on marriage restoration. I was so desperate I carried the book everywhere and read it whenever I had a spare moment! The promises God has given us in His Word that I found in that book gave me more comfort than I can explain. 

Knowing what this book did for me, I began buying them and giving them out to everyone who I heard were in marriage crisis. I kept hearing about how their marriages were restored, so why not mine. Following the book, I didn't speak with my husband for several weeks and then one day he called and said he had quit his job. That meant I was no longer covered under his insurance anymore and I was 4 months pregnant!

Then only three months later, in my seventh month, my husband asked me to reconcile our marriage. I prayed it would happen, but didn't realize it would be so soon! Now I back in our home and we have a beautiful 3-month-old son. We have so many blessings in our life it brings tears to my eyes when I think of them. I am a blessed woman and will forever be humbled by my Lord's power and for the woman who reached out to me and gave me hope.

~Nina in Nevada, RESTORED

 

Dealing with Adultery

Almost every woman who comes to us seeking help is trying to come to grips with her husband’s adultery.

The world has all kinds of remedies to deal with it: foolish things like finding someone new (to make their husband jealous), or trying to seduce him into being faithful to her.

Some marriage ministries believe that chasing husbands are the way, only to find that he has erected what we've come to call a "hate wall."

NO solution that originates with man can ever help—but in fact, will make and has made things much worse.

The reason is, just as in the field of medicine, they often do not seek the source. They don’t try to find out what is at the root and find out what caused this malady or difficulty. Instead the so-called "experts" focus on dealing with the symptom—not the cause.

What is at the source of my husband’s adultery?

Well, because your life is on the line I need to be completely honest and blunt. I will simply tell you the absolute truth. It is due to your adultery.

So now you’re saying (or screaming): MY adultery!?!?!?! Are you kidding??? I have been faithful to my husband!!!!

Actually, no: No you haven’t.

The truth is, you have been unfaithful to your Bridegroom. As soon as you chose Jesus as your Savior, you were called to be His Bride. A Bride that He has promised to come back for when God says it’s time. However, while you wait, He asked you to be FAITHFUL to Him—He expects to be your FIRST love!

“But I have this against you, that you have left your first love”—Revelation 2:4

As soon as He saw your unfaithfulness begin in your heart—that’s when the trouble began to brew in your marriage. And no matter how many troubles you had, you still chose to focus on your relationship with your earthly husband— not on Him.

“For the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His”—2 Chronicles 16:9

That’s when He realized He had to turn the other man’s heart (your earthly husband) away from you!

“The king’s heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He wishes”—Proverbs 21:1

And instead of turning back to the Lord, making HIM FIRST, instead you slapped Him in the face and you longed for your husband and not Him.

That’s when He realized He would need to remove your husband (even more) out of your life, so He can be FIRST.

“You have removed lover and friend far from me”—Psalm 88:18

“You have removed my acquaintances far from me; You have made me an object of loathing to them; I am shut up and cannot go out”—Psalm 88:8

Most of you are shut up and imprisoned with pain, with no one who understands. The question is: Did God take your husband away just to be mean?

No, He did it because He loves you. He knows that no one could ever LOVE you like HE does, and that finding someone else to take His place in your life, making them FIRST in your heart (like your husband or ex), makes you vulnerable to being mistreated: used and abused.

Even though He has already removed your lover, the man who has captivated you, you continue to pine after and yearn for your other lover and NOT the Lord. To help you understand His plan for your life read Hosea 2:7:

“She will pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them; and she will seek them, but will not find them. Then she will say, ‘I will go back to my first Husband, for it was better for me then than now!’”

The moment, the instant that the Lord knows you can be FAITHFUL to Him ONLY, only then will He be free to give you the desires of your heart, which right now is your husband.

“Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart”—Psalm 37:4

What is even more interesting, though, is this—when the moment finally happens, your husband will not be the desire of your heart—the Lord will!

If you ever took time to really look intently at the Restored Marriage Testimonies, you will notice one common gold thread that runs through everyone of them. Each woman fell in love with the Lord and as a result— restoration, their husband, and everything else no longer mattered—everything was added to her life!

"But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and ALL these things will be added to you"—Matthew 6:33

In my own Restored Marriage Testimony I share how I actually tried to negotiate with God to leave things as they were. I had never been more content and joyful in all of my life! And just so you can grasp the full impact of me asking God to “leave things just as they are”—my four children and I were living on food stamps. We lived in a run down townhouse and we slept on mattresses on the floor. We kept the few clothes we had in a plastic baskets. At the same time, I had no idea if our previous possessions still existed (like all my children’s baby pictures, furniture, kitchen items, all our clothes, everything we owned) since my husband had cleaned out our house while the children and I were on vacation visiting my parents. Prior to this we lived in a Country Club with a huge home!

Yet there I was pleading with the Lord to "keep things the same." Once I found and experienced Him as my Husband, there was nothing I wanted more than what I had with Him. And I knew that the only way I could ever live “happily ever after” was if things would remain the same. I asked Him to allow no one (meaning my husband) to ever come between what the Lord and I had going.

Nevertheless, once my heart came to this place of resting in Him, content in His love until it overflowed, I also could sense that He was about to return my husband home to me! I knew that this was HIS will for me. And that meant to take up that cross and follow Him. There were no signs like people normally would mean he was close to returning home. Actually it honestly "looked" like it was as if he was content where he was and would never come back. Even the day he was packing up the other woman to head back to where she came from, he was still aloof and I had no idea what was going on. But God knew and due to me being so close to Him, He basically told me in my heart that I was about be be restored. But when I knew it was about to happen, I simply didn't want it.

Since I felt like this, are you wondering if I ever “really” wanted my husband back and my marriage restored?

Of course!! In the beginning I was just where you may be now! I thought I would die. I actually thought I was dying because I didn’t think dying could hurt as much as what I was feeling! Now I realize it was more due to FEAR than anything. All the pain, that day, was due to fear. This is the way I felt in the beginning, but slowly, and surely the MORE I got of Him, the less I hurt. Then the more I got the more joy I began to have, the more peace I experienced, to the point that I never wanted my Restoration Journey to end—because I didn't want to lose or compromise what I had with HIM!

Compared to the hundreds who come to us for help, only a few women ever come to this place of feeling like this with the Lord. And those are the very same women who submit a Restored Marriage testimonies. And I am sure from where you are right now, it may seem hard or even impossible to believe, but many women fall in love with the Lord to the point that they even choose NOT to restore their marriage.

Yes, that’s right. The Lord turns their husband’s heart back to them, knowing that He has secured the love He lost from His Bride. But when they write to let me know how they feel, I tell them that it’s not about what WE want or what will make US happy. “His will” is how Jesus taught us to pray, and how He prayed and how HE LIVED!

“Your kingdom come. Your will be done”—Matthew 6:10

True, the Bible does say that we do have a choice. Many people may have told you that you have a choice, but unfortunately the choices they say you have, are not Biblical choices.

They may say you have a choice to divorce your husband due to adultery. But now that you've read the Restore Your Marriage you know the truth. You read the original translation in Greek and that  those verses concerning adultery and fornication are not interchangeable. So now you know that adultery is not grounds for divorce. You cannot divorce your husband because divorce was allowed for the sake of fornication (prior to marriage) not afterwards, which is true adultery.

People, even pastors, may also say that you have the choice to remarry, but I am here to set the record straight—that is not allowed anywhere unless your husband dies.

“So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man”—Romans 7:3

How do I know for sure?

Well, with the pain and the mess I had when my husband left me and our four young children, then to add to all of this I was given very bad advice. I heard from the “experts” junk like tough love that led to so many complicated consequences because I following their foolishness! This caused me (and my children) to end up living in poverty! That's when I knew I could TRUST only ONE source. It’s at that point in my life when I began to pore over the Bible to find ALL my answers, answers that I knew wouldn’t fail me or lead me into more destruction!

And believe me, IF there was an “escape clause” by gosh I would have found it!!! Because, guess what? I WAS looking for one! Like you, I wanted out of the pain and mess and shame that I was living through with my children! I certainly searched long and hard to find it. I really did. Yet all I did find, however, as I said, was if the husband dies verse in Romans 7:3.

So this pushed me over the brink when I began to wish that instead of my husband showing up (when he disappeared for almost four months after I already caught him in adultery) that instead he would be found dead.

Shocking, I know! But I wouldn’t be honest with you if I didn’t tell you that this is really how I felt. I thought it would be so much easier, less humiliating, and then I would have Biblical grounds to find the right husband for me— and a new father for my children. Yet even with that kind of a heart...

Guess what?

While I was seeking God for a kind and loving husband AND a good father for my children; guess what? That's what I did find— I FOUND the right Husband. I did find the right Father for my children. And little did I know that He had been pursuing me, ME, for years. He knew me through and through. Everything: Every good thing I did and even the bad things—yet He loved me anyway!

How does it feel to be loved like that?

If you’ve ever gotten a hug from someone, but felt nothing inside. When the Lord hugs you, it’s the exact opposite. It’s like you FEEL it on the inside like nothing you could have ever FELT before—nothing you could ever imagine!

I found LOVE. True love at last. And once I did find my one true love, I know longer needed my husband. I no longer felt I “needed” anything. I was full to overflowing!

And this puts you in a very interesting place in your life. One of the most amazing things is that when you are no longer needy, you are no longer vulnerable to being hurt by others. You are no longer vulnerable to being used or abused by anyone. And the other thing is that you find that once you are no longer pursing—you become the pursued.

This dear reader is WHY the Lord wants you to find Him and His love. He wants to give you everything!!!

Once my husband could see that I was not at all interested in him, he became interested in me! One day he actually confronted me, accusing me of seeing someone, saying he knew I was “in love.” How ironic because for months he told me to find someone else! The reason is that men can tell when a woman “his woman” is "in love" with someone else. She glows. And when a woman stops pursuing, she begins being pursued.

A man can also tell if a woman says she is not interested, but IS interested, and then he uses it to his advantage. He will mistreat and misuse any woman he knows is nuts about him.

Ah, finally, I was no longer the one waiting by the phone for his call. No longer was the I the one who rearrange my life to center around him, like when my husband came to visit. Instead, if something came up that I thought would be nice for the children and/or me, we went or I went. My life began again, instead of being “on hold” hoping, wishing and praying for my husband to call or stop by. The pain was gone and I was a peace and had a joy I never knew existed.

My circumstances NEVER changed, not one bit. When we were poor, we still slept on mattresses, we still got fed with food stamps—yet we were happier than we ever were in our lives! And my grown children to this day still speak of the memories from these two years as the happiest in their lives too!

Why has my life been so different than what you just shared? 

 

Read the verse below and see if you can relate to the top portion. Then read the rest to see what the Lord wants for you—if you will simply return and become faithful (in your heart) to Him!

“Why has my pain been perpetual 
And my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? 
Will You indeed be to me like a deceptive stream 
With water that is unreliable?

NOW read the rest to see what the Lord has for you...

  

“Therefore, thus says the LORD, 
‘If you return, then I will restore you— 
Before Me you will stand; 
And if you extract the precious from the worthless, 
You will become My spokesman. 
They for their part may turn to you, 
But as for you, you must not turn to them.

“‘Then I will make you to this people 
A fortified wall of bronze; 
And though they fight against you, 
They will not prevail over you; 
For I am with you to save you 
And deliver you,’ declares the LORD”

—Jeremiah 15:18-20

So now you know WHY your pain has been perpetual, ongoing without relief. And why even going to the Lord seemed to be like "a deceptive stream of water" because you had NOT FULLY turned your heart back to the Lord—making Him first in your heart, mind and soul!

Yet, did you see when you choose to turn back to Him completely?!?!

Only THEN will He restore you! And the part about "extracting what’s precious from what’s worthless" well, that part took me a while to figure out—yet it was so easy once I got it. Do you want a hint?

Anything apart from pursuit of Him is worthless!

Again the key is you NOT turning to anyone for help or comfort or any other “need” you have—including love and/or affection from your husband. And that includes turning to us, our ministry, for guidance. The Lord must be your “everything”— only then will you attain everything!! And if you really think about it, who else do you really want to trust with your future?!? What about trusting your children's future?

How Can I Control My Feelings God put in Me?

We have had women ask: "What I don't understand is how a person can control their feelings, as God instilled the "longing for our husbands" as part of our punishment for sinning by eating the apple, this along with childbearing pain.

How can He be offended by our longing, when He himself put it in us? I understand our earthly husbands can't be more important than Him."

The key to this answer is nestled in the question.: It was one of the curses that God administered to all women after Eve sinned,  "Because you have done this, Cursed are you... I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth, in pain you will bring forth children; Yet your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you"—Genesis 3:14,16

This is the Old Testament, but PRAISE GOD when Jesus died we were FREED from the curse and set free from the Law as it says in Galatians 3:13 "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us." Women have even been set free from the pain of childbirth! I have personally  met women and read dozens of testimonies of pain-free labor and delivery!

As far as a husband ruling over us, YES, we are even set free from the "law" on that as well. Instead, we are able to choose to "submit." Any longing may be something that is inborn, just as many "natural" urges are. But like the sexual urge men have (that is far stronger than those a woman experiences), a Godly man needs to give those urges over to God, and not excuse what comes naturally but instead he should live freely by the spirit.

"So that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit"—Romans 8:4-5.

What about Me "MOVING ON"

There are probably a LOT of people encouraging you to “move on”—even your husband may have told you to move on just like my husband kept telling me. Now believe it or not, I agree with these people and so should you!

Yet NOT exactly the way they mean to "move on." When they encouraging you to move on, they mean go find some new guy, which again, I have to say I agree with too!

Yet... what I do NOT agree with is their choice for you. You do NOT deserve to settle for anything but the BEST. And the Lord is the Best Husband you could ever dream of having!! 

“‘For YOUR husband is your Maker, whose name is the Lord of hosts; for the Lord has called you, like a wife forsaken and grieved in spirit, even a wife of one’s youth when she is rejected,’ says your God”—Isaiah 54:4–6

*The Lord will ANSWER you and be there when you call, day or night.

“From my distress I called upon the LORD; The LORD answered me and set me in a large [safe] place”—Psalm 118:5

*The Lord will COMFORT you, so you will FEEL it from the top of your head to the tips of your toes.

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God”—2 Corinthians 1:3-4 

*The Lord will PROVIDE for you.

“And my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus”—Philippians 4:19

*The Lord will be a FATHER to your children. You no longer will be a “single mom” because…

He is “A father of the fatherless”—Psalm 68:5

Were you forsaken? Were you grieved? Where you rejected? Then the Lord IS your Husband and wants to fulfill His role in your life. He wants to answer you, care for you, comfort you, provide for you, and protect you from everything you are living through right now! He wants to be an amazing Father to your children—far better than any mortal man every could!

Be AGREEABLE

How freeing it will be to be able to LET GO and MOVE on with your life! Now that you know you are being pursued by the most Amazing MAN who ever walked the face of this earth, you can be joyful again!

Promise yourself and God that the next time your friends or family members tell you that you deserve someone better, AGREE with them!

“AGREE with your adversary quickly, while you are on the way with him, lest your adversary deliver you to the judge, the judge hand you over to the officer, and you be thrown into prison”—Matthew 5:25 NKJV 

When they tell you to MOVE ON, AGREE and then begin to tell them that you have!

And if they suggest some guy, here is what I did. I simply replied, “Right now I need time for myself, time to heal, time to really find out what is best for me and my children."

Just about everyone in the world buys into the all about “me” focus and will quickly AGREE with you!!

CONSEQUENCES

And not that you want to share this with them, as a matter of fact, please DON'T because it will only make them push you more. But between us, let me be completely honest. For those of you who have been tempted to find some new guy. I want you to know the other reason you don’t need anyone new right now (not even your husband coming back) is because it will only complicate your life and make it much worse than it is now!

First, let's talk about your husband coming back too soon. If you haven't fully changed, neither will your marriage. So soon you will be right back here and things will have gotten MUCH WORSE. We see it all the time. Change takes time. Give it time and continue on your Restoration Journey. Traveling spiritually is very much how a trip around the world makes you feel or visiting other countries—you'll be different.

Now let's talk about these women who literally succumb to temptation and move on. Sadly, that’s exactly where some women find themselves: waking up next to some guy (a guy who is NOT their husband) and are wondering what they’ve done—how they got there!!

Some find themselves in physically adultery and often the guilt eats them alive. They give up on ever finding happiness due to guilt. Others think that if they make their adultery “legal” by marrying the guy, it will make things better. However, the new "marriage" comes with its own set of complications, misery and pain!

Though this has not personally happened to me (yet only by the grace of God) it has happened to a few of my dearest friends. One dear friend couldn’t bear to tell me for years that she got remarried because she thought that she would lose me as a friend! Bah, humbug! A true friend loves at all times Proverbs 17:17 tells us that! However, for the record, if ever I have a friend who wants me to agree with what I know is not right, a friend is no friend at all if she is an accomplice to sin. Something she knows will injure her friend. 

Yet once the truth came out about this dear friend's remarriage, and I was able to fully convince her of my love for her, that's when she began to open up and let me know what a horrible mess she had made. She, and my other friend, told me basically the very same thing, said they were married to kind men (though I also have heard horror stories that you will read later in these lessons). The problem was they each knew they really could never love these new husbands they married. At the same time they felt unfaithful to their previous husbands, and because these new husbands were kind, they couldn’t bear to even suggest that they wanted out of the marriage!

One told me that on her honeymoon she heard that her ex-husband had broken up with the OW and had been looking for her!!! At the exact same time she became involved in the relationship with her new husband, the enemy knew it and brought someone into her life in order to make sure he could steal what he saw was up ahead—restoration!

Also, may I say that for many of you whose husbands have either remarried or are deeply involved with other women, that your husbands are probably feeling the same way? I heard this first hand from my own husband when he returned home, and so have most of the other women who have experienced a restored marriage—their husbands told them the same thing. That even while appearing happy, they were secretly longing to come back home. But before you begin longing for that husband again and will end up with nothing, let’s get…

Back to YOUR ADULTERY

Dear friend. From this moment on I want you to understand something. Each time you long for your husband, because you are one-flesh, your husband is longing for the OW (other woman) even more.

Each time you think of your husband instead of the Lord, your husband is thinking of the OW.

Each time you want to call your husband, your husband is picking up his cell phone to call or text her—the OW. However, when you long for the LORD your husband will begin to LONG for you!

If you continue in emotional and spiritual adultery, with your husband as your first love, your husband’s first love will not be you—but the OW.

How can you change that?

How can you possibly let go of someone you care so much for; someone you want so much?

Well, if your husband came to you and asked YOU the very same thing about the woman he was involved with, what would you say?

What solution would you give him?

Whatever it is might just be the place where you should start.