The time following infidelity is often very confusing to the sucker-punched faithful spouse. This website was launched as a resource and support for Christian faithful spouses trying to navigate such treacherous waters. It was also started to help pastors and Christian leaders who truly care about faithful spouses during such traumatic times.
What I have often notices is how most Christian resources on these matters are oriented into pressuring faithful spouses into staying in marriages blown up by their cheating spouses. Such pressure comes even without the condition of full and true repentance on the adulterous spouse’s part. It is sickening to see.
This is not Biblical counsel, but humans trying to manipulate and control outcomes best left between God and the faithful spouses. And it is damaging the sheep.
Three major points I will continue to reiterate here on the blog:
1) Adultery is soul rape.
2) Your spouse cheating on you (and/or abandoning you) is not your fault. You do not share in his/her sin. No “Shared Responsibility Lie” promoted here!
3) Worse outcomes exist than going through a divorce. After all, God hates adultery more than divorce!
Each of these messages are very needed in the evangelical world.
The first reminds us that a trauma and victimization has taken place when someone commits adultery against their spouse. It ought to help us understand and empathize with our brothers and sisters who find themselves reeling after such a sucker-punch.
Point two is about correcting worldly wisdom that says infidelity or even ungodly divorce is always caused by both parties in part. This is not Biblical teaching. God is crystal clear in the Bible that sin flows out of the sinner’s heart alone (e.g. Mark 7:20-23). It does not flow out of the marriage but the individual making the choice to sin.
The sort of “wisdom” that blames the marriage and by extension both partners–at least, partially–ends up further victimizing vulnerable faithful spouses and damaging the reputation of Christ as it suggests He approves of such abusive counsel when He does NOT!
The final message is to remind us that holiness and righteousness trump marital status every single day in the eyes of God. Somehow the church has loss sight of this making “intact” marriages the goal over holiness and godly repentance when infidelity has taken place. Priorities are upended when something becomes more important than honoring God even if that something is keeping a marriage together. Some may even call such a stance idolatry.
To be clear, God is willing to end marriages over unrighteousness. In fact, God instructs His people in the Old Testament to end marriages over such sin as adultery (e.g. Deut. 22:22 and Lev. 20:10).
I will continue to “bang the drum” on these themes and messages. They are grounded in Scripture. And they are needed to counteract a destructive subculture shaming faithful spouses and de-emphasizing what God wants emphasized–i.e. holiness, righteousness, and care for the vulnerable victim of injustice and sin.
{{{APPLAUSE APPLAUSE APPLAUSE!!!!!}}} and lots of pom-pom waving!!!
This is in imitation of our Loving God and Father who continued to send prophets to his ‘wife-nation’ over & over! Our Creator is truly a God of loving-kindness, but also one of justice!
YES! So appreciative of your ‘drum-banging’! ‘Tis a ‘joyful noise’!
ForgeOn, dear DM….ForgeOn!
Your voice is, indeed, a rare one in the church. So glad to have found it. I hope others will be encouraged by your words and will find comfort in knowing that God cares for them as a victim of this great sin even when far too many in the church do not.