“…let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts….”
-Hosea 2:2b, KJV
A Faithful Spouse’s Reasonable Expectation:
The cheater ends the affair(s)–both physical and emotional varieties–and engages in actions demonstrating self-work on the character flaws that led the cheater to betray their partner.
This expectation needs to be made to the faithful spouse’s satisfaction as he or she was the primary one wronged as well as the one risking future violations by staying in the marriage.
Caution: It is not good enough for the cheater to tell the faithful spouse that they have “worked it out” with their bff individual therapist.
Cheaters have been known to report having “worked it out” with their therapist or chosen pastor, which really means that they discussed and agreed how the cheating was really the faithful spouse’s fault (a lie).
In such sad instances, the individual therapist or pastor was won over by the cheater–maybe even months or years in advance–and that is why the cheater did not feel threatened by working it out with this therapist/pastor. No threat existed for the cheater because no accountability exists in that relationship. The cheater knew the therapist/pastor would not challenge them to take full responsibility for the cheating.
Another reason why I emphasize this is to be done to the faithful spouse’s satisfaction–i.e. the faithful spouse is convinced that the cheating is over and the door to further cheating is firmly shut–is that the cheater has lost the benefit of the doubt in this matter.
Just saying that the cheating issues have been “taken care of” is like handing in math homework from a textbook showing no work and only the answers, which were already given in the back of that book. It is lazy and says really nothing about the facts of the matter regarding whether or not the cheating days are over. The cheater must show his work to the faithful spouse!
Further, this expectation ought to be met prior to discussing any flaws the faithful spouse has as such is a pointless discussion while unaddressed infidelity and deception remains to undermine the marriage.
This is not the time for the cheater to give a spousal “improvement” list. The marriage is in immanent danger of dissolution due to the cheater’s infidelity.
In fact, the adultery gives the faithful partner complete freedom not to bother even attempting “reconciliation” if he or she so chooses. The cheater is not even entitled to the opportunity to prove the affair is over forever; he or she is in no place to then to discuss the “flaws” of their victim–i.e. the faithful spouse.
And for clarity’s sake: A threesome is not God’s idea of marriage (e.g. Matthew 19:4-6). The interloper must be expelled, and the door into the marriage union must be closed to outsiders firmly first before any real marriage discussion is attempted. Why bother working on a marriage between two people if what you have is really an unholy threesome?
A pastor or therapist who truly understands what is at stake for the faithful spouse and grasps the true origins of infidelity–namely, as coming out of the cheater’s wicked heart–will treat this basic expectation as reasonable.
That expectation, once again, is:
The cheater ends the affair(s)–both physical and emotional varieties–and engages in actions demonstrating self-work on the character flaws that led the cheater to betray their partner.
*A version of this post ran previously.
