Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. – Hebrews 13:4, ESV
When you are drowning, you often go to desperate measures to stay afloat. I am a knowledge junkie. So, I turned to reading to improve myself as well as figure out what was happening in my first marriage. So, I read somewhere around 20 books with other non-book materials while launching my current professional career all within less than a year period! I look back on this time wondering how I made it (God’s grace of course).
For anyone doing even minimal research online or in the literature about affairs, I am sure you have run into the categorization of them. In particular, I suspect you have heard of “The Exit Affair.” It is the category used to label an affair occurring as an exit strategy from a troubled marriage.
I hate this label:
“The Exit Affair”
It minimizes what has taken place, and it strikes me as a subtle blame-shift where a “bad” marriage is almost viewed as a cause (as opposed to the sin in the adulterous spouse’s heart). Furthermore, the adultery is viewed as almost a noble act by using this label. It was the coup de grâce that merely ended the miserable marriage. Such a perspective is wicked.
It was adultery.
Scripture does not give us categories for adultery. It just calls adultery, adultery. And Scripture strictly prohibits such behavior (see the Ten Commandments!).
Sinning is never noble. It is treason towards God. And when it comes to adultery, it is treachery towards one’s spouse.
It’s not an “exit affair.”
It’s adultery.
Also known as sin.
Oh, I agree it is adultery. But, the current affair my husband is in is definitely an exit affair. He is using her as the crutch to transition to where he believes he is entitled to next. She is merely the current means to his self serving end. To label his current relationship as anything remotely similar to a loving, mutually respectful and Godly relationship is either ignorance steeped in trauma wounds or folly.
When someone brings up exit affair, they are also implying they don t see the situation lasting. It is a chicken s way of saying, “they ll get theirs” in this politically correct world. What these folks miss is, they are right not to be judge and jury. That s God s role. That doesn t mean as brothers in sisters in Christ we renege on our responsibilities to fortify each other in our walks with The Lord.
The proper response to someone referring to the exit affair as such, I believe, is to say: “I love how incredibly precise the English language is. If it looks like, smells like, walks like and tastes like something, there is a specific descriptive noun for it. In this case, I believe you just paraphrased adultery.”
Funny how a troubled person likes to call it a troubled marriage. My husband said our marriage was broken when it was clear the he was broken. Just more whispers from the master deceiver.