If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

-2 Chronicles 7:15, KJV (emphasis mine)

God does not peddle in cheap grace.

He certainly stands ready to forgive us our sins. Yet He requires that we come to Him humbly and turn from our sins. It is not a free pass to keep sinning after just saying, “Sorry” (see I John 3:9).

This is why I feel most pastors are ill equipped to have a forgiveness conversation with faithful spouses.

They tend to want the relationship to heal without the Cheater ever having to exhibit humility and demonstrating a different behavior. In other words, they offer less than God’s standards for forgiveness. This is bad both for the faithful spouse AND the Cheater!

Cheaters believe they are entitled to forgiveness with no demands upon themselves to change–aka repent–and faithful spouses are left in ongoing–now sanctioned–abuse as I see it as a Chaplain.

Not good!

Instead, we need to have a more robust teaching about God’s forgiveness. He requires us to turn to Him in humility and turn from our sins. After all, how can we be forgiven unless we admit to God that He has something we need? Plus, how can we be forgiven if we haven’t stopped the offending behavior?

The same goes for Cheaters. Forgiveness conversations need to start with this in mind:

Is the Cheater responding in humility? Has their behavior demonstrated a visible change from sin to righteous living?

If no, then it is inappropriate to pressure a faithful spouse to forgive (in fact, I don’t think it is ever appropriate to pressure a victim like this). The most they can do is hand the issue over to God in that case for Him to adjudicate.