The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18
Because of the pervasive nature of sexual sin, I am writing a new book on the topic. It is for those who have been sinned against by a spouse who views pornography, has had an emotional affair or a physical affair. I began thinking about this book several years ago and because I have had so many counselee's whose husbands have been caught up in some form of sexual sin I thought I would take the wealth of their combined experience and put it together to help others.
What I want you to know is that it was not your fault- you didn't make him do anything
Despite anything that has been said to you, what your spouse
did was not your fault, it was his own decision.
Unless someone held a gun to his head, what your husband did was
of his own volition.
He had a lust or desire of the heart that was not
fulfilled. The lust or desire was most
likely illegitimate meaning it was not based in Scripture or was selfish and
self-serving. You must believe that if it was not “her” it would have
been someone else, because this sexual sin is a HEART issue.
I cannot and will not say that you as his wife had no
culpability whatsoever, because I don’t know that. There are some marriages that are void of any
sexual contact; the couple lives together, sleeps together, spend time
together, but there is no sexual intimacy.
This is a violation 1 Cor. 7, which clearly states that
married couples are to engage in sexual intimacy for precisely this reason! Men
and women were wired for sex in the confines of marriage. Paul specifically says we are not to withhold our bodies
from our spouse, in fact he says that when you marry your body no longer
belongs to you, but to your husband or wife. When sex is withheld in marriage it provides the occasion
for sin. It is sin in the thought life,
wandering thoughts that lead to wandering hands and wandering bodies.
I would like to lay the blame squarely that the feet of
Satan, but I cannot do that. Jer. 17:9
says that the heart is deceptive, and desperately wicked. So wicked in fact
that we cannot and do not know the depths of the depravity that lives
there. So wicked and so deceptive that
we can rationalize our sinful desires and be lulled into thinking that our sin
is justified, “Because she would not….” or “Because I don’t feel….” and “God surely does not want me to live this
way…”
I cannot say that you as the offended spouse have not been
selfish, greedy, self-pitying, hateful or cruel to your husband. You have
to examine your life, and ask God’s help in examining your own heart to
determine what sin you have contributed to taking the marriage to this point of
brokenness.
Again, what your spouse did is not your fault; he is completely responsible for his own actions. You are responsible for
yours. At some point you must be willing to confess
your sin to your spouse and ask his forgiveness for the sin that you have
committed against him in the marriage. You must determine to change the areas of your life that are
problematic. Not change that makes you
happy or your spouse happy, but change that glorifies God and further
identifies you as His child.
It is also possible that you have had a great marriage. It is possible that you and your spouse have
had a great relationship that includes communication, companionship and an
agreeable amount of sex that pleases both of you. Like any relationship, yours has had its ups
and downs but overall you thought your marriage was impervious to this sort of
thing. The revelation of sexual sin has
completely blown you away.
You cannot comprehend the reality that your husband has
been involved in sexual sin. You did not see the signs; you did not see this
coming. What you saw was a bright future ahead which you now realize was an
oncoming train that has run you over.
You want to believe it was a mistake, a foolish and stupid
mistake. A lapse in judgment or something he did in a moment of
thoughtlessness or drunkenness or something, anything other than what it truly is. You want to believe him when he says, “It meant/means nothing.”
The hard thing to accept is that no
matter what he says, he truly wanted this on some level, because sexual
sin is a heart issue, and reveals the contents of the inner man. This is incredibly difficult to wrap your mind
around and accept for some people. It is
sometimes even difficult for the offending adulterous person to accept.
Because we are so adept at lying to ourselves, and
rationalizing and justifying our behavior it is very easy to overlook this
truth: sexual sin is never an accident. A person cannot accidentally have sexual relations
with another person, a car doesn't have auto pilot that drives the owner to the
porn store or the strip club, or cruises for prostitutes. There is always a decision to be made before
typing “XXX porn” into the search bar on the computer, and then another
decision to be made before clicking a link. Most likely there are other
decisions to be made along the way as well, so to say that sexual sin is
“unintentional” is a lie.
There is always, always thought, belief and
desire that goes into making the decision to be immoral. It is not a decision
that happens outside of yourself, nothing takes possession of you and forces
your body to operate independent of your thoughts, beliefs or desires! It just does not happen.
Whatever took your husband to commit sexual
immorality was something he wanted and sought after. He was someplace he should not have
been, he was involved with someone in some way that he knew was wrong or
dangerous to his marriage covenant.
There was time to think about where he was headed before
the two of them got naked or performed sex acts with each other. There was time as they chatted on line to
close out the chat, delete the account, “unfriend” on Facebook, get in the car,
call you, run away, sneak out the back of the store, or be honest and say
he could not do this; he could not take this one step further.
The fact is…your husband did not. I know that is brutal, ugly and heartbreaking. The truth is hard to look at but trust me when I tell you that you will benefit from these words however hard they are to stomach today.
I will continue tomorrow and pick up where we left off.