I must admit that this massage has touched me deeply. It is true that many Christian marriages are ending in divorces and thus allowing the world to mock our faith. One thing that we must admit, God has put a lot of power and respect on this institution, and the devil knows this pretty well. This makes Christian marriages one of the most favorable targets for the agent of destruction -the devil.

There is only one prescription for this trouble and that is; prayer and seeking God. I wish to encourage any one who has read this message to pray without ceasing, any home that doesn’t have prayer time is in great danger. There is great victory when couples pray together and seek the face of God, they will for sure find answers to the many issues that more often cause tension, in marriages.

I have a call to every one who reads this; pray for yourself so that God can make you the best partner in your marriage. Never ignore the power of Christ in your home. He is the author of all marriages, He is the prince of peace, He is the foundation rock, He knows all your needs and determines your steps!

The Law doesn’t give salvation, but it does define how to live, and shows us why we need the Gospel. And the Law has not gone away. But churches, at least in Western cultures, focus on one aspect of the Gospel – forgiveness – to the exclusion of Law.

Thus many, perhaps most people in churches today have no idea what God says about how to live. Many think they can disregard God’s clear instructions on how to live because God will forgive them for anything they do. This has turned the Gospel into license to sin and made it easy to divorce.

It’s likely that unchurched people have a more acute sense of the tragedy and pain of divorce than church members (I hesitate to call them “believers”). They don’t have anything to soothe the hurts. But the churched can ignore the wounds and pain from divorce because, after all, the ministers of their god (little ‘g’) teach them that forgiveness has nothing to do with obeying God’s commandments. The Church has, in effect, become a comfortable haven within which marriages, probably the most sacred of God’s institutions, can be destroyed.

Yes, I am blaming the ministry. I’m indicting every last one of them who want to appear to be forgiving, non-judgmental, cosmopolitan, erudite and sophisticated in the world’s eyes. They’re refusing or neglecting to teach what God says about how to live (the Law) thereby turning the Gospel into “cheap grace” (Bonhoeffer).

May God make His love for you so very real. I hope that you will always know that God never chose this –for a husband to cheat on his wife and family. That is the sinful choice that your husband made. God never stopped him in his sin… but if God did that, there would be no human race left, because we have all sinned in some way or form. I hope you will continue to look to God to help you DESPITE your husband’s sin.

You ask, “What does God say to my marriage?” I have to say that I don’t entirely know. I can only imagine the depth of grief He feels for you and your children. God knows what it is like to be betrayed over and over again by those He loves. I am sure He feels your pain. He knows that pain all too well.

As far as what you are to do concerning your marriage, that is something you have to keep talking to God about, looking for HIS answers, not mans. Don’t put a time frame on it though. Biblically, you DO have the “right” to divorce, but that doesn’t mean that you SHOULD divorce. That is sometime God will let you know as you keep asking and seeking His heart and His provision for you and your family.

The above Marriage Message focuses more on those who DON’T go the extra mile to try to save their marriages. I encourage you to keep your focus more on the strength and the help God can give you to redeem that which has been inflicted upon you, rather than allowing your energy to be wasted on concentrating on your husband’s sin. That is so terribly difficult to do, but is necessary for survival.

I just got through listening to a radio program that the ministry of Family Life Today (with Dennis Rainey) put together titled “Descending Into the Valley”, that addresses what I am trying to say here. They interviewed a man named Jerry Sittser who lost his mother, wife, and young daughter in a tragic car accident that he was involved in with his family.

In this interview, Jerry talks about loss and death and how there comes a time when we have to decide if we will allow this loss to swallow us up and continue to inflict more pain, or if we are going to put our sights on God and how He can get us through the grief and pain and bring some sort of redemption out of it all.

A bit of what he said might minister to your situation. He said, “I thought about the accident and the scene. I knew what had happened and I thought of what would be as a result. I considered the task set before me. I had a burden that was placed on my shoulders and in a sense, a divine mandate that said you draw a line in the sand right now and decide what you want to be and what you want to come from this experience. And I did. I said, I want the bleeding to stop right here. This is it. I don’t want to do things that are going to set in motion more and more pain and more and more bleeding that could go on for generations.

“I made the basic decision right then and there that I was going to somehow by the grace of God respond and live this story out in a way that was going to be redemptive. Redemption was really the key term that just kept coming back to me. Redemption. This is not the final word.

…”Through a long and often difficult journey I really did discover that the Christian faith is true. Grace really is available to get us through these hard stretches of life. My response of choosing to trust the grace of God was far more significant than the event itself. You know my kids would say the same thing today. They would say that the accident is actually not that significant. It is what’s come out of it that is significant.

…”When you suffer a loss whether it be divorce or terminal illness or loss of a job or it can be other things that are a little less dramatic and tragic, I think we do have the power to set a course and that makes a huge difference over a long period of time. It doesn’t solve all the problems but it gets us going in a particular direction. I think I did that by the grace of God.

…”I think what happens is we give some kind of tragedy more power than it deserves. It does become the defining moment instead of the response being the defining moment. It’s the thing itself and then pretty soon it’s affecting other relationships. It’s affecting life habits that we form and 20 or 30 years later that divorce or loss or whatever continues to dominate our lives. That’s what I call the second death and it’s actually worse than the initial death.” (You can read more of this interview by clicking HERE.)

What I’m trying to say Kama, is that I can’t give you the answer you need as to how to proceed. I’m not living your life or experiencing the same pain you and your children are going through right now. But I CAN point you to God and encourage you to hang on and keep persevering in prayer as to what to do for this moment in your life and the next.

You have suffered a horrible death — death of a dream to live in covenant with a man — the father of your children, who promised you more than he decided to give. He cheated on you and your children, and on God. God will deal with him. Whether he ever turns his life around to quit the cheating or not, is something you can’t control. Only he can make that decision. You have done your part in telling him so. And whether you pray and wait or you pray and stop waiting because God has shown you that is what you are to do, go with God’s leading.

Through all of this, you are to look to God to show you how to live with your children to put smiles back onto their faces and their hearts somehow. Show them that they have a faithful mom who will not leave them and will always participate with God in loving them and being supportive.

You sound like a beautiful young woman, Kama — someone who lives Christ in how you approach life. I pray the best for you and your children.

I have continued to pray for him. Not only am I nursing a very painful heartbreak, I have to continuously console our 2 children aged 11 and 4 who miss him very much. He will not even talk to them on the phone let alone see them. In addition to that, he has left us with huge amount of debts and does not give us any financial support. What does God say to my marriage???

When I told him that I wanted to leave the marriage; he didn’t me want to and said that he was willing to make things work. After reading this newsletter though, I realize that I should stay in this marriage not only because he wants me to, but because I want to honour God. And this is really encouraging me to spend more time with God and in His word; so that I can love my spouse the way Jesus loves.

Thank you so much and God bless you for this. I pray that the Lord will continue to make this service continue for a very long time. Marriage is challenging and we need information like this that can guide, encourage and teach us God’s heart for marriage.

Even something like just a hardened heart or bad attitude about the marriage, if allowed to continue, is sin. Yet we don’t see the church addressing this sin.

Is the church afraid it will get sued if it gets involved in the lives and "affairs" (literally) of it’s members? What good are those vows when the congregation is called to pledge it’s support of the new couple if they do nothing when the marriage is in crisis?

What about pastors who fail to act, who are so focused on same-sex marriage legislation that may impact 1/100th of the congregation, while 25% of the marriages is his church will likely end in divorce?