This is an excerpt from Resurrection that I wanted to share:
Selflessness vs. Selfishness
These two ways of living are self-explanatory. But let’s look at them in this situation via two fictionalized situations. Both spouses in the first example will be selfish, and both will be selfless in the second.
Selfishness in Marital Conflict From Porn
John hid porn from his wife, Anna, for five years of their marriage. She found a link on the computer and three months later they are standing in their kitchen when John comes home from work.
Anna continues washing the dishes and doesn’t acknowledge her husband’s presence. She is still upset because she asked him the night before to stop watching TV and using the computer when she’s not around, and he said he wasn’t married to his mother and can do whatever he wants to do.
He puts his keys on the kitchen counter and says, “Hey.”
She ignores him.
“Look, you need to get over this sometime soon, Anna. Your entire family thinks your nuts. My family does, too. You are blowing this way out of proportion. You know men are visual. I can’t help the way God made me.”
She slams a dish in the sink and storms out of the kitchen.
He follows. “You are such a baby. When are you going to grow up?”
Tears in her angry eyes, she turns to him. “You don’t even know what you’ve put me through. I don’t care what anyone thinks, this hurts. You’ve ruined my life.”
“You’ve ruined my life. If I knew you were like this insecure I would have never married you.”
“Well, if I knew you couldn’t keep your hand out of your pants I wouldn’t have married you.”
They go to bed separately. Anna sleeps in the bedroom. John sleeps on the couch, three feet away from Anna’s wedding rings on the dining room table.
Selflessness in Marital Conflict From Porn
Same couple, same day, different outcome:
Anna continues washing the dishes and doesn’t acknowledge her husband, John’s, presence. She is still upset because she asked him the night before to stop watching TV and using the computer when she’s not around, and he said he wasn’t married to his mother and can do whatever he wants to do.
He puts his keys on the kitchen counter and says, “Hey.”
She ignores him.
“Look, I am so sorry for everything that has happened. I know you are hurting so much. I know I’ve made you feel like you’ll never measure up. I am just a stupid guy with a stupid problem. I hate lust. I hate what it’s done to us. I want it gone and I want you back.”
She puts down a dish and looks at him. “I’m sorry, too. I know I often ask crazy things of you. I know you enjoy watching TV, but it really makes me feel uncomfortable right now. Every commercial makes me feel like I need something I don’t have in order to be beautiful. I just want to be beautiful to you without seeing images that make me feel like I need to compete every five seconds.”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry, Anna. If the TV bothers you that much, I’ll get rid of it.”
“No. I don’t want you to do something you don’t want to do. I will try to get over this.”
John smiles at her, walks into the living room, unplugs the TV, picks it up, and tosses it out an open window. He turns back to her and grins. “Gone. I love you more.”
“John! You really didn’t have to do that. How will you be able to afford another one of those?”
“I’ll tell you what. When our marriage is better than it has ever been before … you get me a TV when you feel comfortable with it.”
John and Anna went to sleep with hope that their marriage may actually be more beautiful than it’s ever been before.
