I can only imagine what kind of heartbreak you are dealing with now that your husband’s struggle with lust is out in the open. As women, we want to be enough, we want to be loved for who we are. Porn just seems like another arrow in our salty wound. We are not good enough.
At this point, the easy road would be to allow your marriage to deteriorate. It would be easy to walk away from your husband and feel validated because of his adultery. And that’s exactly what the devil wants. But there is another road. A road less traveled.
I’m often asked by hurting women, “When is it okay for me to divorce him?”
My answer is consistent, “When God walks away from you.”
Cling to God and give Him your tears. God can change your husband’s heart, but your husband has to desire that change for it to happen. It’s so possible. Many marriages are restored from places many of us could never imagine living through. Maybe your marriage is one of those unbelievably painful situations.
I’ve seen it happen before. But here’s the thing … even if your husband doesn’t change, your faithfulness is so, so beautiful. It’s a beautiful example of God’s love no matter what. I have a character in my novel like that. He never took his ring off and his wife did so much to hurt him. They never got back together, but he stayed faithful until he died because that’s what he vowed. His love for her wasn’t contingent on her love for him. I just love that. I love seeing women stay faithful when it hurts. How rare! The world rarely ever sees love with that kind of beauty. And you have an opportunity to take the road less traveled. A road that leads to everlasting beauty.
Hang in there. God is willing to change every heart, but every heart doesn’t want to be changed. Pray for your husband’s desire for God to increase and continue showing Him the faithfulness of God through your own actions.
There may be seasons to separate, and I am not the judge of that, but divorce? I will consider divorce when Jesus divorces me. Marriage is an image of God’s relationship with us, the Church. Jesus is the head of the Church. We are unfaithful time and time again, but He is always there, waiting for us to come back even when we take off our rings and marry something else.
That’s the kind of love I want to show my husband and this world. A love that is not always easy, but models the King of Kings––the one who loves us no matter how much we don’t deserve His faithfulness.
