Do you ever find marriage advice kind of, well, shallow?
I’ll be on Pinterest, and I’ll see something interesting: “What to do when you find your husband watching porn.” And I’ll think to myself, “Okay, that might be really good! Let’s see what she has to say.”
And I’ll click through, and I’ll read about how the wife needs to get on her knees and pray.
Then I’ll see a post about “What to do when you feel lonely in your marriage.”
And I’ll click through, and I’ll read about how the wife needs to get on her knees and pray.
And then I’ll see a post on “What to do when you disagree with your husband on how to raise your kids.”
And I’ll click through, and I’ll read about how the wife needs to get on her knees and pray.
Then I start to wonder why people read marriage blogs at all.
I know I’m being really sarcastic here, and I really don’t mean to be. I actually believe in prayer, after all! It’s just that I finally was able to put into words this week something I’ve been feeling for a few years, and it’s this:
Instead of seeking out God’s will for our individual marriage, too many people think that we must seek out marital stability.
Ironically, we are sacrificing our marriages on the altar of marriage.
I wrote recently that we need to be careful that marriage doesn’t become our idol. Well, I think that applies in a broader sense, too. I think that the reason that there is so little practical help for the nitty gritty in marriage is because we are aiming for the wrong thing. We are aiming to preserve a certain view of marriage rather than trying to see God’s will done in marriage. And we feel very threatened by anything that may rock the boat of what we believe marriage should be.
Let me explain how this works, and it’s going to take a little bit of a history lesson.
In the 1960s, when the feminist movement grew in strength, it was aiming specifically to attack male privilege. And one of the places where male privilege was so obvious was in marriage. Marriage, feminists said, was a trap. Men basically owned and used women, and women were chattel. The solution was to let women choose relationships on their own terms. Abortion was a huge part of that (I have control over my body).
Christians felt like their whole value system was being attacked. In response, the Christian evangelical church started writing more and more books about what a Christian marriage should look like, and started trying to preserve marriage against the onslaught of feminism and secularism.
Whole evangelical movements grew up in the 1980s fighting for “biblical manhood” and “biblical womanhood” and biblical marriage, where a husband leads and a wife submits. The movement tried to position itself as the opposite of feminism. This was the ground we were going to hold at all costs. This was the hill we were going to die on. Christianity was being attacked, and the family, and marriage, became the focal point for that fight. We began equating our faith with preserving a hierarchical of marriage. The two became hopelessly intertwined (so much so that the doctrine of the Trinity was rewritten to promote male hierarchy).
It reminds me of this tweet I saw recently:
The greatest problem in Christian education today is that doctrine rather than character transformation has become an end in itself
— DallasAWillard (@DallasAWillard) August 15, 2017
We’re promoting marriage over godliness. It’s scary.
Growing up in the 1980s I read less about wives doing a husband’s will than I do now. It’s way more prevalent today. The whole quest for “biblical womanhood” just wasn’t there in the same way in the 1970s and 1980s. And because it’s such a strong Christian cultural current, many people have based their whole identities, and even their faith walks, around living up to this ideal of marriage (just like we talked about in making marriage your idol).
There’s just one problem. It doesn’t work, because it’s entirely the wrong focus.
When you pray the Lord’s prayer, you pray, “Your will be done, Your kingdom come…” You pray for God’s will to be done.
When it comes to marriage, though, we seem to be saying, “the husband’s will be done.” We could look at a given marriage and think, “even though God wants oneness, humility and health, this husband would rather be a workaholic. And since God demands that wives honour the husbands, then God obviously will be pleased if the wife puts up with his workaholism.”
The husband’s will now trumps God’s will.
That is the underlying assumption in so many marriage blogs and marriage books. That’s why when they’re confronted with a problem of a husband’s selfishness or sin, they have no answer. Sure, no one actually wants him being a workaholic. But ultimately, it’s his choice, because he’s the man. That’s how we glorify God, you see–by letting males choose how to live their lives.
But this isn’t just a problem when husbands sin. It’s a problem when wives sin, too.
As I wrote last month, men can be victims of emotional abuse as well. Wives can treat their husbands in horrible ways. I do believe that this is a more acute problem in one direction than the other simply because our theology says that a husband’s will goes, not that a wife’s will goes. But in this quest to make marriage our idol, we’ve put men who are in difficult marriages in a bind, too.
We’ve told those men that their marriages matter more than anything. We’ve told them that if their wife is treating them badly, it’s because they aren’t leading their wives well enough or praying for them properly or loving them as Christ loved the church. If they just did all of those things, then the marriage would be better. And we’ve told these men that marriage is a sacred covenant, and so they need to preserve it all costs.
Then what is a husband supposed to do when his wife won’t lift a finger around the house, overspends so that they’re heavily in debt, or is verbally abusive towards the children?
You know what makes all of this so much clearer? Asking the question: What does Jesus want from this situation?
We tend to ask the question: “How can I fix this marriage?” That really limits our options, because it’s all about not rocking the boat.
But if we ask, “what does Jesus want in this situation?”, the answer is quite different.
Jesus wants God to be glorified. And when is God glorified? When people look more and more like Christ.
How is that supposed to happen?
By loving mercy, acting justly, and walking humbly before our God. (Micah 6:8)
That was what I was trying to hammer home, over and over again, in 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage. God does not want marriage to look great. God wants GOD to look great, and the way that that happens is by loving mercy (showing love and grace, first and foremost); acting justly (standing up for what’s right and not enabling sin); and walking humbly with our God (getting our relationship with God right first so that we can tell what actions are appropriate in each situation).
When we’re having problems in our marriage, then, the question becomes, How can I look more like Jesus, and how can I act in such a way that those around me are led more to Jesus? It’s not about how can I protect the marriage. It’s about how can I bring God’s kingdom here on earth.
And ironically, that’s the best way to preserve the marriage! The only way to really solve marriage issues is to allow sin and selfishness to truly be confronted.
Let’s just look at a few scenarios where this plays out.
Let’s say that a husband is watching porn all the time and won’t stop.
If we ask, “What glorifies Jesus in this situation?”, the answer is obviously that the husband stops watching porn. So the question becomes, “how can we confront sin and do something about this?”
If we ask, “How can we honor male leadership in marriage in this situation?”, though, there’s really nothing she can do about his watching porn. She’s stuck.
Let’s say a wife is overspending on credit cards and driving the family into debt.
If we ask, “What glorifies Jesus in this situation?”, the answer is obviously that the wife stops her materialism and selfishness and cares for the family. So the question becomes, “what should the husband do to protect the family’s finances and help the wife stop this addiction?”
If we ask, “How can we preserve the marriage in this situation?”, though, there’s really very little the husband can do. He has to love her and cherish her, and that’s taken to mean that he may be able to talk to her about it, but do little else.
Or what if it’s something more mundane?
What if we’re simply wondering, “I’m better at looking after money than my husband is, and God has gifted me with attention to detail. So is it okay for me to look after the finances in our marriage?”
If we ask, “What glorifies Jesus in this situation?”, then the answer is, “that each person use the gifts they’ve been given by the Holy Spirit to help build the family, and that each participate as they feel called.”
If we ask, “What preserves a husband’s headship in this situation?”, we may answer, “that the husband bumble through doing the finances while the wife is frustrated.”
You see, the questions we ask matters. If we’re aiming to glorify Jesus, often the whole situation becomes clarified, because we know that Jesus is not glorified where gifts are not used, where sin is enabled, where families move further and further away from him. But if we ask, “how can we preserve a given view of marriage?”, then we’re often left with a very empty and unsatisfying answer of what we should do in many situations.
And that hurts marriage.
Whenever we put something before God, we ruin that thing.
If we’re asking “what does Jesus want here?”, and that conflicts with what you think about marriage, then that is a problem. God does not contradict God. If you know Jesus wants something, and then you choose to work only for marital stability, then you have made marriage an idol. It has come before God, and that’s simply wrong.
Let God be God. Pray for HIS will to be done. Act as Christ wants you to act, not to fulfill a certain role. Let Him in. Until we do that, we’ll never have real answers for the real messiness of life.
And, ironically, we’ll likely never save a marriage.
Can you all do me a favour? I’d honestly love to hear your thoughts on this, because I’ve put a LOT of thought into this post this week. The comments have been a little quiet lately. But I’m feeling a little alone. So let me know what you think and let’s talk!
Sheila Wray Gregoire has been married for 29 years and happily married for 24! She loves traveling around North America with her hubby in their RV, giving her signature "Girl Talk" about sex and marriage. And she's written 7 books. About sex and marriage. See a theme here? Plus she knits. Even in line at the grocery store.
At the beginning of this article I was wondering where you were going with this, because I’ve grown to love your vlog so much – its been so helpful to me (and my husband!). But I really agree. I’ve always had a hard time reading books about marriage, which are more like self help, because they give a lot of advice that focuses on the small picture, not the big picture. Its about what to say to your spouse to love them and how to not get annoyed at the other person, etc. But they dont view marriage through the light of eternity. And its cripples marriages that think they are being fixed. Sam (my husband) and I are 23, almost been married only 2 years, and find it really difficult to get advice from couples without it being more like self help. Its discouraging to us to hear the lack of the gospel message in marriage and so your post today was the opposite! Very encouraging. I love your website, and know that its definitely helping out this marriage. (Because practical help is helpful too. It just isn’t the answer to sin. Which is what so many people dont seem to address.)
Thank you, Hannah! I’m glad you liked it. And I totally agree with your last sentence–we need an answer to sin, and we just don’t have one right now when we aim to preserve marriage above all (and that, ironically, I think, is why so many marriages break up).
This is probably the best article I’ve read on this topic. Thank you so very much for sharing and laboring over this post. I have been so confused on how to respect my husband while dealing with is anger and I’ve definitley idolized marriage and our roles over God’s glory. Thank you again for this!
I’m so glad it helped you, C! So glad. I think the whole “respect” thing has been very overblown, because it does not make allowance for how to handle a husband who is acting wrongly. We need to look at Jesus first, not at roles.
Well said! I do believe the Church can get into trouble if we immediately react to secular views with the polar opposite (e.g. replacing radical feminism with unconditional wifely submission) rather than respond with what the Bible really says (i.e. love and submission work together, but God’s will comes first). Our starting point has to be the Bible, not the world.
I agree that people need to be using their individual gifts, not trying to fit a certain role. For example, I do most of the cooking and my husband does most of the finances, but it’s just because he’s more organized with money and I enjoy cooking more. I know some marriages where it’s the other way around, and that’s perfectly fine. Marriage is two individuals with unique gifts and personalities, not two cookie-cutter roles to fill.
Greta: “Our starting point has to be the Bible, not the world.”. Yep. Just yep. I wonder why that’s so radical?
Yes, our values should be based on ideals that are more absolute than the events of this world. Values should not be based on “everybody else does that, so we should too” or “our enemy is against this, so this should become a value of ours”.
I think feminism brought some really good ideas: that women are in no sense inferior to men, that women have the same right to sexual pleasure as men, that women should not be payed less than men. The church should have embraced these, should have seen how they can be used to strengthen family values and the importance of the hard work of raising children. It is really a pity that the church decided to go in the opposite direction.
Yes, I think when we start defining ourselves as in opposition to everything about our enemy we lose focus. We should instead define ourselves as in everything about Christ. That would have served us better!
Good morning Sheila. I am sure I will be over 400 words today and you may choose to keep this for yourself and or publish it. I am right on topic today but way off. This about How Big is You Unbrella. You see, what you wrote is so awesome. I could talk to you about it for an hour easy. I have something very differnt from your topic but yet is very fitting. I have been trying to research redemptive suffering. So far I have not found a ton of information on it and what I have has not kept my interest or is extremely short. I did find a couple books last night so time will tell on this. I got some sad news Monday. My freinds son is now in hospice and he is day to day. He told me I can not sell redemptive suffering to him. So my question became this. Is the joy in death supposed to be for God/Jesus? Or are we supposed to feel it too? Is it just for us or is it just for Jesus? Today I was talking with my freind and he shared a rip your heart out moment that chills me to the bone. My freinds oldest Grandson who is 14 has distanced himself from his father as he lays there and dies. Mason is his name. I so get this poor kids place. I am asking God. Where is the joy? Please show me. So I shared your book with my freind a while back. But I asked him to please return it as I think it is an important book for my family to read one day. My freind actually picked up a used one on Amazon. This is big because I wasnt sure how he would receive your book because he has not acknowledged Jesus. On top of that redemptive suffering is just a hard pill to swallow. I told him when I got the package I knew it was the book but I didnt open it for a day because I was a afraid there would be a nasty note inside. We ended up laughing and joking ar🙃und about your book and all the comments he would right inside it. I was amazed at how we went from Mason to laughter within a matter of moments. Apparently I have my answer Sheila. God’s will is for us to share the joy of our suffering with Jesus and our family and friends. What a journey Sheila. I am sitting here in amazement. Just blasted this morning with Gods LOVE. Thank you for your work!
So right.
We can’t put “looking like we have a perfect marriage” above “making our marriage as close to God’s ideal as possible”.
I’ve been trying. Honesty is, for me, the first step.
When someone asks “How are you?” I’m trying to give an honest answer. Not that everyone needs to know all the gory details, but I’m not smiling and saying “fine” when the truth is “actually, I’m still upset from the hassle I had with a kid earlier” or some such.
If I don’t want to go into details, I’ll say something like, “Let’s pretend I’m fine – how are you doing?” and there are a couple of friends who I can tell the whole story, and who are amazing at pointing me (and my mess) back to God.
Yes, Emily, it all comes down to honesty, doesn’t it? God wants authentic and real Christians. That’s how He works–in the light. Yet we keep so much cloaked in darkness. We don’t realize we’re doing this, because we’re ever so polite. But then it’s not real.
I’m glad you have a few friends who can help you deal with your gunk, too! 🙂
This is probably the best article I’ve ever read on marriage and the gospel. I’ve been following you and your daughters’ blogs/pages for about 3 years now, ever since my sister was married and recommended you. I’m getting married in December, so I’m on here nearly every day, haha! This is SPOT ON. I have a married female friend who jokes that people may consider us Christian feminists, but really, we’re just gospel-believing Christians. Thank you for making that clear!
Oh, thank you, Emily! That’s very kind. And congratulations on your wedding and your upcoming marriage! I hope it’s wonderful, and I’m glad I could start this journey with you!
I can really agree with this. My wife and I do this. I’m not going to talk much about her but I can say that when I talked with others about her lack of showing affection and very little sex people usually say: Well suck it up. Or man up or something that doesn’t help at all. My wife’s problem I think is that she wants to preserve this marriage image. An image that all is good but it’s not. I have been stuck in a heavy porn addiction for almost three years. I confessed twice but Everytime the same thing happened. She got angry and upset. But then she refused to take about it and acted like everything was normal. what led to the addiction was a emotional and spiritual burnout. I was a mess and couldn’t take myself out of this and I hid it a lot to because of her reaction. I knew I was disgusting and I don’t blame her so I preferred to hide it. Prior to the addiction sex became less frequent and when the first kid came there wasn’t a lot of intimacy. To her the problem didn’t exist so it’s not just because of the addiction but mostly because she adores(idolizes?) the kid. So my addiction continued and if she suspected wich I wonder how she couldn’t. We barely had sex, didn’t she wonder why I stopped complaining about it? Anyways in the beginning of the year she suddenly got more passionate and wanted passionate sex, wih I thought was great but it really showed me what porn had done to me. I couldn’t perform like before and it was disappointing. It hurts when I think about it but it was the best that could happen because it woke me up. I don’t want this. I don’t want lonely nights with sin on a screen. I want her. I want a wonderful sex life with her. So my journey to freedome started. I had come to the place where I finally wanted to be free. It wasn’t just me referring what I done afterwards. The passionate sex disappeared, turned out that she was pregnant and it was just the hormones in the beginning. Again less sex and again almost no intimacy. No hug, no kisses and I was still stuck. But now I started to actively stop. I confessed to two elders and one other leader but again there wasn’t much help. Then finally I told her. I told her that I can’t do this anymore. I told her that if she wants she can leave me. I wouldn’t make it difficult for her and she deserves to be wth a better man and to be happy. She said she wanted to stay but when I told her I had a plan to protect myself from this sin(buying a kitchen safe where I could put my devices so she could see them during the night so i couldn’t reach them) then she got angry. Saying I couldn’t waste money and I need to be strong. Now she doesn’t talk about it and haven’t asked how I feel and how it’s going. I understand she is hurt and that she is angry. That’s why I wanted her to leave if she wanted but I need help. I need boundaries. I now it’s horrible and I know I am a horrible person but I want help. But I think it’s this. She wants the keep the image of marriage. When I told her that she could talk to other women in church and our family and tell them, women we know have been cheated on, she didn’t want to. ” She would never speak badly about her husband to anyone” One of the women is my mom who has been through the same thing. I encouraged her to speak with her but she doesn’t want to. I don’t know what to do. She is happy with husband and kids but she neglects this and also intimacy. I know porn is a problem but her lack of intimacy goes deeper than that. She has her kids to feel her emotional rank and she is happy. I don’t have that but I dont know if she sees that.
Oh, wow. That’s so hard. First, let me say that I am really, really happy that you’re trying to get accountability and trying to get boundaries for yourself. That’s actually pretty rare, from what I’ve seen in the comments, and it does show a real commitment to get free. And I’m so, so sorry that your pastor and church leadership wasn’t more helpful in this area. I’d really suggest seeking out a program like Celebrate Recovery in your area or something like that, because God doesn’t want you stuck, and you don’t want you stuck, but it does take hard work. It sounds like you’re willing to do that, so don’t give up until you find some help! You’re doing the right thing.
Then, about your marriage, again, I’m sorry that your wife isn’t willing to get help and just wants you to paper over problems. That’s not healthy, either. But I would suggest that no matter what she does, you try to find a recovery group. I think when you get to the other end of that, you’ll be able to see more clearly and deal with the issues with your wife more clearly. But I am sorry that this mentality has left you so little room for healing.
Thank you for your advice but sadly I live in Sweden. You don’t know how I envy all of you in USA and Canada. I know from reading different Christian sites that Christianity has lost a lot of ground in your countries but there are still strong churches, there are men’s group, there are xxxchurches and etc. There are so many ways to get help over there. So if you are concerned about your countries spiritual condition you would get a heart attack if you would see how it is in Sweden. Here churches don’t talk much about sin. Not many at least. Not may care about marriage. When I told my elder he was concerned and said he would pray for me but said:Well it’s not a death sin.” I understand he didn’t want to be harsh but it is sin. It is a sin that needs or be dealt with. And my church is the most “radical” here. He tried to help me find Christian therapist but they are few and far away. Secual therapist may not see it as an addiction or art least nothing to be concerned about so I went a Christian but they are far away(I live in the countryside) and very expensive. There are no men’s group, no organization that speaks about this , nothing. When I talk to Christians at the Reddit group NoFapChristian some people don’t believe me. But it’s true. I’m alone. I need help from my wife. I understand it’s hard and thats why I told her she could leave. I wouldn’t blame her. I would tell everyone I cheated. I watched porn. She has a right to leave me and find someone new but if she is going to stay I sadly need help. I know for those who haven’t been addicted it may sound odd that I need restrictions and I understand. But this addiction goes deep and it’s usually symptoms of things that need to be healed but until they are I don’t want to be near it. If I have an opportunity it is so easy to deceived. “Your wife hasn’t been sexual available for years” “You feel emotionally empty. You need this. You need release” And I can say it right now and now it’s lies but when temptation comes in the night that’s when it’s hard. Until I’m healed I need to distance myself from all temptation. But I will continue to pray. I want out and can only hope on God.
Great post that really talks about something that is neglected in Christian marriages
Okay, I’m so glad you wrote that, because that is a real, real problem. You’re right; we do have so many Christian resources here in North America. So if you had to get help online, what would it look like? What would actually help you? I honestly want to know what you think, because then I may see if I can find anything like that online and start recommending it, because I know you’re not the only one dealing with this (according to my Analytics, for instance, only 70% of my readers are from North America. That means that 30% are facing issues more like you do, with little help. Although Australia & New Zealand may not do too badly). But anyway, let me know what you’re looking for–a group that meets at a certain time? An email support group or active Facebook support group? A counsellor who would speak to you over Skype? What would you find most useful? We (as a global church) really need to figure out how to help people in the same situation as you are, and so let’s get started and do something about it!
Dr. Doug Weiss (Heart to Heart Counseling Center-United States) has an enormous amount of material (ebooks, dvds, etc) as well as online help available for sex addiction-helping your spouse etc.
Thank you so much for wanting to help me. Well I have tried accountability before a long time ago. it didn’t work super great but I am willing to try it again. I wouldn’t mind a facebook group or a e-mail group either. i want to be honest. This is hard for me the best is to meet someone because it’s harder to avoid but I want to try so a group that could email me or message me would be great. Especially now that my wife’s knows I don’t have to hide. What I would really want would be counseling. I want to understand why this is so hard for me. Maybe I’m just a horrible person or maybe it’s also something else that needs to be dealt with. So counseling would be great to. Thank you again for wanting to help me! God bless you!
I can help your reader. There are tons of resources that e can access remotely. There are online communities as well as phone meetings. I am willing to direct or speak to your reader. Actually I was reading this on my phone when a froe d my program called. He said he would talk to your reader from Sweden too. I have talke to people in Japan, Isreal, Canada, Austraila and who knows where elese. I actially started here 14 years ago. http://www.sca-recovery.org/meetings.htm There is more. I am willing to share. Safely.
Thank you very much. I have subscribed to the phone meetings. It’s a little late for me but I will do whatever I can to attend. I am open for more resources
Hello sir,
I wanted to recommend a book that has helped my husband (and myself) with dealing with both his porn addiction and the aftermath of his pornography addiction. It’s still a journey, but this book is short, yet offers a lot of practical advice and helpful stuff for you to understand the mental process of what you’re actually going through. It’s called ‘Taking Every Thought Captive.’ By Mark R. Laaser.
Also, idk if you know this or not – you probably do, but our brains form these really fascinating patterns called ‘nueral pathways’, and it’s sort of like a fast-track to a specific thought/way of thinking. The more times you have a thought, the deeper the pathway gets and the faster and easier your brain automatically starts to jump onto that track. So, you have taught your brain some un-true things with this pornography addiction…but the pathways can be re-written if you commit to making one right thinking/acting choice at a time. Combat the lies with God’s truth about who HE says you are and what He calls you to be as a person. Pray the 51st Psalm to God…keep fighting and taking responsibility and seeking help – there is hope. You are not alone, and you are loved by the Lord so very much. God speaks in past tense about this battle you are fighting now, and in Him you already have the victory. Courage, brother in Christ. My prayers will be with you.
Thank you, Phil!
Hello Pornaddict,
I live in Europe, I struggled with porn in the past, and I have been free of it for 7 years now.
I totally get what you are saying. Porn and masturbation are considered so normal here. People have hard time understanding why somebody would go against these “natural” things. And if you have any sort of possible “excuse” such as not extremely high sex frequency, that’s a perfectly sufficient justification for most. I distanced myself from this attitude.
During my recovery, I have mostly been relying on information coming from North America. And on my wife: she was my accountability partner (but that was really hard for her). It is sad that your wife is not helping you with this, but this is something you might need to understand and accept. It is actually very difficult for a wife to be able to deal with such a situation to the extent of being able to help. She might need more help than you, even.
There are great amounts of articles, videos, forum posts online that are very informative, motivating, helpful. I have not kept a list, but nofap has great collections of various resources.
In the beginning, I think the main strategy is: push as far as you can get, analyze your relapse, learn more about yourself and the pain you hold inside, repeat. Eventually you get to the point where you break out of that cycle and no longer relapse, but it can take long, it took around 1.5 years in my case.
Thank you for your reply!
Yeah i understundom My wife. I am thankful that she wants to stay with me but if this doesn’t get better I hope for her sake that she leaves me. She deserves better. I don’t need her to be my accountability partner. All i wanted was to have this kitchen safe and a cellphone during the nights that doesn’t have internet. All I would want for her to do is to see that I put all the devices that can tempt me into this safe. It may not be forever but right now I need it. I was so hopeful but she doesn’t want to. I understand she’s hurt. I blew it. I destroyed our marriage and it won’t be the same. I will try but I can’t do this on my own. I have tried so many times. Why is this so hard? Why am I so perverted? Why have always been like this? Since my childhood. Why ?
Great advice, Dean! I heard once that the biggest part of breaking an addiction is to recognize your triggers and prevent them. Is it being bored? Tired? Alone in the house late at night with nothing to do? Stressed at work? Feeling angry? Unpleasant encounters with a certain person who takes you emotionally back to your childhood? Then, when those triggers come, recognize them and turn to prayer and have a strategy for dealing with them. I thought that was very wise.
Yes, beating the different trigger situations one by one is a big part of it.
“Unpleasant encounters with a certain person who takes you emotionally back to your childhood?” So true in my case!
I think growing up emotionally is a big part of quitting any addiction, because any addiction is pretty much a repeated (very harmful) ritual to soothe the hurt child inside.
Even more so with porn/masturbation addiction, since to stop it you need to learn delayed gratification, you need to learn to deal with not being completely comfortable at all times, you need to accept that some things are out of your control, you need to develop more empathy for human beings (both for your wife and for the women in airbrushed images). Basically, to grow up and stop being a whining child.
Sheila, I am an advocate for women who have been abused. Most of them are Christian women who have been abused by men who use the façade of “christian marriage” as a cloak to conceal the evil they commit against their wives and families.
We read in Malachi that God hates this.
Yet, churchianity has consistently pressured wives to maintain the façade. To shut up about abuse, suffer in silence and to try harder to compensate for their husbands’ neglect.
The maintenance of marital appearances pressures a victim to build her own torture chamber and to make it as attractive – – and impermeable – – as possible.
The doctrines exalting marriage over safety are literally killing victims of abuse.
… And causing them, their children and and unbelievers to view god as abusive
A god who demands that we look as good as possible, and make our abuser look as good as possible while he destroys us is not a good God.
YES! I think you are spot on! I’ve experienced this in my life. I’ve been told I “just need to” submit more, be forgiving, do xyz myself. But it just leaves me feeling trapped and frustrated. The church, Christian books and blogs leave me cynical and feeling angry. Thank you for some perspective and clarification. I appreciate your perceptions and willingness to think about and share them even when it might be uncomfortable.
Thank you, Angela! I’m glad that I could help you out of the frustration cycle. I don’t think I offer an easy solution, though. I think it’s really, really hard. But we have to seek out God and work for His righteousness, not just for looking good. And that’s harder, but far more real!
This is an awesome article. I think sometimes women esp let fear take over instead of dealing with the sin too. Its a scary thing to think “if my husband isnt ready to confess the sin and deal with it, then I will be alone and possibly have to deal with the kids alone, provide alone, etc.” obv God wants us to put godliness and following Him above holding our marriage as an idol and not trusting Him to take care of our needs. Its time for people to deal with their sin instead of letting the days go by, stuck in it. Thank you for pointing to the gospel above all else.
http://www.jewelsonpurpose.com
That’s exactly right, Ash! It’s really fundamentally about, “am I ready to trust God with my marriage?” You see, usually when people ask that question, what they mean is, “Am I ready to live with this obvious sin that my husband is doing forever, trusting that God will support me or will change my husband?” But what if that’s the wrong approach? What if we should really be asking, “Am I ready to do the right thing, come what may, trusting that God will carry me right now?” That takes a lot more trust, and that’s what God is asking us to do!
This may be one of your best articles ever, mom. It feels like what you’ve been saying on the blog for the last 4 years has come together for this one post. Really really good job.
Thank you. 🙂
I agree that our marriages should honor God. However, I think there is a bit of a flaw in the examples provided. Does scripture really say that a wife is to submit to ungodly actions? From past articles you have written, I know you don’t believe she should. Does a husband give up headship because his wife does the finances? Of course not. My wife and I are both financially minded, but she is home and has more time to invest in it. I trust her judgment as well. God will still hold me accountable, and I am responsible for discussing any concerns with her. And while I have never had an issue with her spending, confronting such an issue must be done and it must be done in love. The two are not mutually exclusive. If husband and wife truly take God’s design for marriage to heart, they will be a force that can change the world, as their marriage will testify of God’s grace and glory.
I agree with you!
I think that was Sheila’s point; that we can misinterpret Scripture at the expense of our marriages and at our self-worths. These are great examples of how people are struggling to get proper instruction via scripture but when scripture is taken out of context (the biggest example I can think of is women submitting to your husbands), it can hurt us.
That was in reply to FollwerofChrist’s comment.
Christine, I agree with you. I think it likely was her intention. I just didn’t find it to be clear in the article.
Yes, exactly!
Sheila this is so true! It’s wonderful that you have gone deeper with this topic and this post is extremely clarifying for me, not just in marriage but in relationships with family and in all of life. Thank you.
You’re so welcome, Taylor!
I love this post, Sheila. And I had to “ouch” as I read along because I am blogger and in my zeal to help newlyweds thrive, I’ve been guilty of emphasizing marriage and making assumptions about couples knowing where/how to draw the line. But what is obvious to me isn’t obvious to those who come to my blog. Especially because those who are making the effort to seek online/books help are desperate for deeper practical perspective. Thank you.
This is gold! Thank you for putting the work into saying this so well. I’ll be sharing it with my husband as we prepare to teach our church’s premarital counseling class this week on the topic of Roles and Responsibilities in marriage–how very applicable!
My husband and I are both Christians, married for 24 years. I have never felt pressured to cover up any sin or submission problems in my marriage to put on the facade that my marriage is trouble free. I certainly don’t believe our church has ever taught that preserving marriage should come before seeking God’s will. In fact, couples in our church went through a biblically based marriage course several years ago, I believe it was called “Five Sex needs of Men and Women.” It seems to me that praying for your marriage, and seeking Godly counsel, should be the first thing you should do, asking Him for guidance in how you and your spouse can communicate and repent and allow Him to heal your marriage. I’m not sure I follow you in this post. No, marriage shouldn’t be an idol, but I truly believe you should do all you can that aligns with scripture to save your marriage: prayer, scripture reading, and Christian counsel. Why would telling someone to pray for their marriage ever be wrong?
Well I think Sheila doesn’t say it’s wrong to advise people to pray for their marriages, but what she is trying to say is that often that’s all that is offered, but people who seek help need to get biblical counsel, accountability, support and help on how to confront the sin of a spouse, how to put up appropriate boundaries, practical steps they can take to move towards healing. But repeating ‘pray’ and ‘submit more’ or ‘love more’ just doesn’t cut it. Chances are if you’re Christian and you have a problem you are already praying about it and here you are looking for help, and all you get is the same answers that you already knew.
It’s sad that so many people don’t find real help in the church, they only hear about what is supposed to be but there is no practical teaching and guidance in how to work the gospel into our everyday struggles. So often the cross becomes that faraway one time encounter and the rest of the Christian walk is just trying to muddle your way through in your own strength trying to somehow keep up an ideal image of what that Christian life is supposed to look like…
Love, this, Lydia! Especially this is so true: “Chances are if you’re Christian and you have a problem you are already praying about it and here you are looking for help, and all you get is the same answers that you already knew.”
Hi Vicki, Oh, I certainly believe in prayer–and in saving marriages! The difference is that I want to work towards a HEALTHY marriage, not just a stable marriage, and there’s a big difference. I believe that what God wants is two people following Him and loving each other. And sometimes the way that we act towards each other prevents that. We need to work towards intimacy and oneness, and that means MAKING peace, not just KEEPING peace. It means not papering over problems. It means dealing with things. But that can be scary, because it upsets the status quo. But God wants authentic relationship, not something which is only skin deep. And sometimes, in our endeavour to have stable marriages, we don’t encourage couples enough to really work through issues.
Yes! Very well written and thought through. It’s all about glorifying God!
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. 4 In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.” (Hebrews 12)
We can’t RUN the race if sin still has it’s grip us. Marriage included!
Amen! Those are actually my life verses. 🙂
I think you are right on with this. And it can really make some things more clear when we ask the right questions. I love that.
I think the church has become too afraid of the feminist movement. I have sat in church and heard comments about how it hasn’t done women any favors, and that in the past men used to stand and take off their hats when a woman entered the room, but now that respect is gone. But before the feminist movement, women couldn’t vote, hold a lot of jobs, go to college, or open a bank account. Am I the only one who feels like being able to do those things and NOT have a man take off his hat is more than a fair trade? I don’t agree with everything feminism stands for, of course, but it’s given the developed world so much.
As for trite marriage advice, I could say a lot about that! We have faced a lot of things in our relatively short marriage. We have gone to marriage retreats and had some marriage counseling sessions. The vast majority of it has been trite. And shallow. Like, put a bandaid on your broken leg and expect that to work. In one counseling session we were talking about the lack of communication that was bothering me so much. The pastor spent a lot of time suggesting things like having lunch together, calling him at work, etc. He never visited the deeper issue that hubby has with not wanting to actually talk or share on a meaningful level.
Yes, Ashley, that is a problem. I’m glad your husband was going to counselling, but maybe you need someone more trained, other than your pastor? I wonder if your husband might be more open to that, too, given what he’s walking through right now. I’m sorry!
Oh yes, next time we will be seeing a trained professional if I have anything to say about it, and I don’t think my husband would have a problem with that.
Perhaps Christians with problems in their marriage need to be searching the scriptures for solutions to their marrIage problems, instead of marriage blogs. We can’t expect all marrIage blogs to be biblically based. There are guidelines in the Bible pertaining to approaching someone about their sin, and I’m quite certain that doesn’t exclude your spouse. God is the only one who can change someone’s heart, and they need to be receptive to it. MarrIage is a promise made before God. I don’t see how doing all you can (praying and seeking God’s counsel)to preserve your marriage is sonehow making your marriage an idol. I am an intelligent adult and a Christian and I found this article to be rather confusing.
A person should always pray and seek God’s counsel. But what about people who are told they can’t leave abusive situations or adulterous spouses because God Hates divorce? Of course God hates divorce, but he also hates abuse and infidelity. To value the institution of marriage over the hurting individuals in the marriage is one way of making marriage an idol.
Yes! But even in more mundane things–if you’re scared of bringing up an issue that you have that you know displeases God because it may rock the boat, then you’re putting the marriage before God. God wants truth. Let’s value truth. That’s the way we deal with real issues.
The Book Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas gave me a whole new Outlook on marriage as a whole. I used to say I would never marry just because the examples of marriage I have seen was terrible and I said I would never be a victim. But in this book Gary challenges his readers to view marriage as a way to get closer to God and become more like Christ than as a way to happiness. He said marriage is like God handing you a mirror of a spouse and saying “now here’s to seeing what you’re really like!” I agree with this. I’m not married but I give a lot of advice to married couples (oddly) and I completely agree with this article. But at the same time I think a spouse can get so caught up in the sin or the doing and not doing of their spouse they can sometimes neglect their own salvation and walk with Christ. Prayer really is the most powerful tool we have. Prayer and the Word. But we are called to exhort each other… Including our spouses. The most important thing is to be Led by The Holy Spirit. There’s a time for everything. And when correction isn’t getting anywhere then prayer will definitely grab hold of the heart of the situation and usually a change for the better happens within us first.
I love Gary’s writing, and totally love his insight into this, too. And it’s very much like what I wrote in 9 Thoughts That Can Change a Marriage (which Gary endorsed). But it’s like Gary also said in Lifelong Love: When you love your spouse, you pursue God’s best. So if, for instance, your husband is using porn, you know that this is not the best for him. So you throw the porn out. The key here, as in everything (as Gary says repeatedly in Sacred Search, for instance) is to seek first the kingdom of God. As we do that, we will know how to love and how to pursue God’s best. And sometimes that means standing up and setting very clear boundaries for things like out of control spending, verbal abuse, porn use, laziness, or other things. Let’s just keep our focus on God and ask Him for wisdom to do what He would have us do–and for strength to do what must be done.
Yes!!! I used the advice you gave in this blog and told my cousins wife that not only is he her husband, that they too are brothers and sister in Christ and that when her husband is doing anything that Jesus would find displeasing to bring it to her hubby’s attention. She took it to heart and I hope she steps out of that fear of confrontation and speaks what God puts on her heart. Sometimes , I’ve noticed, that spouses can feel justified in holding grudges against one another forgetting the aspect and respect that they are in the body of Christ together and are each other’s neighbor, so the very things Christ said to do, say to your neighbor applies to the spouse as well!
That’s wonderful, Jasmine!
Wow; it’s amazing how God can put just the right thing in the right place when you need it the most! Thanks Sheila… my husband and I have been having an extremely rough 6ish months and really just a tough marriage overall. This blog post gives me such reliefs as to respecting my husband but not submitting to him in sin… choosing to honor God has given me such freedom over just submitting to a sinful man (albeit a good man) and I think it will also do the same for my husband…your first blog I have ever shared with him… thank you so much… excited to puthonoring God first and asking what would Jesus do 😉
I’m so glad it helped, Crystal! I said a prayer for you guys!
Hi Shelia
Thank you for this blog, i agree that lots of marriage advice is not very helpful. I am in an emotinal abusive marriage and am trying to stand as God calls us to. I ask Him how to respond to my husband’s control taticts and anger. His answer to me is to love my husband, when I ask how does that look how do I do that, He shows me how He loves. That is to show when we are doing things wrong and help us change. He confics us and shows us when we are behaving badly. He does not condem us but helps us see a different way of behaving. So that is how I am trying to work on my relationship with my husband. Along with lots of prayer for him to have a hunger to know God in a deeper way. Things have changed a little for the better. It can be a hard slog but we all have our crosses to bare and God is good and asks us to lean on Him and He gives us the strength we need to walk the path of love.
That sounds very wise, Anne. That’s great!
Well said! When Peter confronted Ananias and Sapphira, the implication was that the apostle expected Sapphira to resist and expose her husband’s evil. Instead she “submitted” to him and was likewise judged. Sometimes being a helpmeet requires a wife to rebuke her husband.
Exactly! I point to that story all the time. God wants us, first and foremost, following Him. And nothing must ever get in the way of that.
This is a really interesting blog article to me because in the last few years God has shown me that I put relationships before Him and He has slowly, painfully but by my request, altered all of the relationships closest to me. I believe I made relationships idols because that was my self-worth and now God is recreating that in me. The interesting thing is I have more joy and a healthier witness for Him.
One area I have always struggled with was with my husband and submission and forever feeling like a “bad” christian for not “submitting” to unhealthy behavior and just not praying enough and trying to do all the changing myself and forever feeling trapped which made me an angry spouse.
A lack of redemptive confrontation not only affects my husband (and other relationships) but accountability towards me disappears as well because when one individual doesn’t want accountability frequently they are not going to hold you accountable either so marriages limp along and stagnate. It’s a team effort.
While I appreciate the point you were trying to make about trite response to “just pray” and I get Totally get it, prayer is the key. Prayer is vitally important since we need to be filled with the HS to even come to these conclusions much less how to proceed. God does, at times, intercede without us doing a thing other than praying for for an individual but most often prayer changes me and that is a ripple affect. As I grow in Gods understanding of redemptive confrontation, the love He places inside of me for my spouse bathes my spouse in an atmosphere of compassion, love and acceptance for who they are where they are so that we can move forward together even when I take a hard stance and won’t back down and I am not angry anymore!!!
I haven’t read your other articles on submission and plan to but I do believe in submission to my husband, after God.
Hi Jennifer, Wow, what a journey you’re on! I’m sure it’s very painful, but very good, too.
I do agree about prayer. Prayer is the key, and God’s been moving me in a real learning curve on prayer over the last few years. I think the message is this, though: Yes, prayer is the battle. But prayer is also preparation for the battle. And sometimes people forget that. We don’t just pray for things to change; sometimes we pray to prepare us to do the changing. Sometimes God wants us to actually DO something, and He shows us what that is through prayer and He equips us through prayer. So prayer is not the whole thing. It is the foundation, but it is not the whole thing. And too many people make it the whole thing, because they feel as if they have no other biblical options.
I watch guys do this all the time. They pray to God to stop looking at porn. They think its Gods job. NOPE. It is the individuals job to stop. God is the power we use to do that. In this case it is do nothing!
Loved this article, Sheila. While I was reading and nodding, I was reminded of my first year of marriage. We were part of a young marrieds life group at that time, and my husband and I were going through a difficult time. As well as getting used to each other, he was laid off and had a lot of trouble finding a job, and I was in school and paying tuition plus groceries and rent was proving to be difficult! We were fighting a lot more. After talking with our life group leaders, the wife gave me a book called “The Excellent Wife” by Martha Peace. Let me tell you, no book has ever scared me more than that one. I read it, and as a new struggling wife, felt like the biggest failure ever and that clearly the reason we were fighting more was all my fault and I must not be submissive enough. I tried so hard to implement everything the book advised, but something always felt either impossible or wrong. Years later of course I look back on that time and know the reasons we were arguing more! Totally normal and natural reasons. Oh the advice I would’ve given my younger self. The grace I would’ve given myself! Anyway, I appreciated this post, and I truly hope that this kind of thinking permeates the church. It would do so much good!
Thanks, Jenn! I appreciate it. And we really need to fundamentally change some of our basic premises. Whenever ANYTHING comes in the way of seeking God first and foremost, we’re on the wrong path. It’s as simple as that!
I can’t say anything that adds to what you’ve already said except…FINALLY THANK YOU! (standing ovation, heck yeah….fill in favorite expression here)
I struggle a lot with my church’s view of women, but oddly enough this is one thing I feel my church gets right about marriage: God first, period. So while I’m bothered by some of my pastor father-in-law’s views on gender, he is serious about sin and is not afraid to tell a spouse when it is time to walk away from his/her marriage on the rare occasions when staying is not glorifying God. I would never accuse my church of sacrificing marriage on the alter of marriage.
And so I don’t know where I fall anymore on the complementarian/egalitarian spectrum since both sides accuse me of being for the other side, but I frankly don’t worry about too much anymore. I know that when I seek God’s will, to further His Kingdom, and to love like Jesus in my marriage, I won’t go wrong!
Kay, I don’t think labels matter–I think Jesus matters! And so I think your approach is just right!
Absolutely!!! God very recently revealed my idolatry of “family” – both my family of birth and my marriage. What it means, in short, is that problems are never resolved, and I only allow God to work from a “multiple choice” list that I provide to HIM. Not Christ-like at all!
This is a very well-laid trap because it preys on our innate desire for relationship, and especially the most intimate kinds. “Love” becomes the enemy of “accountability”. I think across the board, churches are teaching that ending relationships of any kind is a sin – and a greater sin than whatever was driving the ending, to be sure. After all, God forgives us, and tells us to rush to reconciliation. Ending a relationship is framed as the antithesis of God’s character – something He would NEVER do, and therefore His children shouldn’t either.
It’s just not true, though. The Bible has countless examples of God removing His blessing and/or His presence, as a direct response to the state of the heart. Israel, of course, over and over. Saul. David and Bathsheba’s child loss. Eden. It’s true that God forgives – but only when forgiveness is wanted and asked for with humility and repentance.
I could kick myself for all the effort I thought I was putting toward “helping my family” like a “good Christian” when really I was feeding an idol and my own desire for peace. For thinking that I could build loving relationships with my own two hands if I just listened enough or prayed enough or bit my tongue enough or counseled more wisely. I was never really willing to put my family in God’s hands and let His will be done.
Now, we are a family of cool calm, and it is not the same as a “loving peace”. No big confrontations, but a laundry list of “off limits” issues. Love, but not intimacy. I wanted/want much more for us, but I have to stop refusing the only help.
As I said, this has been very recent and I don’t know how it will play out in the future, but we need to start empowering each other in the church to approach our families with a more Christ-like heart.
Thank you! Love this article! Speaks to me in so many ways, through my nasty past two years, ending with divorce this summer.
Oh, Marianna, I’m so sorry for what you’ve walked through! I’m glad this article could help.
Loved your article. I read it looking for help for my daughter who wants a divorce. She is married to a lovely Christian man, but says she is not attracted to him and should never have married him. Not sure how to offer them both advice in this situation.
I think in that case you just help them fall in love by spending time together. Divorce will rarely fix it. And she did marry him. Chase after Jesus, and He’ll show her how to love. But that must be so hard as a mom!
I know you wrote this post a while ago, but I just want to say thank you so much for writing it. My husband and I have had a bit of a bumpy ride this past year since our second was born and he got a promotion. We’ve been through far worse, but that combination of less time and more to do has been tough on our marriage. Our communication was poor because we were exhausted and not making enough time for one another. I tried to look for advice, but as you say, so much of what I’ve read has stressed that I must keep quiet and pray – it was making things worse! We’re in a better place now after making time to communicate, dating each other again and of course, praying! I’ve shared this post with my husband – it is exactly what we need to hear!
I’m so glad, Louise! And I’m so glad that you’re in a better place now, too.
Finally! Someone has something useful to say! Thank you very much for writing. This is an article I look forward to discussing together.