Mars Hill Church recently posted this big blog post on adultery. I linked to it in this week Monday Challenge set of articles. I thought the article covered a lot of ground and provided a lot of food for thought. Apparently, so did others who visited Monday’s post.
Adultery is not a fun feature, but I can’t encourage you enough to take the 15 minutes to go through the article. It reveals much and provides good challenges.
After you’ve read it, here are a few of my own thoughts:
1. Worship.
The Ten Commandments are about worship, and being faithful to God. When we put ANYTHING ahead of him, we cheat on Him. He desires our affection, so a wayward heart toward God is fertile ground for a wayward heart in marriage.
2. Be anti-adultery, but also anti-divorce.
God is pro marriage. The bottom line is marriages CAN survive divorce, although that is certainly not preferred. I listened to the story of a woman whose husband left her for some young fling. She refused to divorce him and just let him go off. At least a year (maybe more) went by as she prayed (in her words) that God would either return him or kill him.
Adultery does NOT have to spell the end of a marriage. I definitely agree with this.
3. Adultery is in the heart.
Ask God to reveal your heart motives. Are the seeds being planted? Do you flirt with someone outside your marriage, even unintentionally? Is pornography a secret desire, worse yet a ruinous private sin?
This was a challenging article that provided a lot of clarity and even some practical things for how to lead someone through. In Christ, there is always hope!
Think. Are adultery and divorce things that simply happen that no one can really change for the better?
Act. Do you need to end a habit, a relationship? Better yet, if you are married or preparing for marriage, ask God to give you the heart of sacrifice and diligence. It’s never too early or too late to see and understand that marriage is more for holiness than for happiness!