SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

CaptainRogers

I often wonder, as a BH, what an affair would be like. I have had the opportunity as much as anyone has. I admit, I even have had frustrations as why I did not enjoy the thrill and excitement of another woman. I am entitled, as a BH correct?

Here’s what GOD has put in me to keep me from enjoying what my flesh wants.

(I googled some of this, some is just me)

If I committed adultery/infidelity…

1. My relationship with God would suffer from a break in fellowship.

2. I would need to seek forgiveness from my Lord.

3. I would suffer from the emotional consequences of guilt.

4. I would spend countless hours replaying the failure.

5. My spouse would suffer the scars of this abuse more deeply than I could begin to describe.

6. My spouse would spend countless hours in counseling.

7. My spouse’s recovery would be long and painful.

8. Their pain would grieve me deeply and compound my own suffering and shame.

9. Our relationship would suffer a break in trust, fellowship, and intimacy.

10. We would be together yet feel great loneliness.

11. The reputation of my family would suffer loss.

12. My children would be deeply disappointed and bewildered.

13. My grandchildren would not understand.

14. My friends would be disappointed and would question my integrity.

15. I could lose my job or business. If I can lie to my spouse, I proved I can lie to anyone. Who wants to ‘those’ people in their lives?

16. My witness among neighbors would become worthless.

17. My witness to my brother would be worthless.

18. My testimony among my spouse’s family would be damaged.

19. I would suffer God’s discipline.

20. Satan would be thrilled at my failure.

21. Satan would work overtime to be sure my shame never departed.

22. My spouse might divorce me.

23. My children might never speak to me.

24. Our mutual friends would shy away from us and break fellowship.

25. I would bring emotional pain to the affair partner.

26. I would bring reproach upon the affair partner.

27. If the affair partner is married, their spouse might attempt to bring harm.

28. Affair partner could get divorced.

29. An unwanted child could be produced.

30. My part in conception might trigger an abortion, the killing of an innocent child.

31. Disease might result.

32. Some might conclude that all Christians are hypocrites.

33. My business could fail because I could not be trusted.

34. My leadership among those I have led in the past might also be diminished in impact.

35. My health would suffer, my spouse health will suffer.

36. I might have to start life over again.

37. This same sin might be visited upon my family for four generations.

38. My spouse, myself, the affair partner, their spouse could NEVER forget.

39. My spouse, myself, the affair partner, their spouse will live with this forever.

40. My marriage will always have the comparison of another person I invited into it.

41. I can never say I did not commit adultery, or lie, cheat, cause harm, inflict pain to the innocent.

GOD has also given me the gift of JESUS. With that comes forgiveness. It is hard for me sometimes. Not for him.

Who are you going to focus on in your talk (sermon?)? BS who know they are BS, WS who have admitted being WS, WS who have not admitted to being WS, people who are not yet BS or WS but need to be aware of the danger, people who are friends of BS and/or WS?

Good question. Short version...neither. Focusing on not committing adultery, what constitutes adultery, and the overall effects of choosing adultery.

Just thinking out in cyberspace, but if this were still the "punishment", do you think there might be less adultery?

'If there is a man who commits adultery with another man's wife, one who commits adultery with his friend's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Leviticus 20:10 NASB

"Now Look! No one... is to stone anyone... until I blow this whistle! Do you understand?! Even--and I want to make this absolutely clear--even if they do say "Jehovah!"

Well played Unhinged, well played.

Wow! A RiverChicken fan knows the ways of Python!?! I may have opened a new fondness for you, my friend. 😁

"Do you find it... wisible... when I mention my friend..."

😂😂😂

if this were still the "punishment", do you think there might be less adultery?

I don't know . . .I don't think so. If I had sat through a sermon or talk on adultery even a week before it started, I would have checked out and thought well at least that's one I don't have to worry about! Back to worrying about how to honor my mother and father. Even the NT entry into the topic - if you have looked at someone with lust in your eye - I would have tuned out figuring it didn't apply. I wasn't looking at anyone with lust in my eye and hadn't had any of that sort of temptation for the entire marriage. I'd have been more apt to listen to someone talk about thou shall not commit murder because the NT updated version of that commandment does apply. I've been thinking about what might have caught my attention at that point in time (not that I was going to church, I was not, but I'm imagining your just-about-to-become WW congregants who don't think it applies). Maybe thinking about betrayal in general - when have *I* been betrayed and how bad did that feel, even if it was in third grade when someone was supposed to save your seat in the cafeteria and didn't. It's easy to remember the hurt from that. Then asking people to think about when they have been the betrayer and how awful that was for the other person. Most people will avoid thinking about this - people narrate their lives so they are the good person - but at some point everyone has probably engaged in at least a minor betrayal, even if it was in childhood i.e. you were not nice to your sibling when in a group of friends, or in the office when someone expected you to have their back and you didn't or whatever. Then magnifying that by a million, sexual betrayal by the person closest to you. That might have got me to pay attention or to begin to consider how it would feel to a BS. Or maybe pointing out the numbers, look around at the people next to you in the pews, numerically someone has or will experience this and it's all over the bible so we must take it seriously even if we think it's not part of our lives and can't envision it being part of our lives. Maybe that would have worked. Where's the first instance of sexual betrayal in the Bible? Abraham? Or does that not quite count? It certainly pissed off his wife with ramifications that last millenia even if it was technically legal.

CaptainRogers, this was in my inbox this morning -the Eldredge daily email. It is what I would have needed to hear to in the weeks/months/years before the affair started. I wasn't interested in the man as a person. (in fact, during the affair I told my IC, myself and even my husband that I knew I didn't like the man and could not understand the compulsion). I needed a way out of what is described here, and that was the path I took rather than drugs or alcohol or whatever else people do. I still don't know if I would have listened. Maybe, to a message like the one below. I was so busy telling myself that my life was just great. But it's something you might think about including for how some people are susceptible and they don't admit to it.

A young woman came to see me, as most seeking counseling do, because she was at the end of her rope. What had begun a year earlier as mild depression had sunk deeper and deeper until she found herself contemplating suicide. We met for many weeks, and I came to know a delightful woman with a poet’s heart, whose soul was buried beneath years not so much of tragedy but of neglect. This one particular afternoon, we had spoken for more than an hour of how deeply she longed for love, how almost completely ignored and misunderstood she felt her entire life. It was a tender, honest, and deeply moving session. As our time drew to a close, I asked her if she would pray with me. I could hardly believe what came next. She assumed a rather bland, religious tone to her voice and said something to the effect of “God, thank you for being here. Show me what I ought to do.” I found myself speechless. You’ve got to be kidding me, I thought. That’s not how you feel at all. I know your heart’s true cry. You are far more desperate than that.

Why are we so embarrassed by our desire? Why do we pretend that we’re doing fine, thank you, that we don’t need a thing? The persistent widow wasn’t too proud to seek help. Neither was the psalmist. Their humility allowed them to express their desire. How little we come to God with what really matters to us. How rare it is that we even admit it to ourselves. We don’t pray like Jesus because we don’t allow ourselves to be nearly so alive. We don’t allow ourselves to feel how desperate our situation truly is. We sense that our desire will undo us if we let it rise up in all its fullness. Wouldn’t it be better to bury the disappointment and the yearning and just get on with life? As Larry Crabb has pointed out, pretending seems a much more reliable road to Christian maturity. The only price we pay is a loss of soul, of communion with God, a loss of direction, and a loss of hope.

[This message edited by Pippin at 9:33 AM, October 17th (Saturday)]

Thank you for that, Pippin!

And the long breath gets released. Small crowd in class (about a dozen). Talked about what adultery is (physical or emotional), the slope to get there, and how to keep yourself in check through proper accountability and pouring into your marriage rather than always taking from it.

Stress level finally slowly dropping.

Thanks for the update.

Did you say what you wanted to say? Did you say anything you didn't want to say?

Said as much as my time would allow. Didn't allow any "fluffy/feel good" stuff. Matter of fact. This is how & why it still applies today. Talked about the ugly parts. No sugarcoating. Every word had a purpose. No extras.

Even in the small class, virtually everyone knew a couple (or two or three) tainted by infidelity.

What I wish I had written was:

I always thought you'd do this well.

How do you feel about it?

I see that logically you know you did well. I hope you feel a sense of accomplishment. Not everybody can lead a class on something that had and continues to have such a big personal impact.

I think it went as well as it could given the parameters of a 45 minute lesson. This could have been something I spent a month of Sundays on, looking at every facet...and still needed 8 more weeks to "finish".

The best part was that while Mrs. Cap wasn't there (I think that if she had, it may have made it a little more difficult), she did all the empathetic things well. She texted me before the class began. She called afterwards. She welcomed me home. She asked if I needed a quiet spot to decompress.

That response from her made everything much better than I could have imagined.

[This message edited by CaptainRogers at 6:26 PM, October 19th (Monday)]

Big change

Big change indeed!