The following letter is a real letter written to a real couple whom we dearly love. To protect their privacy, we have not used their actual names, nor are any personal details included. I post this publicly in the event that it may be helpful to others who are struggling with the issue of infidelity personally, or within their family, friends or church. The letter to our loved ones followed other communication with them, and there has been further contact after the letter was received by them. It is not meant to be a thorough treatment of the issue, but to present the beginning of discussing a biblical framework upon which to consider the circumstances of their life together. Because families are often at a loss as to how to proceed when infidelity is discovered, and it is happening frequently within the Church, we hope that the posting of this letter will be of some help.

Dear Bill and Laura,

When we were married almost thirty-eight years ago, our wedding invitation invited our guests to witness the ceremony when we were “united as one, with Christ, for service.” We were sincere but also terribly naïve, very lacking in understanding as to what that declaration meant. In the early years of our marriage we were greatly influenced by Francis and Edith Schaeffer who said “Christianity is not a series of truths in the plural, but rather truth spelled with a capital ‘T.’ Biblical Christianity is Truth concerning total reality—and the intellectual holding of that total Truth and then living in the light of that Truth.” You know some of the challenging experiences of our family life that have been the ‘fire and flood’ that God has used to teach us to live in Truth. Though they are different from yours, the same Truth applies. God has faithfully, mercifully guided us and taught us through the wisdom of godly people throughout church history, but primarily through the study of His Word, what marriage and sex is meant to be. In other words, these are not our ideas, but what we have learned through the grace of God.

It is with deep love and much concern that we write this letter, praying continually that God will open your hearts to the knowledge of His grace and truth. This is Truth that we strive to live by and what we teach to those who come to us for counsel. Because it is Truth from God, it will be effective in your lives as you consider them and follow God’s way for your marriage.

As you well know, unfaithfulness in marriage carries unbearable weights of guilt, shame, betrayal and pain. These burdens cannot be cast off easily. Human effort, even with strong personal resolve, will fail to lift these burdens. Persistent rationalizations will ultimately fail. In the end, attempts to run away will not achieve your goal. Of course, living in denial, however tempting, is not viable. Spiritualizing one’s actions will lead into deeper frustration. Your attempt to end this nightmare without embracing the Truth and the reality of marriage as God intends it is a path that will stir up lasting roots of bitterness. However challenging your situation is, and it is challenging, we believe that you can move beyond this perilous moment in your lives and have a marriage that is consistent with the purposes of God. Only a marriage that is built on this purpose is worth pursuing, versus a marriage built on self-fulfillment or relational fulfillment. Make no mistake; the journey will be difficult and challenging. Your lives and marriage must be hammered out in contrast to a horde of competing voices and ideas. We encourage you to read carefully, to ponder and pray for God’s Spirit to search your hearts and minds. It is extremely important to struggle biblically because the complex issues you face go to the innermost core of your being.

One of the great weaknesses of the evangelical Christian today is the neglect of the teaching of, and the failure to practice, a biblical understanding of marriage and sexuality. The result is that a number of popular ideas, but wrong ideas, in our culture now influence our perspective on marriage and our approach in dealing with unfaithfulness. The following are examples. You may find that you have bought into these views:

• That love, marriage and sexual intimacy are primarily seen for the purpose of companionship.
• That love, marriage and sexual intimacy only have value and should only be pursued if the relationship produces personal satisfaction.
• That the purpose of marriage and sexual intimacy is romance. Said another way, if one is not happy in a marriage the marriage has little value.

When those views are held by the couple:

• More often than not, couples are self-centeredly preoccupied with their marital problems and their efforts to reach a solution.
• More often than not, the marriage relationship has an inward relational focus rather than an outward focus on others.
• Escaping further rejection and pain is often seen as the best answer to the problem of unfaithfulness.

Also, it may difficult for you, like many other Christian couples, to consider and accept the biblical view on sex and marriage for the following reasons:

• We are biased in our thinking about marriage and sexuality.
• In our sexual histories, our sexual experience or inexperience partly creates this bias along with sexual fears, regrets and dissatisfactions.
• All of your sexual past, in and out of marriage, will drown out your willingness to listen, hear, and follow the Word of God.
• Your sexuality is more fragile than it appears, and has been badly damaged both by your experience and by the Fall.
• No one is able to hear impartially or objectively about their sexuality because we are at the core of our being, sexual; male or female.
• Marriages within Christianity have increasingly and sadly become a constant changing pattern of relationships rather than something stable and permanent. Christian couples have wrongly come to accept the pattern of serial monogamy (moving from one spouse or affair to the next).
• In our culture, understanding about sexuality has shifted radically away from a biblical understanding, even within the church.
• The church is now undermined in its teaching on sexuality and marriage because it has been impacted by the culture rather than the Bible for its norms. It has no credibility.
• The teachings of the Bible are increasingly questioned, even by professing Christians.

Here are some alternative views based on Scripture that we ask you to consider:

• In dealing with unfaithfulness in a marriage, there is no room for self-righteousness. Each spouse must consider the sin in their own heart.
• Being innocent of sexual unfaithfulness does not excuse one from being guilty of sin (James 2:10, 11).
• An open, honest biblical look at sexuality and marriage will result in a new understanding and a new relationship.
• Sexual questions, more often than not, lead to spiritual questions.
• Sex is to be used for the service and glory of God.
• Sex should always be one man for one woman, one woman for one man, for life. Death is the only thing that can separate that man and that woman. Anything else that separates a man and a woman who has married is not of God but originates in the hardness of the heart. (Romans 7:1-6, Matthew 19, Luke 16:18)
• All sex outside of one husband with his one wife and one wife with her one husband, including sex with yourself and serial monogamy is hollow vanity and sheer folly and outside what God has ordained.
• Neither sex nor relationship is the ultimate goal of marriage. (Both are a gift of God and are to be enjoyed, but are not the ultimate goal.) Marriage and sex must exist for the service, purpose and glory of God. Anything less is sex and marriage that has become an empty idol.
• Wherever romanticism exalts sex or marriage and makes it some sort of absolute, a false god exists in our hearts.
• Sexual immorality, and even divorce, would not exist if it did not promise so much. Both in their own way promise fulfillment, release, satisfaction, fruitfulness, life, and escape from pain and frustration.
• Sexual immorality and divorce are both outside the divine order of God. Therefore, what they promise, they ultimately cannot perform. In the end, they disappoint. People believe that divorce and re-marriage will solve their problems, but always remember: hell is portable.
• In the Bible’s view, the way forward is neither via individual autonomy nor fulfilled meaningful relationship, but the joyful, shared service of God.

These questions will help to lead you in another direction than where you are now heading:

• What is the purpose of marriage?
• What should be your attitude toward permanence in your marriage?
• What is your attitude toward sequential relationships; divorce?

The difficult question is not whether your marriage can be saved. No; the question you must grapple with is: “How can we, with undying trust in God, effectively live in this marriage that has been given to us by God Himself?” This question points to several truths revealed by the Word of God:

• Each man who marries a woman must leave his family of origin and cling to the wife of his youth throughout his entire life on this earth. So must a woman (Genesis 2:24; Matthew 5:27-32; Matthew 19:4-6; Romans 7:1-3).
• Marriage, a union defined as “one flesh,” can never be broken except through the death of a spouse.
• It is essential that you embrace this divine order of God that was set up from the beginning of creation.
• Seen in this divine order of “one flesh” is the absolute security that God offers the believer who in Christ is made righteous by faith and faith alone.
• Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ. Neither should any man or woman, once married, attempt to separate themselves through unfaithfulness or divorce.

The point of this letter is to challenge you to the fact that there is another way of thinking about sex and marriage, really an entirely different worldview that is based on the Word of God. Without a doubt, the relationship between husband and wife is meant to be loving, satisfying, intimate, fun, and fulfilling in a variety of ways. A couple whose marriage exists for the service, purpose and glory of God will enjoy the richness of the relational gift God blessed them with, but it is not the purpose of their union.With all our hearts we hope this letter stirs an interest in knowing more.

The overall point is this. We have been taught and encouraged so long and so thoroughly in a lifestyle of self-interest (self-esteem, it’s nicely called), that it is extremely difficult to imagine why we should stay married when one spouse has broken their marriage vows or has fallen out of love. Staying married, it is commonly believed, could hinder our autonomy, impose expectations and limitation of life, and impede our personal and spiritual development. Such philosophy is inherently selfish, introspective and unbiblical. This philosophy, connected to a very real fear, blinds most couples to the Truth.

We write this letter to you, Bill and Laura, at risk of sounding strident or like we’re lecturing. Please know our longing for you to consider and take to heart the Truth that we briefly represent here. The decisions you make in the days ahead are crucial ones and we want to equip you with what we have learned and clumsily lived in our thirty-eight years of marriage. The journey before you is not an easy one, but as we’ve reminded you before, what God commands of us He also provides all we need to obey those commands. Set your faces together toward Him; He is running to meet you.

With our love and many prayers on your behalf,
Harry and Rosie