I Just Can't Forgive My Spouse

Hey, welcome into Walgreens.

Hi, there. Hey.

All right, hon, I'll grab the gift wrap cards and, oh, those stuffed animals the girls want.

Great. And I'll grab the string lights and some. How about I grab some cough drops? This is not just a quick trip to Walgreens.

I'm fine, honey.

Well, just in case. You know what they say, Tis the season. This is help staying healthy through the holidays. Walgreens. Hey, friends. Welcome to the Naked Marriage Podcast. We're Dave and Ashley Willis, and we are talking today about one of the most misunderstood, important, and powerful elements of marriage, and that is forgiveness. What is it? What is it not? How will it help you? How does it impact your communication in marriage? And, yeah, it's vital. A marriage has to have a lot of grace. But I think people misunderstand what this means. They think forgiveness means just maybe is pretending something didn't happen or enabling this really unhealthy behavior, or it's like the opposite of justice. There's either grace or justice. You can't have both. But what Jesus embodied and taught us is that both have to happen. You know, you have to have both. And we're going to talk about what that means, what that looks like in.

Marriage, and that's right. And I'm telling you, you can't have a strong marriage without forgiving each other. I mean, right now, you know, some of you might be engaged or maybe newlyweds, and you're like, well, I just really haven't had to forgive that much because they're near perfect, you know, but the truth is, in marriage, you know, you're going to realize real fast that you both are imperfect people. But we have a perfect God who can help us through. And the thing about being a Christian is that our God forgave us first. Like, he set the precedent and bigger.

Than we'll ever have to forgive somebody else.

Exactly. Way bigger, way more. And we let God down every day. And I think that's the first kind of step is realizing that we can't let pride get in the way. Because I think a lot of times people hold off forgiving because they're like, well, I would never do that to you, or I haven't done that to you, or I haven't done as much to you as you've done to me. And, you know, there's just too much to forgive, and so I can never fully forgive you. And the thing about it is, forgiveness is interesting because the thing about forgiveness is it is good for the other person, for you to Forgive them. But really it's more for you. It's more about setting you free from growing resentful and from having that hardened heart we talked about last week on the podcast. But it's like, you know, it's twofold because you are telling that person, you know, forgiveness really is saying, listen, what you did hurt me. And I didn't like that. And I'm still hurting. And I want to find healing. What you did hurt me. But I'm going to trust that God is going to deal with you, okay? Because God is the one who deals with people. I mean, he deals with our hearts. And we can trust that God is going to deal with our spouse. And he is a just God. And there are natural consequences in this life, of course, and there are boundaries sometimes that when whatever the wrong is, sometimes there's boundaries that we have to put in place in order to, you know, keep this from happening again, whatever that breach of trust was. But forgiveness is also saying, like, I'm letting this go because I'm giving this to God. And, you know, Dave often describes how forgiveness and trust are two different things. Because a lot of times people will say, well, I don't know if I can ever forgive him again. I don't know if I can ever forgive her again. But really, I think what they're meaning is they can never trust that person again. Because forgiveness and trust are two different things. Right, sweetie?

Yeah. And I do think that that misunderstanding the distinction is part of what keeps people stuck. They think, well, I can't forgive. But really what they're saying is, I can't trust yet. And that's okay, because forgiveness and trust are different. But what forgiveness is is that it's a prerequisite for there to be a chance to have trust again.

Right.

If you want to rebuild trust, you have to give forgiveness first. Forgiveness is essentially saying, what you did hurt me. What you did was wrong. But out of love for you and out of the desire for this relationship to be made whole and healed, I'm going to give you the opportunity to rebuild trust. And forgiveness also means, I'm not going to hold this over your head. I'm not going to punish. I'm giving up the right to punish you. There might still be some natural consequences that have to take place. Some of those might come from God. Some of those might happen just in terms of how, you know, how we have to restructure a few things just for there to be an opportunity to rebuild trust. But ultimately, it's not my desire to hurt you, even though I'm hurting, I'm not going to try to make you feel pain as well. I want to create a path of healing for both of us, and we're starting. I'm starting believing the best in you.

Yeah.

You know, Jimmy Evans, our ministry's founder, said trust is built in drops and lost in buckets.

The.

The only way to rebuild trust is consistently one drop at a time, one action at a time, one day at a time, doing the right thing, living with transparency, being who we say we are, being true to our word, we can dump out a whole bucket of trust all at once through a breach of trust, through keeping secrets through in our marriage. That happened early in our marriage when it was found out that I was looking at pornography, which had been an ongoing secret issue that I'd battled alone since my teenage years. And when that finally came out into the open, and we've talked a lot about that, so we won't just make this an episode about that, but that was one time when I dumped out a bucket of trust, and Ashley forgave. She gave me the opportunity to rebuild that trust, and I started the process, a drop at a time, of rebuilding it. Though I was still so broken in that sin, there were times that I. I dumped out the bucket again, you know, through relapse. And we continued together to walk through that journey to get the healing and the help that we needed. And over time, little by little, that trust returned. You know, healing came to my mind as I found really sobriety from that sin. And I'm thankful. That was many, many years ago. And on the other side of it now, I believe trust has been fully repaired and restored in that area. Whatever it is that you're going through, whether it's sin in a sexual nature, whether it's been hiding financial purchases, whether it's been just a pattern of dishonesty, whether it's a lack of transparency where you or your spouse, you're not being forthcoming, and where you are, you feel a right to keep secrets and passwords from each other in marriage. If you want to have a naked marriage, which is what we call this podcast by God's design, that nakedness isn't just physical, representing sexual intimacy, but it's also emotional, mental, spiritual. It's saying, I've got nothing to hide from you. I want you to have full access to every part of my life, my heart, my thoughts, my calendar, my computer, my finances. It's all. It's interconnected. We are one by God's design. And the moment we try to start hiding from each other, then we're eroding that foundation of trust which has to be the foundation of a marriage. And without it, the marriage just can't stand. It won't weather life's storms. So if that's been damaged in your marriage and if you've been the one to damage it, start by apologizing like this. I take responsibility. I was wrong. I hurt you. Here's how I hurt you. Here's what I did. Be forthcoming in everything that you did. You know, confession is a big, big part of healing. Like, here's what's going on. Here's. Here's what you saw. Here's what you caught me doing. Here are the things that you don't even know about that I've struggled with. And I need help and accountability to get through this. And I'm asking you to forgive me, and I'm asking you specifically to give me the chance to rebuild this trust that I broke. But I'm so sorry that I caused you this pain. I wish I could take it back. I wish I could take that pain on myself, and I can't. And that breaks my heart. But what I can do and want to do is to. Is to rebuild your trust and to show you through my actions that I love you. And I'm fully committed to you and fully committed to this marriage.

That's right. And I think another important part of this whole question, how do I forgive my spouse? Is we have to watch where our mind goes. You know, I just got a question the other day from a heartbroken wife where her husband has just been dishonest about a lot of things. Like, there's been some inappropriate relationships online, and he's at least had emotional affairs, if not physical affairs. And she's just like, I just. I don't even know what to do with this. And the husband is remorseful, and he is now getting help. Like, he's going to something like affairrecovery.com, which is a great ministry that our friends who episode way back on Overcoming an Affair shared about. So he's doing his part. But she said, you know, I want to be there to support him, but I'm so hurt. And she said, I just can't think of a time where I won't have these. These negative thoughts go through my mind, like, he's gonna do this again.

And the images of.

And images that she saw, text messages. And she said, and they were of a flirtatious nature and maybe even of, like, a sexy Nature. And she said, and it just was so, like daggers in her heart. She's like, I don't know what to do with that. And how do I, like, will I ever have a time where I don't have that in the back of my mind? And that's, that's just a gut level, honest question. And I think a lot of us who've been through something where our spouse has broken trust, there are these negative thoughts that creep in. And I think we've got to, we need to deal with the emotions we're going to have. You know, we're going to be angry, we're going to be disgusted, we're going to be frustrated, we're going to be appalled. We're going to, you know, we're going to have all kinds of different feelings and sadness. And, you know, it's something that we have to go through. We have to feel our feelings. But we say this all the time on the podcast. We can't allow our feelings or our fears or anything else of that matter become like our guide. Right? And you could say, well, Ashley, but I'm looking at the truth. I mean, what he did was real and what she did, I mean, they really broke my trust. And I'm not trying to take away from that because I get it. Like, I get it. What happened happened. And that's hurtful. And that's part of your story now, like, that you can't take away that part of your story. But what you can do is you can control where your mind goes. Like, God actually gives us license to say what stays in our mind. And that's called neuroplasticity. Okay? Like in the psychological word, neuroplasticity.

She's almost got that master's degree, guys.

And it's. Hey, but I mean, this isn't. You don't have to have a master's degree to know.

I do want to brag on you just for a second that this woman is the hardest working woman that I know or person. You know, it's not gender specific compliment. She's doing all the stuff I'm doing and I'm exhausted. And on top of that, over the last two years she's been doing a master's degree?

No, it's been three years.

Three years.

It's taking me a little longer.

Just so guys she can more effectively help you. That's been her whole motivation. Nobody's making her do this.

Like, there's not like EXO's supporting me through it though.

Exo is supporting her through it. I'm so thankful that this ministry is supporting her through this. But it's like it is her just saying, I want to be even better at helping people overcome their individual struggles and struggles in marriage so we can minister to them more effectively. And I just, I don't brag on you enough because, like, that's. Sweetie, it's amazing. And so, like, I mean, you said that big word and I was like, oh, that's a reminder. Like, she's.

Well, you've probably heard it. I mean, thankfully, I'm so grateful that a lot of these psychological neuroscience, you know, things are out in podcast world. They're out on social media where even on TikTok, you can look this up on TikTok, and there's a lot about, you know that. Now, I wouldn't say TikTok is not your professor, so to speak. Now sometimes there are professors on TikTok that talk about this or doctors and things that share about this. But, you know, we're getting a greater understanding of how the. And what the good news is, is it's the Bible. Okay? Like, neuroplasticity is just saying you can renew your mind.

Yeah. Romans 12:15.

I'm hitting my mic. I'm so excited.

It's a great verse. Don't be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you'll be able to test and approve what God's will is, which is good and pleasing.

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Perfect. He wants you to renew your mind.

He wants this for you. And so you know, this is good news. Okay? This is good news. This is already in the Bible. But the fact that science is saying yes, not that we need science to do that, but when it does, oh, my gosh, it's just the best. And so.

Well, don't be scared of science, Christians. No, no, no, no. Science is the study of how God does stuff.

Exactly.

It's not anti God, but science is just really at the heart of it. It's discovering God's creation, how God did what he did and how he designed the world and how he designed us and learning more. So if you approach science with the right attitude, the attitude of faith, it actually teaches you more about God.

It does.

It's like the, you know, people that are just completely missing the point, that think that somehow science is anti God or whatever, but, sorry, this little side.

Soapbox, but it's so true. And I know there's different schools of thought on this, but the fact that we are able to renew our minds with God's help is just. It's so empowering. And I think that, you know, to this wife, I remember I wrote her, and I said, listen, I get it. Like, I get that he's disappointed you. You saw things that you wish you could just erase from your mind, right? And you can't. You know, I'm not. I mean, God could. Technically, you could ask God to erase that from your mind. Technically, he probably could, but it is part of your story. I don't think we need to fear the truth, right? We have to process the truth. We have to face the truth. And with God's help, He can renew our mind to where he takes that story, right? And he uses it for your good and his glory. And what he does through that, through that renewing of your mind, is he makes you stronger, right? He creates new path for his truth to reign in your mind. And his truth is what needs to reign. Not our feelings, not whatever happened, but his truth. And so when you can, you know, you have that negative thought, come an exercise you can do is you can look at it. You need, you know, look at that negative thought, but you don't let it stay, you know? I know. I think it was Martin Luther who said, you know, there's going to be many birds that fly over your head, but don't let them make a nest in your head. And then Max Lucado later on put it into kind of our modern terms where he said, there's many planes that can fly over your. Over your mind, so to speak. But you are the one who decides as an air traffic controller of your Mind, you decide what lands. Okay?

Those birds and planes representing thoughts, clearly representing thoughts, right? Thoughts shoot through your head. That can be unwanted. But you decide what lands and stays there, what has to take place.

We can't control what crosses our mind, but we get to control what stays, what makes a home in our mind, right? And we want, like it says in the Bible, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of praise. You know, think about these things, think about the good things, and allow God to renew your mind. And this isn't, you know, being pie in the sky. Like, oh, I'm just gonna ignore the bad things that happen. But it's saying, I'm gonna focus on the good. Yes, this is part of my story. My spouse let me down, and I've had to forgive them. But in this process of forgiveness, I'm gonna focus on what God is doing. I'm gonna trust God. I'm gonna focus on the fact that my husband signed up for a recovery group. I'm gonna focus on the fact that my wife, you know, ended that relationship and we have moved and we're starting anew. I'm gonna focus on the fact that we are being honest about our finances, that there's nothing hidden anymore. I'm gonna focus on the. And we are not going to allow Satan to get a foothold in our life. Like, we have to focus on those things. And when you claim those things, you are creating a new pathway in your mind and you're capturing. You know, it says, take those thoughts captive and replace it with God's truth. And what you do is you literally, like, that negative thought comes in your mind and you say, okay, I see it. God, I'm going to believe that. I'm trusting. You're doing a good work in my spouse. My spouse is a new creation. My spouse is not defined by these things they did to me. I am a new creation. I'm not defined by the fact that my spouse broke my trust or whatever it is. And so I think, you know, or maybe the thought is. Maybe the negative thought is, I can't believe she did this to me. I can't believe he did this to me. I would never do that. I'm not capable of that. Like, we start puffing ourselves up. I think that thought of truth that you replace that negative thought with that prideful thought with is, no, I'm a broken person, too, who needs Christ every day, and God has to forgive me every day. And so, too, I'm going to allow my spouse the space to regain my trust because I know, we all make mistakes. You know what I'm saying? It's a powerful exercise.

It really, really is. Because holding on to that lack of forgiveness, it's poison. It's poisonous. It makes people feel an illusion of control over a situation where they felt out of control. Because if your spouse broke your trust, you know, you felt wounded, you felt humiliated, perhaps you felt like, I'm out of control of that situation. But if I can hold onto that anger towards them, it makes me feel like I'm taking the power back. But really what it's doing instead is creating bitterness in your heart.

You're putting shackles on yourself.

Yeah, yeah. You're imprisoning yourself. You're punishing yourself. So holding a grudge doesn't make you strong, it makes you bitter. Forgiveness doesn't make you weak, it sets you free. When God calls us to forgive, it's not just for the sake of the other person, but it's for us. Everything God calls us to do is for our good and his glory. He doesn't want you carrying around the toxic weight of unforgiveness and bitterness. It's like a cancerous tumor that will grow inside you and metastasize and spread to other parts of your life. And so we've got to say, lord, help me to live full of grace. And that forgiveness, it isn't just a one time choice really. It's a daily or maybe even a more often than daily choice. As the images come back as you're reminded of the pain is maybe a little flash of anger comes up over what happened. To give that to God again and say, Jesus, thank you that you paid the price on the cross for every sin I've ever committed and for every sin my spouse has committed, including this sin that's hurt me so deeply. You took the punishment for that. So allow me to stop trying to punish my spouse. Allow me to stop punishing myself by holding on to this grudge, and let me embrace the grace that you gave your life to provide and live in the freedom of that you know. And if there's still healing to be done in the marriage, say God, give us both the strength to walk this path toward rebuilding trust and to stay away from these pitfalls that led us to that pain and that deceit in the first place. And if you were the one that sinned, man, just live with radical honesty. Do whatever it takes to help your spouse be able to reclaim that trust in you. It doesn't mean you have to go through life beating yourself up, but it does mean that you need to be humble enough to recognize that your spouse is living with pain that you caused. And that while you can't go back in time and change that, what you can do is do everything in your power to be a safe place for your spouse, to help promote their healing as you yourself are also healing, and to make sure that you're putting parameters and safeguards in place to make sure you never break their trust in that way again.

It's so true. And I think, bottom line, what we want you all to know is how you forgive your spouse is by trusting God. I mean, that's the simplest answer I can give.

Yeah, that's good.

Is we have to trust God. And it's so easy. Whether it's pride, whether it's resentment, whether it's fear, whether it's. I mean, it could be a whole host of things. We really have to dig deep and trust God. And, you know, all those years ago when I found the porn on the computer, and we have our whole Testimony, both on YouTube and through our Naked Marriage podcast and in our books, the Counterfeit Climax, and in the Naked Marriage book, we talk about this, if you want the whole, you know, all the details. But I just. I remember, you know, for a minute, I did get prideful, and I thought, man, I would never do this to him. And there'd be times, too, when I would think, man, can he even overcome this? I mean, he's had this issue for a long time. You know, there's all kinds of. We have doubts, you know, different things. But when it was, the Holy Spirit was quick to convict me of my own frailties. Okay, maybe porn's not my issue, but I have all kinds of other issues, right, that. Where I desperately need forgiveness all the time, you know, so that really kept the pride, you know, at bay. But also, I just remember having such hope in God and trusting, no, no, God's not going to waste this. And he hasn't, my goodness, he has not waste this.

You know, we've been able to share that testimony and over and over and over again. Yeah, it's been a big part of the marriage ministry, which is now like our shared calling and something that we love doing what we do.

We do. And it helps. You know, you guys have written us and said that helped set me free. You know, and that's the whole thing is we have to bring it out to the light. But as the spouse that maybe was wronged, we have to trust God. We have to trust God. And I'm telling You. At times when our spouse is even doubting the process, and maybe they're having trouble trusting God in their own healing, we have to call it out and we have to say, listen, you might have done this horrible thing, but this is not who you are. You know, we have a God that can heal our most broken places. And, yeah, we have a bunch of pieces like. Like if we were a beautiful vase and it was thrown to the floor, you know, and it's shattered into all these pieces, but God is putting it back together beautifully in a more beautiful way. We never even knew it could exist. You know, I just think about dear friends of ours that we've walked alongside where, you know, they come into a crossroads. And in counseling them and talking to them, you know, they're like, I don't even know if we're gonna get through this. And then, you know, you fast forward to a year or two later, and they've done that work and they've trusted God and said, like, maybe it took everything in me to trust, but they'll. They'll look us in the eye and say, but it's better than I ever could have dreamed. Like, I didn't know 20 years later that our marriage could even look like this. Like, I'm so glad I didn't give up. I'm so glad I forgave, you know, you never. I've never heard a couple say, man, I wish I never forgave him. I never wish I forgave her. Never, never.

It's never a deathbed regret, you know, I wish I'd have been more beautiful.

I wish I would have held on longer to all that.

I would have been angrier. Longer. Yeah. So, guys, release yourself from the prison of unforgiveness.

That's right.

And, yeah, yeah, this is. This is a good reminder, you know, to live with the freedom in grace.

But be set free.

Be set free. Live in freedom. My friends, the Prince of peace, Jesus himself, wants to come alongside of you and give you the strength to live at peace. And I hope this episode's encouraged you do us a favor and share this one. I promise you guys, it is needed. Lack of forgiveness is one of the biggest issues not only in marriage, but in our world today. I think it's the root for so much of the pain that we're seeing.

It is really quick. I keep on doing this at the end.

I know, I know. I get the finger up.

Yeah, the finger. Like, hold on a minute. I want to say this. Sometimes, you know, there's the trouble you know, those of you who clicked on this, you're having trouble forgiving your spouse, but I want to. A lot of times we have trouble forgiving ourselves.

Absolutely.

And I know you were there. I mean, you really had a hard time with that.

We have a real enemy who wants us to live in shame and get you to not forgive yourself. But beating yourself up for something Jesus has already taken a beating to forgive. That's not being humble. That's actually being prideful. It's telling Jesus what you did on the cross wasn't enough. I have to add to it. And that's not being humble. That is a toxic form of pride, a dangerous form of pride. And so you need to trust God when he said he forgave you once and for all. And you need to live in the freedom of that.

And that will set you free, too. And as a spouse again, we can speak into that and say, no, no, God forgives you and I forgive you. And I'm trusting that God will allow me to trust you again. And I'm telling you it's a process, but God is with you in it.

So good. Guys, thank you so much for tuning in. We love and appreciate you. We look forward to seeing you next time.

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