When I made it clear that I was making a Stand in Hope for a Restored Marriage years ago, I was met with disbelief. I was called stupid, dumb, ignorant, and asked why I would continue to stay in a marriage that was obviously not working for me. When I was said I was obeying my Godly Intuition, that elicited laughter, and jokes about “hearing things” that were not there.
When the situation would improve, then turn down a different road for a short time, my faith and belief in God came under attack. Why? Because people didn’t understand what I understood, and I often knew they were speaking out of ignorance. There are some people who will tell you to exercise caution when you’re trusting the Lord with your marital situation. However, people like that, don’t have any kind of real relationship with God, no matter what they say, or they wouldn’t speak in this way.
If they’re honest, they don’t have any clue what they’re talking about–they just want to make you think they do. Because I refused to walk out, throw him out, end my marriage in divorce, and I absolutely insisted that God would definitely bring me through this trial with a restored marriage, I was often accused of being “stuck.” I refused to entertain any other alternatives, except to continue to honor marital vows that *I* had taken when I had bound myself to this man in marriage when we were starting our lives together.
The longer I Stood, the more hateful the comments became–right into a time of being accused of being addicted to emotional pain. None of it was true, because I was learning the lessons of a lifetime from within the vehicle of my own Stand, within my own marital situation. There were lessons to be learned while Standing, and I learned them, one by one. At this point in my life, I’m glad I ignored the discouragers, and did what I knew was right for me.
At first glance, one might think, “What hateful, awful things to say!” To those of you who have been Standing in Hope for a Restored Marriage for longer than two years, enduring emotional abuse from those who claim to support you should never be acceptable. I understand how you feel, because during different times of Standing, nothing seems to be changing, and it’s often hard to see the forest for the trees. And when all that you have to depend and Stand upon is your faith in God who has made a promise of marital restoration to you, hateful, and harsh comments targeting your choice NOT to do anything different, can be very hard to hear. I’ve been there, too.
It’s truly a shame when people who are supposed to be supporting you, turn on you, simply because THEY think, and THEY decide that you’ve stood long enough, and now you need to do what THEY want, just to validate their feelings, their ego, and their pride. They do NOT live your life, you do, and it’s never a good thing to live your life according to someone else’s whims, wants, and wishes. As far as you’re concerned, you KNOW that you’re NOT stuck–you’re living your lives forward, walking your journey toward wholeness and healing, trusting in God to help you through this difficult time, Standing for what you know and believe is right, but aren’t entertaining any other alternatives–and that’s OK, because WHOSE life is this about? Why, yours, of course. 🙂
There is absolutely, positively, NOTHING wrong with Standing longer than two years. There are people who have stood three, five, and seven years, if not longer, because they knew that God had that whole picture of their lives, and they trusted Him with their situations. They had children involved that needed to learn what staying the course, and surviving, AND thriving through tough times in a relationship was all about. Staying committed to a situation to see it through to whatever end it comes into, isn’t a natural aspect–it’s a learned, and taught aspect. Children learn by observation, and they do watch what you do. You’re that role model from which they’ll learn how to handle the difficulties that life is surely going to bring forth.
No one can tell you that you’re wasting your time, and that you’re deluded by an intuition that person will never understand–not when you know what you know, and it’s what you know. Each person has the right to conduct their Stand in the way they see fit, and those who are outside of the situation don’t know what you’re facing on the inside of your own situation.
It’s a shame that some people can choose to come to a point where they feel justified in making statements of discouragement to long-term Standers. My mother used to say that if you can’t say something encouraging, don’t say anything at all. Most especially if you’re not directly involved within a given situation.
Who are you to say that someone is “stuck” when they choose to commit to Standing in a difficult situation for as long as it takes to resolve? You’re not them, and they’re not you. If you can’t relate, and encourage them in their choices, then shut your mouth, because anything you say wouldn’t be helpful, nor hopeful.
There is no justification in making “hope-destroying” statements designed to discourage people from making their own choices. If that’s how some people feel maybe they need to stop the destruction they are causing, go on with their lives, and leave the advising to those of us who have NOT forgotten what it was like to Stand in Hope for a Restored Marriage.
I know I haven’t forgotten what Standing in Hope was like. During my husband’s first bout of midlife crisis, I made a solid Stand based on an outcome that God had shown me not long after I discovered our marriage was dead, and my husband was in a major midlife crisis. I wasn’t your typical left behind spouse in that I did not even think about marital restoration. I only thought about ending the pain as quickly as possible, and it seemed my own alternative was getting a divorce.
However, God intervened in my situation in multiple ways, because He did not intend for me to resolve my marriage into a divorce. He showed an outcome of marital restoration, IF I would walk this hard road forward, and obey Him in all things–because “All is possible, if you would just believe,” and “There is hope, there is always hope, as long as there is love within your heart.” I wasn’t sure what to believe at that time.
I wasn’t in the place of spiritual growth that I’m in now, and I didn’t understand why God would encourage people to stay in emotionally abusive situations. My husband wasn’t physically hurting me, although he was emotionally abusing me at that time. He spoke a lot of hateful things that struck deep, and they hurt me to the core. I had a lot to learn about separating behavior from the person, and learning NOT to take what anyone said, and did, personally.
The whole situation was really confusing.
In spite of the fact, my husband was struggling with a number of things, he showed no real signs of wanting to resolve the marriage into a divorce. As your typical midlife spouse would do, he did everything he could to chase me away, run me off, and threaten to leave to try and convince me to do what he was too weak to do–throw him out, and/or get a divorce. I didn’t do either one, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t have my doubts about his intentions at times.
God could not have worked in my situation, had I not agreed to stand aside at times, and let Him have control of the situation. There are people on this Earth that seek to discredit Godly Intuition, but I can tell you from direct experience that this is a real gift that God supplies for the emotional need of a struggling left behind spouse who is following Him. God has been known to give Intuition to unbelievers, but it’s not as strong with them, as it is with the believers.
However, I trusted God, and eventually took Him at His Word. After three months of fighting against the journey He said I would have to walk for myself (so I could finally grow into a place of becoming better able to deal with this hard road), I surrendered myself to His Will, and began the Journey toward Wholeness and Healing for myself. God was my counselor, who taught me from scratch, as He taught me how to access my inner Self, find that Mirror of Self Reflection, that helped highlight my past childhood issues, and He began working with me in many areas I needed to improve for myself.
I learned to detach, distance, let go, and let God work on this man. I made some pretty horrendous mistakes along the way, but I found a strength that I never knew I had, and I tapped into it. Eventually, I dropped the rope, stopped pulling on it, and when I did that, the situation became easier, as I learned that I couldn’t control anyone but myself. I learned to separate the behavior from the person, set boundaries on the behaviors that directly affected me, and let the rest go–because I couldn’t control the situation anyway, I could only control my actions, and my reactions/responses.
With the help of God, who kept giving me hope all along the way, I eventually realized that what He had given me so early on in the way of an outcome was coming to pass. We stayed together, worked everything out along the way, fought about a lot of things, but we learned a lot, too. Some of the things I learned along the way involved the fact that no matter what I said, what I did, and how I tried to influence my husband, he still had free will, the personal freedom to make his own choices, and I had to learn to accept and respect whatever decisions he might choose to make, even if they led away from me at a later time.
My point is this: In spite of what my intuition had spoken about marital restoration, there was always the chance my husband could have decided on a different path for himself. What I also learned was that for every action, there is a reaction, and for every action, there is a consequence. Marital Covenant or not, every married person has the total freedom to walk away from their marriage, break their vows, and destroy their families. Also, if you are banking on your midlife spouse’s return for the purpose of marital restoration and refuse to accept that there are always other possibilities that could happen, then you are closing your eyes to some necessary knowledge. You don’t control your midlife spouse, and God isn’t going to control him/her, either.
Your job is to walk your own journey into wholeness and healing for yourself, let go of that midlife spouse, let God handle that person, while you seek to come into a greater understanding of accepting that you might not get what you want, just because you want it. If your intuition is strong, and speaks of a positive outcome, a restored marriage, I suggest that you also ask God what it is that you’re supposed to be doing, because this outcome will NOT happen in a vacuum. Your midlife spouse isn’t going to walk this journey in full, without you also doing the same. It’s going to take both of you to start down the road toward marital reconciliation that won’t occur until the whole of the midlife crisis is past. It’s going to take both of you to help each other change, grow, and become the emotional adults that God meant for both of you to be.
While the midlife spouse is out of pocket, I do suggest that you stop waiting, and start Standing for yourself, walk your journey, let God have this wayward midlife spouse, and leave the future in His hands to deal with.
Don’t close your mind to a spiritual education that involves learning to respect the rights of other people, including your midlife spouse. There are no guarantees, although there is always hope as long as you have love in your heart.
When I was ready, God spoke to me even more about my own outcome. He was very clear on what I had to do on my part, before our situation would resolve fully. I had work to do on myself, I had to accept my husband as being separated from me, while still being part of me, bound by the Marital Covenant. I had to learn to want him to be happy, even if he couldn’t find this happiness with me.
I had to learn that I couldn’t put all of my eggs in one basket with him, I couldn’t expect him to become perfect, to want me, to love me, or to even need me. What his choices would be, would be all about him. It didn’t matter what I wanted, he did have that last say in what was going to happen going forward, and I had to accept every bit of, respect all of it, and trust God for what I knew I could not influence, alter, and control. I accepted these aspects, internalized them, and believed them for myself. Though we did go into a second bout of midlife crisis less than two years after he came out of the first one, I still made a choice to stay with the situation, Standing in Hope, and the knowing that while this would take longer, I could trust God to bring His Word to pass, and He did.
What’s my point? A serious test of your faith may involve people who think they are trying to help you, but if you took their advice, you’d find yourself going down a wrong path you never meant to go down. Keep in mind that Satan will do all he can to destroy your Stand, your lives, your relationships, and your families. Stand strong against the temptation that shows a perceived easier path, pay strict attention to your intuition, obey the Lord in all things, and don’t give up. Standing in Hope for a Restored Marriage wasn’t designed to be an easy emotional road to navigate, but if you will always look to God in faith, and ask Him for strength, He will always supply every need you have. ((HUGS))
