I am excited to announce the WINNER of our awesome book giveaway by author and speaker, Joy McMillan of Simply Bloom. And the winner is…………………… {Via Rafflecopter entries} Amber Schroder! Amber, Congrats on your win! You have until … Continue reading
When Tonya asked me to partner with her in writing this series on Sex God’s Way, neither one of us was prepared for the number of responses we would receive from women who were struggling because their husbands were not interested in engaging in sex with them! Much of our experience and study had prepared us for WOMEN not being interested in sex, but MEN?
Weren’t they supposed to be complete sex-mongers?
As we read the comments and private messages from these women, one common theme began to stand out: most (but not all) of these husbands had dealt – or were still dealing – with an addiction to porn and/or masturbation, or some other form of sexual sin. I find myself grieving for these women who so want to share this intimate expression of love with their husbands but are not afforded the opportunity.
Oh, how Satan has abused and broken this beautiful gift our Lord created for us! And I have prayed in earnest for these husbands to be freed from their bondage and enabled to love their wives with heart, soul, mind and BODY! And so it is through prayers for wisdom and the leading of the Holy Spirit that I write these thoughts: Sexual Addiction is a VERY real thing. We don’t want to look at it the same way we do an addiction to heroin or alcohol or gambling, but it is no different! It creates a very physical craving for more and more stimulation, each act requiring more stimulation to achieve the level of pleasure that was achieved the time before. It involves chemical reactions in your mind and body, alters the brain, and it involves a mental and emotional addiction as well. These men have trained their bodies to need A, B, then C to achieve orgasm.
More importantly, men who are addicted to sexual stimulation have been put in Spiritual bondage by our enemy the devil. When they have been involved with porn or masturbation or other ungodly sexual activity, Satan has chained them through this sin. They MUST face their addiction, calling it what it is and confessing it OUT LOUD, and then they must invite Jesus to break these chains. They need Godly men and women to pray with them, pray for them, pray over them to gain freedom over the long-lasting effects of their sins.
Sexual addiction is too often hidden away in the secret places of our lives, but it must be brought out into the open and dealt with. My husband has a close friend who was a closet alcoholic for years, and it wasn’t until it was forced out into the open that he was able to face it and deal with it. Sexual addiction works the same way. Jesus came to se the captives free, ALL CAPTIVES in all areas! HE is the key to breaking free from this bondage.
A person fighting to gain freedom from sexual addiction will also need someone to walk alongside them through the struggle. Think of it like an AA sponsor, only for sex. This person must have total access to the addict’s life; he’s got to be allowed to ask the addict ANYthing and know that he’s going to get an honest answer. It’s kind of like an accountability partner, only it’s that plus SO much more.
If men are used to having erotic stimulation such as porn in order to achieve and maintain an erection, they may need to take a “fast” from any and all sexual stimulation. This means TV, ALL internet access, magazines… they will ALL have to be purged from their homes. They will have to be HIGHLY intentional about guarding their eyes in surroundings outside their homes. And then they and their wives will have to commit to NOT initiating anything sexual for a period of time. It won’t be fun for either one, but it is with a purpose.
As 1 Corinthians 7 instructs, they must use this time for prayer…together…about their sex life! Just like a person who has been living on junk food… the good, healthy stuff just doesn’t taste good…UNTIL you purge your life of the junk. After NOT eating the junk for a good long time, the real stuff tastes really good! And after a man completely purges his life from the junk and re-trains his appetite to enjoy Godly sexuality, his wife should more than arouse and satisfy him. I know that not every man’s inability to have sex or disinterest in sex ties back to a porn and/or masturbation addiction, but I think that many do.
Even once a man no longer views the porn, that sin still has a hold on him until he fully surrenders it to the Lord. If it’s not porn, it may be some other sexual issue that is still wrapping guilt around the whole idea of sex. Even someone who was sexually abused is often burdened with guilt over something that was never his fault. Guilt will always stand in the way of true intimacy!
Wives, here are some thoughts for you as you support your husband in his pursuit of freedom from sexual bondage: Imagine your husband in chains and shackles, locked behind the bars of a prison cell. This is what Satan has done to him through his addiction to ungodly sexual stimulation. Let that image compel you to have compassion and mercy on your husband, and let it drive you to your knees in prayer for his release. Your husband is not the enemy; Satan is. Take the pressure off of him to “perform.”
If you have tried unsuccessfully to have sex, know that your man probably feels really low about himself. That’s his MANHOOD we’re talking about, you know?! So relax for a while and don’t try to push him until he’s ready. While you’re waiting on him, PRAY, PRAY, PRAY! I’ve said it before and I’ll just keep saying it…PRAY about your sex life! Take the responsibility off of yourself and your husband and wait on the Lord to lead you!
Affirm your husband and his manliness without attaching it to anything sexual. Let him know you appreciate how he takes care of you and your family. Applaud his achievements at work, his involvement in community service or church activities. Remind him that you love him!
Did I mention that you should PRAY for him?
Realize that you can’t fight this battle for your husband. HE has to make the choice to pursue freedom through Christ. And understand that it wouldn’t matter how beautiful or sexy you were, you wouldn’t be enough to draw your man away from the addiction. Not because you aren’t gorgeous, but because Satan has convinced him that the sin is better, that the counterfeit pleasure is better than the real thing.
Satan is SUCH a liar!
One more thing: PRAY! (I think you’re starting to get my point…)
My sisters in Christ, don’t give up on your husband or your pursuit of an intimate relationship with him. NOTHING is beyond the reaches of our God’s mighty power, and I firmly believe He can and will restore intimacy to your marriage. Be persistent in your prayers and compassionate in your love, and may God’s tender mercy trade your ashes for beauty and your brokenness for restoration.
“Satisfy us each morning with your unfailing love, so we may sing for joy to the end of our lives. Give us gladness in proportion to our former misery! Replace the evil years with good.” Psalm 90:14-15
I’ve shared this on my blog today too, come on over!
~Angie, from My Heart
www.xxxchurch.com has some excellent resources as well as an online “detox” program you can take part of.
The Sex-Starved Wife
Head on over to Post 2 for more Resources to pick up on Saving Sex for Marriage, Intimacy in Marriage and more……
This is post 2 for today, head back to post 1: Returning to Intimacy After Betrayal
1) Choose to focus on the good in your spouse and the love that runs so deeply in your veins. It’s easy to forget the reasons you fell in love. Write, speak and say positive things, and watch the bountiful harvest of your kind words grow and bloom in your marriage as you fall in love all over again.
2) Never forget your battle is NOT against flesh and blood, aka your spouse. Imagine Satan standing beside your bed, tossing seeds of doubt, negativity and heartache, just hoping they will take root and ruin your love-making. He hates you and he hates your marriage, which means he reallyreally hates sex and the unity that comes after. There is no better way to stick it to the devil, who tried to destroy your marriage, then to make love to your spouse! It is an act of Worship to your Heavenly Father.
3) Remember the power of Forgiveness. My spouse, broken before Christ, had asked the Lord and Savior to wash away his sins. He was white as snow again. It was ME, who was bringing along the filthy rags right into our intimate time. Forgiveness means letting your heart love again during Love Making and letting go of the past for good.
4) Love with all your heart. To fully connect to your spouse, your heart needs to be into it. Be ALL there with your spouse and enjoy every moment together. I know its scary, but be present as your heart and bodies, join as one. Talk to your spouse about your fears, so they can help you know by their sweet and assuring words, that you are their one and only love.
5) Break Old Ties. Out loud, bind those connections in the name of Jesus and break them off. There is a reason the Lord talks about 2 becoming 1 flesh, in the Spirit World, it happens. Cutting those ties will help you move into a closer intimacy with your spouse and get satan out of the picture!
6) Guard your mind from the devil’s attacks. It blessed me so much when Dale would lead us in prayer before being intimate, asking the Lord to bless our union, and binding satan in the name of Jesus. He HAS to flee when he hears that precious name of our Lord, he HATES it. This helped me to stay there with Dale and not let my mind go to the past.
7) Let your love-making be a healing balm for your wounded soul. I found comfort and healing in Dale’s arms, his tears and mine. Don’t let satan lie to you and tell you making love will make things worse. He only wants to cause you further pain.
8) Remember that Sex is a gift from God. You can hurt your Heavenly Fathers just as much by failing to use a beautiful gift He gave you, as MISusing it all together.
God bless you on your road to healing. Satan’s attacks WILL come, so be alert, be unified; body, soul and spirit, as you fight him for your marriage.
And don’t EVER forget, that Victory is yours, bought and paid for by the blood of Jesus.
Take that, satan.
~T
Shared with To Love, Honor & Vacuum
In Scripture, unfaithfulness is the only “acceptable” reason for dissolving a marriage. But we, Tonya and Angie, are telling you today that even this ultimate betrayal does NOT have to result in divorce.
Forgiveness is absolutely possible through the work of the Holy Spirit, and full restoration and reconciliation is yours for the taking. But if you’ve experienced betrayal in your marriage, you may have a few reservations about bringing sex back into the relationship. By sharing our stories and what we learned through our experiences, we hope to help you see that it IS possible…desirable, even.
How am I supposed to even entertain the thought of sexual intimacy with him when he’s been unfaithful? How do you move on? How do you move back into the intimacy that was robbed from you?
Angie:
Infidelity doesn’t have to mean certain demise for your marriage. Obviously you have to rebuild trust before you can bring sexual intimacy back into the relationship. I am so blessed to have a husband who truly felt sorry for his choices and was willing to do whatever it took to rebuild my trust. That willingness in and of itself did so much to help that process.
Bringing sex back into a marriage after infidelity is definitely something you have to pray about. This isn’t a topic we usually think of when we think of prayer, but it is definitely something we need to submit to the Lord. He will let you know when it is time, and He will help you follow through when you decide you’re ready to give yourself to your husband sexually again. It’s not something you should rush into. It happened pretty quickly in my marriage because I needed the assurance that my husband wanted me. I was feeling inadequate and unwanted, and I needed to know that my husband chose me over his infidelity. Bringing love-making back into our marriage helped so much with my healing process and allowed me to focus on forgiveness instead of my own rejection.
Tonya:
It took me a month to allow Dale to kiss me. It took a bit longer than that to move towards intimate touch. The first time we made love, I sobbed. Raw emotions and pure love and heartache, all pouring from my shattered heart as two became one once again.
He stopped, of course, as he realized where I was emotionally. Cupped my face in his hands and kissed away my tears. His willingness to stop made me willing to push on. I WANTED to be one with my husband again, scared as I was to allow him all of me. For the next few months, tears followed our love-making sessions. Only because my heart would swell with love, and those broken pieces would stab, catch my breath and ache from the inside out.
My husband didn’t sleep with another woman, but I still feel like he cheated on me.
Angie:
Sexual intercourse with another person is not the only form of infidelity. Your marriage vows probably included something about keeping yourselves only for each other. This includes your eyes, your mind and your emotions as well as your body. Porn, emotional involvement and masturbation are all forms of infidelity in that the offender takes something that should be given only to you and then gives it to someone else. My husband didn’t have sex with another woman, but it didn’t lessen the feelings of betrayal and rejection that I felt. Sometimes just recognizing that these things are a betrayal can begin the healing process
Tonya:
Betrayal comes in many forms, Dale’s started with the eyes and eventually led to physical betrayal. Whether you are dealing from the shock of finding out your spouse’s porn addiction, one night stand or full-blown affair, you are dealing with a VERY intimate, very personal form of betrayal.
Porn creates an ugly lust that needs to be fed regularly. Your beautiful love-making with your spouse could never, ever, EVER fulfill that ugly lust. It is impossible.
I tried to bring sex back into our marriage, but I just couldn’t do it…
Angie:
Don’t try to rush things. The hardest part for me was waiting on God’s timeline instead of trying to force my own. Allow yourself to grieve for a while, but don’t dwell on the details! Satan likes to use those details to hold us captive and prevent restoration in our marriages. And expect a few setbacks. Scott and I brought sex back into our relationship pretty soon after things blew up, and things were really great for a while, but then a week or two later it was like we were starting all over again. The most important thing we did was COMMUNICATE. As hard as it was, I had to tell him what I was feeling. I was honest with him when I was having a bad day, when the reality of what had happened was knocking me down. I let myself feel the pain, but I didn’t wallow in it. And I had to help Scott know how to respond. Did I need him to just hold me and reassure me? Did I need him to give me space? Our husbands aren’t mind readers, so we need to help them understand what is going on in our hearts and minds. If you find that you have a hard time opening up to your husband, write your thoughts in a journal and then read them to him. For some reason it’s just easier to read your own words out loud than it is to say them off the top of your head.
I’ve tried to make love to my husband, but in the moment I can’t get the thought of what he did out of my mind.
Tonya:
One of the biggest steps we made was the day I admitted in counseling that I could feel “her” in our bedroom tormenting me during love-making. Our counselor explained that when 2 become 1, even outside of marriage, they are bonded together in the Spirit world, actually connected like a sewer pipe. He asked us if we would like to be freed from that connection. Of course we both said YES! They laid hands on us and we all prayed out loud, binding Dale’s connection to her in the name of Jesus, setting Dale free from anything and everything he had taken from her generation sin line in their union and cut off all ties.
We both could feel the release and knew Dale had been set free from this connection. You don’t have to understand it all, you will feel the change. There is much we don’t know about the forces of Good and Evil constantly battling around us, attaching to us via a lustful look, risqué book or raunchy movie.
There was a complete and TOTAL change in the tone of our bedroom after that, and it was a huge step in the healing process for us. After this, we were able to move into an intimacy unlike anything we had experienced before. What doesn’t break you, DOES make you stronger. This does not mean the attacks no longer come, it just means you recognize them for what they are.
The next struggle in the bedroom came from my lack of self-worth. I struggled with self-image for a good year, writing the blog post NOT ENOUGH, during this time. I kept wanting to make this about me, which was a sin unto itself.
Listen, do not try to use a rational mind to understand your spouse’s irrational, in-the-moment decision. It won’t make sense. EVER.
Angie:
Pray, pray, pray! I really can’t emphasize this enough! Ask the Spirit to guard your mind and your husband’s mind. Ask Him to cast Satan far from you and to silence his lies. Although Scott’s body wasn’t bound to another person, his mind was filled with ungodly sexually charged thoughts. I worried that he wasn’t thinking just of me while we were making love, and I had to surrender that to God. I also had to pray that God would take my husband’s every thought captive and make them obedient to Him. It’s okay to pray your way through your love-making. God will honor your desire to love your husband and to be obedient in your submission to him. You also must communicate to your husband what is going on. If he doesn’t know WHY you can’t follow through, he may mistakenly perceive it as a rejection of him. Sometimes it is also okay to choose not to participate in some sexual activities if they too closely resemble your husband’s infidelity. But again, you’ve got to communicate that to him without being accusatory.
Tonya:
2 years later I can tell you that there will come a point in your timeline of healing when you actually consider being thankful for “The Fall”, thankful for the truth, even if it came as a jaw dropping shock. I am beginning to see how it was worth it. Worth the new man and new marriage I live now. The love that grows deeper with each passing day, tested by fire and found strong enough to stand again. The freedom my husband found from stepping out of the darkness and into the light.
The Oneness we both found with our spouses, from allowing the Lord to turn our Tragedies into Triumph, is unsurpassed.
Do not give up on your marriage! Victory is yours, bought and paid for by the blood of Jesus! Satan is defeated by the blood of Jesus and the word of our testimony. THIS is why we share today, the good news of Jesus Christ, who makes ALL THINGS NEW.
May the Lord bless you and your marriage as you commit each step towards total healing to Him!
~Tonya and Angie, My Heart Ministry
This is Part 1 for today. Be sure to catch Part 2, Sex After Infidelity: 8 Steps To Success
4 little Fergusons 