Saving Your Marriage From Divorce (Part 2 of 2)

The couples who don't have the honest conversation, I'm unhappy, you're unhappy, we're in trouble, those are the ones that end up getting divorced. If you'll voice it and you'll seek a plan like my plan or your pastor or Focus' resources and the intensives are awesome, they're excellent, I send couples to them, you can make it.

But you've got to have the conversation and you have to start doing something before it's too late. You'll hear more from Dr. David Clark today on Focus on the Family about what to do if you feel stuck in an unhappy marriage. Your host is Focus president and author Jim Daly and I'm John Fuller. John, our discussion last time with Dr. Clark was so packed with practical advice. I was taking notes and thinking, okay, I got to do this, I got to do this. It was awesome. If you missed it, get the download, download the app for your smartphone, get it.

We'll send you the CD, just get a hold of us. But there were so many very good ideas to help a couple who are not doing well in their marriage. And that's okay. As Dr. Clark said last time, that's like 99% of us at some point, you're going to hit a dry patch. And the question is what you do there? Are you going to water it so something grows again?

Or are you just going to burn it down? And I think Dr. Clark gave us some fabulous advice on what to do next. Another thing I loved about what David shared last time is that to have a good marriage, you need God's help and strength. Fundamentally, that's the foundation. And if you haven't called out to God in prayer before, or if it's been a long time, he's near by. God never goes away from you.

We always move away from God. Here at Focus, our heart is to strengthen and maybe even help save your marriages with the help of the Holy Spirit. One way we do that is through our Hope Restored program. And that's a marriage intensive specifically designed for couples on the brink of separation or divorce. If you're hurting and in that area, call us, get a hold of us, and we will be there for you.

Yeah, you can call or visit our website. The number is 800-232-6459, 800, the letter A in the word family, or get the details you need about Hope Restored and other helpful resources for your marriage in the episode notes. And when you get in touch, ask about Dr. Clark's great book, I Don't Want a Divorce, A 90-Day Guide to Saving Your Marriage. David, welcome back to the program. Great to be back. You are a lot of fun, but you are a bit, I could see, tenacious, cantankerous.

You don't let go of your couples that come to you for help, do you? No, I am edgy. You're like in their face. I'm in. You're like a marine drill sergeant. I am.

I've become their best friend, but that's not what it's like at first, because I'm really hard on them. This is going to be a tough program, and we've got to get all hands on board. It's almost what we need as human beings, though, don't we? We need somebody, I remember playing football, and I was kind of lackadaisical, I'd kind of run the wind sprints, and my freshman football coach grabs me by the face mask. You want to play on this team? You better run faster.

You better finish first. I mean, I don't know if you can do that legally now, grab someone by the face mask, but man, it taught me to shape up. Marriage boot camp. We need that, don't we? I do marriage boot camp. That's it. Let's start here by having you recap something you said yesterday, and that is that what many couples need to do is take their marriage out into the backyard and shoot it.

That's a good word picture. It is. You're done. Your first marriage is over. It's not working out. That's why you're in my office. That's why you don't want a divorce book.

That's why you're calling focus. You're in trouble, and that marriage, we're not going back to that marriage. You don't know what you're doing. It's broken down. It's done. It's like an old car. We're going to push it over the cliff. We're going to shoot it. We're going to start fresh. Yeah, and you reshape it. You recreate it in a way that's healthier, especially in that area that we covered last time, communication, positive comments to your spouse, those things that should have been going on for a long time, how to have conflict, healthy conflict, and not tear each other apart.

Again, if you missed it, get it because it was really good. Today, I want to talk about what you call being married to a stick. Now, what's that? A stick is a person, could be the husband or the wife, that really is not into the marriage. Not going to change. They are happy with a very low level of intimacy.

I mean real low, and they can live 40, 50, 60 years in a marriage just like that. You're going to come after me on this. I want to be a little sympathetic to the stick, maybe because I've got a little stick in me. What happens to a person who develops that kind of emotional disconnection? There's something else going on there.

It's not like you grow up saying, I don't want to be connected. Is it trauma? Is it protection? What have they learned as a child or as a young adult that makes them a stick? Well, great question. It's a wound of some kind.

That's exactly right. If I stay a stick, I never have to deal with that wound. I had a dad that modeled being a stick. I learned from him. I saw him abuse and mistreat my mom forever. That's what I learned.

That's what I know. It's not just modeling. That hurt me too. If I'm a boy in that kind of a situation growing up, that hurts me every day. To deal and to cope, I've got to get a very hard veneer over me. I want to be married. I want to have a marriage. I have no idea what that's like.

I want to be just like my dad. That's what happens. That could be the stick can be a good guy or it can be a bad guy. The stick that's a good guy is when the wife comes to him and says, we've got a problem.

I'm not happy. We need to make some changes. A good guy will always, listen to me, always say, some resistance, but after that will say, you know what? I love you. You're right.

What do we have to do? A bad guy will say, no, get out of my face. You're wrong. I'm right. I'm not going to make any changes. Tough. Now that's a sinning guy. In part is that response because they are comfortable, too comfortable with who they are. Oh yeah.

They don't want to make any changes. I'm fine just the way I am. Thank you very much. What you're asking of me would not only be way outside my comfort zone, but it's going to get, you don't say this, it's going to get me close to my wound. It's going to get me into my wound.

I'm not doing that. Okay, so let's go to it. So you're married to the stick. You want changes. You want more intimacy.

You don't want a roommate. So this is that second phase that we talked about last time. One spouse wants change. The other spouse doesn't. We also spoke about both spouses wanting change last time.

So this is the other side of that coin. What does the person, the wounded spouse begin to do to confront this? Well, what you don't do is follow the typical and very traditional Christian approach, which is keep on loving him. If you love that guy who's a stick for 30 days, I've, I've heard 60 days, I've heard five or six months, you meet needs, you don't make an issue out of anything.

He's going to turn around miraculously and start loving you. That's the dumbest thing anybody ever said. It's not true. It's never been true.

Okay. To the believer in that though, you're saying I've seen thousands of couples that have tried that. It's never worked. It's literally never worked. If you've got a stick now that works with a really great guy who's in the first category.

We're not in the first category anymore. That guy will respond to that. We both want to work something out.

That works like a charm, but it's also applied to the stick and that even a good stick will not respond to that. He, you keep loving me. Even if I'm a good stick, if you keep loving me, I think you're fine.

I have no reason to change. You've not gotten my attention. So what's confrontation look like from the healthy person? You set a meeting and it's a very serious come to Jesus meeting with your stick who's a husband. Could be the wife.

It's a husband. This kid honey in three days, we're going to have a very serious meeting about our marriage and the kids are going to be out of the home. We're going to sit down.

I'm going to make a presentation and I want you to think and pray before the meeting. So will I, that will get the man's attention. Hopefully if it's a good stick, he'll respond, but we're edging into, he's not a good guy, but we're going to give him an opportunity. He'll say, I want to talk about it right now, or I'm not going to talk at all. It's going to be three days.

And it's a one way conversation when you do sit down and it's, I'm going to make a presentation of five, 10 minutes. I'm going to speak the truth about our marriage and I don't want any response because what you're going to get is defensiveness and I can't believe you're saying this and all that stuff. Forget it. I'm going to say, you're not even going to entertain the response. If he interrupts you, you're going to walk away and give him a note that says the same thing.

You're not going to have a dialogue because he'll give the same dumb response he's always given and you're sick of hearing that and you should be frankly. So I'm unhappy in our marriage. Here's why I'm part of the problem too. I'm not saying I'm not. Let's go through a series of steps and I don't want a divorce for example, that that is going to turn our marriage around. I'm asking to think and pray about that. I am not happy. You don't use the words. I love you in that first meeting because if he hears that you're done. I think I'm okay.

She loves me. It's always going to hear. So he hears nothing else. Boom. Exactly.

So after 30 years you figure some things out. So plus I'm a guy, so you, you lay it on him and literally you get up and you walk away. You're asking for a response within the next week. If he's a good stick, it won't take him a week. It'll take him 30 minutes. It'll take him 25 seconds. He'll be following you down the hallway. If he does not respond or responds in a very negative way, now we know we've got a serious sinner in our, on our hands.

He's not going to change. This sounds like Matthew 18. Is that the basic biblical principle you're applying here? That's exactly what's the sin you're seeing here? Just I don't want to change that. I don't remember that being listed. Lack of connection, right?

Yeah. It's any, anything short of loving your wife as Christ loved the church is in my book a sin. Now it's not a sin if you get the guy's attention first phase or first category we talked about. If he changes right away and there's repentance, we're done.

We're going to move on. We're going to build a new marriage together. But if I resist you on that, I am in serious sin. I'm attacking the most precious institution God ever created on the earth and that's marriage. That puts me in a serious sinful position. So no, that's a whole different category.

You've got it. The Bible says you're going to confront sin. So I apply that passage, Matthew 18, 15 through 17 to the marital situation. Not many people do. I do. And I've seen it work. You know, we've concentrated on the he part of the story and I appreciate that.

And I know you do that in the book. You come from that male perspective, but you also talked yesterday about women are also more so now engaged in some of the disconnected behavior. Grab what this looks like from the other side of the marriage when it's the woman who's not emotionally intimate. Maybe she's the distant one. In this scenario, she was raised in a home where there was abuse.

There was neglect. She's very wounded. And so she's not taking any chances to get close to any man. She wants to be married and she is married. Again, her level of intimacy is going to be way lower than his.

Now the roles are reversed and I, I'm not giving my heart to anybody and women are even more sensitive than men. So it's even less likely she will. And she will resist that. She'll cook your food. She will be in the bedroom with you. She will be the best wife in other areas, but she's not going to open up her heart to you, which is exactly what this man needs. And what can happen is over time, of course, that this breaks the man down because even the physical part of the relationship, if you don't have a willing partner, boy, does that get old checking something off a list that doesn't work. And so it really breaks down, but she will fight hammering tongs, any kind of opening up. She's got her own wounds. So my approach is to try to shake that person up so that they will enter the system and maybe God willing make some changes.

Yeah. And again, these are delicate situations that are all unique. So we're trying to apply your experience as a counselor. People are hearing this, if it applies great. And obviously if it doesn't, but you're still hurting, you got to call us and that's what we're here for.

And we can give you more specificity on these ideas and hopefully put this resource in your hands by Dr. David Clark. I don't want a divorce, a 90 day guide to saving your marriage. David, let me come back to that question of the confrontation.

You have some very specific steps that a spouse in this situation, again, we'll just say the wife, what she can do to begin to reset the platform for a marriage, go through some of those steps of confrontation. You talked about the meeting, call the meeting and then move on from there. What's next after the meeting, he's going to blow you off. He's done it a million and one times and he's going to do it again.

Let's make that assumption. He's had the opportunity. He has failed once again, but this time you're not just going to be miserable and wring your hands and pray and hope for the best. Now you're going to do something, a series of steps. And the next thing you're going to do is you're going to develop a support team because now you're moving into the other stages of Matthew 18. We have a serious sinner on our hands.

He's not responded. What do we do? We widen the field of people we talk to. So you're going to have a solid support team, family, friends. You're going to go to your pastor, church leaders, and now it's the one or two witnesses. Now your husband's going to have to weather and it's going to be a surprise visit because he won't do it if it's not a surprise.

One or two godly men, if they have the guts, it's not the church yet, but it's men that he knows. If you can find men with the guts to do, it could be his brother, could be his dad, could be someone that knows him and will actually, you tell them the truth about your marriage. You may not have done that to this point. Here's what's happening. I've confronted no response. Would you talk with my husband? Would you come over to the house, a surprise visit? Me and the kids can leave, whatever. You're going to have a serious conversation.

You're going to confront him and ask him to make changes. Huh? All right, let's keep going though because it doesn't get any easier. So let's go through what that next step could look like. The shunning, I believe.

What do you mean by that? If this guy, who now is in the dirtball category, and that's what I call him, as sitting dirtball, as weathered the church leadership coming to him, that's heavy duty. That's my spiritual leadership. If he is weathered that and he's not going to change, I'll stop going to that church, whatever. Well then, now we're going to go into shunning mode. That's according to the Bible.

Now we're in Matthew 18. That's the next step. You're going to tell your kids what's going on.

If they're small, of course, you do your best. You use words they can understand. We never trash Dad, but we tell the truth. Dad's not been meeting my needs. Here's the story.

Older kids, maybe they're at college. You make the call. Here's what... Because when you start shunning, they're going to notice, obviously. This is big time confronting of sin. So you tell them what's going on. The support team's on board, and now you're going to go into shunning mode.

Could be a week, could be two weeks. God will guide you, you just shut down the relationship. I don't talk to you. I don't say anything to you unless I absolutely have to. I don't do your laundry.

We're sleeping in separate bedrooms. I don't sit in church with you. This is upping the ante and hopefully shaking that sinner up. Hard to do. With God's help, you can do it. You've got to have the support team.

It is heavy duty. But the man's asking for it because he's not responded to the other reasonable steps. He could have answered your first confrontation and avoided all this.

The one or two witnesses, if he's weathered that, he's weathered the church leaders. So now we're going to ignore him. You're not going to make food for him. You'll make food for the family, and it's as if he doesn't exist.

Now we'll see how he likes it. This is... Again, it's a form of punishment, but we're trying to actually shake him up, bring him back to the Lord so things can change. Yeah, David, in a world that is all about accommodation and being kind, this sounds really rough. It is rough. And most ladies listening will go, wow, I don't know if I'm strong enough. Yes, you are. We have the Bible, story after story.

In fact, every story in the Bible is of a person who, with God's help and power, did and said things they could never do on their own. You can do it. And of course, the book will guide you through. I don't want a divorce, but this is something that you can do. And you now, you're listening to me now, you have spent five years, seven years, 10 years, 25 years doing it the other way. How has that gone? Accommodating, loving, putting up with, keeping the secret, it has not worked.

And you're about finished as a person. What about the fear, though? Let's say I'm the guy and I'm going to shun her. And the fear is she's going to actually run and go find somebody else. Or the peace that that spouse finds in that setting.

Wow, this is so much easier. Why stay married? Oh, yeah, yeah. Those are bona fide options that could happen. And I say they were going to happen anyway. That person's already gone. People say, well, if I do this, yeah, like John saying, well, then there could be leave for sure.

They're already gone. I am telling you, at this level of confrontation, we're into the system here. If you have to shun for heaven's sake, that person's gone.

They could care less about you. There's no love. Wow. I mean, this is deep stuff. It's biblical. It's there. But man, it is difficult.

It is. That next step after that shunning phase would be a separation. I've had marriage experts sit here, John, and say we need actually a bit more separation in marriage to make people appreciate what they have.

I don't know that that is the right thing, but talk about the effect and the good outcome of separation. Well, this is the last stage of Matthew 18. You don't want to go there, but God says, now this is next.

If we have someone who doesn't respond to shunning, okay, now you're going to circle the wagons. You're going to get financially ready. You're going to make sure your kids are ready. You got your support team in operation, got your church on board. And now you may have to get a job, get retrained.

You're going to have to see an attorney. All these things are important. Now for the separation. It's a big deal, but you know what? To protect you and your kids, that's what it's really about now.

Plus, it's the last gasp of a chance for this incredible sinner. I'm not going to live with you. I'm not going to allow you to destroy me and destroy our kids, maybe our grandkids. I'm done with that. That's a very strong message.

Now, if he wants you back, he's going to have to get you back. Yeah. And that again, the goal is all good.

It's just tough getting there, right? This is, I've seen this saved many marriages because even these guys that are really sinning, there's a chance with these series of progressive steps more and more intense. Of course, that's what the Bible is.

The Bible, it's the word of God. It works, can turn this kind of person around. And if it doesn't, you follow the Bible and they're done. They're gone. Let's move to the third category. As you described the three marriage types, two of which I just gave. The third one is where that spouse does something so egregious. Maybe it was an affair. Let's assume that. Let's put it in the, in the opposite order this time. Let's say a wife, a woman has the affair in this case.

What did the dynamics of that look like? I'm sitting with a couple and if that's the case, and let's say they're both sitting there, then I turn to the woman and of course I'm reading, I'm reading repentance. Are you sorry? When a fair is revealed and you know your partner knows, this lady knows her husband's knows. If she doesn't stop it and doesn't break apart and fall to her knees begging for forgiveness, how could I?

Serious problem. So if I'm reading that, we're going to have to go to the tough love steps sooner than I'd like to. If we have repentance, that's one thing, but I'm very clear on this and a lot of Christians get this messed up and they're not read, they're reading the same Bible, but they're, they're misreading it. That sin is completely that woman's fault. 100% not 98 even 100. If I choose to sin, I sin. The Bible is very clear on that.

I can't blame anybody else. So if I'll ask her, are you owning 100% of this? Is there brokenness here? And here's a series of steps. And the first steps are, of course you stop the affair completely. You make a phone call, you make a text, I'm done, I'm out.

You break off any contact with that person, right stinking now. And if you don't, I'm not seeing you again. I'll see your husband and we'll do some tough love things, but I'm done with you. That's just what Jesus would say.

Okay. I'm telling you on the authority of scripture to stop the sin. There's no process of stopping sin.

You just stop it. And in that context, we'll do the healing along the way, but stop it. And then we're going to focus on the affair. We're going to focus on the sin. That's the first phase, first two or three months, nothing but what you did wrong. I don't want to hear about the marriage.

We're not doing that right now. That second phase, you'll stop it and you'll help your husband heal from this terrible thing you've done. You will tell the entire truth about the affair verbally, as well as you'll write it out. I have them write out the narrative of the affair might be 25 pages long. It was a two year affair.

It might be four or five pages, but I want the truth, not the gory details of the sex or the physical part, but everything else. And that is a power as someone who will do that. That's someone who's repentant.

So I'm testing that right away. But when they actually read it in my office, wow, God uses those moments of confession. Plus the other person can heal unless they know the truth. I'm sorry. I had the affair. We'll keep it general. Gosh, I'm so sorry.

Would you forgive me? That doesn't cut it. There's no marital change.

There can be nothing. What I say is if there's true repentance and recovery with both of them, then that that's the core. They're getting reconnected even as we go through those steps and the person has to heal and forgive. Now the other partner verbalizes questions and awful pain.

And, and there's a number of conversations directly on point about the adultery. And then that person writes what I call the document of response. You can see how popular this approach is initially because people go, you've got to be out of your mind. My pastor or some will-meaning other book says, no, you don't do this. You just kind of forgive and move on. So you don't do that.

I'm telling you, it never works. This is the marriage work right now. We're not getting to the nuts and bolts of that, but now we're healing from what you did wrong. He writes back, how could you do this?

And reads that in my office. And that's, that's getting them reconnected and we're getting past the sin based on that foundation. Now we can rebuild the marriage. That'll be the easy part actually. Yeah. I mean, this is hard, but it sounds right.

It sounds good. And you're saying, because it's based on scripture. Let me ask you this from scripture. It says God hates divorce and I'm sure it applies even in these tough circumstances.

Why, why does God hate divorce? Well, it, it breaks the covenant. Every marriage is a sacred relationship between two believers. So he just, and it's the very picture of Christ's relationship with the church for heaven's sake. That is unbelievably sacred.

He wants that to be permanent. And I've told couples this for 31 years. If you, it's a sacred relationship. You don't feel that way now, but if you, no matter how damaged it is, and you're as frankly as a mess with God's help, it can always turn around because marriage is different. If you're dating, break up. I don't care if you're living together, whatever, stop that.

I don't mind telling people to break up, but if you're married different story, let's get this done with God's help. You can turn everything around and it can be wonderful. And he gets glorified. Oh, that is good. I'm thinking of the listener and the need for that final word of hope. You draw an analogy of the Israelites and Goliath, uh, to that couple facing a bad marriage.

What is that analogy? Well, here you are, you know, you're, you're facing the most intimidating warrior of his day. No one challenged him because you would be killed. There was no way to beat him.

Humanly speaking, David could have been a tremendous warrior, but as you see in the story, not one Israelite adult man warrior even attempted it impossible. So you're in a situation like that with your marriage. It seems impossible. There's just no way out. Look what's happening. It's been years like this and Satan is pushing.

You're done. God may not be done and it's not going to be done with that marriage. There's always a chance with God's help to gather up the five stones. David and David had to actually walk out there. God could have killed Goliath with a heart attack before he was waiting. No, no, David, you're going to have to walk out there. You're going to have to actually throw the stone from there. I'll take over. But that took incredible guts.

So God has asked you to step forward in faith, follow a series of steps, and let's see what he can do. And we know he can do anything. That's true. The only caveat in all of this would be the abusive situation.

We haven't mentioned that. And I want to be clear at the very end. If you're in that situation, you need to get to safety right now. Oh, yeah, I have never varied in 30 years that there's been any physical contact of any kind.

And it's usually not one time, but even one time you're out. We have an immediate separation. We use the church as covering. Hopefully we have we have a shelter.

People are stepping forward. Oh, yeah, that's beyond the pale. We're separating now. Yeah, that is good.

It's good for people to know. David, this has been so strong. Thank you so much for being with us. Well, thank you and for the having the courage to do this. I'm telling you, it's tough stuff.

Well, it is. And let me turn to you. You're listening.

It's touched your heart. Maybe you're in a tough situation. Your marriage is hurting.

You're hurting. We want to help you. We have caring Christian counselors available on staff to give you that initial consultation and kind of guide you in your next steps to recover and to restore your marriage. They can also tell you about our Hope Restored program, which is a marriage intensive for couples like you. And we believe so strongly that it will help you that we want you to know about and act on it. Eighty percent of the couples that go two years later are still married and doing better. And we want you to be able to experience that kind of victory in your relationship. So speak with a counselor today and find out more about Hope Restored. Our number is eight hundred the letter A in the word family.

Eight hundred two three two six four five nine. And due to the call volume, we may have to take your name and number, but we will give you a call back just as soon as possible. Today's program highlights why we exist. We want to save your marriage and to help save many others. So if you're in a good spot with your marriage, would you help us help struggling couples in the name of Christ? Your donation helps cover the expense for counseling that we offer for free. It helps sponsor couples who need but can't afford Hope Restored.

And it allows us to put this broadcast on air. Your financial partnership allows us to give couples the hope and the practical tools they need to trust in a God big enough to save their marriage. Thank you in advance for your generosity to the ministry. And when you make a donation of any amount, either a monthly pledge or a one time gift to focus on the family, we're going to send a copy of Dr. Clark's book, I Don't Want a Divorce. Donate online today.

The link is in the episode notes or call 800 the letter A in the word family. Coming up tomorrow, Kathy Lipp and Sherry Gregory describe how to find time and space to connect with God. Failure is natural. Pain is natural.

But when we stop going to God with it, when we try to take care of things on our own, we only have so much reserve. On behalf of Jim Daly and the entire team, thanks for listening today to Focus on the Family. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ. I was convinced that nothing could change what was going on in our marriage. And I didn't want to try anymore. But my commitment to God helped me try one more time. We went to a hope restored marriage intensive and it was life changing. The counselors created the safest environment we could imagine. So that let us really talk. We're on a much different course now. And I believe we received a miracle that week. Save your free consultation at Hope Restored dot com.