I am a sinner just the same

October 4, 2011 from my journal:
I pray for wisdom through Your Word this morning.  Your Word nourishes me.

2 Peter 1:4By which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

My mind initially thinks of Your grace in my escaping the corruption of the world because of C or K’s sinful desire.  Which is valid and true, You’ve carried me to safety, to healing.  But I must not fool myself into thinking that my own sinful desire isn’t mingled in there as well.  I have been betrayed by the man I love.  I have been wounded deeply.  But I am a sinner just the same.  It is my own sin that Your mercy is saving me from.  Don’t let me forget.  I am desperate for You.  So needy.  And I wouldn’t want it any other way.

In the midst of pain and a wounded heart, it was easy to read the Bible and only apply it to C as the sinner.   But that is a dirty, dirty lie.  How easy it is for us humans to look at other's failures, other's sins, other's foolish choices and thank that we are better than them.  Well, let me just give you the truth here.  We aren't.  We are just as guilty.  We are just as deserving of Hell.  We are all hypocrites.  It's just that not all of us have our sins, our bad choices, our hypocrisy exposed to the world. We read articles of people in the lime light, Christian or not, who have affairs.  Who hide emails.  Who look at porn.  Who do this or that ugly thing.  And then we think to ourselves, "Phew.  I'm not that bad." or "Geeze, thankfully no one get's to look at the websites I've been browsing."  "Man, good thing no one can read my mind."  Don't just so quickly the sins of others.  Pull the log from your own eye first.  Confess your weakness first.  Seek Jesus first.  Confess your hidden sins, first.  I am as guilty.  So are you.  Even if you don't want to admit it. 

You are not a good person, K.

After I emailed K, her husband G, called my husband C.  Can you believe that?  G wanted to hear from C's mouth the story of their affair.  G wanted to see if what C said lined up with what K said.  Some things didn't and I am sure that was pretty hard on G.  Months and months later, I would realize how hard that was on him.   

My response to K’s email:

Sep 30

K, I have to confess, I was shocked to even hear from you.  Also, I have to confess, I am shocked that my heart is as soft towards you as it is.  But that is the work of the Lord...and time.  I've had 5 weeks to wrestle with every possible emotion and when I think of G having to go through this right now, it brings me to tears.  Because I know how he is feeling.  I all too well understand his anger.  His hurt.  I think he handled his conversation with C like a man, with a lot of self-control.  G is where I was when I sent you the very first email in August.  So please don't think that I don't fully and all too completely understand how fresh G's wounds are.  But I hope that you can see (and G too) that there is hope.
I thank you for offering your apology to me.  I forgive you, Kim.  I really do.  I could not choose to offer forgiveness to my husband and yet withhold it from you.  So I do.  I forgive you from my heart.  
One thing I wanted to touch on from your response was this:  You are not a good person.  I am not a good person.  Neither is C or G.  We are all sinners who make foolish choices.  All destine for Hell.  It is because we are not good, because we are all sinners that Christ died on the Cross.  You chose sin.  C chose sin.  I choose it.  There is no gradient scale for sin.  God does not see me any better than He sees you.  Praise Him!  But please don't fool yourself into thinking that you, or any of us are "good people".  Because that would be a disgrace to the sacrifice that Jesus (the only good and perfect person) gave for us.  If we are good, then His sacrifice was for nothing.  His sacrifice was for EVERYTHING.   Everyone.
Like I said in my last email, C wasn't totally honest with me in the beginning either.  He was (not on purpose either) forgetting details.  But as he remembered, as the days went on, or as my questions stirred his memory, he shared honestly with me.  Because he knew it was better to share openly NOW, rather than have anything come up later on and attempt to destroy our marriage again.  I know it's hard and scary.  But being on the victim's side (like G) I can honestly say I wanted to know everything.  I didn't want anything hidden from me anymore.  I'd been deceived for far too long.  So I'm glad that you feel like last night you finally got it all out.  Keep going.
Find the roots, K, to why you made the choices you did.  I'm not pointing my finger at you right now, I just want you try and draw out some of the deep rooted issues as to why you acted in the way that you did.  C and I have been through the ringer of the "whys" on his end of the affair.  What are your insecurities?  We've all got them.  What is lacking in your marriage that made you turn to another man?  Get yourself and your marriage into counseling.  And not with your pastor, because quite honestly it sounds like he's pretty deceived in the biblical way to handle this situation.  But really, I just want you to figure out who you are.  So that you don't have to continue to live in the traps of insecurity.  And shame.  Let go of that.  Jesus died on the Cross to forgive your affair.  C's affair. (I don't ever want you to think that I believe him any less guilty then you).  Let Jesus forgive you and tenderly minister to you soul.  Cling to Him, K.  It is the only way that you will be able to live.  The only way your marriage will be able to survive this.  You and G cannot fix this.  Only God can.  And He want's too.
Again, you are welcome to respond if you'd like.  But just know, as you are, I'm praying.  Constantly in prayer, K.

Oh. My. Goodness. She emailed me back.

I opened my email a day later and my jaw dropped to the floor.  She emailed me back.  Hear pounding, lungs struggling to function, I read her email.

A response from K:

Sep 30

Hi R,
Thank you for your email.  I am so sorry for all of the pain that I have caused everyone involved.  My heart is heavy knowing what I have done.  Please know that I am truly sorry for the pain I have caused your family.
Please keep in mind that my husband’s wounds are very fresh.  He just heard the entire story.  He is angry, and is blaming everyone (including me).  Because he knows this is so out of character for me, I think he is trying to see what made me act in the poor way that I did. 
About a year ago, we were at church, and there was a sermon on rebuilding marriages.  Our pastor spoke about a couple he was counseling and the man had had an affair.  He wanted to tell his wife everything.  However, our pastor said that telling her all of the details would only cause immense pain to his wife.  It would make him feel better, but it would cause unnecessary pain for her.  When I had to make a decision on what to tell G, I kept hearing our pastor’s voice in my head.  I wanted to protect him from pain.
However, as time went on, I started to doubt my choice.  I didn’t know what was the best thing to do for G, our marriage.  I decided to tell him the details.  Without meaning to, I did leave the nitty gritty details out.  I guess I was still trying to protect him.  I am now trying to tell him every detail I can remember.  My mind is such a mess right now that I am not thinking straight.  I am forgetting some things.  Not on purpose, but just the same.  I honestly feel that after last night I have told G everything and cleared up any misconceptions he had due to details I had accidentally left out.
Please know that I am praying for the healing and rebuilding of all involved.  I truly am not a bad person.  I have just made some really, really bad choices lately.  I pray for forgiveness and healing for all involved constantly.
K

Did you catch that?  What her pastor told her?  That is NOT ok.  Never, never never is it ok to hide our sin from our spouse.  Nothing could ever be more damaging.  Bad advice.  Very very bad.  I had to respond again.  Had to.