Adultery: Pleasure or Misery

Why dabble in adultery?

Adultery is often a drug to cover anger or emptiness, to escape the challenges of home life—pleasure without the accompanying worries, and sexual fulfilment, like alcohol, usually provides some relief and pleasure.

But Proverbs (5:3–4) suggests what is sweet to the taste can become sour in the stomach. Nathan predicted David’s moments of pleasure would lead to a lifetime of distress, for himself and his family (2 Samuel 12:9–10).

It may not be possible to follow a lifetime of the causes and effects of adultery. But it’s easy to forecast hostility resulting from infidelity: anger, loss of trust, and the pain of betrayal.

Further, a variety of attitudes by an adulterous husband—or wife in today’s free and equal culture—from outright denial or excuses to utter remorse and self-reproach can only add to the conflict, and the affair might still drag on after discovery.

Even if it doesn’t, a wife’s loss can trigger a prolonged period of mourning countered by the impatience of the husband. Without reconciliation, the marriage may break up, or continue an uneasy co-existence, the wife using guilt to hold the husband hostage.

Infidelity creates a near death experience for a marriage, yet many marriages survive and become meaningful for both partners again. Most of David’s life is a remarkable record of his source of survival; he never lost his confidence in God in the midst of adversity

David’s psalms are the legacy of his victories for us in times of difficulty. David found pardon in the grace of God’s forgiveness and protection, although still facing the consequences of his sin. David’s example can bring both comfort and strength to continue through adversity.

David’s brief fling resulted in a lifetime of family conflict. Too often, the continuing depth of pain and misery of a broken marriage causes us to retreat from God. But as David found, God is our ultimate source of strength when we need Him the most.

How Equal Are We?

Ann and I were born, raised and married in England, in an entirely different culture to the current North American culture. It was a Christian culture—not one in which everyone was a Christian, but where Christian values were universally accepted. 

However, our marriage partnership was definitely patriarchal; the wife was expected to support decisions made by the husband. Although discussed together, the decision to emigrate to Canada in the 60’s was my decision. Ann dutifully went along, although she confided later that she thought I was crazy—I had just completed my architectural training and was ready to develop a career. This union was clearly not the equal partnership of the Bible.

After arriving in Canada, things changed. Ann noticed the independence of North American women and realized the lopsided arrangement of our marriage. With assertion on her part and bewilderment on mine, things began to change. If she was uncomfortable with a projected decision of mine, I heard about it.

So began an education on my part and a balancing of the marriage responsibility. Despite my Christian background, I had not yet come to an understanding of the relationship between husband and wife that the Bible taught, rather accepting the patriarchal version of biblical interpretation that was current—and convenient—at the time.

I could have considered that this change was belittling to my manhood. But I found that the injection of female ideas and intuition into our plans contributed to better decisions. Not only that, I began to appreciate more the abilities and plain commonsense of the lovely and talented wife God had given me.

How could I have been so ignorant of the great resources Ann brought to our marriage and blind to the guidance scripture gave me? The simple answer is arrogance; I simply believed that I always had the better and final answers to all of life’s questions.

Facing Reality: Let's Update the Wedding Vows

The increasing number of failed marriages, frequently ended on minor disagreements, has led me to conclude that we should update the marriage vows.

I have added some warnings in the following “Revised Version.” This is partly tongue in cheek, but helps to place our capricious nature into the picture.

I now take you to be my wife (husband) according to God’s holy word; to have and to keep from this time forward. I will love, esteem and respect you, I will be faithful to you; I will encourage you to become all that God intends, for as long as we both shall live.

Should I fail to love you, I can expect a deteriorating closeness and companionship.

Should I fail to esteem and respect you, you will exhibit a deteriorating personhood and dignity.

Should I fail to be faithful to you, our marriage and our children’s future will be in jeopardy.

Should I fail to encourage you to become all that God intends, you will lose your individual distinctness and our combined potential for Him will be lost.

Should my actions or attitudes bring our marriage to an end before death parts us, we will both experience misery, displaced children, and an enduring sense of loss.

I make this solemn vow and covenant to you and to God.

I’m sure you can refine this with your own words and vows, but you should be able to pick up the general idea. Perhaps you might like to recite these vows to your partner, and sense the response in your own heart.

What has Cinderella to do with Politics

’Tis the season of Municipal elections, Tory conventions and Senate scandals. The history of politics is a sordid tale: of the power hungry manipulating privilege for personal benefit; of dictators forcing rule over exploited people; of tyrants extending influence by war and conquest

Yet there may be more of a common thread to both politics and our favourite love stories like Cinderella than it appears. “Once upon a time . . . happily ever after,” lurks in those tales and books like Utopia, reflecting a perfection of love and life that our hearts yearn for and our best experiences imply.

Political theorist John von Heyking’s book title, Augustine and Politics as Longing in the World, evokes a sense that, despite its excesses, even politics arises from the notion that there is an ideal to strive for beyond the ravages of earthly life—a thirsty longing that wrenches our hearts but is never fully satisfied.

I’m sure most politicians start off with a desire to improve community life, but undermine their good intentions by the subterfuge, manipulation and compromise that political ambition seems to require. So as men envision the ideal society and strive for it, maidens also dream of perfect love.

But if we could read the rest of the story of Cinderella and her prince, we might find a degeneration of their love into self-serving manipulation. But neither evidences of fallen partners or politicians should blind us to the desire God has placed in our hearts for the perfection only found in Him.

Pascal wrote: “There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus.” If God can complete the yearning of the human soul, then He is also the source of a satisfying and enduring marriage.

Depravity?

When I first learned to ride a bicycle, I was let loose on the streets of my neighbourhood and almost immediately came into conflict with another user. My problem was a very simple one; I was riding on the wrong side of the road as the other user testily informed me.

My father had not taught me the first rule of the road—to ride or drive on the left (that was in England of course). A moment’s thought reveals to us the chaos produced without this one simple and basic rule.

When it comes to human nature, most are poorly informed of the one simple rule that governs all human behaviour, and must be taken into account in any process of governing: that is our total depravity.

This very definitely goes against the grain, especially as it suggests that we have nothing good in us. But it simply means that everything we do is somehow infected with sin; we act with mixed motives and engage in undesirable fantasies.

Society assumes the ultimate good in all, a mistaken notion that contributes as much to society's ills as sin itself, by applying incorrect notions. Sin is regarded as a correctable defect rather than a terminal disease. Compare the name of Canada’s prison system: Corrections Canada!

By contrast the Bible teaches that we are all infected by sin and need inward cleansing by our Creator. The first line of defence for our children is a commitment to Jesus Christ, responding to their recognised need of cleansing and forgiveness; first as an initial experience of salvation, and then as an ongoing need in daily life.

Unfortunately, these are so basic that we take them for granted and forget to clearly instruct our children of them—as my father forgot to inform me of the first rule of the road.