♕ Today's Promise: "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight." Proverbs 3:5-6
Clementine, how did your restoration actually begin?
It all started with a message from my husband telling me that he was leaving. After a few days we talked because I didn't understand what was going on and that’s when he told me that he was no longer sure of his feelings for me, that I was suffocating him and he just did things for me and had stopped thinking about himself and needed time for him to think. After our conversation he decided to come home but then he said he couldn't do it anymore and I let him go. My world collapsed that day, I thought about how I could even live without my husband, how I could be a separated mother, a woman abandoned by her husband. I saw no hope for anything, I thought I had done my best and could only see his defects. I sought help from pastors and friends, but no one gave me hope.
How did God change your situation, Clementine, as you sought Him wholeheartedly?
One day I started searching the internet about marriage restoration and found the book How God can and will restore your marriage. I read each page, not believing what I was reading, and as I read it over and over God was showing me the foolish and arrogant woman I had become. I dropped to my knees and surrendered everything to God. I told Him I wanted to be completely broken and restored. I told God I wanted Him to use my life as He wished and I was willing to obey the Lord's will for me in everything.
After a month I discovered RMI and started my journey! God showed me His infinite love, took away all the hurt, pain I felt for my husband and taught me to forgive. My husband did not want to talk to me anymore and whenever he came to pick up our daughter he showed that he no longer cared for me. I prayed for him every day and wished he wouldn't ignore me because it hurt (it didn’t just hurt me it hurt our daughter). Over time I gave everything to God and let Him do what only He can do. I just kept obeying and seeking more and more of His presence. I no longer felt empty and I was happier than I’d ever been in my life when He became my HH, I no longer spent the day thinking about my husband and my days were all focused on my Husband.
What principles, from God's Word (or through our resources), Clementine, did the Lord teach you during this trial?
God taught me that I should let my husband go and not get in his way. At first I chased him and didn't leave him alone, but then your ministry showed me that I shouldn't get in his way. After that my husband told me that he had an OW, I was at peace because you had already shown me to be prepared. Of course I was sad because we had only been separated for a month but I handed him over to God and did not criticize him or say anything negative. I was always kind towards my husband, even though he treated me with indifference and sometimes rudely, yet, I always received him with affection, meekness and love.
What were the most difficult times that God helped you through, Clementine?
The most difficult moments were when my husband went to live with OW and on the weekends he took our daughter to stay with them. These were the times I suffered a lot but I handed everything over to God and asked for His will to be done. I prayed that God would put the hedge around my husband and also for Him to give new life to OW by restoring her family. It was very difficult to know that my husband was with her, but my HH strengthened me and taught me to trust God’s plans, which are much bigger than mine.
Clementine, what was the “turning point” of your restoration?
My turning point was when I understood that only HE could satisfy me and love me, that I truly only wanted to be with my HH and that I could be happy, happier than I’d ever been in my life. I asked Him to help me let go of everything that kept me from being fully His, which was my husband and church mostly. I realized how wonderful it would be if my marriage was not restored, as I would have time only for my HH and dreamed this to come true. I asked Him to remove my husband from my heart and as I stopped praying for him by handing him over to God for Him to do His will, that’s when everything changed. When I let everything go and I had the peace that God gave me that surpassed all understanding.
Tell us HOW it happened, Clementine? Did your husband just walk in the front door? Clementine, did you suspect or could you tell you were close to being restored?
My husband took our daughter to spend the weekend with him at the OW's house, I was sad but then realized all the time I could have with my HH. Once I decided that I would use this time to spend more time with my HH, He led me to fast, pray specifically. To once again declare that I wanted His will, that I wanted to just obey Him and live His will. To ask again that He not allow my daughter to go to the house of OW, to touch the heart of my EH so that he would not want to take our daughter to that house, but above all to finish my prayer by declaring His will to be done and not to mine.
Well then, He did His will and not mine, my husband took my daughter and I just obeyed. To my surprise before he brought my daughter, he stayed at our house and he still slept here with me. We were intimate for the first time after three months and to my surprise the next day he decided to return home. He told me that he couldn’t stop thinking about me, about what we had together and the damage he knew he was doing to our daughter. That day we reconciled, he told me that he no longer wanted a relationship with OW, being with her made him physically sick. That day he left to pick up his clothes when he knew she’d be out and left her key on the counter.
I never imagined that this would happen, because my husband was cold and distant the entire time! He never came into our house, he just stayed at the front gate. He didn't call me and everything seemed to point to living a life without him. But God was in control and it was at that moment that restoration was no longer my focus that God turned my husband's heart back to me.
Today our marriage is nothing like I ever dreamed and it’s all thanks to You, my Love!
Would you recommend any of our resources in particular that helped you, Clementine?
I recommend the book how God can and will restore your marriage, this book made me see the truth about the woman I had become—all based on God's Word. Your courses and all your resources really.
Would you be interested in helping encourage other women, Clementine?
Yes
Either way, Clementine, what kind of encouragement would you like to leave women with, in conclusion?
Never give up on your marriages, however difficult it may be, God never forsakes His children. When everything seems unsolved and we don't believe that anything can change, when we let everything go and focus on our relationship with our HH, that’s when God comes in and transforms the impossible situation. Seek the Lord and give everything to Him. If you withhold anything from Him you only lengthen your journey. Do not be anxious but seek only your First Love.
Find more encouragement and overcome the hurdle of #Letting Go by clicking on the #TAG linked to Restored Marriage Testimonies.
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