♕Today's Promise: "For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand, Who says to you, ‘Do not fear, I will help you.’” I4131
Janet, how did your Restoration Journey actually begin?
Like most women, with adultery. I found out about his adultery at first, by cell phone message, I was never one to mess with it, even though I had the password, I never looked at it, my trust in him was blind. And I had to pick up my cell phone to write something down and his was closer, when I opened WhatsApp, there was a message from another woman, saying she loved him and everything. My world collapsed at that time, my floor opened, I just wanted to get away from there, but I didn't say anything, I just went to my room to cry, because it felt like a nightmare, the kind I've had on several nights with that. That night we had a heart to heart conversation when I confronted him about the message, he poured out everything he had been feeling for months, things about me that I imagined I was and did, but hearing from him I was sure, and the reality of who I was hit me in the face, I saw like crystal clear water that I needed to change, that person he was describing sounded awful, and I didn't want to be that person ever again. I don't know how to define the date well, how it happened, but at a certain point in my marriage, I started to be contentious, quarrelsome, disrespectful, diminishing my husband in everything, not accepting anything he said or proposed, I thought I was much better, smarter, holier, in short, everything wrong. I was letting the feminist ideas that surrounded me during college, the ideologies of the world, fill my mind and make me believe that I was not valued, I was not loved in the right way, I had no value or self-respect if I submitted to my husband, I thought that he had to value the woman I was, but I devalued him all the time. How much ignorance and blindness, if I could go back 5 minutes today in each moment I did this and redeem myself, I would do it without blinking.
After the weekend that all this happened, a pain devastated my soul, I was always Catholic, in my adolescence I attended church a lot, I gave myself away, I found this love of God, but then I let myself be carried away by the world. I've always been in that coming and going, approaching and moving away, I had never really surrendered like this, I had never experienced living any purpose only by my faith, living faith purely as it has been on this journey. In the first days I got angry with God, as I did when something bad happened, because I always thought I was too correct to deserve it, and I asked Him to get rid of me and stop hurting, but by His own will in the midst of all this, I didn't tell anyone, the people close to me, I went to tell only one friend, asking her to pray for me, but then I didn't continue, because I felt in her words that she didn't believe it was possible, not with adultery, so I never said anything again. And from then on, I only spoke to God. Since then, He has supported me, lifted me up and spent all the time that I had to stand for my marriage, even though it seemed crazy, even when it seemed like there was no other way. I didn't tell anyone about anything, I kept using my wedding ring, because even without knowing about the book, God still guided me to do this, even without understanding and thinking I was crazy. I didn't know anyone who had had a restored marriage, nor had I ever heard anything about it in church, yet I went back to church, and God spoke to me in various passages and sermons, it was a great comfort, it was the only place I I went, and I started looking for things on the internet about marriage restoration, and how this could happen, and I found self-help courses, which talked about it, and I decided to take this course, I didn't like the course at first, because everything was so recent, I only felt pain, nothing made sense there for me. But I found two women, who were going through the same thing, but in the opposite situation, they had left their husbands, and after a while they opened their eyes and wanted their husbands back, and they were fighting for it. One of them called and started talking to me, and I felt that it was God telling me all those things for me to believe that He had this power to incline hearts where He wanted, like a river of water.
This gave me new hope, and it was also through this group, this course that I got to Erin's Book, How God Can and Will Restore Your Marriage, someone shared this book in the WhatsApp Group and I saw it and clicked, and just the title of it already made me want to cry, when I started to read, in the waiting room of the psychiatrist I was going to, I just wanted to leave and read that whole book. From that day on, I saw another world in front of me, there were so many sensations, first I suffered from so much regret, all the principles, everything that was in the book and I did wrong in my marriage, everything, and when my eyes were opened to it , I cried so much, it hurt so much, it was a mixture of pain, regret, guilt, there were many feelings. But I felt it taking me straight to God's lap, I had no idea how it would be, but now I knew that I wasn't crazy, and that voice that I heard inside me, to persist and not give up, even though it seemed impossible, it was God telling me where I was going to go. I read the whole book and my eyes opened like never before, a fear took over me, but also an endless desire not to be like that anymore, never again, and then my changes and transformations began to appear.
How did God change your situation, Janet, as you sought Him wholeheartedly?
When I truly surrendered, when I felt that living life with my Beloved was all I needed, even though I still loved Mitchell, the love I had for my Beloved was much greater. I have never been angry with Mithchell, never been able to hate him, or feel disgusted, or other things that many women feel when their EH (earthly husbands) have OW (other women). Even though it hurt absurdly when Mitchell was close by, I still loved him, and even far away I still loved him, and I said to my Beloved, that He should take everything from my heart if it weren't His will to have my family restored and serving Him. When it seemed that there was no other way, that I didn't feel everything that I read in so many testimonies, it was when I had a great miracle in my life, I took medicine prescribed by the doctor for the whole situation and also because I had very strong PMS, but something told me that these drugs were making it difficult for me to feel that love, which I thought I would never feel because I couldn't love the Lord that way. That was when one night after something very bad had happened, I cried and asked God to heal me because I was never going to take those medicines again, and so I did, I never took them again after that day and I asked God, the beloved of my soul, to heal me and take care of everything in me and in my life. And so it happened, and in the first month after stopping the medicine I saw that I was cured, and I felt feelings in my soul that I didn't have before, and I never took the medicine again.
What principles, from God's Word (or through our resources), did the Lord teach you during this trial, Janet?
All the principles, it's like I had never read the bible, I had never seen the word of God the way I see it today, He had never spoken to me so clearly, all those principles that were mentioned in the book and in the courses I had not known in that way, I was totally ignorant about it. I knew those words from the bible but it never made sense to me like when I started reading the book, and then reading the bible every day. But one of the things that really stands out to me is keeping my mouth shut, being silent, not returning offenses, being kind, patient, respecting my husband, being submissive to him even though he was in the situation he was in, were the most challenging. I I thought I would never be able to listen to things and not respond, not express my opinion, recognize Mithcell’s qualities even though he was with a OW, and God has transformed me to this point, to be able to do all that. I managed to ask him for forgiveness, for everything I did, for everything I caused, something I never thought I would be able to do, but I felt that, I felt such great regret, so great that all I wanted was to ask him for forgiveness .
What were the most difficult times that God helped you through, Janet?
They are still there, but there was a time now close to the moment that I am living, that he returned to us, to our family, where everything seemed to fall, it still does. But the most difficult thing was when he spoke to the OW next to me, when I knew she was the one he was exchanging messages with, in front of me, beside me, and not saying anything, just swallowing hard and handing over all that pain that I felt to God. When she put a wedding ring and the first letter of his name on a social network, as a relationship, and when he took off his wedding ring and said it couldn't be done anymore, and it wasn't once, it was twice, and he spoke for the first time about the divorce, who wanted to file the divorce papers, and even asked me for the documents for that. And I knelt down and cried out to God to deliver me, that my Beloved would stay by my side and support me and deliver me if it was His will. And when he asked me what I thought about introducing someone to our daughter, even bringing them to the city where we live, my heart felt like it was going to come out of my mouth, and my Beloved put the right words in my mouth and I managed to endure it. I asked God to deliver my daughter and me from all of this, but that if it were His will, I would go along this path with Him, wherever He would lead me. It hurt a lot, but He was at all times consoling me and giving me strength, lifting me up. I will have afflictions, but He will deliver me from all of them. Every word that God put in my heart so that I would never forget has been fulfilled, Glory to God.
Janet, what was the “turning point” of your restoration?
I don't know for sure, but it was at the moment that something happened to him and the OW, something happened on that day, he stayed on the phone all day with a friend, talking for a long time, and I saw a message on his cell phone from him to her, saying many things, serious things, about disappointment, about something that had happened, but the weekend before he came as usual and something had changed, he wanted to be intimate with me, we had a really nice weekend, we went out, talked, laughed, it was really good, and something told me that it was the start of his return home. But as this had already happened twice, I was very apprehensive, I was afraid, but even so I trusted and entrusted it to God and my Beloved to do the rest, to do what was in His will, and to incline Mitchell's heart wherever He wanted, I was just here to accept whatever He wanted for me and for my life. And I felt that he started to come back, the other weekend he came and something had happened, I thought I had done something wrong, but then I saw the message for him and I realized that there was something going on, he couldn't sleep, he couldn't eat right, and at dawn when I got up earlier to pray he got out of bed, came to the room and hugged and kissed me and apologized for everything he had done, I was in shock that I didn't even know what to answer, I just thought about the Lord, my Beloved, and asked if I was dreaming or was it real. And I could only see my Beloved Lord in everything that was happening. I saw everything in His hands and His will coming true, and especially His word, which never fails, which is the way, the truth and the life.
Tell us HOW it happened, Janet? Did Mitchell just walk in the front door? Janet did you suspect or could you tell you were close to being restored?
In fact it happened, in a very troubled way, until this week nothing had been said, only the attitudes showed that Mitchell was coming back, and on the last visit he put his ring back on without me saying anything, that is to say not saying anything to him, because that same day, I was talking to my Beloved Lord, and saying that when he felt in his heart the will and the certainty that he wanted this, he would put the ring on, and it was on that day that he left the alliance, I cried with emotion, seeing in front of me materialized that love that the Lord spoke to me, that He felt for me, and that I stopped doubting myself. But this week, the OW got in touch with my sister, and sent her a lot of things, messages, videos, photos, conversations, and even without knowing anything, my sister showed it to my mother, and my mother started attacking Mitchell by messages, until then nobody knew anything, and then on Friday before coming here he told me that she was attacking him and they were arguing, why the OW was making hell, why he had chosen me, why he didn't want to live without his family, and that he didn't see himself living as a separated man without his family, and that the changes in me made him want to come back. I didn't have the words to answer, I could only imagine what was happening, and I thought it's you my Beloved, this is all you, and I repeated it was God who transformed me, it was God, only Him, within me I was only thinking of my Beloved Father and my Beloved Lord.
Would you recommend any of our resources in particular that helped you, Janet?
I recommend the book every day of our lives, I even have to finish the course Finding the Abundant Life to read again, and all the courses that we found on the website, the courses have Erin's videos, which have been balm for my soul so many times, and taught me how to follow my Lord's principles more and more every day, she didn't let me give up, even when everything seemed too impossible, and hopeless. She really encouraged me in so many moments. God's love reached me through the passionate way she spoke of God and his word.
Would you be interested in helping encourage other women, Janet?
For sure, if the Lord enables me and wants me, I will be ready to serve Him as He wants.
Either way, Janet, what kind of encouragement would you like to leave women with, in conclusion?
Stand firm in the presence of the Lord and in His love, only He, and no one else can save, love, calm, change, and do anything for you in this moment and after all this. The reason for our pain was the separation from our husbands, from our family, but the purpose of all this was to bring us closer to the Lord, who loves us and wants us there, with a family delivered, abundant, with trust and love turned to Him. Surrendering to Him goes far beyond having your marriage restored, it's having a new life, because everything inside you is new, because you know a new place, and give your heart and everything you have to the One who gave you life, like no one has ever done for you. Don't take your eyes off Him, His word needs to be the first thing you think of when you're facing a bad situation, with all this still going on, I can only remember and repeat God's words and promises in my head for each situation that I go through, because I believe that His word never returns empty, and it is the way, the truth and the life. Sorry for the size of the text, but it's a lot and there are a lot of details. Be encouraged, and renewed by the word of God every day. Glory to the Lord, Beloved of my soul and my almighty God, loving Father, and Who never forsakes us.
Read MORE testimonies in our By the Word of Their Testimony Full Series.