Carla, how did your restoration actually begin?
It all started after we went to a barbecue in September at the house of my husband's company friends, they were just couples and my husband's best friend. Shortly after this barbecue my husband started chatting on facebook with them but I didn’t think they were anything but coworkers.
One day I saw my husband talking to one of the women we met at the barbecue. I asked what they were talking about and he said that she told her husband that she was tired of him even though there was nothing really wrong with him. I complained and I fought with my husband because I said to stay away from her, but he said that there was nothing, and it was all in my head, but they kept talking on facebook and I could see that she always found a way to speak ill of her husband.
Of course I was jealous, so I complained to him until we ended up going a total of ten days without talking because both of us were too proud to say we were wrong. Then a month later, I found out he was lying to me. He said he lied because he knew that I would fight and he was tired of my suspicions, of my jealousies and all the fights without him having done anything wrong. The next day he went away and said he could not take any more, that he did not love me as much as he did before. That he could not stay with me, only because of obligation.
After hearing this I wanted to die, I did not know what to do. We have a 7 year old daughter so I was scared along with the shame of other people finding out.
About five days later I got the book How God Can and Will Restore His Marriage. I had already learned all that is in the book that Erin wrote, word for word, to be the wife that God wanted me to be but, unfortunately, I did not apply what I learned. I allowed my jealousy to open the door for the enemy to take advantage and to destroy my family.
Finally, I gave my life, my daughter and my husband and left them in the hands of God. During the first two months we were apart, I prayed everyday for my husband to return home and was honestly obsessed with his return. I was trying to let my husband go but could not. I had stopped calling him, stopped sending him a message asking him to come back, but in my heart, I kept thinking of him and looked forward to his return more than anything.
To help I read and reread several times the lesson of course 2 The Freedom of letting Go, until at last, I managed to stop waiting for him and I no longer worried about my restoration. When I called, I also did not want it to appear to him that when I was coming to get our daughter from his home I was still pursuing him, so we would communicate by E-mail. Any matters that concerned our daughter, I answered politely and generously, it was easier doing it by email.
The best thing that happened was when I was able to discover Him as my HH, from FAL because once I realize I live only due to the love my HH, that I need only our sovereign Jehovah God to Live abundantly, I found happiness. Even loving my husband would not be enough for him if I didn’t give him God’s love.
How did God change your situation Carla as you sought Him wholeheartedly?
God really changed my life when I finally let my husband go, when I began to pray for the OW and her husband, that they would love each other again and praying and helping other couples who also had crises in their marriage. Going to prayer sites and sending them to HopeAtLast.com. It was then that I stopped asking God for my husband to return and instead I began to ask that His will be done in my life, only HIS will, before mine. That He was all I wanted and needed, nothing more.
What principles, from God's Word (or through our resources), Carla, did the Lord teach you during this trial?
The principles that I held closest to my heart and which I will never forget was that—there is more joy in helping others and that giving to others is better than receiving.
The verses that kept me going were Matthew 21:21, “And Jesus answered and said to them, “Truly I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it will happen.”
Also Matthew 7:7-9 NET, “Ask, Seek, Knock” “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you then, although you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! In everything, treat others as you would want them to treat you, for this fulfills the law and the prophets.”
What were the most difficult times that God helped you through Carla?
When I discovered that this woman, when we separated, posed as my friend to know how my husband and I were getting along so she could find a way to take him from me. I know it was God who supported me that day so I would not do anything stupid. It’s when I really began to pray for her and her husband even more.
What also helped is when I shared this with a friend who had trouble forgiving the OW. Together we asked our HH to give us peace and tranquility and to calm our hearts. I really felt that He did it for me because only HE could have calmed me during raging of that storm.
What also helped is when I fasted and prayed on my knees every day for the OW and her husband, in the end of my fast, I’d lost more than 35 pounds.
Carla, what was the “turning point” of your restoration?
It was when he signed his email with the nickname that I’d always called him. That’s when I could see that God was already turning his heart and He was already directing him home.
Tell us HOW it happened Carla? Did your husband just walk in the front door? Carla, did you suspect or could you tell you were close to being restored?
My restoration happened was my EH started arranging reasons to talk to me on the phone. He would apologize about calling me but would make up some excuse to keep talking. Often he would call our daughter then ask to speak to me. One day he offered to take me to the hospital to see my cousin who was born and then another time, he offered to pick me up at a party that I went to with our daughter. As we drove, we talked only about random things, never about us, but then one email I replied to I mentioned that I had seen his father that day and that he should look in on him because he didn’t appear to be doing well.
After that, he replied and asked me if I missed him and that he was so sorry for everything, that he want to ask me to forgive him for making me suffer. At that moment I just thought how God is so Wonderful when our Faith moves our lives to experience all that is possible. It's just us believing and trusting Him.
That day we talked a lot, all day actually and he told me that he promises never to betray me again. He said he was miserable when we were separated and even insists that he wanted to be with me, that he never wanted to stay with her because she was also married, which is why he left her because he said God convicted him it was wrong.
Even though the OW and her husband are not yet back together, I know God will glorify her marriage and her life.
My husband came home the same day we talked. I went with him where he was living with a friend to get his things. I will never tire of thanking God for being so infinitely good and loving to me and to my HH who is completely WONDERFUL!
Would you recommend any of our resource in particular that helped you Carla?
I recommend the Bible and the book How God Can and Will Restore Your Marriage also A Wise Woman and the courses.
Would you be interested in helping encourage other women Carla?
Yes I would. I continue to reach out to help other woman. WE all must do that not just focus on ourselves. This is a praise report I submitted that explains how I got started ministering to other women.
"United in Prayer"
Some time ago, after I began my journey, and I asked the Lord to use me to help other women. It wasn’t until I obeyed what I’d been taught, by first letting go of my church, that the Lord showed me what was in front of me! But if I had not let my church go, it would never be revealed to me. My sister-in-law, my brother's wife, came to visit me at work, and when I started talking about this principle of not attending church without a husband leading you, so he would be your spiritual leader, she started telling me about the fights she was having ever since the day of her wedding because she was leaving her home and family to be in church at least 3-4 days a week.
They even talked to her that he’d spoken to them about having a separation because my brother couldn’t accept her obsession with attending church. She started to cry and told me she felt such a huge emptiness in her heart because she lacked a real relationship with the Lord. She even told me that thoughts of a suicide often came into her head as the only remedy!
I could see how the “church” was not feeding as much as she thought it was. And the best of all was that when I started to talk about everything I learned in this Ministry, she began to open her heart even more. That’s when I told her about letting go of her church and uniting at home in prayer and presence of the Lord where she could really come to know Him.
Glory to God, not only did I prevent something horrible from happening, I also found the prayer partner I wanted and had been seeking! With our HH leading me, I was able to teach her a little of what the Lord has taught me on this journey and the principles of the Ministry. I am excited and thankful to God for this wonderful revelation and for also being able to help my family. God is really wonderful!!!
Either way Carla, what kind of encouragement would you like to leave women with, in conclusion?
Please, do not lose faith that God will hear your cries at the right time, when He thinks it's time He will restore you. And while you wait, reach out to others ...
