“Sitting before Chris, I knew I couldn’t hide from my sin any longer. Another lie tried to rush through my mind, telling me that because I would sometimes go weeks without watching porn, I couldn’t be addicted to it. I looked over at Chris and knew I couldn’t keep lying to myself. I dropped my head in shame. Tears began to well up. I opened my mouth to speak but couldn’t. As all the games I’d played with God and all the lies I’d told myself to justify my sin crumbled to the ground, my tears grew to uncontrollable sobs, and I shook all over.

Chris walked over to me, placed his hand on my shoulder, and began to pray. It was as though God Himself had entered the room and was speaking directly to my soul. After Chris prayed, I prayed. My words were nothing like my pitiful prayer on the plane. I came clean with God. I had known I had sin in my life, but I had chosen not to notice the incredible distance I’d kept between God and me. I felt incredible shame for the images in my head and the thoughts I entertained day in and day out. But more than that, I felt ashamed of the grief I caused God. I pleaded with him to forgive me. Chris’s simple questions made me realize that the direction of my life was wrong and had been for a very long time.”—“I Surrender All: Rebuilding a Marriage Broken by Pornography“, pg.19-20

As I was reading some of this book recently and I thought about the role that Chris (Christopher means “Christ bearer”, by the way) played in this couple’s recovery AND the times in my life where wise counsel (Proverbs 24:6) was sho ’nuff a GODsend AND some of the couples-in-crisis that I work with who, unfortunately, received poor premarital counseling (meaning there were some *blaring red flags* that were either ignored or touched on but not fully addressed), a different kind of question peeped into my mind.

Being that covenant marriage is a biblical principle (Matthew 19:6), being that it is paralleled with Christ’s relationship to the Church (Matthew 25:1-13) AND being that the divorce rate within the Church is in *direct competition* with the world: “What do you think can be done to better support marriage, and especially *the intimacy of marriage*, by it? Where is it suceeding? Where is it failing? And why, even in this day and time, do you believe the sex and sexual brokenness are still considered to be taboo issues?” I mean, do any of you have a ministry for  virgin courtship couples? A support group for victims (and/or victimizers) of infidelity? A postmenopause club? Yeah. It may sound crazy, but what would marriage really look like if the Church took a more *practical* approach to it?

Sound off…