When a Wife Puts Her Hope in the Wrong Place

In this interview, Kathy Gallagher teaches wives about the danger of living in fear and how a genuine trust in the Lord is the only way to leave the past behind and have newness of life in a marriage.  (from Podcast Episode #434 - Overcoming Fear When Restoring a Marriage)

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Nate: Kathy, you have counseled many wives over the past 30 plus years since co-founding Pure Life Ministries with your husband Steve. You are very familiar with a wide range of issues that come up between a husband and a wife as they're either dealing with the crisis of sexual sin and moving past it. One question wives often ask us is, how can they leave the past behind after their husband has genuinely repented? Usually, he has been walking in the fruit of genuine repentance for quite some time, but the wife is still living in the past and can't seem to progress in the healing of the relationship. What would you say to a woman that is in this place?

Kathy: Well, I would call that she is living, waiting for the next shoe to drop, which is a miserable way to live. Most women have been living like this, because their husbands are going through ups and downs in their fight for freedom. The husband does good for a while, then crashes and the cycle continues. That kind of dynamic can cause a woman to feel like she is never going to be able to be free of the past. A woman in this place will either live waiting for the next shoe to drop or just live in her own fear.
Fear is one of the undealt with issues that a lot of wives carry around in life. I carried it for many years. I was always on guard and inside I was trying to shield myself from any future disappointments that might come. It is a miserable existence, and you can't move forward because you're waiting for disaster to strike, even though he's doing good and he hasn’t given you any reason to believe that anything devastating is going to happen again. The ongoing routine of fear, anger, and bitterness is where women can really get themselves into a lot of trouble.

Nate: Wow, it's almost like a betrayal of self to let it go.

Kathy: Yes. There's a mentality that a lot of women have that if I don't keep my guard up, if I don't keep this flame of fear alive and if I don't keep watch, he's going to hurt me again. It becomes a very defensive and adversarial position for a wife to get into. They don't do it on purpose, it just feels so natural that it’s almost like it just happens to them. They really have to take a step back and look at what is happening to them, because something is definitely happening inside.

Nate: What do you mean?

Kathy: Fear is the most soul rotting thing that a woman can live in. Fear in of itself is a good emotion; it teaches us to run when we're in danger and to genuinely protect ourselves in a helpful way. But to live in fear as though it is going to be a wall of protection from future harm is deceptive. Really, what it does is turn you into a different person. I had to undo who I was becoming as a result of fear, and it was not a pleasant process. It was very painful and there are remnants to this day of fear in me that I have to deal with. Not fear of Steve falling or something of that nature, but just from time to time it attaches itself to me and gets into my pattern of thinking.

Nate: It's something that you use to protect yourself and then in the end it ends up controlling you.

Kathy: It’s similar to the biblical principle that says the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. The same thing could be said about fear. It is a root that has 1000 heads. It's like pride in that way and is practically impossible to kill. But you don't quit trying to kill it, you keep after it.

Nate: If he's not giving her evidence that something is imminent, then why is she so afraid?

Kathy: I think it's because she's putting her hope in the wrong place. She wants to have a future and a hope, but the problem is that it is resting on a person, and that is a slippery slope for anyone. For wives that is our issue; we put everything into our marriages. It becomes our life and our world. If he does well, we do well. If he does poorly, we do poorly. If he's up, she’s up. If he's down, she’s down. That's a natural thing in marriage, but a woman who can't move forward even though her husband has moved forward has lost track of where her hope should be. That is an obvious indicator that she is not right with the Lord inside, because no matter what we go through in life, our only hope is Jesus.

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Eventually I came to the place where I could live with a man who was shaky and still have a life that wasn't going to blow apart if he blew apart. I had to get my priorities right and I had to realize that Steve was not the foundation of my life, and he was never meant to be. It's difficult for women to get their priorities in the right place, because they place expectations on their husbands to be the foundation in life that only Jesus can be.
It's everything to a wife to have the union, oneness, and sacredness that the marriage covenant is supposed to be. That is how it should be, but in a lot of cases for us wives, it becomes more important than our relationship with Christ. That's why a lot of women struggle, because they put their marriage and the security of it ahead of their walk with the Lord. Many wives think that their walk with God will vastly improve when their marriage improves, but they will come to find out that that is not the truth. I had it so backwards when I thought that if my husband got it together and the marriage was good, then I would grow in my relationship with God. That is not true. If I wasn't putting God first and moving forward spiritually, regardless of what Steve was doing, nothing was happening within me spiritually. I wasn't moving forward with God. I wasn't growing spiritually, and I wasn't trusting God.
When a person is so fixated on the problem, it begins to control their whole life. What inevitably happens, whether it's a man in sexual sin or a woman struggling with horrible fear, is they begin to become a completely different person. If you are a man that is in lust, you will become corrupted the more you give over. Your inside world becomes more and more hollowed out, and you start to become less and less in touch with reality. For a woman in fear, you could potentially become controlling, manipulative, angry, bitter, or even full of wrath. You may become angry at your kids, angry at life or even angry at God. That is ultimately the result when there is a bunch of undealt with stuff inside. That's why I take the issue of fear so seriously when I'm dealing with women, because they have to take care of the root issue.
There is a valid place for the pain, the hurt, and the fear, but it must be reined in.  I would say the same for a guy who is struggling with lust, he needs to rein it in, he can't just let it go, he has to deal with it. If a woman is unable to move forward, often it’s because she is living in fear. She has to start working on overcoming fear just like her husband has to work on overcoming lust. These are both sin issues. Even though the pain and hurt are legitimate for a while, God still expects you to trust in Him with all your heart, to lean not on your own understanding and in all your ways acknowledge Him and know that He will direct your path. That's the truth that a wife has to live in. In confidence and trust you will find rest. Confidence in the Lord and trust in the Lord are things that a wife must develop in her life if she wants to experience freedom.