Hi Gentle,

How are things with your husband? Still the same? Still close to coming home?

I was interested in how were you able to become friends after you split up? Since my wife and I are splitting up, I wondered how you can emotionally survive just being friends again, and maybe not necessarily even good friends?

Gregg

<small>[ July 01, 2003, 06:26 PM: Message edited by: GreggC ]</small>

Gregg,

Sorry it took so long to respond. I started writing last night then a friend called.

Things are about the same with husband and me. It doesn't make sense why he just doesn't come home. I am really crying out to God as to what I am to do if anything. It is a long process.

I would not have learned how to become friends with my husband again if it had not been for God's principles that I learned from the restore book. I do hope you ordered yours. I believe you can download the first chapter after you order the book. I believe this book will change your life, bring you closer to God, and give you the hope you need. Remember it takes time. Did you read the testimonies of restored marriages? They encouraged me so much.

Believe me, following God's principles works. I know because I have seen them work. The problem is that most, even Christians, don't know or understand God's principles for marriage. When I cried out to GOD for understanding, He led me to the restore site. I have nothing to gain by you going there. I would love to see your marriage restored and I know it can be, God's way. The world has given far too much credit to free will. Yes, we are free to choose, but time after time you read of God making His children willing. God is in charge of the heart.

I will not lie to you. This is a hard journey. You must pick up your cross daily. You must die to self. You must lay your will aside and pick up God's will. You must go against what popular culture tells you to do. You must put your trust in God alone. All this may sound simple, but it is all very hard. Most give up and get caught up in "taking care of themselves," or "protecting their rights." The world will tell you, you have the right to be happy or God wants you to be happy. God wants your joy to be in Him, but He never promised an easy journey. I am sure Jesus was not happy on the cross, but Jesus took joy in pleasing His Father. This is a feel good right now world. God's plans take time and they can be very painful at times. The pain produces much in and thru us. We are forever changed and draw closer to Him. We must even rejoice in the pain.

I hope this helps you. You and your wife can become friends again. I cannot give you an easy lesson in how this is to happen. Please get the book and allow God to speak to you thru it as He did me.

gentle

Don't worry about your wife's hope...your hope is enough.

gentle

Thank you Gentle. You are so kind. I am so happy that you are able to feel God in you. I wish there was something I could do to help ease the pain. You keep hanging in there. You are truly an inspiration to me.

Gregg

Gregg,

I decided to answer you on this thread. I cannot really tell you exactly why I believe God may be calling you to stand with Him for your marriage. I don't like to use the word stander or standing for your marriage. I believe I am standing with God for the restoration of my marriage. I can only stand with God if it is what God wants. Without Him I would just be hanging on to what I want.

I believe God may be calling you to stand with Him for several reasons, some I can't explain. It is something between God and I and words can't explain.

But, one reason is because reading your post you sound like I did three years ago. You said things about yourself and the way you treated your wife and the way you have lived your life, that could and have came out of my mouth about myself. I came to realize that God was calling me to Him. He use my husband leaving to bring me were He wanted me. Like me, a lot of the ways you use to deal with things was far from how God wanted me to deal with life and others. I was so lost when it came to many things and didn't even know it. I wanted to be different, promised to be different and nothing changed. When I called out to God to help me with my marriage, He allowed my husband to leave me.

God knew I would turn to Him with all my heart in order to turn my life around and stop the intense pain I was causing myself. I read a lot of this in your post. I didn't start changing until I grew closer to God. He will do want ever it takes to bring us closer to Him.

It is also hard for me to hear God at times. I am having trouble with that right now. Sometimes I don't even realize it is God talking to me until later on down the road. God has spoke to me in different ways. Sometimes it will be thru other people, not just one, but the same thing keeps coming up. God may keep putting the same people in my life over and over. He also talks to me thru the test He allows me to go thru. If I don't get it right, He keeps giving me the same lesson.

God also has spoke to me by having the same scripture keep coming up in different places. He even gave me a scripture once in a dream. I looked the scripture up and it didn't seem to fit until a few days later when I was reading a lady's testimony about something she had prayed for about her husband. She had prayed for the same thing I prayed for my husband. Then at the end of the testimony she shared that God had given her a scripture as an answer. It was the same scripture God had given me in my dream. The same scripture was use in one of my daily devotional. All this within a few days of each other.

God has also spoken to me during or after a fast. He answered a pray that answered other petitions I had made. Sometimes it just all comes together and we don't get it right away.

God led me to the restore site by having it keep coming up in post I was reading. Something told me to go back and look up the web site, when I got to the web site, I knew I was supposed to be there. It was what I had been praying for. I got a lot of answers at once.

God will speak to you in different ways. Be open to listening. Please don't go by what I say. Seek God and he will answer you and led you in the path He wants you to go. So many of the questions I was asking God, the same ones you are asking, was answered when I got my book. I couldn't put it down. I learned so much about God's word in this one little book. I able to understand His word so much better now. The bible came to life for me.

I could go on and one. I could tell story after story. God has done so much in my life. So much healing has taken place. I hope this helps you some. Much of this stuff is hard to explain with just words.

gentle

Thanks, Gentle,

I just like reading your words. They make me feel better, and help ease the pain.

I get the feeling that maybe God is asking me to reach out to my church family, if not only with help in moving and to let them know it is ok if they are there to support me.

I think that maybe that I have not been opening my heart to God in the past by not allowing these people to help me. I was surprisd to hear someone tody tell me that there are a lot of people praying for us.

Thanks for your support. I would like to be there for you too.

Please pray for me to get my act together and spend some time on the restore site and to order the materials

Gregg

<small>[ July 05, 2003, 04:14 PM: Message edited by: GreggC ]</small>

Gregg,

Please reach out to the people in your church. That is how we heal...thru the body of Christ(His church). I would not have made it thru some of the hard times I have been thur , like having to move out of our home, if it had not been for the brothers and sisters God put in my life when I needed them.

A lot of times pride gets in our way. God may be wanted to break you of pride, He did me. This is good, because we are to be humble. Start reading a Proverbs a day. Read the one that matches the day of the month. Then keep reading them. You will learn how God wants us to live our lifes. Read Proverbs for wisdom.

Reach out and let God heal you. I believe you need a lot of the same type healing I needed. I had to learn to be wrong even when I was right.
I learned that we may win the battle, but we lose the ones we love. It is ok to mess up. Just make sure you admit your mistakes.

Maybe this will give you hope, my husband has been here since Wed. and Wed night the girls wasn't even here. He lives with his brother about 30 miles away. He works in the same town I live in, so it is easier to stay here sometimes. The girls came home from camp Thrusday. He planned to leave Thruday night after we went to fireworks, but didn't because it was late. He went and got fireworks yesterday so, he decided to stay and we would cookout. Then after I had went and got all the stuff to cook, he decided he wanted to go out to eat and we would cook out at lunch today. Well, a friend called and wanted to take the girls to the water park and we let them go. So, this moved our cookout till tonight. He had planned to go home after dinner. He is still here. He goes to the same church and we will go together in the morning.

All this after I was discouraged last week. God is so good. We never know how He is going to work things out. I had been praying for a few weeks that God would allow us to spend the holiday together as a family. We didn't spend the last two 4ths together.

He still hasn't said anything about coming back but, I know God is working.

Keep the faith.

gentle

<small>[ July 06, 2003, 12:35 AM: Message edited by: gentle ]</small>

Hi Gentle,

I am happy that God has allowed you to spend some quality time with your husband, and to allow this time to be even longer than you expected.

I have realized that it is up to my wife (since she is the one who believes in this separation and me moving out), if she wants to spend time with me or not, and it is important that the times that God chooses that we spend time together be positive and enjoyable for both of us. I now realize that if she is the one that chooses to spend time with me, then she knows that this is her decision (through God of course) to be with me for how ever long it may last.

For example, I am planning to move out today, and yesterday I was simply getting as many things packed up and moved to the garage in order to load up to be taken to my new place. (I think some people from my church will be helping me move some of these things.) As I was doing this, she asked me if I wanted to do something togeter like go on a bike ride or go see a movie. My hope is that this request is coming from God truly still wanting to be together (at sometimes at least) because she truly desires my company, and that it is her decision, not through my pressuring her. I feel that God is helping me to let go, but not give up) to let God work within her to see if she truly believes that I am changing, and can be the friend (and maybe someday husband) that she had hoped for all along. It has not been easy, but I have not tried to talk her out of my moving out. I feel (and hope) that she understands that I am truly trying to give her what she needs right now (space and my moving out), to prove to her that I truly want her to be happy.

If you are like me, it seems that your situation is similar, in that you are not pressuring your husband in any way, while at the same time letting him feel that you want to be with him in any way that he will let you.

You are truly an inspiration, and God has blessed you with and incredible amount of patience and kindness <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Keep up the faith. I will keep praying that God is working to show your husband that these changes in you are real and permanent, and will continue even after he returns for good.

Gregg

For good information on Standing with God for your Marriage and for prayer requests, visit www.marriagewalk.com

God can heal - regardless of what has happened in that marriage or since. Stand with faith in God for His will to be done. I sincerely believe that is God's will as He so brilliantly expresses the relationship of God and man or Husband and Wife. He always waits for us, regardless of the past we have. I believe that He grants us grace and mercy when we do the same for our spouse.

God bless you.

Thanks, ts10

I'll have to check it out.

Gregg