This message right here is one that I would have rejected, not because I didn’t believe it, but because I didn’t want it to be true. Hearing God would be my Husband, take care of all my needs, comfort me, and make me whole again actually scared me to death because I thought it meant God would replace my husband in such a way that meant I would never get my spouse back.

In the beginning, my head knew that God could and should be my everything and I should be ok with leaning on Him as my comforter, provider, and security, but my heart denied Him because it was not ready to give that place up. The place where my husband occupied. I was not mature enough to realize that we are created with a special place designed for God, and that place was not even awakened in me yet. That place had nothing to do with my husband.

But, as my time went on, my husband kept crushing my hopes and I was forced to find a new source of hope. I learned to look to Jesus. I looked to see what He was doing about my husband. Since I could not see it in the natural, I had to find it in His Word. His Word showed me that Jesus was a Savior Who loved the lost, the broken, the sinner like me and my husband. His character was all about leaving those who were righteous and going after that ONE, like my husband who left the fold.

12 If to any man there should be a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, will he not leave the ninety nine on the mountains and, having gone, seek the one going astray? 13And if he should find it, truly I say to you that he rejoices over it more than over the ninety nine not having gone astray. 14Thus it is not the will of your Father who is in the heavens that one of these little ones should perish. Matthew 18

As I meditated on that fact, hope flooded me. Just because I was not seeing the fruit of Jesus’s efforts, didn’t mean it was not happening! Jesus became my hope and replaced me looking at my husband’s behavior as hope.

And then more and more things became replaced as my lost husband failed me. Truth, faith, trust, belief. Every day I had to make choices about who and what I was going to listen to and believe. What my husband was telling me, telling others, what others were telling me, or what God’s character was whispering to me.

And I say whispering because that is what it sounded like. Everyone and everything was yelling hopeless, impossible, give up………..but God’s still small voice inside was an Anchor to my soul if I only listened.

Think about a raging ocean and a ship being tossed about. Now think about the size of that Anchor compared to it all. How you have to not look at the storm’s incredible wind, waves, rain, loud thunderous claps of lightning. When we look at all of that, fear will overtake us. But we are supposed to look at the Anchor that we can’t see. That Anchor that is deep within the depths, designed to HOLD US FIRM against the rages of the storm. Now, I know I am taking this to an extreme because, in reality, an anchor can’t secure you in a storm of that size. BUT in God’s realm that Anchor CAN and WILL sustain you in ANY STORM YOU FACE!.

it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled [to Him] for refuge would have strong encouragement and indwelling strength to hold tightly to the hope set before us. 19 This hope [this confident assurance] we have as an anchor of the soul [it cannot slip and it cannot break down under whatever pressure bears upon it] Hebrews 6: 18-19

The more I chased after my husband and was crushed by rejection, the more I was forced to admit that my husband was not going to give me what he used to give me. I was forced to find an ulterior person in my life. Move on or give that place of need to God?

Hebrews 6:18 says that we who have FLED will find shelter. The key direction here is fled. I didn’t flee from chasing my husband for a long time. I kept going back for more because I was determined I could do it. I kept after my pursuit of changing his mind, his heart, his sins. It was not until my efforts nearly destroyed me that I started to become desperate for something else. For peace, comfort, security, and rest from being crushed by failing.

When my pain, fears, worry, disappointments, and discouragement became too much for me, and I had finally exhausted all my efforts to change my husband, I fled. I came to the refuge of God and made my peace with it. “I am ready God. Even if this is it. I have to live the rest of my life with just You and not my husband. I surrender that You not only are You more than enough. I am OKAY WITH THAT.”

I have to note that many come to this place and give up. They never make peace with God being enough and chose to move on and find someone else. Missing the fact they can have both!

That is all God wanted to hear from me. That I was willing. That I had given Him my approval. I learned that God didn’t want me to be alone. That my heart was able to have both because that is how God designed us.

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.'” Luke 10:27

You will come to face your fears and WANT Him to be enough as you learn that wanting and surrendering to that doesn’t mean you are telling God you don’t want your spouse. Let me say this again because while it sounds so OBVIOUS, it’s a REAL struggle for so many and they don’t even realize it.

When you confess that you WANT God to be enough, you are not confessing to God that He doesn’t need to restore your marriage!

You are created to have Him in a special place in your heart, mind, soul that IS meant just for HIM. And your spouse has a special place created just for them. When we put our spouses in that place, it can become quite scary to allow God to have His rightful place, because we are unclear of what that looks like for our spouse.

We have become accustomed to living by feelings, instant gratification, having to control to get what we want. But now we are asked to change all that we know and put our trust in that Anchor we can’t see and get our eyes off the storm that we not only see, but is enormous and intimidating.

I have been there. Many of us have been there and over time, as you keep going, keep making the conscious choices to get your eyes OFF of the storm, and through faith, trust in that Anchor, you will grow and mature to the point where you will WANT to confess to God to be enough.

It takes time. The very thing you are not willing to give Him. But that is another topic altogether! I pray this gives you some peace and understanding. God didn’t create you to be alone. But He also didn’t create you to replace Him.

We are one flesh with our spouses, but we are ONE IN SPIRIT with Him. That place, our spirits are created for HIM ALONE!

1 Corinthians 6:17 But the one who is united and joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him.

Standing with you,
Sheila Hollinger