I remember reading the article about a year ago. In front of the whole world, or at least the evangelical world, Lysa TerKeurst announced her marriage was ending. She spoke of her husband’s infidelity and substance abuse and finally concluded, “After much prayer and consultation with wise, biblically-minded people, I have decided that Art has abandoned our marriage. Yet, the Lord has been so faithful to help me at every step of this very painful journey and has now assured me I’ve done all I can do.”
I could feel her heartbreak through the computer screen and hated that she had to announce this news, this dark and intimate valley she found herself in, to an audience that often finds truth much easier to distribute than grace.
It also hit home. I felt like I was flashing back to my own broken marriage six years before.
I remember, while reading her story, thinking, “Geez. Satan doesn’t play favorites.”
There’s no marriage that’s immune, no marriage that’s safe. An enemy is watching for weak spots, planting lies, whispering deceit in every home. He doesn’t care if you are a Bible scholar, a devotional leader, a Christian author and speaker to millions of women. He’s after even your marriage. Especially your marriage.
I also knew something to be true, something that feels impossible to hope for in those isolating, final moments of “It’s over.”
God can redeem even the most broken of marriages.
I didn’t know if He would, but I knew He could. I knew that people do, in fact, change, despite popular belief. It takes work, hard and ugly work from two flawed people, but if the Holy Spirit can raise dead men to life, He can change hearts and heal addictions. I knew He could.
Because He had redeemed mine.
He had done, and continues to do, the impossible work of total restoration in my own marriage.
So I hoped and prayed in that moment that my story would someday be hers as well. I knew my life, my writing, my understanding of God’s promises to me had been deepened and molded by my marriage story. I hoped hers would be as well. What a testament to God’s power for the world to see.
And a few weeks ago, in a simple Facebook post, she made a second announcement. Lysa wrote:
A gift. A hard prayed for and fought for, glorious, messy, miraculous, honest, treasured gift of together. Happy Father’s Day Art! The way you have pursued the Lord, healing, and us . . . is evidence of God’s supernatural grace and goodness.
I’m praying for everyone praying for a miracle today. God has a plan but it will probably unfold in a way you never thought it would.
Yessssss.
She is experiencing her third day, the resurrection of a dead marriage. We are praising God alongside her and couldn’t be more thrilled for her family.
“My eyes are ever on the Lord,
for only he will release my feet from the snare.”
Psalm 25:15