Jesus and Your Unwanted Journey: Wives Finding Comfort After Sexual Betrayal (Participant's Guide)

Jesus and Your Unwanted Journey: Wives Finding Comfort After Sexual Betrayal is for women who need help applying the gospel to their marriage in response their husband’s sexual sin.

Jesus and Your Unwanted Journey addresses such issues as suffering, shame, troubling emotions, forgiveness, and the process of rebuilding trust. The content aims to come alongside a hurting wife and minister to her heart, regardless of where her husband is at in the process of repentance. Each of the 10 lessons in the Participant’s Guide corresponds to the lesson notes in the Leader’s Guide, which assists facilitators with the discussion and offers helpful suggestions for navigating complex and deeply personal issues.

This resource is meant to help wives, and those who want to support them, in three ways. Firstly, it addresses difficult topics biblically and compassionately, giving women a vocabulary to navigate their struggles. Secondly, the study promotes discussion and interaction, so discipleship relationships can flourish. Finally, this resource encourages women to look to Jesus and God’s Word as their ultimate source of comfort, hope, and transformation, while simultaneously encouraging them to take practical steps of faith.

Here’s an excerpt from the first session, “Unexpected Suffering: Face Painful Revelations.”

Painful information has been revealed and, most likely, your emotions and thoughts feel like a piece of driftwood on a stormy ocean. You’ve been tossed into a world you didn’t know existed: your husband’s sexual unfaithfulness... Your unwanted, unexpected suffering has upended what you thought about your life, husband, and marriage—and what kind of future you have with this man.

Jesus is with you in this unwanted place and his first words to you are not “get over it,” “forgive and forget,” or “this is your fault.” No! His invitation is to draw near, listen for his love, receive his comfort, and lean on his strength. The journey in front of you will not be short or easy but he will be with you each step of the way.

The study can be used in many contexts, including one-to-one mentoring relationships and small groups. Friends, mentors, counselors, and godly, faithful women in the church can all journey with these women as facilitators. Male church leaders and counselors will also benefit from the content as it provides a map for walking with hurting wives.

Accompanying the written resource are two brief videos by the author to introduce the Participant’s Guide and the Leader’s Guide and to orient readers to the content.