Over the past couple of years, Starbucks has become a place where I often meet with women to talk about the hard things in life.  I remember one morning sitting with a friend, both of us cupping our coffee as if it was a microphone and she began to share her story with me. Her tears fell fast and her emotions poured out through her words even faster. She went on to explain that she had read all the marriage books and blogs she could find. She was attending church more than ever. But even after doing everything she knew to do she still felt far from God and even further in her relationship with her husband.

I remember her asking me, “What’s next? What am I missing? How were you and Justin able to make your relationship work after years of living in a dysfunctional marriage?”

I knew my response was going to sound “churchy” but in my heart and mind I knew there was nothing churchy about what I wanted to say.  I was eager to tell her the lifesaving wisdom someone shared with me when I was drowning in hopelessness, exhaustion and despair.

I replied, “I would not be married today if I hadn’t sought wise counsel.” I could tell by the look on her face that she was a bit disappointed at such a vague response. But I went on to explain the power that very sentence had in not only restoring my marriage but also continues to shape me into the person I am today.

Seeking wise counsel played out in three distinct ways for me.

1. I was seeking wise counsel by reading the bible in a translation I could understand.

2. I was seeking wise counsel from other women and couples that had gone through similar situations and found hope and restoration.

3. I was seeking wise counsel from a professional counselor.

I know your thinking that IS a “churchy” response and I couldn’t agree more. What may sound like the typical response to the average person becomes healing balm to a desperate and wounded soul. There are times in life where you will choose all the right things you know to do and when that list comes up short you will be tempted to quit.

When I begged Justin to go to counseling early on in our marriage and he refused I just gave up. I leaned on my own understanding and not the wise counsel of others. I choose to stay hidden along with Justin and as he buried his sin I started to create sin of my own. I convinced myself that counseling would only be affective if Justin and I BOTH went to together so when he refused to go so did I.

Proverbs 19:20-21 (NLT)

²⁰ Get all the advice and instruction you can,
so you will be wise the rest of your life.

²¹ You can make many plans,
but the Lord’s purpose will prevail.

I am often asked what should you do if your spouse refuses to go to counseling. My response to them and to you today is GO ANYWAY! All throughout scripture God leads His people to seek wise counsel. Even Jesus being fully God and fully man sought wise counsel from his heavenly Father in his time of desperation and heartache. Counseling wasn’t invented by Western culture nor is it set aside for only certain people to receive it. God calls us all to “Get all the advice and instruction you can” because he knew we would need it. We weren’t meant to figure out life on our own.

I do have a word of caution… Just because someone is a counselor it doesn’t mean they’re a good one. But please don’t let that be an excuse. If it takes you five tries, keep trying. I’m not saying you should find a counselor that will tell you what you want to hear but rather someone who understands and is able to lead you to a place of health. I know there ARE some amazing counselors out there because we had one! The bible doesn’t say seeking wise counsel would be easy or fun. In fact it will most-likely cause you pain. But it will be a redemptive pain rather than destructive pain.

Seeking wise counsel helps guide our pain into redemptive pain where God makes beauty from ashes.

Most of the time it is assumed that the biggest regret I have in our marriage is my choice to have an affair. The hurt was visible. The devastation was widespread. It must be my biggest regret. There is no doubt that I regret that choice every single day.

But the single worst mistake that I’ve made in our marriage is refusing to go to counseling. It is my biggest regret.

Years before the affair, Trisha asked me to go to counseling. She could tell that we were well beyond our experience and well beyond our ability to fix us. She asked, and I refused. I came up with every excuse there is: we don’t have time; we will get through it; I can make the changes I need to make; I’m a pastor, I don’t go to counseling, I give counsel. 

My biggest excuse: We can’t afford counseling. 

Every poor choice; every single mistake; every hidden sin-including the affair, was a consequence of my refusal to go to counseling. Would counseling have magically fixed our marriage? No. But my pride prevented our marriage from the healing that was possible.

Not going to counseling was like dying of cancer simply because I refused to go to the doctor.

RefineUs is a place where everyone can come as they are. This is a place where we acknowledge that everyone is broken and everyone needs healing. This is a place of grace and second chances. This is also a place where we speak the truth in love, knowing that it is only Truth that has the power to transform our hearts. I feel compeled to speak truth in love today.

I think every married couple should consider counseling. It is so helpful. But if your marriage is in trouble or you are contemplating divorce or separation, you can’t afford not to go to counseling.

The average divorce in the United States costs $15,000. Fifteen thousand. You could spend one hour a week in counseling for the next 3 years before you amassed that total. If you have kids, you can’t calculate the cost to them. Divorce, in every way, is much more expensive than counseling.

Should all marriages stay together? No. Can all marriages stay together? No. I know there are many marriages that end even though one spouse deeply desires to make it work.

But so many marriages end way too early and way too easily.

Your marriage is the most important human relationship you have. All other relationships flow out of the health or the dysfunction of your marriage. It is worth the fight!

When we don’t allow wisdom and truth into our life, we become a product of our own will and our own wisdom. For most of us, our own will and wisdom won’t bring about change. All of us need help.

My opinion on counseling: You can’t afford not to.

What is your opinion?

Oh, if learning from our mistakes was as easy as asking “miss-know-it all” Lucy for help!

One of the biggest mistakes I (Trisha) made in our marriage was in the area of physical intimacy. I went to sex education class in 7^th grade. Unfortunately, I made poor choices in high school that made sex education more than just a textbook. By the time I met and married Justin I brought enough baggage of sexual brokenness with me that I forgot what life was like without it.

We got married young. We had kids young. Most of our adult life Justin and I experienced numerous “first time” experiences together.  The poor guy had to experience what it was like to purchase feminine products for the first time after being married less than 24 hours!

Learning how to have a healthy sex life was no exception. We both came into our marriage broken but because we waited to have sex with each other until we got married, we honestly convinced ourselves that staying pure with each other would cover all sins. We were wrong.

I made the mistake of viewing physical intimacy as an afterthought rather than a foundational part of our relationship. Even worse, I eventually used it as a means to get back at Justin. It was my weapon.

When Justin came home late… again…

When Justin didn’t help around the house…

When Justin embarrassed me in front of our small group…

When Justin didn’t meet my expectations my response was to get back at him by refusing to be intimate with him.

When I think about it now, it’s a wonder that we didn’t self-destruct within the first couple years of marriage. It wasn’t until I almost lost my marriage that I finally realized how lost I was in understanding God’s purpose of sexually intimacy. I was on a mission to figure it out and what I found was a panoramic view of intimacy I had never seen before. The definition of intimacy is to be fully known. God calls us to be fully known by our spouse emotionally, spiritually and, yes, physically.

Read what 1 Corinthians 7:2-6 says:

“It’s good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual drives are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them and provide for a balanced and fulfilling sexual life in a world of sexual disorder. The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to “stand up for your rights.” Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out.”

I am often asked how was I able to be sexually intimate with Justin after the affair and his ten-year addiction to pornography when my view of sex was already so messed-up.  What I love about this passage is that it answers the question for me. Anyone can have sex-but intimacy comes with a price. You have to give more of yourself emotionally, lean into each other more spiritually and the end result is an intimate relationship that surpasses any person’s fantasy. Why? Because its not fantasy at all. Fantasy feels good in the beginning but in the end it leaves you empty. Pure, God centered, intimacy is long lasting.

This type of intimacy grows over time and leaves you constantly longing for each other and no one else. Not pornography… not another man or woman… Nothing. It truly becomes an act of serving each other in a way that no other relationship was meant to fill.

I love that! I can honestly say over the past seven years God has redeemed every single choice from our past and given us not only a healthy view of sex but rather a continued desire to serve each other “whether in bed or out”. Sex is no longer a tool for us to get what we want but rather a cherished gift from God in which to serve one another.

Did you have a clear understanding of sexual intimacy going into marriage?

We started this blog series Monday, talking about the mistakes that we allow to creep into our marriage. These are the mistakes that probably won’t cause divorce, but they will keep us from experiencing the marriage we long for and the marriage God has in mind for us. First, we talked about scorekeeping. Yesterday, we talked about sweating the small stuff. Today is part three.

The number one goal I had when Trisha and I got married almost 17 years ago, was to avoid conflict. Well, “have sex as often as possible” was actually number one; avoiding conflict by default was number two. In all seriousness, I didn’t see conflict as a good thing at all. When Trisha and I would get into arguments, I wouldn’t fight back, I would tell her that she was right and I was sorry.

Over the course of the first few years of our marriage, this desire to avoid conflict developed a pattern in our marriage relationship. I would think everything was okay in our marriage as long as we weren’t arguing, so I tried to keep the peace as much as possible. Trisha began to realize that the only way to truly get my attention was through an argument. So she would get angry and start a fight. I would respond by wanting it to end as quickly as possible and she would stay mad until I apologized. “I’m sorry” were the magic words in my mind. I said them a lot.

During one argument about nine years into our marriage we were pretty intense as I had learned to fight back at this point. I could tell that I was gaining no ground and I wanted to move on with my day. I simply said, “Why don’t we save a lot of time and energy here, and you just tell me what I need to apologize for, I’ll say, ‘I’m sorry’ and we can both move on.” It was a statement of deep intimacy and love…or not.

This was a mistake that was holding us back, because here is the deal: Saying you’re sorry and being sorry are two different things.

When you say you’re sorry, you do the minimum requirement to restore peace and make the conflict go away. When you say you’re sorry your behavior rarely changes for the long haul. When you simply say you’re sorry your intention is to end the argument, not resolve it.

Being sorry is completely different. Being sorry often doesn’t require an apology, because your actions demonstrate it. Being sorry brings heart change not behavior modification. Being sorry doesn’t just seek to end the argument, it tries to leverage the conflict to build intimacy.

Avoiding conflict will never improve your marriage. It is fools gold. Avoiding conflict allows you to believe everything is okay, when everything isn’t okay. It allows you to believe that saying, “I’m sorry” will fix everything, when sometimes, “I’m sorry” is the mistake that is holding you back.

Do you embrace or avoid conflict in relationships?

I had the opportunity to speak at Cross Point on Sunday. We continued our series, Empty Promises, based on Pete’s new book. It has been a powerful series for our church, and for me personally. I talked about how easy it is to be addicted to our appearance.

Each week, we broadcast the message at our Internet Campus, and then following the message there is a live Q&A. Chris Surratt, the Internet Campus Pastor and I were talking during the Q&A, and in our conversation I quoted the scripture James 5:16:

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

Chris said something in that moment that was brilliant. He said, “The confession James is talking about  isn’t for forgiveness. It is God that forgives. It is for healing; healing that comes through confessing our sins to one another.”  I had never thought about it that way.

Most of us have the “forgiveness” type of confession down. We know that in order to get forgiveness from God we have to confess our sins. Maybe you grew up confessing to a priest; maybe it is something that you do in your quiet time with God; maybe it is something that you do after you’ve made a huge mistake. Most of us know that forgiveness from God comes through confession.

We don’t talk about the “healing” type of confession in the Church very often. In fact, we have built a religious system that tries to find healing through hiding our sins, not confessing them. The sins we do confess are safe sins: bitterness, jealousy, materialism, selfishness.

I was the master at this. I appeared “authentic” for confessing socially acceptable sins while I lived as a prisoner to sins I wasn’t willing to confess. For years, I forfeited the healing that God longed to bring to my heart not because I didn’t confess my sins to Him; but because I refused to confess them to anyone else.

Temptation loses its power when we confess. 

Sin loses its ability to keep us fractured when we confess. 

Addictions lose the control they have in our lives when we confess. 

God knew that we would need two things to live in freedom in this life: the burden-bearing love of one another and the power of God through prayer. Confess your sins to one another and pray for each other…so that you may be healed. 

Will living this way be easy? No. Will it be worth it? More than you could ever imagine.

Healing may be a conversation away.

I (Justin) grew up with a pretty low self-esteem. Like most kids I wanted to feel valued; to be accepted by others; to feel good about myself. I got made fun of one summer when I was wearing shorts, and called “chicken legs”. I didn’t wear shorts for a few years after that. Self-esteem is a fickle thing. It isn’t something that either you have it or you don’t have…it comes and goes.

Sometimes when you have a high self-esteem it only takes one insult; one harsh word; one failure; one break-up; one tight fit in the dressing room; one lost job; one financial mistake to completely destroy your self-esteem. Self-esteem is easier to lose than it is to gain. People are driven by self esteem. There are books about how to raise your kids’ self-esteem. There are seminars about how to improve your self-esteem.

Lots of people making lots of money on how crappy we feel about ourselves.

Can I share something with you that has set me free and I think can set you free?

There is a huge difference between your self-esteem and your self-worth.

Self-esteem is conditional. Self-esteem factors in your brokenness. Self-esteem is your perception of you. Self-esteem gathers all of your hurt, all of your rejection, all of the lies you believe about yourself and allows you to rehearse those things over and over again in your mind. Self-esteem remembers the one insult you received last week and forgets the ten compliments you got. Self-esteem is an emotional roller coaster that leaves you never looking good enough; never being smart enough; never achieving enough; never accumulating enough.

Your self-worth is God given. Your self-worth is non-negotiable. Your self-worth is based not on who you are, but on who God is. Your self-worth can’t be taken away; it can’t be degraded; it can’t be robbed. Your self-worth was given to you before the creation of the world. Your attractiveness, your beauty, your weight, your complexion, your hair color, your smile, your body shape, your tax bracket, your employment status, your marital status, your past mistakes and failures have nothing to do with your self-worth. You are valuable for the single reason that you were created in the image and majesty of God.

You are valuable because God sees you as valuable.

How much would your life change if you stopped living out of your self-esteem and starting living out of your self-worth?

Christ didn’t die to give you higher self-esteem; He died to demonstrate your self-worth.

Do you struggle in seeing the difference between your self-esteem and your self-worth?

Hey guys! It is great to be back with you after we’ve taken a couple of months off. I know both Trisha and I definitely needed some time to recharge and refocus. God taught us both some things over the past few months that we are eager to share with you. Thanks for being a part of our community.

On Saturday, Trisha and I drove to Indianapolis and participated in the Indy Mini Marathon. Three years ago we registered for the this event and due to some injuries, we had to run the 5k instead of the 13.1 mile half marathon. So this race has been our goal since 2009.

Here are a few pics of our race. We had a blast, and tried to make it an experience and not just a race to run.

The race was going really well and Trish and I were running at a 12:00 minute pace. At each mile marker we would fist bump and congratulate one another…until we got to mile 10. At mile 10, the limited amount of training I did for the race caught up to me, and my legs started cramping up. Trish spent the next 5 minutes helping me stretch my legs. The next three miles would be at a much slower pace. We finished the race, but could have finished much faster had I been in better shape.

As I ran, I saw thousands of people in front of us. It was obvious that we weren’t going to win this race; but our goal wasn’t to win, it was to finish.

Our goal wasn’t just to finish it was to finish together. Finishing together was the win. 

We didn’t compare times with other people; we didn’t wish that we were somewhere else; we didn’t try to compete with or out perform other runners…we were just trying to finish.

How many times in our marriage do we focus so much on things that don’t matter as much as finishing together? We compare our marriage to other marriages; we compare our spouse with our friends’ spouse; we focus on our spouse’s faults and shortcomings that don’t matter nearly as much as finishing…together.

Maybe there is a lack of joy in your marriage right now. Maybe your sense of fulfillment is a distant memory.  Can I offer a few suggestions?

-Shift your focus from competing with your spouse to competing for your spouse.  Does your spouse feel that you are for them or against them? Do you feel your spouse is for you or against you? Seeing your marriage as a race to be run together rather than a competition between you and your spouse can make all the difference.

-Celebrate the mile markers along the way. A fist bump can go a long way. Too often we are so focused on what’s next or what’s wrong or what didn’t meet our expectations that we don’t take time to celebrate the journey along the way. Some mile markers you can never get back; celebrate them along the way.

-Wait for each other. There will be times that you are running at a different pace than your spouse. Rather than resenting them for not keeping up, stop and wait for them. The value you add in that process is priceless.

-Just finish. There will be times when it is painful; when it is messy; when it will feel like you can’t go on; when discouragement and dispare over take your heart. Dig deep and keep running.

As you run this race, know that we are running with you, and cheering for you along the way. 

Trisha and I became acquainted with Kasey Van Norman through our literary agent, Jenni Burke. We not only share an agent with Kasey, we share a publisher as well. Kasey’s first book, Named By God releases today from Tyndale House Publishers. As new authors,we reached out to Kasey and told her that we would be happy to review her book and help promote her book release. That day is TODAY!

Honestly, it was more of a kind gesture…I had no idea what to expect with her book.

A few weeks ago, Kasey sent us the digital version of the book. I downloaded it and before I even opened the first page, the sub title captured my heart. Named By God: Overcoming your past, transforming your present, embracing your future.

There isn’t a subtitle that fits more closely with what our RefineUs community is about. The book itself is just as good as its subtitle. If you’ve ever been haunted by your past; frustrated with your current circumstances or questioned God’s involvement in your future, this book is for you! This book is a powerful reminder that our past can be forgiven. Our hearts can be transformed. Change is possible. Healing is what God does best. God has named us and set us apart for a destiny that is far beyond what we could ask or imagine.

As a gift to our readers, Kasey sent us 3 signed copies to give away. Here is how you can enter to win:

1. Leave a comment below and let us know your name.

2. Copy and paste this to Twitter: Enter to win a FREE SIGNED copy of @KaseyVanNorman’s new book Named By God from @justindavis33 http://t.co/SIXxAHR9

3. If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can share it on Facebook by clicking HERE

On Friday, we’ll pick 3 winners and send you a free book!

Even if you don’t win, you can buy Kasy’s book on Amazon. You can also check out her WEBSITE.

In 2008, Trisha and I sat in Pete Wilson’s living room visiting with he and Brandi for the weekend. Our families had been friends for several years and he and Brandi were instrumental in the restoration of our marriage. We had been out of ministry for three years and had no aspirations about going back into ministry. One night as we sat and talked around the fireplace, Pete made a promise to us. He said, “God is going to call you back into ministry, and I promise I will do anything I can to help you follow that calling.” Trish and I thought he was crazy. He has followed through with that promise over and over again!

Four years later, I have the honor of not only doing life with one of my best friends, but serving as a pastor at the church he leads, Cross Point Church. He has done so much to encourage, uplift and help Trisha and me, we wanted to do all we could to help him launch his new book, Empty Promises today.

I love this book because it gets to the heart of something we all struggle with: Looking to other things to bring us the contentment and satisfaction that only God can provide. 

We are  giving away 5 AUTOGRAPHED COPIES of Empty Promises this week!

Here’s how to qualify for the giveaway!

1. Leave a comment with your name and where you live. We’ll randomly select the winners on Friday.

2. Tweet, Facebook or Email this: Win a signed copy of @pwilson’s new book, Empty Promises from @justindavis33: http://tinyurl.com/bpqfrku 

That’s it…its that easy! (Let us know in the comment that you’ve shared the post)

Even if you don’t win the book, you can order the book through Amazon by clicking HERE

You can check out the video trailer for the book by going HERE. 

If you’re a faithful reader of our blog I’m sure you’ve noticed that we have had the same post up for several days. At the end of this month Justin and I will turn in our manuscript for our very first book, Anything But Ordinary: When a Good Marriage Isn’t Good Enough. Our book is being published by Tyndale Publishing and will release in February 2013.

In addition to our book, we’ve been asked to speak in several different environments…from churches to marriage conferences to leadership conferences. It’s been a mind-blowing year of what God has chosen to do with RefineUs Ministries. Our blog and our book were both birthed out of a desire to help restore hope and renew relationships. Whether they are marriages that are in crisis or marriages that just need a bit of guidance, it’s been amazing to see life change take place.

We also love our friends that aren’t married that read our blog and understand that the heart of what we write about isn’t as much about marriage as it is about personal life transformation. Our single friends have been some of the most encouraging cheerleaders for us to continue doing what we do.

One thing that Justin and I have been consistent with on this blog is being honest and vulnerable. This post is no different.

Although it’s been an amazing three years leading this blog and ministry if we are honest with you Justin and I are tired. Really tired. What we do and the majority of the people we work with are at a place of entering into crisis or just recovering from crisis. Our emails come fast and furious and are heart wrenching.

In order to write our book Justin and I have had a blast thinking through our almost twenty years together. Although our book is NOT about an affair there is a chapter that is about the affair. There is so much to be thankful while at the same time we have felt afresh just how much has been lost. It’s been an amazing and yet and exhausting process.

The past three months we have witnessed heartbreaking separations and even some divorces of good friends. Statistically speaking, half of the marriages in our congregation at Cross Point will end in divorce. The need and heartbreak extend well beyond our church walls, and into the lives of the thousands of people that read our blog each week.

For us each couple represents a family, kids whose lives are forever changed through heartbreaking choices that their parents make.  It’s just hard and sad to watch over and over again. It seems the “BIG C” church is so used to divorce that we have perfected “Divorce Care” yet have little to offer for “lets not get to the point where we want to get divorced” care.

As Justin and I have spent time in prayer we’ve realized that we need some time to pour into our own marriage beyond writing a book together, doing ministry together, and parenting together. When you lead from a place of exhaustion you lead with a “chip” on your shoulder rather than God leading. When you lead tired you think the worst of people and have a hard time bouncing back from criticism. Justin and I have felt this rear its ugly head off and on over the past few weeks.

The word that God kept bringing to both Justin and I is Sabbath. So we are doing what every marketing expert, blog guru and strategist would say not to do…We are taking a Sabbath from our blog and email.

The reality is that when Justin confessed to the affair on a Sunday afternoon we NEVER went back yet church still happened next week! Although I am thankful for this blog I know that we aren’t the only ones doing effective marriage ministry. Jesus is STILL at work regardless if I am or not. What I do know is that I need to be obedient to God even when it doesn’t make sense.

So with that, not only are we announcing the completion of our book,  but also that Justin and I will be going on a nine-week sabbatical from our blog. We will continue to speak at our various speaking engagements and finding rest in the in-between.  We will be back MONDAY MAY 7^th and we’re really excited for what God will speak to us that we will be able to then share with you!

Thank you for your love and support!

Justin and Trish