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Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

clean heart

Unlocking the Padlock of Fear {and a Book Giveaway!}

October 6, 2014 By Michelle

Do you want to know what courage looks like? Meet Jen Ferguson and her husband, Craig. They wrote a book together about the ravaging effect of pornography addiction on their marriage and their subsequent road to recovery.

Think about that for a moment. Think about your co-workers or your kids’ elementary school teachers or your fellow mom’s club members finding out that you wrote about book about pornography addiction. Think that might be difficult, maybe a little awkward, maybe a little hyperventilation inducing?

You bet it would be. Yet that’s exactly what my friend Jen and her husband Craig did. They were brave. They took the risk, they leaped, in order to share their story and offer hope to others struggling on a similar journey. Pure Eyes, Clean Heart is that book, and not only is it a beautiful testament to the power of God’s faithfulness and love, it’s also a real, authentic look at a topic few of us are brave enough to talk about. It’s an absolute honor to welcome Jen Ferguson to the blog today to talk about her journey and the book. And be sure to scroll all the way to the bottom of the post, too – I’m giving away a copy of Pure Eyes, Clean Heart. 

 

PureEyesQuoteImageBy Jen Ferguson

It took my husband about five minutes to decide to write this book with me.

Could this be humiliating?  Yes.

Could this make people see us differently? Yes.

Would this be hard for us to try to explain to our kids? Yes.

But then…

Could bringing this shameful struggle to light bring freedom, not only to others, but to us as well?  Yes.

Once we got fully engrossed in the writing but before we knew we got the book contract, we realized that even if this book never saw the light of day, we were grateful.  Writing about things such as anger, forgiveness, respect, control, love, intimacy, and surrender to God means working through issues that impact our own marriage.

Whenever we have problems in our marriage that we choose to push aside and deal with “later,” it gives the enemy an in.  Satan thrives in the darkness. He uses it to twist our thoughts and harden our hearts against our spouse.  But when we agree to work them out, no matter how messy the process is, we bring those issues out in the open, exposing them to light. No longer can they sit and fester, but in the opening up, we allow Jesus to touch them.

And when Jesus touches, He brings healing.  We see this throughout the Bible.

The demon-possessed? Healed.

The bleeding woman? Healed.

The leper? Healed.

Jesus wants to bring His healing touch to our marriages. Whether we struggle with porn, bitterness, alcoholism, anger, betrayal, or insecurities, Jesus wants to help us fulfill our marriage vows.

But we have to be willing to let Him in. We have to let Him work. And the hard truth? While as wives, we sometimes label our husbands as “the one with the problem,” we have our own issues to work out, too.

As much as this book is about journey through my husband’s porn addiction, it’s about my own addiction to control.  Just as much as he confesses, I confess, too.  Because my initial response to his porn? Control. And if I’m controlling, guess whom I’m not allowing in?

Jesus.  The One who heals.

*******

PureEyesCleanHeart{An excerpt from the Pure Eyes, Clean Heart}

When I look back at myself that day, a crumpled heap on the floor, I can see clearly that every single one of the rules we had implemented [to keep Craig from porn] was rooted in fear. My sneaking and scheming to try to catch him in the act was motivated by fear. My threatening and chastising was instigated by fear. I had been like a military dictator who wanted precise order and regulation because, like most dictators, I was afraid that something or someone more powerful than me would take over. I feared that porn would completely and totally take over and rule our lives.

That soul-crushing moment on Mother’s Day led me to realize that I could no longer carry the weight of Craig’s porn addiction on my shoulders. I left his addiction on the bathroom floor, but it wasn’t easy to keep from grasping it again and hoisting it back on my shoulders. I had to let God train me how to leave it there, at the foot of the cross, in His hands, or however else you could imagine it. He had to teach me that giving up control was not the same as giving in to porn.

*******

Craig and I realized many things and made many changes in our marriage through God’s healing grace and mercy.  We’ve gained great insight into each other and ourselves. This book shares our story. It offers hope.  It offers compassion.  But it’s not a cure.

Because only Jesus heals in ways everlasting and eternal.

JenandCraigJen Ferguson is passionate about Jesus, her husband, and her two girls. She is the facilitator of The Soli Deo Gloria Sisterhood and loves to encourage women to bring their true selves out into the light. She is the co-author of Pure Eyes, Clean Heart: A Couple’s Journey to Freedom from Pornography. You can find out more about the book by visiting their new site, www.PureEyesCleanHeart.com.

To be entered into the random drawing for a free copy of Pure Eyes, Clean Heart, please complete the raffle information below (email subscribers, click here and scroll to bottom of the post to enter the drawing):

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Filed Under: books, control, guest posts Tagged With: clean heart, Jen Ferguson, pornography addiction, Pure Eyes

Hear It on Sunday, Use It on Monday: Create in Me a Clean Heart. Again.

October 20, 2013 By Michelle

[31 Days resumes tomorrow]

Sometimes reading the Bible is a little like reading a newspaper article. We get the five W’s – the who, what, when, where and sometimes the why – but we often hear little more than the basic facts of the story.

Take the reading from yesterday – the story of David and Bathsheba. We learn that David stays in Jerusalem while his men go off to fight the Ammonites. He is enticed by the sight of a beautiful woman bathing on a rooftop, sleeps with that woman and gets her pregnant, and then tries to trick Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, into sleeping with his own wife so the pregnancy can be attributed to him. When Uriah refuses, we learn how David schemes to have Uriah killed in battle and then marries Bathsheba himself. Later, after the prophet Nathan rebukes David, we observe how David confesses his guilt to God, comforts Bathsheba after their child dies, and then gets her pregnant again with the child who will be born Solomon.

These are the facts, but I want to know more. I want to know what’s going through David’s head, not only during this debacle, but even more importantly, after it’s all over. The way this story reads, David simply picks up the pieces of his broken life and moves on, forgiven by God and never tempted by pride again. He gets the miracle cure. He learns his lesson just like that, in one try, and then takes his clean heart and rides off into the sunset.

I don’t buy it.

I’ve wrestled with the same temptation on and off for the past five years or so. Sometimes this temptation merely simmers in the background, sometimes I even wonder if I’ve nipped it in the bud for good. But when I least expect it, the temptation rears its ugly head again, sending me straight back to square one.

Like David, I am tempted by pride. I yearn to be important and well-known, a big-wig. I want to be in the “in-crowd,” included and respected. Not on the fringe, not over here in my own quiet little corner. In. The. Center.

Last week, this temptation roared out of hibernation, and once again, I succumbed. Badly.

Long story short, there’s a new Christian writers’ conference that’s got everyone abuzz, and I wanted to go. Initially I said no, which was the right decision. My family is my first priority, and because of that, I try to choose my travel obligations wisely. But then I heard my friends were going, and other writers I admire, and other people I respect, and suddenly, I felt left out. I was bitter and angry and a little bit panicky, a stream of anxious regret running through my head – I’m the only one not going, I’m the only one not there, I’m never going to make it as a writer if people don’t know me, and no one even notices that I’m not going because no one even notices I exist…

If that angst over feeling left out wasn’t enough, at the same time I realized I’d fallen prey to the same old sins, the same old temptation I’d been wrestling with on and off for five years. I’d fallen victim to pride, self-importance, envy and greed. Again.

Good grief.

And then, just when I thought I couldn’t feel any worse, I read about David. “Well that’s just great,” I thought to myself. “He gets a clean heart and never has to worry about temptation again. How nice for him.”

But that’s when I began to wonder if perhaps the Bible doesn’t give us the whole story down to every last detail. If David is anything like the rest of us – and he is, because he’s human – I suspect he wrestled with temptation more than once after his bad Bathsheba decision. I suspect pride and self-importance were an ongoing struggle for him. Temptation, in my experience, doesn’t simply disappear just because we repent and are forgiven. Temptation is an ongoing threat, sometimes a lifelong struggle, something some of us wrestle with again and again.

I suspect the day David penned the words, “Create in me a clean heart, O God,” wasn’t the last time he spoke that prayer in his heart. Although the bible doesn’t tell us so for sure, I bet David, like the rest of us, returned to those same lines again and again.

Questions for Reflection:
Do you ever find yourself tempted by the same sins over and over again? How do you try to break the relentless cycle, and how do you forgive yourself if you fail?

::

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Filed Under: Old Testament, temptation, Use It on Monday Tagged With: clean heart, Hear It on Sunday Use It on Monday, Old Testament, temptation

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For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a Triple Type A, “make it happen” (my dad’s favorite mantra) striver and achiever (I’m a 3 on the Enneagram, which tells you everything you need to know), but these days my striving looks more like sitting in silence on a park bench, my dog at my feet, as I slowly learn to let go of the false selves that have formed my identity for decades and lean toward uncovering who God created me to be.

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