Healing from the Grip of Pornography w/ Dannah Gresh

Welcome to Coffee and Bible Time, the faith-filled podcast where we tackle tough topics with Biblical wisdom. Today we are discussing how God can redeem the broken places in your marriage. Join us for real conversations about struggles like pornography, addictions, betrayal, and growing apart—and discover how Jesus brings hope and healing to even the most challenging situations.

In this episode, we welcome best-selling author Dannah Gresh. With raw authenticity, Dannah shares her personal journey of overcoming betrayal, the impact of pornography in marriage, and finding redemption through Christ. Learn practical steps for setting boundaries, understanding the science of addiction, and taking the path to restoration.

If you're searching for biblical insights and encouragement to strengthen or heal your marriage, this podcast offers the support and resources you need.
🌟 Topics Covered:

• Breaking free from the grip of pornography and sin.
• Navigating trauma in marriage and reclaiming emotional health.
• Practical ways to foster healing, connection, and Christ-centered love.

Book: Happily Even After
Website: dannahgresh.com
Go-to Bible: ESV Version
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If you are a Christian woman seeking to know God deeper, study Scriptures, pray with and for others, strengthen your faith, and support other in doing the same, this is the place for you! 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:04

At the Coffee and Bible Time podcast. Our goal is to help you delight in God's Word and thrive in Christian living. Each week we talk to subject matter experts who broaden your biblical understanding, encourage you in hard times and provide life-building tips to enhance your Christian walk. We are so glad you have joined us.

Speaker 2: 0:27

Hi everyone, Thank you for joining us this week on our podcast where we are going to be meeting with Dana Gresh. This is such a special podcast it is one of our more popular podcasts that we've had here on our podcast and we really wanted to bring it back because we believe that there is so much wisdom and truth and hope that you can find in this podcast, particularly if you are going through a struggling relationship or marriage. Find hope in what Dana Gresh is about to share with you all, centering around the gospel of forgiveness. With that being said, I hope that you truly enjoy this podcast. This is one of our special podcasts from our archives and we want to be able to share this truth with you again today. With that being said, I hope you enjoy.

Speaker 1: 1:20

Hello everyone, I am Mentor Mama, and today we are going to be talking about the tough topics that come with marriage and how to let God redeem those broken places. We all love the idea of having a fairytale wedding and having that day spill over into the rest of our lives together as man and wife. But the truth of the matter is that marriage is hard and some marriages are facing really tough situations like pornography, addictions affairs or just growing apart and being unhappy, or just growing apart and being unhappy. Well, the good news is that even in those tough situations, jesus can redeem the broken areas of your marriage and restore even the most hopeless relationships. I truly hope you believe that In our guest today, diana Gresh, author of the book Happily Even After Let God Redeem your Marriage, has endured very difficult moments in her own marriage and she is here today to offer hope to those hurting because of broken trust and betrayal.

Speaker 1: 2:43

She is here to remind us that, even though everything is not okay now, there is always hope when we call on the name of Jesus. Dana Gresh is a best-selling author and sought-after speaker. Her best-selling titles include Anne the Bride Wore White Lies. Young Women Believe, co-authored with Nancy Lee DeMoss. And Lies Girls Believe. Dana is the co-host of Revive Our Hearts, a daily podcast for women, and the founder of True Girl, which provides mom and daughter connection tools, including the True Girl podcast. Dana has sold over 2 million books and reaches women and girls in more than 100 countries, and she and her husband Bob live in State College, pennsylvania, on a small farm that could be confused as a petting zoo. The family's pastime is chasing whoever or whatever may be loose. Please welcome Dana.

Speaker 3: 3:49

Hi there, so glad to be with you today.

Speaker 1: 3:52

Thank you so much for joining us. And and, Dan, I just want you to know I appreciate your raw authenticity as evidenced in your book. That just authenticity as evidenced in your book, that just that doesn't brush over painful marriage issues and I think once we have the opportunity to start talking about them, it truly helps and you just help people navigate their way in a Christ-centered way that facilitates healing. So I truly appreciate that about you. So why don't you just start out by telling us about your marriage situation that precipitated your book, Happily, Even After Well, first I have to say I am married to the most delightful man he is.

Speaker 3: 4:42

He calls himself, the guy who carries my books, is so much more than that, but he's a servant. He loves to serve me and he loves to serve um my ministry, I. I cannot stand it when I don't travel with him because I never carry a suitcase or, um, you know, navigate or anything like that. He just serves and serves and serves. But he is human and for a period of time he fell into the trap of pornography and lust, which was a battle that he faced almost all of his life, starting when he was 13 years old. But in the beginning of our marriage he was really able to get the help that he needed and begin to walk in integrity. But it resurfaced and it became a really problem and it escalated, as it often does.

Speaker 3: 5:34

70% of men in the church are struggling with pornography. That's not like oops, I used pornography one time and I've never seen it since. That's like there's a cycle in their lives, maybe monthly, maybe weekly, maybe quarterly, maybe once a year, but they're never really kind of out of the grip of the temptation and it keeps coming back. And 30% of women are struggling in the church. This is not the minority of families in the church that are being impacted by this, but the majority, and so when that happened for us, I knew something was off. My heart was sensing it, my body was sensing it, and Bob sat me down in two red leather chairs in our living room and said I don't know how to make my way back to God's heart without breaking yours. And then he did. He broke my heart and shared with me how his pornography and lust problem had escalated, and it was the beginning of fighting together for our marriage, and I'm so glad that we did.

Speaker 1: 6:40

Yes, one of the things that you just mentioned and you talk about in your book is that before you were married, that your husband also had that temptation and you thought, like you know, the magic of getting married in your own sexual relationship would, just, you know, make that go away. How have you seen that played out in Christian marriages?

Speaker 3: 7:09

Oh, I think it's a lie that we often believe. Many couples believe my husband was a virgin on our wedding night, which is kind of a beautiful gift. I was not. I've written about my own sexual sin and God's beautiful healing in my heart in some of my other books, and you know we both naively believed. Well, you haven't had real sex. When you have real sex, why would you want the counterfeit?

Speaker 3: 7:34

What we're finding, though, is that pornography really is a temptation and an addiction, unlike almost anything else on the surface of the planet. If you look at the way that a brain is impacted physiologically, functionally rather on a brain scan, a brain where that individual is compulsively using pornography in some sort of a cyclical way looks very similar to the brain of a heroin addict. It is devastating. Heroin is one of the most difficult things to overcome, and so when you have a brain that's been trained to have, it's not even a sexual thing, so much as it is a satiation Like the brain is calmed down. The brain is made peaceful by using something, whether it's heroin or drugs or of some other type, or alcohol, or workaholism, or sugar or porn. The brain is satiated and calmed down by that substance or the chemicals created in the body through using something like pornography. That calming effect has a grip on somebody that is really difficult to describe until you get into the science of it. And here's what's unique about pornography.

Speaker 3: 8:58

So heroin let's go to heroin again, since I've already kind of brought that one up. Heroin cake, pizza, a good buzz from beer those dopamine hits will last about an hour in the brain. That's the chemical that's making you feel satisfied, right? That'll last about an hour in the brain. With pornography it's five or six hours.

Speaker 3: 9:23

So the length of time that it's creating peace and calming you down from whatever's stressing you out in your life is so significant and we aren't even aware of that until recent years. People that have been using pornography just know that when they're not using it they feel crazier. So for us to believe that was an incredible deception of the enemy. Uh, because real sex and the satisfaction and the connection and the companionship and the peace that comes from that is very different from the counterfeit um medicating effect of pornography. But so many couples listening right now are going to be like that puts a lot of puzzle pieces together for me. I'm starting to understand why I've wanted so bad to stop using pornography, or I've wanted so badly for my husband or my wife to stop using.

Speaker 1: 10:20

This starts to help me understand why they're having such a hard time this starts to help me understand why they're having such a hard time and if they so, can you maybe share with us like? I feel like this is something where you know they, they want to get help, but they, they struggle with even admitting it. Even how do you get to the place where the the person's doing it? Or how can you, if you know someone, encourage them, praying for them to want to get to a point where you know they can take efforts to sort?

Speaker 3: 11:03

of yeah, it has to hurt. The fact is that the majority of men don't stop using pornography until it gets to a place in their marriage where the stakes are so high that the loss and the hurt that the porn is creating is greater than that satiation and that peace and that medication that it's bringing. So the story that I've heard over and over and over again is that women have had to get to a place where they utilized tough love and said these are the consequences, these are the boundaries. If you cross this boundary again, I'm going to be going to live with my mom and dad until you can figure this out. Or you're moving to the guest bedroom indefinitely, or you're moving out offense that you are bringing before God and before me, to our relationships, your relationship with God and your relationship with me. I can't not. I can't participate in this. Now. In my case, I'm a little bit of a unicorn. My husband came to me and the pain of shame and the pain of feeling distant from me and the pain of me saying you're such a great husband because you always carry my bags that felt like salt in a wound, because he knew the secret that he was carrying.

Speaker 3: 12:28

So there are men like that who come, but more often than not it's usually tough love and a boundary needs to be established. And that gets really complicated for some Christian women because they're like wait, aren't we supposed to love, honor and respect? Yes, complicated for some Christian women because they're like wait, aren't we supposed to love, honor and respect? Yes. And God places boundaries around our lives the 10 commandments, being kind of the greatest example and says there are consequences because this relationship that I want to have with you is so holy. These are the boundaries and there are consequences if you live outside of those boundaries.

Speaker 3: 13:03

And of course, one of the 10 commandments is has to do with faithfulness in marriage. I'll shout not commit adultery. Actually two, I'll shout not fornicate. Those are the King James versions, by the way. And you know God says this is so high and so holy, this relationship, that I'm putting boundaries on it. When that relationship is threatened and pornography and infidelity puts you on a fast track for that relationship not surviving, when that relationship is threatened, it is time to implement special boundaries so that the holiness and the sanctity of that relationship can be restored. And most women get to a place where they have to do that with their husbands.

Speaker 1: 13:46

Yes, most definitely. One of the things that you talked about in the book was the effects that this has on women, and you've talked about the potentially, the trauma, and I feel like that's one area that I'm glad you really touched on it, because I've read information on this topic before and it seems to be less covered. If there's someone out there listening to this who has just you know, feel like their world has fallen apart, help them understand, like, what's going on in their brains and their emotions.

Speaker 3: 16:41

The person, that's the spouse of someone who's using pornography.

Speaker 3: 16:46

Yeah, Well, you can feel crazy. A lot of women are reporting to me that they feel crazy and, of course, sometimes it's the husband who's the spouse of someone who's using pornography. I felt like something was off about 18 months before my husband confessed to me. I didn't realize that he'd had a relapse and that that relapse was escalating until 18 months later, but something felt off in the air.

Speaker 3: 17:18

What happens is, for example, maybe your spouse isn't making eye contact with you because they're feeling shame. Maybe your spouse isn't making eye contact with you because they're feeling shame, and so your body is really aware of oh, there's not eye contact here, alert, alert. And so it sends out an inflammatory response into your body that says can you pay attention to this? Something's not quite right. Or maybe your husband or your wife is in the house but they're not emotionally present. That rich conversation that once was there is just missing or lacking. Or you know, if there's an affair happening, they might not be physically present, they might be saying they're working late, or whatever.

Speaker 3: 17:57

The body starts to measure the environment and say something's off and it's sending you alarm systems. So you might feel crazy, you might feel sick, you might feel joint pain, you might have headaches, those kinds of things. Sometimes your immune system response goes down and you start to get sick a lot. But that can make you feel really nuts until you find out oh, there's pornography in the picture. Or for some of my friends it's been an affair that's been in the picture. Or your husband comes to you and says I need to confess something to you. And then the puzzle pieces fit together and you start to feel not so crazy and you start to get what you need to know. I was right, I wasn't wrong to think something was off and you begin to collect the tools you need for your marriage and your own heart to heal.

Speaker 1: 18:51

Okay, I guess our intuitions really, and just sensing that I found that so fascinating that there could be so many changes within your body. That could also be red flags that we should look out for. That could also be red flags that we should look out for. Well, tell us about your own situation going through this.

Speaker 3: 19:20

What was the most painful thing for you as you navigated through the recovery process? The most painful thing for me? I guess I don't know if this was the most painful thing, but the hardest lesson for me to learn was that I had to take care of my own healing. There's a part of you that thinks, well, you did the damage, so you go get well and then, when you're well, come back and heal.

Speaker 3: 19:45

My heart, back and heal my heart and um, my therapist, my I. I strongly believe that when it comes to addictive use of pornography, you need clinical care, because for someone to really understand the clinical complexity of pornography's grip on a brain as well as the impact on my body because I was experiencing some symptoms as a result of that you need somebody that understands those factors and that free. The free counselor at church who understands you know that you're fighting about who takes the trash out is just not going to have enough experience to really walk you through this. So we had a great counselor, his name was Pete and he told me a story because I wasn't stepping up to take care of my own heart. He said let's imagine, dana, that Bob is a waiter and he's on the other side of a kitchen door in a restaurant and you happen to be walking past that kitchen door on your way to the bathroom waiting for your food to come. You walk past that door and Bob comes through it and right into your nose and it's with such force because he's in a hurry that it your nose is bloody, your nose might even be broken, you don't know, but you're just, and Bob is so sorry, he's so sorry, he's profusely sorry, he's terribly devastated, that he's hurt you, that you're bleeding, and he says I'm sorry. And you say I forgive you.

Speaker 3: 21:12

He said now, is your nose still bleeding? Yes, is your nose still possibly broken? Yes, so who's responsible to take your nose to the ER to get cauterized? I am, I'm responsible. I'm the only one, because it's my nose, and somehow that story really helped me. See, bob is not the one that needs to fix me, I am.

Speaker 3: 21:30

And here's what you're really getting to, though. When you're saying, go fix yourself and then come back and fix me, you're kind of making your spouse your savior. The only one capable of redeeming anything broken in your life is Jesus. He's the only one with the power to take your heart and take all the places that have been wounded and, rather than have it be bitter, make it better. He can make it better. My heart is better now, today, after all of this hard stuff that my husband and I've walked through. Why? Because there are women who go through the same thing and they are bitter. Why? What's the difference? The difference is putting your heart in the hands of Jesus rather than putting your heart in the hands of the spouse that hurt you.

Speaker 1: 22:21

That's so important. Know, in the book you talk about and we're going to it a little bit the route of redemption is being the best plan. But before we talk about that I just want to talk about the addiction part of this pornography that you were speaking to earlier. Can you help our listeners understand because I know you touched on that in the book a little bit how that affects things?

Speaker 3: 22:54

Well, addiction is a hard word for me. I've never been a super big fan of it because you know the traditional addiction model. We've all seen the movies or the television shows where it's like hi, I'm Dana and I'm a alcoholic, so your identity? I've never been comfortable with the identity piece of it. My identity is in Jesus. I want my identity to be based on who Christ is. I want to be in Christ. I want my husband to be in Christ. I don't want my identity to be the sins of my past or the struggles that I face. So I've always kind of struggled with that. So if you struggle with that too, I fully understand.

Speaker 3: 23:41

But what I've come to understand is that the Bible does talk about something called a stronghold, and this is a pattern of sin or a proclivity towards sin that has roots in your heart and in your life, and so the Bible really does have some language that is similar to the language of addiction. And I think that a lot of the things that we've learned about addiction through things like the 12 Steps program can be really helpful as long as you are rooting it in the truth of Jesus Christ. And what I've come to understand is, the more I understand about addiction, the more I understand sin, and the more I understand what the Bible says about sin, the more I understand strongholds or addictions. But there is something different, you know, for me to sin against someone, Say I inadvertently share a confidence that a girlfriend has told me, because she didn't tell me don't tell anyone that I'm pregnant. But I was all excited. So I went to Bible study that night and I'm like hey, guess who's pregnant? Okay, Um, did I hurt her? Did I? Yeah, I did Cause. So I need to go to her and say I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you, that that, even though I didn't do it intentionally.

Speaker 3: 25:02

But that's different. That kind of hurting a girlfriend is very different from a stronghold of gossip where I am continually unable to be trusted with information and confidence and I might even be a person who seeks it out so that I can use it to disrupt the community. So that person has a stronghold of hurting people through that same thing. The help that they need is going to be very different the help that they need in terms of accountability, the help that they need in terms of a community who's fully aware of what their sin is what we really like to do with our strongholds and our addictions is hide them, because they create shame and because the enemy knows that if I create shame so you hide this addiction, the chances of you coming out of it are so much less significant.

Speaker 3: 25:50

One of the things we know about pornography addiction is if there's pornography addiction in a home, there is also a deep loneliness problem in that same home. If you can fix the loneliness problem and that is, you bring yourself naked emotionally naked before a group of people that says, ah, we see what your addiction is, we see what your stronghold is, we love you still that you start to really dismantle the power of that stronghold and that addiction in their life. So I really encourage you be careful when you delve into that area of the word addiction, but don't be afraid of it, because there's some tools in there. If you can glean okay, what are these tools are useful and helpful. And what are these tools? Don't line up with the power of what God says, because there's one thing that's more powerful than every addiction and that is the power of Jesus Christ in your life. It can help you overcome that.

Speaker 1: 26:46

Yeah, oh, that's. That's what people need is to hear that hope for sure. And and I really love how you sort of clarified those addiction comments as well in the book it really does help us understand the level of help better that someone needs. What about the woman who has gone through the experience of or it could be a man as well their spouse caught up in pornography and the? What would you suggest to that person as far as getting help related to how they feel about themselves? So maybe they're having feelings of why wasn't I good enough? Or they might be struggling with self-image or other things related to that well, there are always going to be some.

Speaker 3: 27:57

What did I do wrong? How is this my fault? Why wasn't I enough residue in a woman or husband's heart when their spouse turns their eyes away from you for someone else, whether it's pornography or an emotional affair, an enmeshment or a sexual affair, and the fact is that it's almost always I'm not going to say never your fault, because I have dealt with some cases where there was a lot of blame to be shared, but I would say 99% of the cases you didn't do anything to contribute to it. And here's what's really murky, one of the reasons why I'm cautious about the addiction world.

Speaker 3: 28:38

The classic view of addiction is that if there is an addict, there is a co-addict, and that means that somehow the person that's most significant in your life the spouse, the mother, the father, um was a contributor to the problem. And that's I mean. Certainly. If you have some, if you're living with someone who's an alcoholic and you're bringing home, you know, wine and vodka and whiskey and beer every night, you are contributing to their problem. You are a co-addict. But I would say nine times out of 10 that when it comes to pornography that's not the case. The wife is not saying hey, honey, let's watch a little porn tonight, or she's not creating an environment in which he would be pressed to use it. In fact, if he is saying that, I would say would be pressed to use it. In fact, if he is saying that, I would say stand up for yourself, because the more recent research says that the husband that's using pornography isn't married to a co-addict.

Speaker 3: 29:42

The reason that that woman might not be performing in the most magnificent manner, as maybe she did previously, is because she's suffering from symptoms of betrayal trauma. So you know, I wasn't my same Dana Gresh self. After our ground zero moment, when Bob confessed to me, my brain was foggy, I was tired, I didn't have an appetite. I lost like 20, 30 pounds. I wasn't me. Was that because I was so unwell? Well, what's happened for through the years is that these therapists would meet the addict and then the spouse of the addict and be like well, this person isn't well, they must also be a co-act. Well, of course they're not well. They are experiencing the symptoms of betrayal trauma.

Speaker 3: 30:30

And about 70% of wives of husbands who use pornography have symptoms of PTSD. That doesn't mean they have a diagnosis of PTSD. That means that they're not well right now and they need some extra love and care and attention. Now, if the spouse or a counselor is telling you things that don't measure up, I'm not saying you can't be a co-addict. Lots of people are co-addicts. I'm saying that you can't. I'm not saying that you can't be codependent.

Speaker 3: 31:01

All of us are a little bit codependent, but some of us operate out of that in a pretty consistent manner. Those things could be true, but you need to get with. This is why you need clinical care, Someone who's willing to invest the time to figure out is there codependency here, Is there a co-addiction, or is this person just suffering the terrible, devastating effects of betrayal trauma? Because the kind of care you're going to need to have is very different. But let me encourage you never divorce that care, that clinical care, from the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, Because the psychology world is great at diagnosing problems, but go ahead and check the stats. They're not very good at solving the problems. So if you can have a clinical therapist that's going to be able to glean through some with some of their training and know I need to figure out if this woman has betrayal trauma or if she's a codependent.

Speaker 3: 31:56

And then I'm going to take her to the word of God to figure out. What does God's word say about the particular way that she's walking through this? What lies is she believing about herself, about God and about this world? And how can I rip those lies up and plant truth? The Bible says in John 8, 31 and 32, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. There's not a diagnosis that's going to set you free. There's not a person that's going to set you free other than Jesus Christ. And so when you get somebody who can take that clinical knowledge and take you to the truth, the word of God and the power of the presence of God, you're going to start to experience incredible freedom.

Speaker 2: 32:39

Hmm.

Speaker 1: 32:40

And you do such an amazing job with that in the book is really helping people understand the importance of both sides of that having the professional help as well as being rooted in our Christian beliefs and getting help that way, and the whole betrayal trauma. That was something I hadn't heard of before and I just really want to make sure, if you are listening to this podcast and you feel like this is something that you may be experiencing, I really encourage you to pick up a copy of Dana's book and then she gives you great resources, right Places that you can reach out to to find the specific care that you need. Well, dana, you have discovered seven what you call essential beliefs that every marriage needs to survive broken places. Tell us about how you came up with those and maybe share one of them.

Speaker 3: 33:41

Well, I guess first I should say is that in the book I tell our story and I believe that every story and the path to healing is going to be as unique as the couple that's walking it. And one of the reasons we wrote our story down is because so many programs and books said we are the 10 step solution, we are the three step solution. So these beliefs are not things that we say if you will work through these seven beliefs, your marriage is going to be fine. For us, these were seven of the really big things that we had to work through for our marriage to be well and we're hoping that it's helpful to some of the other couples out there. But one example is confession is the beginning of healing.

Speaker 3: 34:27

So many times I think husbands have believed the lie. My husband has at times believed this lie. It's not hurting her. I know that it's sin, I don't want to do it, I hate my sin, but if I don't talk to her about it it won't do as much damage to her and so I want to protect her. That's really the mentality that kept my husband from confessing to me for that 18 month period.

Speaker 2: 34:54

He didn't want to hurt me.

Speaker 3: 34:57

And there are wives who don't want to hear. They say, listen, if I hear all the factors, it'll devastate me, I won't be able to handle it. Yes, it will be hard, it will be painful, it will be excruciating, but the truth though not pain free always sets us free. That drives and feeds and fuels pornography use. It has to be strangled, the life of it has to be destroyed. And the Bible talks over and over again about confess your sins one to another and then you will be healed. Confession to God forgives us and erases that from our record, but confession to one another brings healing. It's within the context of the body that we bring healing. Paul writes in one of the letters to the Corinthians drag it into the light, stop keeping it in the darkness, drag it into the light. When you do that in the context of marriage, it starts to erase the loneliness and it just changes the battle. It just changes the battle. Now I will say this I really recommend that you again have clinical Christian care guiding you through that disclosure process, because it can be deeply painful and what what I see a lot of couples doing is the pornography user will say oh, I binged, I looked at porn. I did this, and that person will feel a lot better because they just dumped out the trash on the other person. The other person's devastated and so that person thinks I'm going to be fine, I'm going to be great, I'm not going to use it again, because that was horrible. That was devastating. Telling them was terrible. 30 days down the road, they're doing it again. They're confessing it again, they're dumping again.

Speaker 3: 36:53

The cycle continues and continues and continues. That's abusive. That's abusive to the person who's receiving that confession. So, unless there's someone with clinical care involved in the confession to say, okay, now you've confessed this, but this can't happen anymore, you can't do to your spouse what you just did. Do you see how damaging that was? Do you see how devastating that was?

Speaker 3: 37:18

This means this confession isn't a license to continue to do this. This confession is the beginning of wiping the slate clean so that it can stay clean. This confession is the beginning of wiping the slate clean so that it can stay clean. Now I think that there's certainly room. Unless we were Jesus, we're not going to be sinless on this earth, right. So there's certainly room for do-overs and start-overs, but if that's happening in a cyclical manner, that to me is a sign of addiction or stronghold in a cyclical manner. That to me, is a sign of addiction or stronghold and that means you need to do your next disclosure in the presence of someone with clinical understanding that's going to be able to help you, through the follow through and the follow up, to know how to not continue this abusive cycle of damaging hearts and minds.

Speaker 1: 38:04

Yes, that is just. That's so incredibly important and I just pray anybody listening out there will seek the help so that that cycle doesn't have to continue. How your husband wrote the foreword, because I appreciated hearing his perspective and just, I thought that was a great start.

Speaker 3: 38:36

So yeah, our marriage is beautiful. Those red chairs that he confessed me in are kind of a symbol to us of what the Lord has done, and that is he's redeemed our marriage. Redemption is not repairing it. Redemption is not, you know, recovering something that was lost. Redemption is the act of making something more perfect than it was before. The redemption is the act of making it something it was not previously. And only Jesus can do that. Only the blood of Christ can do that. But an example of that would be those red chairs.

Speaker 3: 39:21

I hid them for a while. They were too expensive for me to put on Facebook marketplace. I couldn't stand the thought of that. But I couldn't stand to see them. So I put them away, thinking one day I won't hate them so much. Well, one day I realized, if I believe God can redeem my life, he can redeem the red chairs. So I pulled them back out and I began to just sit in one of them every morning, spending time with Jesus, even imagining that he was there in that other chair with me, and saying Lord, I hate these chairs.

Speaker 3: 39:48

These chairs are a symbol of a devastating day. Would you redeem my? My thinking about these chairs? Well, fast forward. Those chairs have become the chairs where we've prayed with other couples. Those chairs have become the prayers where I've met with Jesus every morning. Those chairs have become the chairs where we've prayed with other couples. Those chairs have become the prayers where I've met with Jesus every morning. Those chairs have become the chairs where I held my grandbabies for the first time, where we as a family nurtured two of those grandbabies who were preemies through their hardest weeks and hours.

Speaker 3: 40:17

I mean just the Lord can redeem everything. I mean just the Lord can redeem everything, even the chair you sat in when you heard the devastating news that you hated so much. You know we hear so much about triggers these days. Those chairs were a trigger for me. I hated when I saw them. They remind me of the pain and what I've decided about triggers and you know there are times where there was a time where I was just too raw and it hurt too much to see the chairs and sit in the chairs. But at some point with our triggers we have to get brave enough to say that trigger is an invitation from God's spirit saying there's more healing for you to be had in this place. And you walk into the hard space saying Jesus, I know you're here with me. Show me the truth about these chairs. Show me the truth about this person. Show me the truth about this memory. Show me the truth about this city. Show me the truth about this person. And he begins to redeem even the things that you thought he never could.

Speaker 1: 41:18

That's just incredible and, yes, like you said, only God can do something like that. Well, as we start to wrap things up here, dana, what would you say to someone who's listening right now and feeling just not sure? I know, in this day and age, a lot of times you know one mistake and the divorce. That's it. How would you encourage them and what would be the next steps?

Speaker 3: 41:47

I think your next step is always to tell someone the body of Christ is a body. A thumb doesn't do well unless it's attached to everything else. A heart doesn't beat well unless it's connected to all the other organs. We do the mistake all the time of taking the hardest parts of our lives, the problems in our marriage, the prodigal child, the addiction, whatever it may be, the stronghold, whatever it may be, and we hide ourselves from the rest of the body.

Speaker 3: 42:22

If you're feeling triggered right now, or you're feeling hopeless, or you're feeling like there's just, this is my normal and this is how my marriage is going to be. There's no way it's ever going to get better. That's an invitation from God's spirit to talk to someone, maybe your pastor's wife, maybe your pastor, maybe a Christian, a licensed Christian therapist, maybe your best friend, because you've never told anybody about the struggle that you're facing. And then, through that, god's going to tell you your next step. The Bible says his word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. A lamp doesn't show you a map, a treasure map, to the next, to the end right.

Speaker 3: 43:07

A lamp shows you where to put your foot safely for the next few steps, and right now I would suggest that your next few steps is to text a friend, call a friend, make an appointment with a therapist, get into that body mode, that community mentality. Christianity is not a solo sport. It is a communal work of God in each of our lives and from there you can say okay, now, god, what's my next step?

Speaker 1: 43:36

Yes, agreed, agreed. Thank you for sharing that and I hope, if you're listening, you will take that step right after this podcast and do that. Deanna, what's your greatest hope for people who read this book?

Speaker 3: 43:55

Well, my greatest hope is that they would truly know and experience the redeeming power of Jesus. And that's my husband's greatest hope. He's awesome. He loves Jesus so much and just being willing to be transparent and honest and humble about his sin, he wants to see hearts restored. In fact, we started, we did a little. We didn't start a podcast, we did a little like eight session podcast because we realized the book is for women, although we hear lots of men are reading it. We wanted something where the men could hear Bob's voice and so on the Happily, even After podcast, you can hear his heart as well as my heart as we talk with some of the people that walked us through, the community of counselors and coaches and friends who walked us through our trauma, so that we can be a part of walking you through, yours, us through our trauma.

Speaker 1: 44:41

So that we can be a part of walking you through yours Excellent. Okay, well, we will be sure and put a link to that in our show notes. Before we go, though, I want to ask you a couple of our favorite Bible study tool questions. Okay, what Bible is your go-to?

Speaker 3: 44:59

Bible, and which translation is it? That's hard. Well, I'm sort of between ESV and CSB right now. I have been an English Standard Version girl for a lot of years. What I find is that when I fall in love with a version then my brain starts to get stuck in seeing the verse through that version, but then when I switch over to another version I have fresh eyes to see it. So recently I've been using the CSB and that's just helping me see things differently. But honestly I love them all, even the, even the like, the message and the passion translations, which aren't for accuracy that's not where I would go but for just overall context and having fresh eyes to see something. It's really good to look at a different version sometimes.

Speaker 1: 45:41

Yeah, it sure is. So that's a great tip. Change it up All right. How about do you have any favorite journaling supplies or anything that you like to use to enhance your Bible study experience?

Speaker 3: 45:56

I feel like I would say in the past one of my favorite supplies would be my journal and my notebook, but lately the Lord's been asking me to step away from that. But I'm not as dependent on it because sometimes with my journal I'm like if I filled in a page of prayers and petitions and Bible verses. Wow, how accomplished am I? Look at me and the Holy Spirit has just been impressing upon me just to sit with them and just to be with them. So I'm in a place right now where a cup of coffee and looking at my woodpecker feeder out the door is actually an incredible tool of connecting with the Lord.

Speaker 3: 46:38

And I just sit there and I process and I think and it's probably usually after I've read scripture, so that it's something to think about. But I'm just in that season where that's what God wants me to do is step away from the journal that makes me feel like I've accomplished something and just sit in his presence so that he can accomplish something in me.

Speaker 1: 46:59

Oh, I love that. All right, last question what's your favorite app or website for Bible study tools?

Speaker 3: 47:09

Well, reviveourheartscom has a lot of really great Bible study tools and we have a podcast at Revive Our Hearts called Women of the Bible, so you can. It's. It's co-hosted by Erin Davis, a girl that I mentored and discipled since she was 15 years old. Now she's in her early forties and she co-hosts as Women Discuss. So it's a podcast. You can just stick it in and listen and walk, or, if you want to, you can, um, you can buy a book that kind of helps you go through it as you also listen to those podcasts. Or, on YouTube, you can watch it, um, so I think that's probably a really good one If you want to dive into some of the women, like Esther and Ruth.

Speaker 1: 47:59

And.

Speaker 3: 48:01

I love that one a whole lot.

Speaker 1: 48:03

Excellent. Okay, we will include those links in our show notes as well. Dana, thank you so much for taking your time to be on our podcast, for sharing so authentically. I just I know so many marriages are hurting and looking for hope and the biblical truth, so, combined with your story, just really shows that God can redeem broken relationships. So if you're out there listening today, please know that and trust that and take steps as Dana has suggested. So thank you for being here.

Speaker 3: 48:40

My pleasure. Thank you so much for having me. Yes.

Speaker 1: 48:43

And for our listeners. Be sure to pick up a copy of Dana's book, Happily, even after. You can find the link in our show notes as well. And, lastly, head over to the Coffee and Bible Time website for our prayer journals. That will help guide and document your prayer life at coffeeandbibletimecom. Thank you so much for joining us on our podcast today. We love you all. Have a blessed day.