Few challenges in life are as difficult as regaining a wife’s trust—and few are as ultimately worthwhile. Trust can be rebuilt in your marriage! With patient, loving, self-sacrificing effort, it’s possible that one day your wife will risk her heart with you again. And she may even have more respect and love for you than before.

In Worthy of Her Trust, Jason Martinkus relates how he repaired his own marriage after revelations of sexual addiction. Along with Stephen Arterburn, Jason offers exercises and tools rooted in counseling principles to help your marriage begin again. This comprehensive guide discusses: 

• How to be truly and effectively transparent 
• ·Combating the “he must not love me” myth and other untruths
• What to do about the Internet, office temptations, and travel
• Encouragement for wives who wonder if trust can ever be restored 
• The “five-minute phone call” and other daily trust-building strategies
• What meaningful forgiveness and restitution look like
• The Amends Matrix—a concrete exercise to admit past wrongs and cast a vision for a faithful future

Including insights from Jason’s wife, Shelley, Worthy of Her Trust guides you through the process of rebuilding your relationship so it is stronger than ever.

Now here are my thoughts. . .

What I liked: Overall I enjoyed the book. I highly recommend this book to an couple that has or is experiencing infidelity and sexual sin in their marriage. Jason is transparent with his transgressions and strategies helped restore their marriage. I really liked the five-minute call rule and the T-30 Journal exercise.

Here are few points Jason made that I highlighted. . .

"There can be authentic forgiveness by the violated party, but if there's no true repentance and change on the violator's part, trust will remain elusive."

Rebuilding trust requires you to be forgivable, regardless of whether she is willing to forgive."

"We can choose our own road to instant gratification and pleasure, or we can lean into God, practice faith, and allow him to be enough for us."

Purchase your copy of Worthy of Her Trust here.

Let's face it, sometimes life is just downright difficult. Then you find that you begin to fear the uncertainty of the future. So what do you do? You worry. You worry about relationships, finances, health, our families, and the list goes on.

If you are like me—a "worrier" by nature—it is probably time to rethink the way that you think! By now you have probably formed the unfortunate and unhealthy habit of focusing too intently on negative aspects of your life, and focusing less on counting your blessings. 

This is not how Jesus wants you to live your life. He wants your burdens in exchange for His peace. He wants you to take your worries and lay them all at His feet...and leave them there. When you learn to worry less and trust God a little more you begin to experience a peace that surpasses all understanding. Not a interim peace that comes from taking a hot bubble bath on a stressful day (although it helps), or from a rather large glass of wine (not too bad either) after a viciously long work day. No. It is an indelible and abiding peace that can only be found when we relinquish all control in every area of our life and allow Jesus to lead. 

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

Do you feel like Jesus is holding out on you? 

Know that He has a great plan for you. You may feel like Jesus is holding out on you. You may feel like he is staying away during your times you need Him the most. I don’t know Jesus’ plan for you, but I promise you that His plan is bigger than yours or mine.Trust him.

Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all the day long. - Psalm 25:5

But I trust in you, O LORD; I say, "You are my God." My times are in your hand; rescue me from the hand of my enemies and from my persecutors! - Psalm 31:14-15

Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices! - (Psalm 37:7)

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

You are not the only one who has ever faced discouragement, despair, depression, uncertainty or has been perplexed as to why God did not work in your life in a certain way. You may be in the midst of God’s working and can’t see the big picture as He can. 

We can trust God's heart, even when we can’t trace His path. [click-to-tweet]
Today, I challenge you to open the Word of God and embrace these truths for yourself—they will offer you hope, peace, comfort and help to you over and over again! I Promise.
But you, God, shield me on all sides;You ground my feet, you lift my head high; With all my might I shout up to God, His answers thunder from the holy mountain. - Psalm 3:3

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

"God, why do I have to go through this?"

"Why are you doing this to me? You don't understand how this feels."

How many time have we said these things in our lifetime? For me it has been plenty of times, and each time I was going through the motions screaming at Jesus that he didn't understand—I was wrong.

Jesus does understand what life is like for each and every one us. What we are going through, is nothing new to your Father. He has been through it all. He doesn't ask anything of us that He wasn't willing to do Himself, and He promises to be with us every step of the way.

Here are 9 reasons why Jesus understands what life is like for us:

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

Can I be honest for a moment? Sometimes I just wasn't in the mood to throw my hands up in the air and praise God. I would have a really bad day, and everything had been going wrong that could possibly go wrong! I would have rather crawled under a rock and throw myself a pity party. And, that accomplished what, you ask? Nothing. Exactly.

It took a long time for me to realize that amazing things happen when you praise God on your mountain-tops, but you praise Him even harder in your valleys.

Paul and Silas are the perfect examples of praising God during their valleys in Acts 16:25-34 {...}

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

As a Believer we all know that Bible Studying time (also known as, quiet time with Abba) is one of the most important times of the day.

Over the past few years I have changed up how I study to get a more in-depth study, or if I was in a hurry; just enough fuel to keep me running through the day. It's not about how much your in your word, rather how much word is in you. There is a difference between reading the Bible and studying [meditating on the Word] the Bible, and then actually living it out; applying it to your daily life.

Today, I want to share with you the different methods of Bible studying that I have used, and some have been shared with me. Some worked for me, and others didn't, but that doesn't mean they won't work for you.


[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]

As I read the passage, it reminded me of our relationship with God. He provides us with the necessary tools so that we can bear good fruit. We have bibles, churches, Christian books galore, sermons, etc. The verse that really caught my attention was Isaiah 5:2, it states the man looked or expected that it should bring forth grapes. This tells me that the man didn't tend to the vineyard to ensure it's proper growth. He just expected that it would bear good grapes. 

When we are first saved, we have a zeal, a burning passion to share Jesus. We do all the right things, say all the right things, and we are living our great Christian life in our great Christian box. Then something happens. The fire burns out, the zeal diminishes. Our flame that once was for Jesus, becomes a cloud of black soot. Why? Because somewhere in between we stopped tending to our vineyard. We stopped watering it, we didn't care for the hedge placed around it, therefore letting outsiders destroy what we had planted.

Oftentimes we as Christians want the blessings that come with having a relationship with God, but don't want to put in the work. We won't read our Word; we won't go to church; we have direct access to God yet we don't have a consistent prayer life. 

[Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.]