December 26, 2009: To A Son Getting Married (Part 2)

Ben,

You must be faithful to Amy.

That seems obvious, doesn't it? You asked for marital advice, and here I say something so unprofound, so basic, so blindingly obvious that it hardly seems worth mentioning. “Of course I'll be faithful to Amy,” you say. And I'm sure you will be. But indulge me a bit as I go over this fundamental. I want to do this because I’ve been shocked and discouraged to find so many people, even Christians, forgetting the fundamentals. Many people I never imagined would ever cheat on their spouses did exactly that 10, 20 or even 30 years into their marriages. So I want to carve these words in stone now - or at least send them into cyberspace - where I cherish the hope that they will last as long as they are needed.

Ben, I think a main reason adultery is so common now is that so few people regard it as truly evil. Even the Christian radio station I listen to tends to treat it as one of those things that can happen to good people. It can’t. Adultery never happens to good people. It is something that bad people do - very bad people. Bastards. A-holes. Swine. People who cheat on their spouses (or who dump their good spouses to take another partner, which is the same thing) are swine. You, Ben, are not swine. You are a son, my son, my beloved son.

As my son, you must never regard faithfulness to your wife as a mere lifestyle choice that happens to appeal to religious conservatives like me. Nor are you to consider it a heroic achievement, a noble act of discipline practiced by good men going beyond the call of duty. No, lifelong faithfulness is simply minimal marital decency. You don’t get a medal for it. It is not even, strictly speaking, “good” – just neutral. Adultery is the abomination; fidelity is a matter of not committing it. I want you to regard adultery as an act of such unspeakably cruel hatred against your spouse that you could no more do it than you could torture a child. You could not mutilate a kid, could you? Of course not! Perish the thought! Well, let adultery be like that to you. Unthinkable. Beyond the pale. The kind of thing done only by people who deserve to die or rot in prison. Not by you. Not by a Lundquist.

Am I being extreme? Would that all were as extreme as I. The world would be a better place.

Actually I am a lot less extreme than the Bible, which in the Old Testament mandates that adulterers be killed (Leviticus 20:10; Deuteronomy 22:22) and, in the New Testament, informs us that they go to hell. A lot of people think that the New Testament is more lenient than the Old on the matter of adultery, but they are wrong. The OT never says that adulterers get thrown into the fiery lake of burning sulfur as it does in Revelation 21:8. You may recall that I began my letter to my unrepentant adulterer brother-in-law with the words, “Hank, it is important for you to understand that you are going to hell.” I meant it. Still do.

You might perceive that I differ from most pastors regarding the strength of my convictions about adultery. Often I have seen pastors counsel forgiveness, reconciliation and restoration in a marriage where one of the partners has been unfaithful, but I do not see this pattern generally in the Bible. As I said, adultery meant death in the Old Testament and hell in the New! Jesus called it a grounds for divorce (Matthew 19:9), not a rough patch that couples have to endure. When Joseph thought Mary had cheated on him (perhaps just one time), he immediately planned to divorce her. In today’s evangelical culture I think that Joseph’s action would be considered harsh and unforgiving (“He should ask her to go to counseling with him!”), but the Bible disagrees. It calls Joseph a righteous man (Matthew 1:19).

Ben, I know that you will never cheat on Amy and Amy will never cheat on you, so this is all a moot point – but let me put it down here anyway: if you ever do cheat on her, I will advise her to divorce you, and if she ever cheats on you, I will advise you to divorce her. I will not make the mistake (which strikes me as a cruelty) of pressuring a cuckolded spouse to forgive and take back the philanderer. Nor, for that matter, will I ever be a safe haven an adulterer can run to for comfort, encouragement and support. (I will be a safe haven to the victim instead.) More than once I have seen family members “stand by their own” when a sibling or offspring trashed a spouse - and it filled me with outrage and disgust. Family loyalty will not tempt me to enable an adulterer to wreak destruction in another’s life.

Amy, I’m happy to be able to say that I have full confidence in Ben. I’m also happy to say that Ben is bequeathing to you an honorable name. No one related to us bearing the name “Lundquist” has ever cheated on or dumped a spouse, and Ben will not be the first. I like to think that we as a family have a stake in guarding the sanctity of the Lundquist name – a name rendered worthy by Ben’s grandfather Lowell, a man of integrity, love, faithfulness, grace, discipline and good cheer. Yes, Ben, it is meaningful to me that you are a Lundquist, and will always remain so. I have kept the honor of the name that I have passed on to you. I was faithful to your mother, keeping the vows I made to her even when she renounced the ones she made to me. I’m faithful to your step-mother now. To this day there are only two women I have ever slept with, kissed, or even held hands with – your mother and my wife Lisa. I do not use people – whether for one night, or a few months, or 20 years – and then toss them aside to move on to someone else. The main reason for that is because I fear God, but even if I didn’t, I am still a Lundquist, and Lundquists know the difference between right and wrong.

You are Ben Lundquist. You will be a good and faithful husband.