RICKY HARRIS: We were living in a team environment

as a bunch of commandos.

You work hard, you play hard.

NARRATOR: Having survived five combat tours in Afghanistan,

Ricky Harris believes his team weren't

the only ones who had his back.

RICKY HARRIS: Times when things were blowing up

around me and bullets passing by so close that they're

grazing the fabric of your uniform,

but I always felt protected.

I always felt like the hand of God was on me.

NARRATOR: It also helped to know he had the faithful prayers

of his wife, Kay.

KAY: I always prayed for Ricky.

Always, always for protection, always for guidance.

NARRATOR: Despite his reliance on God's divine protection,

Ricky's own faith ran between hot and cold,

because like those around him, he lived life on the edge,

both on and off the battlefield.

There's always one hand on the throttle,

and if you've got an empty hand, it's on the bottle.

You know, I was one of those guys

who would live a week without even thinking

about Christ or my salvation.

And then something would happen.

You'd lose a buddy, or something happens in your life,

and it kind of makes you fall back and think, yeah,

you're not doing the right things,

but you are what you are.

You accept the fact that, hey, you're a backslider.

That's just who you are.

NARRATOR: And being away from his wife 10 months out

of the year, it became too easy to do what he

knew in his heart wasn't right.

RICKY HARRIS: I'll be completely honest.

I was unfaithful to my wife on three separate occasions.

Far be it from being justified, but I never

went out intending to do those kind of things.

Alcohol was always involved.

It was always in a place where I shouldn't have been.

I was always with people that weren't looking out

for my best interests.

I suppressed the guilt. I suppressed sometimes the fact

that it even happened.

This could be something that ends my marriage

and destroys it.

I definitely didn't want that.

I loved my wife.

I loved my life.

NARRATOR: Kay had her suspicions but didn't know for certain

until they were confirmed one day

through a mutual acquaintance.

At the time, Ricky was on his fourth deployment

to Afghanistan.

KAY: At first, I felt abandoned by God,

because I had prayed so long for a certain subject that seemed

to never-- he never heard me.

NARRATOR: Even though Kay still loved her husband

and didn't consider divorce an option, she was deeply wounded.

KAY: That was something I was struggling with-- the hurt,

the resentment towards him, things

that he had done in the past.

I had started to become bitter.

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, Ricky could no longer

suppress the guilt that kept rising to the surface.

RICKY HARRIS: I don't want to die

with any questions or any doubts between me and my wife.

I want to be able to look at my wife and say,

there's nothing that you don't know about.

NARRATOR: When Ricky got home, confessing to his wife

didn't come so easily.

In the church one Sunday, he finally

realized that the only thing standing

between his relationship with Kay and God was himself.

The theme of the message was skeletons in your closet.

I was convicted.

I realized that at that point in time, I guess,

I decided that this is what I want more than anything, more

than being the best sniper or being the best Green Beret

or being at the top of my game in my community.

Right now, what's most important to me is being a child of God.

And so I'm not going to grow unless I

get rid of this garbage that is inside.

NARRATOR: That afternoon, Ricky told Kay everything

and expected the worst.

RICKY HARRIS: If the offense is so bad that you can't forgive,

then I understand if you want to go your own way

or if you want the marriage to dissolve.

I don't want that to happen.

I love you, and I'm in love with you.

And I want our marriage to be a godly marriage,

and I want to continue to walk out

the rest of my days this way.

But yeah, it was tough.

KAY: I was feeling pretty lonely.

It took awhile to recover from that,

and definitely prayer was definitely involved.

Christ restored my marriage, restored my faith in myself.

KAY: Well, it won't just, for Ricky that he heard him.

He heard me.

He healed my hurt.

And I suffered a lot from hurt.

NARRATOR: By the time Ricky deployed again in 2010,

he was grounded in his faith and depended on God

not only for his protection, but for his peace and guidance.

Today he is retired and grateful for the work God did

in his marriage and his life.

RICKY HARRIS: My heart is filled now.

It was just kind of like that rededication when it happened.

It was like-- it was kind of like being born again

and being saved all over again.

I just believe he made us strong.

I think God sailed us right through it.

RICKY HARRIS: What Christ went through to buy that sin

and to give me the ability to not

have to deal with that stuff in my life was just incredible.

I mean there's not a day that goes

by that I don't think about what Jesus did on the cross.