Best Selling Author Discusses the Importance of Human Connection

LIFE CHANGES

 After dealing with her disintegrating marriage publically for a decade, Lysa TerKeurst sought a divorce from her husband of 29 years, Art TerKeurst, in December 2021.  In a January 2022 interview with The Christian Post, Lysa says, “Over the past several years, I have fought really hard to not just save my marriage, but to survive the devastation of what consistent deception of one spouse does to the other.  It’s brutal and heart crushing to constantly fear the hurtful choices of someone you love. I’ve had to learn the hard way there’s a big difference between mistakes (which we all make) and chosen patterns of behavior that dishonor God and the biblical covenant of marriage.”  Since then, Lysa says she’s worked hard at healing and focusing on her own health, and is surprised by how far she’s come.  In early 2023, Lysa met author and ministry leader, Chaz Adams, and says on Church Leaders.com, “As the pages kept turning last year, we knew what we’d found in each other was love. A beautiful love that requires work like love always does.  But a togetherness that is safe, honest, fun, funny and surrendered to the sacred way God tells us to love and care for each other.”  Engaged last fall, the couple married in early January 2024, amidst their families in the French Alps. 

Though her new marriage has helped to heal her deeply-wounded heart, Lysa says that marriage itself isn’t the real Healer; that role will always be filled by God alone.  “I think people assume that all is well and my struggles are gone because, after ten years of heartbreak, I have a new man in my life who loves me and loves Jesus.  But I still have to fight against the deep ache inside me that longs to see justice, not just for what happened in the death of my marriage, but what continues to happen.  Just a few months ago, out of the blue, a sheriff’s deputy showed up at my door to deliver papers informing me I have to go to court and face him again.  Right when I thought everything was finally settled, a new battle began.”   She says she’s learned to cope with such things with a perspective change, wrought by God.  “Slowly, I have realized I cannot attach my hope to God making things feel fair.  And I certainly can’t attach my hope to the outcomes I desperately want.  I have to attach my hope to who God is.  He is good.  He is faithful.  He is my Father who loves me.  So, my challenge now is not to tie my hope of a better future to this new man.”

RED FLAGS

“When I think about red flags, I think about the ones that are put up at the beach when there are conditions that shouldn’t be ignored.  If you jump in that ocean, completely ignoring the clearly posted red flag, you may suffer severe consequences,” Lysa states, proposing a shift from “blind trust to wise trust.”  She explains: “Some people believe that when you love someone, you must give them unconditional trust.  But we all know that’s not possible on this side of eternity.  So instead of shooting for unconditional trust where we are blind to. 

red flags and expected to overlook them, we need to shift from blind trust to wise trust.  Wise trust requires us to take an honest look at reality.  While people sometimes lie with their words, the truth eventually emerges in their actions.”  She cites and explains eleven different red flags in character that are signs of relational warning.  A couple of those:

• Insecurity.  “This person lacks confidence in themselves so much that it creates a deep-rooted fear inside of them that you’ll leave them.  This person can be jealous even though there isn’t a legitimate reason.  They need incessant encouragement to feel more stable in their relationships.”  Examples:  “They tend to need you in unrealistic ways and are too dependent on you to help stabilize them or make them feel better about themselves.  They get upset at you for talking with other people instead of them when you attend a party together, because they are unsure of themselves and their ability to branch out on their own.”
• Immaturity.   “This person acts childishly.  They don’t think through the consequences of their choices.  When they get caught, it’s always someone else’s fault.  When something hurts them or they don’t get their way, they have temper tantrums or pouting episodes.”  Examples:  “Their regular behavior tracks with someone much younger and less emotionally developed than their actual age and stage of life.  They lack self-awareness and seem emotionally tone-deaf.”

CAN WE TRUST GOD WHEN WE DON’T UNDERSTAND?

“There’s a lot I don’t understand.  I don’t understand why good relationships sometimes go very, very badly. I don’t understand why two people can look at the exact same situation and have two very different interpretations of what happened,” Lysa confesses.  “I’m realizing that I attach a great deal of my trust in God to my desire for things to turn out like I think they should.  I want the goodness of God to compel Him to fix things, change minds, prevent hurt, punish the bad, and vindicate the good on my timeline.  I want the goodness of God to make people who do hurtful things say they are sorry and then act better, do better, be better.”  Through prayer, God has helped her to see differently.  “I must acknowledge God’s version of making my path straight most likely will not line up with what I expect.  He may have a completely different definition of straight. Another way to understand straight is that God is able to see into the future and to make sense of it.  My understanding will never allow for this.  We press into Him by doing what we already know to do: get into His Word, pray, listen to Him, look for evidence of His goodness, and remember times when He was so very faithful in the past.  What if a big part of our exhaustion and anxiety around hard circumstances is that we are constantly trying to remove faith from our relationship with Him?  When we trust people, we are looking for evidence we can see with our physical eyes that trusting them is safe.  Faith doesn’t work that way.  Faith will always make us anxious and unsure unless we are confident in the goodness of God.”  

TRUST VS. CONTROL

“Life . . . it’s not what I expected.”  Life sometimes works like a surprise party.  Other times like a surprise attack.  The only thing certain is that it will be filled with the unexpected.  I know this, but I still have this driving sense inside me that if I just know enough, worry enough, research enough, plan enough, arrange enough, talk things through enough, stay ahead of things enough, and make sure everyone else is on the same page as me, then I can keep life going like it should go.  Humans who break our trust do not have the power to break apart God’s good plans for our lives.  They may have enough influence in our lives to hurt our hearts and make us feel derailed.  But people are never more powerful than God.”  Lysa recalls her constant striving to control the responses of others and outcomes of situations.  “In the end, it didn’t work.  Trying to control and manage situations and people left me with patterns of thought, doubts, and triggers that I am still trying to undo.  I am having to retrain my thinking that a different plan doesn’t mean a bad plan.”

For more information on Lysa Terkeurst click the Link!  For more information on Proverbs 31 Ministries click the Link! 

CREDITS

Seven-time New York Times bestselling author, written 21 books.  Her latest: I Want to Trust You, But I Don’t (Thomas Nelson, 2024) / Chief Visionary Officer, Proverbs 31 Ministries / Popular conference and cruise speaker, including Women of Faith events / Media: Focus on the Family, Fox News, CNN, The Today Show, Good Morning America, Oprah etc. / Newly married to Chaz Adams, 2024; mother of five grown children, three grandchildren