How to Forgive Your Husband When You Don’t Know Everything

A wise question that comes up with some regularity in ministry to hurting wives is about how to forgive your husband when you don’t know everything he’s done. Women ask, “How can I forgive what I don’t fully know, and may never know?”

Many wives ask this question in response to their husbands who:

• Have been deceitful in the past. The wife is not 100% sure that what she knows is the whole story—how can she forgive fully?
• Have had a pattern of little confessions repeatedly throughout the marriage. We call that the “death by 1,000 confessions.” At this point, the wife is wondering if she really knows the whole story. She thought she knew it all before, and then more painful information was revealed. This is particularly damaging to a wife’s heart.
• Have been so immersed in their sin, deceit, and double life that they are not even 100% sure of all the details. They want to confess, but things keep coming to mind, things that have been buried sometimes for years. Some husbands have lived a lifestyle of deceit for so long that they, themselves, struggle to know the truth.
• Have refused to disclose details or participate in discussions toward reconciliation—whether this is pastoral, through counseling, a full disclosure statement, or otherwise. The husband is hard-hearted and refuses to engage in this process.
• Have died or have abandoned the marriage; the details of his sin during their marriage simply can’t be known.

How can a wife move forward under these conditions? Is she to remain stuck, unable to forgive because she doesn’t know the whole truth? Here are a few thoughts to consider if this is your painful story as a wife.

How to Forgive Your Husband? God Enables

Forgiveness from the heart is not dependent on your husband’s action or inaction, and that’s good news! Through God’s help, even a partial knowledge of the truth won’t prevent you from being obedient to forgive what you do know, regardless of the challenges caused by your husband’s deceit, evasiveness, or cruelty. God can bring strong help to you in your weak, faith-filled response to his command to forgive. Isaiah 41:13 brings hope: “For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, ‘Fear not, I am the one who helps you.’”

God Sees and Knows

The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law. (Deut. 29:29)

The “secret things” here are referring to the unknowable and majestic realities of the triune God. He is beyond our knowledge and comprehension. Because of this, all things that can be known are known to him. You can have peace in the suffering of not knowing because “Even the darkness is not dark” to God, and “the night is bright as day, for darkness is as light” to him (Ps. 139:12).

When you come to the Lord, desiring to forgive your husband and yet feeling that it’s impossible, remember that you are held accountable for your own heart, not for the accuracy of the information you have to work with. God knows and sees it all, even if you are prevented from knowing the whole truth.

Seek to Forgive What You Do Know

Jesus offers us a stunning example of offering costly forgiveness to those who can’t begin to appreciate the full scope of their offense. As Jesus hung on the cross, bearing the weight of his people’s sins—maybe even those of the very ones who crucified him—he cried out:

Forgive them Father, for they know not what they do. (Luke 23:34)

Jesus is the only Man who perfectly forgave his enemies. When we are united to Christ, his righteousness covers all our weakness and inability to forgive, and his Spirit empowers us to walk in his way. It is possible, through the Spirit, to forgive someone who reviles you or who will not confess their specific offenses.

As it is, forgiving what you are aware of is a painful and costly step of obedience, especially when you feel that you don’t know the whole story or may never know it all! As a matter of faith and obedience, start there. Name the offenses that you do know about. Name them. Write them out. This can be a painful process, so take your time and be gentle with yourself. Pray through each offense. Cry out to God to help you forgive your husband from the heart. This is not a “one and done” sit-down with you and God, but rather a process of wrestling with the realities of your pain and the deep injustice of your betrayal. Lament is a part of this as well.

Seek to Lament What You Don’t Know

Lament is not a word used in most day-to-day conversations. Yet it’s a significant practice found in Scripture that offers us a pathway to experience comfort and hope amidst pain. Simply put, to lament is to give voice to your pain before your God who hears and cares. It is not neat and tidy. It is not polished. Lament is a practice that allows us to approach our heavenly Father and ask anguished questions, like the one Jesus asked as he suffered and died on the cross: “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). With the psalmist, we cry out, “How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?” (Ps. 13:1).

Roughly one third of the psalms are psalms of lament. I believe this gives us a clue that God invites us, tenderly, to speak to him about the pain and suffering we experience in life.

You may never have the whole story on this side of heaven. How devastating that may be for you reading this today. If you find yourself there, you might lament and cry out:

• “My dream of a trusting and loving relationship with my dear husband has been shattered.”
• “I just don’t know if I can trust my husband; is this really my life?”
• “I feel certain that there will be more to this story. Lord, help me grieve this painful reality.”
• “I am married to a man who feels like a stranger and even a liar.”
• “My husband has been given over to lies and sin for so long that he doesn’t even know what’s true anymore. How devastating, Lord! Have mercy!”
• “My husband has a hard heart and is unwilling to share so that we might reconcile. This is a deep grief, Lord—comfort me in this distress.”

Meditate on Scripture

Some key passages to consider include:

• Psalm 142
• Psalm 139
• Matthew 26:36–46
• Isaiah 52:13–53:12
• Psalm 22
• Psalm 56 and Psalm 57

Entrust Your Wellbeing to the God Who Sees

Even in the mystery and pain, God sees and knows with perfect justice, and he will make all things right. Listen to what he says of himself:

For the LORD loves justice; he will not forsake his saints. They are preserved forever, but the children of the wicked will be cut off. (Ps. 37:28)

For I the LORD love justice; I hate robbery and wrong. (Isa. 61:8a)

Vengeance is mine. . . . For the LORD will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone and there is none remaining, bond or free. (Deut. 32:35–36)

Hurting wife, you are precious in the sight of God and dearly loved by him. Your Father God will care for you as you walk this weary and uncertain road. He knows the path that you take. When you have no idea how to forgive your husband, consider this: what small step could you take today toward the Lord Jesus? Maybe start by praying in lament: “How long, O Lord?” Write out some of the emotions you’re feeling about forgiveness to bring before God. He has promised to never leave you or forsake you.