When a husband is truly trying to overcome his sin, his wife may wonder at times whether or not he is truly changing. In this short interview from our archives, Kathy talks about how to navigate this difficult position.

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Host: Kathy. We want to talk today about a letter you received from Janet. She was facing what so many women have to face. And that is, how does she know whether or not to confront her husband when she's dealing with suspicions about him?

Kathy: That's a very touchy situation for a lot of wives because I think most women that have been through this with their husbands are suspicious. So, when do you decide to take some of those suspicions and actually deal with them? One of the things that I would say to a woman who has suspicions and is concerned that there's something going on is to first of all pray and try to get the heart and mind of God for her own life. I know for myself when I was going through this, I was so paranoid all the time that Steve was up to no good. I had already conditioned my mind to think suspiciously of him.

    So, when he started doing well, I couldn't believe he was doing well because I had carved these ruts in my mind so deeply. So, I really tried to pray and ask the Lord to help me to believe the best about my husband. There are some questions that a wife can ask herself once she has prayed through some of these things where she can try to get her own heart and mind in a neutral position, which is very hard. First she can look back at the last six months. Look at his track record. Is there some legitimate fruit of repentance in his life? Is he in the Word of God daily? Is he praying? Is he interacting with the family in a good way? Is he in fellowship with other believers? Is there a desire for the things of God? Those are really good telltale signs of where he's at and how he's doing.
      If those things are kind of weak and lacking then there may be a reason to be suspicious. But always when you confront it has to be in a spirit of gentleness and kindness. Also, I would go into it with a little bit of fear and trepidation because the one thing a wife doesn't want to do is to spew her suspicions on her husband who is trying to obey the Lord and leave him feeling defeated amidst the efforts he's making. It's very discouraging to be trying so hard and then have your wife come along and basically say, “I don't believe you and I don't trust you.”

Host: One of the things you said in your response to Janet was that a wife has to walk a fine line between trust and caution. What happens if you go too far in either direction?

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Kathy: Well, some women will stick their head in the sand and just assume everything's great because they don't want to deal with reality. And that's very detrimental to her family and her husband because she's not going to be there to help hold his feet to the fire. The opposite extreme of that is the woman who doesn't believe anything the guy says. And it's very discouraging for a man who is trying to obey the Lord to have a wife that won't cut him any slack. I would like to also say to the wives who have been through a lot with their husbands that trust takes time to build.

   I don't recommend that any woman immediately run into a place of giving superficial trust that isn’t real. If he's a week or a month out of sexual sin, I do not feel like a woman should be in a position where she is throwing the gates wide open and saying “I completely trust you.” Trust has to be earned and for the time being he has forfeited it. He has to prove his trustworthiness. That is healthy for both the husband and the wife. Trust is not something that we just offer out freely. And when I talk about being suspicious, being suspicious and not trusting are different. You can be suspicious and be thinking all kinds of things are going on that are not going on. Not trusting him is a merited reaction to bad or sinful behavior. But you don't punish that person. You've got to give it time. You've got to wait for that person to walk it out.

Host: Is it true that ultimately whatever evidence she sees, whether it shows he is doing well or not, that she still needs to leave things in God's hands?

Kathy: Yes. From beginning to end she has to leave things in God's hands, whether he's doing well or whether he's not doing well. Ultimately his change is going to come from heaven as he is willing and determined to walk a pure life. It really is between Him and God. It's not between the wife and him as much as it is between him and the Lord. If there was one thing I could get across to women, it is that this is not about you, even though you have been so devastated by his sin.
      I know what that feels like. It took me years to come to the revelation that he did not do this because of me. This is who he was before I came along. And this was definitely a thing between Him and God. So, when I began to understand that in my heart and mind, it changed the way I prayed. It changed the way I saw my husband. I didn't feel like a victim. I didn't feel like he was trying to hurt me or ruin me as a person. This was just a sin that he had harbored in his life for many, many years.

Host: Did that free you then to pray for him and be an advocate for him?

Kathy: Absolutely.

Darlene Deibler went to Indonesia to preach the gospel to cannibalistic tribes. But when war broke out, she found herself plunged into the horrors of a WWII prisoner-of-war camp. And yet, Darlene would spend the rest of her life telling about a God whose comfort outshined her sufferings, whose presence was more precious than her losses, and whose loving provision was as faithful as the morning sun.

Resources

• Evidence Not Seen: A Woman's Miraculous Faith in the Jungles of World War II (Book) By Darlene Deibler Rose

All believers must face a life-long battle against their fallen natures. These battles can be very different based on our personalities, our likes, dislikes and the sins of our past. So in this discussion, 3 of our staff sit down and share about their journeys in the Christian life and the battles they have faced along the way.

Resources

This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.

What are the most common issues a husband and wife deal with when reconciling after sexual sin? Jeff and Rose Colón share their thoughts in this interview.

Mike: Jeff and Rose. As we focus on couples today, I'd like to discuss a scenario where a man is in our Residential Program and his wife is going through the Wives Program at home. What kind of issues do these couples deal with as they come together and go through this experience?

Jeff: Typically, what we see is this couple having a hard time bearing one another through the different kinds of issues that they'll be dealing with as they go through their programs. And what I've seen with a husband a lot of times is that he is looking at everything he has sacrificed to come into the program. He is focused on everything that he has given up in order to get his life in order after he's been in sin for maybe 30 years. And now that he's been in the program for four weeks or so, he expects his wife to just come around and forgive him. He wants her to move on from the hurt he has caused her, and he thinks that she needs to start patting him on the back for doing well now.

Mike: And Rose, how is the wife looking at the current situation? Obviously, she's seeing it from a different perspective.

Rose: Usually for the wife, when the husband comes into the program, whether it's the Residential Program or the Overcomers At-Home Program, has certain expectations for her husband as far as him changing into a totally different person. And if she sees any sign of his old nature coming up, it sends her into a panic. And for her, she may wonder if her husband is really changing because she still sees remnants of his old nature. So, she may start to wonder if her expectations for him to change are realistic or not.

Mike: Ok. So Jeff, how do you begin to deal with this man? I mean I guess what you describes is fairly typical of how guys are. We deal with an issue as we see it come up and then we move on and we don't think about it again. How do you begin to help a man to see his wife's perspective? Or what is the real issue that you have to deal with there?

Jeff: The real issue is self-pity. He's feeling sorry for himself and he's looking for a little bit of recognition from his wife to make him feel better. What I try to help him understand is that he needs to be in sight of the mercy that God has had on him in the fact that he didn't die out there in his sin. He needs to see that it's the mercy of God that he's even in the program and he needs to have a grateful heart. And with that he also needs to understand that he must bear his wife through what she needs to go through. And if she has a hard time, maybe she doesn't speak nicely to him on the telephone, he needs to bear with her through that and be a little more understanding of what she's going through instead of focusing on how everything is affecting him.

Mike: I guess a lot of times for these guys, they may have been dealing with whatever the sin issue is for many years and this may just have been a sudden thing for the wife. And so, you can understand how she may not be as quick to forgive or quick to move on. Rose, what's the real issue you're dealing with when it comes to the wife?

Rose: Well, a lot of times the wife is too focused on the husband and how he's not changing. And we really want her to get focused on the Lord and we want to encourage her that her husband's a work in progress just like she is. Sanctification is a process and it takes time for the Lord to change different attitudes in our hearts and our behavior as well. So, I would try to encourage her to get her eyes on the Lord and look to Him. I would also have her write down some things that she does see that are different in her husband and not be so focused on what she still sees is wrong with him. She needs to see what God is doing in her husband's life and encourage him in that way.

Jeff: That reminds me of what I told a husband to do recently that really goes along with what Rose is saying. I encouraged him to make a list and write down the things that he's grateful for about his wife. I told him was that he should be grateful that she's talking to him after 30 years of deceiving her and sinning against her. I told him that he should be able to come up with 50 things to be grateful for about his wife. The bottom line was that I told him he needs to get the focus off himself and how he is feeling and how maybe he’s not getting treated the way he would like. I told him instead that he needs to be focused on his wife’s needs and he needs to be praying for her and caring for her. And ultimately, he should be thanking God and he should be having a heart of gratitude for his wife.

Mike: Well, it sounds to me like the common thing I hear from both of you, whether you're dealing with the husband or the wife is that they need to bear one another. For both of them, much of the solution involves getting their eyes off of themselves and looking to meet the needs of others. So, this would be something we could all apply to our lives whether we are married or not. How many relationships would be transformed overnight if we would just bear with one another.

Here's a paradox: If you want to enjoy tremendous freedom in Christ, then cultivate a disciplined lifestyle. In today’s episode, Steve Gallagher joins us to take a look at why discipline is part and parcel with growth as a Christian.

Before God flooded the earth, the Bible tells us that man’s heart was continually thinking of only evil. This horrific condition is the extreme end of the “Spiral of Degradation” outlined in Romans 1, which still threatens the hearts of man today. In this week’s discussion, three of our staff members break down each step of the spiral and discuss how it played out in their own lives before coming to Pure Life. Yet they also share the hope of how God was able to bring them back up and out of that spiral of sin and into His marvelous light!

Resources

This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.

Austin Kropf and Josh Bergstrom had both tried numerous things in an attempt to find freedom from sexual sin. But instead of getting better, they had only grown worse. So when they came to Pure Life Ministries, they were exhausted, despairing and desperate for change. And then something happened that changed everything. They fell in love with Jesus.

Resources

The Love of Christ Constrains Me (Article) By Guest Author

It’s hard to build trust in a marriage when a man has spent years or even decades lying to his wife about his secret sexual sin. But Jeff and Rose can testify to the Lord’s great power to restore a broken relationship. In this brief segment, they discuss some simple lessons they’ve learned on how to rebuild trust in a marriage.

Host: Jeff and Rose, as we focus on couples this week, we want to talk about what is admittedly a difficult issue for anyone. And that is the betrayal of trust. Jeff, how does a couple begin to deal with this issue?

Jeff: Well, first of all, the husband needs to understand the impact that has come from lying to his wife for a long time. He has hurt his wife very deeply by lying to the point that some wives actually are more upset at the lies he's told rather than the actual sin that was committed. And the husband has to understand that and realize that trust is not going to be something that's going to come automatic for his wife. He's going to have to be willing to be truthful and to handle things differently so that he can build that trust back into his marriage. And it might take quite some time to do that.

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Host: So, do you find that sometimes the husbands think, “Well, ok. I've gotten all this out in the open. I've acknowledged everything that I did, so everything should be ok now.”

Jeff: Absolutely. That's what we see a lot of the time where the husband expects his wife to immediately begin to trust him as soon as he makes some visible changes. And really, I question whether that guy has really been broken over his sin if he is not willing to bear his wife through the process of building trust back into the marriage.

Host: So, are there any particular steps that he can take? What are the things that he needs to begin to do?

Jeff: Well, the Bible is pretty clear. In Ephesians 4:25 it says, “Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.” (Ephesians 4:25, ESV) And it pretty much comes down to learning how to speak the truth and being vulnerable. A lot of times a husband who is in sexual sin isn't honest about what is going on inside. So, the wife may sense that something's wrong, but he's lying and saying that everything's fine. But when a husband is honest, and he begins to speak truth from his heart and he's vulnerable to his wife then she can know that she can trust him. She can know that he is not putting a false front to her and that he is being honest about his struggles.

Host: Yea. And oftentimes, I would assume that a man is just looking at his own outward behavior, but God is wanting to do a deep inward work in his heart. And that's what the wife is looking for too. So, if a guy is just focusing on changing his behavior to make things right, he maybe won’t understand why his wife isn’t trusting him. What he'd be failing to understand is that she's looking to see if there's a heart change over a period of time.

Jeff: Absolutely. And sometimes the husband will fall into the trap of being lead to believe that she is just expecting perfectionism. So, in those cases the husband may fear that if he shares with his wife that he's struggling inside or that there's something not right inside then she's going to freak out. But really what he doesn't understand is it'll actually make her more secure if he is honest about his struggles. Our wives want to know what's going on inside of us and they're not looking for some spiritual superman. They're looking for a man that is honest and vulnerable and willing to open up his inside world with his wife.

Host: Rose, is there a different perspective that a wife in this situation has? How does a wife perceive this issue? Does she see it differently?

Rose: Usually the wife does not trust the husband at all. Even if he is someone who has gone through the Pure Life Ministries Residential Program and done all the right things, initially she still won’t trust him. And that's just where she's at in that point in time. Also, a wife will get frustrated a lot of times because the husband is in this mindset that he has proven himself to be trustworthy through the right things he has begun to do. But regardless of the outward acts, the husband still has a track record where he can't be trusted.
       So, I try to help the wife to see that her focus needs to be on the Lord. She needs to see that the Lord is the one that her husband is accountable to primarily and she needs to trust that God is able to deal with him. Overtime as she sees the Lord working in his life and dealing with his heart, then the wife starts seeing that trust can be built back into the marriage. It can come back, but it really depends on the husband and how vulnerable he's willing to be and how open and honest he is with his wife.                                                                                                                              

       That’s because you can trust someone that is honest and vulnerable. But someone that's been lying and deceiving – you can’t trust that person. And usually I'll ask the wife “When can you trust someone?” And the right answer is that you can trust someone when they're being honest with you. So, if they're not being honest, then they are hindering the Lord from working in the area of restoring trust in the marriage.

We wouldn’t think twice about trying to live without air, water, or food. So why do we think we can live spiritually without a daily intake of God’s word and a daily life of prayer? In this episode of Purity for Life, we’re going to talk about establishing and maintaining a devotional life—because, let’s face it, we will never stay on the road to freedom without keeping first things first.

Resources

• The Walk of Repentance (Bible Study) By Steve Gallagher

Although worldliness isn't only about what we watch and listen to, the kind of entertainment we engage with on a regular basis does have a very real impact on our spiritual life. In this discussion, three of our staff members talk about how their worldly lifestyles opened the door for sexual sin.

Resources

This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.

Imagine that for the first time in your life, you're leaving all the miserable consequences of sexual sin behind you and walking forward in real freedom. But then something devastating happens. You fail. Now what? In this episode, Steve and Kathy Gallagher join us to talk about what to do, and what not to do, when you fail so that you don't get fatally sidetracked on the road to freedom.

Resources

• Truth #18 - Failure is Not Defeat in Your Battle with Sexual Sin (Short Video) by Steve Gallagher

True repentance is a gamechanger, and it sets a man on a path toward real freedom from sexual sin. But what should he do if he fails? And how should his wife respond to this? In Part 2 of a discussion with Steve & Kathy Gallagher, we show husbands and wives how to respond to failure in the right way so that they keep moving forward in their battle against sexual sin. (from Purity for Life Episode #511 - How to Handle Failure | Key Lessons on the Road to Freedom)

Nate: Now, Kathy, if a man who has repented of sexual sin is married, then likely he's married to a woman who has already been through a lot. This is not the first time she's had to face this, so if he happens to have another failure that can be really traumatic for her. All of the pain is freshly opened again. The wounds are open again. It brings back a lot of the memories that she hoped were completely behind her. Maybe she hasn't even really healed from a lot of these memories. What does she need to hear about these failures and how does she deal with them?

Kathy: If his repentance is genuine, a failure does not nullify that. It doesn't take you back to ground zero. I remember so well, the dichotomy of seeing Steve deeply repentant and then fall. It was very hard to understand because I knew what I had seen. I knew his repentance was real. I could not get away from the reality of what had happened to him spiritually. So, then I ask myself, “What is this failure then? What in the world are you doing here? You said a lot of things to me and you said a lot of things to the Lord. Things were changing, and now this.”

      All I want to say to women is that this is part of the process. I had to learn it. You have to learn it. It's not the end. It's not over. We're not going back to ground zero. Actually, the way I see it now, when Steve would fall into a form of sexual sin it was the lingering remnants of his old life still being purged from him. It wasn't truly failure, but it was like a finality to the whole awful thing. He had a few failures with pornography after he had his biggest moment of repentance, and it was pretty devastating because as a wife I went right back to square one in my mind.

    But what was happening in between the falls was that he was changing and I could see the change was real. And so, we’d go along for a few months and then boom, he would fall again. And in the female mind, we're back to ground zero. We have to start all over again. But he was still changing and the failures became less and less. There was more period of time in between each of those failures. So, he was changing and he was repenting. He was just having to battle his way out of things.

     In my mind, I was thinking he just wants his sin and that's why he keeps going back to it. That's what was in my heart sometimes, because that fear just takes over inside and you think that your husband is just messing with your head. But that's not what was happening and that's not what's happening in your situation most likely. Your husband is moving forward. It may not feel like he is to you, but he is. The thing that every woman should be looking for isn't necessarily the sin but the fruit of repentance. And for Steve, there was more fruit of repentance in the daily life than there was sinful behavior.

     What is happening in your husband spiritually? What does his life with God look like? That's the thing I have such a hard time trying to get through to women, because we take so personal what our husbands have done to us. We are always looking at how his sin is affecting us. And I don't mean to make it sound like that’s a horrible thing. It's just the reality of what we as wives are bent toward. But what you should be seeing is what is going on in his life with God, because that's the most important thing. Not the marriage.

      I hate to say it. I know that ruffles feathers, but the most important thing is his walk with God. If that is growing, your marriage will end up where it's supposed to end up. But if all he is focused on is you and your feelings then he is not going to grow spiritually. The thing that kept me hanging on with Steve was the repentance in him and the life that was developing in him spiritually. I saw something even in the midst of failures. I saw reality and I wasn't going to let go of that.

Nate: And that reality doesn't mean an absolutely transformed life overnight.

Kathy: No, it took years. And to be honest with you, walking through Steve issues with sexual sin in a certain way was the easy part. Yeah, he would have his lapses of sexual sin after he came into a life of victory, but there were deeply rooted attitudes and ways of thinking in Steve that God needed to deal with. And once the sexual sin got dealt with, I thought, “Oh, boy, a new husband, won't this be fun!” But then I was like, “Who is this guy?” The sexual sin was gone, but there was an angry, grumpy, disgruntled, complaining husband still there.

     Those were the things that the Lord was working out of him. So, I hate to say it, but women generally have a very fairy tale mentality about marriage. We think of it as if it is supposed to be utopia on earth and that is just not what it is. It’s two sinners coming together under the banner of Jehovah and allowing him to work into both of us His compassion and His mercy. His patience and His long suffering. All that He is we are supposed to be becoming. Not a happily married couple necessarily. That's not really the goal as I see it.

Nate: That's a lot to chew on. I'm glad you say that stuff and not me. One thing I have seen with quote unquote sexual addiction specialists is this idea that the failure should be thoroughly analyzed. Like, “Where was I?  What did I feel? What were my triggers?” And I think the idea is that if I can understand all the dynamics, then I can protect myself from those circumstances in the future and that will keep me from “relapsing”. Is there any value in this approach where you analyze the failure, or is that a lost cause?

Steve: Well, I can tell you this. I sure I am grateful I have the Lord and I am not dependent on my ability to analyze myself. I suppose there may be a little bit of value to doing that, but comparatively to putting your energy, time and effort into developing a life with God, it is a night and day difference. It's like three cents worth of help versus a million dollars worth of help.

     We are talking about the power of Almighty God working on your behalf inside of, transforming your life, changing your circumstances and carrying you through life. Compare that to analyzing yourself. Are you kidding me? But that's the difference between worldly wisdom and the wisdom that comes from God and from a life in God. All I can say is this is not a mental battle. This is a spiritual battle and it's not won through knowledge of ourselves. It's won through connection to God and it's that connection to God that gives us the victory.

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Kathy: This whole idea of analyzing self to me is just an extension of what people have already been doing, because sin is like a thesis on self. So, why do you need to look at yourself more?

Steve: All it will do is a get a person more wrapped up in themselves.

Kathy: Yes. It is totally taking you away from where you should be putting your head and your heart toward, which is the Lord. What Steve just said is absolutely true. Put your energy, put your effort and put your mind in the Word of God and spending time with Jesus, because that is where true change comes from. Not by looking at yourself. We already know we're a mess. We need help and it's not going to come from our self-estimation. Self-examination is such a worldly wisdom approach to me and it grieves me.

Steve: And now you know why there's no hope in this world, because the world has nothing to offer.

Nate: Yea. Well, one of the struggles that I had with this whole interview was that we're talking about in some ways the good that can come out of failure. And it's a touchy subject because you don't want to give people a sense that every single time I fall good is going to come out of it. That can really let people off the hook from reality, because sin has destructive consequences every single time. So, I know Pastor Steve, in your book at the At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry, when you talked about this you were very clear that this should never be an excuse to give into any kind of sin. Although, you did touch on the good that can come out of it. So, can you identify for us some of the specific kinds of good that can come out of a failure.

Steve: Ok. Well, first of all, let's set the proper stage here. We're talking about a man who is walking in victory but then has a failure. So, he's been mostly walking in victory over sexual sin for a matter of months or something like that. We're not talking about a guy who's still in the throes of sin. So, for a guy who things are going pretty well for and he has a failure, is there a silver lining to this cloud? Yes, I would say that there certainly could be the. The potential is certainly there. It'd be better not to fall into sin, because there are consequences. But it's not all black and it's not all negative.

     For instance, it's a humbling experience. There is an element of the man’s pride that's still there, especially when he starts doing well for a time. He may start feeling pretty self-confident and self-reliant, and sometimes we need to be taken down a peg or two. So, a failure can be a positive in that sense. Another thing is that it creates and deepens the hatred for sin, because there are consequences. And you get sick and tired of paying the price for that little bit of fun. So that reality goes deeper in you, which is a good thing also. Which that's the sort of thing that really can keep you from sin later when a temptation comes along.

     You start remembering, “Yeah, I know it could be really fantastic for a few minutes, but I remember the aftermath and it’s not worth it.” That kind of a thought can come to you. And the other thing we need to keep in mind is God's approach to our dilemma is holistic. He's not interested in just cleaning up this one little sin. We would be happy if that's all He would do. So much so that a man may have thoughts like, “Just leave me alone Lord. Let me live my worldly carnal selfish life. Just take this one sin out of my life because it's bothering me and it's making my wife really mad, so take it.” And praise God that He doesn't think like us.

  He's thinking about a complete change of character and a movement of our entire being headed towards Him and His Christ likeness. And that encompasses all the different elements of our nature. So, it's not just a matter of sexual sin. He's wanting change everywhere and in everything about us. So, we would be happy maybe to keep things as they are life other than this one sin that is ruining our lives, but God wants to move us into a life of true victory.

Nate: Yeah. And Kathy, for the wife, what good can come to her from her husband's failures?

Kathy: I have a short list. The first thing I would say is dependence on the Lord because we can very easily go through life without depending on Him when life is going well. So, I see the trials that have come through my husbands’ failures as a blessing, because they have caused me to really cry out to the Lord and put all my faith and hope in Him. I needed to be humbled greatly. When you're the wife and the “victim”, you can really get yourself in a mental quagmire and a spiritual quagmire of trouble from thinking that you're a victim and losing sight of the sovereignty of God. I have had to go through this struggle a million times in my life. Where I ask myself, “Where is God in all of this?” And the truth is that He is in every part of it.

      That's my answer to that question every time now after 43 years of marriage and looking back, He used it powerfully in my life. I needed to be humbled greatly even at the ripe age of 21 when all this hell broke loose on my life. But it also helped me to see the real battle that my husband was in. And it helped me to see how the Lord uses our struggles and sins to deal with us, to purge us and to conform us. My sight was raised up from not just my life in this world but to the bigger picture of what God is doing. It's so much more than what we can see. We're just so earthbound and it's natural to be that way, but the Lord is wanting to lift our vision to something more than just life on this earth.

    For decades we have been going through dealing with our own issues, but also dealing with so many other people. I have to ask myself, what is God doing with all of that? What is the point of all of that? That's kind of what we've been saying in different ways through this whole interview. We are being conformed to the image of Christ. We are not just putting off the old man, we are putting on Christ. That's the point. So, to lose our lives in this world and repent and turn away from our sin means that we're turning to Him and that we are taking on Christ likeness. And that to me is worth all the battle and all the struggle.

    Jesus is the prize. He is the goal. That is the end of the line right there. So, all the other stuff that confuses and muddles up the purpose for the struggle, I'm done with all that. I want Jesus and I don't care what it cost me. And that is where I have ended up after 43 years of marriage and seeing a lot of people go through struggles. But I understand God is still in everything. As painful as it is, He's there for us in every trial. You just have to apprehend Him and set Him as your course and as your prize in life.