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Key Bible Verse: Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed (James 5:16). Bonus Reading: 1 Peter 3:7

I've got to tell you something," I said to Bobbie the next weekend. "There's a woman I see walking into the building every day …"

For the next several minutes, I explained what had happened and how this mystery woman had captured my imagination.

The burden of keeping a secret from Bobbie had become more than I wanted to carry.

I told her that I was sorry and needed her forgiveness for my foolishness.

She thanked me for telling her and willingly forgave me.

By the way, although I noticed the woman on Monday morning, my eyes left her before she made it to the front door. Because I'd told Bobbie, the thrill of watching had evaporated.

Your wife doesn't need to get a catalog of every lustful thought you have, but telling her that this is something you struggle with will shed light on it and release it from your secret memory bank.

And it will also create accountability. Secrets that hide can fester and become serious infections inside your marriage. They have the power to ruin your friendship. They need air in order to heal.

—Robert Wolgemuth in The Most Important Year in a Man's Life

My Response: Could I level like this with my wife? If not, to whom else could I become accountable?

Thought to Apply: A fault confessed is a new virtue added to a man.—JAMES S. KNOWLES (British author)

Adapted from The Most Important Year in a Man's Life (Zondervan, 2003) by permission.

Copyright © 2005 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity.

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Prayer for the Week

Preserve me, Lord, from the stupidity of craving what You, for my protection, have placed off-limits.

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