Laura Lentz Reveals Why She Stayed After Former Hillsong Pastor Carl Lentz’s Affair: “It Took Me Three Years” to Forgive

Laura Lentz stayed married to Carl Lentz after his infidelity became a public scandal-but forgiveness took considerably longer than their continued marriage might have suggested.

Speaking on the October 23 episode of De-Influenced with Dani + Jordan, Laura revealed that she had considered leaving the former Hillsong NYC pastor and had a plan if she needed to go. What followed, she said, was an exhausting process of deciding whether his actions gave her any reason to trust him again.

"It took me three years to say out loud, 'I forgive you,'" she told host Jordan Ramirez.

That admission cuts through any tidy version of the couple's reconciliation. Laura described days when getting out of bed was an achievement, the strain of caring for their children while processing betrayal, and the fear that resurfaced when Carl eventually travelled for work again.

In the immediate aftermath, she said, a therapist gave her basic instructions: eat, sleep and avoid making life-changing decisions while in shock.

"I was trying to handle everyone and everything," Laura recalled, naming her children, friends and church staff among those she felt responsible for.

But the interview's most revealing moment came when Laura explained what first made her consider giving the marriage another chance.

During a call with a therapist, she heard Carl discussing childhood abuse. Watching him struggle to describe his experience, she said, exposed pain she had not previously understood.

The disclosure did not excuse his betrayal, Laura stressed. It helped her see why he needed serious help-and made her willing to wait to see whether change was possible.

"I'd been married for almost 20 years, we have kids and I love this man," she said, describing the tension between loving her husband and confronting what he had done.

Carl, meanwhile, recalled telling her she should leave.

"You should divorce me," he remembered saying. "There's just no reason why you would ever trust me again."

According to Laura, remaining together required evidence that went beyond those conversations. She said Carl repeatedly demonstrated change and continues to ask a daily question: "What can I do to make you feel safe today?"

She also pushed back against the suggestion that staying meant passively waiting for her husband to improve. Laura described undertaking intensive therapy and pursuing her own recovery, with her personal health taking priority over preserving the marriage.

"I just want to be healthy and be whole for myself," she said.

Carl also discussed what he described as an Adderall addiction and the secrecy surrounding his behaviour. He rejected the assumption that infidelity necessarily means a marriage lacked love, saying their relationship had been loving in many respects even as his choices undermined it.

The couple appeared as they discussed their book, Overcoming Infidelity. Their return to public interviews inevitably places their marriage under scrutiny again, but Carl disputed the idea that the appearance represented an attempt to reclaim their former position.

"This isn't us returning," he said. "This is us talking about a book that we wrote to help people as we continue to live our lives."

For Laura, the clearest measure of reconciliation remains what happened away from the microphone: years of rebuilding trust, with no immediate guarantee that the marriage would survive.