I have decided to publish my book on this site in the hope God can use it to reach any one that may need hope or help, I believe that everyone has a story to tell and a need to be heard.
May God get all the glory if in any way my story blesses you.
Chapter One - About me
First I want to tell you about myself, and why, when there are so many books on the market, why I would write this book. I was born in 1965 in Sydney, Australia. I am the fourth child of five Two older brothers, an older sister and a younger brother. My father was a military man and so we moved around quite a bit including eight years altogether in Papua New Guinea, of which I loved. My mother was a homemaker, choosing to stay at home and look after her children, which she considered a far more rewarding and important job, for that I am forever grateful to her. I framed my world on the fact that she modeled that being a mother was more important than a career.
I am usually an outdoor person enjoying all types of sports and doing things that are fast and exciting, but I can also enjoy just sticking my feet up with a good book. I loved school and still to this day love study and learning.
My family, quite typically reflected the times in which I grew up. We were middle class working family where my father provided for us well by working hard, usually at more than one job. We had a variety of experiences growing up as we traveled with the Defence Force, within Australia and overseas in P.N.G. I really appreciate my upbringing more now, than when I was living it. The years I spent in P.N.G were a lot of fun; they were what I call my wonder years. I particularly remember and am fond of the times we would go into Dad’s work and help him do stock take or something. We also used to go down to the wharf where the navy boats were so mum and dad could fish, only mum more often than not caught old boots or octopus or some other interesting object.
We always had animals and sometimes it looked a bit like a menagerie than a home. Mum and Dad had a soft heart towards animals and to this day love to feed the wild birds. My Father and Mother loved each other and had gone through a lot together to build a life for their family, they loved their children very much and did the best they could for us all.
Even though they loved each other, my observation was that communicating this was not usually done with words, except on special days, such as birthdays or wedding anniversaries etc. But I noticed that their love language was more through acts of service. My father had been to Vietnam during the time of my birth and this particular war had left the men that went and fought feeling very unappreciated for their services and they were even treated like outcasts in their own countries. I often wonder what these men would be like today had the world’s reaction to this war been different.
The military way is more like a culture all by itself and a man’s priorities change when they enter in. Loyalty to the Defence first, then wife and family. This was just the way it was and so any long hours or trips away must just be handled without question. Parents who had suffered through the depression brought up my parents and because lack was so prevalent and jobs scarce a strong work ethic was instilled in these men, as was the understanding that you do whatever work you have to, to provide for your family. Most parents were trying to give the children more than what they had because they wanted us to never have to experience lack like they did. Now although this was a good thing as far as working goes it took its' toll on the marriages and families because the fathers were often workaholics and the very thing they were trying to preserve they were pulling apart, often ending in divorce or angry homes.
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; and whosoever will lose his life for My sake will save it. Foe what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Matthew16: 25,26
This principle comes into play when we try to hold on to something so tight we often lose it, but if we trust God with it and seek Him He will preserve it for us.
My mother struggled at times to cope with the workload that goes with a large family and not having dad there because he was working a lot. My dad often worked more than one job to provide for us, of which I am grateful that he was so committed to us in that way. When lack comes, so often fear does too. When we do things driven by fear we often go to extremes and the result is damage to others, and ourselves, which is what transpired in many homes across Australia and probably across the world throughout this generation. The scales would tip often for my dad as he worked hard to provide for us, he couldn’t seem to relax often and his reaction out of pure frustration would be anger, which caused an unpleasant atmosphere in the home. Now I say these things not to bring disrespect to my father or mother, but to paint a picture of the times that I grew up in, and of what I witnessed to be the same for many. Sometimes when a picture is painted for us we can see ourselves in it more clearly enabling us to identify the world in which molded us to be the adults we are today.
I witnessed as I grew up a style of communication that was so destructive, but was very prevalent. It was this unspoken rule that no matter what was said you were to understand that you were loved. It didn’t matter if you got hurt by what was said, you were never to show that or you would receive more put downs under the guise of jokes or teasing. There were the constant jokes being made about women being useless, or only good for one thing (and we all know what that one thing was).
Most of the comments towards women were supposed to be humorous and I'm sure they were very funny to the men and others but it became such a habit for the men that they didn’t realize what was happening to the hearts of the women. It was just the way the culture was, and still is for some. I'm sure they didn't know how this was sounding to their wives or to their daughters who were going to grow up thinking that this was what men really thought of women. Even though it was just the way it was, it was destructive nonetheless. Then there was the women’s' reactions to these sarcastic barbs and the feeling of being less than equal with the men, they then would start to act rough and hard hearted towards their men in order to protect themselves from being hurt. They themselves would indulge in similar behaviour toward the men and when gathered together would criticize and put down men.
A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. Luke 6:45 (NKJ)
So there was this vicious cycle of put downs going on and my rebellion against my father, men and authority began purely out of self- preservation. I felt like I had to always prove that I was as good as or better than the boys to be acceptable. It caused me to cover up my true self so I wouldn’t get rejected. I believed that I would only be liked if I became what others wanted me to be. I hated this and so would sabotage most relationships by not giving of myself totally or truthfully. So the very thing I craved, love and belonging, eluded me more and more.
For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. Matthew 16:25
I was brought up in the Catholic Church throughout my childhood and we faithfully went to church each week, this was my first introduction to God the Father and Jesus. This was an integral part of our family and my parents felt it important for us to be taught good morals and values.
I had never received Jesus as my personal Lord and Saviour, and did not know I needed to. However I did have a love for God as a child, and at times would feel God's presence although I didn’t know it was Him at the time. Anyway I remember wanting to be a nun when I grew up, I had a strong desire for the things of God but maybe this was so because I thought if I became a nun I would be safe from the world and the pain it could cause me. But I also had a strong desire to be a wife and mother. I believe this stemmed from a desire for someone to love me unconditionally, and I thought that if I were to marry and have children they would have to love me because they belonged to me. I thoroughly believe in a wife and a mother being a very important vocation. However we can embark on this journey because we are trying to fulfill a selfish need. Well both those desires wrestled within me until I reached about 16 and then I decided to follow the path of motherhood.
By this time church seemed pretty pointless to me as I always thought that every time something bad happened to me it was God punishing me and so this was not where I was going to find happiness. I didn't know how to appease this God I was brought up to follow. I didn't have the power to obey Him the way I wanted and I was scared in case I died on any other day
I had already developed a healthy rebellious streak by the time I was 16 and made promises to my parents that I knew I wouldn’t keep. I was looking to everything and anyone to fill the void of peace and love that I felt in my life, and this led me to men, drinking, drugs and the occult. I was engaged to a man that I met at college, against my parents wishes, of which eventually ended up in heartbreak and no marriage.
Because I felt I had blown it I decided to really let my hair down and decided I would go out with lots of men and be quite wild. When I had gone to college I met a girl who was heavily involved in witchcraft and so I did too because I was looking for somewhere to belong and she seemed to show genuine interest in me, again I remember my parents not liking her and wanting me to break off the friendship, but me in my rebellion did not, rather I got further involved with them and moved further away from my parents and family. For ten years I went down this path and yet did not find happiness.
He who is satiated [with sensual pleasures] loathes and treads underfoot a honeycomb, but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. Proverbs27: 7 Amp
Everything that was bitter, tasted sweet to my soul because I was trying to fill with sensual pleasures, a void only God could fill. While in the process of completely wrecking my life, I met my husband. I fell into this relationship because I had a lot of insecurities at this time and he promised me what I was supposedly looking for. So I agreed to live with him and to get engaged to see how things would work out, in my heart I was not certain that this was the man for me and because I couldn’t say no I said yes. I then fell pregnant and because I was brought up a Catholic I knew that the right thing to do was to get married and have the baby, of which I did, and very glad that I did have my first son.
Having become a wife and mother and having to fulfill the needs of others. Having demands placed on my emotional, physical and mental resources, really showed up my inadequacy as a person who had only learnt to look out for self. I really wanted to love someone, but was so unable to do so. My survival skills would kick in at these times which was to put up a guard in my heart for protection so that I didn’t feel the pain of my own inadequacy and selfishness. I would say and do things I shouldn't or use a tone of voice to indicate my anger at the demands placed on me, which made my husband and children feel like they were not important to me and that I didn’t care.
When that is not the reality at all, I just felt inadequate and believed that if I was to fulfill the needs of others I would somehow lose myself and/or my needs would not get met.
Sometimes my lack was disguised in sarcasm or put-downs, supposedly funny little jokes or comments. This in turn would cause me to receive rejection from my husband and children and it would continue to cement my ideas of self- preservation. And I found that when the communication stays this way for long enough this guard against rejection becomes a strong fortress under girded by rebellion towards not only that person, but also whatever that person represents in life.
This I believe not only is what I did, but what so many men and women do, therefore the very people they are trying to love and respect, they actually end up rejecting and dishonouring.
I had built a picture in my mind as to what my marriage and family should look like, and was now in a state of panic trying to make it look like that
I looked for happiness in all the wrong places and doing a process of elimination to try and find it. So I decided then that the answer to my unhappiness was lack of money and financial freedom. We joined several multilevel marketing businesses over a seven-year period and throughout the course of this we met a couple that seemed to take an interest in us beyond business. Yep, they were Born again Christians; they were the only people I had met that showed us unconditional friendship. They told us we needed Jesus, and I told them that I felt you had to be weak and pathetic to need God like that, and besides I had already tried all that and it doesn’t work. I was getting further and further into the new age movement and trying to find the god within myself.
Well seven years into my marriage, two separations and four children later my wonderful Saviour rescued me. God picked me out of the miry clay and set my feet on the rock of His Son Jesus. I was so grateful because I had run out of answers and even though I had heard about Jesus as a child I didn’t know that I had to make Him my own personal Saviour. I didn’t even know I needed saving. I knew I needed saving out of my circumstances, but I didn’t know I was on my way to hell and needed saving from that. I believed that if I could just find the magical solution, my husband would love me, my children would love me, my world would look and be perfect. I had no idea that each step I was taking was carrying me further and further down the path of destruction towards hell and eternal separation from God.
Jesus took the opportunity to meet me one day when I decided that in order to get my life in balance I needed to tick my spiritual box of life and go to church. These friends of ours went to a Pentecostal church and so I decided I would go to one too (not because I needed God of course) From the moment I walked into church I started crying and didn’t know why. This happened two weeks in a row, but I was so focused on my husband being the problem in our marriage that I sent him down for prayer, not realizing that God was knocking on the door of my heart.
At this time we lived on the north side of town and were looking to move to the bayside area of town, but just not yet, as we wanted to find a suitable house as to raise our four little boys and we didn’t want to rush. Well God had other ideas. Because on the third week (of our going to church, ticking box program), we had moved to the bayside area and the move was a miracle in itself and another story another time. God provided a beautiful home and so off we went to the same church our friends went to, as the first one we went to, was now too far away. At the time of the service when the altar call was given for people to receive Jesus as Lord, my eldest son who was all of six got up from his seat and proceeded to walk down the front. My husband went to get him and by this time we had all shuffled out of the seat, and I thought everyone would be looking at me and decided it would not be so conspicuous if it looked like we were meaning to go down for prayer, after all how much would it hurt to have someone pray for you in order to avoid an embarrassing situation, right! This I did and prayed the sinners prayer to invite Jesus into my heart, I still had no idea what I had done. Again all I did was cry, which made me feel very uncomfortable as I prided myself in keeping things together. The next day I awoke with such a knowing of what had transpired. It was so dramatic that it was as if my world went from black and white to colour.
Such was this revelation that my hunger for the things of God was so strong I couldn’t seem to get enough. I was literally born again, just like a newborn baby who is hungry for it’s mother’s milk so I was for the word and things of God. I had heard that very same week, that Jesus was returning soon for His church and to judge the world and I was so grateful that I had just made it into the kingdom in time. This was the first time that I had ever known true peace
God showed me in His word in John 15: 16 You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.
This scripture just leapt off the page at me and I knew it was the Lord. I felt secure in Jesus because of this word as I realized He chose me. I knew that this experience was different to anything I had grown up with and anything I knew about God, Jesus or religion. I had an assurance of my salvation for the first time and so this gave me confidence that Jesus was the only one who could fix the problems in my life, and I had plenty for Him to choose from but especially my marriage, as I thought this was my biggest problem…yeh’ right!
So my husband and I embarked on a marriage course recommended by our Pastor and I was very excited, as I thought that everything was going to change quickly once we knew how God wanted it done. I learnt that we were redeemed from the curse that came on the earth when Adam sinned and so for me that meant that I could have a marriage that was like Adam and Eve had experienced before the fall, I didn’t realize what was going to be necessary for me to have what I had asked for.
After having done the course, things seemed to be getting worse and I was getting discouraged. So Jesus in His compassion gave me a passage of scripture from Isaiah 54:4-17, v5 says,
“For your Maker is your husband, The Lord of Hosts is His name; and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; He is called the God of the whole earth.”
Little did I know how relevant this scripture was going to be?
So now I return to the time of this writing and at this time I am divorced from my husband. I have six beautiful children, five sons and one daughter. Now you might be thinking that this is a big jump in the story and how come my story doesn’t work out the way we think it ought or would want it to, with my marriage restored and us living happily ever after.
When I believed I was to write this book, I felt it was for the purpose of revealing to people that a lot of the problems we face in our marriages and other relationships and even in the choosing of a spouse and the way we see things in life stem from detouring off God’s commands and principles, especially the command to honour our parents. This command was given by God to children so as to lay a foundation for their lives to be built on. It is the first command with a promise attached to it, that if children do this they will live long and it will go well with them. So when life isn’t going well for us, maybe we need to check this area of our lives. I will go into this further in chapter three.
I am not saying that every problem or suffering comes from disobeying this principle, however I believe it can be.
I hope to encourage all those out there that are in similar situations in life. It doesn’t have to be your marriage that didn’t work out; it could be your career, children, or ministry. As Christians we have failures, they are our failures not Gods', but if we learn from them and don't quit we will succeed, because we are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus. We only fail completely when we quit, because if we get back up and try again then each failure will take us one step closer to success if we faint not. This book is about the pressing that took place between then and now. It’s my story of how God took me from being a selfish rebellious woman and started the process of turning me into a woman of God and a vessel of honour. I want share the principles that God showed me that would free me from destructive life patterns that were affecting my relationships with others. It is about revealing a pattern that God has outlined in His word, that I had no idea would affect my marriage, my children and other relationships if I didn't follow it. I'm suspecting that I am not the only one who missed it, and so I hope that this book will bring some hope and life to others.
We must also remember that the victories are not just the restored marriages, careers, children, ministries etc, great as they are, but also the work of Christ in our lives during the process. I’m sure that there are many women like myself that believed God for restoration and ended up divorced, and they have felt like failures. They have felt like and been treated like they have nothing much to offer because they don’t have the glorious testimony at the end.
Let me encourage you right now if that is you, there were many great men and women of God in the bible that had less than perfect lives and in fact made some really big mistakes. But God used each and every one of them in His purposes. He wants us to learn from our mistakes and press on toward that upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Also keep in mind that the story isn’t finished yet as we are still here and not in heaven. So come with me on a journey through the pages of my life in Christ and see some of the tools that Jesus gave me, and the experiences whereby I lived them out.
My first step in getting back in line with God’s plans and commands was in the area of putting my trust in Him and not my feelings. As do most of us when we come out of the world, we have learnt to trust what we feel rather than what is truth. This causes us to see truth as relative and not absolute. Our feelings can go from one extreme to another and then in between all in a short space of time. So they are not reliable enough to be putting our trust in. We need to find what is stable, strong and sure, and then anchor ourselves to it.
Well I was totally in bondage to this one, to the point where I couldn’t even say or do things if I didn’t feel them as well I could only say or do the things that I did feel. Sound confusing? It was. It caused the framework of my life to keep changing it brought confusion and every evil work into my life. Satan loves to keep us in this realm, as he is a master at manipulating us through it. If I wanted to do something or say something that I didn’t feel, I would be in turmoil trying to work up my feelings all the time to try and match what I thought I should be doing or saying. The problem was that I would say a lot of negative things, as I felt pretty bad most of the time. I wanted to love my husband and feel loving all the time and be nice to people and so I was always trying to change situations and circumstances and even people to try and create feelings so they would line up with what I wanted to be true in my life. When you allow emotions to rule your responses you will become very controlling and manipulative yourself. You don’t realize it, but because the things in your life won’t be lining up with your feelings all the time (in fact not often) you will always be manipulating situations and people to fit what you want. I was truly in bondage to myself, and the lies I had believed about happiness and truth. For me I had seen and believed that happiness in relationships came from getting your own way, and truth was whatever I perceived it to be based on my emotions.
The Lord decided it was time to deal with this deception in my life and this is what He showed me to do. He told me one day that I needed to say to my husband that I loved him. I had rarely said this to my Husband throughout my marriage to him, as this is not how I felt most of the time. I had convinced myself that it was a lie to say something unless I meant it. My judge of what I believed was my feelings, so if the feelings weren’t there then I mustn’t love him…what a LIE.
I wasn’t sure I loved him, I had been quite hurt by him and I didn’t have loving feelings toward him, so it felt like I was going to tell a lie. What God was asking me may seem to be simple enough, but for me it was like trying to climb Mount Everest. In fact I felt it would be easier to jump off a cliff than to say these words. Please don’t misunderstand me, it wasn’t those words I had a problem with because I could tell my children and Jesus that I loved them as this was how I felt towards them. I also want to say that this was not my husband’s problem it was mine.
There is a way that seems right to a man (woman), but its end is the way of death. Proverbs 14:12 NKJ
Satan is so clever at deceiving us when we don’t know Gods’ word or His ways, and he will get us to speak death and not life. I really believed in my heart that I would be hurting my husband to tell him this if I didn’t mean it. I knew it was wrong to lie and so I couldn’t say something I didn’t believe to be the truth, and my reference for truth at that time was whatever I felt (my feelings).
Anyway I remember this night so vividly, I had responded to the Lord that day with a resounding,” yes, I will do what the Lord has asked of me”, not realizing what was ahead. That night I shared with my husband that I needed to say something to him that the Lord had asked me to, he had no idea what I was going to say. It was going to have to be by faith to say something that I didn’t feel at that time. I thought and felt I was betraying myself. I spent from 7pm to 3am in the morning crying repenting and asking God to help me do it. I so desperately wanted to obey Him and it was such a powerful thing I couldn’t ignore it, yet as the night went on I realized what a bondage Satan had over me. It was literally like I had a lock on my mouth. I couldn’t get those words out through my own will.
However I had the life and power of the Holy Spirit in me and so eventually I said these words to my husband who had been very patient with me throughout this event, but was half asleep by this time.
The release, and relief that flooded my soul that night, and at that moment was more than I can describe. I experienced such sweet deliverance that night. I had conquered a large foe in my life and Jesus had destroyed this yoke of bondage off my mind. This was not the end of the problem just the end of the devils control.
Now I had the yoke destroyed I needed to submit my mouth to the Holy Spirit and to Gods’ word and start to speak out His truth whether I felt like it or not. I knew that my feelings were to no longer govern my obedience. It took awhile after this breakthrough to discipline myself to not allow my feelings to control me, but today I have progressed so far from where I was, yet it still raises it’s ugly head at times. I find now it is easier to detect and easier to deal with as I can now more easily identify it.
So beloved be careful of the deception of the enemy, who loves to tell us that our feelings are really what we think and believe. If he can keep you in this realm then you will not speak words of truth out of your spirit man rather you will speak death and be always in a state of confusion and turmoil. It will also affect you hearing the voice of God clearly because you have trained yourself to listen to your emotions. You may even struggle in talking, trusting and loving God Himself because there will be times that you won't feel like it. Also beloved when the Lord tells you to do something that you find near impossible to do remember that all things are possible to those who trust God and press through until you obey Him, even if it takes all night.
His favour is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning. Psalm30: 5b
I am still working on this aspect of my life, because as I walk more and more with Jesus I find more and more things that we think is okay to say and do that is not from the Lord, but us. We need to constantly maintain this aspect of our life, watching what we say and not to check with our feelings, but to consult the word of God. Make it the final answer on every subject, and be in agreement with it. You may find yourself in a similar situation where you ensnared yourself by believing your feelings and not the word of God. This was a major breakthrough in my life that was accomplished by three words empowered by the Holy Spirit in obedience to Jesus. Then came the choice to discipline myself to go to God’s word and find out what He says and get into agreement with it and not my feelings. Please understand that emotions are a God given gift for us to express ourselves, but they were not given to be the authority in our lives, God's word is for that.
Always remember that Jesus will always enable you to do what He has asked of you. However you will not be able to transfer from living in the realm of your feelings, being tossed to and fro as it says in the book of James 1:8 that a double minded man (woman) is unstable in all his (her) ways, to living out of your spirit man until you have the Holy Spirit living in you, and then you need to submit to the process He requires of you. If you sense through reading this that God is knocking on the door of your heart wanting to come in and be with you, to be the Lord of your life (life being every aspect spirit, soul and body) Or you did once before, but have wandered away from His leading then you can pray the following prayer at the end of this chapter from your heart and Jesus promises to forgive you of all your sins and to send the Holy Spirit to live in you and seal you as His forever.
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Romans 3:23; 10:9,10
In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory. Ephesians 1:13
Prayer of Salvation/Recommitment
Heavenly father, I acknowledge that I am a sinner, and that I have not lived my life the way that you would have wanted me to, nor can I without your help. Jesus I believe You are the Son of God and that You came to earth as a man to die for my sins. I ask You to forgive my sins and cleanse me spirit, soul and body with the precious blood that You gave as a sacrifice for me. I believe that the Father raised Jesus from the dead on the third day and now He sits on the right hand of the Father. I ask for the Holy Spirit to come and live in me as the seal of the promise You made to me and to fill me with Your power and presence Lord according to Your word. Amen
If we were to buy a house to restore, the first thing we would need to check, if we are wise builders, is if the foundations are strong enough and stable enough to withstand the weathering of everyday living or any reconstruction we may do on the building. Well when Jesus becomes the building inspector on our site He will start with any area in the foundations of our lives that is not built on His word or principles. He will start to strip back and expose those things that we need to address in order for Him to build His temple. He gave us an example in the book of Matthew of two men who built houses and what happens when the storms of life come and beat on each mans’ house, and the storms of life will come and beat on your house.
So everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts upon them [obeying them] will be like a sensible (prudent, practical, wise) man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of Mine and does not do them will be like a stupid (foolish) man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house and it fell - and GREAT and COMPLETE was the fall of it. Matthew 7:24-27 Amp
This was what my foundations were like, I had not built my life on Jesus or His word and my house was falling fast and hard. My life had definitely been on sand and yet I could only see the building not the foundation. I knew the house had taken a battering and was worn and torn, but now I had Jesus in my life it wouldn’t take too long to fix, so I thought.
So just after my life was in Jesus’ hands and I had asked Him to deal with my marriage He started to deal with areas that to me were not related at all.
It is so typical of us to see the immediate situation we want deliverance from and think,” why is Jesus talking to me about this other stuff, did He forget what I asked Him for?” I thought He was going to talk to my husband about how he was treating me, because I decided that if my husband treated me better I would be different. We often believe that if God would just deal with the other people in our life we would be able to act different.
Well I guess He thought I wouldn’t change if He changed my husband or anyone else for that matter because He started work on me. I guess He thought I had had something to do with why my life was less than perfect. (As for me I thought it was everyone else making me unhappy)
Through skillful and godly Wisdom is a house (a life, a home, a family) built, and by understanding it is established [on a sound and good foundation], And by knowledge shall its chambers [of every area] be filled with all precious and pleasant riches. Proverbs 24: 3,4 Amp
He knows only too well what we need to be delivered from and the way to go about it. This is where our relationship and trust factor come in and this is why first, Jesus needed to deal with my basis of trust and where I was putting it. We can miss our deliverance if we try to reason what the Lord is asking us to deal with and decide it is not relevant and therefore we won’t do it or we will deal with it later. He knows the order of things, as it was Him who created the order in the first place. It is through Godly Wisdom, not earthly wisdom that a house is built.
We need to get foundations right first before we can build a strong house for the Lord, and in everything God has an order. It actually just make sense to have an order to follow when building something, yet we seem to want to skip procedures that are too difficult or that seem too time consuming so we can get quick results.
One of the houses that we lived in a little while into our Christian walk was a physical example of this approach to life. This house was the nicest house we had ever lived in, it was large, beautifully decorated, had a pool etc.
I mean this house looked gorgeous, there was four large bedrooms with a study off the main bedroom, it had a humungous kitchen with a walk in pantry all made of wood, two bathrooms again in beautiful wood grain and brass taps, lovely plush carpets and polished floors, a back deck looking over the yard and pool, the drapes were custom made and the wallpaper was professionally done, it was really something. Included in the lease was someone who came to look after the grounds and the pool. We thought we had just won the jackpot. This is just what we do with our lives, we make them look exteriorly just perfect and we attract someone into our lives to share it and they think they have just won the jackpot in relationships……… Until.
A few months into our lease we discovered some fundamental things wrong. When it rained we discovered the roof leaked, the water pressure because of where it was positioned was pathetic, the main electrical power box needed to be totally replaced, as it was faulty and nearly burnt the house down. The pool pump that was installed was too small for the size pool and therefore didn’t clean the pool properly. All these fundamental problems, which were far more important and needed to be done right were neglected. Yet the interior decorating was lovely. It appeared to be stable and in good condition, but wasn’t. And it wasn’t until someone lived there for a time that any of these faults were picked up, unless you knew what you were looking for or got a professional inspector in to check it over, but even then some of these faults may have been undetected.
If the house were built from the foundations up properly, following the blueprint and housing standards, these faults and weaknesses would not have been there. If some maintenance and checks had been done along the way there would not have been the need for major repairs all at once. Money was put into things that looked appealing to the eyes and flesh and yet we had to move out within eight months because the house was not sound enough for us to raise our family in, and the person who was supposed to come and do our yard and pool constantly had to chased up to come.
The owners threw out a good deal, but didn’t count the cost of repair and maintenance and service until someone took that deal and the cracks started to show and the cost started to be more than they wanted to spend or had at all.
Just like this house which was left for so long not checked and some of the requirements for safety and stability not done properly from the beginning, so to are our lives that have not been built on the sure foundation of Gods’ word. And just like the promises made for those who were to live there, for those who would come and share our life they are not always able to be met because we made them without counting the cost first. If we build our lives this way and set out to do things our own way, rather than follow a pattern, we are deceived into thinking we know what we are doing our pride gets in the way of us thinking clearly. We think that by having guidelines or order that people are just trying to take our freedom away from us.
Who when building a house would start with the roof and work their way down? We wouldn’t. It doesn’t make sense to not follow the order of building the foundations first. Then we may try to save time by taking shortcuts on materials. Why is it that we do things back to front or sloppy when it comes to building our lives?
Let's have a look at how God built and established the world, the first place of dwelling for man Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. 11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
20 And God said; Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. 4 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. 26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.
In the beginning God created the light; then the firmament between the water and the heavens; then the dry land and all that it contained; then the sun, moon and stars; then the creatures in the sea; then the living creatures on the earth as well as man. Do you see the order?
He didn’t make man first with nowhere to put him. He created everything first to accommodate man. He caused everything to bring forth its food so that man had something to eat; He brought forth all the things that man was to have dominion over. He had order to His creation. And He built it to last the distance with the substance of His word. This is the way God will work in our lives as well, He will deal with things in His order not ours and change the substance we are built on. Let me show you some other patterns of order; Exodus 25:8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.
9 According to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it.
God had a pattern for the temple that he would dwell in to meet with the people; and even for every instrument used to minister to Him in the temple.
23 Thou shalt also make a table of shittim wood: two cubits shall be the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof.
40 And look that thou make them after their pattern, which was showed thee in the mount.
Again we see a pattern in the priestly garments that were to be worn by the men who were to minister to the Lord.
Exodus 28:2 And thou shalt make holy garments for Aaron thy brother for glory and for beauty.
4 And these are the garments which they shall make; a breastplate, and an ephod, and a robe, and a broidered coat, a mitre, and a girdle: and they shall make holy garments for Aaron thy brother, and his sons, that he may minister unto me in the priest's office.
God seemed to have many patterns to follow with regards the making of the temple and the priestly garments of which had to be made of specific materials and made in specific ways. He didn't get the people of Israel to make the priests garments first before they had a temple to serve in. God couldn't come and fill the temple or dwell with the people until it was made He only spoke to one man. If you read through the whole building of the temple and the garments in Exodus Chapters 25-28 you will see that God is very particular about the order of things that He sets up on the Earth. The order on this earth made from natural things is a reflection of God’s character. He is a God of order not chaos. God’s wisdom and understanding is what created the world and us, therefore we should consider His order of things when establishing our lives.
Let’s look at what happens when the order is not followed. In the book of 1 Samuel King Saul who was God’s anointed King at that time was coming up against the Philistines (enemies to God’s people) and the people were not feeling very secure in their ability to defeat them, So Saul decided to do something that was only for the Prophet to do. But Saul panicked because Samuel the Prophet didn't come when Saul thought he should and so Saul took matters into his own hands. Now Kings went to war and shed blood and so were not to do things like offer the burnt offerings to the Lord. This is what happened when Saul stepped out of order.
Samuel I 13:5 And the Philistines gathered themselves together to fight with Israel, thirty thousand chariots, and six thousand horsemen, and people as the sand which is on the sea shore in multitude: and they came up, and pitched in Michmash, eastward from Bethaven.
6 When the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait, (for the people were distressed,) then the people did hide themselves in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in high places, and in pits.
7 And some of the Hebrews went over Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead. As for Saul, he was yet in Gilgal, and all the people followed him trembling.
8 And he tarried seven days, according to the set time that Samuel had appointed: but Samuel came not to Gilgal; and the people were scattered from him.
9 And Saul said, Bring hither a burnt offering to me, and peace offerings. And he offered the burnt offering.
10 And it came to pass, that as soon as he had made an end of offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came; and Saul went out to meet him, that he might salute him.
11 And Samuel said, what hast thou done? And Saul said, because I saw that the people were scattered from me, and that thou camest not within the days appointed, and that the Philistines gathered themselves together at Michmash;
12 Therefore said I, The Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal, and I have not made supplication unto the LORD: I forced myself therefore, and offered a burnt offering.
13 And Samuel said to Saul, Thou hast done foolishly: thou hast not kept the commandment of the LORD thy God, which he commanded thee: for now would the LORD have established thy kingdom upon Israel forever.
14 But now thy kingdom shall not continue: the LORD hath sought him a man after his own heart, and the LORD hath commanded him to be captain over his people, because thou hast not kept that which the LORD commanded thee.
Saul lost His kingdom because he operated in fear and didn't follow God's pattern of who should offer the sacrifices. Let's look at another example:
Samuel I 2:12 Now the sons of Eli were sons of Belial; they knew not the LORD.
13 And the priests' custom with the people was, that, when any man offered sacrifice, the priest's servant came, while the flesh was in seething, with a fleshhook of three teeth in his hand;
14 And he struck it into the pan, or kettle, or caldron, or pot; all that the fleshhook brought up the priest took for himself. So they did in Shiloh, unto all the Israelites that came thither.
15 Also before they burnt the fat, the priest's servant came, and said to the man that sacrificed, Give flesh to roast for the priest; for he will not have sodden flesh of thee, but raw.
16 And if any man said unto him, Let them not fail to burn the fat presently, and then take as much as thy soul desireth; then he would answer him, Nay; but thou shalt give it me now: and if not, I will take it by force.
17 Wherefore the sin of the young men was very great before the LORD: for men abhorred the offering of the LORD.
22 Now Eli was very old, and heard all that his sons did unto all Israel; and how they lay with the women that assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.
23 And he said unto them, why do ye such things? For I hear of your evil dealings by all this people.
24 Nay, my sons; for it is no good report that I hear: ye make the Lord's people to transgress.
34 And this shall be a sign unto thee, that shall come upon thy two sons, on Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall die both of them.
35 And I will raise me up a faithful priest, that shall do according to that which is in mine heart and in my mind: and I will build him a sure house; and he shall walk before mine anointed for ever.
Eli hadn't taught His sons the pattern of the priesthood and they did not honour God at all, so they lost their lives and Eli had no descendants to carry on after him.
There are grave consequences when we do not follow God's patterns, however we often are not told what these patterns are or seek to find them ourselves. Eli's sons were not exempt just because their father wasn't a good father. They weren't exempt because they weren't taught properly; they still suffered the consequences of disobeying God's patterns and orders. We can’t, as adults blame our parents if they have not taught us properly, we are old enough to seek and find the answers ourselves.
Now that we have had a look at some of the patterns that God put in place from the beginning, we can see that these order of things are important and the lack of adherence to them can bring dire consequences to our lives. The order I want to look at in this book comes from God's commands in Exodus 20. Exodus 20:1 And God
spake all these words, saying, 2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
6 And showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7 Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13 Thou shalt not kill.
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15 Thou shalt not steal.
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.
And in particular v12Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
Now I was happy and somewhat relieved to have Jesus set me free of all my occult, rebellion and witchcraft. I was happy and relieved to repent of my sin that I knew I had committed, in fact I wanted God to go through me like Epsom salts as I didn’t want anything in my life that displeased Him. But when He started messing with my attitudes about my parents and family the rebellion in my heart toward them started to surface toward God. I wasn’t happy at His suggestion to deal with this….only it wasn’t a suggestion but rather a command. Talk about starting at the very beginning. He showed me I had to honour my father and mother and that what I thought was right attitudes towards them was not.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord [as His representatives], for this is just and right. Honour (esteem and value as precious) your father and your mother - this is the first commandment with a promise - that all may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth.
Ephesians 6:1 Amp
All was not well with me; my life was messed up in every area even to where my body was showing signs of the stress and strain of sin. I had an anxiety condition that had attacked my body for years, so I guess I was not going to live as long as I thought if I did not sort out this issue in my life. I didn’t even understand what it meant to honour someone, and I thought I had successfully escaped ever having to deal with these issues.
I mean I was an adult, married with children of my own; surely I could just by pass this child/parent thing. I had successfully distanced myself in every way to not have to have relationship with my family. I wasn’t sure I even liked them, let alone wanting to honour them. I really had very little to do with them since I left home and because of my dishonouring attitude they didn’t even attend my wedding. But because I was desperate for things to change and desperately in love with Jesus, I asked the Holy Spirit what I could do to honour my parents.
Well He showed me to start by repenting of not having honoured or obeyed them in the first place, and then He gave me this strategy. I was to find something about them that I could truthfully in my heart speak positively about, some attributes or things they did well, anything. When you have shut off emotionally because of rebellion, it makes it hard to find something good about someone. So I asked the Holy Spirit to help me and I found one thing. Then I was to dwell on that and anytime a conversation would come up about parents, I was to only say the positive attributes I had thought of, and was not to indulge in any slander or judgment of them. After a short while of following these instructions more and more good things about my parents started to come to my mind.
Throughout this time I was getting delivered of generational bondages, self-bondages and lots more, I wonder if I hadn’t obeyed whether my deliverance would have happened at all or would have been delayed…just a thought?
Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Matthew 7:1,2 NKJ
We need to be careful how we have judged our parents, because it will come back on us. God gave us parents and He is their judge not us. He doesn’t put conditions on obeying and honouring them. Yes, there are abusive parents, there are neglectful parents, there are busy parents, and there are good parents. Whatever type you have you are not exempt from Gods’ commands.
As children we don’t see things from an adults perspective and often we judge our parents for decisions they made concerning us, or things they did to us that we thought unfair. This is very dangerous for our lives as God states very clearly the consequences of doing this, and I am not fully convinced that a lot of things in our lives that hinder us aren’t caused by an oversight of not rectifying our relationship with our parents and obeying Gods’ command. And we need to remember that this command is not based on how we feel towards them, or how they treated us.
Let me share something that the Lord showed me to help you understand not to go with your feelings. When I was in college I had joined the Army Reserve to give me some finances. I remember that there was a Major that I didn’t like that was on my base that I worked at. Every time he would be near I would go out of my way to avoid coming into contact with him so I didn’t have to salute him. I didn’t like him and felt that he didn’t deserve my salute. This is what I did with my natural father as well. I avoided him so I didn’t have to deal with the way I felt. Jesus showed me that it wasn’t the man in the uniform I was saluting, but the commission of his rank. It was the authority of his position I was to honour not necessarily his person. This revealed to me that it is the same with parents. God has bestowed on them a position of authority, a rank if you like. We are to give honour to the rank not necessarily the person. If you had great parents and you love them it will be easier for you to do this, but be careful that in this relationship that you don’t get presumptuous and dishonour the rank by taking them for granted. Why do you think that in the Defence force officers and other ranks don’t mix socially a lot? Respect and honour come from knowing the boundaries of rank and authority. If the lower ranks don’t respect the officers they won’t obey them without question in time of war. This doesn’t mean we are not equal in value as people, we are. If the officers need discipline because they are not fulfilling their duty properly, then a higher-ranking officer will dish out the punishment, not a private. God has given us our roles and it is not for us to decide whether He got it right or not, our role is to obey His commands. Once we have decided to obey God and honour our parents (even if it is just the position they hold that we give honour to) we will eventually start to like them as a person as well.
This is because our thoughts about them change and when our thoughts change, we act differently which in turn brings better attitudes towards us from them and before you know it you begin to like one another and see things about each other that you didn’t see before.
Finally, brethren whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy - meditate on these things. Philippians 4:8 (NKJ)
Now having shared this little story, there will be some of you reading this saying that it would be impossible for you to honour your parents, as they were the perpetrators of hideous acts upon you. You may have been abused physically, emotionally or sexually; been neglected; been abandoned, you may have been adopted. You can still do this, as it will be God that brings the judgment and punishment on them, it is not our place. However He knows where you hurt and how you were hurt and He can heal you right where you are. Let Jesus bring your healing and also let Him bring the judgment. He will show you His love for you and His mercy for your parents. If your parents are dead you can still do this, as it is the attitude in your heart toward them that needs to change, and God is so creative that He can show you ways to show your honour to your parents even if they are not physically with you.
I had no idea that this request from God was a major key to my healing of both my children and myself. And how I related to my husband was very much connected to this attitude.
…and let the wife see that she respects and reverences her husband [that she notices him regards him, honours him, prefers him, venerates him, and esteems him; and that she defers to him, praises him, and loves and admires him exceedingly]. Ephesians 5:33
How could I honour my husband if I couldn’t honour my own father of whom God gave me first? This was the very beginning of this trail of obedience to the Lord in this area, He showed me things to do to show honour and as He did I obeyed and the results are heavenly
Now what transpired from this event in the healing of bridges between my father and myself and also in learning obedience to my husband happened about 12-18 months later. My father was about to retire and I thought we should have a party or something (I love parties and so this was a good reason to have one)
I didn’t know what exactly to do, but I knew it was an important time and change of season for my father and that it should be important to us as his family. We should pay respect for all the years that he put in providing for us all. I would not have probably thought this way before the Lord started to deal with me in this area, or I would have waited for someone else in the family to do something, but it wouldn’t have been me as I was too selfish and judgmental to think of anyone but me. Such a monumental change God had wrought in my life - Praise His name! Anyway my husband came to me one day and said that I should write a tribute to my dad. “A tribute”, I said. “Yeh, right”, was my reply. I thought that this was quite corny and maybe something he would do, but I never considered myself as someone who could put anything like that together and so it couldn’t be God, right? God wouldn’t ask me to do something of which I have no talent to do, would He? Well I was wrong and my husband was right, God used him a lot to speak to me even though he wasn’t listening to God for himself.
Just let me interject for a minute and say that God’s order still is there with unsaved spouses or ones that are not walking very closely with the Lord. God will still use them to correct us and teach us etc as our heads. We women have to change our attitude toward them and submit to them as unto the Lord, not allow our feelings or pious, self righteous attitude to decide whether what he says is of God or not, we need to simply line anything up with the word and if he is not telling you to sin then we need to submit and let God deal with them.
Anyway I went to God with this idea and asked Him if this is what he really wanted me to do, I sort of knew it was right, but out of my own insecurity I was hoping it wasn’t. It was and so comes the next step in bridge building and honouring. I wrestled with this task all night as I had never done this before and had no idea what to write.
I decided to just sit down with pen and paper and write whatever came to my mind and trust that the Holy Spirit would write through me. Well He did help me and I got something down on paper, and it didn’t take too long.
Well all the family that lived in Brisbane came up to dad’s the day of the celebration, we ordered a special cake for him I had put the tribute in a nice frame so he could put it up. I decided not to just hand it to him, which would have been easier for me, because then everyone didn’t need to hear what I had written, but I knew I was to read it out loud in front of everyone to him. It was just beautiful, and dad was quite stirred by it all, I don’t believe he felt that his children really appreciated anything he did, and he probably would have been right. We all were too selfish and too busy considering how terrible we thought our upbringing was. So for dad it was a moving moment and I think for all of us too.
Now these steps that God was getting me to take were very crucial in the rebuilding the foundations of relationship between my father and myself, I didn’t have as many issues with my mother, because to me dad was the one I saw as ruling the house and therefore anything I thought was unfair I had directed at him.
You may not have to do the things I have done or maybe your parents being dead you can’t. Don’t underestimate what God can get you to do to restore your soul in this area. Just because your parents are dead doesn’t mean things like tributes can’t be done for them, or some other honouring testimony. Ask God and follow whatever idea you might get even if it seems wacky, if you are sincere, He will not lead you astray.
Now if you have found yourself in these pages and you have discovered that you have not obeyed and honoured your parents the way God wants you to, pray this following prayer with sincerity in your heart and receive a fresh start on this journey today.
Prayer of repentance
Father in heaven, I come to you today in the name of Jesus and by the power of His blood that was shed for me on Calvary. I ask forgiveness for my disobedience of your command to obey and honour my father and mother. I have been hard hearted toward them and not given them the respect due them, as the ones You chose to be the authority over me on this earth. I have expected them to love me unconditionally and yet not done the same myself. Ultimately, I have not trusted You and so Lord I ask that your blood would wash me clean and at this time would put a stop to the continuing affects of my sin and restore me to fellowship with You and with my parents. I cut off my judgments towards my parents and ask forgiveness for putting myself in a place of judge over them, a place that is only to be God’s and that this sin and judgment be cut off of all my children even down to the third and fourth generations. Thank you Lord for this revelation and freedom, and help me by the power of your Spirit to honour my parents and submit to their wisdom and guidance as unto the Lord at all times. Amen
So now we can see that in order to follow God’s commands we need to not be ruled by our feelings and emotions, we need to follow God’s order in His word so we can build stable lives. However there are going to be some other tools we will need and other principles we will need to understand, to be successful in this.
For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it - lest after he laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him… Luke 14:28-29 NKJ
Throughout this time of learning God’s ways, I had been so blessed, He had set me free of the anxiety condition I had suffered with for 9 years, He was looking after us financially and He was constantly blessing me in lots of other ways.
God started to show me that I had a root of bitterness in my heart.
Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord: looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of god; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled; Hebrews 12:14-15 NKJ
No wonder my parents and husband were not seeing the Lord and there was trouble in my home. I had allowed all the wrong done to me to form bitterness in my heart. Some of these wounds were real others were perceived. I felt I had a right to nurse my wounds; I didn’t see the wounds I had caused others; and I was shut off from the love and fullness that I so desperately desired.
I was relieved when all I had to do was repent for my sin because that was an area I had control over, but now was a real test of my trust in Jesus and whether I was going to let my feelings rule me or submit to the word of God as He showed me that it was again my fault that I wasn’t receiving love. He showed me that I needed to forgive if I wanted to move on, this was a difficult thing to accept, as I had built my life around blaming other people for my misery.
Bitterness comes from being offended and hurt and not forgiving. Over time, we don’t realize, how our hearts become hard and we can only see the things that were done to us and so we meditate on them, and at anytime an opportunity comes up to tell someone about our pains and sorrows we do. We shut people out by our anger and our preparedness to let them know just what they did to hurt us. If we are the type who doesn’t say anything we will shut off from others by becoming withdrawn and harboring these hurts in our heart. We probably even make vows to ourselves, that we won’t let anyone hurt us again or that we will never forgive them for what they did. We think if we hold onto the memories of these wounds we won’t be vulnerable to others and then they can’t hurt us. We build a wall with the hurts to protect us from further hurt.
What really happens is that we are held in bondage to the past and are being controlled by these people and events. This is why Jesus told us to forgive.
Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times? Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.” Matthew 18:21-22
Jesus says that every time someone sins against us we are to forgive him or her and if we don’t this is what happens to us.
23 Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king, which would take account of his servants.
24 And when he had begun to reckon, one was brought unto him, which owed him ten thousand talents.
25 But forasmuch as he had not to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, and his wife, and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.
26 The servant therefore fell down, and worshipped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.
27 Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt.
28 But the same servant went out, and found one of his fellowservants, which owed him an hundred pence: and he laid hands on him, and took him by the throat, saying, Pay me that thou owest.
29 And his fellowservant fell down at his feet, and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.
30 And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he should pay the debt.
31 So when his fellowservants saw what was done, they were very sorry, and came and told unto their lord all that was done.
32 Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me:
33 Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee?
34 And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.
35 So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.
Through our unforgiveness we are allowing the enemy to be involved in our lives. The enemy is able to torment us until we release others from their debt towards us. I was being tormented as I couldn’t progress in my relationship with God or with my husband and I was being mean and yet not knowing why. I was constantly asking God for forgiveness over my attitude and the next day would repeat the same offence, that is torment to the soul to not be able to be free of something you know is wrong.
Now forgiveness is not acknowledging that what that person did was right. It is not saying that they will go unpunished. By you forgiving that person you are relinquishing the right to take retribution in any way upon them, you are releasing them into God’s hands for Him to deal with.
The day I understood this lesson is indelibly imprinted in my mind, as it was another major breakthrough for me. I was doing my homework for this marriage course that my husband and I were undertaking, and it was the lesson on the different roles of husbands and wives. In this particular week they had listed certain attributes based on God’s word that a godly woman and man should have.
As I perused this list I discovered I didn’t have very many of them and my husband had none of them. I wanted them though, and so I started to pray about them, and as I was doing this, the Lord showed me that I hadn’t forgiven my husband. All I could see were all the things he was supposed to be on his list and so I murmured and complained to the Lord how he wasn’t any of them.
However, I felt that I was better than him because I had justified my lack of godliness because I didn’t know what God expected from me, but his lack was based on him being mean and just not caring (all the woman out there who have been abused would be saying, “yeh!” right now).
That was wrong, but my unforgiveness was telling me this and so I believed it. Anyway I felt the prompting of the Lord to forgive him for everything he had done to me and for not being the husband I felt he should be. I wrestled for some time with this one that day as my mind couldn’t get around why I needed to forgive him and apologize for having this bitterness, when it was him who had done the wrong things to me. He had abused me in all ways, threatened my life, and continually lied to me, how could I EXCUSE that. Where was the justice, God? How unfair is that? How could someone just violate me like he did and get off Scot-free? Why didn’t he have to apologize to me first? When he was sorry for what he did then I would forgive him. It was making no sense to me at all to forgive him or to ask forgiveness from God for having this attitude.
Forgiveness isn’t about making sense and it isn’t something you can understand with your mind until after the event. This is why Jesus says that we are to forgive our brother from the heart not the head. What we do need to use our head for is to make the decision to obey God’s word, because we know and love Him in our heart.
For if you men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But, if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Matthew 6:14-15
So after I just couldn’t get my head around it I decided that pleasing Jesus was again more important and so I verbalized with my mouth a prayer of forgiveness and I began to weep and weep and weep. I really did want to forgive him, but I didn’t want my pain to be overlooked or counted as nothing. That day Jesus took out that bitterness from my heart and showed me that He was asking me to forgive so that I could be set free, not so that my husband could be excused from his actions. When I got that revelation, of which only came after I forgave, I then could understand why Jesus was telling me that in order for me to change I needed to forgive.
Jesus went to the cross so we could be forgiven by our Father in heaven, we didn’t deserve it and He did this while we were still sinners, what right have we to withhold this same gift from others.
You won’t often understand why something is right until after you obey, that is why it is called faith. That day I forgave by faith, not by feelings, not by my understanding, but by faith in God’s word and His character, after which my feelings were also set free to line up with God's word. If we have made vows we need to repent of those first and then forgive the person/people. A vow will bind us up and until it is broken and you will find it difficult to obey the word.
Now after this day where many tears were shed I understood how bound I was, and I decided that I wanted to be the best person I could be in spite of what my husband would do, had done to me. I wanted to change and not let what happened or didn’t happen to me as a child hold me back. Because I understood that by not forgiving I was allowing him and others to be in control of my life and not Jesus.
I asked God to put a love in my heart for my husband and He did. I didn’t feel the same pain of violation in our intimate time as I had done before, I could begin to offer myself to him, as I should as a wife. This didn’t mean that he changed; he still hasn’t changed to this day. But God changed me and He can change you even when your circumstances don’t. You can live above your circumstances, in the power of His might. If you perceive while reading this that you do or could have a root of bitterness in your heart, or maybe just people that need forgiveness, below is a prayer you can say to deal with the unforgiveness in your life.
Prayer for forgiveness
Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus, and by the power of his blood, I forgive and release to you ____________________(name whoever you know you have unforgiveness toward). I ask Your forgiveness for holding onto these offenses____________________________ and I release them to You today. I choose to not speak about them again or to deliberately remember them, and should the enemy offer them to me as a thought I will cast down that thought and bring every thought into captivity and to the obedience of Christ. I ask now Lord that You would bless ______________________(name the ones that you have forgiven) and that You would make me a blessing to them. Now and forever more these offenses are under the blood of Jesus and have been thrown into the sea of forgetfulness. Lord I ask Your forgiveness for the vows I have made in order to protect myself from further pain and I cut of those vows____________________ in Jesus’ name, Amen
After a few more years of struggling with an abusive husband, the Lord came on the scene and confronted him with his behavior. But he didn’t feel that he was doing anything wrong and so decided to leave us. It was a horrible time, as I had gone from a stage where I wanted God to take him away if he wasn’t going to change to a place where I really wanted God to keep us together no matter what. Jesus had changed my heart toward him so much that I was even shocked that he would not want to work it out, but would rather leave. He was at that time quite unstable and dangerous, (although he could not see that) that I believed I was to get some help from the police with a restraining order, to protect the children and myself during his time of instability. My husband then decided to take things further and start down the track of custody of the children etc. This was such a shock to me that that was what was in his heart, although he had indicated this before he went, I just thought he was mouthing off. Anyway, then started a two-year saga in the courts. (The saga never really ceases and reaches far beyond court until the children grow up, I guess)
Anyway, not long after this breakup, of which my parents were very supportive, comforting and helpful, I was laying on my bed one afternoon talking to God while the children were with their dad, my usual conversation with the Lord at that time was about what was going to happen with my marriage. I recall reading a Christian magazine and reading a story about a lady who had been in a similar situation like me, I knew who she was and had heard her testimony before, and in this article of her testimony she said these words, ‘that the Lord told her to go back to her father’s house, as she needed to learn to be a daughter before she could be a wife.’ Well these words leapt out at me and I knew that this was what the Lord was saying to me too. This woman actually went back to live with her parents with her two little boys.
Then I got to thinking, how could I take six children and go and live in my parent’s three-bedroom house? Surely God this is not what you are saying to me? I knew He had said those words to me, but the practicality was going to be interesting.
Well, He showed me that it was me that had to go back, not all of us and the strategy that He gave me was to ask my parents if I could come up to their place one weekend a month to stay.
At this time the children’s father was not able to have the children for a whole weekend and so for me to obey this instruction God needed to do two things: one was to provide care for my children; and the other was to get my parents to agree to let me come. The later I thought was harder as I didn’t believe that my parents wanted a Christian fundamentalist in their house once a month and our relationship had not been tested like this since I had left home at eighteen. So I rang my parents and knew that even though it was usually mum I spoke to and would ask permission for things when we were children, especially when we wanted a positive answer from dad. This time I was to ask dad no matter what, and his answer would also be my confirmation if this was God or not, even though I was sure it was.
Mum used to soften the blow for us so that when we would approach dad, he already knew what we were going to ask and his reaction would not be so scary because he had had time to think about it, or mum would let us know when was the best time to ask, or tell us not to ask at all as it would not be received. Well mum answered and she was suggesting all reasons why this might not be a good idea, I told her I really needed to ask dad directly and that whatever he answered I would respect.
I spoke to dad and his response was a simple,” yes”, straight away. I knew this was God’s hand. I told dad that I wanted to come up and spend some time with them and with God over these weekends and he had no problem with it at all.
Then, the Lord provided my children a wonderful lady who had six children of her own to take my six children for these weekends, and so the season began. This was a new thing for both my parents and I and so we were walking very cautiously at first, trying to make sure that we didn’t step on each others toes.
It was as if they knew something was different this time and I knew God was working behind the scenes. I found it to be a glorious time with the Lord and at the same time a wonderful time with my parents as I would spend time talking with mum and dad about different things, and just having fellowship together.
While going through this season, which lasted about eighteen months, God worked on the issues I had with submission. He started a real healing work in the area of my femininity and emotions. I really didn’t trust men and was too scared to put myself under their authority completely because I didn’t feel that they were after my best interest, but rather their own. I also held parts of me back and could not give myself totally to a man as I was always waiting for the let down, put down or backlash from them. I had my guard up and had learnt to be self sufficient in a lot of areas because I thought this would keep me safe from having to be in the hands of someone who would use me or just abandon me. Jesus I felt somewhat safe with, people I didn’t and I hadn’t reached the place where I felt safe with people because of Jesus in my life.
So I went off to the Christian bookshop and asked God to direct me to some books He might want me to read and study while going through this time at my parents house. I knew why He was sending me there so I figured He knew who He wanted to mentor me while there. He led me to four books and they were just perfect choices for me. So I started my journey on learning to be a daughter and a woman.
One of the things that occurred during this time was my divorce from my husband. My parents had become very supportive of my quest to know God better and our relationship was going well, so when it came time to get divorced I knew the Lord wanted me to put myself back under the headship of my father. I knew that I was to have a covering if you like over me and it was part of my learning to submit to my dad and trust God in it. I explained to my dad that this meant that I would come to him whenever I had any major decisions in my life to make and that I would be seeking His advice and direction in them. That also if he thought that I shouldn’t do something that I really wanted to do I would respect him and not do it, I was back at the beginning, like a daughter who had never left home.
Now I knew dad had respect for my faith and where I was coming from by this stage and he accepted this challenge graciously. I don’t think at that time either of us really knew what it all meant, but we were willing to go with what the Lord was requiring. Dad was great and I felt safer than I had ever felt with his authority before (or so I thought).
With everything the Lord tells us to do there is surely going to be a test on it, and this was no exception. He led me through decisions where I felt confident that whichever way dad felt to go I could have lived with the answer, and in none of them did dad and I clash or argue. God had grown me up some and showed me how He can work through our parents to bring about His will. Then came the biggy!
I had received a revelation one day from the scripture in 1 Peter 3:5,6
For in this manner, in former times, the holy women who trusted in God also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, whose daughters you are if you do good and are not afraid with any terror.
Now the background to this scripture is found in Genesis 12:10-20, but briefly it goes like this: Abram took his family to Egypt during a famine and asked Sarai to say to the men in the land that she was his sister not his wife. This was because he was scared that they would kill him to have her because she was beautiful. She was his half sister, but she was also his wife. She obeyed him and Pharaoh took a shine to her and asked for her to be brought into his harem to have her. She did not protest, but quietly trusted and obeyed. God gave pharaoh a dream and told him she belonged to another, and God rescued her out of that situation.
Now I would have had great difficulty with this decision of Abrams’, and I would have protested vehemently with some not so nice words about his cowardice. I would have been very afraid and giving way to this fear not obeyed, nor trusted God. So when on this day I saw this scripture in my own life that I had given way to fear with many situations in my marriage and reacted poorly, I felt I owed my ex-husband an apology and a opportunity to reconcile. I lived in fear with what he would do or get me to do and so I was regularly giving way to this fear even as a Christian and I believed I needed to put my trust in God and the authorities He placed over me.
I went to my ex-husband and apologized and explained what I had done and told him I would reconcile if that was what he wanted to do and that I realized the damage I had done through this and would learn to trust God with him and not let my fear rule me. Part of me was rejoicing over this and the other parts were still very scared, but I had put myself back under dad’s authority and this was my big test to trust God to intervene if necessary and to give my dad wisdom.
I told my ex that because we were divorced I was back under my father’s authority and that he needed to ask my father again to marry me. I decided to trust that whatever decision my father came to would be what God wanted me to do, so no matter that my ex-husband hadn’t changed I was not looking for outward securities, but to Jesus, for that was where my security needed to be.
Psalm 62:8 Trust in Him at all times, you people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.
I had poured out my heart to Him and now I needed to walk in my new found revelation of not giving into the fear I felt if my dad said I was to remarry or my fears to my dad’s reaction to this question in the first place. My father didn’t like this man and had refused to speak to him in the past. I thought that dad would be angry for me putting him in this position. I then had to trust that God would speak to my father, if my father even considered the question. Well my ex-husband rang and asked my father and he was great about it, totally blew me away with how well he responded. He was not angry with me at all. It was on the weekend of my 34th birthday three weeks from when dad was asked and I was going to spend it with my parents and we were going to talk about the decision. I wasn’t there when my ex rang my father and I hadn’t spoken about it with dad at this time.
However my ex turned up at my party beforehand and told my dad, in private, that he didn’t have the same faith as me and didn’t think it wise to remarry me, he also made some comments about his medical condition affecting his ability to be a good father and husband. That weekend we were to talk about it I was really scared of the outcome, did God really want me to be with this man? What was dad going to do? If I remarried could I really go through the abuse again? Would it be different? What was going to happen to me? Moreover what was going to happen to my children?
I wasn’t aware of what my ex told my father until later and my father said that before this private conversation that day with my ex, he would’ve supported me if I wanted to go ahead and give this man another try, however because of what he was told my father said that he didn’t believe it to be a good idea. Phew! I can tell you as saddened as I was that the children would forgo a father in their lives at this time, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that God had definitely been the One to set me free from this man in the first place.
We can trust our Savior and Lord to rescue us when we submit to His ways. I learnt that submission was a safe place to be not a place of control. I can only say that my Heavenly Father obviously revealed the true heart of this man and rescued me from going down a path that would have been disastrous.
I learnt a greater level of faith and a greater level of understanding in the character of my Heavenly father, through this situation, as well I learnt that I could trust my earthly father because God chose him to be the person in authority over me and to look out for my best interest and so He could get any information to my father in helping to make decisions on my behalf.
Am I saying that if we obey our parents as the Bible tells us to, that God will always make things turn out right the first time, certainly not! People have their own free will and people ignore God’s prompting all the time. However, I believe that when I do my part it doesn’t hinder what God wants to do in my life and will turn things around for good eventually, why? Because God promises that it will go well with us if we do.
Just to conclude this chapter, I know that there will be people out there who will be horrified at the thought of submitting to their parents because of who their parents are, but you must understand that God is the Head of all and He can be trusted. Also God never promised that in it going well for us we would always get our way; or decisions might be downright painful. However He does promise that it will go well with us. Eventually it has to turn around for good because, ‘God is not a man that He should lie’.
Prayer dealing with fear
Father, I come before You today, in repentance. I ask for forgiveness for not trusting in You and Your word. I ask forgiveness for not trusting Your choice of parents for me. You are Almighty God and You care even about the little sparrow, how much more do You care for me. I have feared man and what he can do to me and not in Your justice and truth and compassion. I ask that You would renew my faith and strengthen me when I go to fear instead of believing in Your goodness, in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Page 2/25/2012 Chapter Six– What’s in a Blessing?
The next revelation I received about why God wants us to obey and honour our parents was in the area of blessing. First I want to have a look at what blessing actually means.
The word blessing is more than just a nicety that we say to someone down the road as we pass by, or when someone sneezes. It holds much more meaning and power than that. The dictionary says this: bless - to consecrate by a religious rite: to request of God the bestowal of divine favour on: to bestow good of any kind upon. Blessing - a special favour, mercy, or benefit. Blessed - sacred: divinely or supremely favoured.
Other words used to describe what blessing means from the English Thesaurus are: Bless - consecrate, dedicate, exalt, extol; bestow, endow, favour, give, grant, grace, provide.
Blessing - consecration, dedication; approval, backing, consent, permission, regard, support; advantage, benefit, bounty, gain, help, profit.
You can see that the word bless and the action of blessing go much deeper and are much more powerful than probably you thought. But for the purpose of simplicity and ease of understanding for this chapter and book, I am going define blessing as, ‘the empowering to prosper’ which sums up a lot of the qualities of what it means. It would do you good to look up for yourself the meanings and do a study for yourself and get a good understanding of this word.
It holds a lot of power and this is why God used it when He wanted to empower someone to prosper and why His servants and children used it for that same purpose. Let’s take a look at how and when it was used in the Bible. In the book of Genesis God blessed the creatures and mankind so as to be fruitful and multiply.
And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the fowl multiply in the earth. Genesis 1:22
And God blessed them and said to them, Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it [using all its vast resources in the service of God and man]; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and over every living creature that moves upon the earth. Genesis 1:28 (Amp)
So fruitfulness and multiplication are results of blessing, God did not bless any other creation only those He wanted to bear fruit. Blessing also comes with obeying Gods directions, when we go from one place in life to another under God’s command we need His blessing to go with us. It brings comfort to know that we have God’s favour and empowerment to prosper in our next destination.
Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curseth thee: and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed Genesis 12: 1-3
When we are blessed we are empowered to be a blessing to others.
Blessing [empowering to prosper] also comes with obedience to God’s commands and ways.
Therefore you shall keep the commandment, the statutes, and the judgments, which I command you today, to observe them. Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the lord your God will keep you the covenant and the mercy, which He swore to your fathers. And He will love you and bless you and multiply you; He will also bless the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land……………………you shall be blessed above all the peoples;……………and the Lord will take away from you all the sickness. Deuteronomy 7:12-15 (NKJ)
Now it shall come to pass, if you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the lord your God will set you high above all nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the Lord your God…. Deuteronomy 28:1,2 (NKJ)
…. that the heavens [came into] existence long ago by the word of God…2Peter 3:5 (Amp)
Behold, I have received a command to bless; He has blessed, and I cannot reverse it. Numbers 23:20 (NKJ)
For the word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart. Hebrews 4:12 (Amp)
So we can see that it is well within God’s power and range to bless, but what about us as people. Can we bestow this sort of favour on each other? Who has the authority to do so? Let’s have a look.
He said, “Bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son’s game, so that my soul may bless you.”…………..And he came near him and kissed; and he smelled the smell of his clothing, and blessed him and said… Genesis27: 25-27 (NKJ)
Then Israel saw Joseph’s sons…and he said, “Please bring them to me, and I will bless them.” Genesis 48:8,9 (NKJ)
And Jacob called his sons and said; “Gather together, that I may tell you what shall befall you in the last days”… And He blessed them; he blessed each one according to his own blessing. Genesis 49:1,28 (NKJ)
But the King said to Absolom, “No, my son, let us not all go now, lest we be a burden to you.” Then he urged him, but he would not go; and he blessed him. 2Sanuel 13:25 (NKJ)
Then David said to Abigail: “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me! And blessed is your advice and blessed are you… 1Samuel 25:33 (NKJ)
It seems to me that God would encourage us to bless those around us with genuine and sincere blessings. The people in the Hebrew culture understood the power of blessing as they have lived with it from the beginning and their patriarchs have passed on the blessing to their children and it has gone down through the generations. This was God’s idea so that we would live fulfilled lives fully able to do the work and the will of God for our lives. And whatever God blesses or considers a good thing, which He has blessed cannot be revoked by any other source.
It was the privilege of the parents to bestow a blessing on their children at different stages of their life. This was done with naming the baby on the eighth day after birth; at age thirteen there was a celebration and blessing to take the child from childhood into the beginning of adulthood; then there was the blessing of the child’s destiny or work; then there was the marriage blessing, suggesting that the parents approved with the choice of mate; then the children were empowered to bless their parents, the cycle then starts with the children who will then have their own children.
When these blessings are missing from our lives by default cursing in those areas become evident. There are only two ways in life that God has set out before us: Behold, I set before you today a blessing and a curse…. See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil… I call heaven and earth as witness today against you that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life that both you and your descendants may live… Deuteronomy 11:26; 30:15,19
Now that I have shown you a little what the word says about blessing and how important it is for us to pray, declare; proclaim blessings on our families and others.
One afternoon while lying on my bed at home talking with God, I was curious as to why my parents had said that I could marry my husband when they had never met him before the day he asked them to marry me. I was engaged before him when I was in college to a man that I truly loved with all my heart and when it came time for him to ask them the same question, they said no. They had met him and known this man for a while as we dated in college for most of the time. They didn’t agree with the idea because they didn’t like him and he wasn’t Catholic. So along comes this stranger they had never met before (in fact I hadn’t had contact with my parents much at all since the breakup of my first engagement, of which they wouldn’t have a part of) he could have been an axe murderer for all they knew, and they go and say yes. This never made sense to me at all, in fact it convinced me that they didn’t love me at all and just wanted to palm me off to someone.
So I asked God why did the first relationship where I was so in love and would do anything for this man didn’t make it, yet this marriage which was such a disaster from the beginning, and a relationship on the rebound was still hanging in there? It didn’t make sense to any part of me; it even looked like God wanted me to be miserable.
When I was engaged to this other man, and it wasn’t looking to last I had thought I was pregnant, he said he would marry me if I was, but I wasn’t. Yet not long after my engagement to my husband I found out I was pregnant and was then trapped into going through with the marriage much earlier than I wanted, or was ready. I couldn’t understand why God didn’t allow me to be pregnant to the man I wanted, yet to a man that I had already started feeling concern about marrying, I fell pregnant so easy. Go Figure!
So that’s when He showed me the power of the blessing of my parents. My parents had not given their blessing for me to marry the first man, but they had to the second man. God told me that it was the power of my parents approval, and blessing that gave the second marriage power to sustain, it was as if the blessing was doing it’s best to cause us to succeed, blessing can’t do anything else, but prosper. Our marriage had been given the ability to be empowered to prosper, and that is what held it together so far. However the first engagement was totally against my parent’s wishes and therefore had the opposite power at work in it, death. That is exactly what happened. In fact this other man’s mother wasn’t approving of us marrying either and said so.
I hope you can understand what power there is in getting your parents approval and blessing, even if it is not a good choice of spouse, if the parents bless it then that power goes to work to make it successful. Whether we actually realize this and work with it and not against it is another thing.
I saw the support and the respect that God has for parental authority and for the power of the blessing from my parents and I then went to my parents and discussed this with them. I also asked them why they let me marry a man that they didn’t know; they surprised me totally with their response. They told me that because last time I had decided to rebel and go off and get engaged anyway, without their permission or approval. I also had had nothing to do with them for having made that decision so they thought that if they had said no again that I would take off again and they might not see me at all. So it was because they loved me and were afraid of never seeing me again, they felt compelled to say yes and bless the union, because they thought that this was what I wanted. Little did they know that deep in my heart I was hoping they would say no, so as to get me off the hook with this man, as he was pushing me with the marriage and I wasn’t ready. So this discussion and the revelation God gave me about my parent’s decision and the reasons behind all these events brought much healing to us all. It turned a corner for me in my relationship with my parents, and with God.
Never underestimate the power of blessing especially when someone God has placed in authority over us blesses us. Again we see the command of God come into play, when I didn’t obey them and honour their decisions at first it started a whole domino affect of disaster in my life.
Did you see the power of the cursing in my first relationship, both sets of parents wouldn't bless our union and so God wasn't going to either. God respects the authority of parents, as it was His idea. Does this mean that if God wants something to happen in your life and your parents are against it, it won’t happen? I don’t know the complete answer to that, but I do know that if we are obeying and honouring our parents then eventually God will get us on track no matter who tries to block the way. Read the account of Joseph in Genesis and you can see that no matter how much people tried to destroy him, his obedience to his father and God brought him to the place that God wanted him.
If you push ahead in your own plans even when the blessing isn't there, you could get your own way, but in the long run will you really be happy?
Galatians 6:7,8 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.
This is why by default we are cursed if not blessed, God calls us to choose which way we want to go and He tells us what will happen if we don't make right choices.
Deuteronomy 30:19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
He then tells us how as children we can make sure we stay blessed
Ephesians 6:1-3 Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; which is the first commandment with promise. That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.
See how God shows us how to have things go well with us? Obey our parents and it will go well with us.
Renouncing the Curse
Father, I come before you this day with my sin of rebellion against my parent’s choices for me in my life __________(name rebellious decisions you made). You gave them to me to help me be guided into right decisions for my life in all areas. In particular I bring the area of my spouse ________(name spouse) before you and ask forgiveness wherever I have not received wisdom from, nor acted in obedience towards my parents in this choice. I ask that You bring blessing to my marriage where it has been cursed. In Jesus’ name, Amen
For people not yet married
Father, I come before You this day with my sin of rebellion against my parent’s choices for my life ____________(name rebellious decisions). You gave them to me to help me be guided into right decisions for my life in all areas. In particular I bring the area of a future partner to You and I ask that if __________(name person) is not the right choice according to Your will that You will help me do what is right in Your sight according to this matter. That You will give my parents wisdom in helping me sort this out and that _________(name person) will be given understanding as well to grasp Your will. I ask that the curse of disobedience be lifted for me regarding this and that Your blessings would flow, that I would trust You with this matter, in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Chapter Seven – Servant hood or Robin Hood
The next step in my journey of understanding God’s command about honouring and obeying parents was in the realm of my own parenting. I wanted their lives to go well and for them to live long as well, so how did I fit in with this?
I now had to learn how to help my children honour and obey me. I realized soon enough that children are your worst critic and you can’t hide too much of your true self from them. Jesus said…
If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord, neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know these things happy are ye if ye do them. John 13:14-17
If I was to teach this principle to my children then I was to be an example first. God had taken me through many stages of learning what it meant to honour and obey, but now I needed to learn that my part in this principle as the parent was to be a servant to my children. Jesus never forced us to serve Him or to respect Him, He never forced us to love Him. However He CAUSED us to love Him through His great act of love and servant hood in going to the cross. We too must lay down our lives for our families in order for them to know we are sincere.
The only way we are able to do this is if we are plugged in to Jesus through the Holy Spirit, and are allowing His life to energize us and fill us so it can flow out to others.
For many years I couldn’t be a good parent or wife, as I needed to grow up myself. I was like a little girl playing house in the real world. I had to fulfill the needs of others and I was busy looking for my needs to be met. I had to look after others and I was still looking for someone to look after me. I had to give where I wanted to receive.
I thought that when I got married and had children that I would have this unconditional love from everyone in my family, that they would always judge me by my intentions and not by my actions, although this is not how I judged them. I didn’t count the cost and nor could I as I was too immature and self centered to do so. Until Jesus stepped into my life this was how I saw things. He taught me to follow His word and as I did I grew up.
I still had trouble with passing this on to my own children. I told them that the scripture says children need to obey their parents, that they were to honour me etc, and it wasn’t sinking in, why?
It didn’t seem that my children loved each other or me much, I didn’t like the type of mother I was, there always seemed to be bickering; animosity; jealousies etc and no matter how much scripture or prayer I poured into my family it made very little difference. Why was this so? I was applying the word and asking God for help and yet still I couldn’t find the answer. My house was more peaceful in many ways now that the fighting and hurt had stopped from the marriage, but the order I was looking for didn’t seem to be able to be accomplished through my usual organization and rules etc
The abuse in my marriage overshadowed me being able to see what the problem was, and any time I went to God with this, all I could see was the abuse and that seemed to me to be the key. If I could just deal with this marriage then things would be different in the home. This is true….things would have been better, but this wasn’t the whole problem.
Once the dust settled from the divorce I noticed that there was still this problem with order and respect. Yes we had organization and discipline, but it was always a battle, why?
Back to God I go, and this is what I noticed. I noticed that I gave my family less than what I gave others. Others would get the best of me and my family would get the dregs. I expected them to always understand why I was always too tired, too cranky, too frustrated, too impatient, too something………. for them. What was wrong with me, why was it no problem to serve others and not my family in the same way? I did love my family, so why did I give them so little?
Well, I call it the, “Robin Hood syndrome”- where I would take from the rich (family) and give to the poor (others). I would take the resources and attitudes and love and time etc that was for my family to help them grow and be nurtured, and I gave it out to others. I didn’t for a long time see that I was taking things from my family. I just thought that they didn’t care about me or what I was trying to do.
Now at first it looks like an admirable thing to do, to give sacrificially to others. Well, what can look to others as very honourable is often the mask of a very selfish or hurt person.
When people have been abused or neglected those who have been close to them, a parent, a spouse, a teacher, religious leader etc usually do it. So they then learn that it is not safe to be vulnerable with those who you are close to. They won’t go to the ones close to them to receive as they could get rejected, so they will often either turn inward and be completely self indulgent or out toward others by helping the needy. This way they can always walk away if they get hurt, they get convince themselves they are needed, they can get needs met without having to be too intimate.
Most of the time others’ needs could be met some other way, but we want to be someone’s saviour. This type of giving is not born out of a godly servant heart, but rather a self- centered desire to be the saviour in someone else’s life. The need to feel important, the need to look good to others, to quench the feelings of guilt or duty, to receive recognition and praise. None of these are correct motives for doing something.
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity (love), it profiteth me nothing. 1Corinthians 13:3
Our motive is to be love for others, not love for self.
Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life shall preserve it. Luke 17:33
The truth is most of us are so conditioned by our society, families, churches etc that it is okay to neglect our homes in the name of service and loyalty to others. We don’t understand how families can fall apart and not function when we are trying so hard to be a servant to others. We have fallen under the deception that we can take our families for granted, that if things aren’t working at home, then let’s go and do something outside the home to avoid facing it. Let’s look good to people, so that people scratch their heads with us when we come a whining about how hard we try and things don’t seem to be working.
If we are looking to only receive from our families, then when they don’t seem to give us what we want then we tend to look elsewhere to fill that void. If we look to our families for our only identity, and a spouse leaves or children leave, then we can go elsewhere to try and find a new identity rather than trying to find out what is wrong in us. Rather than possibly facing more rejection from our loved ones we go outside the home to find love and recognition, often through acts of service to others more needy than ourselves.
If we do as Jesus did and look to our Heavenly Father for our needs, then look to be a servant to those that God has placed in our immediate sphere of influence, then we will be following His example. Not everyone appreciates Jesus’ love or willingly submits to it, but He continues to make it available to us. Honouring and obeying one’s leaders comes from the leader showing the way.
So this is what the Lord showed me to do with my children, stop putting my energy outside and invest in them. Especially as a single mum I need to be careful not to cover myself too thinly across my responsibilities toward God and others. Let me balance all what I have said with this. It doesn’t mean that we never help others outside our families, it doesn’t mean to not at times as a family show sacrificial service, it doesn’t mean we don’t have an eternal perspective on the world around us, but rather, not at the expense of our first ministry to our families.
Once your family know your heart and you lead by example, once you have captured their trust then they are happy to serve others sacrificially even together most times. We can then fulfill the great commission together without neglecting the more important matters.
So I gave up doing home groups, outreaches, driving for church, to make sure my serving was first to them and to kill off this wrong motive to serve. One of the reasons I chose to home school my children was to show them how much I am committed to them and their final outcome, as it can be too easy to put them into school so I can go off and do my own thing and look real good to others while neglecting what they really need.
So we need to go to God when we find our children not wanting to submit to His word and just check….is it my example Lord, am I being a Robin Hood or a Servant Hood.
Prayer for Servant hood
Heavenly Father I come before you today, with a heart of repentance about my misguided efforts at service. Your example was to serve with a motive of love and joy. I acknowledge that my motive has been one of self and pride. I haven’t given my best to my family and/or to others I ask for Your forgiveness. Wash away with Your precious blood my filthy attitudes. Help me to be Your hands and feet, Your servant to my family and others. I ask that as I go to them with a sincere heart to recognize my sin toward them that You will go ahead of me and soften their hearts, helping them to forgive me for their sakes and that we would be united with your love and for Your purposes, in Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Chapter eight – Lady in waiting
Having looked at this principle of God’s 5th commandment of honouring your mother and father, my prayer is that as I have shared how this was outworked in my life both the obedience to it and the disobedience of it, that you will have a greater understanding and desire to want to outwork it in your life. God doesn’t give us anything that will hurt us, or spoil something that would be good for us, He wants to protect and bless us.
Just as a fence line shows you where your property starts and someone else s’ finishes, so it is with Gods commands to us, they are a fence line designed to keep us within the safe bounds of His kingdom, protection and provision. Don’t be stubborn toward Him, He is so faithful and loving that He will leap to show you what promises await you within the fence line of His word.
Even if your parents are the most difficult to honour, just be willing and Jesus will show you the way through, I couldn’t see my way through on many occasions, but I took His hand and He lead me gently through to this day, where my relationship with my parents is the best it has ever been.
I am now a Lady in waiting, waiting for my Heavenly Father to provide a new husband and father for us, and waiting for my earthly father to approve and bless it. Waiting to see the awesome protection that comes from submission, and the evidence of it in my life in this area. Waiting to see what reward will come from obedience. Waiting to see my children pass this on to their own.
However I do not wait anymore with a fear of what will happen, but rather a hope and joy of knowing that all will be well with me.
So now I have shared the tools and the ways in which My Heavenly Father used to remodel me. There have been many a principle and command that God has changed my life with, but this was one more important and the one I see causes so many broken relationships and bad decisions in our lives. God gave us parents to be that protective covering and that guiding counsel, as they have traveled the road before us.
I hope that in writing this book I have given some hope to those out there where things didn’t go the way they thought it would, that the testimony of Gods goodness lies in His work in us, as we become His trophies of grace. That we made bad decisions often because we didn’t obey God’s command in honouring and obeying our parents and we reap consequences for disobeying. That God can turn it around at any time if we are willing to submit and deal with it. That disobedience to this command can and usually will affect our marriage and other relationships including how we see God. That even though I have shared His way of dealing with this in me doesn’t mean He will deal with it in you the same way, but if you are willing He WILL deal with it.
It has been a long process and it has been as painful as it has been wonderful. There has been many high’s and many low’s, but it is all worth it. I am not at the end of his renovations yet. I feel that He has dealt with a great deal of the foundations, and now needs to refurbish me with beautiful things. These things will be costly and precious, and I look forward to them with all my heart.
Jesus said, And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free
John 8:32
I AM FREE, How about You?
