Tag: Human Relationships

The Wife of Noble Character: A Chunk of My Thoughts on the Topic

by theparacleteshammer, posted in Principles Of Relationships

40 years…..

I know the arguments….

The discussion….

The debates…..

And the back-and-forth….

And enough experience on receiving end of what it should not look like in several dozen facets.

First marriage destroyed through adultery.

Second marriage lost due to interference from control, jealousy, and witchcraft because I work with survivors of Satanic Ritual Abuse.

January 14, 2005 to April 15, 2013: 3013 days.

April 19, 2014 to July 19, 2022: 3013 days.

And both marriages had many lessons to impart to me, and these treasures were not easily excavated. It was a crucible for the silver, and a furnace for the gold…

And I would like to offer the following bits, so thank you to those friends who enabled me to see some facets of a number of right ways of looking at this topic, and I would like to share things that maybe do not get enough daylight.

For those who ask if I am going to touch the egalitarian-complimentarian-headship debate, well, we will see.

But allow me to lead it with a couple of lines of thought….

Three Threads

Thread 0 offered, then set off to the side: Regardless of how I interpret Ephesians 5:21 followed by verses 22ff (I am very much of the view that in the context of the submission that all believers offer one to another, a wife still has a further place to submit in some way to a husband to loves her as Messiah loves His body), we are missing some critical ideas in this topic, because we look at roles, without looking at birthrights.

And design….

Women are not merely to play like they have hammers and swords….

Rather, they are to use them.

Thread 1:

A woman and her sword, once separated, leave her vulnerable in ways she should not be made so.

 Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the L-RD G-d had made. He said to the woman, “Did G-d actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but G-d said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For G-d knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like G-d, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. 

Genesis 3:1-6 ESV

The chief clown, Lucifer (I call demons “clowns”) came to the woman with her man and spoke to the woman.

For those who say “the man should have spoken up”, I am going to stop you right there.

The attack of the clowns frequently shows us an indicator of design. Husbands and wives are made as foxhole partners. Period. Get that one into your spirit. I implore you. Wrestle with the junk that fights against both of you, and woman of G-d, pick up your sword.

Or your tent peg.

Healed Exhorter/Servant combos in action…

The Other Two Points:

At this point, the issue is not one of submission, but of dominion, and refusing the victim spirit. Also, it is not about blame-shifting, but about fighting together against the real enemy. The real question is not are you loving and submitted to one another. The real questions (and from this, submission and love will flow, as well as a whole host of other dynamics) are these:

“Are you together learning from Father how to build; and how to fight?”

“Not only that, but are you aware of the raw materials you have together with which to build in a creative fashion?”

Point 2: Building

I pose these questions to y’all, gang, because there are times when the Father is not going to give you directions to obey, but is rather going to turn the two of you warriors loose in order to make choices together about what to build creatively.

First, in the early days of your relationship, you are going to struggle because you are going to feel like there is no user manual for building. So you are might desperately struggle with working together as you slap something together because you feel like you have been thrown together with little training. And then, as you grow together, working with one another, synching with one another, you are going to get more intentional about what you are doing, and as you grow more intentional, you can begin to incorporate strategy, and timing, and understanding, and pacing, and wisdom, and you will get able to fold together intimacy with one another together with skill in building.

Slaves obey. Sons create.

Create and build together. There is something there that can be done. He wants to partner with you to enable and endue and empower you two to build.

Point 3: Fighting

Second, to fight together.

Are you also aware of the real enemy that you should both be protecting and covering one another from? Do you have your lover’s six? Can they count on you to protect them and to give the enemy an earful of the Word of G-d Himself, and a faceful of His shekinah on their behalf?

“Having done all, to stand….”
As Anne Hamilton has said, have you allowed the Bridegroom Warrior to kiss you into your armor? And that is something husband and wife were made to do in tandem with He who is Adonai T’Sevaot.

Again, as with the building part, you might find yourself clumsy as you work to direct your assaults away from your mate, whom the enemy will tempt you to attack as the source of all your problems, and against the real enemy. This is why you should exercise plenty of descretion when choosing a mate. And if you already have one, then work the best with what you have. This is not a decision to rush into, but rather to wait until the markers and evidence that this will be a redemptive relationship, one in which you can accomplish more redemptively together than apart. When you have the markers there, then a lot of the marriage prophecies and dependence on other people saying “thus saith the L-rd” can fall by the wayside.

Are you a safe place for your mate, and a terror to the enemy that assaults them?

Are you a confidant?

Do you hold secrets back one from another?

Can you share the little things together?

Do you have the common interests on some level?

Is there a cause?

The biblical text that gets overlooked, and I think the King Jimmy puts this best.
Matthew 19:5

For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?

It’s not about the love and submission (shorthand for the Ephesians 5 text) at this point….

Go beyond the elementary principles to the roots of those things which give life to a marriage.

And at the root of every marriage, let me CAPS out three words in Matthew 19:5.

FOR THIS CAUSE….a man will leave his parents and be joined to his wife….

You have to have a cause….there has to be a reason….a purpose….for the connection….

What’s your cause…..

What’s your reason for wanting to wake up with this man, this woman…

As David said before he fought Goliath….”Is there not a cause?”

Do you have a reason? Is there something you do incredibly well redemptively with this woman that you do not do with another? Or this man?

The cause will show you what to build and what your fight is.

And are there connection points between you and she….or you and he…..?

And is there enough diversity and difference between the two of you to make things interesting.

And is there enough of a draw beyond the superficial that you will last?

I cannot believe I am sharing this cut…..

Oy,

Thanks Tiffany….

Before You “I Do”

Though, a man should be confident enough in his own identity and authority on some level BEFORE HE STEPS INTO A RELATIONSHIP BEFORE IT TURNS INTO MARRIAGE that he will not have married a harpy or yielded his authority and is asking a woman to lead him or make decisions for him OR TO OTHERWISE GIVE HIM HIS LEGITIMACY…

Conversely, a woman should be confident enough in her own identity and authority on some level BEFORE RELATIONSHIPS AND MARRIAGE HAPPEN that she does not marry either an abusive or controlling jerk or a passive, milquetoast man, or an immature manchild who will not listen to her voice when she speaks to him in fullness, honesty, and rawness.

There has to be not merely the biblical text triteism of mutual submission, but also some level of mutual vulnerability, and both parties walking in partnership with Messiah, and willing to work through the tough issues, especially of growth, healing, deliverance, and love with one another.

And G-d did not say we had to be completely healed before we step into relationships or marriage. Nobody in Scripture, including Messiah who was fully human was fully whole without emotional issues as a human before stepping into relationship.

What G-d looks for is willingness and vulnerability, not absence of wounds or scars. The three together of y’all, working through things and journeying on this adventure…G-d looks for people who will just walk with Him and put Him at the center and forefront of their lives.

And couples who will walk together with Him, protecting one another.

It really means something when we war together against the enemy of our souls. And instead of the usual dynamics, we look at life between two battle buddies, two partners in crime, two companions in this eternal adventure.

And we engage with one another without passive/agression.

Some couples choose the way of sarcasm, and that works for them.

The real clincher here though is, are you together on close to a similar page about the L-rd, and the enemy?

And the next question that I would ask is, is there a spirit-to-spirit connection between you and your beloved, because so much happens in that space, when the portions of your spirit, and the portions of your beloved’s spirit actually interact and mingle.

It’s not just about being one flesh. It’s about the joining of spirits and the connection of journeys so that things flow in alignment.

More about that in another post…..

Cafeteria Masculinity and Femininity, LGBT Confusion, AND Kingdom Eunuchs in Matthew 19:12

by theparacleteshammer, posted in Sexuality

What follows promises to be short and sweet. Whether you take offense is a personal choice, and something you might have to work out. I do not claim to answer every point any community asks, but there will be a couple of issues that I will point out, as they flow through this topic

First, it would appear sexuality, male and female, was created on the Third Day with the introduction of the plants and dry land, and that reproduction and the spread of creation requires male and female interacting one with another.

Now, the exceptions aside where gender switch happens in biology, which happen to be a gross minority, and understanding that many of those switches occur in order to create a male/female binary, most of creation by a wide margin requires both parts interacting one with another.

G-d created them male and female, and G-d intended that generation and multiplication happen across the board. This is His design, and well beyond any counterflowing viewpoints.

Second, while conversing with my wife about the transgender issue, and following a conversation with a brother who came out of the transgender arena and back to relatively healthy masculinity, something occurred to me that this brother helped bring to light.

Those who adapt different sexual identity from how they were designed mostly do so with a pick-and-choose system. There is rarely consistency of any sort. That is, trans people generally seem to execute a cafeteria masculinity or femininity.

And the L-rd has made us for more than merely to pick and choose. He did not intend for us to walk in confusion.

Third, I had a conversation with a pastor friend of mine, and he postulated the following question, in light of Matthew 19:12, which reads:

“For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”

Matthew 19:12 ESV

What if we get used to either marriage or sexual deviance as the only two acceptable options, when there might be a third option that few are willing to entertain? Namely, the calling to a life of eunuchhood.

And what if we are forcing people to choose between this (marriage) and that (deviance) when their real expression should be celebacy?

It is an interesting concept to consider.

I do not think healthy and close same-sex friendships are a bad thing. As a Redemptive Gift of Mercy, I have a few of those that I would consider close friends, maybe some intimate.

What I have an issue with is….

…when we think that closeness and intimacy and physical touch means we were meant to embrace a solution that violates all kinds of principles that have been clearly laid-down and later uncontested in the canon of Scripture.

And when He gives principles, and law, and statutes, He does not do it to be a killjoy, but to protect us and to keep us from destruction and from paths that are dead-ends and will keep us from walking out the greater purpose for which we were created.

Gang, being taken into a place of frustration because we think marriage or deviance are the only two acceptable and G-d-ordained possibilities, and we force people into relationships rather than permit them to entertain a lifetime of singleness can rob us of some fine treasures the Father wants to express.

G-d did not make us to solve one problem by creating twelve others.

And perhaps we would do well by letting and celebrating G-d’s design in expressions that are other than the norm and that do not violate cause and effect.

I have seen much destruction when we present or we allow the culture and the SOTA (Spirit of the Age) to teach us and our children what helathy relational expression looks like.

And lest we forget, a man or a woman will reap what they sow. His design for relationships is for relationships where the possibility of multiplication and fruitfulness is a real possibility. Engaging in sexual relationship structures that guarantee both a lifetime of frustration and zero chance for multiplication was never his intent.

For those who wish to pick this apart by marshalling the argument of barrenness (“well, barren people are not able to have kids. Are you condemning them as well?”), then you missed the point and the nuance of what I am saying.

For the barren couple, the possibility of childbirth is very real, and repeatedly we have seen throughout Scripture the L-rd speaking about and dealing with barrenness.

So, no, I am not going to insert the barrenness red herring into this discussion.

What I am saying, is that when our expressions of sexuality violate the fairly-clear cause-and-effect relationships pertaining to human sexuality that the L-rd gave us, we find ourselves in a dangerous place.

And when we fail to recognize or we purposefully neglect other of His principles, such as the principles pertaining to eunuchs in Matthew 19, we will likely increase the chances of our frustration.

Perennial frustration and powerlessness and futility are not the portion of the child of G-d. Seasons where we have a bit of testing and refining and difficulty are. But G-d did not create us and destine us for permanent powerlessness.

So, as you consider masculinity and femininity, be sure to embrace ALL of that which pertains to you, and I implore you to deeply consider whether or not you are allowing woundedness, deception, offense, or buy-in of a cultural system to chart the course of your relational expression.

Those legal/moral passages in Scripture, regardless of the testament in which they are found have a purpose, and they form a fence and boundary markers and building blocks that protect us and with which we can build.

So, build well and defend well what He has given to your charge.

Be blessed, gang.