I was sitting in a fourth grade elementary school class when our teacher was called out to the hallway. When she returned she was crying, telling us between sobs that the President of the United States had been assassinated. After she defined the word “assassinated,” we readied ourselves to return home as she announced an early dismissal.
Devastating news, for sure, that went around the world quickly. But there was another celebrity that died that very same day–the British author C.S. Lewis, an intellectual defender of the Christian faith.
C. S. Lewis was an author of many books that are now classics like: Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters and The Chronicles of Narnia.
Lewis spent most of his earlier years as an atheist. But he began to realize that God was “closing in on him.” He discovered the joy he was missing in life would be found in the faith he had resisted.
Lewis was a rather shy professor of literature at Oxford and Cambridge universities and he passed from this earth in the shadow of another, His death hardly registered on the news blips of the day.
Another personal hero of mine died in the shadow of a famous celebrity. Mother Teresa passed from this world the day before Princess Diana’s extravagant funeral. It’s no secret that Princess Diana, who was a friend of Mother Teresa, would steal the limelight from a woman who had given her life to the poor and the needy. It is said that Mother Teresa could carry all of her life possessions in a five-gallon bucket.
These death eclipses seem unfair, but don’t they speak to how the godly live their lives? It’s not our life that we are lifting up but rather, Christ’s. Even Paul the apostle said, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.”
While the world celebrates the rich and the famous, God celebrates the obedient, the humble and the servant. Recently, during the highest holy days of the Christian faith, The New York Times had a headline article titled, “In This TIme of War, I Propose We Give Up God.” It was just one more anti-God diatribe.
That article reminded me of a 1966 Time magazine cover article announcing God was, in fact, dead. A few years later that same magazine had a cover article titled, “The Jesus Revolution.”
Discovering how we need to change in order to reflect love is an effective strategy for our marriages today. Here are three reality questions to consider.
Question number one: Do you realize that you were born into brokenness? We all have imperfect families, wounded backgrounds and personality difficulties. When we found the “perfect” person, we found someone like ourselves — in need of healing. While weddings reflect perfection, e.g., perfect clothes, flowers, beauty and pageantry, they are actually filled with imperfect people. Psalm 51:5 reveals, “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” I must realize that in my natural, selfish state I do not always reflect Christ to my life mate.
Question number two: Do you realize there is no perfect marriage? Only one relationship on this earth started out perfectly: Adam’s and Eve’s. Their world was perfect, their jobs were perfect and their lives reflected that perfection. But, Adam and Eve chose to walk away from perfection and by the second generation one of their children committed murder. Marriage is not perfect because the two individuals that make up the marriage are not perfect. Within the first 90 days of marriage, we quickly discover we married someone unlike us.
It is God’s story and strategy to begin to hold us together through our differences. You see, my wife is what I am not and I am what she is not, but together we make an amazing and whole team. Ephesians 5: 25- 27 says that, as men, we are called to love our wife as Christ loves His church. We are not Jesus, but we are His representatives.
To love your spouse is to give your life and your love to the point that you bring healing to them.
Our final question; number three: Do you have the mentality of an owner or a renter in marriage? I had a nagging issue with a basement wall in my house that was repeatedly becoming damp. We had torn it apart and rebuilt it only to have moisture show up again. We have now torn it apart a second time. I am the owner; I will do whatever it takes and spend whatever money it takes to make that wall dry again. It’s an owner’s mentality. Owners do what’s best for the property at their own cost and sacrifice. Too many couples are renters today–they’re out the back door while owing three months’ rent. A renter’s mentality in marriage will bring damage to a spouse because they lack long-term commitment. They’ll walk by the weeds every day and not bend over to pull them. A renter in marriage does not think in terms of making an investment in their marriage. Marriage by nature is designed for owners, not renters.
Owners invest their own sweat equity, their life savings and their day-to day care to repair, clean and manage their property. Why? It’s a lifetime investment. It’s an asset, not a liability. Owners desire an increase in value over time.
Do you take ownership for being healed and bringing healing to your marriage? Are you in your marriage for a lifetime investment and have a passion for an increase in value? If you answer, “yes” to these questions, then you are taking ownership, growing through your own brokenness and imperfections.
It was 1920 and the scheme netted him a cool 15 million dollars in just eight months. It’s a scandalous story and it would begin a movement that extends into today’s world.
Charles came up with a unique opportunity for investors when he would buy an asset in one market and sell it at a higher price in another market, or so his story went. After he explained his transaction to his gullible investors, he did not, at the same time, inform them he had no way to sell his product, keeping his investors money. Not being too inept, he was sure to have a payout for the initial investors in order to get the money rolling and attract new customers.
He called his new business The Security Exchange Company and he promised a 50-percent return in interest within 90 days. Lines of people began to form outside his office and he began to bring in a million dollars a week. What was really happening was that older investors were paid the return on their money from newer investors, a pyramid scheme at its best.
Who was this man? Charles Ponzi. He ended up in prison and eventually died penniless. His name, however, infamously lives on and has become the term for swindlers and pyramid scheme masters. Often repeated to this day, “It’s a Ponzi scheme.”
The book of Proverbs in the Bible has a lot to say about money. To the Charles Ponzis of the world, it says this:
Such is the end of all who go after ill-gotten gain; it takes away the lives of those who get it.
Dishonest money will not remain:
Dishonest money dwindles away, but he who gathers money little by little makes it grow.
And, to the persons who are targeting or exploiting certain people today through schemes of dishonesty, God’s word reveals:
He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and he who gives gifts to the rich–both come to poverty.
A misinformed gentleman called me the other day about helping someone in England who had been “beat up and robbed losing all their money and their passport.” Have you heard that story before?
I don’t know about you, but these types of stories bother me, especially when it comes to the most vulnerable. Take the time to inform others in your life to not fall prey to such immoral and appalling schemes. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are lost each year by such schemes and persons in the church can be susceptible to schemes which are “too good to be true.” Let’s help to protect one another.
Have you ever been to an ox pull? We were in New England, seated on a set of old wooden bleachers at a county fair; we had never experienced a real, live ox pull. Let us try to describe it to you: two mammoth oxen are yoked together, side by side, and behind them is an apparatus like a hitch. The hitch is connected to a large chunk of concrete weighing thousands of pounds. The oxen are commanded by their owner (called a driver) to pull together and drag the concrete slab as far as they possibly can. It was quite entertaining, and we immediately began to realize something with the teams of oxen. Some were young and inexperienced. Some pairs were noticeably different sizes. Some simply refused to work with their partner. But those teams that were mature and experienced knew how to work together, with their driver shouting out commands at their sides. Those teams, we noticed, pulled the heavy concrete a lengthy distance.
We found ourselves thinking about how the teams of oxen were a picture of marriage—specifically, the picture of a team of two either working together successfully or failing miserably to pull in unison. It was not the biggest or strongest team that won; it was the oxen that could work together, each performing to the best of its ability. Working alone, the block wouldn’t move an inch; but working in complete harmony, the teams would succeed in reaching the goal.
It astounds us to discover how many couples do not know why they are married. For what reason(s) has God called you together into this union? Those who once were two have been called to move as one. When the two oxen didn’t compete with one another and acted as one, they were surprisingly successful.
Businesses, civic organizations, churches, and the military all have mission statements. If they understand this statement and what goals are to be accomplished, all of the members or employees of these organizations know why they belong. Mission statements are composed of descriptive terms like “to serve the homeless of our city,” “to build a better and more efficient home,” or “to protect our nation’s borders.” When God created man, He also created a mission for man. God gave Adam and Eve an assignment from heaven—to tend the Garden of Eden and to rule over creation.
This assignment was not just busy work; it was a charge from God to care for God’s creation and to replenish the earth. There was purpose, a co-mission in this first marriage, and Adam and Eve went about each day fulfilling that call of God upon their lives. Both you and your spouse can discover your co-mission, just like Adam and Eve. You each have both spiritual and natural gifts that balance and complement. As husband and wife, you are a team, yoked together to fulfill all that the Father has planned for you. Perhaps God has called you to the business realm, to be in worship ministry together, or to raise your children or to pay off your mortgage early. All of these can become pieces of your mission together as a married couple.
Life can get busy and pass us by rather quickly. Before we know it, we’ve been married for five or even ten years. We can begin to myopically focus on the stuff of life that has no real or eternal value or lasting effect upon our lives and the lives of others. It’s important to remember why God called you together in matrimony, and writing your mission statement as a couple can help to refocus your marriage on the things that truly matter.
Where it all began for us
When Mary and I first discovered the idea of mission as a couple, we were already many years into our marriage. Looking back over several decades, we realized that our first co-mission assignment came from our local church. Our pastor asked us if we would consider starting a bus ministry. The idea was to fill a bus with unchurched kids and bring them to Sunday school. We loved visiting the kids and their families every Saturday and picking them up in our red-and- white converted school bus early Sunday morning. Sometimes they ran to the bus half-dressed due to a lack of parental involvement, but they were excited nonetheless. The bus ministry was so successful that we began a second route, and then a third. Soon we were reaching the parents as well as the children and were helping to grow a multicultural fellowship.
I’d venture to guess that most of us like talking more than we like listening. Counselors are paid to listen, but for the majority of us, we’d rather express our opinion versus listening to another’s.
Having written a number of books and plenty of articles and published well over 600 blogs, I have, without trying, widely opened the door for feedback, push back, criticism and opinion. When I write something like a book I embrace the input of others, their corrective feedback and their helpful, critical eye. Using what I call pre- readers makes for a better book. Having hand-selected persons who I know will read the material and will also be willing to give me honest and fair input is invaluable.
By the time a book goes through editing and then proofing, being scoured for theological correctness and cultural sensitivity, etc., the author is ready to be done with it. This process can take several years and can be somewhat grueling.
Our first widely published book, Called Together, was featured in a magazine article about methods of premarital counseling. It was great to see it featured and to read the positive article about its effectiveness. One month later came the letters to the editor. While most were positive, one was extremely negative. It was obvious the writer of the letter never read the book, but those toxic and inaccurate words were already out there and I could not retrieve them or add a rebuttal.
The same is true with online reviews where books are sold. While many are positive, there are those who criticize your work and give you one-star ratings for the most trivial things. Once again, authors cannot provide a rebuttal or even go on the offensive to somehow set the record straight. You have to learn to take the good with the bad and not lose sleep over it.
Articles and blogs are somewhat unusual because it’s much easier to be critical of these than it is a book, primarily because of their shorter length. My experience with this type of writing is a bit different. Let me explain.
Negative responses from your audience might begin with a question. You, the author, do your best to provide an answer. This then provokes another question or two which are often not related to your response to their first question. You once again attempt to not be defensive, take the question as sincere and provide an answer. Now the tone begins to change and you begin to pick up that the questions were leading and a ruse for what is to come.
The next expression is pushback and criticism of your written piece. If you as the author continue to try and respond, the critic can easily become venomous, strongly opinionated and letting you know rather loudly that they are right and you are clearly wrong. The whole thing begins to break down and starts to feel really bad.
The worst part is this is normally not a person who when reading your many blogs or articles ever writes back with a positive comment or word of encouragement. This type of person is waiting for you to slip up and wander off into one of their sacred cows. And this criticism from the critic whose only goal is to prove you wrong by their expertise or life experience, is really to ridicule you and tell you how wrong you are. It is typically pretty unfair, undesired and often unprovoked.
Most likely there will be nothing productive from the conversation and it will become more and more toxic along with the possibility of it also becoming anger-filled.
How should we respond and give critical input to an author?
There are respectful and acceptable steps we can take that do not create further offense, hurt and anger. Let me share a few helpful steps with you. These are steps that I have incorporated into my life as well.
Know your boundaries. Stay within your field of ministry or expertise. (See II Corinthians 10:12-18.)
Earn the right to speak into another’s life and what they write. If at all possible, make sure of the health of the relationship first. This builds trust which allows truth to be spoken without taking offense.
Thoroughly read what is written. Do not allow a word in the piece to cause you to emotionally react. Try to be sure the author is saying what you think they are saying and do your best to not only read words but to hear their heart.
Find the positive. What can you agree with and then include this in your comments.
If you don’t understand something, then humbly ask the author for further clarity. Perhaps you are misreading the piece.
Questions to the author that are leading in nature will be picked up by the author and you will be setting yourself up for a defensive response. Stay away from leading questions. These are questions with an agenda attached to them, e.g., “You don’t really mean what you are saying about ______, do you?”
Give your input through your experience or knowledge humbly. The author will receive it when it is felt that it’s coming from a genuine experience and a genuine heart of humility.
Do not keep the dialogue going beyond one or two responses. It just gets defensive after that. If there is disagreement, let it go.
You can do all these steps without being defensive or argumentative. A know-it-all response will come across as not legitimate, but rather arrogant.
When responding, keep these verses in mind:
12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. (Col. 3:12-14)
6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. (Col. 4:6)
I hope this will help to give improved and more gentle responses in a sincere effort to be a builder in conversation keeping the admonishments in mind from the above listed scriptures.
Today I received email notice that I won my class action law suit! Wow, what a relief. I have been waiting for years for this case to come to a close. I think I actually gave up hearing any good news about this suit several years ago.
Let me be more specific. I won a case against none other than that huge behemoth of a company, Apple and their optical disc drive unit in which apparently they overcharged or some such thing like that. It’s been so long I forget the original intent of the suit and exactly what the manufacturer did wrong. So, that said, I want all my readers to know I am going to the bank with the check and then thinking about how to invest it. I do want a return for all my pain and suffering.
So, what to do with this sum of money? I could almost buy a value meal at McDonalds. I could buy a bit more than a gallon of gas. Or, I could go crazy and go on a vacation to my neighbor’s back yard and his nightly fireside R & R.
You’re getting the picture I think. I generously received a whopping settlement of $7.61. I know, unbelievable after being named in this suit and waiting for years. But, hey, seven dollars is seven dollars, right?
Now for my point, because I sure hope there’s a point to this. Proverbs reminds us, “The greedy stir up conflict, but those who trust in the Lord will prosper.” My trust was not in the lawsuit. For one, I’ve been in this position before and realized no compensation. But mostly because greed is looking for a return with little to no investment for the sole purpose of self-consumption. The greedy bring conflict upon themselves while those whose trust is in God will prosper.
When does a boyfriend or girlfriend get to have husband or wife privileges?
The short answer is: NEVER. Now for the longer answer.
This person you’re falling for may be amazing, handsome, beautiful, spiritual and cuddly but that’s as far as it goes. They are not entitled to those things that go beyond certain godly and self-imposed boundaries. God gave us very clear limitations for relationships outside of marriage and relationships inside of marriage.
Because you are not in covenant (a binding relationship with one another before God) with your boyfriend or your girlfriend, those things that belong to a covenantal relationship are not theirs to partake in. That means anything sexual or beyond the boundary you are comfortable with prior to sexuality. Why?
This person has not been given to you to provide for you, to love and cherish you until death, to be committed to you through sickness and health or to cover you spiritually and protect you emotionally and physically. For the father and/or mother to release their daughter or son to another is to release their authority and their parental covering.
While you may be becoming a priority to one another, you are not THE priority. You are not sharing the same address, meaning you are not living together. The quickest way to destroy a marriage is by living together beforehand. It crosses all the boundaries mentioned above and gives to another what only belongs within a marital commitment. Living together gives all of you before all of you is required to be given and that undermines the success of the marriage vows.
Living together gives all of you before all of you is required to be given.
So what happens when you treat a boyfriend or a girlfriend like a spouse? You are trying without God’s help, support and blessing to have and to be what only married couples enjoy. This privilege is earned, not freely given away in relationship after relationship. For if you do choose to prematurely give this away, you are giving away something that was to be jealously guarded for your future spouse.
And that’s the special privilege shared by a married couple–saving themselves for the one they will make a lifelong commitment to.
So, while dating or even while engaged, give one another something–the gift of saving yourself. That is worth waiting for. That is attractive. That is unselfish. That is special. That is godly and that is loving. Boyfriends and girlfriends do not qualify!
While my wife was cleaning out our attic, among tha many boxes (some that were not opened since moving from our first apratment) she came across an old Kodak camera that was mine when I was a young child. Fiddling around with it, I opened the film compartment and discovered a roll of finished film still in place. It had been waiting to be developed for 60 years!
At first I thought I would throw it away knowing it had been exposed to extreme cold and heat in our attic. But then my curiosity got the best of me and my wife and I decided to take it to the local drug store who told us they could in fact develop the film.
Two weeks later and $18.00 less in my checking account, exactly eight pictures survived. Can you believe it? I was astounded.
They were black and white. There were several pictures of my Collie dog, Lady, and an unnamed cat. There was a picture of my mother on the phone located in our kitchen. It was an old-style black phone connected to a “party line.” (Meaning multiple parties were on the same phone line and if one party was talking you could not use your phone to make your call until they hung up.)
There was a picture of my neighbor who was younger than me. And there was a picture of our camper trailer parked in a campground somewhere in Pennsylvania.
I began to think about finding that film and what has transpired since those photos were taken by me as a very young boy. I thought about:
-All of the time that has transpired since those pictures were taken (six decades) and where life has taken me.
-How my heavenly Father has protected me, walked with me, blessed me and provided for me.
-How He has worked in my family since I received my Savior at age 17.
But, my most profound thought from this unusual find was regardless of age, time and life passing by, what has been hidden has a way of surfacing eventually and it will be exposed.
Jesus said, “There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight.” (Luke 12:2,3)
I was thinking about independence and how much we love this word and all it represents. We can move to become independent rather quickly. After all, isn’t that what we spent 18 years training our children to become? Then one day they attempt to be independent of us and we want to hold them back because we don’t like their attitude or some such thing.
I can still remember my teenage boys pushing to become independent of their mother. They actually practiced not listening to her or at the very least looking like they were not listening as she followed behind them telling them what she thought they ought do.
There is something inside of us that speaks to not desiring to be told what to do because that’s not independence. It feels like hovering or maybe even smothering to us. So we say to our wives, “Yes, yes, yes, I hear you.” Or to our husbands, “Are you listening to me?” Or to our wives, “I’m serious when I say this.” Or to our husbands, “You must be joking.” We’ve been longing for independence since Genesis chapter three. Our fallen nature thinks we can do it; we can be self-dependent, not needing others.
But the actual truth is every day we need others. We need our mechanic to fix our car. We need our boss to keep us employed. We need our church family to help us lead. We need our spouse to look out for us and to help us find things we’ve lost. Daily, we need others.
But more than anything or anyone, we need God. We are wholly dependent upon the Spirit of God to lead us, cover us, answer our prayers and speak God’s direction to us. We are never really independent of others. We certainly do not want to be independent of God. So let’s truthfully acknowledge our need for Him and of those He has placed in our lives.
I saw this “need” pictured in a scripture I read the other day. “Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother (Philemon), have refreshed the hearts of the saints…that I may have some benefit from you in the Lord; refresh my heart in Christ.” Philemon 7, 20b
Be refreshed this Independence Day and bring refreshment to others by loving them!
The Philistines had Goliath and the Israelites had David. Goliath, I Samuel 17 says, had a bronze helmet, a coat of arms, leg coverings, a bronze javelin on his back, a sword and an iron spear in his hand. He terrified the king of Israel, Saul. For forty days the Philistines taunted all of Israel.
Meanwhile back home, Jesse, David’s father, sends young David with some food for his warrior brothers. David tells king Saul that he will fight this giant. David then faces this towering man and says, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin…” David tells him that all he has are this world’s weaponry. And then David reveals to the giant Goliath and all of the Philistines what he has, “I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, who you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands and I’ll strike you down.”
We now have behind us almost 50 years of the oppression of Roe vs. Wade. What happened? The U.S. Supreme Court took on the Dobbs vs. Jackson case from the state of Mississippi which would effectively end the constitutional right to abortion, the killing of a child in the womb of its mother. The Supreme Court made an error almost 50 years ago and it has now been corrected.
Franklin Graham said, “This is one of the most significant rulings in my lifetime. It was egregiously wrong from the start.”
Samuel Rodrigues said, “The long, dark night officially comes to an end. The unconscionable injustice of extreme abortion policies is over.”
Dr. Ben Carson said, “Today the Supreme Court of the U.S. made a statement to the world that life matters.”
Dr. Alveda King expressed, “Roe is no more! We must see every human, born and pre-born, as created in the image…of God. As long as a baby can be killed in the womb there is no such thing as civil rights. Abortion is a weapon of mass destruction.”
Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “We end this opinion where we began. Abortion presents a profound moral question, the Constitution does not prohibit the citizens of each State from regulating or prohibiting abortion. Roe and Casey arrogated that authority. We now overrule this decision and return that authority to the people and their elected representatives.”
On January 22, 1988 then President Ronald Reagan spoke to the March for Life participants, “Our opponents tell us to not interfere with abortion. They tell us not to impose our morality on those who participate in the taking of the life of infants before birth. Yet no one calls it imposing morality to prohibit the taking of life after a child is born. We’re told about a woman’s right to control her own body. But doesn’t the unborn child have a higher right, and that is to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?”
It is also Ronald Reagan who said, “I’ve noticed that everyone who is for abortion has already been born.”
The evil one has had a long history of killing the firstborn of Israel. The spirit of abortion, that spirit of death, was activated a long time ago against mankind. Those who have fought for this day are cheering. But those who are fervently and violently bent on killing preborn children are going after the justices, church leaders, pro-life centers and anyone and anything else they can attack.
Why would those who have been given life be so aggressively and brutally in opposition of mothers giving life to their children? Let’s consider another quote for the answer.
“Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use violence to get what they want. That is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.”
And even more deeply this same author said this in answer to the violence and result of abortion:
“America needs no words from me to see how your decision in Roe v. Wade has deformed a great nation. The so-called right to abortion has pitted mothers against their children and women against men. It has sown violence and discord at the heart of the most intimate human relationships. It has aggravated the derogation of the father’s role in an increasingly fatherless society. It has portrayed the greatest of gifts — a child — as a competitor, an intrusion, and an inconvenience. It has nominally accorded mothers unfettered dominion over the independent lives of their physically dependent sons and daughters. And, in granting this unconscionable power, it has exposed many women to unjust and selfish demands from their husbands or other sexual partners. Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being’s entitlement by virtue of his humanity. The right to life does not depend, and must not be declared to be contingent, on the pleasure of anyone else, not even a parent or a sovereign. It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.” (Mother Teresa — “Notable and Quotable,” Wall Street Journal, 2/25/94, p. A14)
Now let us continue to support the pro-life centers near us, the confused mother who is carrying a child, the fostering and the adoption of these precious little ones.
Thank you, Father, for the many who fought this good fight without ever giving up for the unborn. It was worth it. Just as freedom came to Israel because of David’s heroic actions, may freedom come to the unborn and those who carry them.
Steve Prokopchak 