Encouragement, Marriage

Marry a Prostitute?

You fall in love with a prostitute. Well, not exactly. You just happen to bump into her on the street, no, not that way either. Actually, you have been actively rebuking the voice that keeps telling you to take the woman not of your dreams and marry her. She is a prostitute, an “adulterous” wife who will have “children of unfaithfulness.” Ridiculous? I think so, but God didn’t when He told Hosea to marry this woman of the night, Gomer, and have children with her. Gomer even continued to remain unfaithful while in the marriage. Perhaps she was a temple prostitute for a foreign god, but now she finds herself on the auction block. Most likely she is sick and no longer beautiful or desirable, a throw away. Her life is wasting away and it is a more than obvious, and legal, time for a divorce.

images-16Unbelievably Gomer’s husband hears of her plight, gathers some money and some extra grain for good measure and heads down to one of the worst places in his city, where slaves are auctioned like farm animals. This faithful husband buys back his unfaithful, adulterous and most likely diseased wife for 15 pieces of silver. At this point we could stop and say what an amazing love story, the stuff Hollywood movies are made of (remember the movie Pretty Women?). But it’s not a Hollywood movie, it actually happened and is recorded in the book of Hosea in the Old Testament.

This story, this amazing picture is about how much God loves us even when we are “adulterous” and unfaithful to Him. In His mercy He implores us to come to Him for healing as He binds up our wounds and restores us (Hosea 6: 1,2). Even though prostitution (unfaithfulness) and arrogance is in our heart, He loves us and longs to walk with us. He sent His Son to purchase us back from slavery and to forgive us of our sins as we turn away from those sins.  Have you sinned against your heavenly Father or your spouse? Know that forgiveness awaits you.

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Children, Marriage, Parents, Prayer

Growing in Values and Co-vision as a Couple

images-15Mary and I were in our first year of marriage and I don’t think either of us had a huge burden for un-churched or underprivileged children. One day our pastor asked if we would like to start a bus ministry. Once he defined it for us and we received training, we were sold as to its value. Reaching a child had the potential of changing a life forever, not to mention touching a family.

After filling several buses with some amazing but wild city kids, we fell in love with the whole ministry. Their needs were huge but they were being touched through an excellent children’s program coupled with our love as we also visited them every Saturday morning. It didn’t take long until we figured out how valuable children are to our heavenly Father, and from the vision of another, our hearts were hooked. We went on to eight years of missionary work with adjudicated delinquent teenage males and then several years of social work in foster care. As our heart grew, we found ourselves developing a deep value for reaching children, teens and their families.images-13

How about you, have you discovered your heart being enlarged by the Lord for some form of ministry only to have it become a deep value for you as a couple? If not, ask Him to show you His co-vision for the two of you.

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Encouragement, Prayer

An Amazing Circuit Rider and a Nation Called America

images-19Francis Asbury preached more than sixteen thousand messages before he died in March of 1816. At about the time of the American Revolution, there were approximately 5,000 Methodists churches and Asbury, an Englishman who never married, had a direct effect upon changing that figure. This circuit rider who is said to have traveled over 300,000 miles on horseback was out to grow the church. By the end of his life there were 200,000 Methodist churches all across America. Asbury slept in barns and wood sheds, was ill much of his life, dealt with depression and doubt, but he took seriously the task God had assigned him.

Father, may Your kingdom come and may Your will be done in this great nation called America. On this National Day of Prayer we remember men like Francis Asbury who gave their lives for Your gospel of freedom to come and to change lives. May we continue to fight the fight, preach the gospel and see souls made new. We ask You for miracles, signs and wonders to follow the teaching of Your word and we humbly ask for a spirit of repentance to come and a great awakening to follow. In Jesus’ name.

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Marriage, Postmarital, Prayer

Seven Secrets to Save Your Marriage

  1. images-9Keep dating. Just because you have said, “I do” does not mean the dating scene for you as a couple is over. Keep the fire lit by spending time alone doing what the two of you love to do together. Continue having fun!
  2. Get a weekend away. Once a quarter or at the very least, twice a year take a weekend away together. Travel a short distance and get away from your home, the kids and your local environment by staying at a hotel or a bed and breakfast. It will help the two of you to get back to the two of you.
  3. Drink coffee. A pastor friend of mine once told me, “Coffee saved our marriage.” Wondering what on earth he meant he went on to explain that taking time together over coffee to simply listen to one another was a marriage lifesaver. Their short coffee dates provoked the kind of communication and connection they needed.images-10
  4. Stay sexual. Do not allow busyness, children, jobs or ministry to steal intimacy from you. Stay sexually connected because it is unhealthy to do otherwise. If you need to, make a schedule for sex and agree to frequency. A schedule will actually bring freedom to both of you. Why not, you schedule everything else in life. (I Cor. 7:3,4)
  5. Pray together. In our book, Called Together, we state that the most intimate thing you can be involved in with another human being is to pray together. When we pray, really pray, we reveal our hearts to each other. To reveal our heart to God and one another on a regular basis is to remain spiritually connected. Nothing says oneness like prayer together. (Matthew 18:19)
  6. Praise in public; construct in private. Speak words of life and affirmation to your spouse, especially when in public. Let the world around you know that this person is the one (the only one) and that you are madly in love with him/her. When we have constructive words to share keep them full of grace while maintaining a position of humility, always speaking them in private.images-11 copy
  7. Respect one another. Disrespect is rampant in our culture and it’s unattractive and ungodly. To show respect is literally to show honor and who on this earth does not want to feel honor, especially from the one they love?

May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife [spouse] of your youth. (Proverbs 5:18)

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Encouragement, Marriage, Parents, Postmarital

Oh, Those Cutting Remarks

I heard a pretty humorous story that went something like the following. A wife was begging her husband to take her to her High School reunion of 25 years. Reluctantly, he finally gave in to the idea that he also knew was going to be a bust for him. After meeting a few of her friends and former classmates, he just sat at the table yawning, alone and bored to death. Pretty soon the band hired for the evening cranks up and a few persons are beginning to dance. But there is this one character that is on the dance floor just living it up large, break dancing, moon dancing, back flips…the works. Soon his wife returns to their table, sits beside her husband, leans over and says, “See that awesome ‘life of the party’ guy up there?” “Well, 25 years ago he proposed to me and I turned him down.” Abruptly her husband turns to her and quips, “Looks like he’s still celebrating!images-8

Funny? Yes, but cutting. How often have you used humor to bring some kind of indirect and at times hurtful message to your spouse? I have been guilty of it I’m sorry to say. When you make fun of or put down your spouse, you are making fun of and putting yourself down. You are one. There are plenty of hurts already coming from relatives, the work place and others. You and I do not need to “pile on.” Cutting remarks do not change anyone, they are embarrassing, belittling and are words of death. Jesus said it this way, “The Spirit gives life…the words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.” Speak words of life today to your spouse, to your children, to your co-workers and to your neighbors.

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Encouragement, Mission Report

Our American Culture has an Infatuation with Self-care

How many self-help books would you say are on the market at any given time? Department stores cry out to the new image found as the latest fashion is purchased. One local insurance company in my community has a tag line that reads, “It’s all about you, you, you.” Self-care topics on health, personal happiness, self-fulfillment and self-actualization in the United States must be at an all time high. We can get lost in our television and see ourselves dancing with the stars or one of America’s talents. Culturally somehow we are so easily obsessed with ourselves. In all this our Lord said that the greatest commands ever were to love God and love your neighbor as you love yourself.

I just returned from a developing nation where simply surviving is a daily task. People asked me for money while others wanted to do a small job so that I would pay them. The end goal was to eat and somehow meet the needs of life for today. School, jobs, health care, books, a computer all out of reach for many of these persons. Once again, I was reminded to my very core that life is not just about me. I felt so selfish and self-protective at times. I felt anger that I lacked compassion at other times. I was concerned about the loss of water and the inconvenience of no electrical serviceimages-6. I once actually found myself thinking about how far behind I will be with email once I return home.  Really, Steve?

We [I] have got to stop making ourselves [me] the center of attention. We show love for God by loving others. In the parable of the Great Banquet Jesus said to go find and invite the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame. Who are you called to love today?

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Marriage, Postmarital, Premarital

The Ultimate Compliment, but the Scariest One

images-10I was listening to a wife complain about her husband’s lack of attention toward her with him sitting right there in front of us. It was a bit awkward, but not nearly as awkward as the next emotionally charged sentence she blurted out, which went something like this: “Why can’t you be more like Steve in this area?” Her husband’s response was to then give me this forlorn look, while his eyes searched for the correct answer from his memory bank. He sheepishly spoke, “Yea, she often says to me, ‘what would Steve do in this situation?”’ I was floored, embarrassed and wanted to be anywhere but there. While I know it was in some weird way a compliment, it felt so… I don’t know…comparing, negative and unhealthy? I sat there speechless at first, feeling his pain. He was being compared with someone who he is not, is never going to be and is not created to be.Roter und Grüner Apfel

Finally gathering myself, I turned and looked at her and spoke forthrightly. I began, “Your husband is not me and should never be expected to be me. While we each have traits that reveal Jesus in us, it is Him that we are to emulate. Your husband will not change by you comparing him to another man, in fact, it only serves to humiliate him and that is not a godly trait. Please do not use my name in that way as I am a very imperfect man and I will fail you.”

The crucible for silver and the furnace for gold, but man is tested by the praise he receives. (Proverbs 27: 21)

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Encouragement

Dirt Bikes and a Promised Resurrection

images-4 I first met Wade in a feed mill in the 1970’s. I was purchasing animal feed for the small farm our ministry operated. His smile was contagious and his eyes were the brightest blue I had ever seen. As we talked, we discovered that we had two things in common: Jesus and dirt bikes. He was recently married and had a baby girl on the way. Wade was a transplant to the Pennsylvania mountains as was I and we loved the area because it afforded hundreds of miles of trails to ride. Wade was an excellent rider and we continually stretched our skills by playing cat and mouse on tight trails motorcycles had no business riding fast on. We even entered a number of enduro races together.

images-5Regularly, when we stopped to take a break from riding and catch our breath, we would talk about Jesus and how He was changing our lives. Like riding fast in the woods, we also pushed one another in our faith. On one ride I noticed Wade started coughing and struggled to catch his breath. He passed it off as a cold. The coughing wouldn’t subside and he finally submitted to seeing a doctor and then to a specialist. Wade, a young man in his early thirties, was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. Regardless of treatment, Wade never improved but day by day became weaker and weaker. He no longer had the strength to ride his bike.

Wade wanted to hear his 400 cc two-stroke Husqvarna one more time. After several hard and painful kicks it roared to life and then for some unknown reason, the bike caught fire and burnt to the ground. Like the bike, Wade died soon thereafter. I still miss him – his laugh, his teasing me because he was a better rider than me, his love for the Bible and just talking about his Savior. Wade has been with Him in heaven for many years now. I can still remember one of the conversations we had sitting on a log along side a trail. Wade looked at me and asked, “Do you think the Lord has dirt bikes in heaven?” One day I will see Wade again and I will find out the answer to that question.  Jesus once said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies…”

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Pornography

Pornography Almost Sent Him to Jail

“My sexual lust was fueled by my viewing pornography,” a friend once confessed to me. That statement provoked more questioning on my part and it’s an interesting, sad and revealing story. He described his pornography habit as helping to create a fantasy world in which he lived in, within his mind anyway.   His conscious and subconscious thoughts would affect his reality on a daily basis. He shared, “Porn provided a subconscious trigger that can lead to far worse situations.” One day he found himself in one of those “situations” and he followed through with a “far worse” fulfillment of his fantasy world.

images-2That one single decision to act upon his fantasy almost landed him in jail as he ended up committing a sexual crime.   Today my friend confesses to me that pornography actually changed his reality, “It changed how I viewed my wife, my co-workers and almost everyone I interacted with on a regular basis; it was such a dishonoring view.” Regular intake of pornography will keep you from relating to the opposite sex in a healthy way. It will distort your reality and it will eventually effect your actions. I love how the writer of Psalm 119 expressed it, “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word…I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you…Turn my eyes away from worthless things…”

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Pornography, Singles

Pornography, a Road to Self-destruction

images-7A number of years ago I conversed with a man who was $32,000.00 in credit card debt. When I asked him what he had purchased as a young single in order to find himself at that level of debt he replied, “Pornography.” I was stunned. Tens of thousands of dollars spent on an addiction and nothing to show for it besides remorse, regret and shame. Proverbs chapters 5-7 speaks so plainly of the adulterous woman and the man who goes astray with her, however consider the following verses in the light of viewing pornography:

With persuasive words she led him astray: she seduced him with her smooth talk. All at once he followed her like an ox going to the slaughter, like a deer stepping onto a noose till an arrow pierces his liver, like a bird darting into a snare, little knowing it will cost him his life. Now then, my sons, listen to me; pay attention to what I say. Do not let your heart turn to her ways or stray into her paths. Many are the victims she has brought down; her slain are a mighty throng. Her house is a highway to the grave, leading down to the chambers of death.

images-2“Many are the victims she has brought down…”  Could those verses be an apt description of a pornography addiction? Under the Law of the Old Covenant, the result of one caught in adultery was death. However under the New Covenant, Jesus was stricter than the Law of Moses. He said that if we look at someone with lust in our heart, we are committing the act of adultery. What if we are held captive by images on a screen…?

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