Emotional Maturity in Marriage is what we are looking at this morning. Man is a tripartite being. We are spirits, we have a soul and we live inside a body. Our body is the earthly suit that makes us able to live and function on this earth. Exactly what a spacesuit is to astronauts in space, and makes it possible for them to stay and function in space.
We are spirits and really we need to understand we function from the spirit realm. We have to understand our identity as spirits and operate as such.
My focus for this morning is really centered on our Soul. Our soul is what connects our spirit and body together. Our soul is what makes us give expression to our spirit on earth through our bodies.
Our Soul contains our will power, intellect, and emotion. Our willpower is what helps us in decision-making. Our intellect is the faculty that help us function in the intellectual world. Our emotion is the seat of our feelings. It is where we feel pain, hurt, bitterness, loyalty, faithfulness, guilt, joy, etc
3 John1:2 in AMPC Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in every way and [that your body] may keep well, even as [I know] your soul keeps well and prospers.
Our soul must prosper. We must move from one level to another. We must grow in our soul realm. We should not be directed by our feelings alone in our marriage. This is what Emotional Maturity in Marriage is all about.
Have you ever eaten at a buffet and felt very full? At that moment, you are full but in some hours that changes and you become hungry again. Our feelings are fickle. Our feelings change.
Don’t take permanent actions based on temporary situations.
Our feelings are subject to change. When we feel like being bitter we switch to our spirit.
That is how we mature in our souls. Don’t yield to the dictates of your feeling. You are not your feeling.
In the practical sense, it’s not everything, every word, every action you respond to, to mature in your soul. Grow up in your soul.
Guard your heart and your soul for it affects your life and indeed your marriage. It affects your relationship with your spouse. Get rid of every bad feeling, hurt, pain, and negative vibe in your marriage. Replace them with positive emotions.
God bless your marriage. Emotional Maturity in Marriage is a must
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I am not my feelings. I live above my feelings.
PRAYERS FOR THE DAY Lord, I receive grace to master my feelings.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Rom 12:2 (CEV) Don’t be like the people of this world, but let God change the way you think. Then you will know how to do everything that is good and pleasing to him.
What Do You Call Yourselves? I know couples have sweet names that they call themselves, and that is so sweet. I would like to draw the attention of husbands and wives to the immense power that lies in ‘calling’ ourselves. We tend to lose the power thereof when we lack the revelation behind that action.
The man was created in the image and likeness of God. That means we are in the class of God. We are a speaking spirit.
Gen 2: 23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
We are to call those things that are not as though they are.
God allowed Adam to call Eve whatever name he deemed fit. He called her ‘woman’. She is to birth and be the mother of all living things.
We.should call ourselves based on whatever revelation of what we want to accomplish. We are to assume our priestly role. Priests use their mouths to declare. What Do You Call Yourselves?
We have to practice using our faith to call our wives and our husbands. There must first be a desire in your heart.
What do you want your spouse to be? Begin to prophesy. Not just a name you call yourselves, but making a habit of constantly calling your selves what you want to see.
Habakkuk 2:4 says …the just shall live by his faith’.
You don’t have any business experiencing whatever you don’t want in your marriage. If you have a mouth and you have God’s word.
Every one of us has a total of 24 hours. Those hours are more than enough to change the course of your marriage and your spouse.
Does your spouse have any unpleasant behaviour? Don’t waste your energy fighting him or him. The Bible says we will have what we say. We don’t just have what God says, we have what we say. The question is what are you saying?
God wants us to labor to enter His rest. That labor is laboring in the Word. We have to grow our faith consciously, Just as we build our muscles in the gym. No matter how skinny a person is, you build your muscles by putting them to use.
Begin to use and build your faith muscles. Don’t be moved by sight ( what you can see) be moved by sight. What Do You Call Yourselves?
Be a speaking spirit. Don’t just speak as a “normal” human being. God has given you what to speak. You speak His word.
God bless our marriage as we speak the word of blessing over our marriage. It is our responsibility.
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I am a speaking spirit. I declare and I call my spouse those things I desire to see.
PRAYERS FOR THE DAY O Lord, I receive the Grace to declare as you have spoken in your word in Jesus’ name
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith. Habakkuk 2:4 KJV
ACTION PLAN FOR THE DAY Start speaking by faith to your spouse and your marriage
Every Husband Must Hear This! I feel like the Samaritan woman this morning, who excitedly went into the town and told all the men about Jesus.
The woman then left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men, Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ? John 4:28 – 29 KJV
I believe men really need to hear by revelation and have an encounter with Jesus. It makes all the difference. Men (of course our husbands) are the ones God gave the command, to love their wives like Christ loved the church.
I guess it just makes a lot of sense that they need an encounter with the man Jesus so that they can learn to be like Him.
What really makes Jesus who He is? What did Jesus represent and what did He come to the world to show us? I believe He came to show us the God kind of faith. To show us how to live the faith life. He lived here on earth as a man to show us how men (by extension, women also) ought to live.
If we are going to love our wives like Christ loved the church, it’s going to be by faith. Jesus wants every Husband to be men of faith. Every Husband Must Hear This
Talking about faith, our example of faith who walked by faith is our father, Abraham. His journey of faith started with God calling him to leave his kindred and father’s house.
I love the Amp translation NOW [in Haran] the Lord said to Abram, Go for yourself [for your own advantage] away from your country, from your relatives and your father’s house, to the land that I will show you. [Heb. 11:8-10.] And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you [with abundant increase of favors] and make your name famous and distinguished, and you will be a blessing [dispensing good to others].Genesis 12:1 – 2 AMPC
This is the similar instruction God gave to Adam as a key to having a successful marriage.
Therefore a man shall ‘leave’ his father and his mother and shall become united and cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24 AMPC
Every Husband is called to a life of faith. It takes faith to leave the familiar and go on a journey trusting in God.
You cannot love a woman if you are a natural man. Challenges of life will come. What will you overcome them with? The bible says faith is our victory. Faith is what gives us victory 100% of the time.
In leaving your father’s house or kindred, God actually wants us to ‘leave’ the ideals, methods, and ways of this natural world. He wants us to live by another standard. Which is the standard of faith. This is done by renewing our minds.
Husbands you have to be men of faith. Every Husband Must Hear This
Romans 12:2 AMPC Do not be conformed to this world (this age), [fashioned after and adapted to its external, superficial customs], but be transformed (changed) by the [entire] renewal of your mind [by its new ideals and its new attitude], so that you may prove [for yourselves] what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God, even the thing which is good and acceptable and perfect [in His sight for you].
You love your wife by being ‘a saviour’ to her. You enforce what is written over your marriage.
I remember just before our wedding, I was ill suddenly and was taken to the hospital. I actually passed out. It was the prayer of faith of my fiance, now my husband that revived me.
Life will be full of crises and challenges. Husbands, the greatest gift you can give your wife and family is to be a man of faith.
Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word. Be a man of the word.
Read the word, study it, meditate on it, confess it and begin to live by faith.
“Look at the proud one, His soul is not right within him, But the righteous will live by his faith [in the true God]. Habakkuk 2:4 AMP
God bless our marriage
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I am a man (woman) of faith. I develop my faith and I experience victory over life’s challenges
PRAYERS FOR THE DAY I receive grace to begin to walk by faith in Jesus’ name
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Look at the proud one, His soul is not right within him, But the righteous will live by his faith [in the true God]. Hab 2:4
ACTION PLAN FOR THE DAY Begin to live by your own faith
Don’t Play the Victim In Your Marriage. I heard the story of a man of God who went hunting together with a friend (the friend was actually the one taking him hunting). He was looking forward to having a quick or fast hunting experience but to his greatest surprise this was not happening.
He then asked his friend “where are the animals?” His friend said, “I will show you a secret.” He made a certain sound, and true to his words, an animal came out from the woods. He asked his friend what was the connection between the sound and the animal coming out?
The friend told him, that was no ordinary sound, but the sound made by animals that are caught in a trap, that are already helpless. Hearing that sound means there was cheap meal available for it.
This is the crust of my message this morning.
“There is no virtue in playing the victim”.
Our lives are constantly making sound(s) in the spirit realm. What sound are you making? Are you playing the victim game? Is your life oozing out victory or defeat?
Even in our marriage, if we constantly give a sound of defeat and being beaten, our spouse will not enjoy our company despite loving us. Don’t Play the Victim In Your Marriage
Another truth is that the sound you produce determines more of what you attract. If you are joyful, you will attract more joy.
Don’t be a victim in your marriage. We all have being through some things. Yes, I know some have been through harder situations than others. Bible tells us, we can handle whatever comes our way.
1 Corinthians 10:13 KJV. There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.
Whatever situation we faced or passed through is to make us better not bitter. We gained experience to comfort others with the comfort where with we were comforted.
2 Corinthians 1:3 – 4 KJV Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
Pick up yourself from your past. Whatever happened in your past, rise above it and don’t live in your past. Don’t keep the memory of your past in your present. You lost your mum, yes, live past it. You lost money, lost relationship, whatever your loss is, get past it and move on.
Move on as though it never happened. Dust yourself. Be like the donkey in a story, who even though dirts were dumped on it it “shook it off the dust and stepped on it”.
The more you play the victim the more life will hand you more abuse. When you murmur, complain and grumble about life the “serpent” will bite you. Your sound of murmuring and complaining will attract demons who will give you more reasons to complain.
Keep up your joy. Let the sounds of Glory, of rejoicing and shouts of praise proceed out of you.
In your marriage, you become attractive to your spouse when you are full of life. Depression is a disease that repels. It is repulsive. You want to be your spouses’ friend? Then be responsive, be jovial, be playful, be youthful.
Some times we feel when we play the victim we engender sympathy and pity from others. Yes, we might. But soon they get tried and frustrated.
We already have all the victory in Christ Jesus. Don’t have an entitlement mentality. The world doesn’t have to revolve around you. Pick up yourself and enjoy life. Don’t Play the Victim In Your Marriage
God bless our marriages.
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY My mind is renewed by God’s word. I am not a victim of life
PRAYERS FOR THE DAY O Lord, I ask for wisdom in areas where I lack wisdom in Jesus name
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Rom 12:2 (CEV) Don’t be like the people of this world, but let God change the way you think. Then you will know how to do everything that is good and pleasing to him.
ACTION PLAN FOR THE Pick up yourself from whatever happened in your past. Stop being the victim.
Seeing Love From The Eyes of Jesus Christ. The love of Jesus is an absolute, unconditional and a sacrificial love. A love marked with ultimately giving of Himself.
The Bible says
john 3:16, ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only beloved son, that whosoever shall believe in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.’
He loves us that we may know how to love. He shows us how to love that we may in turn reciprocate that agape love to others especially our spouse. Seeing Love From The Eyes of Jesus Christ will make us appreciate that love.
The love of Jesus is greater than any type of love. It is so deep, it reaches the inner recesses of our heart and the core of our being. It is so wide we can’t get round it , it covers all our being. It is so high we can’t get enough of it. It just overwhelms us.
Such is the love of Jesus to us. His love was what made Him die on the cross of Calvary. Jesus came to this world as the express image of God the father. He is the expression of the father. The expression of the fathers love. This love is not selfish or self seeking. It is a love that is faithful and loyal . A love that keeps waiting with arms wide open to receive us. Our weaknesses, faults, short comings, stubbornness, disobedience not withstanding.
The abba fathers love yearns for us every time, He wants an intimate relationship with us. He wants to be our Yahweh. Our best friend , our shepherd who protect us with His life. He wants to be our defender, the one who fights our battles for us. Our Jehovah Rohi, Shammah, Rapha and whatever names, He has revealed Himself to us
Seeing Love From The Eyes of Jesus Christ’s perspective helps us to see how we should love our spouse unconditionally.
God bless our marriage
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I love my spouse with the agape, unconditional love of Christ
PRAYER FOR THE DAY Lord; let me see and receive your love that I may love my spouse the same way
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY John 3:16 God loved the people of this world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who has faith in him will have eternal life and never really die.
