Good morning and welcome to class on this first weekend after Easter. As you all know we will be starting our next topical study on April 6th, so we have a spare week to fill in. I have prepared a “special lesson” for us this morning, and have given it the grand title of:
“Universal and hidden barriers to spiritual growth of a Christian”
Let me say that again. Let’s pick this apart a little so that we all know what I’m going to be covering today.
· Universal – This means that every person, believer or non-believer, faces these barriers.
· Hidden – We can’t sense them in any way, in our natural state. (What do I mean by that?)
· Barriers – Something that gets in the way of progress.
· Spiritual Growth of a Christian – Progress in becoming more Christ like.
Sounds like a mystery, doesn’t it? This morning I want to demystify it for all of us. First, though, I think it would be good to simply list some barriers to spiritual growth for Christians. Let’s try to use some actual examples we have seen in our, or other’s, lives.
· No prayer life.
· Don’t study the Word.
· Fellowship with unbelievers.
· Other gods; like materialism or leisure.
· Not attending church.
· Ungodly spouse.
· Compulsive behaviors or addictions.
· Inappropriate relationships.
· Worry.
· Distractions. (Discuss)
This is a big list, and I am experimenting this morning to see if anybody comes up with any of the hidden barriers I am about to discuss. (State whether we did or didn’t)
These are the hidden barriers, and although we might be able to identify more, I am going to contend that it is these three that hold up our growth more than any other:
· Values
· Beliefs
· Attitudes
Can anybody identify what characteristics these three have in common? I’m looking for one big common characteristic, common to every person.
· Change over time.
· Change minute by minute.
· Related to one another.
· THE BIG ONE – They are characteristics of the HEART!
Our Scripture has many things to say about the heart, and there is one verse that captures the “hidden barrier” concept well. It is Jer 17:9:
The heart is more deceitful than all else, and is desperately sick; who can understand it? NASU
This is a statement that is directed at all people. Contextually God, speaking through Jeremiah, is addressing the apostate nation of Israel whose heart has turned away from believing and trusting God. This demonstrates the “universal” nature of the problem within the heart, that it applies to all people, believer or non-believer.
Here we see that God is trying to help understand that our values, beliefs and attitudes are hidden in our heart and because they are hidden, they will deceive us. Now let’s move on to looking at these three in detail, starting with “values”.
Values
I want to start this subject by asking everybody to list 20 values, just kidding. Let ask ourselves this question though:
· What are my values, and where do they come from? (Discuss for a minute)
(Make sure “worldly sources” are discussed, like school, TV, Internet, work)
Now let’s narrow down our value statements by clarifying what a value is, and as usual I look to my trusty Webster’s dictionary, a value is:
A principle, standard or quality regarded as worthwhile or desirable.
What is it about this thing called “values” that causes them to be a hidden barrier? I’m going to open this question up because we need to get to the answer, as all of us battle with this. (Open for discussion)
If we look at this small section from the “Sermon on the Mount” we might get a clue as to what God wants us to understand. Mt 6:5-6 says:
When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. NASU
What is Jesus telling us here? That the people praying on the corner are not praying to meet a value they say they have, they are praying for the adoration of men, a different value. What do we call this? Hypocrisy!
The sin of hypocrisy is one of the reasons that God has called our heart sick, and as the great physician he knows what we need to heal it. I am going to have us look at the greatest value statement of all time, which, if we take it on as some of our values will help our hearts to become well. It is found in Mt 22:36-40:
"Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?" And He said to him, " 'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' "This is the great and foremost commandment. "The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' " On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." NASU
In a nutshell here it is; Love God, Love Yourself, Love Others. In that order and priority. I included verse 40, which says, “On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets”. We must not miss this point. Jesus gave us the values, and He added the extra point to tell the Jews, and now us through the written word, that everything depends on these values. Don’t be confused by the word “commandment”, Jesus was telling us to value God above all things, then value ourselves and others after that, and demonstrate it through love.
Everything we do, everything we think, and everything we feel can be tested against these three values. Take your mind back to what you have done over the last twenty-four hours, have you been meeting the standard set by these values?
A challenge for all of us is to search our hearts and look to see if we are using the values God Himself had written down for us, or do we use something else. There is a wonderful Psalm that looks at this whole subject of are we using God’s values or are we using values from “worldly sources”. In Psalm 119 we find an extensive look at the results of using ungodly values, and how much less our life is because of it. It seems to me that if we could all run our lives with God’s values screening our thoughts, feelings and actions, we might enjoy a more joyful and peaceful life. I want to quote just two verses from this chapter 119 of Psalms, the first is verse 105:
Your word is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my path. NASU
This verse captures what I’m saying, God’s word, which contains God’s values, shows you the right road to travel on.
The second is verse 11:
I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. NIV
This, to me, says it all, what does it say to you about values?
Now I’m going to move on to beliefs.
Beliefs
Beliefs are enormously powerful. It is beliefs that enable a suicide bomber to commit his or her act, it is beliefs that enable one person to discriminate against another, and it is beliefs that are the key to eternal life. So what exactly is a belief? Webster’s dictionary says this, a belief is:
A mental acceptance of or conviction in the truth or actuality of something.
When the dictionary speaks of “mental acceptance”, it is using a secular term that is better understood as “psychological” by us. This means that the belief is accepted somewhere inside the Soul. There is a familiar passage of scripture that identifies exactly where. Romans 10:9-10
That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. NASU
Clear as a sunny day, “with the heart a person believes”.
What is it about beliefs that are hidden and dangerous? Much like our values, we get our beliefs from a variety of sources. Some of us might believe that a certain presidential candidate can “save us”, where does that belief come from? The things we read, TV, people we listen to, the Internet, even in church! As these worldly opinions get allowed into our Soul, they slowly cement in as new beliefs, we can’t even tell when and how it is happening. We just “know” that we believe a certain thing to be true.
Our hidden beliefs are demonstrated in our actions. Can you think of some examples of a hidden belief being exposed? Let’s try to identify what the hidden belief might be.
· Not praying about something.
· Driving while intoxicated.
· Having an affair.
· Not coming to church on time.
How do we deal with these secret beliefs? It is really very straightforward; we test them against the truth! For example if we believe it is acceptable to drive at 80 mph on the Katy freeway, we might have a police officer test that against the truth for us!
Every human acts in accordance with his or her beliefs, hidden or not. As Christians, this presents a challenge. When we act in accordance with our beliefs, but against the truth, the Holy Spirit convicts us. God can see our hidden beliefs, through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And if they are not truthful beliefs, He wants us to correct them.
I want to say a little on conviction. The Holy Spirit will always convict us, that is part of His role. It is us who do not listen, it is us who listens but chooses to ignore and it is us who simply disobeys.
The remedy for dealing with our hidden beliefs is therefore the truth, and where can we find that? In Jn 14:6 Jesus says this:
I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me. NASU
If you want the truth go to Jesus!
Attitudes
Did anybody arrive today with a “tude”? If you don’t admit it, you are fooling yourself; we all have attitudes, all the time. Webster’s dictionary says an attitude is:
“A state of mind or feeling”.
Are we always aware of our attitudes? Of course not! Is our attitude a constant and consistent thing? Of course not! Do we display our attitudes? All the time! Can you think of some examples of where hidden attitudes come out?
· Driving!
· When we snap at someone.
· Sarcasm.
· Some of our thoughts.
Does God have anything to say about attitude? He does, I just enjoy the absolute direct and simple way He communicates about this. In the book of Jeremiah, chapter 12, the first two lines of verse 3 capture it:
But You know me, O Lord; You see me; And You examine my heart's attitude toward You. NASU
God states here that he knows us, sees us, and examines the attitude in the Heart. Have you ever thought about having your attitudes examined? It is really a scary proposition. What if your spouse or co-worker knew exactly how you were feeling toward them at every moment? It could produce some interesting conversations!
What can be done about these hidden attitudes? This is a little difficult to pin down, but I think we can find a clue in the following scripture. Ph 2:3-5 seems to help us understand what we ought to do about them, it says:
Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus. NASU
The antidote to malevolent hidden attitudes is humility. Why do you think this might be so? It is because the hidden attitudes are the ones that involve “self”, such as:
· I’m more important than him or her.
· I know more about this than him or her.
· I deserve this more than him or her.
· I’m a better person than him or her.
I think that hits the point home, these are all prideful statements.
Let me summarize what we have covered this morning. There are three major hidden barriers to personal spiritual growth, and our God provides a remedy for each of these sicknesses.
· Values, studying the scripture helps deal with this.
· Beliefs, knowing the truth combats hidden beliefs.
· Attitudes, learning humility is the answer.
That concludes our lesson for today, next week we kick off “Safe People”.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Christian Principles Underlying Love and Respect
Welcome to the last lesson of our “Love and Respect” series. Today we are going to do a more conventional study of scripture, and see how it applies to our few weeks in the Love and Respect study. We are going to look at seven basic truths about how to conduct ourselves in the Christian life, and apply them directly to being more loving and respectful.
The passage of Scripture we are going to look at has been sometimes called the seven virtues of Christianity, amongst other things. It is really a list of things to work on for a believer throughout his or her lifetime. Let’s look at the Scripture, 1 Pet 1:5-8:
Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. NASU
First let’s look at the beginning of this set of verses. Right before this the Apostle Peter says, and I am going to paraphrase it, “Because of what Jesus did, you can take part in His divineness, and this is how you do it”. Then he begins verse five. In that he says, “applying all diligence, in your faith supply”, what does that interesting phrase say to us? (Open to class)
The Message, a modern paraphrase of the Bible, says it in a well expressed fashion:
So don't lose a minute in building on what you've been given, complementing your basic faith. (The Message)
The idea here is that we are to acknowledge that we have a basic belief in Jesus and what He has done for all of us (faith), and because of that we ought to get on with what Peter is about to tell us. There are seven things that Peter identifies for us, let’s list them:
· Moral Excellence
· Knowledge.
· Self-control.
· Perseverance.
· Godliness.
· Brotherly Kindness.
· Love.
We’ll look at these seven virtues or Christian principles in a moment, but first we need to see the point of why we ought to do these things. In verse 8 Peter tells us by using a double negative, that these qualities will lead us into Christian fruitfulness and a deeper knowledge of Christ. To me that sounds like something worth going after.
Now it is time to get to the meat of our lesson, the seven virtues. I am going to look at these in the context of “Love and Respect”.
Moral Excellence
This is sometimes translated as goodness, or virtue in other versions than the one I typically use. What does the class think this might mean? For a further clue let us take a quick look at Ph 4:8-9:
Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you. NASU
This gives us a flavor of what Peter was meaning when he said “moral excellence”. My personal take on this is that he is talking about having courage in applying and improving on the strength of godly character that we show in our daily lives.
In terms of “Love and Respect” it means we are to put in every effort to be loving and respectful, as we are instructed to in Eph 5:33. It further means that we are to do this regardless of what the other person in the relationship says or does. That takes courage and strength.
Knowledge
What do you think Peter might have been getting at when he puts this second in the sequence of virtues? (Open to class)
This is a uniquely Judeo-Christian virtue, although the flowering of knowledge as we know it only began a few hundred years ago, and was only found in the Christian world. I think if we think a little about it, we might see that Peter is directing our thoughts to seeking knowledge from God. There are many verses about knowledge in the book of Proverbs, but I think the essence of Peter’s message can be found in these two. Pr 1:7 and 2:5:
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction. NASU
Then you will discern the fear of the Lord, and discover the knowledge of God. NASU
From these two verses what kind of knowledge is Peter talking about? (The knowledge of God) What does that mean? It is not the knowledge about God; it is not knowing God, because Peter’s audience already knew God. He is talking about the knowledge that comes from God through the Holy Spirit. And we know where that starts don’t we? The fear of the Lord, or for our purposes, the awestruck respect of the Lord. Communing with the Holy Spirit is usually accomplished through prayer and meditation, and so if we want to receive knowledge from God, that is what we will need to do.
Our context is Love and Respect. So this is going to be simple to say. If you want to love or respect someone it is wise to seek counsel from God directly through prayer and meditation. Allow God to help you acquire His knowledge on the best way to love or respect someone. This is one of those times when we can pray, “change me” instead of “change him or her”. I can’t emphasize this enough; God is way more disposed in helping you become a more mature person, than he is in helping you by answering a self-serving prayer to change another person for you. Any thoughts?
Self-Control
Does anybody here this morning want to skip this one? Just kidding!
The KJV uses a wonderful word here, temperance. Did you know that a whole worldwide ministry was built around this concept of temperance? It began in England and was originally called the “Gospel Temperance Army”, and their focus was on getting a legal prohibition of alcohol by saving one person at a time. Do you know what ministry I’m talking about? That’s right “The Salvation Army”.
I know that was a bit of a divergence, but it illustrates the idea that I think Peter was trying to convey. That is the idea that we need to seek God, to help us be self-controlled. The temperance army focused only on alcohol consumption, but Peter wants us to consider universal or complete self-control.
In our context this morning, we are to consider how we are to conduct ourselves in our efforts to be loving or respectful. If things aren’t going how we thought they should, are we under self-control? Or, are we hopping mad that he or she is not responding in a textbook fashion? Or are we upset that God hasn’t brought them to their knees, because they deserve it? Or are we not trusting God? Do you recall that in our previous study we learned that God is in control in the big picture sense, but we are in control of how we conduct our lives? It is when we put our self-control under His authority that we can truly exercise our love or our respect.
Perseverance
We all have a good idea of what this means, it sort of says “keep on, keeping on”, doesn’t it? Webster’s dictionary has a very good and appropriate definition:
The steadfast adherence to a course of action, belief or purpose.
For those church historians among you, perseverance is one of the five doctrines of Calvinism (Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace and Perseverance of the Saints). I am telling you this to help us to understand that this virtue is a big deal in the Christian life. Let us look at why this might be so, our direction on how to view this is found in Rom 5:1-5:
Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. NASU
What is the Apostle Paul saying to us here? (Class input) In verse one and two we see a statement that basically says “since we have been made right with God by Jesus, we are now under His grace and live in the confident expectation that we will have the glory of God in our lives.” Then we get to my point.
Verses 3 through 5, lay out the purpose and importance of perseverance. The Living Bible has an excellent paraphrase:
We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they are good for us-they help us learn to be patient. And patience develops strength of character in us and helps us trust God more each time we use it until finally our hope and faith are strong and steady. Then, when that happens, we are able to hold our heads high no matter what happens and know that all is well, for we know how dearly God loves us, and we feel this warm love everywhere within us because God has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. TLB
In this paraphrase perseverance is translated as “patience”, but the Greek word here is “hupomone”, which means “cheerful endurance”, and that is a better way of describing the virtue. The point here is that the difficulties which we all face will lead to us developing perseverance, and God’s intent is that it refines our character, builds our faith and connects us more closely with the Holy Spirit.
Sometimes when we are trying to love or respect our partner, it is a trial or we might even say a tribulation. God says to us to persevere, and he will use this to improve our own character. So even if you don’t feel or think that something is happening in your relationship, it is happening in you! The implication is this. If you don’t keep going in your efforts to love or respect, even if the other person is not responding, you will lose the opportunity to have your character improved by God!
Godliness
One commentary has an excellent description of what Godliness means, but before I read it let us hear from the class on some of the things we think might be included in this small word.
Piety toward God; a deep, reverential, religious fear; not only worshipping God with every becoming outward act, but adoring, loving, and magnifying him in the heart: (from Adam Clarke's Commentary)
This is such a good picture of what being godly is all about. If we start to apply it to love and respect what kind of things can we say?
God’s word says to love and respect, with no conditions. If we are to express “godliness” then we would obey, wouldn’t we? According to the definition provided providing unconditional love or respect is an act of worship, do you agree with that? (Open up) What is the opposite, not providing unconditional love and respect? It is self-worship, as you would be saying that your ways are higher than God’s ways.
Brotherly Kindness
We have talked about “brotherly love” a couple of times in our study, can anybody recall the Greek word used for this or how we have described it in our lessons? Phileo is the Greek, and we have defined as a deep sense of affection for another person.
The word used in the original language here is a special extension, it is “Philadelphia”, and is best translated as “Love for the Brothers”, meaning all fellow Christians. This is one of those generic uses of the masculine word (brother) that covers both males and females. It implies that we are to develop a special affection, displayed through friendships, for our fellow believers. Rom 12:10 clearly identifies this for us:
Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor; NASU
Paul uses the same Greek word here for brotherly love (Philadelphia), and tells us to give preference to one another.
If there is such a thing as giving more preference to someone, should it not be toward those we are to love and respect? I think that we might do well to consider this as a very specific instruction to become friends with those we are to love and respect, even if we don’t feel like it! This particular virtue reminds us of the fifth men’s need described in our book, “Shoulder-to-shoulder friendship”.
Love
This last virtue is the ultimate virtue, it is what we have looked at before and identified as “Agape” love. The willful action of unconditional and sacrificial love toward someone. In fact Jesus made this virtue the very definition of a Christ follower in Jn 13:34-35:
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." NASU
I suppose the simplest way to look at this in terms of love and respect is this. If you act in a loving and respectful manner, you are acting as a Christ follower, if you don’t, then you are not acting as a Christ follower.
I hope that we can all see the power of scripture displayed today when we took a piece of God’s word and applied it to our study. Our Bible is truly amazing and alive.
That is it for our series!
The passage of Scripture we are going to look at has been sometimes called the seven virtues of Christianity, amongst other things. It is really a list of things to work on for a believer throughout his or her lifetime. Let’s look at the Scripture, 1 Pet 1:5-8:
Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. NASU
First let’s look at the beginning of this set of verses. Right before this the Apostle Peter says, and I am going to paraphrase it, “Because of what Jesus did, you can take part in His divineness, and this is how you do it”. Then he begins verse five. In that he says, “applying all diligence, in your faith supply”, what does that interesting phrase say to us? (Open to class)
The Message, a modern paraphrase of the Bible, says it in a well expressed fashion:
So don't lose a minute in building on what you've been given, complementing your basic faith. (The Message)
The idea here is that we are to acknowledge that we have a basic belief in Jesus and what He has done for all of us (faith), and because of that we ought to get on with what Peter is about to tell us. There are seven things that Peter identifies for us, let’s list them:
· Moral Excellence
· Knowledge.
· Self-control.
· Perseverance.
· Godliness.
· Brotherly Kindness.
· Love.
We’ll look at these seven virtues or Christian principles in a moment, but first we need to see the point of why we ought to do these things. In verse 8 Peter tells us by using a double negative, that these qualities will lead us into Christian fruitfulness and a deeper knowledge of Christ. To me that sounds like something worth going after.
Now it is time to get to the meat of our lesson, the seven virtues. I am going to look at these in the context of “Love and Respect”.
Moral Excellence
This is sometimes translated as goodness, or virtue in other versions than the one I typically use. What does the class think this might mean? For a further clue let us take a quick look at Ph 4:8-9:
Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you. NASU
This gives us a flavor of what Peter was meaning when he said “moral excellence”. My personal take on this is that he is talking about having courage in applying and improving on the strength of godly character that we show in our daily lives.
In terms of “Love and Respect” it means we are to put in every effort to be loving and respectful, as we are instructed to in Eph 5:33. It further means that we are to do this regardless of what the other person in the relationship says or does. That takes courage and strength.
Knowledge
What do you think Peter might have been getting at when he puts this second in the sequence of virtues? (Open to class)
This is a uniquely Judeo-Christian virtue, although the flowering of knowledge as we know it only began a few hundred years ago, and was only found in the Christian world. I think if we think a little about it, we might see that Peter is directing our thoughts to seeking knowledge from God. There are many verses about knowledge in the book of Proverbs, but I think the essence of Peter’s message can be found in these two. Pr 1:7 and 2:5:
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction. NASU
Then you will discern the fear of the Lord, and discover the knowledge of God. NASU
From these two verses what kind of knowledge is Peter talking about? (The knowledge of God) What does that mean? It is not the knowledge about God; it is not knowing God, because Peter’s audience already knew God. He is talking about the knowledge that comes from God through the Holy Spirit. And we know where that starts don’t we? The fear of the Lord, or for our purposes, the awestruck respect of the Lord. Communing with the Holy Spirit is usually accomplished through prayer and meditation, and so if we want to receive knowledge from God, that is what we will need to do.
Our context is Love and Respect. So this is going to be simple to say. If you want to love or respect someone it is wise to seek counsel from God directly through prayer and meditation. Allow God to help you acquire His knowledge on the best way to love or respect someone. This is one of those times when we can pray, “change me” instead of “change him or her”. I can’t emphasize this enough; God is way more disposed in helping you become a more mature person, than he is in helping you by answering a self-serving prayer to change another person for you. Any thoughts?
Self-Control
Does anybody here this morning want to skip this one? Just kidding!
The KJV uses a wonderful word here, temperance. Did you know that a whole worldwide ministry was built around this concept of temperance? It began in England and was originally called the “Gospel Temperance Army”, and their focus was on getting a legal prohibition of alcohol by saving one person at a time. Do you know what ministry I’m talking about? That’s right “The Salvation Army”.
I know that was a bit of a divergence, but it illustrates the idea that I think Peter was trying to convey. That is the idea that we need to seek God, to help us be self-controlled. The temperance army focused only on alcohol consumption, but Peter wants us to consider universal or complete self-control.
In our context this morning, we are to consider how we are to conduct ourselves in our efforts to be loving or respectful. If things aren’t going how we thought they should, are we under self-control? Or, are we hopping mad that he or she is not responding in a textbook fashion? Or are we upset that God hasn’t brought them to their knees, because they deserve it? Or are we not trusting God? Do you recall that in our previous study we learned that God is in control in the big picture sense, but we are in control of how we conduct our lives? It is when we put our self-control under His authority that we can truly exercise our love or our respect.
Perseverance
We all have a good idea of what this means, it sort of says “keep on, keeping on”, doesn’t it? Webster’s dictionary has a very good and appropriate definition:
The steadfast adherence to a course of action, belief or purpose.
For those church historians among you, perseverance is one of the five doctrines of Calvinism (Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace and Perseverance of the Saints). I am telling you this to help us to understand that this virtue is a big deal in the Christian life. Let us look at why this might be so, our direction on how to view this is found in Rom 5:1-5:
Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. NASU
What is the Apostle Paul saying to us here? (Class input) In verse one and two we see a statement that basically says “since we have been made right with God by Jesus, we are now under His grace and live in the confident expectation that we will have the glory of God in our lives.” Then we get to my point.
Verses 3 through 5, lay out the purpose and importance of perseverance. The Living Bible has an excellent paraphrase:
We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they are good for us-they help us learn to be patient. And patience develops strength of character in us and helps us trust God more each time we use it until finally our hope and faith are strong and steady. Then, when that happens, we are able to hold our heads high no matter what happens and know that all is well, for we know how dearly God loves us, and we feel this warm love everywhere within us because God has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. TLB
In this paraphrase perseverance is translated as “patience”, but the Greek word here is “hupomone”, which means “cheerful endurance”, and that is a better way of describing the virtue. The point here is that the difficulties which we all face will lead to us developing perseverance, and God’s intent is that it refines our character, builds our faith and connects us more closely with the Holy Spirit.
Sometimes when we are trying to love or respect our partner, it is a trial or we might even say a tribulation. God says to us to persevere, and he will use this to improve our own character. So even if you don’t feel or think that something is happening in your relationship, it is happening in you! The implication is this. If you don’t keep going in your efforts to love or respect, even if the other person is not responding, you will lose the opportunity to have your character improved by God!
Godliness
One commentary has an excellent description of what Godliness means, but before I read it let us hear from the class on some of the things we think might be included in this small word.
Piety toward God; a deep, reverential, religious fear; not only worshipping God with every becoming outward act, but adoring, loving, and magnifying him in the heart: (from Adam Clarke's Commentary)
This is such a good picture of what being godly is all about. If we start to apply it to love and respect what kind of things can we say?
God’s word says to love and respect, with no conditions. If we are to express “godliness” then we would obey, wouldn’t we? According to the definition provided providing unconditional love or respect is an act of worship, do you agree with that? (Open up) What is the opposite, not providing unconditional love and respect? It is self-worship, as you would be saying that your ways are higher than God’s ways.
Brotherly Kindness
We have talked about “brotherly love” a couple of times in our study, can anybody recall the Greek word used for this or how we have described it in our lessons? Phileo is the Greek, and we have defined as a deep sense of affection for another person.
The word used in the original language here is a special extension, it is “Philadelphia”, and is best translated as “Love for the Brothers”, meaning all fellow Christians. This is one of those generic uses of the masculine word (brother) that covers both males and females. It implies that we are to develop a special affection, displayed through friendships, for our fellow believers. Rom 12:10 clearly identifies this for us:
Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor; NASU
Paul uses the same Greek word here for brotherly love (Philadelphia), and tells us to give preference to one another.
If there is such a thing as giving more preference to someone, should it not be toward those we are to love and respect? I think that we might do well to consider this as a very specific instruction to become friends with those we are to love and respect, even if we don’t feel like it! This particular virtue reminds us of the fifth men’s need described in our book, “Shoulder-to-shoulder friendship”.
Love
This last virtue is the ultimate virtue, it is what we have looked at before and identified as “Agape” love. The willful action of unconditional and sacrificial love toward someone. In fact Jesus made this virtue the very definition of a Christ follower in Jn 13:34-35:
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." NASU
I suppose the simplest way to look at this in terms of love and respect is this. If you act in a loving and respectful manner, you are acting as a Christ follower, if you don’t, then you are not acting as a Christ follower.
I hope that we can all see the power of scripture displayed today when we took a piece of God’s word and applied it to our study. Our Bible is truly amazing and alive.
That is it for our series!
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Love & Respect - His Needs (Part 2 of 2)
Good morning and welcome to Lesson 8, the penultimate lesson, in our “Love and Respect” series. Today is the second of two lessons on the subject of “His Needs”. Last week we covered the subjects from chapters 16, 17 and 18 of our book, which were Conquest, Hierarchy and Authority. This week we are in chapters 19, 20 and 21, whose subjects are Insight, Relationship and Sexuality.
I want to start with a reminder about the simple question I asked us to all consider last week. Do you believe God? Did anybody get a chance to reflect on it over the last week? (Discuss)
In the lesson last week we talked about the fact that although the book calls what we are studying “Men’s Needs”, they are really better thought of as “Men’s Designer Parts”. Put into each man by God’s design. These parts are to be used primarily for the benefit of the man and his family. Then secondarily for his work and his social life, such as church.
Also from our discussion last week we identified three objectives for these two lessons. They are:
· Understand and acknowledge that God has laid out His design for a man in His word.
· Be honest in your attempts to accept what He says a man needs.
· Seek Him and His power to overcome the social and cultural barriers that have been placed in your Mind, Heart and Will over your lifetime, so that you can accept God’s design for a man
Now I think we are ready to tackle these last three, beginning with “Insight”.
Insight
The author says that men have “insight”, what exactly does he mean? (Open to the class) He calls it an ability to analyze and counsel. To me the author is trying to convey how men use this feature of their makeup rather than explain what “Insight” really is. Analyzing is breaking things down into their smallest parts and seeing how they are made up. Counseling is then provided as guidance on a course of action based on the analysis.
Just for fun, can anybody tell us when men do this the most? Here is a clue, “When women talk to men about their day, or their problems, what is the typical response of the man?” To fix it! Which is short for analyze and counsel.
So the author is right, men do indeed do this. I think there is more to this than he put into this chapter, and I want to take a short look at my sense of what “Insight” is.
Webster’s says this:
Insight is “the capacity to discern the true nature of a situation”.
I like that definition, and I like it a lot. Let me read it again. Does anybody have a comment on this definition versus what the book focuses on? If you write in your books like I do you might want to write the definition on page 227, the opening page of chapter 19.
There are two key words in this definition, and you should probably put a circle around them, for memory jogging purposes. These words are “discern” and “true”. Let look at why they are important.
Discern or Discernment – I look at this from two points of view. There is the natural and supernatural. In the natural sense, men have been given an ability to figure things out, to connect the dots, to analyze. This ability applies to all men, whatever their status is, Christian or not, single or married, red, black, white or yellow, it doesn’t matter, it is designed in.
The supernatural. This is a key spiritual issue in understanding how we must relate to each other as Christians, how we relate to non-believers and most importantly how we relate to those close to us. I want to take a look at 1 Cor 2:14-16:
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIM? But we have the mind of Christ. NASU
This short set of verses could be a whole lesson by itself, so I’m just going to focus on what is relevant to us in looking at how God designed the man. In the original Greek, verses 14 and 15 use the word “anakrino” three times. In our various Bible versions here, it is translated “discerned”, “appraised” or “judged”. The practical application for us is that there are some situations where we, that is believers, are given spiritual discernment. That is discernment with the aid of the Holy Spirit. Natural men, non-believers, who do not understand it, describe this discernment as “foolishness”.
In the context of looking at a man, and how he is designed, ladies might benefit from remembering what we are about to discuss. A man is designed to be able to figure things out, to analyze or discern. If the man is also a Christian, having the Holy Spirit within, he has an added dimension of discernment available.
Let us look at a situation. An event has occurred, and a man and a woman are dealing with it.
· The man is in a peaceful, thoughtful, and relaxed state, able to look at what is going on rationally. He may or may not be in a spiritual frame of mind.
· The woman is upset, is carrying resentment about what is happening, she is acting in a natural way. She is definitely not feeling the Spirit!
What ever the man decides through his discernment is likely to be a reasonably good judgment of what the situation actually is, and how to deal with it. The woman is likely to think that his choice and advice is nonsense, and since she is the emotionally charged up one, she may choose to ignore the man’s insight.
The point here is that, ladies, it is very unwise to dismiss the man’s insight; you could actually be dismissing God’s insight, which He gave the man!
Men, don’t go getting puffed up about this. It works in reverse too! Only when women are given the help of the Holy Spirit we call it intuition! The ladies may not be able to tell you in logical steps or be able to explain how they “know” something. They just do. It is wise for us as men to listen and consider their “intuition” in any situation.
What is the healthiest circumstance is where the man’s insight and the woman’s intuition come to the same or similar conclusion about a problem or situation.
I also want to say a couple of words about the truth, and I am referring back to our definition of insight. If we do our best to operate in the Spirit, or paying attention to God, we are more likely to experience a true discernment, or a true intuition, because God is truth!
Now let’s take a short look at some of the downside to women not appreciating men’s insight, or ability to analyze and counsel.
· Alienation. It is possible to push the man away from you through not accepting his help. He is actually loving you when he attempts to “fix it”. It is okay to let him go forward with what you consider a bad choice if it is not going to cause harm to himself, you or others. Men learn from their mistakes reasonably well. I do acknowledge that some men just don’t get “some things”, but it is well to remember that it is not “all things”. Of course an obviously bad choice does need to be stopped before damage is done. Minimize your rejections of his ideas and you will maximize the love generated through his desire to get things done.
· Pain. It may not occur to women, but you can produce a response of emotional pain if you reject his insight. He is built for insight and expects to give it, and if he is frequently denied the opportunity to give insight, his unspoken expectations are not met. Resentments and pain will follow. The most common way we deal with this in our culture is to not share it, but stuff it. This is then followed by an attempt by the man to release the pain somehow. This could easily come out in the form of an addiction, such as drinking, work, pornography or gambling.
· Communication. Just as we have said in the previous three “needs”, shutting down this part of his design will inevitably result in a slowing down or possibly stopping of communication. He will go from being “open” to being “closed”.
That is enough on “insight”, but before we move on is there anything relating to this subject that somebody would like to discuss?
Relationship
For this part of our lesson I am going to use visuals.
1. First I need two ladies with their chairs. Okay ladies take your chair and sit on it so that you can talk to the other one. Now quietly chat with each other, and we’ll observe.
2. Ok thanks, now let’s have two men with their chairs. Men, sit like you would if you were fishing from a bass boat, and talk about something. We will observe.
3. Third visual; a married couple. Take your chairs and sit like you would at a restaurant if you were 18 and dating. We’ll observe while you chat.
4. Now for the “piece de resistance”. My specially chosen couple, who will depict a more mature, and I use that word loosely, older married couple.
Ok class, give them all a hand! What did we see?
1. The ladies sat face to face, so that they could see each other while they connected.
2. The men connected with their backs to each other.
3. The dating couple sat almost on top of one another, next to each other to achieve the maximum possible connection.
4. There is nothing I can say! This couple was avoiding connection.
The bottom line is that when men connected the most positively they were not looking at whom they were with.
Our book calls this “his desire for shoulder-to-shoulder friendship.” The man achieves companionship when he is doing something and not directly connecting like the two women did in our demonstration. In fact let us see what it looks like to have two men sit opposite each other. (Get two guys with chairs to sit face to face for a moment.)
When men sit opposite each other it is a possible conflict, and subconsciously they will attempt to avoid it!
So, ladies think about it, when you want the man to achieve connection, sit next to him while he or you, or both of you, are doing something. Talking is not a requirement!
There is a Scripture that might help us understand that this is a Godly action on the part of the wife. Titus 2:3-5:
Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored. NASU
This says that older women are to teach younger women to love their husbands. There is a single word in the original Greek used for the English phrase “love their husbands”, it is “philandros”. It is from the two basic words “philos” friend of, and “aner” man. It is also where we get the term “philanderer”, meaning a person who has casual love affairs, from. The older women are to help the younger ones become friends to their husbands.
Why do we think that is laid out so plainly for us all to see? (Get input) It is because after the initial romantic excitement has worn off it is easy to get discouraged as a wife. Becoming friends is the antidote to discouragement.
Now it is time for a trip to the downside. Not doing this ladies, risks the relationship.
· Quality Time. One of the ingredients in a successful relationship is the amount of connecting time the man and woman have with each other. When a man is doing something with another person, he is connecting. If the ladies ignore or otherwise don’t participate in some of his activities, a great loss of relationship occurs. Always remember that he doesn’t have to talk to connect! Try going fly-fishing or bowling or to action movies with him. You may not be interested in the activity, but he will be connecting in his way with you. And I’ll bet he will suggest going to some of the things you like to do, things like quilting shows, ballet and chick flicks. It is not so much about what you are doing; it is more about doing fun things together.
· Alternative relationships. If the woman doesn’t want to go do some of “his things”, he will most likely find someone who will. That may not be safe for your relationship!
· Communication. I know I’m harping on this, but if you are not being his recreational companion, you lower the available time to simply talk.
Are there any more thoughts on this subject? If not we can move on to the reason everybody came this morning. It is time to talk sex.
Sexuality
This is a surprise to all of us; men are designed with a propensity to want sex! Of course we all know that, and we are constantly reminded of it through our culture. I’ll open the class up right here for examples of “sex” messages we get delivered to us on a routine basis.
· Sex sells.
· Get as much as you can.
· Women “need” sex as much as men.
· Homosexual sex is acceptable.
It seems to me that even if sex is not part of a conversation or a story, that people try to throw it in there somewhere. My lovely wife and I have become more aware of this lately, and recently watched a movie called “The Rock”. There is a scene where the hero and his girlfriend are having sex on the roof of their building, and he gets a phone call. She says don’t stop, he says its my phone, it is important, and he answers it. How ridiculous! Public sex, on a rooftop for all to see, and he answers the phone in the middle of it. This was the only sex scene in the movie and it was completely unnecessary, it actually detracted from the story, but they had to put something in to titillate us viewers.
The point here is that sex has been taken from its actual purpose to a lower purpose by the culture. What might I mean by that? (Open to class) There are two basic reasons sex or sexual activity exists.
· Procreation, be fruitful and multiply. (Gen 1:28)
· Relationship. (Gen 2:24)
While it is almost impossible for the world to get rid of the need to procreate, it is working hard on it through stem cell research and in-vitro science. The objective of course is to be able to produce children without random parents, resulting in a sort of man-made human evolution. More importantly our culture and indeed the whole world is trying hard to eliminate the sex and relationship purpose. This is where we need to focus today.
In Gen 2:24 it is said that man is to leave his home, his father and mother, and to “cleave”, and become “one flesh”. I know we have all heard this taught or preached on at some point, but I want us to connect this verse with our “man need”.
Let us look at this passage in its total context. Gen 2:21-25:
So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib, which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. The man 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." For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. NASU
Notice the sequence of events. The man is put to sleep by the Lord. God takes a rib out of the man, and makes the woman. The Lord brings the woman to the man, he names her “woman” because she was taken out of man. And this last phrase is key to understanding and acknowledging God’s design for a man.
Verse 24 says “for this reason”, meaning because she was taken out of man, the man leaves and cleaves. This is very symbolic prose in these verses and we have to be sure to pick up what God is telling us in this whole passage. So here it is.
In verse 2:21 God takes a “tsela”, which always seems to be translated as rib in our Bibles, from the man. Its actual meaning is “side of”, which implies more than just a rib. The man confirms this when he says in verse 23, she is bone of my bones and flesh of may flesh, indicating that she is part of him.
God could have gone off and made a woman from the dust, just like he did all the animals and the man. But he didn’t! Can you guess why? It is because he wanted the man and woman to have a unique connection, not found in any other relationship with other “made beings”. So that when the cleaving goes on it is a Soul connection, which is then cemented by the physical connection of becoming one flesh. Part of this physical connection is what we know of as sex.
In Gen 2:24 it is the man who is told to leave, and cleave and become one flesh. This shows us that God designed into the man the requirement to have sex with his wife. We tend to think of it as a “need”, but it is not. It is an obligation that the man has designed into him by God for the purpose of connecting with his wife.
We, all of us, who live in this world have taken this design, with all its benefits, and twisted it into something it was never meant to be.
As I have been doing with the other “needs” I am going to look at the downside of not handling the man’s built in design for sex well.
· Connection. Sex is a way that a man connects with his wife, it is not the only way, but it is a significant thing. If the ladies could try to always remember that the man is often reaching out to you when he wants to have sex. I know that in some cases it doesn’t seem that way, but that is because something else is wrong between the two people involved.
· Emotional well-being. For a man, having sex with his wife results, in a relatively normal marriage, in a sense of well-being. A feeling that things are right with the world. The guy connects with the wife, and they share this act together, the relationship just seems okay. He doesn’t have to have sex at all times, just enough to feel good. Each couple will determine their desirable frequency so that this sense of well-being and connection is generally present.
· Communication. No sex means negative messages are sent. Not enough sex could do the same. What would be the negative message? How about “I don’t care about you”. Never ever use sex as a weapon against your man. You may win a battle, but you will lose the war, because he won’t forget what you did!
Any last points to discuss, before we wrap up?
That is it for today. Next week we will be finishing our series with an overview lesson, and I will be teaching it.
I want to start with a reminder about the simple question I asked us to all consider last week. Do you believe God? Did anybody get a chance to reflect on it over the last week? (Discuss)
In the lesson last week we talked about the fact that although the book calls what we are studying “Men’s Needs”, they are really better thought of as “Men’s Designer Parts”. Put into each man by God’s design. These parts are to be used primarily for the benefit of the man and his family. Then secondarily for his work and his social life, such as church.
Also from our discussion last week we identified three objectives for these two lessons. They are:
· Understand and acknowledge that God has laid out His design for a man in His word.
· Be honest in your attempts to accept what He says a man needs.
· Seek Him and His power to overcome the social and cultural barriers that have been placed in your Mind, Heart and Will over your lifetime, so that you can accept God’s design for a man
Now I think we are ready to tackle these last three, beginning with “Insight”.
Insight
The author says that men have “insight”, what exactly does he mean? (Open to the class) He calls it an ability to analyze and counsel. To me the author is trying to convey how men use this feature of their makeup rather than explain what “Insight” really is. Analyzing is breaking things down into their smallest parts and seeing how they are made up. Counseling is then provided as guidance on a course of action based on the analysis.
Just for fun, can anybody tell us when men do this the most? Here is a clue, “When women talk to men about their day, or their problems, what is the typical response of the man?” To fix it! Which is short for analyze and counsel.
So the author is right, men do indeed do this. I think there is more to this than he put into this chapter, and I want to take a short look at my sense of what “Insight” is.
Webster’s says this:
Insight is “the capacity to discern the true nature of a situation”.
I like that definition, and I like it a lot. Let me read it again. Does anybody have a comment on this definition versus what the book focuses on? If you write in your books like I do you might want to write the definition on page 227, the opening page of chapter 19.
There are two key words in this definition, and you should probably put a circle around them, for memory jogging purposes. These words are “discern” and “true”. Let look at why they are important.
Discern or Discernment – I look at this from two points of view. There is the natural and supernatural. In the natural sense, men have been given an ability to figure things out, to connect the dots, to analyze. This ability applies to all men, whatever their status is, Christian or not, single or married, red, black, white or yellow, it doesn’t matter, it is designed in.
The supernatural. This is a key spiritual issue in understanding how we must relate to each other as Christians, how we relate to non-believers and most importantly how we relate to those close to us. I want to take a look at 1 Cor 2:14-16:
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIM? But we have the mind of Christ. NASU
This short set of verses could be a whole lesson by itself, so I’m just going to focus on what is relevant to us in looking at how God designed the man. In the original Greek, verses 14 and 15 use the word “anakrino” three times. In our various Bible versions here, it is translated “discerned”, “appraised” or “judged”. The practical application for us is that there are some situations where we, that is believers, are given spiritual discernment. That is discernment with the aid of the Holy Spirit. Natural men, non-believers, who do not understand it, describe this discernment as “foolishness”.
In the context of looking at a man, and how he is designed, ladies might benefit from remembering what we are about to discuss. A man is designed to be able to figure things out, to analyze or discern. If the man is also a Christian, having the Holy Spirit within, he has an added dimension of discernment available.
Let us look at a situation. An event has occurred, and a man and a woman are dealing with it.
· The man is in a peaceful, thoughtful, and relaxed state, able to look at what is going on rationally. He may or may not be in a spiritual frame of mind.
· The woman is upset, is carrying resentment about what is happening, she is acting in a natural way. She is definitely not feeling the Spirit!
What ever the man decides through his discernment is likely to be a reasonably good judgment of what the situation actually is, and how to deal with it. The woman is likely to think that his choice and advice is nonsense, and since she is the emotionally charged up one, she may choose to ignore the man’s insight.
The point here is that, ladies, it is very unwise to dismiss the man’s insight; you could actually be dismissing God’s insight, which He gave the man!
Men, don’t go getting puffed up about this. It works in reverse too! Only when women are given the help of the Holy Spirit we call it intuition! The ladies may not be able to tell you in logical steps or be able to explain how they “know” something. They just do. It is wise for us as men to listen and consider their “intuition” in any situation.
What is the healthiest circumstance is where the man’s insight and the woman’s intuition come to the same or similar conclusion about a problem or situation.
I also want to say a couple of words about the truth, and I am referring back to our definition of insight. If we do our best to operate in the Spirit, or paying attention to God, we are more likely to experience a true discernment, or a true intuition, because God is truth!
Now let’s take a short look at some of the downside to women not appreciating men’s insight, or ability to analyze and counsel.
· Alienation. It is possible to push the man away from you through not accepting his help. He is actually loving you when he attempts to “fix it”. It is okay to let him go forward with what you consider a bad choice if it is not going to cause harm to himself, you or others. Men learn from their mistakes reasonably well. I do acknowledge that some men just don’t get “some things”, but it is well to remember that it is not “all things”. Of course an obviously bad choice does need to be stopped before damage is done. Minimize your rejections of his ideas and you will maximize the love generated through his desire to get things done.
· Pain. It may not occur to women, but you can produce a response of emotional pain if you reject his insight. He is built for insight and expects to give it, and if he is frequently denied the opportunity to give insight, his unspoken expectations are not met. Resentments and pain will follow. The most common way we deal with this in our culture is to not share it, but stuff it. This is then followed by an attempt by the man to release the pain somehow. This could easily come out in the form of an addiction, such as drinking, work, pornography or gambling.
· Communication. Just as we have said in the previous three “needs”, shutting down this part of his design will inevitably result in a slowing down or possibly stopping of communication. He will go from being “open” to being “closed”.
That is enough on “insight”, but before we move on is there anything relating to this subject that somebody would like to discuss?
Relationship
For this part of our lesson I am going to use visuals.
1. First I need two ladies with their chairs. Okay ladies take your chair and sit on it so that you can talk to the other one. Now quietly chat with each other, and we’ll observe.
2. Ok thanks, now let’s have two men with their chairs. Men, sit like you would if you were fishing from a bass boat, and talk about something. We will observe.
3. Third visual; a married couple. Take your chairs and sit like you would at a restaurant if you were 18 and dating. We’ll observe while you chat.
4. Now for the “piece de resistance”. My specially chosen couple, who will depict a more mature, and I use that word loosely, older married couple.
Ok class, give them all a hand! What did we see?
1. The ladies sat face to face, so that they could see each other while they connected.
2. The men connected with their backs to each other.
3. The dating couple sat almost on top of one another, next to each other to achieve the maximum possible connection.
4. There is nothing I can say! This couple was avoiding connection.
The bottom line is that when men connected the most positively they were not looking at whom they were with.
Our book calls this “his desire for shoulder-to-shoulder friendship.” The man achieves companionship when he is doing something and not directly connecting like the two women did in our demonstration. In fact let us see what it looks like to have two men sit opposite each other. (Get two guys with chairs to sit face to face for a moment.)
When men sit opposite each other it is a possible conflict, and subconsciously they will attempt to avoid it!
So, ladies think about it, when you want the man to achieve connection, sit next to him while he or you, or both of you, are doing something. Talking is not a requirement!
There is a Scripture that might help us understand that this is a Godly action on the part of the wife. Titus 2:3-5:
Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored. NASU
This says that older women are to teach younger women to love their husbands. There is a single word in the original Greek used for the English phrase “love their husbands”, it is “philandros”. It is from the two basic words “philos” friend of, and “aner” man. It is also where we get the term “philanderer”, meaning a person who has casual love affairs, from. The older women are to help the younger ones become friends to their husbands.
Why do we think that is laid out so plainly for us all to see? (Get input) It is because after the initial romantic excitement has worn off it is easy to get discouraged as a wife. Becoming friends is the antidote to discouragement.
Now it is time for a trip to the downside. Not doing this ladies, risks the relationship.
· Quality Time. One of the ingredients in a successful relationship is the amount of connecting time the man and woman have with each other. When a man is doing something with another person, he is connecting. If the ladies ignore or otherwise don’t participate in some of his activities, a great loss of relationship occurs. Always remember that he doesn’t have to talk to connect! Try going fly-fishing or bowling or to action movies with him. You may not be interested in the activity, but he will be connecting in his way with you. And I’ll bet he will suggest going to some of the things you like to do, things like quilting shows, ballet and chick flicks. It is not so much about what you are doing; it is more about doing fun things together.
· Alternative relationships. If the woman doesn’t want to go do some of “his things”, he will most likely find someone who will. That may not be safe for your relationship!
· Communication. I know I’m harping on this, but if you are not being his recreational companion, you lower the available time to simply talk.
Are there any more thoughts on this subject? If not we can move on to the reason everybody came this morning. It is time to talk sex.
Sexuality
This is a surprise to all of us; men are designed with a propensity to want sex! Of course we all know that, and we are constantly reminded of it through our culture. I’ll open the class up right here for examples of “sex” messages we get delivered to us on a routine basis.
· Sex sells.
· Get as much as you can.
· Women “need” sex as much as men.
· Homosexual sex is acceptable.
It seems to me that even if sex is not part of a conversation or a story, that people try to throw it in there somewhere. My lovely wife and I have become more aware of this lately, and recently watched a movie called “The Rock”. There is a scene where the hero and his girlfriend are having sex on the roof of their building, and he gets a phone call. She says don’t stop, he says its my phone, it is important, and he answers it. How ridiculous! Public sex, on a rooftop for all to see, and he answers the phone in the middle of it. This was the only sex scene in the movie and it was completely unnecessary, it actually detracted from the story, but they had to put something in to titillate us viewers.
The point here is that sex has been taken from its actual purpose to a lower purpose by the culture. What might I mean by that? (Open to class) There are two basic reasons sex or sexual activity exists.
· Procreation, be fruitful and multiply. (Gen 1:28)
· Relationship. (Gen 2:24)
While it is almost impossible for the world to get rid of the need to procreate, it is working hard on it through stem cell research and in-vitro science. The objective of course is to be able to produce children without random parents, resulting in a sort of man-made human evolution. More importantly our culture and indeed the whole world is trying hard to eliminate the sex and relationship purpose. This is where we need to focus today.
In Gen 2:24 it is said that man is to leave his home, his father and mother, and to “cleave”, and become “one flesh”. I know we have all heard this taught or preached on at some point, but I want us to connect this verse with our “man need”.
Let us look at this passage in its total context. Gen 2:21-25:
So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib, which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. The man 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." For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. NASU
Notice the sequence of events. The man is put to sleep by the Lord. God takes a rib out of the man, and makes the woman. The Lord brings the woman to the man, he names her “woman” because she was taken out of man. And this last phrase is key to understanding and acknowledging God’s design for a man.
Verse 24 says “for this reason”, meaning because she was taken out of man, the man leaves and cleaves. This is very symbolic prose in these verses and we have to be sure to pick up what God is telling us in this whole passage. So here it is.
In verse 2:21 God takes a “tsela”, which always seems to be translated as rib in our Bibles, from the man. Its actual meaning is “side of”, which implies more than just a rib. The man confirms this when he says in verse 23, she is bone of my bones and flesh of may flesh, indicating that she is part of him.
God could have gone off and made a woman from the dust, just like he did all the animals and the man. But he didn’t! Can you guess why? It is because he wanted the man and woman to have a unique connection, not found in any other relationship with other “made beings”. So that when the cleaving goes on it is a Soul connection, which is then cemented by the physical connection of becoming one flesh. Part of this physical connection is what we know of as sex.
In Gen 2:24 it is the man who is told to leave, and cleave and become one flesh. This shows us that God designed into the man the requirement to have sex with his wife. We tend to think of it as a “need”, but it is not. It is an obligation that the man has designed into him by God for the purpose of connecting with his wife.
We, all of us, who live in this world have taken this design, with all its benefits, and twisted it into something it was never meant to be.
As I have been doing with the other “needs” I am going to look at the downside of not handling the man’s built in design for sex well.
· Connection. Sex is a way that a man connects with his wife, it is not the only way, but it is a significant thing. If the ladies could try to always remember that the man is often reaching out to you when he wants to have sex. I know that in some cases it doesn’t seem that way, but that is because something else is wrong between the two people involved.
· Emotional well-being. For a man, having sex with his wife results, in a relatively normal marriage, in a sense of well-being. A feeling that things are right with the world. The guy connects with the wife, and they share this act together, the relationship just seems okay. He doesn’t have to have sex at all times, just enough to feel good. Each couple will determine their desirable frequency so that this sense of well-being and connection is generally present.
· Communication. No sex means negative messages are sent. Not enough sex could do the same. What would be the negative message? How about “I don’t care about you”. Never ever use sex as a weapon against your man. You may win a battle, but you will lose the war, because he won’t forget what you did!
Any last points to discuss, before we wrap up?
That is it for today. Next week we will be finishing our series with an overview lesson, and I will be teaching it.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Love & Respect - His Needs 1 of 2
Good morning and welcome to Lesson 7 in our “Love and Respect” series. Today is the first of two lessons on the subject of “His Needs”, and this follows the two lessons on the topic of “Her Needs” which were so well covered by Cheryl and Sandy. I think it needs to be said up front today that the ladies are going to be challenged by what gets said this morning. We are in chapters 16, 17 and 18 of our book, which discuss the difficult subjects of Conquest, Hierarchy and Authority, and are called “needs of men”. I am reasonably sure that our discussion today will provoke some lively reactions.
I want to start with a simple question. Do you believe God? What does this mean to you? This is a serious issue! As a teacher I am charged with pointing everyone here toward God. This is the first question that God has laid on my heart and mind for today. I want to re-ask it, do you believe God?
· Is He always right?
· Is He right if our culture agrees with Him?
· Is He right if I agree with Him?
What if you don’t agree with Him? If He says you need to quit your job, will you? If He says, “go feed the homeless” will you? If He says, “stay with your nagging wife, will you?” If He says, “stay with your deadbeat husband, will you”? How do you want to answer that question? (Discuss)
I know that this question can be a little confrontative when asked, and that is because it causes us to look at who we really are and what we really believe. I want to take a look at a familiar Scripture, Lk 9:23-26.
And He was saying to them all, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. NASU
By now some of us are probably asking, “What has this got to do with men’s needs? I’m glad you asked! What is at stake here is our spiritual life, our spiritual growth and our spiritual health. Although we are going to look at what the author calls “men’s needs”, what we are actually going to be studying is “God’s design of men”. What is the difference, and why is it important to us?
What is a “need”, Webster’s says this:
· A lack of something necessary or desirable.
What is implied here is that there is some kind of deficiency present. Well, is that actually true for the six characteristics we are covering? If we really stretch our minds we could say yes, but no is a better answer, and this is why. All the characteristics are part of every man; they are designed in! It is not a deficiency issue it is an exercise issue. By this I mean, does he get to use, or exercise, all his designer parts.
This brings us back to the original question. Do you believe God? Someone who does not will reject all of part of these next two lessons. The choice we all face today is to decide to accept that God is right, or not. Is this clear to everybody, because I don’t want to move on unless we all understand this point clearly?
Before we all get up and leave because we can’t meet this standard of complete and utter acceptance and belief in what God says, I want to let us off the hook a little. There is only one man who has ever matched the absolute standard, and who was that? Jesus! So while I’m sure that God would like us to believe Him and place our lives under His Will, He is a realist, because He really knows that we are fallen individuals. The message to us today is therefore this:
· Understand and acknowledge that God has laid out His design for a man in His word.
· Be honest in your attempts to accept what He says a man needs.
· Seek Him and His power to overcome the social and cultural barriers that have been placed in your Mind, Heart and Will over your lifetime, so that you can accept God’s design for a man
Now it is time to lighten up things, I’m going to read a short story called “Consideration” about a husband and wife relationship that demonstrates love and respect in action. (Show the golf club and read the story)
Okay it is time to look at what us men need!
Conquest
The first need covered, which is found in Chapter 16, is called “Conquest”, and when I first saw that word I thought, you are going to get all the men on your side, but lose the women! Fortunately, the author explains himself. Let us start with the scriptural basis for this “need” or as I prefer, this “designer part”. Open your Bibles to Genesis 2:15. Could someone read it please?
Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the Garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. NASU
In the chronology of Genesis was the man working in the first vegetable patch before or after the woman appeared? Before! What is the implication of this in the context of work? God designed the first man, and every man since then, to work. It was after this that God created the Woman, because as God says in verse 18, it is not good for man to be alone. Let’s read it:
Then the Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him." NASU
Did God say, “I will make a companion”? How about this, didn’t God say, “I’ll give Adam a personal servant!” Maybe God said, “I know I’ll make Adam his own special robot!” No, none of these, God said, “I’ll make him a helper!” The Hebrew word for “helper” is “ezer”, and it is only ever used in the sense of personal one-on-one help in the OT. So Eve was made to be Adam’s personal special helper. Let’s look at the situation in the Garden before the serpent arrived.
· God, the creator, made and owns the garden.
· Adam, the man, works in the Garden, and is responsible for taking care of it. He is the steward or manager, serving God.
· Eve, the woman, was made for the man and is to help him.
As a confirmation of this last point let us look at 1 Cor 11:9:
For indeed man was not created for the woman's sake, but woman for the man's sake. NASU
The bottom line for our lesson is that man was made from the very beginning to work and bring home the bacon! He is hard wired to work, and get things done.
Now we come to the downside of this for a man. There are several things that a woman ought to try to remember about a man and his work. This is particularly important for wives in relating to their husbands, but can also be applied in any adult female to adult male relationship. Let us go through the list, this is the practical application of what we have been learning:
· Getting fired or laid off. This is like a death sentence for the Soul of a man. Does anybody have an example of this they are willing to share?
· Appreciation. A man wants his “work” efforts to be genuinely appreciated. Honest gratefulness is an important issue here. It doesn’t matter if it the work is a major or minor project, mowing the grass, fixing the faucet and putting out the trash are all work. When a man’s work is not appreciated, he cannot feel close.
· Making a mess of things. Not performing well at work leads to feelings of failure. Not achieving goals or getting a bad appraisal are equivalent disasters for a man.
· Communication. A lot of women would love their men to communicate more. Well, men will normally be happy to talk about their work. Even if is boring to a woman she would be very well served to become interested. If a woman shuts a man down about his work by indicating disinterest in some way, she might as well kiss communication goodbye.
Are there any comments on this list or maybe additions to it? If not we will move on to the next “need”, Hierarchy.
Hierarchy
Another cultural minefield! In our society, and popular culture, it is common to believe that the Bible says that men are to be rulers over woman, or something like that. Just look at how the SBC was derided a few years ago when it talked about women submitting to men. The problem then was that it was ignorant people doing the reporting. They failed to get all the facts and were not Bible literate. So what does the Bible say about this subject? We need to go to Ephesians 5:22-24:
Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. NASU
I know we must have some strong opinions here this morning on this subject, so let’s hear them! We don’t really have time today to study the issue of submission. I am prepared to do a lesson on it some time in the future, if you would like that. For now I want you to notice something. In this biblical statement and instruction the same order appears as we found in the “Conquest” discussion above. That is:
· Christ is the head of the church, which means all believers.
· The husband is head of the wife, but subject to Christ.
· The wife is subject to the husband.
Again, this is God designed, and He put this hierarchical sequence in place, where the man is the head of the woman. Let’s look at this situation from the perspective of the downside to the man.
· When the woman won’t submit. Very awkward for the man, because he is hard wired to be the provider and protector. How does he provide and protect when the woman doesn’t want him to? Women who do this non-submitting thing put their spouse in a totally no win situation. God tells him to protect and provide, to take care of the woman. The woman says no way, and he cannot force her to accept his provision. If any women don’t want their husbands to provide and protect them, think again. Ephesians 5:22 tells it all! (Discuss)
· The Princess Syndrome. Some women want the man to treat them like a princess. The man is to satisfy all their needs, he is to provide and protect to the extreme. There is just one problem, every princess has a father, and he is the King. So when a woman wants to be a princess she is forcing her husband into being her “father”. I suppose the question here is “ladies do you want a husband or a father?”
· Public behavior. When women choose to not submit, it comes out in their public behavior. Ladies, it is impossible to hide any disrespect you may have toward your husband. You will slip, even if you are trying to hide it. If you slip, especially in public, when your husband is present, don’t expect him to feel loving toward you for a long time, you will have demeaned him in the worst possible way. The hurt that is generated inside him is deep and lasts a long time.
· Communication. If a woman wants to be able to have an intimate relationship with her mate, appropriate submission is a pre-requisite. Always remember that God has pre-wired him to want to take care of you, if you don’t let him, he won’t talk to you in deep ways.
I want to finish Hierarchy here, are there any questions or comments?
Authority
Yet another thorny problem. This is obviously a close issue to that of submission, which we have just discussed. But it is not the same. Let’s look at one of the most troublesome verses in the entire Bible. 1 Tim 2:12, but to get proper context let’s look at 1 Tim 2:9-14:
Likewise, I want women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly garments, but rather by means of good works, as is proper for women making a claim to godliness. A woman must quietly receive instruction with entire submissiveness. But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet. For it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression. NASU
If there was such a thing as an ‘American Culture” Bible, would this verse even appear? Yet, there it is, clear as day, a woman is not allowed to exercise authority over a man. Even worse than that, she is to remain quiet! What does the class have to say about that? For the record, Paul, the author of this book, was only referring to public teaching, public authority and public quietness.
This Scripture refers us back to Genesis, but this time we need to consider the third chapter. Let’s review Gen 3:16 (b):
Yet your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." NASU
After the rebellion and deception of Eve, and then Adam, God exercising his absolute authority, initiated the consequences of this rebellion. One of these consequences is that the woman will desire her husband and he will rule over her. Notice again the hierarchy of authority, spoken in a whole different way, but having the same meaning as we have already seen this morning.
· God initiates the consequences, exercising his authority over every person.
· Adam, the man, is placed between God and the woman, due to the woman’s desire for him.
· Eve, the woman, will desire Adam, and he will rule over her.
Our Scriptures are wholly and completely consistent on this subject! As an important side note, this authority structure does not take away, reduce or otherwise change the woman’s ability to have a direct one on one relationship with God.
All this comes down to this single point. The man is designed to exercise authority over the woman; the woman is designed to be subject to that authority.
What does that really mean? (Ask for answers) It means that the man is hard wired to be responsible for the decision-making in the family. He may delegate actual decisions to his wife, but he is still responsible for them. As the book says, the man is to serve and lead the family. Let’s look at the downside of this, when this authority structure is not in place.
· Stress. God designed the man/woman unit, which we call a family, so that the man is responsible for its health. He is to carry the burden, and will be the one to answer to the Lord about fulfilling his responsibility. If the woman chooses to usurp this design, she will then take on the stress of leading and serving the unit. He is made for it, she is not! Unanticipated problems will arise. (Examples are; discipline trouble with the kids, laziness of the man and physical distress, possibly illnesses, of the woman)
· Insignificance. If the man feels emasculated by his lack of authority in the relationship he will back off. By this I mean that he may let the woman take over completely. He would prefer not to deal with the lack of respect, because it hurts so much. He might sub-consciously say, “I’ll let her have the whole thing, she thinks she knows better.” He will actually begin to disengage from the relationship. One of the extremely important things to understand here is that, if the wife does this, the man will still be searching for his personal importance. He becomes very vulnerable to another woman making him feel like he is “king of the hill”, in other words, an affair.
· Service. The man is designed to serve the family, let him! If a woman discourages or demeans what a man does to serve his wife and kids he becomes deflated. How many deflations does it take before he gives up doing things for you? You can nag him, but does that really work? Using a guilt trip to force him into serving the family works for a short time, but it builds up major resentments, and puts distance between you and him. Is that what you want?
· Communication. Ladies, not allowing the husband to take his God ordained place of leadership, will put distance between the two of you. He is unlikely to demand that you follow him, and this is because he loves you too much to coerce you. He is also designed to let you make your own choice to follow. If you choose to not allow him to lead, you will also be making the choice to cut off communication between the two of you.
This is a good time to jump in with disagreements or questions.
I want to finalize today’s very difficult study with a provocative statement.
A woman that doesn’t submit, in a scriptural sense, to her husband, can’t submit to God!
That is for all of us to think about, in the context of Ephesians 5:22.
Next week, I will be covering chapters 19, 20 and 21, for the second part of men’s needs.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Love & Respect - Communication
Welcome to lesson two in our “Love and Respect” series, for those of you that are following along in the book, we are in chapter two. Before we begin, for all of you that were here last week, what do you remember about the lesson?
{We covered the Scriptural perspective and basis of the entire book. This was an in depth look at Eph 5:33}
For the record let’s look at what the verse says:
Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband. NASU
How are we to view this instruction from God’s word?
· Husbands are to love their wives.
· Wives are to respect their husbands.
What escape clauses are there? Are there any conditional aspects to this? Can this approach to relationship apply anywhere else in our lives? (It applies, in principle, to all adult opposite gender relationships. Men are to have loving attitudes toward women, and women are to have respectful attitudes toward men, it is only the boundaries that change)
At the end of the lesson we took a look at the diagram on page 5, called “The Crazy Cycle”, let’s take another look now. What does it say to you? (Expect many different and interesting answers, all of which have some value to the class.)
Here is mine. It reminds me of a clock, and we begin the cycle at midnight, hands straight up! (Maybe it is an attitude of surrender) The situation is this, a relationship exists, and the man is not demonstrating a loving attitude to the woman. The woman tolerates this for a while, until approximately two o’clock. She then begins to react to the unloving environment established by the man. This reaction goes on for another couple of hours, which gets us to four o’clock.
The man then starts to feel dissed (disrespected), but he soldiers on for four hours, until about 8. He then has had enough of this “stuff” from the woman, so he starts to dish out some unloving attitude. That goes on until about 10 to 10:30, when he feels like he has finished his “I’ll show her” performance. She starts to feel unloved again, and it is almost noon, so it must be time to start to get back at him!
What is happening here? There are four phases that are happening. The two “time outs” where love and respect are missing, and the two reactionary periods when one or the other is dishing it out. Today we are going to look at the times when we dish it out; the time outs are covered in a later lesson.
Before we look at the “dish it out times” I want us go back to the “I surrender” comment I made earlier. The way the cycle is drawn out, it has the women doing the surrendering, but I hope we can all agree that the cycle could just as easily drawn with the “without respect” at the top, where the men would be surrendering.
When we surrender in this cycle who or what are we surrendering to? (Ask for suggestions) My answer is this, we have three permanent enemies in our daily lives:
· The flesh.
· The world system.
· Spiritual forces.
It is to one of these that we are surrendering, and possibly all three at one time. Let’s consider a couple of passages of Scripture here, first let’s look at Romans 8:5-8
For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. NASU
The key verse here is verse 7, where it identifies that the mind set on the flesh, does not subject itself to the law of God. What does this mean? (Allow a little time for answers and discussion) My personal answer is that it is talking about the self-centered mind. The mind of a person who is internally saying, “I’m going to have things my way”. If that is the “mind set” of an individual how will they be able to love and respect? In fact, turning it around, we could say that if you are not demonstrating love and respect, you are showing how self-centered you are! I don’t know how you might feel after hearing that, but I was not pleased with my level of self-centeredness after I meditated on this issue in my life.
The second piece of Scripture to look at is Ephesians 6:10-13. This is in the last part of the letter Paul writes to the church in Ephesus. It comes almost immediately after our series focus verse of 5:33, and is the final, and because of that, most important instruction that Paul gives in his letter
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. NASU
In verse twelve Paul identifies the other two sources we all struggle with. The first is “the rulers, powers and world forces of darkness”, which I called the world system. The second is “the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places”. In practical terms what do these two things mean? It means that the social, cultural, political and legal systems are working to affect us to not live by God’s word. It means that somehow, the unseen powers of darkness are also trying to influence us to not obey God.
Does anybody have examples of this? Some I can think of are:
· Easy and “no-fault” divorce.
· Tolerance. We are supposed to “tolerate” certain behaviors.
· Political Correctness. (Certain statements of truth are not permitted)
· Public Lies. For example “Bush lied, people died”, or “I didn’t have sex with that woman”.
As we begin to grasp what a challenge it is to be loving and respectful, we are basically facing a question like this, “Am I going to try to do things God’s way?” A natural second question could be, “okay I understand the problem, where do I start”? This brings us around to where we were earlier, let us look at what we “dish out”.
When I say, “dish it out” what types of words come to mind? Speak, talk, connect, interact, stick it to him/her. There are many things we can say, but the one that I like the best here is “communicate”. Let’s list some of the ways we “communicate” with the opposite sex.
· Voice, talking face to face, or on the phone, where an actual voice is heard. Some sub-sets of this include, volume (from whispering to shouting), tone (from gentle to rough, or loving to sarcastic) and message (from I love you to I hate you).
· Facial Expression, you probably know that there are several hundred combinations of facial expressions, as a result of the many facial muscles we have. Each of them contains a different message! You might not know that there are entire organizations dedicated to the science of facial expressions; they have web sites and all kinds of information about interpretation of facial expressions.
· Mouth, another way we communicate. Tight lips or wide toothy smiles tell us something. Did you know that back in the 1950s we were all taught to never show our teeth to an alien, because humans are the only species where toothy smiles are a friendly gesture?
· Eyes, I have heard the eyes called the window to the soul, well there might be some truth to that. Eyes speak to us. I remember when my wife and I were first connecting; she could tame me in an instant with her eyes.
· Posture, we all know when someone is really listening from how they are sitting, or if they have their arms crossed, or maybe they look like they are a million miles away. Body language can be so telling, and almost impossible to hide.
· Space, does anybody here, apart from me, have a problem with personal space? I absolutely hate it when people get into my personal space, it is so disrespectful. When someone gets in my face, I have no idea of what they are trying to communicate; I just want to get out of the situation.
· Code, this is the one that I really like. Men speak one language, and women another, and this applies to all of the modes we have discussed. The words we select, our voice tones, body posture and facial features differ between men and women.
At this point, after talking about “codes” I would like to try a simple exercise. I am going to hand out a sheet titled “What do they mean?” Take a couple of minutes to fill it out. Give your best answer to the phrase or gesture I’ve listed for when a woman says or does it, and then do the same for a man. I’ve given an example in the first line. The phrase is “I have nothing to wear”, my answer is that women mean, “I have nothing NEW to wear”; men mean, “I have nothing CLEAN to wear”.
(After a few minutes, start to ask for what people wrote down) As we can all hear each of us has different answers to these few simple examples. How can that be? We all speak the same language and live in the same social culture don’t we?
In researching the general subject of communication I have discovered that it is a very soft science. For example, various studies show that verbal communication accounts for as low as 7% or as high as 33% of all communication, but all the studies agree that non-verbal communication is much more significant than verbal. Also some researchers have estimated that an individual has more than 200,000 non-verbal gestures available, the high number I saw was 700,000. Even 200,000 non-verbal gestures is a “wow” number to me.
Our book has some very good major points to make on this subject of communication. If you have the book with you let’s open them up and take a look at some. We will start at page 31:
· The “issue” isn’t always the “issue”. We all know this don’t we? We do, but we don’t always remember to remember do we? All of us fall into the trap of thinking that whatever is raised in a conversation by somebody is what they really mean. The reality is that the first issue raised is usually not the real issue, and we would all benefit from remembering that. How? The amount of conflict we get into through misunderstandings would go down if we actually addressed the real underlying issues.
· On page 38 – Men hear negative criticism as contempt! There are two levels of negative criticism that a man experiences. Personal and non-personal, both are damaging to him although at different levels. Personal negative criticism will almost always result in the man feeling disrespected. The longer it goes on, the worse it gets, the more definitive it is, the worse it gets. Men, can you give us some examples? Non-personal negative criticism puts a man’s guard up, and gets him ready for a switch from criticizing something or someone else, to attacking him on a more personal level.
· Also on page 38 – Women feel silence as hostility. When a man simply says nothing, the message he seems to deliver to the woman is “I don’t care enough about (the subject) to comment”, and this is understood, as “I don’t love you”. For a woman this makes complete sense, for men, that is a ridiculous statement. Men sometimes close up to avoid exposing their feelings. Exposing feelings sometimes results in further ridicule (in their mind) and so they protect themselves from being hurt. Some men choose to not respond because they know they are angry and will lash out at their wife, who they love.
Do you recall from last week’s lesson that I stated that this series is going to be a challenge? Well, here is the challenge this week.
For the men – don’t lapse into silence toward the significant adult females in your life this week. Make an honest attempt to explain your feelings and thoughts, no matter how they may react. If you are angry, say so, and state you need some time to process what you are experiencing. Agree on a time to get back to the issue.
For the women – do not negatively criticize the men or what they do this week. Make an honest attempt to deal with perceived problems using “I” statements. An “I” statement frames an issue in terms of the first person not the second. An example is, instead of saying “you haven’t finished fixing the leaking shower head”, say “Is there any way I can help with that leaking shower?”
For both – Talk about the real issue, stop prancing around hoping that the other person can read your mind, they can’t!
Now you all have your homework assignments, I guess we can close. Before I do, let me ask if there are any questions on today’s lesson?
Finally, in the context of understanding that we have three “enemies” trying their best to mess up all our relationships, I’ll leave you all with this message from Scripture. In the “Message” paraphrase of 1 Peter 3:8-9 it says:
Summing up: Be agreeable, be sympathetic, be loving, be compassionate, be humble.
{We covered the Scriptural perspective and basis of the entire book. This was an in depth look at Eph 5:33}
For the record let’s look at what the verse says:
Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband. NASU
How are we to view this instruction from God’s word?
· Husbands are to love their wives.
· Wives are to respect their husbands.
What escape clauses are there? Are there any conditional aspects to this? Can this approach to relationship apply anywhere else in our lives? (It applies, in principle, to all adult opposite gender relationships. Men are to have loving attitudes toward women, and women are to have respectful attitudes toward men, it is only the boundaries that change)
At the end of the lesson we took a look at the diagram on page 5, called “The Crazy Cycle”, let’s take another look now. What does it say to you? (Expect many different and interesting answers, all of which have some value to the class.)
Here is mine. It reminds me of a clock, and we begin the cycle at midnight, hands straight up! (Maybe it is an attitude of surrender) The situation is this, a relationship exists, and the man is not demonstrating a loving attitude to the woman. The woman tolerates this for a while, until approximately two o’clock. She then begins to react to the unloving environment established by the man. This reaction goes on for another couple of hours, which gets us to four o’clock.
The man then starts to feel dissed (disrespected), but he soldiers on for four hours, until about 8. He then has had enough of this “stuff” from the woman, so he starts to dish out some unloving attitude. That goes on until about 10 to 10:30, when he feels like he has finished his “I’ll show her” performance. She starts to feel unloved again, and it is almost noon, so it must be time to start to get back at him!
What is happening here? There are four phases that are happening. The two “time outs” where love and respect are missing, and the two reactionary periods when one or the other is dishing it out. Today we are going to look at the times when we dish it out; the time outs are covered in a later lesson.
Before we look at the “dish it out times” I want us go back to the “I surrender” comment I made earlier. The way the cycle is drawn out, it has the women doing the surrendering, but I hope we can all agree that the cycle could just as easily drawn with the “without respect” at the top, where the men would be surrendering.
When we surrender in this cycle who or what are we surrendering to? (Ask for suggestions) My answer is this, we have three permanent enemies in our daily lives:
· The flesh.
· The world system.
· Spiritual forces.
It is to one of these that we are surrendering, and possibly all three at one time. Let’s consider a couple of passages of Scripture here, first let’s look at Romans 8:5-8
For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. NASU
The key verse here is verse 7, where it identifies that the mind set on the flesh, does not subject itself to the law of God. What does this mean? (Allow a little time for answers and discussion) My personal answer is that it is talking about the self-centered mind. The mind of a person who is internally saying, “I’m going to have things my way”. If that is the “mind set” of an individual how will they be able to love and respect? In fact, turning it around, we could say that if you are not demonstrating love and respect, you are showing how self-centered you are! I don’t know how you might feel after hearing that, but I was not pleased with my level of self-centeredness after I meditated on this issue in my life.
The second piece of Scripture to look at is Ephesians 6:10-13. This is in the last part of the letter Paul writes to the church in Ephesus. It comes almost immediately after our series focus verse of 5:33, and is the final, and because of that, most important instruction that Paul gives in his letter
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. NASU
In verse twelve Paul identifies the other two sources we all struggle with. The first is “the rulers, powers and world forces of darkness”, which I called the world system. The second is “the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places”. In practical terms what do these two things mean? It means that the social, cultural, political and legal systems are working to affect us to not live by God’s word. It means that somehow, the unseen powers of darkness are also trying to influence us to not obey God.
Does anybody have examples of this? Some I can think of are:
· Easy and “no-fault” divorce.
· Tolerance. We are supposed to “tolerate” certain behaviors.
· Political Correctness. (Certain statements of truth are not permitted)
· Public Lies. For example “Bush lied, people died”, or “I didn’t have sex with that woman”.
As we begin to grasp what a challenge it is to be loving and respectful, we are basically facing a question like this, “Am I going to try to do things God’s way?” A natural second question could be, “okay I understand the problem, where do I start”? This brings us around to where we were earlier, let us look at what we “dish out”.
When I say, “dish it out” what types of words come to mind? Speak, talk, connect, interact, stick it to him/her. There are many things we can say, but the one that I like the best here is “communicate”. Let’s list some of the ways we “communicate” with the opposite sex.
· Voice, talking face to face, or on the phone, where an actual voice is heard. Some sub-sets of this include, volume (from whispering to shouting), tone (from gentle to rough, or loving to sarcastic) and message (from I love you to I hate you).
· Facial Expression, you probably know that there are several hundred combinations of facial expressions, as a result of the many facial muscles we have. Each of them contains a different message! You might not know that there are entire organizations dedicated to the science of facial expressions; they have web sites and all kinds of information about interpretation of facial expressions.
· Mouth, another way we communicate. Tight lips or wide toothy smiles tell us something. Did you know that back in the 1950s we were all taught to never show our teeth to an alien, because humans are the only species where toothy smiles are a friendly gesture?
· Eyes, I have heard the eyes called the window to the soul, well there might be some truth to that. Eyes speak to us. I remember when my wife and I were first connecting; she could tame me in an instant with her eyes.
· Posture, we all know when someone is really listening from how they are sitting, or if they have their arms crossed, or maybe they look like they are a million miles away. Body language can be so telling, and almost impossible to hide.
· Space, does anybody here, apart from me, have a problem with personal space? I absolutely hate it when people get into my personal space, it is so disrespectful. When someone gets in my face, I have no idea of what they are trying to communicate; I just want to get out of the situation.
· Code, this is the one that I really like. Men speak one language, and women another, and this applies to all of the modes we have discussed. The words we select, our voice tones, body posture and facial features differ between men and women.
At this point, after talking about “codes” I would like to try a simple exercise. I am going to hand out a sheet titled “What do they mean?” Take a couple of minutes to fill it out. Give your best answer to the phrase or gesture I’ve listed for when a woman says or does it, and then do the same for a man. I’ve given an example in the first line. The phrase is “I have nothing to wear”, my answer is that women mean, “I have nothing NEW to wear”; men mean, “I have nothing CLEAN to wear”.
(After a few minutes, start to ask for what people wrote down) As we can all hear each of us has different answers to these few simple examples. How can that be? We all speak the same language and live in the same social culture don’t we?
In researching the general subject of communication I have discovered that it is a very soft science. For example, various studies show that verbal communication accounts for as low as 7% or as high as 33% of all communication, but all the studies agree that non-verbal communication is much more significant than verbal. Also some researchers have estimated that an individual has more than 200,000 non-verbal gestures available, the high number I saw was 700,000. Even 200,000 non-verbal gestures is a “wow” number to me.
Our book has some very good major points to make on this subject of communication. If you have the book with you let’s open them up and take a look at some. We will start at page 31:
· The “issue” isn’t always the “issue”. We all know this don’t we? We do, but we don’t always remember to remember do we? All of us fall into the trap of thinking that whatever is raised in a conversation by somebody is what they really mean. The reality is that the first issue raised is usually not the real issue, and we would all benefit from remembering that. How? The amount of conflict we get into through misunderstandings would go down if we actually addressed the real underlying issues.
· On page 38 – Men hear negative criticism as contempt! There are two levels of negative criticism that a man experiences. Personal and non-personal, both are damaging to him although at different levels. Personal negative criticism will almost always result in the man feeling disrespected. The longer it goes on, the worse it gets, the more definitive it is, the worse it gets. Men, can you give us some examples? Non-personal negative criticism puts a man’s guard up, and gets him ready for a switch from criticizing something or someone else, to attacking him on a more personal level.
· Also on page 38 – Women feel silence as hostility. When a man simply says nothing, the message he seems to deliver to the woman is “I don’t care enough about (the subject) to comment”, and this is understood, as “I don’t love you”. For a woman this makes complete sense, for men, that is a ridiculous statement. Men sometimes close up to avoid exposing their feelings. Exposing feelings sometimes results in further ridicule (in their mind) and so they protect themselves from being hurt. Some men choose to not respond because they know they are angry and will lash out at their wife, who they love.
Do you recall from last week’s lesson that I stated that this series is going to be a challenge? Well, here is the challenge this week.
For the men – don’t lapse into silence toward the significant adult females in your life this week. Make an honest attempt to explain your feelings and thoughts, no matter how they may react. If you are angry, say so, and state you need some time to process what you are experiencing. Agree on a time to get back to the issue.
For the women – do not negatively criticize the men or what they do this week. Make an honest attempt to deal with perceived problems using “I” statements. An “I” statement frames an issue in terms of the first person not the second. An example is, instead of saying “you haven’t finished fixing the leaking shower head”, say “Is there any way I can help with that leaking shower?”
For both – Talk about the real issue, stop prancing around hoping that the other person can read your mind, they can’t!
Now you all have your homework assignments, I guess we can close. Before I do, let me ask if there are any questions on today’s lesson?
Finally, in the context of understanding that we have three “enemies” trying their best to mess up all our relationships, I’ll leave you all with this message from Scripture. In the “Message” paraphrase of 1 Peter 3:8-9 it says:
Summing up: Be agreeable, be sympathetic, be loving, be compassionate, be humble.
Love & Respect - The Crazy Cycle
This is from page 5 of our study book, we will be referring to it periodically, but extensively in our second lesson on 1/20/2008.
For those not able to attend the class, please be sure to read chapter two on the subject of communication.
(From the book Love & Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs, published by Focus on the Family) IMO - This is one of the best marriage help books I have read, simple yet profound!
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Love & Respect - Two skits.
INTRO LESSON – SKIT ONE
Meet John and Jane, a young married couple, John is just coming through the door from a day at work. As he comes through the door he notices a pile of dirty dishes in the kitchen sink.
John: Honey, I’m home! What are those dishes doing in the sink?
Jane: Hi sugar! Oh, the dishes, well I got distracted by watching Oprah and forgot about them.
John: What do you mean distracted? By watching TV. You know I do the dishes in the evening, but this, this is just too much. I’m not out there working hard so you can sit back here watching TV, and leaving the dishes for me again!
Jane: I’m sorry John…….
John: (Interrupting and feeling a little angry) What do mean sorry, how many times do I have to ask not to leave your dirty lunch dishes for me to clean up?
Jane: I’m sorry John, I didn’t mean it.
John: Oh forget it, I’m going to get a beer and watch the game; you can clean your own dishes.
INTRO LESSON – SKIT TWO
Meet Mindy and Mike, another young married couple, they have two small kids Matt, age 3, and Mary age 2. Mary is just coming through the door from grocery shopping with the kids. As she comes through the door she hears the TV blaring, a football game is on.
Mindy: Honey, I’m home! Can you give me a hand?
Mike: Hi sugar! I’ll be just a minute, it’s third and goal on the one yard line.
Mindy: Mike, I’ve got a van full of groceries and two screaming kids out there.
Mike: (A little annoyed) Mindy, I said I’ll just be a minute.
Mindy: (also getting angry) How many games are you going to watch? I bet you haven’t even got those few things I left you doing finished! I’ve being dragging your children around the store for three hours and I come home to find you on the couch drinking beer and watching football, again!
Mike: Okay, okay, you don’t have to nag me, again! I’m going, just let me take care of it.
Mindy: Yes, you take care of it, I’m going to call my mother!
Meet John and Jane, a young married couple, John is just coming through the door from a day at work. As he comes through the door he notices a pile of dirty dishes in the kitchen sink.
John: Honey, I’m home! What are those dishes doing in the sink?
Jane: Hi sugar! Oh, the dishes, well I got distracted by watching Oprah and forgot about them.
John: What do you mean distracted? By watching TV. You know I do the dishes in the evening, but this, this is just too much. I’m not out there working hard so you can sit back here watching TV, and leaving the dishes for me again!
Jane: I’m sorry John…….
John: (Interrupting and feeling a little angry) What do mean sorry, how many times do I have to ask not to leave your dirty lunch dishes for me to clean up?
Jane: I’m sorry John, I didn’t mean it.
John: Oh forget it, I’m going to get a beer and watch the game; you can clean your own dishes.
INTRO LESSON – SKIT TWO
Meet Mindy and Mike, another young married couple, they have two small kids Matt, age 3, and Mary age 2. Mary is just coming through the door from grocery shopping with the kids. As she comes through the door she hears the TV blaring, a football game is on.
Mindy: Honey, I’m home! Can you give me a hand?
Mike: Hi sugar! I’ll be just a minute, it’s third and goal on the one yard line.
Mindy: Mike, I’ve got a van full of groceries and two screaming kids out there.
Mike: (A little annoyed) Mindy, I said I’ll just be a minute.
Mindy: (also getting angry) How many games are you going to watch? I bet you haven’t even got those few things I left you doing finished! I’ve being dragging your children around the store for three hours and I come home to find you on the couch drinking beer and watching football, again!
Mike: Okay, okay, you don’t have to nag me, again! I’m going, just let me take care of it.
Mindy: Yes, you take care of it, I’m going to call my mother!
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