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Tuesday 24 February 2015

UNDERSTANDING THE MARRIAGE COVENANT – PATIENCE AND TOLERANCE




A man of God once told this story. A young lady who had newly married came to him asking him to help her because she just discovered she had married the wrong person and wanted out of the marriage. She was a member of her church’s prison evangelism team and had been visiting and witnessing to this inmate for a while. Later a friendship developed because this inmate had no family and she became the only “family” he had. When he was to be discharged from prison, he had no body and nowhere to go and so she decided to harbor him. To cut a long story short a romance ensued and not long after they were married.

The problem was that she was brought up to eat with cutleries and on a table with proper table manners and all that it entails. She was also a very neat and proper person who was almost impeccable in her habits. He husband was completely the opposite; he had no table manners, ate with his fingers and will fling his clothes anywhere; on the couch, chair, ground to the annoyance of this lady. In short she discovered that she was completely “incompatible” with this man.

The man of God told her that he was only empowered by God to join people and never to separate them. Pastors and clergymen were never mandated to separate or divorce couples and so he told them to do an experiment for the next two months which he called “one week in, one week out”.
What he simply told them to do was live the way it suits one partner for one week and the next week switch unto the way of the life of the other partner. Your guess is as good as mine that the couple did not separate but found marital live very blissful because they found a way to be patient with each other and to tolerate each other. One week they ate without cutleries and did not observe any table manners and the next week they ate with cutleries and observed all table etiquettes. The man learned to live like his wife and the wife learned to live like the husband and their quarrels completely disappeared.

Anyone who is determined to make his marriage work must imbibe these two principles – patience and tolerance. If you are an impatient person, please pray for the grace to be patient. If you are intolerant, you also need to ask God for grace to tolerate people.

As Christians, Christ is patient with us, tolerating all our misdeeds and shortcomings yet loving us in spite of the fact that many times we are unlovable.

You ought to demonstrate the same token to your partner. Try the principle behind “one week in, one week out” because it will work for you.

God bless you.


Femi Imevbore
+2348080929292
femiimevbore@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/officialecc?ref=hl
www.lifebuilder.ecwid.com
www.elshaddaicovenantchurch.org

 

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Thursday 19 February 2015

UNDERSTANDING THE MARRIAGE COVENANT 8 – TOUGH AND TENDER







"The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery, and having set her in the center of the court, they said to Him, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in adultery, in the very act.  "Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women; what then do You say?" They were saying this, testing Him, so that they might have grounds for accusing Him. But Jesus stooped down and with His finger wrote on the ground. But when they persisted in asking Him, He straightened up, and said to them, "He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." Again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they began to go out one by one, beginning with the older ones, and He was left alone, and the woman, where she was, in the center of the court. Straightening up, Jesus said to her, "Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?" She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more."John 8:3-11 (NASB)
 


 Many times our expectations from people are set on high standards while our expectations of ourselves are often set at lower standards. We are quick to excuse our shortcomings while we cry “crucify him” when someone else does something we ourselves may be guilty of.

Whenever we find ourselves in situations and conditions that expose our weak nature and basal tendencies, we hear things like “after all I am only human, and no man is above mistakes”. We also hear excuses like, “It was not my fault” or “it was the devil’s work”. The core of the matter is that we expect people to sympathize with us and understand our imperfections, but when it comes to other people we begin to judge them by other standards.

We are tough on other people but tender on ourselves!

However, Jesus in the passage of scriptures above turns this logic around. The woman was caught in adultery and needed to face the brunt of the law. Unfortunately for the accusers of the woman they failed to recognize some obvious truths:-
·         No man sins alone and there is nothing like a victimless crime. The man with whom the woman was committing adultery was cleverly let off the hook. This is what is termed selective justice. How often we see this play out in the home.
·         Everyone has defaulted one time or the other. No one is infallible!
·         He who comes to equity must come with clean hands like the lawyers say.
·         You only qualify to judge another man when you have first passed the test yourself.
·         Everyone deserves another chance.

How often we see this scenario play out in the home! We are always ready to criticize our partner for failing to play their role in spite of the fact that we on our own part cannot be said to have fully mastered our own roles. We must understand that marriage is a learning process and everyone is a STUDENT when it comes to marriage. 

If we apply these principles in our marriages and relationships there will be less conflicts and breakups.  

To be tough on ourselves – setting very high standards as our moral codes and tender on others, giving everyone the opportunity to learn from their errors and mistakes, is what makes for strong relationships.

The marriage covenant is about being tough on morals and tender in mercies remembering that he who has NO SIN is the only one qualified to crucify another.

God bless you.



Femi Imevbore
+2348080929292
femiimevbore@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/officialecc?ref=hl
www.lifebuilder.ecwid.com
www.elshaddaicovenantchurch.org



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Monday 16 February 2015

UNDERSTANDING THE MARRIAGE COVENANT 7

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the Church; and he is the savior of the body. Therefore as the Church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands love your wives, even as Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. Ephesians 5: 22-26 (KJV)

Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."Genesis 2:18 (NASB)

 One fundamental issue in understanding the marriage covenant is to find out the reason why God created the woman and why He instituted marriage? I cannot claim to know all the answers to these pertinent questions but reading the word of God and taking it literally helps me to put a lot of things in perspective.

I will therefore attempt to answer the question why God created the woman. Before I continue I must say that if you are a Christian reading this, please note that what I will be saying are not my words but what the Bibles says. On the other hand if you are a non-christian reading this piece, may I ask you to consider carefully, if what I will be saying makes sense.

Permit me to be a little philosophical by saying that everything created or invented is created not for itself but for some thing else. Cars were invented not for themselves but for the purpose of ease of  transportation for man. A vacuum cleaner was invented not for itself but for the purpose of helping to do something outside of itself.

In the same vein, the woman was created by God not primarily for herself but for the man. Now let us examine the scriptures carefully.

Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."Genesis 2:18 (NASB)

The above passage can be rewritten as follows:

Then the Lord God said, it is inappropriate for the man to be  incomplete, I will make FOR HIM someone that will fill the emptiness in him. 

In other words, God saw that man had a need even though the man did not realize his need at that time and so God made the woman to fulfill that need. However, I must say here that this is not meant to propose that the woman is a "need machine" a tool to be used by the man to satisfy his desires but the point being made here is that the woman was created to fill the void in the life of the man. May I make bold to say that the man may never be complete at least in the eyes of God, if he does not have an "Eve" in his life; a God given wife.

The woman is in no way inferior to the man because she is actually what makes the man complete. She is the helper suitable for the man. A helper is usually someone who has what you do not have that you badly need. In so many ways a helper actually occupies a more privileged position than the one being helped as far as the issue at hand is concerned.

It is therefore not about what you want, your rights, desires and pleasures! It is about helping your partner be the man or woman God wants him or her to be by fulfilling their roles in the marriage.

More next time.

God bless you.

N/B Please lets have your comments and contributions.

Femi Imevbore
+2348080929292
femiimevbore@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/officialecc?ref=hl
www.lifebuilder.ecwid.com
www.elshaddaicovenantchurch.org


Saturday 14 February 2015

UNDERSTANDING THE MARRIAGE COVENANT - COMPATIBILITY IN MARRIAGE

Last time we tried to establish the fact that compatibility in marriage is not so much what we "have in common" as compared to what we "agree in common". It is a function of what we are willing to tolerate and accommodate.

One misconception is the desire to have your partner change and conform to the image you have created for him of her in your consciousness. Every one want his partner to be the perfect husband or wife but reality shows that we can only find that in fiction and story books. The Bible clearly shows in the writing of Paul the divine pattern of a compatible marriage.

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the Church; and he is the savior of the body. Therefore as the Church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands love your wives, even as Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. Ephesians 5: 22-26 (KJV)

In this passage of scripture Paul points out certain profound truth about marriage using the relationship between the Church and Christ as a analogy. So lets pause for a moment to reflect on this relationship.

1. Christ loves the church not because the church deserved to be loved or earned his love
2. Christ loves the church in spite of the fact that many times the church is unlovable
3. Christ loves an imperfect and impure church
4. Christ gave himself for the church - this connotes a situation of forgetting who he was, his majesty and power to relate to the church.

The Church in ancient times and now in no way measures up to the standard of Christ. There was no compatibility between us mortals and the incarnate of God who decided to come in human form. I am sure angels still marvel at this display of unconditional love.

Now here is the crust of the matter. Christ constantly washes the church by HIS WORDS. What you say to your spouse in spite of their shortcomings is vital in maintaining a lasting relationship. In other words, Christ seems to tell us all the time that if we trust him we can make it in life and in the hereafter. The words of Christ are words of hope and encouragement and not words of condemnation and judgment.

This is the principle of divine compatibility.

God bless you.

Femi Imevbore
+2348080929292
femiimevbore@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/officialecc?ref=hl
www.lifebuilder.ecwid.com
www.elshaddaicovenantchurch.org

Monday 9 February 2015

UNDERSTANDING THE MARRIAGE COVENANT – COMPATIBILITY IN MARRIAGE




I  have my father in the Lord Dr. James Iruobe,  to thank for granting me an understanding of what it means to be compatible with someone. I attended a Marriage Seminar where he had been invited to speak to Ministers and their spouses and in the course of his speech he illustrated how he and his wife overcame the issues of their different backgrounds.

It may be expedient to let you into the different backgrounds from where my father in the Lord and his spouse came from. Dr. James Iruobe came from a very humble background and was raised in a village setting. Conversely, our Mummy (his wife) came from a very urban background and was raised in the high brow city of Lagos, Nigeria. 

So when they got married they experienced a clash of many habits, cultures and tastes. My father in the Lord was brought up to eat very fast (a skill required for survival in the village) while his wife was brought up to eat at the dinner table with cutleries. From a purely human point of view such a marriage would have been earmarked for disaster but over 35 years on, their marriage is a model to emulate. How did they achieve “compatibility”?

Dr James explains as follows. “I like my morning pap very thick but my wife likes hers watery. So my wife makes very thick pap, serves me my own first and thereof adds water to make her own watery and everyone is happy.”

In life many people are looking for compatible partners, people with the same taste, likes, hobbies and backgrounds but these parameters have not been able to stem the high divorce rates. The fact that your partner likes what you like; the kind of music, sports and other forms of entertainment, does not guarantee that your love for that person will grow.

Compatibility is the ability of two different people to accommodate each others likes and dislikes. The ability to make room for the others background and blend to complement each other. It is the ability to enjoy your peculiarities without denying your partner the liberty of enjoying theirs.

It is wishful thinking to expect that two different human beings can be totally compatible in the face of the fact that even identical twins are two different entities. This is how God has made us so that the world is enriched because of our diversity. You can imagine if this world was made up of only Sanguine or Choleric people or any of the popular personality traits.

What every one of us should strive for is the ability to accommodate each other. Remember what makes two objects glue to each other is that they have different surfaces. 

That's compatibility.


Femi Imevbore
+2348080929292
femiimevbore@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/officialecc?ref=hl
www.lifebuilder.ecwid.com
www.elshaddaicovenantchurch.org










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