Greetings
in Jesus' name who said, "Peace to you" (Luke 24:36)
Every one wants to be happy. Moreover every one wants to be happy in the home,
more than the working place or church. And when the man does not get this peace
and happiness he wants in the home, he tries to get it with his friends in the
coffee house or club. He sits there or plays in the club laughing and enjoying
the atmosphere of joy. So he is filling the vacuum in his heart - a need, with
a substitute. When he is unhappy in the home, he finds the shelter - his friends
where he is happy and can laugh. Why, because the home is not giving the peace
and happiness he desires.
Well, a man can walk out of the home into the circle of his friends or a club.
But what will a woman do? She will become a victim of loneliness that will end
up in depression. She will find solace in crying in the loneliness of the bathroom
and meditate about suicide. Many such living corpses are not committing suicide
because they have children. Yes, this is a naked truth and alarming fact. And
the number of such victims are increasing rapidly. It is reported in different
media that Kerala, where the illiteracy rate is very negligible and Christian
population is very strong, the percentage of suicide is very, very high. The
church has to wake up and conduct research to find remedial measures to counter
attack and stop the invasion of this gorilla on the grape vine garden of families.
And what happens to the children in such fighting and or abusing parents? Where
the father is not there to love, lead and guide. They drop out of schools, embrace
communism or join naxalite (terrorist communists) movement or other revolutionary
set ups. Kerala, the state of Christian missionaries, the percentage of Christians
in communist party is very high. It is the Christians who helped communist party
in this state to grow in the 50's and 60's. It is the Christians that installed
a communist government in power. (Do you know that Kerala is the first state
in the world to have an elected communist government in power?) It should not
have happened if the Christians were not there to nurture it and help it. Do
you know that more than 50% of the inmates of prisons in Kerala are Christians;
where as the Christian population is only 24%.
Kerala is a land of gospel preaching. Each city hosts more than 100 evangelistic
crusades a year. Every town has more than 5 Pentecostal churches and several
evangelical churches.
Yes, the youths from the homes where the parents are not living in their role
models, turn out to be troublemakers.
Yes, for most, the home is not a comfortable place. There is trouble and shaking
and earthquakes - even tsunami - in the home. As a result people pack up and
separate, fighting in the court for years for money, property, hurts and abuse.
When God united Adam and Eve, he said, "Therefore shall a man leave his
father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one
flesh." Gen 2:24. The root word for cleave has the meaning of two glued
together in such a way that it cannot be separated.
But man separates. Remember that it was not God's plan at all, but man's twisted
idea. If two papers that are glued together are pulled apart, it will get torn
badly and become unusable. That's what divorce does to two people.
Ask a woman or man who is separated. 'Are you the same though you live with
another person now? Same as you were living with the first person in love? Do
you cry now? Cry when you think of your time with that person or your children
in that marriage?'
You do - if you are sane.
Separation hurts because you violated the word of God.
But what do you do if you are already separated? You can do nothing. You cannot
go back - if you or the other person is already married. Irreversible damage
is done by your mistake, anger, ego or false pride and unwillingness to humble
and say, 'I am sorry. I was wrong.'
If both of you are not already married and have kids, think whether you both
can live together again at least for the sake of the kids. If needed you can
meet a counsellor. Think whether you can try again to live together.
But let me warn you that you must think one hundred times before you do this.
Because you should not go through a second marriage with the same person and
then a divorce again. You must not live in a self made hell and suffer violence,
abuse and sleepless nights. If both have learned from your mistakes and has
changed, really changed from the heart and is willing to take a different route,
as in the Bible, you must consider this path. If you both learned from your
mistakes and have become matured, it is a good idea to be united again and live
in peace and harmony - and bring up the children in the commandments of God.
But I would like to suggest that it is better that you both go for Christian
counselling before you say YES.
Do you know why I say this? The child/children need a father and a mother. There
was a time when the family counsellors and psychologists said that a child needs
a mother and that will fill the vacuum almost. They also thought that the presence
of father is necessary as a provider and to discipline the child. And that is
why the courts always handed over the child to the mother when there was a split
in the family. But now everyone is thinking seriously as they have found that
this is not true. A child needs the mother to love, feed, teach and so on. Girls
need a mother as they reach puberty or to teach them about marriage or home
making. A girl needs a mother to counsel them about their teenage problems and
emotional struggles - more than boys.
But now every one knows that a father is also equally important for a boy and
a girl to provide them security and a role model. It is found that a child,
whether boy or girl, must look up at the father as a role model and hero. Such
children will do better, face the problems in a calm attitude, learn to protract
others in the family and more over trust others in the family. Those who lost
a father who left them and went after another woman will have many psychotically
problems in their life, studies, believing people and their marriage.
Well, those who are in the category must not draw the conclusion and decide
that they are going to be problem children now and later in their marriage.
You don't have to be. You can be an exemptional case if you will read books
on this subject, trust God to make you a model for others in your category and
work to be a success. You can. I know people who have done well - very well.
You can be one of them.
Now, if you are already separated and cannot go back - trust God to take you
further in the days to come. Do not cry over the mistake and end your life in
guilt and shame. Learn from your mistakes. Have you heard the Jewish proverb,
"Making a mistake is not a mistake. Not learning from the mistake is the
mistake." Read that quote again.
Making a mistake is not a mistake. Not learning from the mistake is the mistake.
So instead of living in guilt, bury the past. Ask forgiveness for all the mistakes
that happened knowingly or unknowingly and holding the hand of Jesus, walk forward,
head lifted up in hope and trust in Him.
Are you separated and married again? Take care of your present marriage. I am
talking to the man and woman. See that the mistakes you have done in the past
are not repeated in this marriage. Here are 10 commandments that I would like
to give to every married couple:
I. Thou shall keep the priorities in order.
(1.God, 2. family, 3. job, and 4. friends. Recently when I was speaking on the
TV on this subject, I illustrated it with a juggler most of you have seen in
the circus. Do you know what will happen to a juggler who is playing with four
lemons and one of them will fall from his hands. All the other lemons will fall
from his hands. He has to stop, pick them up and start it over again afresh.
Keep the priorities in the right order.)
II. Thou shall have family prayer every evening and eat at least one meal
a day together.
(Make both an enjoyable time. Think of good ways to make the food and prayer
time not just a routine affair but quite different, at least once in a while
- like different people cooking different items or every one taking part for
a common meal. A study has revealed that the children from families that ate
one meal a day together behaved much better in the school.
Worshipping God by holding hands together or dancing together. How about having
campfire and family prayer in a cold evening outside your home. How about having
an open discussion about a subject the children are interested.) [Like: 'love
marriage', 'why some people are not healed', 'where will the non-Christians
go when they die,' 'which baptism is right: child baptism or believer's baptism?
Why some Christians don't wear ornaments etc. Make it a real interesting Bible
study with total freedom given top the children to express their feelings and
understanding.]
III. Thou shall spend enough time with your spouse and plenty time with your
kids.
(Play together, go for a walk, picnic together and say jokes and laugh. Give
each other memories as though each week is the last week you are going to live.
Give each one enough time.)
IV. Thou shall love and trust your partner as thyself.
(Do you doubt the character of your partner whenever you will see him/her talking
to someone or laugh with a person of the opposite sex? Is it not just suspicion?
If this gnawing suspicion is increasing as the days go by, do not hesitate to
go to a Christian counsellor at the earliest. It is found that the women dare
to seek help from counsellors and men normally hesitate to cooperate. This must
change. Both should go. If one feels the need, the other must go too to help
and find help.)
V. Thou shall NOT ever talk about divorce.
(Remove that word from your vocabulary. Some time, the thought of divorce or
separation may come into you. Arrest it. Your deceiving heart would say, 'this
marriage was a mistake.' But don't meditate about it. Don't ever utter it. Stop
it as soon as possible. Fill up that devastation thoughts with hopeful words
and wonderful Bible promises.)
VI. Thou shall NOT dig the past that stinks or pains.
(Don't dig into the past affairs of your spouse whether it is about the life
before the marriage or about the first marriage. Or even about the failures
of your spouse in the past with you. Look forward and talk of faith, hope and
love. [1 Cor 13:13.] More of love, even when you do not feel like talking of
love.)
VII. Thou shall save for the future, so your future will be secure.
(Men are more carefree or careless to think about the future. He feels that
everything will be all right and bright. But the woman and the children feel
happy and secure when they can feel it. For them love and security is not a
feeling but it must be tangible. They need a house, money in the bank and security
in the future that they can see and touch - sure of - and not just a dream of
faith. They don't like the fantasy talk of prosperity)
VIII. Thou shall not criticize,but admire each other.
(You can correct. But remember the ratio 1:5. One criticism sandwiched with
2 + 2 or more encouragements and praises.)
IX. Thou shall do all to enhance your marriage.
(I suggest: Read a book on marriage and or family life every year and subscribe
for a periodical magazine on family. The older you get, definitely you should
read books because more than half of the aged couples are living in frozen marriages
and sleeping in separate rooms.
You should attend a seminar on marriage whenever possible. Not because you have
trouble in your marriage but to learn about the traps and snare the devil will
put to destroy a Christian home - the smallest unit of God on earth. Seminars
will enhance your marriage and correct the directions and actions. Seminars
will help you to understand your spouse as why he/she does many things different
than you expect.)
X. Treasure your children.
(Treasure them, protect them, cherish them, take care of them, live for them,
love them, give them faith in GOD and invest in them. Their life, their protection,
their education and their health must be your primary concern. Sacrifice all
that is necessary for them. And build them in strict discipline with due love
in such a way that no one will starve of attention or affection. No one will
be able to say that my father and mother did not care for me and that is why
I ended up as a mess.)
Well, if you are married first time, or second time, see that you are protecting
your marriage. Just like you will protect a candle in the wind. Observe the
10 commandments.
Remember your children. If you ever separate, they will feel the pain as though
you were sawing them slowly in two halves from head to toe to live their lives
and their hurt will never be healed.
A woman in Delhi went to the roof of a high rise building drank liquor as much
as she could from a bottle. Then she left a note and jumped to her death. In
the suicide note she wrote to her kids, 'I love you very much. Believe me. I
tried (for a peaceful family life) but it did not work. Bye.'
Do you think that she loved the kids? NO. It was just hollow words. If she really
loved them, she would have lived for them. She should have sought help from
good counsellors.
She escaped but left the kids to suffer all through their lives and even the
next and the next generation. Don't you do that!! Don't leave your kids and
escape with a divorce.
Do yourself a favour -
= Love your partner with respect as the Bible speaks,
= Stay united as one,
= And let no one separate you - whether it is you, your ego, your pride, your
parents or job. 'No one should separate' a married couple.
God wants every family to be a little heaven on earth. I want you also to enjoy
your married life.
You can if you will try.
