Relationship Series, #4
The Church as a Type of Marriage
This morning I
would like to continue our series on relationships. For the past couple weeks
we’ve been looking at isolation and it’s effect upon relationships. It doesn’t
matter if it is in a marriage or in other relationships such as a church or any
Group of people who have a common bond. When someone in that group, or
marriage, begins to become depressed, they will begin to lose hope, and when
they have lost hope, they begin to isolate themselves from their spouse or from
the body of believers, and before you know it they will leave that group of
believers.
A couple years
ago, we studied this process which brother Branham told us was happening in the
world today. We saw that isolation or “dis-association”, was the last stage in the neurotic condition
before the person became totally a neurotic. In the message Christ Revealed in His Own Word. he had said, , 20 Men now and people
today are in such a neurotic condition, the whole world..
Now, in order
to understand more deeply how to keep a marriage relationship healthy and full
of life, we need to know what things cause it to fall apart. As I said last
week, I believe the same stages that we saw in the development of neurosis also
apply in the death of a marriage, and the death of family, as well as the death
of any other relationships, including church relationships. And families die by
the vine, and friendships die by the vine because the people loose their focus
on why we are placed here on earth. We found in our study of neurosis that the
main thing which causes the process of neurosis to start, is the people are not focused on the right
things.
Jesus
commanded us to “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His Right-wise-ness, and ALL the
things you have need of will be added unto you.” From the Message CHRIST IS THE MYSTERY Brother Branham said, Hell is against this truth of
the revelation of this mystery. But the Bride is standing on it. That's Her
stand. Why do you hunger, Church? Why
do you thirst? It's the Father trying to reveal this hidden secret to you, but
you let so many things get it out of you. You
let your job, you let your wife, you let your husband, you let your children,
you let the cares of the world, you let some pastor, you let somebody else get that out of you, when you know that way
down in your heart you're a-thirsting, hungry. It's God trying to reveal it to
you (See?), the revelation. The last day is here.
And once you
let your job or your wife or your children or whatever get your focus off God’s
promise for you, then it’s over, and you’ve lost. YOU then become depressed and
once depression sets in, hope takes it’s flight and then your gone.
Remember, the
process goes from depression to isolation. Depression, then isolation, that is
the order of the falling away. Brother Vayle called it attrition. A wearing
away. You just get tired of it all. You wear out and lose hope, and when hope
is gone you die. For Hope maketh alive.
In the
Magazine Psychology Today, Dr. Philip Zimbardo, professor at Stanford
University, said, “I know of no more
potent killer than isolation. There is no more destructive influence on
physical and mental health than the isolation of you from me and us from them. Isolation has been shown to be the central
agent in the development of depression, paranoia, schizophrenia, rape,
suicide and mass murder.” “The devil’s strategy for our times is to trivialize
human existence and to isolate us from one another while creating the delusion
that reasons are time pressures, work demands, or economic anxieties.”
PROVERBS 13:12
¶ Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but [when] the desire cometh, [it
is] a tree of life.
MIGHTY CONQUEROR You're... Not only is He here alive, but
you're alive with Him. The great hope that you have within your heart makes you
alive.
WITNESSES And we who were once dead in sin and trespasses has he
quickened us. And the word "quick" means "resurrect" from
our old forms of life to a new and living hope that lies within our hearts,
waiting for the coming of the Lord Jesus the second time in glory.
So we see that
hope maketh alive. It is a living hope we are talking about.
I PETER 1:3
¶ Blessed [be] the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath
begotten us again unto a lively hope
( That means a living hope) by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
Now, last week
we spoke of how close the early church seemed to be. We read in
the scriptures how the early church did everything together. This kept the
rires burning in their hearts. In the Book of Acts we found the key to this
intimacy was a four step process of Doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread and
prayer. That’s what is lacking today in the home and in the church. It’s not
having all four of these elements working together.
These four
important elements begin with having the same Doctrine, because how can two
walk together lest they be agreed. Then this doctrine brings fellowship which
means association, community and sharing,
participating together to the point of intimacy.
ROMANS
5:1 ¶ Therefore being justified by faith, we have
peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: 2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace
wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
I
STAND AT THE DOOR AND KNOCK 57-1208 He's got to
have access to every room in the
house, every compartment. All the little secret things of life, He's got to have access to every bit
of it. Then He becomes Lord. What does He want to come in your heart for? Is to
be your Lord. He's knocking at the door to be your Saviour. And if you hold
selfishness, and pride, and malice, and all these things in your heart, He
can't be Lord, though you accept Him in, He can't be Lord. When He's Lord, He's
Lord over all. And that's what He's knocking for. [Brother Branham knocks--Ed.]
Oh, Lord...?... Let Him in. "I want to come in and sup." What supping
is, is fellowship, when you got fellowship one with another. How that the--the
Lord and you are buddies. You're partners. And whatever you have, He has too.
Whatever He has then, you have too. You see, He becomes you, that you might
become Him. And everything is in common.
Notice brother Branham is quoting from
the book of Revelations here, REVELATION
3:20 20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and
open the door, I will come in to him,
and will sup with him, and he with me.
He said, ." What supping
is, is fellowship, when you got fellowship one with another. The Jesus is calling out for us to just
open up to Him that He might have access to fellowship. That is all He is
asking. He wants access to fellowship with you. And how does He do that?
Through His Word? And how does He present His Word to you? Through men. Men
having access with Men. Brother getting together with brother and talking the
Word and fellowshipping around the Word, and praying together.
Access into fellowship. That is what a
church is all about, and that is what a marriage or any relationship is all
about. Access into fellowship. That is
what the Church needs more of today than at any other time. Access to sharing.
Access to caring, access to loving. Access to one another, as a family of God.
But what have we done? We have let our jobs, or our schedules, or our other
associations cut in on the fellowship of the saints. We have become a reclusive
world and we wonder why we starve for affection and someone to love us.
In GENESIS 2:18 ¶ And the LORD God said, [It is] not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an
help meet for him. GENESIS
2:21 ¶ And the LORD God caused a
deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and
closed up the flesh instead thereof; 22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken
from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. 23
And Adam said, This [is] now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh:
she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. 24
Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they
shall be one flesh.
Now this word
cleave means to stick together, to cling, stick, stay close, cleave, keep
close, stick to, stick with, follow closely, join to, overtake, catch So we see it was God Himself that
said, it is not good for man to dwell alone, therefore, I will institute
marriage for the purpose of having someone by his side always.
But what
causes this isolation, this separation, this exclusion or alienation that takes
place in marriages today? When you are
excluded you have a feeling of distance, a lack of closeness, and very little
intimacy. Your in the same ship, but
have no fellowship. Your in the same church but don’t really know each
other. You eat the same spiritual food, sit at the same spiritual table, and
yet isolated, alienated and cut off from one another. Why? You come together to worship together, to
believe together, because you have the same Loving Father, and yet why are we
so distant from one another? You were not created to live alone. Then why do we
try to live out our Christian life alone? YOU couldn’t isolate yourself and
keep your family together, and more than you can isolate yourself and keep your
marriage together. You need to be loved, and you need to love.
Paul said in the
Book of HEBREWS 10:24-25, And
let us consider one another to provoke
unto love and to good works: Not
forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some [is];
but exhorting [one another]: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.
PSALMS 133:1 ¶ How
good and how pleasant [it is] for brethren to dwell together in unity! 2
[It is] like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the
beard, [even] Aaron's beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments; 3 As the dew of Hermon, [and as the dew]
that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the LORD commanded the
blessing, [even] life for evermore.
EPHESIANS 4:1
¶
I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy
of the vocation wherewith ye are called,
2 ¶ With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing
one another in love; 3 Endeavouring to keep the unity of the
Spirit in the bond of peace. (what does it mean to endeavour to do
something?) It means to be diligent and to exert oneself on behalf of that
thing. ) 4 [There is] one body,
and one Spirit, even as ye are
called in one hope of your
calling; 5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 One
God and Father of all, who [is] above all, and through all, and in you all. 7
But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the
gift of Christ.
Now, this is
the key. There is one body, not two, but one body period. And the same thing
applies in marriage.
Jesus said in,
MATTHEW 19:5 And
said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to
his wife: and they two shall be one flesh?
6 Wherefore they are no more two, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined
together, let not man put asunder.
And this is
also the key to a close knit church. Realizing we are not a bunch of
individuals, but we are one body. Why? Because God made us that way. I guess, this is one area where we all need
to learn to grow together.
I am sure that
in every marriage there are things that the husband does that just drives the
wife insane, and there are things that the wife does that just drives the wife
insane. But the rub comes when the things that drive him insane are the same
thing that drives her insane, and yet just the opposite.
Therefore,
where we need to come together and recognize that we are not two but one means
that we must have a meeting of the minds to work out those areas. Just like
when a couple are different in their money matters, maybe he is real free with
the buck, and she might be a real saver. Now, in a situation like this both he and she will usually try to get the
other one to convert over to their way of thinking and then you’ve got
troubles. If we would realize that God does not do anything with out a purpose,
then we might understand if we believe that the Footsteps of the righteous are
ordered of the Lord, then we should also know that God had a purpose in our
marrying the person we did.
God has a way
of getting you to look at your faults,
and he could find no better way than to give you a spouse. The same applies in
the church. If we were all the same then God could not perfect us by rubbing us
together and knocking off all the nubs. But God has a purpose in what He does
and it is no secret that He has placed us together to work within each of us a
rubbing in order to bring us to the place that He wants us to be.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 64-0830E 1149-30 018 How can I take
a cocklebur and make a grain of wheat out of it? It's impossible for me to do
it. The only way it can be is because inside that cocklebur has been
transmitted from a cocklebur wheat--a cocklebur to a germ called "wheat
life." Then you bury that cocklebur, and it'll produce a grain of wheat
(That's right. See?), because there has been a life of wheat put in the
cocklebur. And the life of the cocklebur has been taken out; but the nature of
the cocklebur is still sticky (See?), and it will be until this new life has
fully been developed out of the ground and raised up again. When it comes
forth, then it's no more cocklebur, but wheat--but wheat. But while it's here
on earth and the--in the--out of the earth... And a cocklebur, it's still
sticky, but it's got the nature on the inside of it of wheat. And as long as
you're in this life, you're going to be sticky and have a carnal nature that's
going to bother you as long as you live; but the inside of you, you're borned
again. And when you're raised up, you're in the likeness of Christ and all the
sin is gone from you. See? That's--that's the thing.
1151-36 023
Somebody told me he had one, one time was converted, received the Holy
Ghost, and he said to him, "How you getting along?" He said,
"Pretty good and pretty bad." He said, "Well, how do you mean
pretty bad and pretty good?" He said, "Well, since me receive the
Holy Ghost," he said, "there's been two dogs in me, and one of them a
black dog and one of them a white dog." And said, "They argue all the
time." Said, "They growl and
fight at one another." And said, "The white dog wants me do good;
the black dog wants me do bad." Said, "Well, Chief, which one of them
wins the fight?" Said, "That
depends on which one Chief feeds the most." So I think that's a good
answer here. See? There just depends on the warring of the body that's in you;
it depends on which one you cater to, which nature you cater to, the carnal
nature after the things of the world, or the spiritual nature after the things
of God. That does it.
Now, the
reason the chief had a struggle after He received the Holy Ghost is because,
before He received The Holy Ghost, there was only one direction he was going,
and that was to perdition. And if you are not born again, then there is no
battle within. But when you receive the Holy Spirit, that is when the battle
begins. It is a battle for the mind to take possession of your being.
There are only
two powers in this world. God and Satan. And before you were born again, you
just drifted along with the world and the cares of the world. YOU might have
been happy go lucky, because you didn’t know better. But when God enters your
heart by the Word, you begin to understand and it is this understanding that
brings conflict. And this conflict is the greatest battle ever fought and it is
being fought in your mind by God and Satan for the right to control your mind,
and thus your entire being.
But in
marriage there is another kind of confrontation that awaits you, because you
and your wife are used to being two people, and now you have been made one by
the Law of God in marriage. Therefore, you are no longer two, but you are one,
and you have to think like one, and work together like one if you are to
succeed in your marriage. And whenever you have two coming together to make
one, you will have conflict. But I is how you resolve that conflict that will
determine the results.
You should
never handle your conflict based upon emotion. Your conflict should never be
based upon unwarranted fears. Either you trust the Lord in your life or you do
not. Either the cares of this life guide you or the Word of God guides you, but
you can not be guided by both.
And so I would
like to examine this conflict in marriage, this conflict of two becoming one,
this conflict where many come together to become one body, and thus live in
harmony and unity as David said. PSALMS
133:1 ¶ How good and how pleasant [it is] for
brethren to dwell together in unity!