Marriage: Decide Today

I have a column in the Sistah, Sistah Newsletter where the editor-in-chief is Catherine Tukes. My column is called The Marriage Circle. I wanted to share this issue with you all. If you would like to subscribe to her newsletter, please leave your email address below and I will give it to her to add you to her email list. Enjoy!

The Marriage Circle

“Decide Today”

Eph 4:17-18

“This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart;”

As I thought upon the newsletter’s theme for this month, the song we used to sing at my old church came to mind; “Where are you in Christ? Where are you in Christ?” I have to ask, where are you in Christ? Your marriage doesn’t have to be in “trouble” to do a self-examination but you can always make it better by doing one. Decide today to take your marriage to another level. 

Reading Ephesians chapter four (and I suggest reading it all) reminded me of how I can apply these teachings to my own marriage. In verses one through six, I realized I was called (as we all are as wives) to walk worthy of the invocation of being a good wife to our husbands. I was called to Douglas Lapsley…LAWD have mercy and what a wonderful calling it is!!! Praise Jesus! Sorry, I had to take a praise break. You are called to yours, whether he is saved or not, whether he does everything right or not, or whether he has hurt you or not. Let’s be real for a moment anyway, all of us have hurt somebody and somebodies more than once in our lives. Let’s stop hanging onto the song, “He hurt me. He did this. He did that,” because so have you. You have spoken words that cut him to his bone and in the natural when a bone is broken sometimes it never heals the way it’s supposed to. 

When we hurt God, He doesn’t throw us away or sings the song we sing. I can’t even remember a time AT ALL that God brought back up something I did wrong and kept rehearsing how it hurt Him. He doesn’t even speak of it. That’s the kind of God we serve! We should serve our husbands in that same way. Our relationship with Jesus Christ (the Anointed One) should be so sound and secure in Him that we don’t rehearse with our husband how they hurt us. It just should not be. If it’s something that you have to keep rehearsing, then again I ask, “Where are you in Christ?”

Today, we have a choice to make and that is to decide to no longer walk as others walk in the vanity of their mind, a darkened understanding, being alienated from God through ignorance because of the blindness of their hearts concerning their marriage. No, YOU be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new man in your marriage. You can do this by putting away: lying, bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, malice and evil speaking, speak the truth (in love), be angry but do not sin, don’t give place to the devil, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, don’t grieve the Holy Spirit, be kind to him, tenderhearted, forgiving, even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you (Eph 4:23-32).

Be blessed and cause your marriage to ever increase in Christ!

-          Keisha Lapsley

Wealth & Riches

The true meaning of wealth and riches is often misconstrued and wrongfully interpreted or is not fully expressed. Wealth means having enough, high value and an abundance of material possessions and resources. Riches means large amounts of money and possessions or good things that are available to use or choose.

As with many things in this world, we choose to see and gravitate to those things that will pleasure and please us and leave the most important things out. God is so good that He allows us the choice to choose. Nevertheless, we choose to overlook what will cause us to look inward to make the necessary changes for our lives. We have become so focused on the outside that we totally forget about the inside and still end up unhappy. What is it that we have to do? How do obtain wealth and riches and yet stay grounded?

In Psalm 112, it speaks of this very thing and the answer is easy to all of our questions in how to obtain wealth and riches and it starts in the very first verse. It says, "Praise ye the LORD. Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD, that delighteth greatly in his commandments." God doesn't want us to be afraid of Him. That is not what He is saying at all. What He is saying is that, He wants us to reverence Him. We spend all of our time trying to do better, to better ourselves and have a better life without following what His word says to do which in the end will hurt us more than we thought it was helping. We cannot forget that the Lord is the one who blesses us. Everything great that we are is because of Him. He designed us in such a fashion that it upsets the devil. He designed us to praise Him (which the devil wants). He designed us to worship Him (which the devil wants). He designed us to live the kingdom life here on earth (which the devil wants dominion). He designed us to live and not die (which the devil wants to take away from us). Let him that steals, steal no more. Let him that deceives, deceive no more. Take the time to learn God's commandments so you can become greatly delighted in them. Take the time to reverence the Lord in worship and in your living. When you do this, it is then true wealth and riches will be opened up to you.

I cannot talk about receiving wealth and riches and not mention motives. Do not think for one second that you think this is a "secret path" to gaining riches and wealth. As long as your motives to fear Him, to know Him and to delight greatly in His commandments are not pure, you will not prosper in whatever it is you seek. No, we have to do this, not to gain wealth and riches but to gain the ONE who is rich and wealthy. It's like the story says, "He who accepts the Son gets everything." Fall in love with the Lord. That is one thing I can promise and guarantee you; is if you take the time to invest in your relationship with the Lord and with a pure heart (no strings attached), you won't be able to help but to fall in love with Him and it will be the best thing you've ever done in your life.

I have come to realization that it's not always about having the most of everything but instead it's making the most of everything. It's not about having the abundance of possessions but instead possessing the abundance of who the Father is. There is nothing wrong with abundance or having nice things but it becomes wrong when it's all of who we are.He should be included in every area of our lives. That is the way we show Him honor. Delighting greatly in His commandments is rejoicing that He cares enough to give us directions and rules so we can live a fruitful life. His Word is full of life and to delight in it is to follow it. Take a minute to think about what or who you're following. If your life or delights are in something other than the LORD then it's time to make a change.

Fear the LORD. Delight in HIS commandments. Then watch true wealth and riches befall you. Blessings!

A Promise of Change

A Promise of Change

               

God said that he will take me out from among the heathen, give me a new heart and a new spirit, take away my heart of stone and give me a heart of flesh, put a new spirit within me and cause me to walk in His ways, statutes and keep his judgments.

My heart rejoices because that is truly what I need and what I’ve been praying for because I cannot continue on in the way that I’ve been with the heart and spirit that I have now. I am His righteousness. I belong to the Lord my God. I refuse to go back and pick up all that God has caused to fall off of me. I want to touch heaven again. I want to move amongst the clouds. I want to sing again. I want to belong…to the Father. I’ve changed so much but don’t want to continue to sing that same old song. I can still sing; I just have to change the lyrics.

In order to receive a new heart and spirit, you have to first admit and repent that the heart you have now is no good. Go to the Surgeon and tell him you need a heart transplant. This heart is old and no good. It has calluses. Things have been engrained that shouldn’t be. It’s not pumping the blood to the arteries correctly. The blood is not reaching who it ought to be reaching. The blood is tainted because there is something in the heart that isn’t right. I need a cleansing of my heart, my mind and my soul. Wipe away my very being and make me anew. Create in me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me.

Prayer: Father, help me to change and let You do the surgery. I don’t like the way I am now. It doesn’t feel good. I don’t like it! Be my new heart and my new spirit. Let Jesus’ blood be what flows through my veins. I’m ready for my new heart and new spirit, in Jesus name I ask and pray. Amen.

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