Subject: "You're killing me." Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2002 14:24:48 +0000 From: Jesus Christ is the Only Way to God To: jesus-is-lord@topica.com Dear CHRISTIAN Friends: Greetings in the name of the ONLY wise God and Saviour Jesus Christ. **********QUIET DESPERATION********** As we returned home at dusk today (Sunday June 23, 2002) my mind turned to my brothers and sisters out there who are living Christian lives of quiet desperation. I was particularly thinking about those who have an unsaved spouse but it would also apply to children with unsaved parents--I hear from their sweet little hearts too. I lived your life of desperation for a number of years...I had a broken heart for years. I tried to carry on like everything was alright, but it was not alright. One young unsaved woman told her mother, "Miss Tracy always looks sad." I didn't know that. When you go out in public you want folks to think all is well, even though it is not. I guess I wasn't fooling anybody. ***********YOU CAN BE HEALED*********** The beautiful thing is that King Jesus healeth the broken in heart and bindeth up their wounds. I am a witness to you today that there is hope in King Jesus--His blood is so powerful--but ONLY if you'll avail yourself of the divine remedy. I will warn you right now, His way is NOT the way that the flesh would choose, but then again, who is making provision for the flesh? The flesh has never done anything but cause me sin and death. I owe the flesh NOTHING, glory be to God. I've got the blood of Jesus, and I owe all my decisions, allegiance, and obedience to Jesus. I've been born again into the kingdom of God. My flesh may rear up, but I don't have to obey it anymore because of the blood of Jesus. Glory to His name. Hallelujah to the Lamb. ************MY SORRY STORY************ When my husband Tony and I met, we were both heathens in college in 1989. In the midst of our engagement, I got saved, he didn't. I told a Christian friend that Tony and I were not at the same place in the Lord (the Lord was obviously warning me), and she told me to be careful that I not be unequally yoked. I did not take heed. We married. I CANNOT BLAME MY HUSBAND FOR OUR EVIL YEARS, I HAVE TO BLAME MYSELF AND NOBODY ELSE. He wasn't the bad guy, I was. The Lord told me don't do it and I did it anyway in disobedience. Young people contemplating marriage don't want to listen to nobody--but they really need to. Bro. Tony faithfully went to church with me before and after we married, but he was not saved. He couldn't help the way he acted because he wasn't saved. You cannot expect an unregenerate man to act like a regenerate man. Just like you can't take a snake and say, "Grow up and be a tiger. Take that skin off and get some fur! Stop being a cold-blooded reptile and become a warm-blooded mammal! What's wrong wit' you?" Ah, what evil years--and self-inflicted at that. And to add iniquity to iniquity, I was fussing and getting out of the car and cutting tv cables 'cause I couldn't stand filth being pumped in the house. I was saved and growing more sensitive to sin, he was unsaved and loving it. The one scripture my husband could quote was "Sarah called Abraham Lord." One day I said "Do the works of Abraham and see what you get." I should have been quiet. I let my hurt make me more rebellious. Sometimes in a lucid moment, I would say in all calmness with no anger, "You're killing me." When a man is full of lust, he starts to hate his wife though he may not see it that way. His mind can get confused and very selfish. I would oftentimes think, "Somebody needs to die, whether me or him." I can remember even praying along those lines that I would die. I did not believe that the scriptures permitted me to divorce my husband. I walked around destroyed and devastated--for years. ***********THE WORD CAME DOWN*********** Then one night at a little independent Baptist church, the pastor said from the pulpit, "Every argument is the wife's fault." I was like "Whoa brother, that's deep." I listened attentively. He basically said that if a wife is in submission to her husband, that she will not argue against his decrees. Mmmm...I didn't previously know about this doctrine called submission--had never seen it in action--but as the pastor preached from THE WORD (King James 1611), King Jesus shed some light into my wretched little stinky carcass. Soon afterwards, the pastor passed out "Daughters of Sarah". As I laid upon the bed and read that little book there were times I had to put it down because I saw my own rebellious self so vividly. I tried to start getting in line with this doctrine of submission. Regretfully, I can't say that I got it all right, but I kept on trying. When I didn't do right, I'd ask the Lord to forgive me and help me. I kept on struggling to come up to the standard of the word of God. You got to practice to get good at anything. You don't walk on the scene an expert. King Jesus asks you to try the best you can and don't stop until you get the victory through His blood. Anyway, things did not get immediately better. I was still loathed and embarassed in public. *********A VERY LOW POINT & RIDICULOUS PLANS************** Even after the submission teaching, June of 1999 proved an especially low point for me. I moved out of the bedroom and started interviewing for a job. I had made up in my mind that I would quit JESUS-IS-LORD.COM because the direction I was going in was not of the Lord. I wasn't going to be playing around and still working on the website. In addition to that, I wouldn't have anything to write. Sometimes people ask me how to get ideas for articles--I can't tell them that much because if the Lord does not move me I can't write anything. That's the main reason why you don't hear from me that often. I knew back then that if I were to leave my husband, I would dry up, so I knew I'd quit the website. Everything about the Lord would be folded up in my life. NOT because I found any deficiency in King Jesus, but because I was going to leave my husband in direct disobedience to His word-- 1 Corinthians 7:10 And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband: 7:11 But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband: and let not the husband put away his wife. In my mind, I had no intention of ever being reconciled to my husband. In fact, I got downright carnal in my thinking. I wanted to buy a piece of property, buy me an SUV, a Rolex watch, and maybe even have "a friend". I was tired of it all and I was going to make myself feel better--that was the flesh and the devil talking. Well I had my corrupt, fleshly plans for how to heal myself, but the Father had other plans... *************THE WORD CAME AGAIN*********** One day I was in the hallway bathroom and I looked up at a scripture on the wall, I had titled it "Consider Him"-- Hebrews 12:3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. 12:4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. 12:5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. I looked at it and said to myself, "I have not shed any blood striving against sin." And I knew the Lord was saying to me, "Stay here." I said "Okay." I believe that that day the Lord said something like this, "That is MY daughter and I am her Father. I'll talk to her and she will listen to me because I am her Father." I did not have this revelation back then and it only recently came to me in a time of fervent prayer. But I believe that is the exact type of dynamic that was going on. ***********A NEW BEGINNING************** Well, I came out of the bathroom and asked my husband if he was going to church, I guess it was a Sunday. He said something like, "Why are you talking to me?" Praise the Lord, I was not in the flesh, I had gotten a directive from my Father. I said, "I just want to know." That was the beginning of us coming back together. I knew in my mind that I would stay. The agreement was made in the bathroom with my Father. When I sit down and reason it out with my Father, it is a done deal. The next month, July, one of our internet readers asked if I'd ever considered adopting a child. In November of 1999 the Lord told me "Expansion." I wondered why I would keep thinking about that word "expansion". I didn't even know what part of speech it was. I was like "Is expansion an adverb? Why am I thinking about this? What could this mean?" As I am prepared this email I looked up the definition of "expansion"-- An expanding or being expanded; enlargement; dilation. At that time when "expansion" was in my mind, I kept seeing an open horizon in my mind's eye, no trees just open limitless space. I felt as if I had entered into a large room. But I did not know what it meant. The next month, December 1999, I had a husband (same man but now a husband) and a newborn. That same month, my husband found out that he was going to have to look for a new job. One night, he tossed and turned. I asked him if he was concerned about employment and he said yes. I said, "Honey, don't have to worry, THE LORD is on our side." O glory to His name. Glory! After that, our little family had a GOOD TIME for a month. We'd go out or stay home and enjoy each other punctuated by job interviews. King Jesus gave my husband a couple of good offers--including a great one at a firm he had wanted to work at for years. In February, Bro. Tony went back to work and I remember sitting on the couch that week saying, "Lord, I MISS THAT MAN!" What a difference from where I was just a year previously. **********WHY ARE YOU TELLING US THIS?************ Why do I share my story? If anybody is out there walking around devastated, I'm telling you from personal experience that King Jesus can bring you out. Cancel the divorce proceedings. If you can't, pray for your spouse. Forgive and do good to your spouse. Repent for your own shortcomings. Don't harbour anger and resentment and hatred. If you've been hurt bad like me, ask the Lord to heal you. He knows how to do His work. King Jesus is the Master-- Psalms 147:3 He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds. If you are a rebellious wife today, ask the Lord to make your desire to your husband. Stop talking about your husband and start esteeming him highly for he is over top of you-- 1 Corinthians 11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and THE HEAD OF THE WOMAN IS THE MAN; and the head of Christ is God. "But my husband is not a Christian!" Makes no difference--whether you think your husband is a good leader or not is of no significance, his head is Christ--NOT YOU. Don't beat your poor, dear husband over the head with the Bible either. See our Family Page section "Mothers" for an article on the Jezebel spirit http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/family.htm Who would think I'd be writing a Christian Family Page? That is miraculous in itself. As miraculous as walking on water if not more so. I was in my prayer closet one day when I prayed that someone would publish a Christian family page on the internet so people would know the joys of being a Christian family. Almost as soon as the request came out of my mouth, I said, "Okay, Lord, I'll do one if you want me to." I wasn't qualified to do one before, but after coming through the rough way, I was ready. I was once like a wild horse ready to go my own way. But somehow according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself, King Jesus broke me like you do a wild animal. He gave the command that I would obey and now I STILL bow down before Him in service. I ain't much, but I will bow down--and I'm GLAD to do it. I am a GRATEFUL, WILLING subject of the Lord Jesus Christ. You don't have to bust me over the head to serve Him. The Lord has been good to me. I am striving to do His will for it is GOOD for me. In my mind (the battle is for the mind), I know that everything that the Lord does for me and allows in my life is the best, wisest, most expedient thing for me. I may be hurting in body or spirit but my soul still says "Jesus Christ is the Lord!" That fact NEVER changes. It will never change. ***********WHERE ARE YOU?************ Where are you at today my friend? Are you a devastated husband, wife, child, employee? If so, start understanding what the Bible says about your position and then do what the Bible says for your position. For instance, you are a saved man and your wife is unsaved. Love her like Christ loved the church. If she does not want to hear anymore about the Lord, BE JESUS TO HER. Present your body a living sacrifice and do special things to please her and minister to her. If she likes sour cream and onion potato chips, get her a bag. Pray and fast for her. Study what the Bible says about your position as a husband. Are you a saved child and your parents are unsaved? Obey them, love them for taking care of you and honour them. Most parents are not going to ask you to do anything illegal. If they don't want you to tell them about the Lord, just BE LIKE JESUS. They'll see the excellency of the Christian life. Wife, be subject to your husband. He may be a pathological liar, he may love watching stinky harlots on hellivision, he may be a drunk, but he is still YOUR husband. You have to pray and live Christ before him. A foolish woman plucketh down her house with her own hands. Don't tear your husband down, build him up. You are his help meet. You are there to HELP him where he is hanging down. THAT IS YOUR JOB. Don't talk bad about your husband, esteem him and do good to him and ask King Jesus to help you. I Peter 3:1 says your husband can be won by your chaste conversation. As much as lieth in you, stay home and learn how to keep your mouth shut--leaving sets in motion a whole other set of circumstances. 1 Corinthians 7:10 And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, LET NOT THE WIFE DEPART FROM HER HUSBAND: Don't leave! That makes it harder to come back. Dig your heels down in the name of Jesus, PRAY HARD, fast, cook, clean, do what you do BECAUSE YOU FEAR THE LORD *WITHOUT* murmuring and complaining. Listen to your husband, don't always disagree. Keep yourself up. Be easy to be with and not always growling and barking orders. Slufoot Suzy down the street that ain't nobody's wife and she will go to the hairdresser to be looking good and smelling good. She'll be amused with a man's company and do whatever he asks--just like many of us used to foolishly do when we weren't married. Pre-marital fornications channel in so many evil spirits into people's. We fornicate before marriage doing whatever some fool asks us to do and then after marriage, we don't want our husband touching us. That is Satanic. A whole other subject in itself. ...anyway, wife don't leave, BUT IF YOU DO-- I Corinthians 7:11 But and if she depart, let her REMAIN UNMARRIED OR BE RECONCILED TO HER HUSBAND: and let not the husband put away his wife. Understand that in God's eyes, you don't leave, get a divorce and remarry. YOU STAY BY YOURSELF OR GO HOME TO THE ONLY HUSBAND GOD ACCEPTS FOR YOU. Leave, divorce and remarry and you are an adulteress. If you marry somebody else's husband while his wife is living then you are basically a concubine. I write these things to warn you, but if you already find yourself in this position today repent and keep on going. The Lord would not have you divorce your current spouse. It's folly to remarry and go back to your real husband (Deu 24:1-4). There is a woman in the church we visit who came the hard way but she was tough and tenacious because she feared the Lord. Her husband left her for about nine years. He was living with another woman. This sister was something because she'd still wash his clothes and even offered to take him and his concubine (he did not remarry, just had a live-in whore) to church. He came to his senses and today, they have a sweet little family. They even had more children when they thought they could have no more. And working with their children so easy. They are attentive, well behaved, and beautiful. That man really seems grateful for his wife and even bought her a new wedding ring. He sings in the choir today. My hat is off to that sister. She feared God to that type of level and today she testifies by her presence. She doesn't do a lot of talking and I've heard her say that she does not bring up the past. That is truly all right. I'm not so perfect, but my husband is appreciative of what I do. We watched a video about how an evangelist took care of his infirm vegetable wife and my husband said (and this is kind of funny) "That's what you do for me." He was serious. She couldn't do nothing. Of course, big daddy is no vegetable, but I do wait on him and keep things rolling around here. Sometimes I may want to sit down and read, but if he wants some company or if some domestic duty needs to be done, I put my stuff to the side. I am to be a keeper at home, that's doctrine. I have to have that down and then when that is done I can stretch out to something else. The married woman must care for the things of the world how she may please her husband. I'm a HELP meet. I've got to answer my end. One night I was about to have an asthma attack from all the pollen in the air and I asked my husband to pray for me. He had his hand on my head and said to the Lord, "my wife is the sweetest thing I know next to Jesus". When you fear God and go past yourself for your husband and even for other people, you'll make an impact for the kingdom of God whether anyone ever tells you that or not. Don't leave your husband. But... I Corinthian 7:15 But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases: but God hath called us to peace. 7:16 For what knowest thou, O wife, whether thou shalt save thy husband? or how knowest thou, O man, whether thou shalt save thy wife? If you unbelieving spouse leaves you, you don't have to spend your days chasing him or her across the country or laying awake at night thinking how to get them home. God has called you to peace of mind, not bondage on how you can get them back and what is happening to them. Some read this to mean not in bondage to the marriage bond. I disagree because is clear from other scriptures that if you remarry while you have a living spouse you are an adulterer (for example Romans 7). ***********THIS IS THE HIGH WAY************** Doing things God's way is high level. It is WAY above what we would do by nature--WAY ABOVE--and the results are WAY ABOVE the natural. That SUPERNATURAL POWER STARTS KICKING IN. GLORY. The Lord will reward your continued obedience with POWER. You will see and know for yourself that THE POWER OF THE HOLY GHOST did not end in apostolic days, it'll be on YOU. Glory to the Lamb and hallelujah. Many of us think talking spiritual is the answer, no. BEING spiritual is the answer. You have to learn how to PRAY to get strength for this level. We are not talking earth here. Earth is to say "Forget you!" Heaven is to bow down before the word of God. Glory. This is high level, earth is low level. Even those of us in what seem to be the best of relationships can say a prayer like this-- "Dear Father, please show me my position from your word, O Lord. Let me rise to it and fulfill it. Let me abide there in obedience to You. Let me stay regardless of what the flesh may say. Renew me, O Lord and give me the grace and strength that I need to stay in position. Please forgive me for those times I have rebelled against your word and help me to line up with it. No matter what somebody says or does, LET ME STAY IN POSITION. Let me not avenge myself on anyone. Help me to be calm in my soul and bear up underneath whatever comes my way. Help me, Jesus, help me Lord. Give me compassion for those that have not known your ways. They are in the depths of darkness and cannot see their way, let me help them by being a light to them. Let me rise outside of myself and let me present my body a living sacrifice that I may minister to others. I know that you will take care of me. That frees me up to take care of others. Your name be blessed forever. It is in Jesus' name I pray, amen." *************STAY WITH JESUS NO MATTER WHAT*********** Sometimes you just have to keep on saying, "Help me, Jesus." Sometimes you don't know what to say, circumstances are just too overwhelming. You just have to keep calling on the name of Jesus until you get some satisfaction. There have been times in my life when I've been leveled to the ground. I know why people have nervous breakdowns and go on pills and check into mental wards. I been through the ringer, BUT I HAVE JESUS and mercifully there was certain information withheld from me until I could accept it and not totally "kirk out" as my sister would say. If I don't know how to do nothing else, I know how to call on the name of Jesus. I can do that. When times are hard, sometimes my "Help me, Jesus" even comes out feeble, but HE ALWAYS CAUSETH ME TO TRIUMPH. ALWAYS. King Jesus is the reason that my walk is steady. The reason most Christians have a rollercoaster ride faith is because they try to fix their own problems. When you try to give them some word to help them, they say "But..." I'll be honest and tell you that that gets on my nerves when people do that. You give them the EXACT solution from the word that they need for deliverance and they say "But" negating the only real solution they'll ever find. The Lord is teaching me to tarry with the people especially by showing me that I haven't always suffered the word of exhortation the first time I heard it. ***********CONCLUSION************ I don't sit here to say I'm so exact perfect but the Lord knows I love Him and I love the life that *HE* has given me and my family. IT IS A MIRACLE that the Lord has made our family a pattern and example to the people that we know. Brother Tony and I are a good gospel team as we work with the young people. My husband preaches the gospel of Jesus Christ, is an elder in the church, preaches in the prison, the barber shop and to colleagues, he passes out tracts, counsels those in trouble, and he is GOOD to his family. We have no cable and we watch no hellivision in our home. We talk about the work of the Lord continually. The Lord has RESTORED the years that the locust, the catepillar, the cankerworm and the palmerworm have eaten away. I have a rich life. Storms come, but my house is built on Jesus so I can endure all things and bear all things. "Expansion" did occur and is still occuring. Many, many deep things have happened to me since November of 1999. Many, many revelations of the word and of the dynamics of the kingdom...I can say unequivocally that if I had left my husband this would not have been. Something terrible would have resulted. Get in position and stay in position. The word is always right, even when our flesh wants to go another way. Know who is doing the talking--the flesh will do the opposite of the Bible and the Holy Ghost will minister the word. If you want to "get away", get a separation agreement, etc. you know that is not the Lord. That is the flesh and the devil. Know who is doing the talking...And learn how to fast and pray. Philippians 3:12 NOT as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I FOLLOW AFTER, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. 3:13 Brethren, I COUNT NOT MYSELF TO HAVE APPREHENDED: but this one thing I do, FORGETTING THOSE THINGS WHICH ARE BEHIND, AND REACHING FORTH UNTO THOSE THINGS WHICH ARE BEFORE, 3:14 I PRESS toward the mark FOR THE PRIZE of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. 3:15 Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. 3:16 Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing. Keep doing what you know to do and start adding more skills from the word of God. Let us not be satisfied and complacent in the little bit of knowledge that we have, let us explore, grow, exercise, sweat, workout. Submission to a mean husband is not easy. This is a hard thing especially when somebody is doing you wrong but after you keep on exercising in it, it starts getting more natural for you and you will find yourself strong and skillful in the word of righteousness. Your husband or wife can be saved by your witness. Tarry on them and esteem them highly because you twain are ONE flesh, not twain, ONE flesh. God bless you all with His own Self. The Lord be magnified. for Jesus' sake, sis. tracy -- http://www.jesus-is-lord.com ...they are impudent children and stiffhearted. I do send thee unto them; and thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD. And thou, son of man, be not afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns be with thee, and thou dost dwell among scorpions: be not afraid of their words, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they be a rebellious house. Ezekiel 2:4, 6