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Message by Pastor Kunle Osunkunle
(President, The Singles and Married Fellowship, The Fountain of Life Church , Lagos
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| Healthy Relationship |
6. STAGNANCY: This also kills relationships. Any river that doesn’t have things flowing into or out of it will eventually accumulate dirt. This is typical of the dead sea. As a human being, you are supposed to keep flowing; your life - your heart is supposed to keep flowing. Things are supposed to keep flowing from out of you. The Bible says, “…out of us shall flow rivers of living waters…” But, when you stop flowing, what happens is that you start becoming dead. If you are in a relationship where there is no mutual flow, you will both become dead. You need to let things flow from you; from your spirit, soul and the physical part, not sleeping together. You bless your people out of the abundance God has given you, that’s why you buy gifts for people.
It is so amazing that you see two people who are crazy about themselves at outset. After a while, they begin to take that relationship for granted.
Tell a woman “I love you” four times a day. And when you are telling her, say it in a different way. Be spontaneous. Don’t just be one way. I tell brothers that for you to have a good marriage, you must be more romantic than your wife. You must be willing to give more in that marriage or relationship. If you want to tell her “I love you”, tell her in four different ways during the day. Some men would say, “…but you know that I love you now, why do I have to say it again…?” Those sixteen words are more than just the three words. Spontaneity is a thing that ignites relationships.
I have a book I do bring to church, where I write notes at home and all that. One day, I was opening this book because I write in it constantly, bible readings, my meditations and so on. So I opened to a point one day and I saw “…my one and my only, to the one who makes me believe in becoming who He has called me. My one and only, you’ve loved me, you’ve helped me to reach for the stars. You make me strong, make my heart soar and I will want to say thank you…Thank you my one and only…” as I read this, my heart leaped! “My wife wrote that?” I asked. That’s spontaneity, thinking of you in a different way.
But when you sit down and just face one direction, just like having two metals rubbing against each other, if you do not oil it constantly, it begins to rust; and once it rusts, it can’t move very well. Then, wearing or tearing will occur. You’ll understand especially what I am saying when you get married, because when you get married you say, “well I am in it now”; you stop buying the cards, you stop sending the flowers, although, most African women don’t like flowers. There are some things you stop sending because you say well the person is here now. Don’t let it be like that. A relationship after a while can actually be neutral; you are just making the runs. But what God wants for you in every relationship is for you to move from one level of glory to another level of glory. In year one, this was your level of happiness, year three you have moved to another level, year ten to another, year fifteen and so on. You can look at yourself and say “this guy or this lady, I love you…” But some people get to that year three of happiness and they have the same experience over and over again.
Bring humour into your marriage, visit the cinemas together, spend time alone, let there be things that you do out of the ordinary. Don’t let there be stagnancy in your marriage. Ask the Holy Spirit “What can I do.” Forget those people who tell you there is no romance without finance. You can actually by the things you do ask the Holy Spirit what exactly you can do to improve the quality of your relationship. Some people waste time concentrating on the mistakes or flaws of their partners. The Bible says,”…remove the log in your eye before you can see the speck in your neighbour’s eye…” Many people have logs in their eyes, but they see the splinter in the eyes of their partner. If you are in a relationship, you are not supposed to bring your partner down. Yes, he or she can make mistakes and he or she is not perfect, but you are not supposed to emphasize hi or her imperfections; rather help out. That’s why you have come to compliment each other. Where he or she is weak, you pull him or her up and vice versa. When he or she is weak, if you press him or her down, what you have done is to that you press yourself down.
Someone once said, to see our own flaws, is usually difficult. There is a message Pastor Bimbo preached sometimes ago titled, “The known self, the unknown self and the blind self.” There are some things that you can’t see about yourself that only others can see. She put it like this, “…to see your own flaws is difficult, to see others flaws is easy. This is because, seeing and conquering our own flaws require inner strength and awareness, whereas, seeing others flaws involves forcing on others our own opinion of how they should be…” When you see the flaws inside of you, it takes a lot of energy to work it through, but when you see the flaws of others, it is easy to say “…ah you shouldn’t be doing that…” because you can just force your opinion on them. But, there are some things you are battling with. If they have flaws, you can help them.
One requires inner strength and the other requires force. To change yourself requires inner strength, but to change someone else requires force. The former requires the lessening of ego, while the latter builds the ego. The problem is, in order to build one’s ego in a relationship, usually, it requires tearing down the other’s ego; so that you can say, “…well, I am on top now…” The essence should not be building either your ego or your partner’s ego, but building mutual respect and love. And the best way to do this is through complete trust with each other, achieving mutual goals together. Don’t shout about the flaws in your partner, and try to correct him or her in such a way that he or she will see how the flaw can be mended.
This is the balance. If you are in a relationship, if you see a flaw in your partner and you think it is a flaw he or she can correct, find a respectful and polite way to tell him or her with love, so that he or she can correct it. But if it is a flaw he or she can correct but is unwilling to correct, you need to be careful about getting married to such a person. It can be corrected but he or she is not willing to take a step. Don’t say that is how you are or that is how you were created, that you cannot be bent or changed. You must be willing to marry someone who is flexible and not a dangerous person who says “…I DON’T CHANGE MY MIND…” because if there is superior information, you should be able to change your mind. Don’t say “…once I have said it…that’s it…!” Are you God?
7. COMPETITION: About competing with your partner. You are in a relationship, nobody is the enemy. You need to know that there is a common enemy that you are both fighting; that is, the devil. But, once you make your spouse the enemy, you cannot move in the level of agreement and relationship requires agreement. The Bible says that, “…can two work together except they both agree?” Therefore, do not put yourself in the level of competition wanting to out-do your spouse.
This brings me to the issue of earnings power, how you earn. There are three things that also spoil a marriage. There is a book called “Sex Communication and Money”. I recommend it for you to read. Money can easily bring down your marriage or relationship if you do not know to handle it. Some people would ask if you can have joint accounts, you don’t have to. As a lady you probably earn more than your spouse, it is not a problem if you understand that both of you are in a covenant. You hear some ladies say, “…what is his is his and what is mine is mine…” that’s not marriage! What is his is hers and what is hers is his. This is not the era were you totally depend on him instead, both of you are working together to achieve a common goal.
Your successes are his successes and vice versa. If your husband or your spouse is not in the place he should be currently, pray him into his position. Go before God and pray for God to open the doors for him, put him before the throne of God boldly every morning, you would see things change for him. So do not let us compete or fight with ourselves, let us work together to achieve a mutual objective.
Some guys because you do not have a car, it is the beginning and not the end. That’s where you have started, you see a lady in a lovely car, and because you do not have a car, you begin to down play yourself and judge the lady falsely. You have actually relegated yourself to that position immediately, you’ve put yourself down that at the end of the day, you can’t get her for friendship. You are not supposed to just go immediately to tell her you want to marry her, but you can actually start by becoming her friend. What she is looking for is a mentor, a leader; someone who has qualities of being a father not someone who can drive a car. I tell some ladies, make yourself approachable, but also put up a boundary. Some people once you see them you already conclude that you cannot say hello to them. Simply because they have chips on their shoulders, the way they walk. They chase guys away by the way they look at them. It is not where you are that makes you”you”, it is what is inside of you that makes you who you are.
8. INFIDELITY: This is usually the biggest thing that ruins marriages and relationships. Cheating on your partner and having an affair outside your relationship or marriage are good examples of infidelity. This can emotionally destroy your partner.
When you are committed to someone in a relationship, it means that every other person is off limits. The bible says that, “…drink water out of your own cistern…” Another version says, ”…stolen water is sweet…” By the time water begins to have taste, you are in trouble, because water is tasteless. When you are in a relationship, whatever you hide to do, once you legalize your union and tie the knots, you become disinterested. Anyone who goes out cheating on his or her partner, if you are to marry the person you are cheating on, the marriage will surely become uninteresting. Why? Because you are a cheat. You need to understand that when you commit to somebody especially in marriage, it is a blood covenant that does not allow any other person. What usually happens is that when you break a covenant, death is the result and therefore a number of people are dying and they do not know.
Abimelech took the wife of Abraham out of ignorance. At night, God came to him and told him, “You are but a dead man because you are still breathing you think you are alive, because the person that you have is a wife of somebody.” Genesis 20:3 (Paraphrased).
Therefore, we are not allowed to go outside that covenant when we get married. You need to concentrate especially as a man, when you get married limit your sexual exposures. What are you going to do on lunch breaks with Mrs. X. You might say you just enjoy each other’s company, rather enjoy the company of your wife! If you are going out with another woman or lady (during lunch breaks), you would be bonding. Limit other people, put barriers or boundaries.
When I was going out with my wife before we got married, I had to take someone out on a date, I had promised this person that I was going to take her out some months back. I had to ask the Holy Spirit to help me know what to tell my wife to be so she wouldn’t have the wrong impression. When we placed our orders, I asked for Fanta drink and she ordered for Coke drink. Then I said, “It’s like ladies like coke, because my girlfriend also prefers coke…” Immediately I mentioned “my girlfriend” she acted as if she didn’t hear what I said. Something came up again and I said “…if you know what my girlfriend said…” and so I broke everything.
You need to know that temptation thrives in secrecy. If you are in a relationship, you need to let people around you know so that you can create meaningful and reasonable boundaries.
Put down the things you want in a woman. Ask your self aincerely, “What do I require in a man, a man that would be a man not just a boy?” Look for it, as you relate with people, you will see it in their lives. But when you too hasty, what happens at the end of the day is that you do not get the right things for your life. You have sowed a seed you definitely would reap the harvest. Let us be truthful. Don’t let us create emotional wreck, or havoc for people that we are relating with. If you see people who their husbands or their wives have gone into infidelity, they are broken, because trust is broken. Even Share this
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