By Sam Adeoye
Marriage become a Prison Yard when the whole essence of being in the marriage is more of a master and slave affairs. When one person labored endlessly to keep the marriage together and the other do little or nothing to survive.
The institution of marriage works differently in different cultures, traditional and nationalities. For example, Nigerian Men are more committed to treating their Wife right than their South African counterparts. At a time, South African Ladies were practically abandoning their Men because of the ways and manners they are treating them and giving their all to the Nigerian Men because of the ways and manners Nigerian Men are treating them; showering them with respects, gifts and money. Unlike the South African Men that give nothing and yet still treat them with no respect.
Culture, traditions and religion are the worst enemies of marriage. And just as I told a friend, if you want your marriage to work, knock it out of your brain that God will make your marriage work. I’m yet to find one person that served God with the whole of his life and have a successful marriage. Even your Pastors, Bishops and many religious leaders that are parading themselves as one having a perfect marriage is all a lie.
Some had made traveling from one country to another preaching as an escape route from their marriage. If your marriage is so sweet, why jumping running away from your matrimonial home all in the name of preaching the Gospel?
Who takes care of your sexual needs when you have a urge for one? Is it your spouse that you left behind in your country that suddenly appear in your hotel bedroom and give you a nice time or you masturbate or have an escort with you? Yes, you heard me.
Some countries in Africa provide escort for preacher that comes to preach in their church. For those who don’t know what an escort means, it’s simply means sex workers. A Lady to spend the night with the man of God or a Man to spend the night with the Woman of God.
Don’t blame them. It get as it be.
Let’s look at the life of some Men of God in the Bible to establish some facts.
ABRAHAM
Abraham served God with all his heart and life, he had a testimony of a friend of God. His relationship with God was so great that it was said in Gen 17:1-2 that the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am Almighty God; walk before Me and be blameless. And I will make My covenant between Me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly. Yet, his marriage was a total failure. His marriage was so bad that Sarah his wife left him. Yes, I know that you’d never read in the bible word for word; but ask yourself, who is that Woman that will wait Ninety years to have a child, then one day, the Husband who had already had a son with another Woman took the child with many years of waiting for sacrifice unto the Lord without informing her.
As I do tell people, Abraham’s decision to sacrifice Isaac was never an act of faith, it was an act of selfishness. If there is no Ishmael, will Abraham still be willing to sacrifice Isaac? I doubt it.
In Gen 23:1-2, it was said that; Sarah lived one hundred and twenty-seven years; these were the years of the life of Sarah. So Sarah died in Kirjath Arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her.
To the best of my knowledge, you don’t come to mourn someone that is living with you. You simply carry the person’s body and bury. So, for Abraham to come to mourn for Sarah, to weep for her and bury her simply means they’re no longer living together.
ISAAC
Isaac was a child of promise and covenant. As a matter of fact, God reestablished the covenant He made with Abraham with Isaac just to prove He is with him. This was made clear in Gen 26:2-6 where it was said that; then the Lord appeared to him and said: “Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land of which I shall tell you. Dwell in this land, and I will be with you and bless you; for to you and your descendants I give all these lands, and I will perform the oath which I swore to Abraham your father. And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven; I will give to your descendants all these lands; and in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed; because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.” So Isaac dwelt in Gerar.
When the people of Gerar decided to become his enemies, and he left Gerar; it was said in Gen 26:23-25 that he went up from there to Beersheba. And the Lord appeared to him the same night and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham; do not fear, for I am with you. I will bless you and multiply your descendants for My servant Abraham’s sake.” So he built an altar there and called on the name of the Lord, and he pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.
When he left Gerar, the blessings of the Lord departed from Gerar. Which means the blessing of the Lord is a person not an invisible or untouchable element. Isaac leaving Gerar made the blessings of the Lord to left Gerar and in Gen 26:23-29 it was said that; then Abimelech came to him from Gerar with Ahuzzath, one of his friends, and Phichol the commander of his army. And Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, since you hate me and have sent me away from you?” But they said, “We have certainly seen that the Lord is with you. So we said, ‘Let there now be an oath between us, between you and us; and let us make a covenant with you, that you will do us no harm, since we have not touched you, and since we have done nothing to you but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of the Lord.'”
In every sense of life, working and walking relationship with God; Isaac was on point. He never did anything without God’s instructions and approval and yet, his marriage was a mess. His Wife questioned his authority as a Husband and he has no say in the affairs of his home. His marriage failed big time.
JACOB
Jacob was a Man with the heart of a Lion. A Man that work his path into God’s heart. Tirelessly he fought with God to leave his footprints on the sands of life. Unashamedly he worked to see the promise God made unto Abraham becoming a reality and in Gen 32:28 the angel of the Lord said to him, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed.” Yet, his marriage was listed among the bad one. So bad that he did not have the right to name his sons when they were birth. His children named them except Joseph.
Even Moses, Eli, Samuel, David and Solomon were not spared. They all have bad marriages. And the reasons for this is very simple. In Ex 20:5 the Lord said; I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God…
Now, if someone is jealous, they feel angry or bitter because they think that another person is trying to take a lover or friend, or a possession, away from them. Which means your spouse is a threat to God. Your lover is taking you away from God so what do you think a hungry spouse should do, standing by and be looking? Never, he will fight.
Therefore, it is not all the time that a marriage have issues that it is Satan, Devils or one enemy somewhere. It could also be God been jealous of not having you to Himself. It could be your selfish attitude like in the case of Abraham, it could be as a result of your not been too strong mentally like the case of Isaac. No one can face such animanistic nature in human and still remain the same mentally. If the sacrifice event between Abraham and Isaac is to take place in this time and age, Abraham should be in Jail by now and Isaac should be going through some therapy to regain himself and his mental stability. It could also be as a result of your greed like in the case of Jacob who was always after what belong to another person. He stole the birthright of Esau and the wealth of Laban; what a Man he was?
There are no rules to marriage just as there are no rules to life. Marriage thrives or failed based on personality. You can lie to people about your true self but you can never lie to yourself about your real self because you know who you are and all you’re made of.
Our attitude of indiscipline and lack of characters makes us to blame other people for our low life syndromes; just like in the case of Adam when he said to the Lord in Gen 3:12 that; “the woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”
That was not true, you ate it because you lack self-discipline. You ate it because you’d been eyeing it to eat from it but you never had anyone to motivate you to eat it. It just like someone saying he or she tempted him or her to have Sex. My dear friend, you wanted to have that Sex with that person. No one tempt you; you’re not just disciplined. No one can make you do what you don’t want to do. You do only what you’d made up your mind to do. In Gen 11:6; the Lord said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them.
The moment you’re of the same mindset with someone regarding a thing, you’re already in agreement with that person. Verbal agreement begins with mind agreement. If your mind will not agree with someone, your words and actions will never aligned with that person no matter how hard the person tried.
Even though Apostle Paul said in Rom 7:15-25 that; for what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God — through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.
Reading these sounds good and Christiany; but in the real sense of life and character development, this is hiding from your true self and indulging yourself in your lack of discipline. If Satan cannot make Jesus to do what He doesn’t want to do, I see no reasons why the same Satan will make anyone to do what they don’t want to do.
You’ll never be disciplined in any areas of your life if you failed to overcome the three temptations mentioned in Matthew 4:1-11 where it was said; then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
Hunger Temptation
And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. 3 Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.'”
Pride Temptation
Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you, and, in their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.'” Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.'”
Religion Temptation
Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, “all these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.'”
Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.
The devil will always leave you when your heart, mind, thoughts and actions are not aligning with his suggestions. You’re a victim of temptation because you’d had your entire being fixed on the same opportunity you’re presented with. And this is the main reasons why so many people are not married or suffering endlessly in their marriage.
If there is any scripture that had mislead and destroyed many homes and lives all in the name of trying to make wrong interpretation to look good, right and truthful, it is 1 Timothy 5:8 where Apostle Paul said to Timothy that; “if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.
So many people believed and still believes that Apostle Paul was addressing the husbands and the fathers; teaching them to be more responsible for their wives and children’s wellbeing. But you really cannot understand this verse until you start reading the same from 1 Tim 5:3-16
According to Message Bible translation, Apostle Paul said that; “take care of widows who are destitute. If a widow has family members to take care of her, let them learn that religion begins at their own doorstep and that they should pay back with gratitude some of what they have received. This pleases God immensely. You can tell a legitimate widow by the way she has put all her hope in God, praying to him constantly for the needs of others as well as her own. But a widow who exploits people’s emotions and pocketbooks — well, there’s nothing to her. Tell these things to the people so that they will do the right thing in their extended family. Anyone who neglects to care for family members in need repudiates the faith. That’s worse than refusing to believe in the first place.
Sign some widows up for the special ministry of offering assistance. They will in turn receive support from the church. They must be over sixty, married only once, and have a reputation for helping out with children, strangers, tired Christians, the hurt and troubled.
Don’t put young widows on this list. No sooner will they get on than they’ll want to get off, obsessed with wanting to get a husband rather than serving Christ in this way. By breaking their word, they’re liable to go from bad to worse, frittering away their days on empty talk, gossip, and trivialities. No, I’d rather the young widows go ahead and get married in the first place, have children, manage their homes, and not give critics any foothold for finding fault. Some of them have already left and gone after Satan.
Any Christian woman who has widows in her family is responsible for them. They shouldn’t be dumped on the church. The church has its hands full already with widows who need help.
While TMB used the word “worse than refusing to believe in the first place”, KJV used the word “worse than an infidel” and the NKJV used the word “worse than an unbeliever”.
According to HarperCollins Publishers; “if one person refers to another as an infidel, the first person is hostile towards the second person because that person has a different religion or has no religion.”
Now, having different religion or have no religion at all doesn’t make you a bad person. Not at all. Neither does having a religion makes you a good person. Never!
However, whenever I heard a Pastor or any believers quoting 1 Timothy 5:8 saying any Man that cannot provide for his household is worse than infidel (unbeliever). I laughed because it shows that the person doesn’t know what he or she is talking about and the person is misquoting the scripture is misleading the people.
That verse is not talking about a Man, Men or Husbands, no. The verse is talking about people in general, both Male and Female; with more emphasis on the Young Widows (women that are less than Sixty years of age), that refused to work and provide for their children.
To understand the verse, you have to start reading it from 1 Timothy 5:3 and the first thing you’ll see is the heading you’ll see attached to it is “Honor True Widows” which means some widows deserved honour and some don’t deserve any; depends on the circumstances that led to their widowhood and how they’d been handle it.
Apostle Paul went on to say that; “honor widows who are really widows. But if any widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to show piety at home and to repay their parents; for this is good and acceptable before God.
Now she who is really a widow, and left alone, trusts in God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day. But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives. And these things command, that they may be blameless.
But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. Do not let a widow under sixty years old be taken into the number, and not unless she has been the wife of one man, well reported for good works: if she has brought up children, if she has lodged strangers, if she has washed the saints’ feet, if she has relieved the afflicted, if she has diligently followed every good work.
But refuse the younger widows; for when they have begun to grow wanton against Christ, they desire to marry, having condemnation because they have cast off their first faith.
And besides they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house, and not only idle but also gossips and busybodies, saying things which they ought not. Therefore I desire that the younger widows marry, bear children, manage the house, give no opportunity to the adversary to speak reproachfully.
For some have already turned aside after Satan. If any believing man or woman has widows, let them relieve them, and do not let the church be burdened, that it may relieve those who are really widows. 1 Timothy 5:3-16
Misinterpretation of this very verse is the reasons why some people are not married today. Looking for a made Man that will walk them to the Altar, pay all their bills and shower them with gifts without measure; even when they have no idea of what the Man is doing for living. My dear, you might be leading yourself to your early grave.
If God had blessed you as a Lady, Pray to God to lead you to a God fearing Man or lead the Man to you and together start building a life worthy of emulation. The most important thing is the Man not be a lazy person who is only interested in your money and body and never your heart or your wellbeing.
Men are finding it hard to open up to Ladies because of their financial situation and wrong concepts and ideology of what Ladies want. Their quick to say that the only language a Lady understand is money always amazing me. Some Ladies married their husband when the Man was nobody; but today, the Man had not become not just financially okay but super wealthy.
If there is anything I’m so certain that Ladies want is love, respect, understanding, trust and value for their person, their decisions, their choices, and everything and everyone that matters to them. Make them your priority as they had already made you their priority from the moment they said yes to your request of been the love of their life.
Place that Lady you called your Wife above all others and that includes your parents, your friends, your relatives, your business, your associates even your religious leaders because she had already made up her own life ready to sacrifice their own lives once they love you.
Enough of causing life issues for ourselves over falsehood and misinterpretation of scriptures. As a Lady, Woman, Wife and Mother, it is also important that you provide for your household as well and not just your Husband alone doing all things by himself. This is also applicable to the Men. Don’t live your life on your wife; be a provider not an opportunist.
Don’t wait for the Man to die before you start to provide for your household. It is called support or help.
So many Men are dying and are dead now as a result of carrying too much financial burdens for their family. Madam, please help that Man
Yes I know some Men are just wicked trying to render their wives useless so that they can be controlling her. If you found yourself in such relationship or marriage, please ask yourself if that is what you want for yourself.
Together, let’s build our marriages building our community, our society, our nation, out continent, our world. Pastor Sam Adeoye, lives in Lagos.