“THE UNPREDICTABILITY OF LOVE?”
BY: J.FARRELL FISHER, APRIL 8-10, 2017
Sacred, holy marriage is not unpredictable but assured because the Christian commitment is in the ‘spirit of Christ’ who laid His life down for all, not the few! “God so loved THE WORLD that He gave His only begotten Son!” Giving in marriage Sacred, holy marriage is not unpredictable but assured because the Christian, yielding to, clinging to, devoted to, is not a ‘sacred vow’ one makes “if everything goes well or goes ‘my way’”!
There are interesting Verses in Matthew 18:3-4 when Jesus said to His new disciples, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”
But is there “the kingdom of marriage” planned, instituted, and blessed by Almighty God with the clear understanding of marriages’ predictability of unending love as man and wife, before Holy God, who consecrate themselves and their marriage to Him and to each other?
Oh, but then in Matthew 18:4 God identifies why for some THERE IS “the unpredictability of love”! “Therefore whoever humbles himself (herself) as this little child IS the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Are there those who do NOT humble themselves before God, “in marriages”, because ‘self-rule, fleshly desires, and warped biblical understandings let the flesh do as it pleases’?
I’ve often wondered, over my 80 years of life, having lost my family at the age of three, taken by my mother to live with her parents, my grandparents, from age three to twelve. But then my mother married again and took me to live with her and my step-dad. And I lived day by day filled with doubt if I’d truly be loved in the spirit of Christ’s ‘predictable love’ –“I’ll never leave you nor forsake you”! And His predictable love never faltered or failed, faithfully released through my grandparents, their two daughters, one six years older than me, the younger only two years older than me – and they were stout witnesses on His unending love and grace and mercy!
And, of course, in a world of ‘free will’, men and women sometimes live with, yes, the ‘unpredictability of love’ because they choose to be ‘lord’ over their own destinies! What did Jesus say in Matthew 18:3? “…unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” Of course, the question of the here and now is, is there “the kingdom of heaven in marriage, and do I or we enter it with or without that assurance that Holy God will bless, oversee, and fulfill His promises to us and through us, as we stand true to our ‘sacred vows’”?
I really find it interesting and informative to read Paul saying in Galatians 4:19, “My little children, for whom I labor in birth (pains?) again until Christ is formed in you.” Just as in the spiritual realm of babyhood in Christ, children in Christ, youth in Christ, and adulthood in Christ, is it true in marriage, that there is a path and pilgrimage in the journey that, yes, REQUIRES patience, steadfastness, and heavenly glee over every new step of maturing as we “grow in grace” in ‘marital blessing’ and ‘marital fulfillment’, and ‘marital pleasure’?
But some step into the holy ground of marriage with only ‘my will, my pleasure as I define it, my desire for what I want in my marriage’, not the good, acceptable, or perfect will of God!
Reading through Jeremiah recently, I saw in Jeremiah 4:1 a very powerful word from God that I believe relates not only to national blessing in submitting wholly to God’s will, but, yes, even in marriage! God spoke through the prophet saying, “If you will return, O Israel,” says the Lord, “Return to Me; and if you will put away your abominations out of My sight, THEN YOU SHALL NOT BE MOVED.”
Is it possible that in marriage some “CHOOSE” to fall away from the very Spirit of Sovereign God and choose to live by the ‘best’ and the ‘worst’ of fallen flesh rather than the Word, the will, and the Spirit of God Himself, experiencing not, ‘shall not be moved’, but seeing the foundation of biblical faith in marriage ignored, denied, or overlooked and ‘moved away’ from true devotion to one another? And Jeremiah 4:2 then says, “And you shall swear, ‘The Lord lives,’ in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness,” with God then saying, “The nations (including the sovereign nation of marriage’?) SHALL BLESS THEMSELVES IN HIM, AND IN HIM THEY SHALL ‘GLORY’.”
I love Oswald Chambers’ word in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest”, (p.269), when he said, “The battle is lost or won in the secret places of the will before God, never first in the external world ( world of the flesh- control rather than Spirit or Word controlled! JFF). The Spirit of God apprehends me and I am obliged to get alone with God and fight the battle out before Him. Until this is done, I lose every time (barring divine will and Spirit and glorifying ‘flesh’ and ‘selfishness’ even in the sacredness of marriage! JFF). The battle may take one minute or a year, that will depend on me, not on God; but it must be wrestled out alone before God, and I must RESOLUTELY go through the hell of a renunciation (of ‘selfishness’ in one’s marriage JFF) before God. Nothing has any power over the man (and I say his marriage! JFF) who has fought out the battle before God and won there.” ( But don’t you find Chambers’ words very strange across the marriage world of the U.S.A. today?)
In the Chicago Tribune, Heidi Stevens, Contact Reporter of Tribune Newspapers said: “With more Americans than ever saying ‘I Don’t’ to marriage, it’s time to reinvent the institution.” In her October 7, 2014 article she said: “Fewer Americans are married than ever before, and a growing percentage are happy to stay unhitched.” She went on:
“A Pew Research Center analysis of 2012 census data found that one in five adults age 25 and older – roughly 42 million people – have never been married, meaning the United States is made up of a historically high number of single people. (In 1960 by comparison just one in 10 adults 25 and older had never been hitched).”
In her article she quoted Susan Pease Gadoua, licensed therapist and co-author of “The New ‘I Do’: Reshaping Marriage For Sceptics, Realists, and Rebels.” (Seal Press). She said: “Analysts cite such factors as the rising median age for first marriages, an increased acceptance of cohabitation, and difficult economic times for the increase in singles. But our views of marriage – an institution celebrated and sanctified in every real from the spiritual to the retail – are changing too. When analyzing the census figures, Pew researchers asked people how valuable marriage is for society at large. A full 50 per cent of respondents said society is ‘just as well off if people have other priorities’.” That, my friend, is a shocking observation!
But, do YOU believe “marriage” is a sacred institution, a strong center of witness to the glory of God, in a marriage where both husband and wife live together to honor and glorify Him in and through their holy marriage? The day a husband and wife say, “I Do”, that’s the day, in that present moment and every day to follow, when mutually they agree, “We’re united together to glorify Him in our marriage!” There is an interesting, convicting, awakening Word in Hebrews 13:4, when the author, inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote: “Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed, undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.”
And don’t you find it so enlightening to continue in Hebrews 13:5-6 when the author wrote: “Let your conduct (in marriage?) be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we may boldly say:
‘THE LORD IS MY (OUR?) HELPER; I will not fear. What can man do to me?’” Or, maybe, ‘What can my mate do to me to obliterate ABIDING LOVE, SOVEREIGN OVERSIGHT, AND FAITHFUL PROVISION OF WHAT IT TAKES TO HONOR HIM THROUGH YOUR MARRIAGE IN YOUR, YES, SERVANT SPIRIT”? Didn’t Christ Jesus say, “I didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give My life as a ransom for the many”?
It was just today that I heard Roberta Flack’s singing of the song “EVER I SAW YOUR FACE” (by Evan Mccoll by way of THE ROYAL NETWORK INC.). I have chosen to change the words from her chosen male love to the LOVE of the Glory and Honor of God through His redemptive work by Christ on Calvary’s Cross. My edited words?
“The first time I saw Your face, I thought the Son rose in (or through Your eyes). And the moon and stars were the gifts You gave, To the dark and endless, eternal skies.
The first time I ever kissed Your (hand) I felt the earth move in my heart! Like the trembling heart of a captive bird That was there at the time you COMMENDED AND COMMANDED Your love to me.
And the first time I ever “rested” in You I felt Your heart so one in mine, And I knew Your joy would fill the earth and last forever, my greatest love…
The first time ever I saw Your face, Your face, Your face…I knew I was covered by Your grace!” Amen?
I feel led to share a letter my wife Sue wrote to her mother, probably 10-15 years before her mother died. The mother, having read the letter, gave it to Sue’s sister, Amy Rodgers, probably to alert the younger daughter of her sister’s ‘radical’ views of New Testament ‘discipleship’ –( unsure of why Virginia did that). But…Sue wrote:
Dear Mother, I sure hope you are better! Margaret (the one who drove me to the doctor), called me yesterday and Jamie, her oldest daughter has bronchial pneumonia. When Stan (our second son) had pneumonia when he was a child, they took a smear of mucous from his nose to determine the kind of medicine to use. Did they do that with you?
The Millers (the judge from Oklahoma) and their two children came back through and spent Saturday night with us, so they could go to the Bible Study at Thomas Baird’s Sunday morning (Thomas being a lead attorney in his law firm and co-elder with Farrell in our fellowship in Belton). And Susan and Ted Owenby to go with us, too. (They had left at 5a.m.). Farrell had smoked a turkey Saturday and I made dressing and fixed green beans and new potatoes, and triffle for dessert. So we had that Saturday night with the Millers and Sunday noon again with the Millers and Owenbys. The Millers left Sunday afternoon and the Owenbys left Tuesday afternoon.
So I spent yesterday cleaning house to get ready for the Bible study group last night. And Farrell studied, cleaned the carpet in the trailer, and started building a sidewalk up from the steps to the back gate. He built a frame and dug up all the grass and leveled it off. And he’s going to lay flat stones and concrete.
Our garden is doing great. We will have a lot of yellow squash by this weekend and we have lots of tomatoes about the size of grapes and lots more blooms. The beans, cucumbers, peppers, and zucchini squash have lots of blooms, too. And we got some onions yesterday, and should start getting potatoes next week. The okra is coming along, but needs more hot weather. And we have lots and lots of greens!
Farrell and I saw the dermatologist Tuesday and we look like we’ve been in a fight and both lost! He burned off places on Farrell’s face and arms. He then cut off and burned off moles on my neck, chest and mid-drift. And then removed a lot of the whiteheads between my brows. We are a sight!
Stan and LeAnn are coming down for Monday and Tuesday and Zach is going to stay with us until Friday. Farrell is supposed to preach at a church in Dallas Sunday the 21st, so we’ll take him back with us, and spend the weekend up there. We are supposed to leave for Montana with Vaughn and Joyce Baird.
We are looking forward to the trip, but dread those long days of riding. But we really want to see that part of the country. I just have to figure out how to take a “tee-tee pot” or wear adult diapers!
Mother, I enjoyed having you here so much. And you have a home here where you would be welcome and loved if you ever want it or need it.
I know that what we are all about (in the “faith-realm”) is a real puzzle to you, and I wish I could help you understand. You think that we are against everything and critical of everything and everybody. And I am so sorry it comes across that way. I want to give you a simple illustration. If you were driving down a road and discovered the bridge was out and that if anyone went over it, it would mean certain death. Wouldn’t you flag cars down and do all you could to warn the drivers of the danger ahead? Now you might look a little crazy out in the middle of the road flapping your arms and screaming, and some folks might choose to go right on by you, as they discuss that crazy person out in the road. And they might even roll up their windows and lock their car doors “to protect themselves” from the nut in the road.
Well, the bridge is out – it has been out for a long time, and we are the “nuts” out in the road, warning of the washed-out bridge of true, redemptive faith in and through Christ alone! And we aren’t alone, though sometimes it seems like it! It is happening all over this country and the other countries we have visited. People are meeting in homes, barns, gyms, store fronts etc. sharing their lives, studying God’s Word, weeping over and praying for the church (not only ‘criticizing’ as some say, but exposing extreme errors in their ‘faith’)! Some we stand with are so hungry for “GOD” and “REALITY OF THE TRUE FAITH” that they refuse to play the religious ‘games’ any longer. They refuse to close their eyes and stick their heads in the sand and say something is working that does not work – call it powerful when it is weak and helpless, call it alive when it is dead, and has been dead for years! Paul said that in his day and beyond men would have a “form” of Godliness, but denying its power. A form of Godliness is not Godliness! But it causes great deception and gives a false ease and a false peace. I heard a homosexual on the news the other day, dying of aids, saying it would soon be over and he would be in heaven. Yet the Scripture is real blunt and says NO homosexuals will be in heaven. But the churches say “God is love” and we must love and we must not criticize and judge. Most churches won’t dare tell anyone they are going to Hell, so the homosexuals and lesbians, most of them without true repentance and life- change through Christ’s shed blood, die and go to Hell “thinking” they are going to heaven. That is not love if one denies God’s Truth! Denying Truth is rebellion to God and His Word. So they shake their fists in God’s face and saying His way and Truth isn’t right, “we have a right to be what WE want!” But the “bridge of Truth” is still out for many and they go over the self-determined brink and perish in Hell!
We saw it experientially for years and then began to see it in the Holy Word, Old and New Testament. It didn’t sneak up on God! The prophets of old prophesied about the declining, compromising, ‘flesh-approving’ churches! Proverbs calls her “the strange woman, the whore, the harlot” – claiming to be married to the Lord and in bed with the world, the flesh, and the devil, and with sin and every evil thing.
Look at Colossians 3:5-10. In Verse 5 Paul said that immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and greed are all idolatry! My, my, I thought for years that idols were only in foreign countries. Then, I think it is in Romans, that Paul said that there are demons behind every idol, and that, when you participate in what God hates, you are actually worshipping demons.
The condition of the homes and children and youth of many ‘church’ parents is evidence enough! But the condition of our whole country screams out that “the church is dying or dead already”! The upsurge of Satan worship is the result of the absence of God in too many churches – no power, no truth, no help – only a ‘form of godliness’!
A law enforcement officer on the news the other night, said that he did not believe it would be an exaggeration that witchcraft and Satan worship is practiced in every town in America, and animal sacrifices and possibly human sacrifices (babies particularly!) are performed in all of their gatherings! And the poor, big, rich, weak, dead churches are “totally helpless” to do anything about it (or just don’t want to!). They don’t even believe in demons – that is not for the ‘sophisticated’, well-educated, cultured people (which Jesus was not!). Many do not even believe there is a devil or a hell.
Well, I didn’t mean to turn this into a sermon. And I know I can’t make you see anything – only God and His Word can – I pray He will. I know we look strange. As time goes on it will be more exaggerated. We aren’t a part of this world system, and we feel our job is to call people out, to Him and His Word! It can’t be cleaned up, straightened up, or rehabilitated. The Bible calls Satan the ‘god’ of this world. So, it has to be forsaken. And in most cases many churches have become a part of the natural world – in fact, if you are honest you can’t tell the difference. So our emphasis is on the only True God who is powerful and mighty to set men free from the power and bondage of sin and to give them clean hands and pure hearts – without which they/we will not see God.
Jesus wept over Jerusalem and said, “Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem – who stoned the prophets…” And then when Jesus told the Jews they didn’t know God and that they were worshipping Satan, they shut Him up, too, imprisoned Him, then crucified Him! And history repeats itself, always. I think it was Will Rogers who said, “If there is no God, nothing matters. If there is a God, nothing else matters!” Hence the magnificent obsession and possession.
We Love You, Sue and Farrell…..P.S. I’ve included a statement by Martin Luther that we ran across some years ago. His statement? “I WAS BORN TO FIGHT DEVILS AND FACTIONS. IT IS MY BUSINESS TO REMOVE OBSTRUCTIONS, TO CUT DOWN THORNS, TO FILL UP QUAGMIRES, AND TO OPEN AND MAKE STRAIGHT PATHS. BUT IF I MUST HAVE SOME FAILING LET ME RATHER SPEAK THE TRUTH WITH TOO GREAT SEVERITY THAN ONCE TO ACT THE HYPOCRITE AND CONCEAL THE TRUTH.”
What you’ve just read is a powerful love letter from a daughter to her mother that she personally and passionately loved and longed for her to understand what following Christ truly means!
If Hebrews was meant to speak to those around Jesus’ day who had the prophetic letters of the Old Testament, swore by them, but failed to see “Christ in them as the hope of glory” can church folk today, many, not all, “refuse Him who speaks”, even Jesus Himself? In Hebrews 12:25-29 we read:
“See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away Him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, ‘Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.’ Now this, ‘Yet once more’, indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, (Old Testament Judaism and a man-made temple?), as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.
Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire. (That’s Christ Jesus!).”
In Psalm 25:12-15 we find, not the unpredictability of love, but its grace and assurance! It says: “Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him shall He (God) teach in the way which He chooses. He himself shall dwell in prosperity, and his descendants shall inherit the earth. The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him (honor and reverences Him first in their lives!), and He will show them His covenant. My eyes are ever toward the Lord, for He shall pluck my feet out of the net.” (Sad to say, there are some who don’t even know they are trapped in the world and its religious system, in their ‘flesh’ allegiance!).
Whether kingdoms of the world or the ‘kingdoms of marriage’, before Holy God IS there an accounting to take place by Him? What did God say to the ‘pretending’ nation of Israel who crucified the Christ, the Promised Messiah? In Matthew 21:43-44 Jesus spoke! “Therefore, I say to you (Israel), the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone (the Rock of Christ?) will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.”
How many marriages do you know of, whether one or both partners in the marriage were “ground to powder” because they had no desire, no insight, no agreement with the purpose of God for the relationship, even after ‘holy vows’ and/or holy pledges before Him?
Elsewhere in Matthew 21:33-42 plus Verse 43, examine it related to “the kingdom of marriage”! Jesus said: “Hear another parable: There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a winepress in it and built a tower. And he leased it to the vinedresser and went into a far country. Now when vintage-time drew near, he sent his servants to the vinedressers, that they might receive its fruit. And the vinedressers took his servants, beat one, killed one, and stoned another.
Again he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did likewise to them. Then last of all he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son. But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance’. So they took him and cast him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vinedressers?” They said to Him, “He will destroy those wicked men miserably, and lease his vineyard to other vinedressers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons.”
Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes?’” [How “marvelous” do YOU find the work of God’s Sovereign Grace through Christ?].
Verse 43-44 is so important! “Therefore, I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.” Can you relate these last eleven verses to ‘the kingdom of marriage’? In your ‘kingdom of marriage’, tell me about “the fruit of it” that reveals the honoring, the uplifting, and the glorifying of Christ through your relationship to your mate! Remember, Jesus said, “I didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give My life as a ransom for many.”
Is ‘the stone’ of your marriage relationship evidence of the fruit of the Spirit of Christ, serving, or do flesh-masters insist on their way or the highway? Are you aware that many in the marriage relationship avoid it being ‘mastered by the Master’, satisfied to make it “a den of thieves”?
God, help us in America to witness the revival, renewal, and reclaiming of Your ordained way to honor You! Amen?