Relationship Series, #2
The Cancer of Isolation
This morning I would like to continue our series on relationships
that we began last Sunday. I believe of all the things I have ever preached
that are pastoral in nature, this series will do the most to help us in our
homes to understand and develop our relationships.
As you know, last week we began our series by focusing on
the wedding ceremony as Brother Branham gave it. He also said in the message Flashing Red Light, “Notice,
there is nothing that God could give a man outside of salvation better than a
nice wife. There's no man can console, no person can console a person when
they're tired; they'll won't confide in anyone like they do their own wife. And
what a fortunate thing you brothers are when you've got a nice little wife
that's clean, and upright, and moral, and you can come in when you're tired and
weary and set down, and she can talk to you. She can do more with you than
anybody else. That's right. She's a jewel; she's a queen.”
It was once said, “Getting
married is easy, staying married is difficult. Staying happily married for a
lifetime would be considered among the fine arts.”
Last week we took our text from the wedding ceremony
which Brother Branham used, where he said, “It
is therefore not by any to be entered into unadvisedly or lightly, but advisably, soberly, and in the fear of
God.
We focused our thoughts on these three main points which
he said, being advisably, soberly, and in the fear of God.
We found to enter into marriage, advisably, means that you are to
seek advice, counsel or the opinion
of someone who is knowledgeable, if you are serious about establishing and
maintaining a harmonious relationship with someone for the next 70-80 years of
your life. Therefore you had better know
what it takes to make that relationship work. If marriage is to be entered into
advisably, then it can not be entered into without preparing for it.
Secondly he
said, “it (marriage)
must be entered into soberly, meaning to be temperate, not extreme,
but serious,
solemn, grave and sedate. Not bright, garish or flashy, but with quietness,
plainness, and in self control. In other words, well thought out, having your
mind, your emotions, and your flesh under control. These are not attributes of
an immature person. These attributes suggest someone who is mature and
thoughtful.
The third point brother Branham brings out is, “it (marriage) must be entered into in the fear of God. And
according to God’s own word, “the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, a
good understanding have all they that do [his commandments]: In Proverbs 1:7 we read, ¶ The
fear of the LORD [is] the beginning of knowledge: [but] fools despise wisdom
and instruction.
If we want to have a marriage that lasts, one that is
focused, and that is entered into with understanding and prudence, then we need
to enter marriage “in the fear of the Lord.”
As we began our series last week we also examined the
word relationship and found that it comes from the root word relation, or
relations. Webster tells us the word relationship deals with the connection of
persons by blood or marriage, and uses the word kinship to express this
relationship. Therefore in this series when we are speaking of relationship, we
will be speaking of family.
We found the same thing applies in having a relationship
to God. From the message, “Is Your Life
Worthy of the Gospel” Brother Branham said, “Christians, oh, you must have a
personal relationship to God. In order to be a son of God, you must become relation to God. He
must be your Father in order for you to be a son. And only His sons and daughters
are saved, not the members of a church, but sons and daughters. There's only
thing--one thing that will produce that; that's the new birth. The new birth is the only thing that will
produce relationship to God.”
We found that relationship is not the same as fellowship.
These are two different words. According to Webster and Brother Branham,
relationship has to do with family access, or family connectivity, where as fellowship is something altogether
different. Fellowship has to do with sharing things in common, But what we
found last week is it takes relationship to give you
true fellowship. And the focus of every family here this morning,
should be to have true fellowship with your spouse, your children, your
siblings, because, there is nothing
better in life than for a man and wife to be able to share their life with each
other.
In the Message
God’s Provided Way, brother Branham said, “We enter into fellowship through
relationship, by being borned of
the Holy Spirit,…”
And in Ephesians 2:18 For
through him we both have access by one
Spirit unto the Father
Access
into fellowship. That is what marriage and relationships are all about. Access into fellowship. Access into sharing.
Access into love.
And yet why do we see so many marriages falter. Why do we
see so many marriages die a slow death.
In Matthew 13:
22 Jesus told us, He also
that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh
unfruitful.
Now,
to be choked is not sudden death. No, death sets in rather slowly and harshly
through suffocating, it begins to die for lack of something, and that is
exactly how so many marriages have ended in the big “D” for Death by Divorce.
And since this is the hour for the great
Divorce, when God has Divorced the church because she has cut herself
off from Him and His Life, it should
only seem fitting that the manifestation of this divorce and separation, would
become manifested in the lives of so many people today. He said, I used to know you as my wife, but
I do not know you as my wife any more… And thus cut off from Him she dies.
We read in Ephesians
4:17 ¶ This I say therefore, and
testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the
vanity of their mind, 18 Having their understanding darkened, they become alienated from the
life of God through (there’s your conduit)
through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart: 19 Who being past feeling have
given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with
greediness. 20 But ye have not so learned Christ; Notice, they have become alienated,
separated, set apart, that means excluded.
Now
this is a terrible condition to be in, but this is the same atmosphere we find
the majority of marriages in today. Married yet lonely. Married yet
isolated. Married, yet separated from
the fellowship of sharing a life together.
The more I study on this subject of marriage, The more I am
convinced that the neurotic condition brother Branham spoke to us about seems
to be the main reason for the high amount of disintegration in marriages today.
If you remember, the cares of this life seem to engulf the people. That is the
beginning’s of neurosis.
I
TIMOTHY 6:10 For
the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they
have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many
sorrows. 11 But
thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness,
godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness. 12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on
eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good
profession before many witnesses.
It is a known fact among marriage counselor’s today that
nearly 85% of all marriage dissolution’s occurs because of money problems. Therefore, the cares of this
life begins the whole down hill spiral. The people get so caught up in the
cares of this life, that it just takes over the marriage. This brings about
compulsive behavior, which in turn,
leads to possessive behavior, which
brings about fear which in turn brings forth depression and finally
disassociation. And then at this point death has taken it’s toll.
The
following story was published by a
Walking toward the two, I heard the woman
demanding that he fix whatever he had done to the car so she could leave. He
responded only with a contemptuous laugh.
She turned to me and asked if I would make
him fix the car. The other officer came forward, and we separated the couple to
find a solution to the problem.
I began talking to the man, who told me his wife was having an
affair and was leaving him. I asked if they had gone for counseling, and he
said he wasn’t interested. He said he was interested in only getting back his
“things”, which he said she had hidden from him.
I asked the wife about his things and she
said she wouldn’t give them to him until she got one of the VCR's. She said she
wanted only one of the three VCR’s they owned.
The other officer walked over to the wife’s
car and looked under the hood to see if he could fix the trouble. The husband
walked over, took the coil wire out of
his pocket, and handed it to the officer. He then told his wife that she
could have a VCR if he could have his things.
She finally agreed and went into the house. (I found out later that his
things were narcotics he was dealing in.)
As the wife entered the house, I noticed two
little girls standing in the doorway, watching the drama unfold. They were
about eight and ten years old. Both wore dresses and each clung to a Cabbage
patch doll. At their feet were two small suitcases. My eyes couldn’t leave
their faces as they watched the two people they loved the most tear at each
other.
The woman emerged with the VCR in her arms
and went to the car where she put it on the crowded back seat. She turned and
told her husband where he could find his things. They agreed to divide their
other possessions equally.
Then, as I watched in disbelief, the husband
pointed to the two little girls and said, “Well, which one do you want?” with
no apparent emotion, the mother chose the older one. The girls looked at each
other, then the older daughter walked out and climbed into the car. The smaller
girl, still clutching her Cabbage Patch doll in one hand and her suitcase in
the other, watched in bewilderment as her sister and mother drove off. I saw
tears streaming down her face. The only “comfort” she received was an order
from her father to go back into the house, as he turned to go talk with some
friends.
He concludes this story by saying, “There
I stood…the unwilling witness to the death of a family.”
Why did this
family die? Was it drugs? The husbands criminal background? Was it the anger
and hatred? No! All these things may have been involved, but the look on the
little girls face said it all. What Dave
Johnson saw was the pain filled eyes of a little girl who over the years had watched a creeping separateness distance
her parents from each other. That family died from a disease which infects
millions of marriages today, a disease called isolation. Notice it is isolation
or disassociation which is the last attribute of neurosis before the all
consuming conversion or change takes place. The big “D”, divorce.
Why did brother Branham use those three points in the
wedding ceremony? Because unless you are willing to enter marriage advisably,
soberly, and in the fear of God,
your marriage is destined to naturally move toward this state of
isolation. What does this mean? You have
got to enter marriage with a plan, and not just any plan will do. You have got
to enter this marriage with God’s plan for that marriage. After all, he is the
author of marriage. It is He that said, GENESIS
2:18 ¶ And the LORD God said, [It is] not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an
help meet for him. GENESIS
2:21 ¶ And the LORD God caused a deep
sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed
up the flesh instead thereof; 22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken
from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. 23
And Adam said, This [is] now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh:
she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of
Now this word cleave means to stick together, to
cling, stick, stay close, cleave, keep close, stick to, stick with, follow
closely, join to, overtake, catch So
we see it was God Himself that said, it is not good for man to dwell alone,
therefore, I will institute marriage for the purpose of having someone by his
side always.
But what causes this isolation, this separation, this
exclusion or alienation that takes place in marriages today? When you are excluded you have a feeling of
distance, a lack of closeness, and very little intimacy. You can share the same ship, but have no fellowship. You can sleep
in the same bed, eat at the same table, parent the same children, and still be
alone, and isolated, alienated and cut off.
The sad thing is that people don’t marry thinking they will be lonely.
It’s just the opposite. People marry to fill that void of loneliness. They
marry to share their lives together. But what has happened to bring about this
void called alienation or isolation?
PROVERBS 14:12 ¶
There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof [are]
the ways of death. 13 ¶ Even
in laughter the heart is sorrowful; and the end of that mirth [is] heaviness.
I do not believe that any one intentionally wants their
marriage to turn sour. Nor do I believe that any one would intentionally do
that which leads to death. But man has a propensity too often to try to work
out their problems on their own, without the help of God. If we are to have a marriage that one which
God Himself ordained, then we must have a blueprint to follow. How can we try
to produce on our own a marriage which is something that God has ordained.
Wouldn’t it seem a little ridiculous to leave out the author of marriage from
the planning of our own? I mean, if He ordained and established marriage, then
wouldn’t He also be the one who designed how marriage should be lived out. And
if He designed marriage for man to fulfill that emptiness in man, to fulfill
that loneliness in man, to take that loneliness away, don’t you think that He
wouldn’t also have a plan to keep that marriage together?
Therefore, if any marriage is to stay together, it has to
be put together by way of composition, and it has to be done by God
Himself. He does have a plan for your
life, and he has someone to share that plan with.
Now, then, we are looking at two things here. First, to
have a marriage that will last we must go tot he source of that marriage for our
answers. And secondly, when we try to do so on our own, we should know by now
that we are bound to fail.
We know that the number one killer is heart disease. At
least it has been so for the past 40 years. We know that this is a sign of the
end-time. LUKE 21:25 And
there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon
the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves
roaring; 26 Men's hearts failing
them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the
earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. 27 And then shall they see the Son of man
coming in a cloud with power and great glory.
28 And when these things begin to come to
pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth
nigh.
In the message, BALM IN
And I
would like to ask, what is sin? It’s unbelief!
Dr. James Lynch, a specialist in Psychosomatic diseases
at the
Man
was not created to live alone. After all, if God Himself longed for
companionship and fellowship, how much more mere man? So to desire for your lonely heart to be
fulfilled with companionship is not an unnatural thing. But as I said before,
if God planned it that way, and He made us to crave companionship, and He gave
us a means to fulfill this craving, then would He not also give us a way to
keep that fulfillment?
From the message, Reconciliation
Through Fellowship, brother Branham said, Notice...Fellowship, God wanting to fellowship with man, always wanted to do
it. The Old Testament, all of it was full of the shed blood. "Without the
shedding of blood there is no remission of sin." And where there's no remission of sin there's no fellowship. You've got to
get away from sin before you can every have fellowship with God, 'cause God
can't fellowship with sin. So you're borned a sinner, shaped in iniquity, come
to the world speaking lies, and how can you ever do it? You just might as well
quit right now to begin with. You can't do it within yourself, but there is One Who died to bring you to
fellowship, back not only to fellowship, but relationship with God, to make you
sons and daughters of God. Died for that purpose, come here, proved Hisself
Emanuel, omnipotent. And when an Omnipotent speaks, the miraculous happens.
In the Magazine Psychology Today, Dr. Philip Zimbardo, professor at
There’s
your neurosis again. Oh, how I love it when God brings me into contact with
things that verify and validate that these things are from God.
In his book, His
Needs, Her Needs, Dr. Willard F.
Harley, Jr. contends that meeting each others needs is the key to making
your marriage happy and affair-proof. Dr. Harley, who directs a network of
mental health clinics throughout the state of
When we have needs which are not being met, this is a
good indication that we have become isolated in our marriage at least in those
certain area’s. But so many times we would rather slide into a state of
isolation than to have to deal with the problem. Just like the person who has
come from anxiety, through compulsion, and possession, fear depression, and
into isolation or disassociation, those who slip into isolation do not do it
because they want to be hurt, but rather they think there is solace and comfort and safety in solitude. The “Peace of
avoidance is better than the pain of dealing with reality”, but this form of
death is very deceptive.
Isolation is not forced upon any married couple. We
delude ourselves by the atmosphere we have set up in our homes. We create the
delusion the we have time pressures, and work demands, and economic anxieties
which lead us to believe that we are excused for our lack of interest in
meeting the needs of our spouse. Every day we face choices that we must make
and it is these choices we make that will either bring us into a further blessing in our relationship, or will lead us
into depression and eventual isolation.
As I have said before in the mini series I preached a few
years ago called, “Home and the House of
God,” And in the series entitles, “As
a man Thinketh in His Heart,” you might remember where we found that the
seeds of every trial, and every reaction we go through, is only the
result of what we have already been sowing in our mind. It is our minds that get
in the way of our having the most wonderful relationships. It is our minds that
get tired, and look to find an easy way out. It is in our mind where we have
the opportunity to take God’s provided way for our marriage or to take the way
which only seems right for the moment. And it is in our mind where the
atmosphere is created to either cause a wonderful harmonious relationship to
exist or destructive isolation to occur.
It all begins in our minds.
We know that this is the hour when the church ends up in
divorce-ment because she isolates herself from the Groom, Jesus Christ the
Word. He’s on the outside knocking, trying to gain entrance but she won’t open
the door. Oh, how I hope you see that this is the spirit of the age. Don’t get
caught up into that or your marriage to one another and your marriage to Him
will end up on the ash heap of history. It’s time to arise and shake ourselves.
Pinch yourself to make sure you are awake. Remember, Brother Branham taught us
to look
at the women and you will see the condition of the church.
From the Message,
I WILL RESTORE, brother Branham said, “not only among the Pentecostal
denominations, but all denominations, this great palmerworm has broke down brotherhood.
It's did it with the Lutherans. It's did it with the Baptists. It's did it with
the Presbyterians. It's did it with the Nazarenes. It's did it with the
Pentecostals. It's always been that old worm in there to make them isolate
themselves. "We got it. You ain't got nothing." What a pity. He goes on to say .. And did you notice it's the same
insect all the way down. Now, this old devil cankerworm has come in, and he
crawls in the skin too, you know, cankers you up. Once they ever find a little thing
and when he does, it don't make any difference what somebody else tries to say,
he will just hold to that, and he will
isolate his little group into something, "but this is this."
Brother, it ain't, "This is this."; this is "that."
WHY SOME PEOPLE CAN'T KEEP VICTORY So
it takes the baptism of the Holy Ghost to come into that human heart there to
make the thing run right. The love of God, God is love. And unless each one of
these gifts is put right in the center of love, it'll become selfish and
indifferent, and pull itself off, and isolate itself, and cross over, and fuss
and stew. But when it's anchored right into the middle of love, it'll
fellowship everywhere. And that's right. That's exactly what we need. The
church is dying for love, brother.
As you fill out this questionnaire, be completely honest
and ask yourself, when I do any of the following of these activities, do we
both participate (husband and wife together) or do we seem to have our own way
of doing these things apart.
Areas of relationship |
Isolated
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
Intimacy
6 |
Spiritual Growth and Togetherness |
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Finances |
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Problem Solving |
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Rearing our children |
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Goals for our Marriage |
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Physical Intimacy |
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Emotional intimacy |
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Resisting stress and pressures |
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Recreation and friendships |
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Grocery shopping |
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