My husband, George, loves football.
It was Christmastime. We have five kids, and I love decorating.
I said, “George, come help me decorate for Christmas.”
He said, “Claire, I’m going to be watching the football game today.”
I said, “You’ve got these children. You need to do what I want you to do.”
He told me, “After the football game, I’ll come help you.”
I said, “Well, that thing lasts for 400 years.”
I had such resentment against the football game. Why am I telling you this?
Divorce comes about by little bitty things and rash responses.
Here is where my mind went and how I felt at the time. I thought he was insensitive and a terrible father since he chose to watch his football game instead of helping me decorate when I wanted him to.
I made that little bitty thing so big that I was ready to leave him.
When we had just one child, I used to get mad and say, I’ll take my baby and leave.” Then when we had five kids, I said, “I’ll leave you with all these kids.”
I made terrible threats because I didn’t understand that marriage is a decision.
Like every major decision, you have the opportunity to look at it and say, “I didn’t do right by it.”
I’ll never forget when George told me, “Clarice, never again in this household will we ever use the word divorce. We’ll never use that word again.”
That decision was powerful.
Anger keeps us in a state of pride and hurt. Sometimes there are justifiable reasons. That’s where forgiveness comes in. Remember, you’re married to a human being. None of us are perfect. Give each other grace.
The scripture teaches us about trust. We say I’ve just got to trust my mate. I’ve just got to trust my friend. I’ve just got to trust.”
You know what? You are very deceived if you think that trust is what God said that we are to do with each other. Trust is what you do with God.
The scripture says, “Some trust in chariots, some trust in horses, but I will trust in the Lord, thy God.” In the book of Hosea, it says, Don’t even trust the one you sleep with.
How do you have a relationship where you don’t trust?
You learn to forgive and you learn to love.
Forgiving is not just saying the words, I forgive you. When my children were young and had spats with each other, I would say, “Tell your sister that you’re sorry and that you love her.”
They would just stand there and look, then say, “I’m sorry”. They said the words, but there was nothing to back it up. Even if they hugged each other, it was only the fear of my discipline that caused them to respond like that.
We can say I’m sorry, I forgive him for what he did, but you can’t wait to recall it. You can’t wait to bring it up to him again, but you are the one that’s going to suffer.
Forgiveness is another one of those things called a decision.
You decide to forgive because you pass sentence on yourself. The Word of God says, give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, exactly the way we forgive those who sin or trespass against us.
You’re passing a sentence on yourself. When you choose to forgive yourself, then God forgives you. Choose to forgive the others for your own sake whether or not restoration results.
Forgiveness is a choice.
I have a client who had been wrestling for 14 years with her marriage. She had been to every kind of counselor you can go to and spent thousands and thousands of dollars.
She loves her husband and he loves her. They just couldn’t live together, because he hurt her and she hurt him. It was an endless thing trying to reason with it.
I was delighted to get her letter that said, “After three months of working with Dr. Fluitt, my marriage has been totally healed and totally restored.”
Reason is doubt in disguise.
Doubt is the spirit of the antichrist. Antichrist does not mean against Christ; it means anything other than the anointing.
Christ is not Jesus’s last name. He is the Christ, the anointed of God. It is the anointing that destroys the yoke. The yoke is sin.
When doubt comes in, begin to say, “Lord, God, I thank you right now, that that you break off the spirit of doubt that comes in and makes me doubt my friend, my neighbor, my loved one, my husband, my brother, my sister, my uncle, my aunt, and all the people we do business with on a daily basis.”
There are times and seasons of reconciliation.
There is a time when you can talk about you did this, or you did that. A time when we are able to confront one another with sins and shortcomings and inconsistencies. After we have come before one another, we can be sincere and say, “I choose to forgive.”
When you choose to forgive, then you have to turn it loose. You can’t go back and just revisit it all the time. The enemy tries to bring that back to you.
Once you understand the rule, if you want the benefit of a long-lasting relationship with your husband, with your wife, with your children, with your mother, with your father, with your uncle, your aunt, bowlegged-mosquitoes, or cross-eyed ants, you have got to choose to live a life of forgiveness. It’s all a choice.
You no longer have to stay disappointed and disillusioned.
Stop dragging around the pain, hurt, and frustration. Stop playing the “he did this and you did that” game in your mind.
I understand that it was painful. According to 1 Corinthians 10:13, No test or temptation that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down. He’ll never let you be pushed past your limit. He’ll always be there to help you come through it.
May this message build your faith. I pray over your current or future covenant marriage. Let God heal your heart. You have the power to prevail.