My husband and I celebrated out 31st wedding anniversary yesterday. I calculated that we have been married for 11307 days. Many people who congratulated us said that we weren’t in the majority because so many people don’t stay married these days. I believe for a successful marriage there has to be effective communication. There are scores of children who grow up in single parent families, mostly with single mothers. Many people just don’t want to take responsibility for their actions. There was a report on the news of a dead new-born baby who had been discovered at a garbage dump. It is so heart breaking when I hear of all the sadness and all the perversity in the world. The dictionary gives the meaning of perversity as, ‘a deliberate desire to behave in an unreasonable or unacceptable way; contrariness.’
There were also reports of various murders country wide. Conditions don’t seem very bright at all when I listen to the news. Christians must be wary not to fall into the trap of blaming all these things on the end times.
Matthew 24:6 -14 And you will hear of wars and rumours of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.
“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name’s sake. And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another. Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.
We cannot ever become discouraged when circumstances look bleak. We cannot ever give up evangelizing and being witnesses and we must never give up praying for missionaries and other people who make it their life’s mission to spread the Gospel. We really should also lift up marriages in our prayers. The enemy hates Godly marriages and any kind of unity for that matter.
John 17:21-23
that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.
The devil wants to cause division among Christians at all costs.
1 Corinthians 1:10 Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Here Paul is pleading with the believers not to have division amongst themselves. Where there is division, there isn’t proper communication. People who are angry or bitter can’t communicate in a reasonable way with each other. Effective communication is the key to unity.
Ehesians 4:29 Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.
Proverbs 25:11 A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.
We really have to watch our words when we speak. I think we rate what we say way too low. Speech is our primary means of communication, and it’s so easy to say things we don’t really mean and then hurt people badly. We cannot take back words once they have come out of our mouths. They’re out there for eternity. God made the world by speaking words. What His words caused all those years ago is still here today.
Proverbs 18 21 Death and life are in the power of the tongue,
And those who love it will eat its fruit.
Our words are really powerful for bad and for good. We should never use our words to break down people, irrespective of who they are and what they have done to us. We should use them to build up our families, friends and fellow believers. We should use them to lift up others in prayer and to tell Go what’s in our hearts. Let us spend much more time thinking about what we say and how we communicate.
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