We have been looking at the need for husbands and their wives to learn how to communicate adequately and appropriately in their homes, so that Satan will not be able to use their failure in this area to access their homes and work. Therefore, we all must give ourselves to learning from the word of God how to make our communication with our spouses adequate, effective and profitable. That way, we will be able to build homes where love and peace will continually reign.

Then we also need to learn to pray to God to strengthen us to do these things. To say the fact, it is not in every case that a marriage is not working that those in it are totally ignorant of what to do to make their marriage work. There are many married people, especially believers, who have been taught again what right steps to take to make their homes work. Yet their homes are not working. Why? They will not act on what they are learning.

Why, then, will someone know what to do to make life easier or better or safer for them and not do it? One main reason is insufficient strength. Jesus says this to His disciples: “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." (Matt 26:41NIV) Did you see that? Being willing to do what is right is not enough; you also need strength to do what is right. And if you do not have sufficient strength to do what is right when you are supposed to be doing it, you will disappoint yourself.

Peter, for instance, disappointed himself that same night that Jesus said those words of warning to them. He had vowed to stand by Jesus till the very end, if it meant dying with Him. And was it right of him to want to do that? Yes! Did he want to do so? Yes! But did he eventually do so? No! Instead, three times in a row he said that he did not know Jesus at all.

Why did Peter fail himself, not just the Lord, on that occasion? The reason was that he did not have sufficient inner strength to do the right thing that he wanted to do. And that was why Jesus told him and his friends earlier that same night to watch and pray so that they would not fall. But did they watch and pray, as they had been told? No, they did not. Yes, they wanted to. But they did not. And they did not because they were so tired that all they wanted to do was sleep. Only if they had understood how important it was for them to rob themselves of sleep that night in order to pray, they would not have been messed up the way they were.

Well, thank God for second chances. Those men were later brought back to the Lord. But they had learnt their lessons. And from what we learn through history, none of them ever denied the Lord Jesus again. Instead, they always had sufficient strength to stand with him, even till the point of death.

What is my point? It is that it takes more than a willingness to build your home to be a place of rest, joy, peace and fruitfulness; you also need spiritual strength to do so. And one sure way to be daily strengthened to do all that you know to be right for your home is by praying.

See, strength is always available in God. But we have to learn to draw it for ourselves through prayer. This is why Paul prays for the brethren in Ephesus in his letter to them, saying, “I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith…” (Eph 3:16-17NIV)

What is the apostle’s prayer for the brethren here? It is that God, out of His glorious riches, will strengthen them with power through His Spirit in their inner being. How will God strengthen us with power? It is through His Spirit that is already living in us. And why does He have to strengthen us with power in this way? It is so that Christ will dwell in our hearts through faith.

Now what does it mean for Christ to dwell in one’s hear through faith? It means for Him to be at home in the person. In other words, the Lord is free to rule and direct the person. No arguments! No controversies!

So, it takes spiritual strength for us to allow the lordship of Jesus over our lives. Yes, it takes spiritual strength for us not to argue with the Lord Jesus when He is telling us or reminding us of the right way to live our lives and the right way to relate to our spouses in our homes. And if you do not have enough of this spiritual strength, you will just realise that even though you know the right thing to do, you are not doing it.

And how many times have failed to do what you know to be right for your marriage? Have many times have you refused to keep quiet in your home, even though you knew that the right thing for you to do was to shut up? And how many times have kept quiet in your marriage, even though you knew that you were supposed to speak out in order for things to go right? What kept you from doing the right thing on such occasions? It was insufficient strength.

So, if you don’t want to continue to use your lack of strength as your excuse for not being patient, kind, loving and understanding in your home, you had better begin to pray to God to daily strength you from within to always do what is right in your home and wherever you go. And He will surely answer you and see to it that you are never short of strength to do and say what is right in your home again.

Then you must also learn to pray for your spouse that they too will daily be strengthened by God to do what is right in your home and in all their dealings. That is because while you want to do what is right in your home and also praying for yourself to do so, Satan may be doing all kinds of work to keep your partner from doing what is right. But as you pray for them wholeheartedly, you can expect God to frustrate whatever Satan may be doing to capture them to do his will.

For instance, I once shared the experience of a man of God with you on this platform. According to him, he sat in a plane one day with a man that told him that he was fasting. And he felt that the man must be a Christian because of that. But when he asked the man concerning his church, he told him that he was not a Christian but a cultist. He even told him the cult that he was a part of.

In any case, when the man of God asked him the purpose of his fasting, he said that he and members of his cult were all fasting to see marriages of church leaders collapse and their testimonies destroyed. Just think about that. While you are trying to build your home, someone is someone fasting and reciting incantations to see that same home collapse. Don’t you, then, think that you too must releasing God’s power through prayer for the protection of your home and for the frustration of the devil?

See, there are many wicked and unreasonable people out there. And some of these have made themselves available to be used by the devil to destroy marriages. So, you must continually pray that God will keep you and your spouse safe from their wicked schemes. That is because even though they are unable to get you, they may just be able to get your spouse because of their own carelessness, negligence or frustration. Therefore, your prayer should not just be for yourself alone but also for your spouse. That way, both of you can continually be shielded by God’s power from the schemes of the devil.

Well, something led us to all that. And it is the fact that husbands and wives must learn to communicate with one another adequately and appropriately, if their homes will be the blessing that they are supposed to be. But then, you must remember that this is not a one-sided thing. It is not that only the husband or the wife that will be making all the effort to communicate well and right in the home, while their spouse is showing no interest at all. It will not work.

The point I am making, then, is that there are times that even if a spouse is the best communicator in the world, they may still not be able to communicate well with their partner. For example, if a partner has shown himself or herself to be unreliable, it may not be in the interest of the family for their spouse to communicate some things to them.

Now why should anyone marry an unreliable or unfaithful person? I think Samson would be in the right position to answer that question. Remember that he settled down for Delilah, as unreliable and unfaithful as she was. The bible shows us that Delilah did not hide from Samson the fact that she was up to no good. Yet, for love, Samson held on to her. (Cf. Judges 16)

However, it was a very difficult thing for the man to tell her certain things about himself. Why? He knew that she would use the information to destroy him. So, as the bible tells us, he kept on tossing her around with all kinds of lies, when she wanted to know the secret of his power. Yet the woman was not ready to give up. And when he could no longer bear the weight of her nagging, he told her the whole truth. That, of course, was the beginning of his end. (Cf. Judges 16)

So, while the ideal thing God wants is for both the man and woman to be open to each other in communication, to speak adequately and appropriately to each other about every matter that concerns them and their home, where you are dealing with an unreliable spouse, it will be wisdom for you to sieve what you communicate to them.

Should you have married an unreliable person? No! But you are already married to one. You just have to keep on praying that God will have His way in their life and change them. And while you are expecting God to change them, you had better know what sort of information you will be communicating to them.

Now someone may say, “Did you not say that not communicating adequately and appropriately with you spouse will surely bringing in the devil?” Truly, I said that. But then, communicating some things to an unreliable spouse is nothing other than bringing in the devil himself into your home. Do you know what the bible says about an unreliable person?

The bible says: “Depending on an unreliable person in a crisis is like trying to chew with a loose tooth or walk with a crippled foot.” (Prov 25:19GNT)

Did you see that? Relying on an unreliable person, especially in a moment of crisis, is like trying to chew with a loose or broken tooth or trying to walk with a crippled foot. That is multiplying pains and sorrow. So, if your spouse has shown themselves time and again that they cannot be trusted, you will need to determine what is adequate and appropriate for them to know about those things that concern you and your home.

Am I now saying functioning like this will be sweet for you and your home? No! It is never a sweet thing not to be able to say everything in your mind to your spouse, a spouse that you love wholeheartedly, without being afraid that they may use the information against you. It was not sweet for Samson to do. That was why he eventually spilled the beans. And that cost him his eyes, his ministry and his life.

But if you are not ready to lose your eyes, ears, pregnancy, health, job, salvation or anything else to the unfaithfulness of your spouse, you may not want to act like Samson. Instead, you may want to be prudent about what sort of communication you will be having with your spouse.

I actually have more things to share with you along these lines. But they will have to wait until the next episode of Mr and Mr. I thank you for your time, patience and contributions and pray that God will rid your home of everything that is inconsistent with His will for it, in Jesus’ name. Amen. 

In our last hangout, we dwelt further on how not to allow Satan to use inadequate and inappropriate communication to ruin our homes. As I pointed out, it is not enough to be communicating adequately to our spouses; we must also be communicating appropriately to them. That is because inadequate communication can be as bad as inappropriate communication.

Now is inappropriate communication? First, it has to do with not using appropriate words to communicate our thoughts, feelings or ideas. In other words, what we are saying with our mouths it contrary to what we want to accomplish. We want our spouse to do something or not to do something. And we may be right. But the words we use in addressing have a great role to play in whether they will listen to us or not. And if we truly want them to listen to us, we must learn to use words that will encourage them to listen.

That is why the bible says:

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” (Eph 4:29NIV)

Did you see that? What must come out of your mouth to your spouse must always be something helpful, something that will build them up, something that will benefit them, according to their need. So, in addressing your spouse on any matter, it must not just be about what you want them to do, it must also be about how what you want them to do will benefit them.

People naturally don’t want to give themselves to doing things that is not obviously beneficial to them. But these same people will take some bitter pills, if they know that they will cure some ailments in their bodies and give them comfort. And can you count the number of times you have had to take some bitter pills or some very painful injections, just because you wanted to get well? You did that not because you loved bitter things or pain but because of the benefit of doing so.

In like manner, we can make our spouses accept bitter truths from us, if we can use words that will show them the benefits of what we are saying to them. Why, then, aren’t always use words that will show our spouses the benefits of what we want them to do? The reason is that we don’t care enough about them. We don’t care whether they get hurt by us or not. So, we are not ready to make any serious effort towards finding and using words that are edifying in talking to them. And that is a shameful thing.

To say the fact, if some people would use half of the effort they are making towards destroying their homes in building them, those homes would most likely be heaven on earth. But they are not ready to do that. They would rather be making effort towards destroying their homes than making efforts towards building them.

Perhaps you are like that. You cry or scream all the time that you are making effort to make everybody fine in your home. But is your effort really towards building your home or towards destroying it? If your words are still caustic and hurting to your spouse, then, regardless of how hard you may think you are working towards building your home, you are simply destroying it.

I once told you that with our tongues we can either speak death into our marriages or life into them. Look at what Solomon says about that:

“The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” (Prov 18:21NIV)

Did you see that? You will surely eat the fruit of what you say to your spouse or into your marriage. If you are continually blessing your spouse with your words, filling them with courage and hope, you will reap the fruit of your words of blessing in their lives. That means you will enjoy them.

In like manner, if you are continually cursing your spouse or talking disrespectfully to them, you will surely reap the fruit of what you are saying. In other words, you will not enjoy them. A woman, right in front of her husband, once told me that she and her husband were age mates and so she could not allow him to treat her as he pleased.

Now was it right for the man to treat her anyhow? No! And was the man treating her anyhow? Yes, in some ways. For instance, being ready to beat up your wife is nothing but treating her anyhow. However, we can also not overlook the danger of the words of the woman. Are her words capable of driving her husband crazy enough to beat her?

I may be wrong about this: I have observed that unbelieving wives would not dare say to their unbelieving husbands because they would not anyone to beat them. But believing wives would freely open their mouths and say these things to their husbands. Why? They are not wise. And of course, it shows that also don’t care about how their husbands feel about what they say or how they will react to what they say.

So, while those husbands may not beat them up, they will also not make life pleasant for them. But then, there are pastors that are ready to beat up their wives any given day. I personally know of at least three pastors that used to do that. I hope they have stopped. Is that commendable or acceptable? No! But as I said before, the words of some women are capable of bringing hell down on them.

The bible says:

“By talking, a fool gets into an argument, and his mouth invites a beating. A fool's mouth is his ruin. His lips are a trap to his soul.” (Prov 18:6-7GW)

Did you see that? A fool does not know how to talk or when to stop talking. So, he invites a beating with his own mouth. Yes, he ruins his life with his own mouth.

How many men, then, have ruined their marriages with their mouths, with caustic, useless and irresponsible words? And how many women have ruined their marriages with their mouths, with wicked, injurious and bitter words?

See, much harm is done in many homes with words than with actions. That is why we all who are married must make learning how to use appropriate words in addressing our spouses a serious business. Yes, it will take a lot of effort on our part to do so. In fact, for some of us, it will take seriously giving ourselves to the word of God and prayer in order for us to be able to do so. That is because we have for years been loading ourselves with hateful and bitter words. Those are the main words we have in our vocabularies. So, unless we are cleansed of them through the word of God and prayer, nothing good can be expected to come out of our mouths.

But that effort will be worth it, if we will begin to make it. And don’t use your spouse as an excuse for not learning how to use appropriate words to communicate in your home. That will be an unacceptable excuse to give to God.

God has commanded you to speak only what is helpful and edifying to your spouse and to others in your world. So, obey that command, irrespective of how your spouse is acting. Then God will reward you for doing so. But if you are continually using your spouse as an excuse to be saying hateful and bitter things in your home, you both will end up destroying each other. You may even destroy your children and their future homes as well. So, mind yourself.

Now all this does not mean that we are not to correct or rebuke our spouses when necessary. We must correct or rebuke our spouses when necessary. “But some spouses don’t take rebuke or correction well,” you say. That is true. That is why anyone who wants to marry has no business marrying someone who listens to nobody. That person can endanger your life.

Remember what we said about Nabal, Abigail’s husband in our last hangout. Even though he had married an intelligent woman, he would not appreciate her intelligence or take it seriously at all. So, he once put his family in danger because of his arrogance. And perhaps he had been endangering the lives of his family members before that time. Only God knows.

In any case, the point is that if you are the type that will not allow anybody, not even your spouse, to correct you, you can put yourself and your family in harm’s way any day and any time. And there may be no remedy. So, regardless of what you think you know, you don’t know enough.

The bible says, “The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know.” (1Cor 8:2NIV) Did you see that? You don’t know enough. I don’t know enough. Therefore, there is no shame in accepting correction or rebuke. On the contrary, it will bring healing and wholeness to our lives.

That is why you must always let your spouse know that they are welcome anytime to correct or rebuke you. They may not be right in correcting or rebuking you. But they must know that they are welcome any day and anytime to do so. That way, even if they are wrong, you will be able to point misunderstanding out to them, even without any quarrel.

But if you always present yourself as someone that must not be touched or corrected, your spouse may be left with no choice but to let you be. And that is dangerous for both of you. So, your spouse must still find ways to communicate what you need to know to you. And you too must find ways to let your spouse know whatever they need to know.

Abigail, as we see in 1Samuel 25, knew that it would be dangerous for her to let Nabal continue in his arrogance. So, she had to find ways to communicate to him what he needed to know about his arrogance and what it would have cost him and the entire family. What did she do? First, she stepped into the situation before it was too late to fix. Then she waited until her husband was sober before she said anything to him.

You too should never fold your arms and let ruins come to your home through your spouse before you act. I have, for instance, heard of women who would say of their cheating husbands, “Let him continue to mess up. He will be the only one to suffer for it.” No, he won’t be the only one to suffer for his sexual immorality. You and your children too will suffer for it. So, you had better begin to do whatever righteous thing you have to do to save your home from whatever mess your spouse may be creating at the moment. And may the Spirit of God fill you with sufficient wisdom and strength to do so.

Now I know there is yet a lot that can be said on this matter. But this is where we will end it for this hangout. Thanks everyone your time, patience and contributions.  

In our recent hangouts, our focus has been on communicating adequately with our spouses in our homes. And as I pointed out, this is one way not to give room for certain to come into our homes and destroy them. So, again, I am saying be sure that you are talking about everything that is of relevance to your life, to your spouse’s life and to your marriage as a whole. That way, you and your spouse can be on the same page about everything and in every situation.

Then, apart from being adequate in your communication with your spouse, you also have to be appropriate. In other words, you must learn to use the right words in communicating with your spouse. Otherwise, what is meant to accomplish good for your home may end up ruining things for you both. And where that is the case, you have already given room for Satan to come into your home.

Remember that the bible says, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” (Eph 4:29NIV) Did you see that? What must not come out of your mouth? Unwholesome talks! In other words, you must not say anything unwholesome or unhealthy to anyone, not to even talk of your spouse.

Now, as I said in a previous hangout, the only reason you will have something unkind or untoward to say to your spouse is that you have filled yourself with evil and poisonous things. The bible says that the mouth speaks from the abundance of the heart (Luke 6:45). So, if the words coming out of your mouth to your spouse are hateful and hurting words, the reason is that there is abundance of hate and bitterness in you. And you need to allow the word of God to rid you of them. Otherwise, even if you want to communicate adequately with your spouse, they will show no real interest in listening to you.

None of us wants to be having discussions with people who insult and hurt us all the time. Even if they are our bosses at work and we are not ready to lose our job because of them, we will do our best to avoid talking or doing anything with them. But where we have an option, we will always choose not to have anything to do or discuss with someone with a foul mouth.

There are people who complain that their spouses don’t make time out to discuss with anything with them. And while we cannot praise their spouses for acting like that, we also need to know what sort of things they have been saying to those spouses. If your words are caustic and injurious, your spouse will do their best to avoid discussing anything serious with you. If every conversation you have with your spouse always ends badly because you must say something negative or harmful, they may begin to avoid you in order for peace to reign in your home.

Is that, then, good? No! And will it accomplish peace for any home? It hardly does. That is because whether you talk to some people or not, they must insult you. In fact, it gets worse with some people when you won’t talk to them or respond to their insults. They will get really mad at you and do all they can to bring hell upon you.

But there is no excuse for a child of God to be like that. There is no excuse for you, a child of God, to be full of bitter and hateful words. So, get rid of whatever bitterness or hatred or pollution you have in you that is making you to say things that hurtful things to your spouse. Then you will see that you will be able to have normal and productive conversations with them.

Now, as Paul says in that text from Ephesians 5, it is not enough for us not to be saying hateful things to our spouses; we also have to be saying helpful things to them, things that will build them up. But that will not happen by accident. We will have to be deliberate about it. In other words, we will have to deliberately give ourselves to learning how to speak words to our spouses that will fill them with life, love, courage, encouragement, hope and healing. And where that is the case, our spouses will, of necessity, long to talk to us.

Look at what Solomon says about himself:

“Keep this in mind: The Teacher was considered wise, and he taught the people everything he knew. He listened carefully to many proverbs, studying and classifying them. The Teacher sought to find just the right words to express truths clearly.” (Eccl 12:9-10NLT)

Did you see that? The reason Solomon was popular and had people from every part of the world coming to listen to him was not just that he was wise. The reason was that he made a business of studying words and the way they are used. Then he also sought to find the right words to express whatever wise and helpful things he had to share with anyone. That explains why people were delighted to listen to him and to follow his counsel. And that was what made him wealthy.

Now every teacher that will excel in his field must be like Solomon, studying words and how they are used to produce the right results in those that he is teaching. But it is not only teachers that need to learn how to use words, married people must also learn how to do so. Otherwise, how will they be able to get along with their partners and continually work together to attain great heights in life.

So, each of us that is married must make it our business to learn how to be effective communicators in our homes. We must learn how not to say what we don’t mean and how to mean what we say. Yes, we must learn to employ the right words in communicating our thoughts, feelings and desires to our spouses. And we must learn the right time to express our thoughts, feelings and desires to our spouses. Otherwise, our spouses will not stop misrepresenting us, even where our intentions are good. And misrepresentation of things can be used by the devil at any time to ruin any family.

Look at Abigail of bible days, for example. She was a great and effective communicator. How she learnt to be this kind of person is not something we are told in the bible. Unfortunately, her husband did not recognise her abilities or learn anything from her. But we see that she was able to save her home from destruction by knowing how to express herself clearly and wisely to David.

David, as the account goes, had vowed to destroy Nabal and his household that day because of the man’s ingratitude. And was he right to make that kind of vow to murder another person and his entire family, even though ingratitude was involved? No! But somehow, anger got hold of him that day and began to drive him to do evil.

Thankfully, Abigail got to know about what was going to happen and quickly sprang to action. Now look at what is said in the bible about her conversation with David:

“When Abigail saw David, she quickly got off her donkey and bowed down before David with her face to the ground. She fell at his feet and said: "My lord, let the blame be on me alone. Please let your servant speak to you; hear what your servant has to say. May my lord pay no attention to that wicked man Nabal. He is just like his name — his name is Fool, and folly goes with him. But as for me, your servant, I did not see the men my master sent. Now since the LORD has kept you, my master, from bloodshed and from avenging yourself with your own hands, as surely as the LORD lives and as you live, may your enemies and all who intend to harm my master be like Nabal. And let this gift, which your servant has brought to my master, be given to the men who follow you. Please forgive your servant's offense, for the LORD will certainly make a lasting dynasty for my master, because he fights the LORD's battles. Let no wrongdoing be found in you as long as you live. Even though someone is pursuing you to take your life, the life of my master will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the LORD your God. But the lives of your enemies he will hurl away as from the pocket of a sling. When the LORD has done for my master every good thing he promised concerning him and has appointed him leader over Israel, my master will not have on his conscience the staggering burden of needless bloodshed or of having avenged himself. And when the LORD has brought my master success, remember your servant.”" (1Sam 25:23-31NIV)

Did you see how this woman address David? She addressed him with respect and also with clarity. She reminded him God’s promise to him and of God’s commitment to fulfilling it. She then told him that what he wanted to do was needless and would may end up messing up the fulfilment of God’s good purpose for his life. Yes, while she was at this, she had to refer to her husband as a fool. But that was only to save him and everybody in the family. Besides, the man was actually a fool.

Well, when she was done, David’s will to fight and kill had already gone from him. All he could do was just bless her for curing him of his madness. And when the woman eventually became a widow, he lost no time at all in asking for her hand in marriage. That was because he could not see how he would allow an intelligent and effective communicator like her go to another man. It pays, then, to learn to be effective in communicating with your spouse. It will make them honour you more than everyone around them. It will make them want you by their side all the time.

Furthermore, as the account goes, when Abigail got home that same night, having persuaded David to go back, she met her husband getting drunk and in high spirits. And what did she say to him? Nothing! Why? She knew that was not the right time to tell him anything about what had happened.

Now think about it. While this woman was risking her life for the family, her husband was getting drunk. But it was this same man that messed up and put the life of everyone in his family at risk. So, naturally, one would expect Abigail to come back home screaming at him and perhaps pouring a cup of his wine on his head to make him come back to his senses.

But she did not do that at all. Yes, she risked her life for Nabal and everyone. But everyone was already safe. Her family was already safe. So, a discussion with the man who almost brought death on everyone in the family could wait until the man was sober and ready to make sense of whatever was said to him. And Abigail made that discussion wait. What a wise and effective communicator!

Unfortunately, many of us don’t know how to wait. Yes, you have something to discuss with your spouse. And you can see that the mood is not right or that the discussion may get them distracted or afraid and make a bad situation worse. Yet you cannot wait. You cannot exercise enough patience to discuss the matter when it will achieve profitable results for the family. You just have to spill the beans and cause more chaos. You are not doing well at all.

See, nobody become an effective communicator in their home by accident. People make effort to become effective communicators. And a key to becoming one is patience. Don’t be in a hurry to say anything. But think carefully first about what you want to say in order to see the right way and the right time to say it and get appropriate results.

What does the bible say? It says, “My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry…” (James 1:19NIV) Did you see that? This is an instruction to every one of us, whether we are married or not. We are instructed to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry. That is how to become effective communicators in all our relationships, especially in our marriages.

So, stop making excuses for being impatient or hasty in communicating with your spouse. Yes, what you have to say is what needs to be said or discussed. But if saying it will help and build up your family, it has to be said in the right way and at the right time. That is why you have to learn to be patient in talking to your spouse. And you can achieve that by being more ready to listen to whatever they have to say to you. People like to hear someone who listens to them but will do their best to avoid the one who talks all the time or who thinks they have a monopoly on talking.

Let us pick it from here next year when we have the next hangout. I pray that God will keep you and your home safe and sound till then, in Jesus’ name. Happy new year in advance, and make sure you keep my new year meat. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at another way through Satan works in people’s homes. And that is poor or inadequate communication. As I pointed out, no communication at all in a home is always dangerous. It is a sign that Satan is already at work in that home and about is using someone the way he used Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus. So, don’t ever allow any disagreement in your marriage to make you shut down communication. That is nothing but giving Satan an opportunity to work.

But then, just as no communication at all in a home is a sign that Satan is already at work in that home, poor or inadequate communication also can be a sign that Satan has already found a footing in a home. Now remember that God’s number one reason for setting up the marriage institution is that both the man and the woman will be suitable companions to each other. Let me give you that Scripture again:

“The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."” (Gen 2:18NIV)

Did you see that? God’s aim is that both the man and the woman will be suitable helpers to each other. But how can they be suitable helpers or companions to each other, if they will not learn to communicate appropriately and adequately with each other? It is impossible.

Now you don’t have to be an orator in order to be able to communicate adequately and appropriately with your spouse. You just need to know that it is the right thing to do. The word of God says, “Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so?” (Amos 3:3NIV)

What does that mean? It means that any two people that will function together as a team in any situation must be united in purpose. How will they know that they are united in purpose? It is through communication.

It is a shame that many that are married today got married without ascertaining how united in purpose they were with the people they are now married to. That means they did not communicate enough to know whether they even had any business marrying themselves or not.

To say the fact, the only communication some people were having before getting married was sex. And they assumed that since they had been sleeping with one another, they already knew enough about one another. But having married for a while, they can now see that they have nothing in common. So, each of them is just doing their own thing, seeking to find fulfilment in life without the other.

What am I saying? It is that learning to communicate adequately and appropriately with your spouse is something you should have learnt before getting married at all. You should have learnt how to express yourself, your feelings, you desires, your plans, your concerns and whatever else that concerns your life to your partner. And they also ought to have learnt to do likewise. So, you really had no business marrying someone that you both would be struggling to communicate with each other.

But since you are already married, we cannot be dwelling on what you should have done before marrying that you did not do. What we are going to be doing now is showing you how to do that thing you failed to do before getting married and which is relevant to the survival and fruitfulness of your marriage. And in this case, we are dealing with communicating adequately and appropriately with your spouse, so that Satan will not use your poor communication as an excuse to work in your home and destroy things.

Communicating adequately and appropriately in every home, of course, is not a one-sided thing. It cannot be a one-sided thing. True communication is never a one-sided thing. The speaker and the listening must both be actively involved, showing that they understand each other and are not misrepresenting anything. Otherwise, somebody may start acting under some assumptions or suspicions or ignorance. And that may later create problems for both of them.

What I am saying, for instance, is that if my wife is not communicating with me adequately about a matter, I may remain ignorant in some ways about that matter. And my ignorance about that matter, however little it may seem, may be the door that Satan will take to ruin things in our home.

There are couples, for example, that Satan has succeeded in creating enmity between them and their parents or siblings because of this. So, they are no longer able to enjoy the love and affection of those family members of theirs again. And that was all because somebody was talking clearly enough.

How much about your parents or siblings does your wife or husband know? You may think you don’t want to hang your dirty lines outside or that you do not want to the respect that your spouse has for your people to diminish. But by not giving them enough relevant information about them, you may just be making them unfit to relate appropriately to them.

You know your people. You know how they reason. You know where they are good and lovely. You also know where they can be difficult or naughty. Your spouse should know all these things. Why? It is so that they will know how to properly relate to them, as their own people too. Otherwise, they may unconsciously insult or maltreat them, something that will most likely not make you happy with them. And once you are unhappy with you spouse, Satan already has an opportunity to fill you with anger, bitterness or hate towards them. Then you may find yourself saying hurtful things to them that may make a bad situation worse.

So, learn to communicate well with your spouse. And this should not only be where it concerns your family; it should also be in every matter that concerns you and your home. So, talk about your job, the people you work with and whatever is going on there that may be of relevance to your home. Also, remember to share with your spouse the neighbourhood news or happenings. Then remember to mention to your spouse the favours you are giving to others or receiving from others, however, little they may seem.

Furthermore, always remember that there are certain responses you should not give without first consulting with your spouse, just as there are certain gifts you cannot give or receive without first consulting with them. And you should make it a point of duty to always communicate these things with them first before taking any action or giving any reaction.

What about your health challenges? Should you not talk about them to your spouse? You should. And what about your concerns about certain habits they have developed or certain relationships they have? Should you not discuss these things with them? You should.

Why should you discuss these things with them? First, it is a demonstration of your love for them. Jesus says this about His relationship and fellowship with God:

“For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, to your amazement he will show him even greater things than these.” (John 5:20NIV)

Did you see that? Because God loves Jesus, He shows Him everything He does. In other words, He communicates with Him adequately and appropriately about what He is doing. In like manner, if you love your spouse, you will show them all that you are doing. Yes, if you love your spouse, you will surely find a way to tell them everything you are up. And that will assure them that you truly see them as a vital part of your life.

The second reason you should communicate freely and adequately with your spouse about everything going on in your life and that is of relevance to them is that it is a demonstration of your trust in them. Some of us have friends that will share everything about our lives with. Why do we do that? First, it is because we love them. Second, it is because we trust them. We believe that our secrets are safe with them.

But do you know that the person that should our best friend is our spouse? That person that we should be telling everything to is our spouse. Unfortunately, in many marriages, people have other individuals that they share everything about their lives with instead of their spouses. And when it comes to their spouses, they may say, “Oh, he won’t understand.” Or they may say, “Oh, she does not need to know.”

What that means is that they do not trust their spouses enough to freely share their lives with them. And why would you marry someone you cannot trust? What are you even doing in a marriage with someone you cannot fully trust? Don’t you know that you are not safe in that marriage?

Now I know there are some exceptions to what I am sharing with you here. And I will come to them too when it is time. But when you begin to say things like, “I don’t trust my wife,” or “I don’t trust my husband,” what you are unconsciously saying is that Satan has already entered your home and turned your spouse to a betrayer. How, then, can you be safe with a betrayer? Even Jesus was not safe with Judas Iscariot. What, then, makes you think you are safe with your spouse that has become a betrayer?

See, there are statements we make carelessly without considering their import. And by making them, we are bringing Satan into our homes to work. The role of trust in every home cannot be overemphasised. It is key to the success and peace of every home. And if you love your spouse, you will also trust them, for love always trusts (1Cor 13:7).

Well, the point I am making is that by communicating adequately and appropriately with your spouse, you are showing that you trust them. That, of course, will also build their confidence in you. They will be assured that you hold them dearly in your heart and will never betray them or do anything behind their back. You can see why some spouses can give their lives in defending their partners, even where those partners are not present to defend themselves. That is because they know everything going on in their lives. So, there is nothing you are going to be telling them about those partners that will be news.

One of the reasons outsiders are able to corrupt some homes is poor communication. They are not just talking enough and building trust with communication. So, anything any outsider says to them about their partner will make their ears tingle. It will make them suspicious and desirous of knowing more. And when you start trying to learn about your spouse, not someone you are intending to marry, from an outsider, Satan is already at work in your home. You are just not paying attention.

No outsider should know your spouse better than you. But what about their parents and siblings? Even their parents and siblings should not know them better than you. That is because while their parents and siblings came to know them unconsciously, you are supposed to be making a conscious effort to know them. And if both of you are devoted to doing that, there will be no outsider that will know you both better than yourselves.

But then, the key to all that is communication. And you have to be deliberate about it. You have to be sincere about it. Don’t say, “I am not the talking type.” When it comes to your husband or wife, you had better be the talking type. Don’t say, “I just don’t like to be elaborate about things. In short, I don’t know how to explain things.” When it comes to your husband or wife, you had better be elaborate and also learn how to explain things. Don’t even say, “I don’t like to be repetitive with words.” When it comes to your spouse, you had better be ready to say some things over and over again, if that is what will make them stick in your spouse’s memory. Otherwise, you will only be showing that you are not ready to build your home.

Mind you, I am not talking about nagging anybody here. Rather, I am talking about making intelligent and useful conversations. And I am saying it is not going to happen by accident. You have to be on purpose about it in dealing with your spouse.

Then you also have to make room for it in dealing with your spouse. You should not see yourself as the only one that knows how to talk, for you are not. Your spouse also knows how to talk. Your spouse also has things to say. So, learn to listen and to listen attentively. When you give your spouse the impression that you are never attentive when they are talking to you, they may just stop talking. And then when you are done doing some really stupid, you will have no moral right to tell them, “Why did you not counsel me against this?”

Why did Nabal almost lose his life, his family and wealth in one day? Was is it not because he was poor in communicating with his wife? As we are told in the bible, Nabal’s wife Abigail was not just a beautiful woman but also an intelligent one. But the man, evidently, did not marry her for her intelligence but just for her beauty. So, he would not speak to her about anything of importance to him or the family. And that was why when David sent his men to ask for some favour, he dismissed them shamefully without saying a word to his wife about it. (Cf. 1Sam 25)

Then when his wife heard what he had done and the sort of danger it poses to the family, she also did not bother to say anything to him before going to meet David to appease him. Why? It was because, as one of his servants rightly pointed out, he was an arrogant and wicked man who listened to nobody (1Sam 25:17). And it was not until the following morning that his wife told him of the kind of destruction that would have come on all of them, if she had not gone to meet David without his permission. That, of course, was what made him develop the heart attack that killed him some days later.

Well, the point is that don’t be that person that your spouse cannot freely talk to. Don’t be that person that always shuns their spouse anytime they want to say something. And don’t be that person is always busy anytime their spouse has something to say. You may say the reason is that your spouse never makes sense with their words. But did you not know that before marrying them? You opened your eyes wide and married someone who does not know how to make sense with their words. And you think you yourself are making sense?

See, just drop it and begin to do the right thing. Even if your spouse is not as intelligent as you would have loved them to be, they are already your spouse and one with you. So, help them through prayers and through adequate communication to be the kind of intelligent person you desire.

When Peter and John stood be the religious elders of Israel to defend their ministry, as we are told in the bible, those elders were amazed at their boldness and wisdom. Why? They were uneducated men! How, then, did they suddenly become bold and wise in handling the Scriptures? It was through their interaction with Jesus. (Cf. Acts 4:13)

So, if you communicate well with your spouse, all the good attributes in your life will rub off on them, that is, if they don’t fully get intoxicated by them. And the same thing will happen to you too, if your spouse is communicating well with you. So, one of the keys to imparting whatever goodness you want to see in your spouse to them is adequate and appropriate communication. Why, then, don’t you start trying it instead of making excuses for avoiding conversations with them? And you will be amazed at how doing so will pay off.

Let us stop here for tonight. I pray that these words will live in all our hearts and transform us and our homes into heaven on earth, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at another way through Satan works in people’s homes. And that is poor or inadequate communication. As I pointed out, no communication at all in a home is always dangerous. It is a sign that Satan is already at work in that home and about is using someone the way he used Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus. So, don’t ever allow any disagreement in your marriage to make you shut down communication. That is nothing but giving Satan an opportunity to work.

But then, just as no communication at all in a home is a sign that Satan is already at work in that home, poor or inadequate communication also can be a sign that Satan has already found a footing in a home. Now remember that God’s number one reason for setting up the marriage institution is that both the man and the woman will be suitable companions to each other. Let me give you that Scripture again:

“The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."” (Gen 2:18NIV)

Did you see that? God’s aim is that both the man and the woman will be suitable helpers to each other. But how can they be suitable helpers or companions to each other, if they will not learn to communicate appropriately and adequately with each other? It is impossible.

Now you don’t have to be an orator in order to be able to communicate adequately and appropriately with your spouse. You just need to know that it is the right thing to do. The word of God says, “Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so?” (Amos 3:3NIV)

What does that mean? It means that any two people that will function together as a team in any situation must be united in purpose. How will they know that they are united in purpose? It is through communication.

It is a shame that many that are married today got married without ascertaining how united in purpose they were with the people they are now married to. That means they did not communicate enough to know whether they even had any business marrying themselves or not.

To say the fact, the only communication some people were having before getting married was sex. And they assumed that since they had been sleeping with one another, they already knew enough about one another. But having married for a while, they can now see that they have nothing in common. So, each of them is just doing their own thing, seeking to find fulfilment in life without the other.

What am I saying? It is that learning to communicate adequately and appropriately with your spouse is something you should have learnt before getting married at all. You should have learnt how to express yourself, your feelings, you desires, your plans, your concerns and whatever else that concerns your life to your partner. And they also ought to have learnt to do likewise. So, you really had no business marrying someone that you both would be struggling to communicate with each other.

But since you are already married, we cannot be dwelling on what you should have done before marrying that you did not do. What we are going to be doing now is showing you how to do that thing you failed to do before getting married and which is relevant to the survival and fruitfulness of your marriage. And in this case, we are dealing with communicating adequately and appropriately with your spouse, so that Satan will not use your poor communication as an excuse to work in your home and destroy things.

Communicating adequately and appropriately in every home, of course, is not a one-sided thing. It cannot be a one-sided thing. True communication is never a one-sided thing. The speaker and the listening must both be actively involved, showing that they understand each other and are not misrepresenting anything. Otherwise, somebody may start acting under some assumptions or suspicions or ignorance. And that may later create problems for both of them.

What I am saying, for instance, is that if my wife is not communicating with me adequately about a matter, I may remain ignorant in some ways about that matter. And my ignorance about that matter, however little it may seem, may be the door that Satan will take to ruin things in our home.

There are couples, for example, that Satan has succeeded in creating enmity between them and their parents or siblings because of this. So, they are no longer able to enjoy the love and affection of those family members of theirs again. And that was all because somebody was talking clearly enough.

How much about your parents or siblings does your wife or husband know? You may think you don’t want to hang your dirty lines outside or that you do not want to the respect that your spouse has for your people to diminish. But by not giving them enough relevant information about them, you may just be making them unfit to relate appropriately to them.

You know your people. You know how they reason. You know where they are good and lovely. You also know where they can be difficult or naughty. Your spouse should know all these things. Why? It is so that they will know how to properly relate to them, as their own people too. Otherwise, they may unconsciously insult or maltreat them, something that will most likely not make you happy with them. And once you are unhappy with you spouse, Satan already has an opportunity to fill you with anger, bitterness or hate towards them. Then you may find yourself saying hurtful things to them that may make a bad situation worse.

So, learn to communicate well with your spouse. And this should not only be where it concerns your family; it should also be in every matter that concerns you and your home. So, talk about your job, the people you work with and whatever is going on there that may be of relevance to your home. Also, remember to share with your spouse the neighbourhood news or happenings. Then remember to mention to your spouse the favours you are giving to others or receiving from others, however, little they may seem.

Furthermore, always remember that there are certain responses you should not give without first consulting with your spouse, just as there are certain gifts you cannot give or receive without first consulting with them. And you should make it a point of duty to always communicate these things with them first before taking any action or giving any reaction.

What about your health challenges? Should you not talk about them to your spouse? You should. And what about your concerns about certain habits they have developed or certain relationships they have? Should you not discuss these things with them? You should.

Why should you discuss these things with them? First, it is a demonstration of your love for them. Jesus says this about His relationship and fellowship with God:

“For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, to your amazement he will show him even greater things than these.” (John 5:20NIV)

Did you see that? Because God loves Jesus, He shows Him everything He does. In other words, He communicates with Him adequately and appropriately about what He is doing. In like manner, if you love your spouse, you will show them all that you are doing. Yes, if you love your spouse, you will surely find a way to tell them everything you are up. And that will assure them that you truly see them as a vital part of your life.

The second reason you should communicate freely and adequately with your spouse about everything going on in your life and that is of relevance to them is that it is a demonstration of your trust in them. Some of us have friends that will share everything about our lives with. Why do we do that? First, it is because we love them. Second, it is because we trust them. We believe that our secrets are safe with them.

But do you know that the person that should our best friend is our spouse? That person that we should be telling everything to is our spouse. Unfortunately, in many marriages, people have other individuals that they share everything about their lives with instead of their spouses. And when it comes to their spouses, they may say, “Oh, he won’t understand.” Or they may say, “Oh, she does not need to know.”

What that means is that they do not trust their spouses enough to freely share their lives with them. And why would you marry someone you cannot trust? What are you even doing in a marriage with someone you cannot fully trust? Don’t you know that you are not safe in that marriage?

Now I know there are some exceptions to what I am sharing with you here. And I will come to them too when it is time. But when you begin to say things like, “I don’t trust my wife,” or “I don’t trust my husband,” what you are unconsciously saying is that Satan has already entered your home and turned your spouse to a betrayer. How, then, can you be safe with a betrayer? Even Jesus was not safe with Judas Iscariot. What, then, makes you think you are safe with your spouse that has become a betrayer?

See, there are statements we make carelessly without considering their import. And by making them, we are bringing Satan into our homes to work. The role of trust in every home cannot be overemphasised. It is key to the success and peace of every home. And if you love your spouse, you will also trust them, for love always trusts (1Cor 13:7).

Well, the point I am making is that by communicating adequately and appropriately with your spouse, you are showing that you trust them. That, of course, will also build their confidence in you. They will be assured that you hold them dearly in your heart and will never betray them or do anything behind their back. You can see why some spouses can give their lives in defending their partners, even where those partners are not present to defend themselves. That is because they know everything going on in their lives. So, there is nothing you are going to be telling them about those partners that will be news.

One of the reasons outsiders are able to corrupt some homes is poor communication. They are not just talking enough and building trust with communication. So, anything any outsider says to them about their partner will make their ears tingle. It will make them suspicious and desirous of knowing more. And when you start trying to learn about your spouse, not someone you are intending to marry, from an outsider, Satan is already at work in your home. You are just not paying attention.

No outsider should know your spouse better than you. But what about their parents and siblings? Even their parents and siblings should not know them better than you. That is because while their parents and siblings came to know them unconsciously, you are supposed to be making a conscious effort to know them. And if both of you are devoted to doing that, there will be no outsider that will know you both better than yourselves.

But then, the key to all that is communication. And you have to be deliberate about it. You have to be sincere about it. Don’t say, “I am not the talking type.” When it comes to your husband or wife, you had better be the talking type. Don’t say, “I just don’t like to be elaborate about things. In short, I don’t know how to explain things.” When it comes to your husband or wife, you had better be elaborate and also learn how to explain things. Don’t even say, “I don’t like to be repetitive with words.” When it comes to your spouse, you had better be ready to say some things over and over again, if that is what will make them stick in your spouse’s memory. Otherwise, you will only be showing that you are not ready to build your home.

Mind you, I am not talking about nagging anybody here. Rather, I am talking about making intelligent and useful conversations. And I am saying it is not going to happen by accident. You have to be on purpose about it in dealing with your spouse.

Then you also have to make room for it in dealing with your spouse. You should not see yourself as the only one that knows how to talk, for you are not. Your spouse also knows how to talk. Your spouse also has things to say. So, learn to listen and to listen attentively. When you give your spouse the impression that you are never attentive when they are talking to you, they may just stop talking. And then when you are done doing some really stupid, you will have no moral right to tell them, “Why did you not counsel me against this?”

Why did Nabal almost lose his life, his family and wealth in one day? Was is it not because he was poor in communicating with his wife? As we are told in the bible, Nabal’s wife Abigail was not just a beautiful woman but also an intelligent one. But the man, evidently, did not marry her for her intelligence but just for her beauty. So, he would not speak to her about anything of importance to him or the family. And that was why when David sent his men to ask for some favour, he dismissed them shamefully without saying a word to his wife about it. (Cf. 1Sam 25)

Then when his wife heard what he had done and the sort of danger it poses to the family, she also did not bother to say anything to him before going to meet David to appease him. Why? It was because, as one of his servants rightly pointed out, he was an arrogant and wicked man who listened to nobody (1Sam 25:17). And it was not until the following morning that his wife told him of the kind of destruction that would have come on all of them, if she had not gone to meet David without his permission. That, of course, was what made him develop the heart attack that killed him some days later.

Well, the point is that don’t be that person that your spouse cannot freely talk to. Don’t be that person that always shuns their spouse anytime they want to say something. And don’t be that person is always busy anytime their spouse has something to say. You may say the reason is that your spouse never makes sense with their words. But did you not know that before marrying them? You opened your eyes wide and married someone who does not know how to make sense with their words. And you think you yourself are making sense?

See, just drop it and begin to do the right thing. Even if your spouse is not as intelligent as you would have loved them to be, they are already your spouse and one with you. So, help them through prayers and through adequate communication to be the kind of intelligent person you desire.

When Peter and John stood be the religious elders of Israel to defend their ministry, as we are told in the bible, those elders were amazed at their boldness and wisdom. Why? They were uneducated men! How, then, did they suddenly become bold and wise in handling the Scriptures? It was through their interaction with Jesus. (Cf. Acts 4:13)

So, if you communicate well with your spouse, all the good attributes in your life will rub off on them, that is, if they don’t fully get intoxicated by them. And the same thing will happen to you too, if your spouse is communicating well with you. So, one of the keys to imparting whatever goodness you want to see in your spouse to them is adequate and appropriate communication. Why, then, don’t you start trying it instead of making excuses for avoiding conversations with them? And you will be amazed at how doing so will pay off.

Let us stop here for tonight. I pray that these words will live in all our hearts and transform us and our homes into heaven on earth, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you. 

We have been looking at how not to give Satan an opportunity to work in our homes. And we are doing that against the backdrop of what the word the of God says, which is, “Don't give the devil any opportunity to work.” (Eph 4:27GW)

Now if we were not in a position to act on these words, God would not say them to us. But we are in a position to act on them. In other words, we have what it takes not to give Satan an opportunity to work in our lives or in our marriages. And that is what God tells us not to give him an opportunity to work. We all will do well, then, to pay attention to this command of His to us and daily act on it. Otherwise, we will have only ourselves to blame, if we should give Satan a reason or an opportunity to ruin our homes for us.

Well, so far, we have looked at how not to allow Satan to work in our homes, through sex, money matters, undue comparison, stinginess, our relationship with others, insensitive words and even life challenges. Now I want us to look at another way through which Satan may gain access into our marriages and begin to work in them. And that is poor or inadequate communication.

Well, I said poor or inadequate communication because it is hard to find a marriage in which those in it don’t communicate at all. Even those who are married to deaf or dumb people still have ways of communicating with them. That is because a marriage in which there is no communication between the partners is practically dead. Satan has already taken over such a marriage completely. And before you know it, the parties involved will want to go their separate ways.

I know there are people who don’t know any other way to protest against their spouses apart from going mute. They just altogether stop talking to them. And they may carry on like that for days or even weeks, until their anger subsides.

Why do people act like that? Often, their excuse is that they do not want to speak out of anger and make a bad situation worse. Truly, we can make a bad situation worse in our homes through our words. That is why the word of God tells us this: “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.”(Eph 4:29NIV)

Did you see that? As a child of God, you must not let any unwholesome, cruel or unkind word come out of your mouth to your spouse, regardless of the circumstances. Yes, your spouse may offend you. And you have to address their offence. But you must not let anything unclean come out of your mouth to them. Otherwise, as I have severally shared with us in the past, you may just ruin their life and your home.

Now, in response to that, someone may say, “But that is why I choose to keep quiet when my spouse offends me. I know that if I should say something, it will be bomb. So, I just keep quiet until my anger completely goes away. And that sometimes may take a while.”

Well, if you will look carefully at the Scripture I just gave you again, you will see that Paul does not just say, “Don’t say anything terrible with your mouth.” He also says, “Say something helpful, something beneficial.” So, the command is not for us to keep quiet when people hurt us and be boiling with anger or bitterness. Rather, the command is for us to speak up. However, what we are going to say must be something that will help the situation or set it right.

Of course, the fact that we say something helpful or beneficial to people does not mean that it will work for them. It depends on the heart with which they receive it. But it is on us, as God’s people, to train ourselves to always say only what will benefit us and others, even in our moment anger.

Why will God be placing this kind of burden on us? It is because He expects us to be full of goodness, seeing that we are His children. And if we are full of goodness, it does not matter what people do to us or say to us, what we are going to give out will be goodness and nothing us.

The word of God says:

“The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.” (Luke 6:45NIV)

Did you see that? The reason people struggle to do good is that they are not full of goodness. If all that you have in you is goodness, you will not struggle to bring forth goodness. But if what you have in you is evil, bitterness, hate, anger, envy and greed, bringing forth goodness through your life becomes an impossible thing, regardless of how hard you try. So, you will have to pretend to be good and kind to people in order to convince them that you too are capable of giving out goodness.

What is my point? It is that, as a child of God, all that you are meant to have in you is goodness. And if that is the case, it does not matter how greatly your spouse has offended you, you will not find it easy to say anything terrible to them. Have you ever been in a situation in which someone was insulting you, using all kinds of vulgar words, and yet you knew that you could not just reply them in kind? Why? It was because those words that the person was using were not just a part of your own vocabulary. So, even if you opened your mouth to say anything, it would not be an insult or a curse.

Consider our Lord Jesus Christ also, for example. He never had to say anything untrue or wicked to anybody, even though people constantly did and said things to offend Him. Yes, there were times that He was angry because of the insensitivity and hypocrisy of the religious leaders of the Jews. And He had to address and rebuked them at such times. But He said anything that was foul or vulgar in dealing with them. That was why they could not trap Him through the words of His mouth.

Now Jesus was like that because He had only goodness in Him and nothing else. So, anytime He opened His mouth, only goodness came out of it. Even if His words were a rebuke, they were still words of goodness, words to heal people of their spiritual sickness.

In like manner, you too should yield yourself to be filled with the goodness of God by giving yourself to His word and also by praying. That way, whatever you will be saying to your spouse can only be something helpful to them and to your marriage, not something destructive.

I said all of that to first establish the fact that it is not the will of God for you cultivate the culture of going mute in your marriage once there is a misunderstanding or disagreement. Yes, out of respect and a heart of understanding for our partners, we may decide to keep quiet and allow them to freely express their displeasure about a matter. In other words, we do not interrupt them when they are talking but permit them to fully state their case. But we still have to respond to whatever they have said, unless they are not interested in listening. And that will be another problem on its own, something that we will talk about later.

However, to just go mute in our marriages and refuse to talk to our spouses or greet them for a whole day or days is totally out of line with the will of God. And it can only open the door for Satan to come in and multiply our griefs and sorrow.

Yes, as I said before, we may say that our reason is that we don’t want to say anything wrong. But why must we have something wrong to say? The only reason we have wrong things to say is that we have been feeding on wrong things. Yes, we have been polluting our hearts and minds with wrong thoughts and wrong desires. So, if we open our mouths to speak, poison is bound to be spilled out.

The word of God says, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think about such things.” (Phil 4:8-9NIV) Did you see that? We are not permitted by God to think just anything we like. Rather, we are to think only about those things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy. And if these are things we are thinking about all the time, each time we open our mouths to talk, it is only something good, wise, true and edifying that will be coming out of them.

Now I am not saying that we are immune from evil thoughts. None of us in this world is immune from evil thoughts or desires. In fact, the word of God says that evil thoughts and desires are constantly warring against our souls. It is our job, however, to abstain from them. It is our job to refuse to think evil and to refuse to desire evil things. And if we are devoted to doing just that, then, even if there is a misunderstanding between ourselves and our spouses, insults or curses will not show up at all in our attempt to resolve it. (Cf. 1Peter 2:11)

Also, if what we are devoted to thinking about are good, pure, true, right and excellent things, we will not be expecting the worst from our partners, if we should have any matter to resolve. Instead, we will believe in them, believe in the fact that they will be understanding and reasonable to listen to us. And that will help us in choosing our words in addressing them wisely and carefully.

But if all that we are thinking about is how our spouses will not listen but choose to abuse or fight us, we may just shut down our brains and not think of how to wise present our case to them or we may begin to prepare how we are going to fight them back. And where this is the case, Satan has already taken over our minds in order to control them to ruin our homes.

Am I saying that we don’t have unreasonable husbands and wives? No! There are indeed wives and husbands that are so unreasonable that there is nothing that their partners say to them that will not result in a quarrel. Even the kindest words they say to such people will attract insults from them. And that is because Satan has already filled their hearts with bitterness towards their spouses. So, what they need is help; what they need is salvation from the jaws of the devil. And if their spouses love them well enough, they will stop fighting with them and start interceding for them.

Now perhaps you are like that. You quarrel with your spouse over everything they say. In short, even their greetings irritate you. I want you to know that Satan has already gotten you. And if you don’t quickly turn to the Lord Jesus for help, so that He will cleanse you of your bitterness, your destruction may come sooner than you can ever imagine.

Well, if you are dealing with a quarrelsome spouse, one who is always ready to have word battles with you, it will be wise for you to do your best to avoid speaking to them, if the chances are high that it will result in a quarrel. In fact, the bible says it is better to live alone in the desert than to live with that kind of person. That means that marriage situation has become abnormal and unsafe for those in it. So, it is better for them to stay apart, if they cannot fix whatever is causing them to quarrel all the time. Otherwise, they may someday be pushed by the devil to injure or murder themselves. And some of us may know of certain people whose marriage ended in that manner for one or both of them.

At any rate, just as quarrelling all the time in a marriage is dangerous and pointing to the fact that Satan is working in it, not communicating at all is equally wrong, terrible and dangerous. It is also a sign that Satan is working on somebody in a home or that he has already completely taken over the person. And if you keep hanging around that person, you may not know when Satan will strike you through them.

Remember Judas Iscariot. The bible says this concerning him: “The evening meal was being served, and the devil had already prompted Judas Iscariot, son of Simon, to betray Jesus.” (John 13:2NIV) Did you see that? At the time John is referring to in this Scripture, Satan had already gotten Judas Iscariot. He had already filled him with all kinds of evil schemes about betraying Jesus and handing Him over to His enemies.

Yet Judas did not leave Jesus outright. He did not open his mouth to vent his anger and frustration or whatever it was that he had against Jesus. He just kept everything to himself. And despite all the things that Jesus said to the other disciples about him, despite the fact that Jesus made it clear that he knew what he was up to, he still did not say anything to him. He just kept mute and acted as though all was well. So, nobody knew what he was up to until he handed Jesus over to those who would kill Him right before all their eyes.

In like manner, when you refuse to talk to your spouse, whatever your reasons may be, we have to assume that Satan is already preparing you for something grand and terrible. And if your spouse is smart, they will keep an eye on you. Otherwise, they may become a victim of Satanic afflictions through you.

See, even though it is not right to insult your spouse and say hateful things to them, the one who is speaking out the terrible things in their mind out to their spouse is still better than the one that will not say a word to them in a whole day or week. That is because that person can be corrected and set right.

Peter, once, called Jesus aside to rebuke for saying that He was going to die. And Jesus rebuked him for that and even said that it was the devil that was speaking through him. So, Peter repented and never said that again. But Judas kept quiet and continued to secretly work with Jesus’ enemies to bring Him down. So, he could not be saved or redeemed.

If you, then, don’t want to end up like Judas Iscariot, you need to destroy in you that culture of not talking to your spouse once there is an issue. It is a culture that will make it very easy for Satan to hijack or recruit you to destroy your home and yourself. And perhaps you have been struggling with that in your life, I pray now that the hold of that evil spirit that is causing you to act dumb or mute in your home is broken over your life, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Let us stop here for now. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

In our last hangout, I further shared with us on why we should not unduly compare our spouses or even ourselves to any other person, as far as marital matters are concerned. And it is important that we continue to give a careful attention to the things we are learning. Otherwise, we will not stop opening the doors of our lives and homes to the devil to make things complicated for us.

Remember that Solomon says, “This is all that I have learned: God made us plain and simple, but we have made ourselves very complicated.” (Eccl 7:29GNT) That means, a lot of times, we are the reason for our own afflictions.

And you can begin to ask yourself, “Am I not the reason for problems we are facing in my marriage? Is my selfishness or lack of consideration for my partner not the reason Satan has come into our home to afflict us?” It will take a very sincere person to examine what is going on their marriage in this manner and to admit their faults in whatever problems they are facing.

In any case, the point we are making all along is that we making all along is that we should not unduly compare our partner or our marriage to other people’s marriages. And one way not to do that is to desist from insisting that our partners act towards us in ways that God has placed no demand on them to act. Otherwise, that will become an avenue for Satan to come into our homes and work.

But then, as I also pointed out towards the end of our last hangout, the fact that God has not demanded that we do something for our spouse does not mean that we should not do it at all, if that thing is not contrary to the will of God and if we have what it takes to do it.

For instance, I used the celebration of birthdays and Christmas as my examples in the last hangout. And is said that there is indeed no command from God that any husband or wife must handle birthday or Christmas celebration for their spouse in a grand way. So, we must not insist that our spouse handle any of these things for us in a grand way. We can request for it. But we must not make it a do-or-die affair. That is because it is not meant to be so. And if we make it so, Satan will be sure to seize the opportunity to bring bitterness, quarrelling and other related evils into our homes.

However, just as it is wrong for our spouse to insist that we handle their birthday or Christmas celebration in a way that is beyond our financial capacity or in a way that is selfish and inconsiderate, it is also wrong for us to insist that we will not make our spouse happy when we have what it takes to do so. It is wrong because that is not a demonstration of love. And anything that is not borne out of love is a sin.

So, before you reject your spouse’s request or proposal on any matter, be certain that it is something that is actually beyond your ability, inconsiderate or contrary to the will of God. If that thing is not contrary to the will of God, is not beyond your ability and is also not inconsiderate, then, you should do it for them as an expression of your love. Otherwise, Satan may just use that thing, even if it is something insignificant, to sow the seed of bitterness into the heart of your spouse. Then the day you will hear them talk about it, you will be shocked to find out that they have been bitter against you because of that matter for days, weeks or even years. And where that is the case, you can be sure that Satan has been working in your home. You may not just be pay attention.

As we see in the bible, Hanah did not inform her husband before she pledged her first son to the Lord. And that was because she did so in the spur of the moment; she did so when she was pressed in prayer to receive a son from God. (Cf. 1Sam 1:9-11)

Now, based on what we have in the Law of Moses, her husband had a right to cancel her pledge, if he was not there to give his consent when she was making it. And God would honour the cancellation of that pledge. In other words, God would not punish her for not keeping it. (Cf. Num 30:6-8)

If Hanah’s husband, then, had cancelled that pledge, after the Lord had answered her prayer and given her a son, do you think she would have been happy about it? No! Of course, it was a rash and inconsiderate pledge; it was a pledge that she made in a moment of desperation. Yet it was a pledge of an honest heart.

Now supposing she was the only wife of Elkanah. And supposing it was their first and only child she pledged to God in that manner. It would make a lot of sense, if Elkanah cancelled her pledge to God because she did not carry him along about it. But even if that were the case, if he decided to reason with her and overlook her rashness in making the pledge, so that she could honour God, he would be making her exceedingly happy.

However, it was even better in their case. That was because Hanah was not the man’s only wife. He had another woman that already gave him children. So, if he decided to release Hanah’s first child to God, he would not be without children to be around him, make him happy and also help him in whatever way he might have needed their help. That, of course, does not mean that it would be convenient for him to do so. It may not be convenient for him to do so at all, especially if he was fond of the boy.

Nevertheless, it was within Elkanah’s ability to grant Hanah’s desire to give their first child together to God, even though he was not under any obligation to do so. And that was exactly what he did. He granter her heart’s desire. In fact, he did not argue with her about the matter at all or rebuke her. Why? He loved her so much that all that he was just after was making her happy. And since the boy was being given to the Lord to serve Him all his life and not to the devil, he did not see any reason not to release him. (Cf. 1Sam 1:21-23)

Why did I bring this matter up with you? It is to show you that there are things we don’t need to argue over in our homes, and we should not argue over them. Yes, it may be within our rights to argue with our partners over certain things or to prevent them from doing certain things or to refuse to do certain things for them. But as long as allowing our partners to have their way in the situation is not going to hurt us or our home in any way and we have what it takes to grant their requests, we should let go of our rights in order to make them happy. It will be an expression of our love for them.

More so, there are times that we may have to go out of our way and take risks to do certain things for our spouses just because we love them. Some of us have taken risks for some friends or people that were dear to us in the past. So, taking risks to make our spouses happy and live well is not something bad. It depends on the measure of love we have for them. And if they love us dearly too, there are risks they will never allow us to take for them.

For instance, we are told this about certain men of David:

“During harvest time, three of the thirty chief men came down to David at the cave of Adullam, while a band of Philistines was encamped in the Valley of Rephaim. At that time David was in the stronghold, and the Philistine garrison was at Bethlehem. David longed for water and said, "Oh, that someone would get me a drink of water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem!" So the three mighty men broke through the Philistine lines, drew water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem and carried it back to David. But he refused to drink it; instead, he poured it out before the Lord. "Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this!" he said. "Is it not the blood of men who went at the risk of their lives?" And David would not drink it. Such were the exploits of the three mighty men.” (2Sam 23:13-17NIV)

Did you see that? These men did not risk their lives on this occasion for David because he was their commander or because they were under an obligation to do so. Rather, first, they did it for him because they loved him and wanted to make him happy. Second, they did it for him because they were fit and well-trained to do so.

Nevertheless, when they brought the water David wanted to him, he would not drink it. Instead, he offered it as an offering to the Lord. Why? It was because he did not expect them to risk their lives for him in that manner. He just expressed his wish to drink water from his homeland. And those men, out of love for him, risked their lives to get it for him.

Why did I share this with you? I shared it with you to let you know that if we are well-able to do for our spouses certain things that will make them happy, we would not shy away from doing them, if we truly love them. And if we truly love our spouses, there are certain love risks or sacrifices we will not allow them to make for us.

As we see in David's case that I mentioned before, he did not know that those three men would take what he said casually seriously and risked their lives to make it happen. If he had known when they were leaving, he would most likely have prevented them from going to do what they did for him. That was because he loved them too and would not want any harm to come to them, since they were among his best and most trustworthy men. And since he did not know, he decided to offer to God the water they had brought to him.

So, if you too love your spouse truly, there are risks you will not be expecting or asking them to take for you. In fact, if you should know that they want to take certain risks for you, you will do whatever you can to stop them. That is because true love is not self-seeking (1Cor 13:5).

Unfortunately, many today have opened the doors of their marriages for the devil to set them on fire because they are self-seeking. In other words, when they want something from their partners, they will not care what that thing will cost them -- they will just want them to get it for them. Otherwise, they will give them no peace in those homes.

This explains why some people steal in their offices or misappropriate funds entrusted to them. It also explains why some are immersed in all kinds of debts and why some have resorted to money rituals. Satan used their self-seeking spouses to push them into these things. And by the time the consequences of their wrongdoings will show up, those spouses may not even be willing to stand by them.

Now this is not applicable to men alone. I mean that it is not only men that Satan can use their wives to push into doing things that will ultimately destroy them. Women can also be victims of such things. There are husbands that will not let their wives rest once they want some money from them. They will keep harassing and insulting them until these women will go and do something stupid to make them happy. And yet they will be among the first to call them fools, when their foolish acts backfire.

All such things should not be happening in our marriages and will not be happening in them, if we truly love our partners and are not self-seeking. The reason we are self-seeking is that we think our marriage is simply about us, about making us happy. But your marriage is not simply about making you happy; it is also about making your partner happy.

Therefore, as you seek happiness for yourself in your home, which is okay, you should not neglect the happiness of your spouse too. And as you seek progress for yourself in life, you should also seek progress for your spouse. Otherwise, you cannot claim to truly love them. And if your spouse should sense that you are self-seeking, that all you are after is your own happiness and progress, they may begin to oppose you, if they are not fully yielded to the control of the Spirit of God.

There are many homes today in which husbands and wives literally oppose one another. I mean that they allow themselves to be so possessed by the devil that most of the things they will be saying and doing are things that will ruin their lives and homes. Why? They are self-seeking. And Satan is using that to make life unnecessarily hard and unpleasant for them.

I was once told of a pastor that sent one of his associates to stop a bank from giving his wife a job. He, in fact, threatened to close down all the accounts of his church that were with the bank, if they should give his wife that job. Why? He was self-seeking. He wanted to keep the woman dependent on him. And since he knew that if she should get that job, she would be financially free, he made the move behind her back to oppose her.

But the woman was working before that time. The only reason she left her former job was to relocate to join this man. And that upset him. It upset him because what she did no longer made it easy for him to bring in any kind of church sister into their house again. That, of course, was why he became determined to oppose and frustrate her. Yes, he was a pastor. But at the time, Satan had entered him to hurt his wife, just the way he entered Judas Iscariot to hurt Jesus.

Now don't forget that what we are still dealing with is how not to give Satan any opportunity to work in our homes. And I am further saying that one of the ways not to give him any opportunity to work in our homes is not to be self-seeking. This life is not about you alone. Your marriage is not about you alone. It is about your spouse, your children, your immediate families and the societ at large.

So, don't make it about you alone. Otherwise, Satan will possess you. Yes, he will take you up as a weapon of destruction and begin to use you to destoy things in your home. And going to church meetings will not stop that from happening. Also, being a pastor, a deacon, a deaconess or an elder will not stop that from happening. There are many so-called ministers of the gospel today that have become nothing but little devils in their marriages but of their selfishness.

So, the only thing that will stop that from happening is for you to allow the true love of God to fill your heart and guide your conduct in your home. If His love is in you and guiding you, you will not be self-seeking. No, you will not want anything at any cost. Instead, you will be considerate. Yes, you will be concerned about how whatever you want will affect the welfare and progress of your spouse and other members of your family.

Some of us have parents or have had parents that gave up furthering their education because of us. Was it wrong for them to further their education in order to increase their prestige and create more opportunities for themselves to earn more money? No! But because they thought of what doing so might do to our lives, they gave up their dreams. That is what is called love. And they were able to love us that way because they were not self-seeking.

If you too are not self-seeking, there are things you will voluntarily give up for the welfare and progress of your spouse. Nobody will tell you to do so. You will just know that it is the right thing for you to do.

But if you are still fighting your spouse over matters of no significance, over things that you can do without, what is the guarantee that you will want to make love sacrifices for them? And what is the guarantee that you will stop them, if you should know that the sacrifices they want to make for you may endanger their lives or reputation?

Well, whether your spouse is ready to succumb to your selfish or unreasonable demands or not, as long as you are making them, Satan willl not be far your home. So, one main way to keep him out of your home is not to act in selfishness at all. And you can begin to ask yourself now, "Have I been acting in love in my marriage or in selfishness?"

Then, in closing, if your partner has been loving and considerate, if your partner will never make any demand that will make life difficult for you or insist that you do anything against your wish, you should learn to go out of your way once in a while to make them happy. You can't tell how encouraging that will be for them.

Let us stop here for this hangout. I pray that God will cause these words to cleanse and set us right wherever we may be acting in selfishness in our homes. I also pray that as we walk in love in our homes, God will release His awesome power to destroy whatever Satan may be currently doing in our marriages to ruin them. For we have asked in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thank you sirs and madams. 

In our last hangout, we further shared with ourselves on the need for us not to allow Satan to use our undue comparison of our spouses with other people’s spouses to work in our homes. And we rounded off by saying that we must separate God’s demands on our spouses from our demands on them. God’s demands on our spouses are those things that God commands and expects them to do in our marriages. Our demands are those things that we love and expect them to do in our marriages.

Now God’s demands on our spouses are a must for them to meet. Yes, they may choose not to meet them. But there will be consequences for choosing to disobey God. This, of course, is why everyone who wants to get married need to go for a God-fearing person. That is because you can trust a God-fearing person to obey Him, even where it is not convenient for Him to do so. But if you marry one that is not God-fearing, God help you.

Those who are currently in marriages with those who are not God-fearing, whether mistakenly or deliberately, can tell you that it is not a joke at all. That is because you will often need a miracle to get them to do even those things that are obviously right for them to do.

But that is not so with those who are God-fearing. Even if they are reluctant to do what is right, for one reason or the other, the fear of God in them will not let their consciences rest until they get it done. So, if you are married to one who has the fear of God, be thankful to God for it and always pray for that God will keep that fear of Him forever present in their hearts.

In our last hangout, we began to look at another way through which Satan gains entrance into people’s homes to work in them. And that is through undue comparison. This is a situation in which we are unduly comparing our spouses with other people’s spouses and using this to place undue demands on them.

Now, as I pointed out before, even if the person that we are comparing our spouse with is their brother or sister, they are still two different personalities with different divine purposes here on earth. Therefore, they will be different in many ways. Yes, they may both be children of God. But they will still be different in many ways. Therefore, it will be wrong for you to expect them to handle their homes in the same way.

Yes, as I equally pointed out, there are attributes that God wants all of us to have and exhibit in our various marriages, regardless of our social, economic or religious backgrounds. He wants us to be loving, patient, kind, gentle, humble, generous, faithful and self-controlled. These are His demands on all of us. And He has given us His Spirit to enable us to meet these demands.

So, we can make these demands on our spouse. We can tell them to be loving, patient, kind, gentle, humble, generous, faithful and self-controlled. But the reason we are telling them to exhibit these things is not that our neighbour’s husband or wife is exhibiting them. Also, the reason is not that our father or mother exhibits it in their marriage. Rather, it is because God, who created us all for His pleasure, wants us to exhibit them.

However, if we ourselves will not exhibiting these qualities, are we going to have any moral right to tell our spouses to exhibit them? No! Yes, they will have no excuses for not exhibiting them, since it is the will of God for them to do so. But we will not qualify to judge them for not exhibiting them, since we ourselves are not exhibiting them.

Unfortunately, one main reason Satan is having a free day in some marriages and causing the couples in them to quarrel all the time is that they keep making moral or spiritual demands on one another that none of them is willing to meet. How can you be telling your spouse to go and learn patience, when you are not patient? Or can you be accusing your spouse of pride, when you too will not humble yourself before God and act on His word? That is nothing but hypocrisy.

Now look at what Jesus says about that:

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.” (Matt 7:3-5NIV)

Did you see that? Before you start saying that your spouse is not loving or considerate, you first ask yourself, “Am I too being considerate?” And before asking your spouse to go and meet your pastor for counselling on how to behave properly in the home, don’t you think you should be the first person to go and find out from your pastor if you have been behaving properly in your home?

Well, the point I am making is that if we will first devote ourselves to being the persons God wants us to be our marriages, we will stop being quick in judging our partners of falling short in character. A boss of mine once shared with us in a staff meeting of how it took him six years or so to complete his ICAN programme. Why did he say that? One of the reasons, of course, was to show us not to be quick to judge anyone who is failing at anything. In other words, if you have ever failed at anything, you will appreciate how difficult it may be to succeed at something.

What am I saying? It is that if even you, with all your knowledge and spirituality, are not often at your best in character, you should not be quick to condemn your marriage partner and send them to go and learn from your parents, their parents, a neighbour, a colleague at work or a church member. Otherwise, you will be opening the door for the devil to come in and work in your home.

How will he work? First, it is by making your love partner more adamant or stubborn in doing what is wrong and hurting you. And what will make that possible? It is your hypocrisy! As I pointed out before, as long as you yourself are not an example of the good thing you want to see in your spouse, you have no moral right condemning them. But if you choose to condemn them, in spite of the obvious, you will simply be strengthening them in rebellion.

For instance, here is a woman that is accusing or suspecting her husband of infidelity or unfaithfulness. But she is still in that marriage. That, evidently, means that she wants him to change. And he should change, for it is the will of God for him to do so. But then, the same woman is not ready to be faithful in preparing meals for her husband at the right time or ready to talk to him with respect anytime. How, then, do you think that man will respond to that? He will most likely respond with more unfaithfulness. He will ask himself, “What do I gain by being faithful to her? I don’t even have her respect.”

The same thing is applicable to the man that wants his wife’s respect. While it is appropriate for him to expect it, since it is commanded by God, does he also have any respect for his wife? Does he talk to her with respect? Or is he always talking down to her and relating to her as though she were his slave? If this is the way he is acting, why should he expect that woman to treat him with respect?

Now someone will say, “Do two wrongs make a right?” Certainly, two wrongs don’t make a right. However, unless the word of God has fully settled in someone’s heart, the person will often respond based on how he is treated and not based on what the word of God says. That means people often wait for others to treat them well in order to also act well. This, of course, is wrong and not the way of God. But it is usually the way people act.

All of that is why Jesus says, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” (Matt 7:12NIV) And if you are breaking this rule in your marriage, your partner will be someone utterly given to the word of God for them not to pay you back in your own coin.

If you both, then, begin to score points by hurting each other in your marriage, that is all that the devil needs to strike and destroy your home. And you know there are many husbands and wives that make it their daily business to score points by hurting one another. That means if your husband hurts you, you want to hurt him more. Or if your wife hurts you, you want to hurt her more. And where this is the case, the devil has already taken charge. He will begin to freely work to destroy your lives, your children’s lives and your home as a whole.

It is sad that so many homes have been destroyed in this manner. They were destroyed by the devil because of their rebellion towards the word of God. Remember that the bible says, “A man who remains stiff-necked after many rebukes will suddenly be destroyed — without remedy.” (Prov 29:1NIV) So, the more you walk in rebellion towards the word of God, the more open your life and home will be to the works of the devil. And you know that all that Satan wants is to destroy your life and home.

So, stop acting in rebellion towards the word of God in your life or in your home. Instead, begin to learn His will for your life and home to do it. And begin to do this before you start making any demand on your spouse to act likewise. Otherwise, you may never be able to build that happy and joyous home you desire.

Now remember that something led us to all that. And it is the fact that you have no reason to be referring your spouse to learn another person’s spouse or to be like another person’s spouse, as far as the exhibition of godly character and prudence in your marriage is concerned. Instead, always refer them to the word of God. The word of God has enough counsel for both of you to be the kind of couples you ought to be. So, make the most of it. And be the first person to lead in doing this.

Then you must also be able to differentiate between God’s demands on your spouse and your demands. Why do I mean by that? Well, what I mean is that there is clear difference between how God wants us to conduct ourselves in our homes and how we want us to conduct ourselves in our homes. And if we will not make this distinction, we will often find ourselves getting in trouble in handling our marriages.

As I pointed out before, things that have to do with living a life of righteousness, love, humility, self-control, gentleness, faithfulness and generosity is God’s demand on every one of us, whether we are married or not married. So, all of us must give ourselves to meeting it. And we can meet it, as long as we have His Spirit in us. That is why the bible refers to these things as the fruit of the Spirit. In other words, it is through the aid and inspiration of the Spirit of God that our lives are able to bring them forth. All we need is to submit ourselves to Him by acting on His word. And He will take care of the rest.

But there are also things that we may want from our partner, things that have to do with what we personally like. It may have to do with some types of food, some types of wears or a kind of lifestyle. And while nothing is wrong with wanting any of these things from our partner, there is no demand from God on them to give it to us. If we, then, are trying to force them to give it to us, we can expect some measure of resistance from them. And that, of course, may be the beginning of the fall of our marriage, as it was the beginning of the fall of some marriages.

Is anything wrong with wanting your wife to pound yam for you every day, since you love yam so much? No! But there is no demand from God on your wife to pound yam for you every day. There is, in fact, no demand on God on your wife to know how to pound yam. A particular society may demand that their women know how to pound yam. But God is not going to send anybody to hell for not knowing how to pound yam.

Therefore, if a man is so much in love with pounded yam that he must eat it every day, he had better find a woman that is also like him or be ready to pound his yam by himself. And think about this, even if he finds a woman that is like him, is it every day that the woman will be strong enough or have time to pound yam? The answer is obvious, and it is ‘No’.

If such a man, then, begins to join issues with his wife for not being ready to pound yam for him everyday, do you think God will be on his side? No! Why? It is because he is selfish and not considerate. While God demands that his wife take good care of him in food matters, for the word of God says that women should be homemakers, He does not demand that she use all her time for cooking or for pounding yam. And He does not demand that she destroy her health in order to give her husband pleasure. (Cf. Prov 31:15; Titus 2:3-5)

Now if that is the case with a man who has married a woman that likes what he likes, and it is, what do you suppose will be the case with a man who has married a woman that does not like what he likes? Don’t you think it will be ridiculous for that man to be insisting that his wife act like his neighbour’s wife in this matter? Because your neighbour’s wife pounds yam for husband every now and then, you are comparing your wife with her and referring her to her. Are you not looking for trouble?

I can’t remember correctly at the moment how I heard this. But pastor’s wife once said that if he her husband asked her to pound yam at midnight, she would be right on to it. And some people might hear that and say, “Wow! That is pretty! But why can’t my wife be like that?”

Well, personally, I have a problem with what she said. But that is my personal problem, not her problem. If she is okay with that, then, so be it. But asking my wife to act like her or telling to go and learn that from her is another thing entirely. They are two utterly different people. They have completely different work schedules and different skill sets. They also have completely different likes and dislikes. So, it will be unfair of me to be referring her to learn from that dear woman how to wake up at midnight to pound yam.

Besides, the reason God brought her into my life was to support me in doing His will and not to destroy the uniqueness in her life and make her become like me. There is no demand on her from God to become like me. God’s demand on her is for her to become like Christ. And I have to be careful not to get in the way of that happening through my own demands.

What is my point? It is that we need to separate our demands from God’s demands in dealing with our spouses. Our demands have to do with those things that give us pleasure. But those things may not give our spouses pleasure. And will that make them wrong? No! These are simply matters of ‘likes and dislikes’, not matters of ‘rights and wrongs’. Therefore, we should not give Satan an opportunity to enter our homes and begin to work in them through them.

Yes, there will be things that other people’s spouses may be doing that we will like our spouses to be doing as well. It may be that they dress in certain ways or know how to do certain things well. Or it may be that they take them out to all kinds of places to have fun or that they are often around them to do house chores.

Good things! But don’t use those things to judge your spouse’s performance or devotion to you. Instead, use the word of God. Is your spouse treating you as the word of God says they should? Does your husband truly love you, as God’s word says he should? Is your wife submissive and supportive to you, as the word of God says she should? Also, is your spouse fulfilling their marital duties to you, as the word of God says they should?

If the answer to each of these questions is ‘Yes’, then, anything else you want from your spouse is extra; it is just something you want for your pleasure. And that is fine. We all want our spouses to give us pleasure. And that is one the things that make marriage beautiful. If we are not deliberately giving ourselves pleasure in our marriage, we are not better than robots or machines. You know that machines can’t function outside what they are made or programmed to do. So, you cannot derive any more pleasure from them that what the manufacturer has programmed them to give you.

But we are not machines. We are human beings. We are dynamic. We can think. We can evaluate. We can adapt. We can change. And to have mutual pleasure and satisfaction in our marriages, we must be prepared to employ our dynamism, our ability to adapt and to change. Otherwise, such marriages will be boring. And there are many boring marriages and homes today. What a pity!

But then, if we want our spouses to change their way of doing things and deliberately give us pleasure, even though God has not commanded it, first, we must let them do so out of their love for us. In other words, we must not let it look like a do or die affair, since our lives actually don’t depend on it. I love blue colours. But I don’t drive a blue car at the moment. That means my life does not depend on it. And as long as your life does not depend on something, don’t let it be the reason Satan will come into your home and destroy it.

Also, we must learn to relate to our spouses with consideration in matters that have to do with our own pleasure. You want your husband to always be at the weekend parties with you. That is fine. It will be good for him to do so as a show of his love and care for you. But you also have to be considerate. He may not have the time to do that with you all the time, some of the time or most of the time. It all depends on his schedule, something you too will already know. So, don’t expect him to be like your friend’s husband that is always at the parties with her and bring Satan into your home. It is not worth it.

Let me stop here for this hangout. I pray that God will use these words to make each of us better in handling our marriages, in Jesus’ name. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at how we can open the doors of our homes for Satan to come in and work in them through our words. And the point we are making is that we must avoid using unwholesome words in addressing others or in addressing ourselves. Here, again, is the Scripture we used in teaching ourselves these things:

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” (Eph 4:29-30NIV)

Did you see that? It is our job not to let unwholesome or unproductive words come out of our mouths. No, we may not be able to prevent circumstances of life that will want to pressure us to say wrong things to others or ourselves. But we can choose not to say wrong things, either to others or to ourselves. In fact, God has commanded us to choose not to say evil things with our mouths to others or to ourselves. And if we take Him seriously, we will choose to act accordingly every day.

Now, as I pointed out in the last hangout, it is not only others outside our homes that we must not use evil words in addressing; we must also not use evil words in addressing ourselves. In other words, I, as a married person, must not speak evil words into my life. Otherwise, I will ruin my life with those words.

Look at what James says in admonishing us on this matter:

“The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.” (James 3:6NIV)

Did you see that? The tongue is a fire. And what does fire do? Two things, actually! First, it consumes. Second, it purifies. And our tongue is also able to do both. It is about to consume our lives, just as it is able to purify them.

Now whether our tongues will consume or purify our lives is up to us. But James already warns us that our tongues can set our entire lives and world on fire. And it will set our lives and world on fire, if we are using it say evil and negative things to ourselves.

For example, this is said to us about Rachel, Jacob’s second wife:

“When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, "Give me children, or I'll die!"” (Gen 30:1NIV)

What led Rachel to speaking like this about herself? Frustration! So, frustration is real. But it is up to us to choose to either be frustrated about the circumstances of our lives or to use the word of God and prayer to frustrate those circumstances sent by the devil to frustrate us.

Rachel allowed her temporary childlessness to fill her heart with jealousy and to frustrate her. And before long, she began to say negative things into her life. She called for death. And guess what? Even though she was younger than her sister Leah, she only managed to give birth to two children while her sister gave birth to seven children. She died when she was having a second born.

Was she destined to die young like that? No! But because she allowed frustration to make her speak death into her life, she eventually got what she said. And if we too don’t want to make a hell of our lives and homes, we had better stop speaking evil into them.


Yes, we may be faced with negative situations in life. But the word of God teaches us not to allow those negative situations to control our tongues. Instead, we are to change those negative situations with our tongues, that is, with our words, words spoken in agreement with the will of God for our lives.

Look at what our Lord Jesus says about this:

“So Jesus answered and said to them, "Have faith in God. For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be removed and be cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.”” (Mark 11:22-23NKJV)

What is the first thing Jesus says to us here? He says, “Have faith in God.” Why do we need to have faith in God? It is so that we can be on the same page with Him. If we have faith in God, then, we will be in agreement with Him about our lives and our world. That means it is what He tells us about our lives and our world that we will believe, not what we are seeing, hearing or feeling. Do you get that?

The second thing the Lord says is for us to speak on the basis of our faith in God to whatever challenge we may be faced with in life. Here He refers to challenges of life as mountains, mountains that hinder progress or peace of mind. And how are we to deal with them? He says we are to talk to them; we are to tell them to move or change their positions for our good.

Now observe that He says that if we will talk to these mountains, asking them to move, on the basis of our faith in God, we will have whatever we say. Who is going to have whatever he says? The one who is talking to his mountains! And what is he going to have? He is going to have whatever he says to his mountains.

So, if he is asking his mountain to move in his favour, they will move in his favour. In like manner, if he complaining about his mountain or speaking about how this mountain will crush him or will never let him move forward in his life, he is going to have whatever he says. That means that mountain will surely crush him or keep him from moving forward in life.

This principle, unfortunately, is what many of us, especially Christians, do not know or understand. We think by complaining, grumbling and condemning our lives, jobs or businesses, we are making sense and simply speaking the reality. But the word of God says that is not what we are doing. What we are doing is that we are destroying our lives and world with our negative words.

If we don’t want to destroy our lives and world anymore, then, we need to change our words. Yes, we need to stop setting our lives and world on fire with our words. Instead, we are to purify and change the circumstances of lives and world with our words, words that are consistent with what God Himself is saying.

This, mind you, is not an attempt to ignore or deny the existence of any challenge we may be faced with in life. Remember that the Lord does not say that we are to act as though the mountains in our lives did not exit. He does not say we are to deny their existence. Instead, He says we are to ask them to move, to get out of our way.

So, instead of speaking negative words into your life, words that will ultimately bring ruins to you and to your family, start speaking the word of God into your life. Start blessing your life. Start saying to yourself, “I prosper in all that I do. My life prospers. My marriage prospers. My children prosper. My job and business prosper. Nothing fails in my hands. Nothing dies in my hands. Depression is far from me. Oppression is far from my household. That is because God is with me and He is causing all things to cooperate for my good.”

If this is how you are talking, it will be long before everything going on in your life agrees with your word, even though things may look tight and difficult for you now. So, begin to act accordingly.

Then apart from not speaking evil words into your own life, you must also refrain from speaking evil words to your partner or into their life. Otherwise, you will be encouraging Satan to come and work against your home. And that is nothing but witchcraft, for witchcraft is nothing but an encouraging of the activities of the devil.

See, many people think that it is only those who belong in some evil and secret societies or those who visit witchdoctors to collect charms from them that are capable of practicing witchcraft. But that is not so at all. Any one of us is capable of practicing witchcraft. We just need to be saying or doing things that encourage Satanic activities. And will become well qualified to be referred to as witches.

So, if you are speaking evil words to your spouse or into their lives, you are simply doing the job of a witch in your home. You are calling Satan forth to come and act in your home. And you can be sure that he will come and serve you beyond your expectations.

Remember that James already tells us that we can set an entire life on fire through our words. We, then, need to ask ourselves if we have not been setting the lives and careers of our spouses on fire through our words. We need to ask ourselves if we have not been filling the hearts of our spouses with discouragement, bitterness and hopelessness through our words.

When Job’s family was struck by the devil, what words did his wife have to offer him in that moment of distress? None! Instead, she said, “Curse God and die.” She was, in other words saying, “Of what use are you alive. Why don’t you just curse God and die?” (Cf. Job 2:9)

Unfortunately, there are still men and women who speak in a similar fashion to their spouses, especially when such spouses are facing difficult times in life. They say all kinds of discouraging and hopeless words to them. And if their spouses should die in those conditions, they will be the first to start crying and rolling on the floor and speaking of how it was never part of their agreement that they should die untimely.

Now that is hypocritical, or what do you think? How can you be speaking failure and death into your spouse’s life and still be expecting them to live long and succeed in life? It does not add up. The real question you ought to be asked is this: “Do you really wish death for your spouse?” If you do not wish for your spouse to die untimely, why, then, are you speaking death into their life?

I know there are people who actually wish death and destruction for their spouses. I am talking about people who are so filled with bitterness that they are ready to get rid of their spouses at all cost. Such people are evidently under demonic possession and need urgent help. And if you are not one of them, then, you should only say only those things that are consistent with the word of God and also with what you want to see in the life of your spouse to them.

As we see in the bible, even though Hanah somehow found herself in a polygamous home, a home where her mate made sure her life was a hell, her husband never spoke any unkind word to her. Instead, the bible says this to us about the way he used to address her anytime she was provoked by her mate and was downcast:

“Elkanah her husband would say to her, "Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don't you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?"” (1Sam 1:8NIV)

Did you see that? That man would not make an already bad situation worse for Hannah by joining Peninnah in abusing or insulting her. Instead, he always spoke kindly to her, so that she would not ruin herself with worries. Of course, he could have more for her. He could, for instance, have joined her in praying to God about her case. But at least, by speaking kindly to her, he made it possible for her to maintain a mind sane enough to pray to God about her case. And when she did, God answered her.

In like manner, even if we do not have anything else to offer to comfort our spouses in a moment of distress, we should at least have good and encouraging words to say to them. As I pointed out to you in an earlier hangout, we are not told exactly what Abigail said to her husband Nabal the night David had wanted to attack their household. But whatever she said to him, as we are shown in the bible, gave him a heart attack. That is how powerful words can be. (Cf. 1Sam 25)

So, please, don’t use your words to give your spouse a heart attack. No, don’t use your words to drive them crazy or to make them run away from home. Go and find speak to run away husbands and wives. And it will shock you to know that some of them ran away from home because of the evil words of their spouses. They feared their words more than Satan himself. So, they ran for their lives.

In any case, the point I have been making all along is that we need to let our words be a blessing and not a curse to us and to our spouses as well. That way, regardless of what challenges we may face in life, we will be able to build homes that are full of love, peace and all the good fruit of the Spirit of God.

This is where we will end this hangout. I pray that God will use the things we have learnt to rebuild and heal our homes wherever they may be sick, in Jesus’ name. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at how we can open the doors of our homes for Satan to come in and work in them through our words. And the point we are making is that we must avoid using unwholesome words in addressing others or in addressing ourselves. Here, again, is the Scripture we used in teaching ourselves these things:

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” (Eph 4:29-30NIV)

Did you see that? It is our job not to let unwholesome or unproductive words come out of our mouths. No, we may not be able to prevent circumstances of life that will want to pressure us to say wrong things to others or ourselves. But we can choose not to say wrong things, either to others or to ourselves. In fact, God has commanded us to choose not to say evil things with our mouths to others or to ourselves. And if we take Him seriously, we will choose to act accordingly every day.

Now, as I pointed out in the last hangout, it is not only others outside our homes that we must not use evil words in addressing; we must also not use evil words in addressing ourselves. In other words, I, as a married person, must not speak evil words into my life. Otherwise, I will ruin my life with those words.

Look at what James says in admonishing us on this matter:

“The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.” (James 3:6NIV)

Did you see that? The tongue is a fire. And what does fire do? Two things, actually! First, it consumes. Second, it purifies. And our tongue is also able to do both. It is about to consume our lives, just as it is able to purify them.

Now whether our tongues will consume or purify our lives is up to us. But James already warns us that our tongues can set our entire lives and world on fire. And it will set our lives and world on fire, if we are using it say evil and negative things to ourselves.

For example, this is said to us about Rachel, Jacob’s second wife:

“When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, "Give me children, or I'll die!"” (Gen 30:1NIV)

What led Rachel to speaking like this about herself? Frustration! So, frustration is real. But it is up to us to choose to either be frustrated about the circumstances of our lives or to use the word of God and prayer to frustrate those circumstances sent by the devil to frustrate us.

Rachel allowed her temporary childlessness to fill her heart with jealousy and to frustrate her. And before long, she began to say negative things into her life. She called for death. And guess what? Even though she was younger than her sister Leah, she only managed to give birth to two children while her sister gave birth to seven children. She died when she was having a second born.

Was she destined to die young like that? No! But because she allowed frustration to make her speak death into her life, she eventually got what she said. And if we too don’t want to make a hell of our lives and homes, we had better stop speaking evil into them.


Yes, we may be faced with negative situations in life. But the word of God teaches us not to allow those negative situations to control our tongues. Instead, we are to change those negative situations with our tongues, that is, with our words, words spoken in agreement with the will of God for our lives.

Look at what our Lord Jesus says about this:

“So Jesus answered and said to them, "Have faith in God. For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be removed and be cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.”” (Mark 11:22-23NKJV)

What is the first thing Jesus says to us here? He says, “Have faith in God.” Why do we need to have faith in God? It is so that we can be on the same page with Him. If we have faith in God, then, we will be in agreement with Him about our lives and our world. That means it is what He tells us about our lives and our world that we will believe, not what we are seeing, hearing or feeling. Do you get that?

The second thing the Lord says is for us to speak on the basis of our faith in God to whatever challenge we may be faced with in life. Here He refers to challenges of life as mountains, mountains that hinder progress or peace of mind. And how are we to deal with them? He says we are to talk to them; we are to tell them to move or change their positions for our good.

Now observe that He says that if we will talk to these mountains, asking them to move, on the basis of our faith in God, we will have whatever we say. Who is going to have whatever he says? The one who is talking to his mountains! And what is he going to have? He is going to have whatever he says to his mountains.

So, if he is asking his mountain to move in his favour, they will move in his favour. In like manner, if he complaining about his mountain or speaking about how this mountain will crush him or will never let him move forward in his life, he is going to have whatever he says. That means that mountain will surely crush him or keep him from moving forward in life.

This principle, unfortunately, is what many of us, especially Christians, do not know or understand. We think by complaining, grumbling and condemning our lives, jobs or businesses, we are making sense and simply speaking the reality. But the word of God says that is not what we are doing. What we are doing is that we are destroying our lives and world with our negative words.

If we don’t want to destroy our lives and world anymore, then, we need to change our words. Yes, we need to stop setting our lives and world on fire with our words. Instead, we are to purify and change the circumstances of lives and world with our words, words that are consistent with what God Himself is saying.

This, mind you, is not an attempt to ignore or deny the existence of any challenge we may be faced with in life. Remember that the Lord does not say that we are to act as though the mountains in our lives did not exit. He does not say we are to deny their existence. Instead, He says we are to ask them to move, to get out of our way.

So, instead of speaking negative words into your life, words that will ultimately bring ruins to you and to your family, start speaking the word of God into your life. Start blessing your life. Start saying to yourself, “I prosper in all that I do. My life prospers. My marriage prospers. My children prosper. My job and business prosper. Nothing fails in my hands. Nothing dies in my hands. Depression is far from me. Oppression is far from my household. That is because God is with me and He is causing all things to cooperate for my good.”

If this is how you are talking, it will be long before everything going on in your life agrees with your word, even though things may look tight and difficult for you now. So, begin to act accordingly.

Then apart from not speaking evil words into your own life, you must also refrain from speaking evil words to your partner or into their life. Otherwise, you will be encouraging Satan to come and work against your home. And that is nothing but witchcraft, for witchcraft is nothing but an encouraging of the activities of the devil.

See, many people think that it is only those who belong in some evil and secret societies or those who visit witchdoctors to collect charms from them that are capable of practicing witchcraft. But that is not so at all. Any one of us is capable of practicing witchcraft. We just need to be saying or doing things that encourage Satanic activities. And will become well qualified to be referred to as witches.

So, if you are speaking evil words to your spouse or into their lives, you are simply doing the job of a witch in your home. You are calling Satan forth to come and act in your home. And you can be sure that he will come and serve you beyond your expectations.

Remember that James already tells us that we can set an entire life on fire through our words. We, then, need to ask ourselves if we have not been setting the lives and careers of our spouses on fire through our words. We need to ask ourselves if we have not been filling the hearts of our spouses with discouragement, bitterness and hopelessness through our words.

When Job’s family was struck by the devil, what words did his wife have to offer him in that moment of distress? None! Instead, she said, “Curse God and die.” She was, in other words saying, “Of what use are you alive. Why don’t you just curse God and die?” (Cf. Job 2:9)

Unfortunately, there are still men and women who speak in a similar fashion to their spouses, especially when such spouses are facing difficult times in life. They say all kinds of discouraging and hopeless words to them. And if their spouses should die in those conditions, they will be the first to start crying and rolling on the floor and speaking of how it was never part of their agreement that they should die untimely.

Now that is hypocritical, or what do you think? How can you be speaking failure and death into your spouse’s life and still be expecting them to live long and succeed in life? It does not add up. The real question you ought to be asked is this: “Do you really wish death for your spouse?” If you do not wish for your spouse to die untimely, why, then, are you speaking death into their life?

I know there are people who actually wish death and destruction for their spouses. I am talking about people who are so filled with bitterness that they are ready to get rid of their spouses at all cost. Such people are evidently under demonic possession and need urgent help. And if you are not one of them, then, you should only say only those things that are consistent with the word of God and also with what you want to see in the life of your spouse to them.

As we see in the bible, even though Hanah somehow found herself in a polygamous home, a home where her mate made sure her life was a hell, her husband never spoke any unkind word to her. Instead, the bible says this to us about the way he used to address her anytime she was provoked by her mate and was downcast:

“Elkanah her husband would say to her, "Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don't you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?"” (1Sam 1:8NIV)

Did you see that? That man would not make an already bad situation worse for Hannah by joining Peninnah in abusing or insulting her. Instead, he always spoke kindly to her, so that she would not ruin herself with worries. Of course, he could have more for her. He could, for instance, have joined her in praying to God about her case. But at least, by speaking kindly to her, he made it possible for her to maintain a mind sane enough to pray to God about her case. And when she did, God answered her.

In like manner, even if we do not have anything else to offer to comfort our spouses in a moment of distress, we should at least have good and encouraging words to say to them. As I pointed out to you in an earlier hangout, we are not told exactly what Abigail said to her husband Nabal the night David had wanted to attack their household. But whatever she said to him, as we are shown in the bible, gave him a heart attack. That is how powerful words can be. (Cf. 1Sam 25)

So, please, don’t use your words to give your spouse a heart attack. No, don’t use your words to drive them crazy or to make them run away from home. Go and find speak to run away husbands and wives. And it will shock you to know that some of them ran away from home because of the evil words of their spouses. They feared their words more than Satan himself. So, they ran for their lives.

In any case, the point I have been making all along is that we need to let our words be a blessing and not a curse to us and to our spouses as well. That way, regardless of what challenges we may face in life, we will be able to build homes that are full of love, peace and all the good fruit of the Spirit of God.

This is where we will end this hangout. I pray that God will use the things we have learnt to rebuild and heal our homes wherever they may be sick, in Jesus’ name. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at how Satan can work in homes through challenges. And as I pointed out, we can only speak of the challenges we have faced in life; we cannot speak of the ones that are yet to come. However, regardless of what challenges may come our way in the future, as long as we are in the will of God, we can trust Him to never permit challenges that are beyond what we can handle to come to us. Also, we can trust Him to clear the way for us to walk in victory over whatever challenge that comes our way.

Let me give you that Scripture again: “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” (1Cor 10:13NIV)

The part I want you to pay attention is where Paul says, “And God is faithful…” Did you see that? God can be trusted to take care of us in the face of any challenge of life. And that is the mindset we and our spouses must have in our homes. Otherwise, Satan may end up succeeding in using whatever that he brings against us to destroy our lives and our faith.

So, as I said to us before, we must watch ourselves not to be like Job’s wife. Even though she did not leave him when Satan came forcefully against their family, took away their children and wealth and also attacked Job’s body, she had no word of comfort of faith to offer him. In other words, she contributed nothing to the victory of the man had over the devil and his works.

Now you too may want to ask yourself, “What am I contributing to the victory of my spouse or family over the challenges that are coming our way? Am I contributing anything significant at all? Or is that I am adding fuel to fire? Or is that I am just passive, watching to see how things will turn out?”

Indeed, you may not abuse your spouse or say discouraging words to them in the face of life’s trials. But that is not enough. You also have to be offering words of comfort to them and words of prayers for them and with them, so that you both will be strengthened to walk in victory over whatever Satan is throwing at you.

God, as we see in Scriptures, does not want us to be defeated by the devil in any way. He does not want us to fall and be crushed by this wicked being in the face of any trial that he brings our way. That is why the word of God says this to us:

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” (Eph 6:10-14NIV)

Did you see that? The word of God tells us to be ready for the day of evil, which may appear in various ways. It tells us to be ready to take our stand against the devil and his schemes. How? It is by putting on the full of armour of God. And who must put on the full armour of God? I must put it on. My spouse also must put it on. Even our children must be taught to put it on. Why? It is so that all of us will have sufficient spiritual strength to support ourselves in walking in victory over whatever Satan throws at us.

But if any of us will not put on the whole armour of God, that person, then, may just be the weak link in the family. Job’s wife was the weak link in their marriage. So, after all that Satan has done to them, he was still able to find her as a tool to use to make things worse for them. And if Job had not been steadfast in his faith, Satan would have succeeded in using her to ruin whatever was left of their faith and life.

So, you must be a contributor faith in your home, not a destroyer of faith. Yes, you must be a contributor to victory over life challenges in your home and not an accessory to the devil. And you cannot be on the fence here. If you are not contributing to victory and success in your home, you are contributing to the failure and destruction of that home. It is as simple as that.

Jesus says he who does not gather with me scatters (Matt 12:30). So, if you are not standing firm with your spouse in the face of any challenge that Satan brings against your home, you are weakening your home, your marriage. That is because while you think that your spouse is strong enough to handle something, they may just not be strong to handle it. And before you know it, Satan may gain victory over them and, of course, over your home.

There have been husbands and wives that died prematurely because their spouses did not offer them any support or sufficient support to gain victory over death. And that may not be because those spouses were wicked children of the devil. Rather, it may be because they just assumed that their wives or husbands could handle what came against them. But before they knew what was happening, sicknesses that did not appear to be life-threatening became life-threatening and took their spouses away from them. And they may never forgive themselves for contributing no support to those spouses when they needed it.

There have also been husbands and wives that fell into immorality because their spouses did not offer them any serious spiritual, emotional and mental support in the face of sexual temptations. They clearly saw some signals that their spouses may be in danger through their dealings or closeness to certain neighbours, colleagues at work, friends or even church brethren. But they simply assumed that there was nothing to worry about, since their spouses were spiritual giants. Sadly, those spiritual giants fell into Satan’s traps and brought shame upon themselves and their homes.

Things like such, of course, could be very painful. But they are things that are repeating themselves everyday in different homes across the world. If fact, the very first home in the world had its share of them. Remember that when Satan came tempting Eve, Adam was there. The bible says:

“When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.” (Gen 3:6-7NIV)

Did you see that? Her husband was with her all the time she was being tricked by the devil. Yet what did he have to offer her? Nothing! What did he say to keep her from listening to the devil? Nothing! Or did he pull her away from the tree and ask her if she was alright? No! He just stood there and watch her get flogged by the devil. Yet when God came questioning him, he was quick to put the blame on the wife. What a shame! (Cf. Gen 3)

Now If that were to happen today, do you think Eve would not want to go for a divorce? She probably would want to. That is because by keeping mute when she was being tempted by the devil, her husband was simply contributing to her fall. That fall, of course, was his own fall and the fall of the entire human race as well.

So, if Satan succeeds in getting your spouse, then, you can be sure that he has succeeded in getting you too, to one degree or another. And how that will affect your home, children and even grandchildren is what no one may be able to say anything about.

If you, then, don’t want your home and perhaps your children to end up in a fallen or lost state, anytime you can see or sense that Satan is seeking entrance your marriage, whether through your finances, some health problems or some family, neighbourhood or even church problems, don’t waste time to speak up and offer your partner the needed support to shut this evil being out of your lives. And God will honour every step of faith you take.

In Job’s case too, do you know that if he had not been a truly righteous and forgiving man, he may have opted for a divorce after his recovery? That was because his wife, the same woman that gave him ten good children, had nothing to offer him for victory over the devil and the trials he brought against their family.

To say the fact, there have been people who divorced their spouses for lesser errors or offences. There have been people that divorced their spouses because of their attitudes towards them when they were sick or when they lost their jobs or when they were falsely accused and had their reputations messed up. And were they right to do so? No!

Yes, their spouses failed them. But who made them fail in that manner? Satan! Who, in the first place, brought the challenges that revealed the weakness of those spouses? Satan! And what was he after by bringing those challenges? He was after tearing their homes apart. So, even if he did not succeed in destroying anybody’s life in those homes, as long as he succeeded in tearing them apart, he has won. That is how Satan reasons and works.

So, even though he did not succeed in destroying Job and his faith, if he had succeeded in making him drive away his wife for failing him in his hour of need, he would still have won. But Job would not give him any further opportunity to work in his home by not forgiving his wife. Instead, he forgave her for whatever she did nor did not do to him while he was in pain and decided to rebuild their home together with her. So, they ended up having new children and a new prosperous home. (Cf. Job 40)

I am bringing this up because the reason Satan is working right now in your home may be because of your refusal to forgive your spouse for not being there for you or for acting irresponsibly towards you or your children in a time of need. But God already gave you victory over the challenge that Satan brought against you. Why, then, do you want to give Satan another opportunity to come into your home and work by being bitter in heart towards your spouse?

I know there are cases in which even when we forgive some people, we may not be free to give them the kind of access they had to our lives before again. And that will most likely be because they themselves have not changed their ways. For instance, someone once begged me to help him beg his wife to come back home, so that they could start living together as in old times. And I said, “No, I am not going to do that.” Why? It was because nothing about him had changed at the time.

So, don’t miss my point here. I am not saying that you should make room for Satan to use an unrepentant spouse to ruin your joy or peace again, when God has just rescued you from the problems they brought upon you. Rather, I am saying that you must forgive your spouse for whatever wrong they may have done to you, so that Satan will not use your unwillingness to forgive them as an excuse to step into your home and work again. And where such spouses are truly repentant, you, like Job, should join hands together with them again to rebuild whatever Satan has torn down in your home.

The point of it all is that when challenges come your way in your home, don’t run away. Running away in this sense does not mean literally abandoning your spouse and (or) children. You may be physically present with them at home but not present with them in dealing with the problems that Satan has brough against you. And I am saying you should never do that.

Then don’t keep mute. Don’t fold your arms and leave your partner to be handling everything all by alone. That may expose them to further danger. There are, for instance, women that have been victims of false prophets because they were left all alone by their husbands to seek solutions to certain problems, especially problems having to do with barrenness, that their families were facing. And there have also been men that were misguided into money rituals or office theft because they were left all alone by their spouses to face their family financial challenges all alone.

Some husbands and wives even fell terribly ill and died because they were trying to bear alone the burdens that Satan tossed upon their families. And I pray that such will not be your portion or the portion of your spouse, in Jesus’ name. But it is important that you know that whatever challenges that come your way in your home are meant to be faced squarely by both you and your spouse. And as long as you are functioning with this mindset and relying on the power of God, there is no challenge that will be unconquerable for you.

This is where we will end this hangout. I thank you all for your time, patience and contributions. 

We have been looking at how Satan works in homes through the way husbands and wives handle their family resources. And on that note, I warned us that we must not see ourselves as competitors in the way we use our family money or in any way. We are not competitors but partners. So, whatever we do must be geared towards the reign of peace in our homes and mutual edification.

The bible says, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” (Phil 2:3-4NIV) This is not applicable to church relationships alone; it is also applicable to our homes. We must not do anything out selfish ambition or vain conceit in our homes. We mut not look to our own interests alone but also at the interests of our spouses, our children and other people in our lives. Otherwise, we will be opening the doors of our homes for the devil to bring into them all kinds of chaos.

Besides, we must show good understanding in relating to our spouses where matters of using our resources is concerned. Peter, in his first epistle, tells husbands to be considerate in dealing with their lives (1Peter 3:7). And that has to do with relating to them with understanding instead of deliberately proving stubborn or difficult.

But that is not applicable to husbands alone; it is applicable to wives as well. They too must learn to relate with their husbands with consideration, with understanding. And one main area in which both the man and the woman must learn to relate to each other with understanding is that of the use of their family resources.

See, we can deliberately make the administration of our family resources difficult for ourselves by not making effort to understand each other. And that will be because we do not trust each other. When you trust someone, it will not be hard for the person to explain certain things to you. That, of course, because you too will be willing to understand what they are saying. But when you do not trust someone or trust their judgment, it will be hard for them to make you understand the simplest of matters.

Now why should we go into a marriage relationship with someone that we do not trust? Why should marry at alls someone that you did not trust? Did you expect marriage to change the person and make them trustworthy? If someone was not trustworthy when you were on the road to marriage, what made you think marriage would make them trustworthy? Should not have known that unless some series of miracles take place in their lives, that is how they will be till Jesus comes?

So, if the reason you are not relating with your spouse with understanding is that you don’t trust them, then, you surely need to start praying for miracles of change in their lives. That is because as long as you don’t trust your spouse, to the end that you can relate to them with understanding, Satan will not stop having free opportunities to come into your home and work. Whatever you need to do, then, to trust your spouse is what you must know and begin to apply. That way, you will be able to function with understanding and unity of purpose in using your resources.

Then there are times that the reason some people don’t just want to understand their spouses, especially in money matters, is pride. They just don’t to admit that what their spouses are saying about the way they should use their resources is the right thing. So, they will deliberately refuse to understand their explanation on why they should spend money or not spend money on certain things.

The bible refers to people like that as having unhealthy interests in controversies and quarrels (1Tim 6:4). And if you are like that, you are a proud person. You need to repent, then, before it is too late. That is because God never favours the proud but the humble. Not only that, you are opening the doors of your home for satanic attacks and afflictions by acting like that. And you can be sure that he will come in and attack you.

Perhaps he is already attacking you. Perhaps he has already robbed your home of joy, peace and rest. What are you going to do to stop his works? Will you continue to complain and blame your wife or husband? Or will you repent, humble yourself and begin to show good faith and understanding in relating to your spouse? The choice is yours to make. But I counsel you to humble yourself and begin to relate to your spouse with consideration, with understanding. Then, without even praying, you will see that you have already shut the devil out of certain areas of your family life.

And remember that the command God has given to us is that we must give no room for Satan to work in our lives or in our homes (Eph 4:27). So, it is on each of us to be determined not give him any room to work in our marriage by seeing to it that we never again use our family resources in a selfish or self-centred way and also by demonstrating good understanding in dealing with our spouses. And I pray that God will furnish us with sufficient strength and wisdom to act accordingly. Amen.

Now let us turn to another way we could give Satan an opportunity to work in our marriages. And that has to do with life’s challenges. Are we going to face challenges in our marriages? I am sure the answer is very clear. Even if we did not believe that we would face challenges in our marriages before we got married, now that we are married, can we say that we have never faced any challenge since we got married to our spouses? Again, the answer is obvious.

Here is what our Lord Jesus Christ says to us about life’s challenges:

"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."” (John 16:33NIV)

What is the Lord telling us here? It is that we cannot run away from challenges in this world, whether as single men and women or as married people. However, He assures those of us who are in Him that we will have His peace. And that is because He has overcome the world for us. So, we don’t need to worry ourselves about what challenges may come our way as individuals or as married couples. That is because He will take care of them for us, however enormous or frightening they may be.

Paul, speaking along the same line, also says this to us:

“No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” (1Cor 10:13NIV)

Did you see that? There is no challenge we may face in life that is unusual or peculiar. In other words, there is nothing we are facing in life at the moment that is new. Remember that Solomon says there is nothing new under the sun. And that is very true. There are no new problems in this world. Yes, our problems may come in different shades of colour or be combined in different ways. But fundamentally, they are not new.

What I am saying is that ever since man fell in the Garden of Eden, he has been faced with the same problems, generation after generation, century after century. Murder, hatred, bitterness, jealousy, hate, barrenness, flooding, earthquakes, plagues, sicknesses, famine, poverty, misfortunes, death and so forth are things that men of all ages had their share of.

Therefore, the word of God says if should be faced with any of these, don’t consider it strange. Instead, keep in mind the fact that God, your Father, is a faithful Father and protector. So, first, as long as you are living in His will, He will not allow you to face challenges that are beyond what He has prepared you to handle.

And that should not be hard for us to relate with. As loving parents, we will never want our children to face challenges that are beyond their ability to handle. In fact, sometimes, we can be overprotective of these children. I am talking about situations in which we want to protect them even from challenges that they have the ability to face and handle.

Now if we earthly parents, as wicked, negligent and foolish as we can be, know how to protect our children from challenges they are not prepared for, will God not even do far better in dealing with us? He will. But we will need to trust Him every day that He will never allow anything to come our way that He has not prepared us or that He is not willing to prepare us to handle. It is only when we are walking outside His will or when we will not allow Him to build us up with His word that we may find ourselves facing problems bigger than us or problems we are never supposed to face in life.

The second thing Paul says we must trust God for is the fact that He will always show us the way out of any problem we may be faced with. So, if we are faced with any challenge at the moment, all we need to do is to talk to God about the way out. And as a faithful Father, He will answer us and show us what to do.

Unfortunately, many do not know these things because they do not know God. Then even many who know God don’t often walk in the consciousness of these things. So, when they are faced with challenges that seem overwhelming to them, they give up on God, on life and even on their spouses or marriages.

Look at Job’s wife, for instance. When they lost their wealth and all their children in one day, she gave up on God. But we are not told anything about this until her husband became terribly ill as well. Abd when her husband became terribly ill because of Satan’s attack, she lost it totally and gave up on him as well. Look at her words:

“Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!" (Job 2:9NIV)

Why would this woman tell her husband to curse God and die? Was it because she did not love him? No! She loved him. Otherwise, she would not stay with him all through those days of his trials. But did she have any word of comfort for him? No! Did she have any word of faith for him? No! Did she tell him of the need for them to pray together about their problems? No!

She, at least, knew her husband well. She knew that he was a good man and that the things that befell him could not have befallen him because of his sins. And that, of course, was why she too was bitter towards God. She felt that God was utterly unfair to her husband and their family. But what she could not understand was why her husband would not abandon God, a God who had treated him harshly and wickedly. And if Job had listened to her, Satan would have won.

But Job did not listen to this woman. Instead, he said to her, "You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" (Job 2:10NIV) What Job meant was that his wife was speaking like godless person, when she was supposed to be a godly woman.

Now, of course, he was wrong to say that it was God that sent all those problems into his life, for it was not God that did that but the devil. But he was right in rebuking his wife and not giving her any opportunity to allow Satan to take away their faith in God along with the things he had already taken away from them. So, the bible says that in all these things Job did not sin against God.

In any case, even though Job was not offering any prayer to God in order to resist the devil, by not cursing Him in his time of distress, he prevented Satan from having any further opportunity to work in his life and home. Remember that God had already instructed Satan not to take Job’s life. But if Job had cursed God, as suggested by his wife, would that not have given Satan the justification he needed to end the man’s life? I believe that it would. But since the man would not curse God because of his distress, he made it impossible for Satan to do anything else to him and whatever was left of his household. And finally, God vindicated him, healed him and also restored everything he had lost in multiple folds.

What is the point of all this? First, as I pointed out before, it is that challenges can come our way, even though we are living in the will of God in our marriage. So, if any challenge should come our way, financial, health or social, we should not think that something is wrong with us or with our spouse. Instead, we should remind ourselves that God will not allow us to be destroyed by whatever challenge has come to us. Instead, He will make a way out for us to walk in victory over it.

That being the case, what we need is to be willing and ready to stand by each other and support each other. And that, in fact, is one of the reasons we are together as husband and wives. We are together so that we can continually offer support and comfort to each other, even where no one else is willing to stand on our side. Look at what the word of God says about this:

“Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work: If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up! Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” (Eccl 4:9-12NIV)

Did you see that? Two are better than one. How? It is through the friendship and support that they are able to give each other. But where they are not ready to give each other support, will they be better than one person? No!

If Job’s wife, for instance, had given him moral and spiritual support during those days that he was down, he may have come bounced back earlier. If she had been there to give him support, then, he would not have had to endured the slanders and tongue-lashing of his friends as he did. But though she did not leave him, she had nothing tangible to contribute to his victory over the challenges that came to destroy their family. So, it was as good as the man had no companion at all. What a shame!

And there are still several marriages like that in which, when there is any challenge, it is only one person that will be left to face it. It is only one of the couples that will going up and down, seeking prayers, seeking miracles or seeking financial support. Their partner will just act as though what is going on did not concern them at all. Or they may begin to say foolish and wicked words that will discourage them and make them give up on God too. That, of course, is how many a home ends up being utterly ruined by the devil.

Think about this: if Job had been weak in his faith in God, would he not have listened to the voice of his wife. And he had, would we have had his faith story in the bible? No! If he had listened to her, would Satan not have triumphed over their home eventually, if God would not step in to show them mercy? He would.

So, regardless of what challenge comes your way in our home, you need to stand by your spouse to resist the devil. Don’t be like Job’s wife. Don’t add to their pains. And don’t ruin whatever is left of their faith. You will simply be empowering the devil against your family by doing that.

Also, don’t be like Adam who kept mute while Satan was seeking entrance into their marriage through his wife. He could clearly see that Satan was working his way into their young home through Eve. Yet he said and did nothing to shut him out. And that is why all of us are where we are today, in a fallen and lost world.

If you too don’t want your home and perhaps your children to end up in a fallen and lost state, anytime you can see or sense that Satan is seeking entrance your marriage, whether through your finances, some health problems or some family, neighbourhood or even church problems, don’t waste time to speak up and offer your partner the needed support to shut this even being out of your lives. And God will honour every step of faith you take.

This is where we will end this hangout. I thank you all for your time, patience and contributions and also pray that God will cause all our homes to be firmly rooted in His great love. Amen. 

In our last hangout, we began to look at how Satan works in people’s home through undue competition in the way they use their family resources. And we must begin to guard our homes against such. As I told you before, Satan will use any reason at all to work in our homes, however insignificant that reason may be to us. So, we must not give him any opportunity to work.

Now, as I said before, undue competition in the way we use our family resources is also among those things that can give Satan an opportunity to work in our homes. And if we will not allow him to use this as his excuse to work in our homes, we must learn the proper way to use our resources. What, then, is the proper way to use our family resources? The proper way to use them is to use them according to individual needs.

As I pointed out in our last hangout, what God is committed to supplying are our needs, not our wants (Phil 4:13). In like manner, what we should devote our family resources to are the real needs of the family, not the wants of the individual members of the family. Of course, we also have to consider the actual amount of money or resources available to us to use in determining what we spend on. But whatever the case may be, our family resources should mostly be used to take care of the real needs of the family.

That being the case, I should not be looking at how much of our family resources is really being spent on me. Instead, what I should be looking at is whether our family resources are being used to meet the needs of the family members or not. Otherwise, the spirit of competition may take over my heart at some point, fill me with resentment for my partner and drive me to begin to compete with them in the way we use resources. And that spirit is an unclean spirit, one that, if allowed, will put bitterness into any home. So, don’t allow it in your home.

But you will allow it, if you don’t protect your heart against undue competition with your spouse in the use of your resources. When I was working in the bank, for instance, I had to regularly buy new office wears, almost on a monthly basis. Why? My job required it.

My wife’s job, however, at the time did not require that she changed her wears or buy new office wears every month. If she had, then, insisted that she too much be changing her wears as I was, since she too was working, what do you think would become of our family resources? They would be greatly depleted. And we may even get into debt at some point because of that.

That, of course, explains why some families may never be financially stable till Jesus returns. The husbands and the wives in those families are continually competing with one another in the way they use resources. If the husband bought a new phone, then, the wife too must buy hers. Why? She too is working and deserves to spend as much as her husband spends in money. Some will even tell you that since they and their spouse are one, then, they must enjoy their resources equally.

But equality in the way we use our resources is not the kind of equality that we have in arithmetic. Equality in the use of our resources at home is not the same thing as two equals two. Rather, it means that there is a balance in the way we use our resources, such that no one in our home feels cheated or neglected in the way our resources are used.

Again, for example, when I stopped working in the bank and my wife had to further her education, it was natural for more resources to go to her. If I, then, said that I too must spend as much as she was spending, would I be making sense at all? I would not.

Yes, there are times that in meeting the needs of someone in our home, very large fractions of our resources may be going into it. For instance, a child that just gains admission into a higher institution may be using more money than everybody in the home. Is that fair? It has nothing to do with fairness. Rather, it has to do with needs that must be met.

Would we rather have our child sleeping and waking up at home than be in a university and getting himself or herself fit for life? You know the answer. But that may be taking more resources from us than we have anticipated. And that is where making sacrifices comes in. Everybody in the home will have to make sacrifices for that child. And we will have to do it lovingly. Otherwise, our sacrifices would not be sacrifices after all – they will be loans.

You know there are parents that talk all the time about how much they sacrificed for their children and how those children must acknowledge them and treat them specially. While it is true that children that have enjoyed the hard labour of their parents ought to continually show that they appreciate their parents by caring for them, parents also must never forget that whatever they do for their children is simply a discharge of their duties.

Those children of yours did not ask you to bring them into the world. You were and your spouse were the ones eager and perhaps adamant to have children. So, don’t think you are doing your children some favour by taking care of them. It is your job to take care of them.

But then, of course, all of this does not mean that children should not appreciate their parents in every way that is righteous and possible. They must do so. God commands them to do so (Eph 6:1-3). So, they must be taught while they are still little and young to see that it is their God-ordained duty to appreciate their parents. And if they are not taught when they are young to appreciate their parents by lovingly and freely sharing with them the little gifts they are receiving from their parents’ friends, families and so forth, they may just grow up to be negligent in this area.

That explains why many elderly parents are unhappy with their children today. Those children, whom the have laboured over with all their active years, are ignoring them and not helping them as they should. And that is limiting those children as well, for they are breaking God’s law. But did these parents teach those children when they were young to appreciate them?

Well, all that is just by the way. The main point I am communicating is what equality in the way we use our family resources mean. And I am saying that it does not mean everybody gets the same thing. It does not mean everybody eats the same quantity of food, drinks the same quantity of water, uses the same class of phones, has the same number of wears, spends the same amount on transportation or health care or takes care of their parents and siblings with the same amount of resources.

Such things are not possible or healthy. And they do not spell equality but competition. So, we should avoid anything that will make us push or press for them. Instead, we should focus on, then, is how to distribute our resources in such a way that everybody’s need is adequately and appropriately taken care of.

Yes, taking care of the need of everyone in our homes will sometimes require that sacrifices are made. And each of us must be ready to bear his own cross, as far as this matter is concerned. Not only that, each of us must show that they can be trusted to bear their own cross and make whatever sacrifices they need to make for other members of the family when the time comes.

Now I want you to understand that none of us can quantify the kind or measure of sacrifices we may be required to make for our spouses, our children and our extended families in our marriage, going forward. We can only speak of the sacrifices we have made in the past for them. That being the case, there is no way we all will be required to make the same degree or quality of sacrifices. One of us may have to make more sacrifices than others. And that is not a bad thing.

However, any one making sacrifices for others in our home, especially for their spouse, will want to know in their heart that if the reverse were the case, others, especially their spouse, will not hesitate to do likewise or even more. When we were going to do my late mother’s burial, for example, my father said something touching, something that I would never forget. His words went something like this:

“I want everything to be well done for this woman because I know that if I were to be the one lying down there, she would stop at nothing to give me a befitting burial. She would surely do more than I could ever imagine to do for her.”

Was that the truth? Yes, it was the truth. I mean that it was something obvious to all of us that my mother sacrificed the most for everyone in the family. And she did that, believing that if there should come a time in which needed any of us to make sacrifices for her, we would not hesitate to do so. So, in her last months here on earth, when she had become so sick that she could no longer feed herself, I was there to care for her day and night, in spite of my very busy schedule.

Of course, it pained my heart that it was that kind of sacrifice that I had to make for her, a sacrifice that did not lead to more enjoyment of life for her. But what does it matter, a sacrifice is a sacrifice?

Well, if we don’t want Satan to work in our homes through our competition in the way we use our resources, we must focus on two things. The first has to do with using our resources, however small these resources may be, on the basis of individual needs in the home. The second has to do with being willing to make sacrifices for one another where necessary.

Now for these things to work, none of us must be selfish. I must not be selfish but considerate. My spouse must not be selfish but considerate. If we are not selfish but considerate, our children will most likely follow suit and not be selfish but considerate.

Look at some of the things Paul says along these lines:

“Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.” (Rom 14:19NIV)

Did you see that? In using our family resources, our focus must be on doing what leads to peace and mutual edification. In other words, I must not be after using the family resources for my benefits alone but also for the benefits of all the members of my family. So, ask yourself each time you want to use the resources of the family, “How does this benefit everybody? Will everyone see what I want to do as something that will benefit them?”

It is easy to complain that there is nothing good you want to do that your spouse will support. But the question is, “Are you relating to your spouse in such a way that they will consider whatever you are doing as benefiting to them and others in the family?” If they cannot see how what you are spending the family resources on will benefit the family, they will not support you in doing it, if they can have their way. Or if you have consistently shown that you are a selfish person and that any good thing that happens to you is for your enjoyment and advancement alone, your spouse may hinder you from using the family resources to pursue your person agendas.

I know some spouses can be unreasonable. And that is often rooted in jealousy and a lack of understanding of the fact that whatever good thing that happens to their spouse is also for their own glory. So, they won’t support their spouse in anything that will result in their progress and, of course, the progress of the family.

Here, for example, is what the bible says about the virtuous woman and her husband:

“Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value. She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life.” (Prov 31:11-12NIV)

Why does the husband of that woman have confidence in her? It is because he knows that whatever she does is to bring him good all the days of her life. So, if, for example, she decides to further her studies, the man has no doubt about the fact that it will be for his own progress too and, of course, for the progress of their children and others in their family. Why, then, will he not support her?

But a lot of times, people don’t support their spouses where it comes to using the resources of the family because they are not convinced that those spouses will use their progress and prosperity to promote peace and prosperity in the family. No, they are not convinced that if their spouses are elevated, they will not use their elevation to hurt them and perhaps their kids and other relatives as well. And we see this illustrated all the time in cases that involve travelling to live or work in other countries, furthering of education and working in some prestigious organisations.

Now if, for a legitimate reason, you give your spouse an impression that you don’t want them to progress in life, will they be happy with you? They will not be happy with you, if they are selfish and cannot reason the way you are reasoning. And Satan will use that as an excuse to fill your home with bitterness, hate and all kinds of evil.

So, it is important that we eliminate anything in our marriage that destroys confidence or that leaves an impression of selfishness. It will make it hard for us to be objective in the use of our resources, even where it concerns supporting our parents or siblings, supporting the work of God or helping others around us. And if Satan should succeed in preventing us from adequately giving to God and also supporting those in our lives that we ought to be supporting, he will be able to cheat and steal from us in many ways.

There is definitely a lot more things I can go on to share with you on this matter. But I will want us to end this episode of our hangouts here. My prayer that is that God will give all of us and our spouses better understanding in handling our family resources, so that we don’t give Satan any room to work in our homes through our failure in this matter, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you for your time, patience and contributions. 

In our last hangout, we dwelt on how Satan can use stinginess to afflict homes and the need for us to be on our guard against this. Then we also said that the stinginess of any of us in our homes can open the door for God’s judgment to come on us. So, we should not ignore stinginess in our lives or in the lives of our spouses. Instead, we must address it.

However, how we address stinginess in our homes also matters. Otherwise, it may result in quarrelling. And once we begin to quarrel over it or over any other matter, Satan has already stepped in. If we do not immediately humble ourselves before God’s word and end our quarrel, then, we may not be able to say to what extent Satan will use the situation to work in our homes and ruin them.

There are homes that are on fire today because of the stinginess. Some homes have even collapsed because of it. Think of a situation in which your children need money for their school fees, wears or some other important things. Yet your spouse will not bring money to support. And that is not because they do not have but because they just don’t want to spend money. Will that make you happy, even if you have enough money with you to take care of those kids? No!

Or think of a situation in which your spouse is never ready to give money to your parents or siblings or even their own parents or siblings, each time you talk about supporting them. Will that make you happy, even if you have enough money with you to take care of this business? No!

First, you will want to know where the money your partner is making is going, or won’t you? And even if they are just saving up the money, will you not want to know what they are saving it up for? You will want to know.

Mind you, if your partner is saving up money for some family projects, you will want it to be something you both have agreed to do. It is not that there will be very important domestic matters to handle and someone will say that the money with them cannot be touched because it is being saved for some special family projects. Where, then, should the money needed come from?

You can see why stinginess may result in quarrelling in the home. No, you may not want to quarrel with your partner because of their stinginess. So, you have decided that you are going to be bearing the needed burden with whatever resources you have. But how long will you be able to carry on like that and not complain? Two years! Four years! Ten years! Twenty years!

Well, it does not matter how long you try to bear under the burden of stinginess of your partner, you may find yourself protesting at some point. And that protest may not end well.

All of this is why I told you before that anything that should be addressed in your marriage should be addressed and not left unattended to. Don’t wait for issues to pile up before you address them. That way, you will not be speaking from an overflow of a bitter heart.

Remember that the bible says out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks (Luke 6:45). So, if you allow your heart to be filled with anger or bitterness because of the wrongdoings of your spouse, wrongdoings that you should have addressed, then, a day may come when you may just protest out of the overflow of your heart. And the sort of words that will come out of your mouth, then, may just be ugly and destructive enough to ruin your home.

So, address the stinginess of your partner before they really start hurting you with it. Actually, you ought to have recognised and addressed it before you got married. But since you failed in doing that, don’t fail again in addressing it early in your marriage. And perhaps you have done some years already in your marriage without addressing it. It is still not too late to start doing so.

In any case, in addressing your partner’s stinginess, watch your mouth. I will, of course, later share some things with us about how Satan can use our words to ruin our homes. But I am saying this in advance: watch your mouth in addressing your partner on any matter. You don’t have to say everything in your mind, if everything in your mind is not edifying. So, say only what will edify your partner and your home. Otherwise, keep quiet.

Then be mindful of the time or the circumstances in which you address your partner about their stinginess. Look at what is said about how Abigail addressed her husband’s stinginess and the danger it almost exposed their family to:

“When Abigail went to Nabal, he was in the house holding a banquet like that of a king. He was in high spirits and very drunk. So she told him nothing until daybreak. Then in the morning, when Nabal was sober, his wife told him all these things, and his heart failed him and he became like a stone. About ten days later, the LORD struck Nabal and he died.” (1Sam 25:36-38NIV)

Did you see that? Abigail did not address her husband when he was drunk. Instead, she waited until the following morning when he was sober before saying anything to him. No wonder we are told that she was an intelligent woman.

So, wait until the time is right before addressing your spouse on a matter of such importance as stinginess. Otherwise, you may just make a bad situation worse.

Now let us proceed and look at another way Satan can gain entrance into our homes through money matters. And that has to do with competing with ourselves in using the resources of our family. Is it possible for the husband and his wife to compete in the way they use the money and other resources coming into their family? Yes, it is possible. And there are homes in which this is happening and causing problems.

Perhaps that is the reason Satan is working in your home too and stealing your joy. You need to address it and shut him out of your marriage. And how will you do that? It is by understanding that there is no basis for you and your spouse to compete in the way you use your money or family resources and then acting accordingly.

How should we use our family resources? On need basis! What does the bible tell us about God’s dealing with us as our Father? It says, “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” (Phil 4:19NIV) What is God meeting? Our needs! In other words, God is not committed to meeting our wants; rather, He is committed to meeting our needs.

In the same vein, our focus in using whatever resources God gives to us in our homes should be on taking care of the needs of everyone in those homes. It should not be about what anybody wants; rather, it should be about what everyone needs. And if this is the way we reason in our homes, there will be no space for competition. It won’t not even come to anybody’s mind.

Look at the way we treat our children’s education, for example. We don’t introduce competition in the way we pay their school fees. Why? It is because we know that those fees have to be paid on the basis of the needs of the individual child. So, we will not insist on paying the same school fees for a child that is in a primary school as we do for a child that is a tertiary institution.

Also, look at the way we use water at home. Unless there is scarcity of water, nobody is going to say that they must drink the same gallons of water as another person. Things like such won’t even come to mind at all.

Even in food matters, it is children that often want to compete in what they eat and drink. But when they come of age, they may not even pay attention to how much food the others in the home are eating, as long as it does not affect theirs. Why? It is childish to do so.

Unfortunately, some parents don’t know that it is childish to compete with their spouses in the way they use resources. So, if their spouse buys a new phone, they too must buy theirs. If their spouse gives money to their parents or siblings, they too must give money to their siblings.

Now I understand that sometimes the selfishness of a spouse can breed such things. All the time you are coming up with what you must do with money. And you want your spouse to understand and support you, which is okay. But are you also considering how your spending is affecting your spouse? Are you considering how your spending is affecting the progress or health your spouse and other members of the family?

The word of God says this to us about our relationships: “Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” (Phil 2:4NIV) Did you see that? While it may be true that you need money to do certain things for yourself or for some other people, you also need to look at how that will affect your spouse and other family members. Otherwise, you will be nothing but a selfish person.

So, you may need to change your phone because your job or business requires that you do so. But don’t insist on doing so without considering how that will affect your spouse and family. Perhaps they will have to let go for certain things in order for you to be able to do that. That is a sacrifice they are making for you. And that is what families are for, to make sacrifices where necessary for the progress of one another.

But what sacrifices are you making for them? If your spouse has to make some sacrifices for you to have certain measure of enjoyment or progress in life, if they have to make sacrifices for you to take care of your parents who, of course are now your parents too, what sacrifices are you making for them? Or must they always be the ones that will be making sacrifices for you?

Yes, your progress is also the progress of your spouse and your prosperity is equally their prosperity. But your spouse’s advancement in life should not stop because of you. Otherwise, you are selfish.

See, you need to be concerned about your spouse’s progress and welfare as well, just as you want them to be concerned about yours. So, if they are making sacrifices for you, you too should thoughtfully consider what sacrifices you can be making for them to progress and advance in life. Then they will not feel cheated or used.

Mind you, the sacrifices you will be making for your spouse may not be monetary. It is not every love sacrifice that is monetary. Some may just be about helping them to do some house chores, run some errands, organise their business or take care of some family members. But it must be obvious that they are not the only one making love sacrifices for you – you too must be making.

That way, you will be showing that you are not selfish. Also, you will be aiming for equality in that manner. The bible says this about equality in human relationships:

“Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. Then there will be equality, as it is written: "He who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little."” (2Cor 8:13-15NIV)

Did you see that? In human relationships that involve giving and receiving, one must aim for equality. This does not mean that everybody must have the same thing or make the same measure of sacrifices. Rather, it means, if someone is making sacrifices for you now, you also should be there to make sacrifices for them if they should need it. They may need you to make any serious sacrifice for them. But they should know that if there should be a need for you to do so, you will not hesitate at all.

Now it is that kind of mentality that builds homes. It is that kind of mentality that eliminates competition in the home. But where you are selfish and unconcerned about the progress of your partner, you must just stir up a spirit of competition in them. That way, they will want for themselves whatever you want for yourself and also want for their family whatever you want for your family.

Where, then, will that take your marriage? It won’t take you anywhere good. You will just find yourselves quarrelling anytime any of you needs to do something good for themselves or for others close to them. You won’t be able to agree. You won’t be able to agree to support your parents, siblings, relatives or friends. Then you may find yourselves holding tight to whatever money you have with you and not wanting to use it to help your spouse at all. And where that is the case, Satan is already at work in destroying your home.

So, if you don’t want to stir up the spirit of competition in your marriage, be careful to show interest in the progress and welfare of your spouse, just as you want them to be careful in showing interest in yours.

This is where we will end it for this hangout. Thanks everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

We are still looking at how Satan uses money matters to work in homes. And in our last hangout, I told us that we would, in this hangout, begin to look at how he can use stinginess to work in our marriages and ruin them. So, as we look at this, if there is any form of stinginess in our lives, we should immediately begin to take advantage of God’s grace to deal with it. That way, we will be able to end whatever Satan has been doing in our homes through our stinginess.

Now what does it mean to be stingy? Well, it means to be ungenerous. It also means to be mean or tightfisted. And it is always connected to ingratitude towards God. What I mean is that one main reason people are not generous is that they are not grateful to God. And they are not grateful to God because they do not acknowledge Him as the source of every good thing they have.

The word of God says the following to us:

“Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” (1Tim 6:17NIV)

Did you see that? First, we are told not to be proud because of what we have or have accomplished in life. Why? It is because we cannot have or accomplish anything in life without God.

Second, we are told not to put our trust in wealth or earthly riches. Why? First, it is because putting our trust in our wealth is idolatry. That means we have replaced God with wealth in our lives. And that cannot have a good ending. Second, it is because wealth is uncertain. That means it can be here in the morning and gone in the evening.

Remember Job. Remember that he woke up one morning, still a very wealthy man. But the evening of the same day, he had lost everything he had, including his ten children. So, wealth is unreliable. And since it is unreliable, it will be foolish of us to put our trust in it. (Cf. Job 1)

God, however, is ever reliable, ever dependable. Not only that, as Paul tells us in that text, He is actually the one that provides us with everything for our enjoyment in life. That means wealth does not come to us by itself; it is God that brings it to us. No, the good things of this life don’t come to us by themselves; it is God that bring them to us.

Therefore. God is the one that we should always put our trust in. And as long as we have our trust in Him, even if our wealth disappears in an instant because of the wickedness of the devil, God will restore it to us, even in multiple folds. That was the case with Job, remember! Because his trust was in God, everything he lost was restored to him in two folds. (Cf. Job 42:10)

What is my point? It is that God is the source of everything we have. So, we should always be grateful to Him. And one of the ways to show that we recognise that He is the source of everything we have and that we are grateful to Him is by being generous to Him.

But how do we show God generosity? At least, we know that God is a Spirit. So He cannot eat our food, drink our wine, wear our gorgeous dresses or live in any of our fancy houses. He Himself has said these things to us:

“I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird in the mountains, and the creatures of the field are mine. If I were hungry I would not tell you, for the world is mine, and all that is in it.” (Ps 50:9-12NIV)

“Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? says the Lord. Or where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things?' (Acts 7:49-50NIV)

So, you can see that when we are talking about being generous to God, there is nothing of this earth that we can give to Him that is already His. But by giving to men, either to promote the work of God that they are doing or to make life easier for them, we show our generosity to God.

For instance, we are told this in the bible:

“God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them.” (Heb 6:10NIV)

Did you see that? How do we show God love? It is not just by singing to Him and telling Him that we love Him, neither is just by living in righteousness. We show Him our love also by being generous and kind to others. That means true generosity to God is generosity to man. And it also means true generosity to man is generosity to God.

Anyone, then, that is generous to man will have no difficult being generous to God. Check out people who are generous to their family members, colleagues at work, neighbours or church members, and you will see that they won’t have issues giving to God’s servants or for the work of the gospel. But those who are stingy to those around them are also bound to be stingy towards God.

In any case, if you or your spouse is stingy, your stinginess will surely be an open door for the devil to afflict you. For instance, we have the story of Nabal and Abigail in 1Samuel 25. And here is how the two of them are introduced in the bible:

“A certain man in Maon, who had property there at Carmel, was very wealthy. He had a thousand goats and three thousand sheep, which he was shearing in Carmel. His name was Nabal and his wife's name was Abigail. She was an intelligent and beautiful woman, but her husband, a Calebite, was surly and mean in his dealings.” (1Sam 25:2-3NIV)

How is Abigail introduced? She is introduced as an intelligent and beautiful woman? And how is Nabal introduced? He is introduced as a surly and mean man. In other words, he was rude and stingy. Yet he ended up marrying an intelligent and beautiful woman.

Now having an intelligent woman by Nabal’s side ought to have been a blessing to him. Unfortunately, it was not. And it was not a blessing to him because he clearly did not marry the woman because of her intelligence but because of her beauty. That means all he wanted was just to parade the woman for being beautiful. He was not interested in listening to her or allowing her to help him perfect what was lacking in his life.

Sadly, there are many men and woman like Nabal today. They will not allow their spouses to perfect what is lacking in their lives. They will not allow them to use their intelligence, wisdom, strength, influence or resources to help them. Why? They are proud. They are full of themselves. And people like that often hinder the progress of their families.

Well, because Nabal was a mean, a rude and stingy man, a day came when he maltreated some of the men that David had sent to him. As the account goes, during a particular festive period, a period in which Nabal was shearing his sheep, David had sent some of his men to give him his greetings and to tell him to help them with some food and drinks. And why did he do that? It was because he had become acquainted with some of Nabal’s servants while they were tending their sheep where he and his men were camping. And during that period, they did not harass or steal from them. Instead, they offered them protection.

So, it was not that David was trying to be a troublemaker. Rather, it was because he felt would have heard how he treated his men and animals with respect and would have wanted to extend the same hand of favour to him. But he was wrong. He was wrong because Nabal was not someone that listened to anybody, not even to is wife. So, nobody reported what David did for his servants to him because they knew that he would not even want to hear it.

Nonetheless, when David sent his men to him and asked him to confirm from his servants about him, he should still have done so. But because he was a rude and stingy person, he made no effort at all to do so. He just arrogantly dismissed the men that David had sent to him. And that, of course, got David so upset that he swore that he was going to destroy his entire household.

Now was David right for wanting to destroy Nabal’s household just because the man was not going to give him and his men food and wine? No! He was, in fact, being motivated by the devil to do that. And if he had had his way, he would be guilty of shedding innocent blood.

But what gave Satan the needed opportunity on this occasion to stir David up to destroy Nabal’s household? It was the man’s stinginess. So, when we are talking about Satan working in people’s homes, it is not always about making husbands and wives quarrel or go for a divorce. Sometimes, it is simply about totally killing everyone in those homes.

See, as far as Satan is concerned, what is important to him is working in our homes and destroying them. So, if it is divorce that works, he will use divorce. If it is sickness that works, he will use it. And if it is death that works, he will use death. For him, anything that works is a win.

This is why we must not give him any space at all to work in our homes. Nabal, by being stingy, gave Satan an opportunity to want to use David, who was a godly man, to destroy him and his household. Think about that. As godly as David was, Nabal’s stinginess made him totally forgot himself. And if Abigail had not quickly gone out to stop him and his men, they would have shed innocent blood before they would start having their regrets.

Why did I share all this with you? It is to let you know that stinginess can open the door of your home to devil in unimaginable ways. Your stinginess or your spouse’s stinginess can give Satan an opportunity to turn even godly people against you. So, where they are supposed to help your family, they may not want to. And where they are not supposed to quarrel with your family, they may end up quarrelling with you.

I was told of a man that would keep all the foodstuff of his family in his bedroom and lock the room anytime he was going out. Why? He did not want his wife to share any of their food with anybody in the neighbourhood or any of their family members. So, even though he was a church leader, no serious-minded person wanted to have anything to do with him. Even his own siblings did not want to have anything to do with him and his family. And if some of them had not known him for what he was and seen how he used to maltreat his own wife, they would have assumed that the woman was the reason he was stingy.

Now there are actually worse situations. There are those who are so stingy that they will not even want to spend on their spouses or children. It does not matter how rich they are, they are always thinking of the minimum they can do for their own spouses and children. So, their own family can’t enjoy what the have. And some have even lost their children and spouses to sicknesses that should not have taken their lives just because they were stingy, just as some others have lost their wealth or riches to strangers.

So, stinginess does not belong in any home. Don’t be stingy, then. And if your spouse is stingy, you have got to address it. Don’t say, “I don’t want trouble in this house. So, I will just keep quiet and do what I can do.” There is already trouble in your home, if one of you is stingy. It is just that you aren’t seeing it yet. And even if you are generous on your part, the stinginess of your spouse can still put you or your children in trouble, if you will not address it.

Do you know that stinginess can also open the doors of people’s lives for God’s judgment? Look at this story shared by our Lord Jesus Christ:

“The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, 'What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.' "Then he said, 'This is what I'll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I'll say to myself, "You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry." ' "But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?' "This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God."” (Luke 12:16-21NIV)

As I told you before, those who are stingy are stingy because they are not thankful to God. And they are not thankful to Him because they do not see Him as the source of every good thing they have and are enjoying in life. That, of course, is illustrated for us in the story in that bible text. The ground of that rich man produced a good crop because God blessed it and not because of his hard work. There, evidently, may have been people at the time who were more hardworking than him. Yet they did not receive the kind of prosperity that he had received from God. So, he should have been thankful to God for the fruitfulness of his land and for his prosperity.

But this man did not think of God at all when he was evaluating his success and planning for the future. He did not thank Him for the prosperity of his farm. And he did not think of giving to support God’s work in the land by giving to the priests and Levites in the land. Also, he did not think of sharing his success with any family member, friend or neighbour or the poor people around him. All he thought of was how he would enlarge his store and settle down to enjoy his prosperity for many years to come.

Now the fact that he thought of enjoy his prosperity for many years to come shows that his ground really did well. Nevertheless, all he could think of was how he was going to enjoy everything all by himself. And what is that? Stinginess!

Well, because of that, God spoke to him, while he was still celebrating himself and planning his future enjoyment, and said that his life would be taken away from him that very night. Then who was going to inherit and enjoy everything he was laying up for himself? Only God knows!

In any case, the part I want you to pay attention is the Lord’s remark after the story, which reads: “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.” Did you see that? Stinginess towards God can cut someone’s life short. It can make God withdraw from us the power to enjoy our lives or the fruit of our labour.

To say the fact, there are many who have died before their time because they were stingy towards God and men. There are also many that on sick bed at the moment for the same reason. Then some have remained in poverty for years, working like elephants and eating like rats, simply because they are stingy. And if such people will not repent and begin to generously give to God and to men, their situation may not change at all till they will leave this earth.

So, if you have a spouse that is stingy, you need to begin to educate them on the consequences of their condition. If you have a spouse who is always complaining each time you want to give as a family, whether to ministers of the gospel, for church matters or to other people in your life, you need to let them know that they are opening the door of your family for God’s judgment or satanic afflictions. And perhaps you are the stingy one in the family, you need to change your ways now and before it is too late.

See, none of us knows how God will judge your stinginess or the stinginess of your spouse. But regardless of how He judges it, there is no way the family as a whole will remain the same again after His judgment. I pray that none of you will die before your time and that doors of prosperity and enjoyment will not be shut against your home. But it is important that you too do not give room for stinginess in your home.

I will stop here in this hangout. I pray that God will use these few words to set us all right in our various marriages, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Thank you everyone and remain immeasurably blessed.  

In our last hangout, we rounded off on the note that couples must speak to themselves on any matter of importance to the well-being of their home and not keep quiet. Yes, both the husband and the wife must always labour for peace to reign in their home. However, they must use their desire for peace as their excuse for not talking at all or enough to their spouse about things that can endanger their peace and prosperity. Otherwise, they may be forced someday to talk. And at that time, what they will say may not be edifying at all. Instead, it may be what we make an already bad situation worse.

Well, something led us to all that. And it is the need to address any form of mismanagement of funds or resources in the home. Why? It is so that Satan will not use it as his excuse for coming into our marriages and destroying them.

As we have been instructed in the Scriptures, it is our job not to give Satan any opportunity to work in our homes (Eph 4:27). And one of the things that can give him an opportunity to work in them is mismanagement of the resources of our families. So, any form of mismanagement of resources going on in our homes has to be addressed.

Now, of course, whether we address it or not, Satan can use it to work in our homes. But if we address it and we succeed in leading whoever is mismanaging our resources to repentance, we will have shut the devil out of our homes in that area. If we, however, won’t address it, you can be sure, as I have severally pointed out, that Satan will use to it hurt or ruin our homes.

So, first, as far as you are concerned, don’t mismanage your family resources. If you are mismanaging your family resources, then, you have no moral right to challenge your spouse, if they also are doing the same thing. But if you are not mismanaging your family resources, you will be able to call your spouse to order, if the way they are handling your resources can be taken as mismanagement.

What, then, are we going to refer to as a mismanagement of our family resources? First, it has to do with using the resources of the family for purposes that do not promote the well-being of the family in any way, whether spiritually, morally, materially or physically. Second, it has to do with wasting the resources of the family.

Now I should quickly say that when we are talking about our family resources, we are talking about everything that belongs to both the husband and the wife. I know some people have issues with this. Yes, they are married, but they do not see the resources they have as belonging to both them and their spouses as well.

But the word of God tells us that those who are married are one and not two. That, then, means that everything that they have belongs to both of them equally. Also, the word of God tells us that the body of a married man belongs to his wife as well, just as the body of a married woman belongs to her husband as well. If this is so, and it is so, then, there is nothing that a man has that does not belong to his wife, just as there is nothing a woman has that does not belong to her husband. (Cf. Mark 10:7-9; 1Cor 7:4)

Now what I just drew your attention to is God’s ideal for every marriage. But for some reasons, right or wrong, a man may not give his wife unrestricted access to everything he has, including his body. And for some reasons, right or wrong, a woman may not give her husband unrestricted access to everything she has, including her body. Yet that will not change the fact that God’s ideal situation is for both the husband and the wife to see their possessions as belong to both of them equally. And where they sincerely practise this, they are bound to know tremendous peace in their lives and homes.

In any case, whether both the husband and the wife see their possessions as belonging to both of them equally or not, it is wrong for any of them to mismanage whatever resources they have in their care or under their control. It is wrong for them to use the resources for anything that does not promote the welfare of their family. And it is wrong for them to waste anything they have, be it money, food, water, electricity or fuel. That will hurt the family, sooner or later.

Where this, then, is happening, such a husband or wife ought to be addressed by their partner. Yes, they need to be told the truth. How that is said, of course, is important, as I said in our last hangout. How that is said can tell whether the problem will be solved or aggravated. But truth must be told. And in the interest of our families, we need to be willing to listen to our spouses, even if they are wrongly accusing us or misrepresenting us.

One of the reasons Satan is dominating some homes is that the husbands and wives in them have no listening ears. And if it is just one of us that does not have listening ears, that person is like Nabal, Abigail’s husband, and they are bound to put the whole family in trouble one day (1Sam 25). It is only a matter of time.

What does your wife want to say? You don’t know. And you don’t want to know. What does your husband want to say? You don’t know. And you don’t want to know. You just don’t want to look at what they want to say. That is why what should not result in arguments in some homes will result in very big fights in them. Somebody does not just want to listen to or hear what the other has to say. So, there is often chaos.

Well, though I will address this in the future, the point I am making is that if your spouse has to address you anything, good or bad, be ready to listen. Even if it has to do with the mismanagement of your resources, you need to be willing to listen to what your spouse has to say to you.

See, even God is not in support of mismanagement of resources. So, He does not want us to keep quiet about it. Look at a story Jesus once told to illustrate this:

“There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in and asked him, 'What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.'” (Luke 16:1-2NIV)

What was this man’s manager accused of? He was accused of wasting his resources. And how did he respond to the accusation? He said that he was going to sack him. Notice that the man did not ignore the accusation of mismanagement of his resources, even though he was a rich man. Instead, he responded by deciding to sack the person involved.

Now Jesus told that story to teach us faithfulness in managing anything that is entrusted to us. And everything we have in this life, big or small, has been entrusted to us by Him. So, we must not mismanage or waste it. Or we will be sinning against Him.

Also, in John 6, we are told of how Jesus fed five thousand men, without counting the women and the children, with five loaves of bread and two small fish. And when the people were done eating, He told his disciples to gather everything left and allow nothing to be wasted (John 6:12).

So, it is not in line with the will of God for us to mismanage or waste our family resources or anybody’s resources. If you, then, are being rebuked or corrected by your spouse for doing so, you should listen and repent instead of starting a fight through it. Otherwise, you will be the access door that Satan will use to enter your home and ruin it.

Mind you, it is not only through quarrels over money matters that Satan can work in your home. He can also work in your home through insufficient funds to address your needs. So, if you are mismanaging or wasting resources that are not enough for your home, where will the balance come from? Will disgrace not visit you? Think about it.

Then, of course, we need to deal with misplaced priorities. Misplaced priorities in using our resources are also synonymous to mismanaging or wasting our resources. Yes, what you are spending money on is what is good for the family. But if there are more important things to spend money on, then, you are still mismanaging your family resources.

All of this is why it is good that you and your spouse always discuss money matters. Talk about the things you need to spend money on. Talk about where your money goes and should be going. Then you will know how to prioritise.

There are many married people who don’t know how to prioritise their spending. And that is because they don’t talk at all or talk enough with their spouses about money matters. Yet they complain all the time that their spouses are not appreciative of all the good things they are trying to do for the family.

Yes, your spouse should indeed appreciate you for all your hard and good works. But you don’t expect them to appreciate you for misplacing your priorities in handling your family resources. Perhaps you have your children’s school fees to pay. And while your spouse is considering how that will be handled, you come home with a mini oven for the kitchen.

Now do you need an oven in your kitchen? Yes! But how readily do you need it? Is getting an oven right away more important than paying your children’s school fees? I am sure you know the answer. So, while what you have done is a good thing, it is a product of misplaced priorities. Instead for it, then, to attract the praise of your spouse, what it will attract may be their anger or rebuke, at the least.

All of this is why you and your spouse should endeavour to talk about your family needs, responsibilities and finances as regularly as you can, making sure nothing is left untouched. That way, even if you are not running a joint account, you can both prioritise with your spending and not give Satan an opportunity to enter your home and work through a mismanagement of your resources.

The next thing we are going to pick on the list of money matters and how Satan often uses it to work in homes is stinginess. Are you stingy? Is your spouse stingy? Well, the stinginess of any of you can be an access door for Satan to work in your home in various ways. And this is where we will pick things up from when next we meet on this platform. I pray that the few things I have shared with you will be firmly established in your heart and strengthen you to be better in handling your family affairs, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

We have been talking about the importance of knowing the kind of space we are to give those in our lives in our marriages, so that Satan will not be able to use them to ruin them. And we said this should be based on their understanding of the will of God and their understanding of how to relate to married people.

Remember that our Lord Jesus says: “‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.' So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."” (Mark 10:7-9NIV)

So, in all our dealings with married people, we must keep these words in mind. They are now one. Therefore, whatever we do to them or say to them must be what will build their homes and lives up and not what will destroy them. Otherwise, we will have God to answer to.

Yes, it is possible that a wife or a husband may not know the proper way to function in certain areas of life. But we should remember that we all have our weaknesses. So, in addressing the error of a married person, as far as their marriage is concerned, our aim must be on building them up and not on destroying them. Otherwise, the good we are trying to do may end up being seeing as evil.

In like manner, before we start exposing our marital issues to anyone, we need to be sure that the person understands the will of God about marriage and is also truly concerned about the prosperity of our home. Otherwise, we may end up bringing the serpent into our home. And the result of that, of course, will not be palatable.

Remember that people cannot give what they do not have. So, if someone’s home is not established in the will of God, the person may not be able to help you establish your home in the will of God. Even if the person is a prophet, a pastor or an evangelist, as long as their home is not established in the will of God, as long as their marriage is not working, they may not be able to help you in your marriage.

Am I saying that if a preacher’s marriage is not working, it is altogether their fault? No! Their marriage may not be working because their spouse is uncooperative or because certain family members, friends or neighbours are poisoning them. But the fact remains that their marriage is not working. And unless they are ready to counsel you on the basis of the word of God rather than their experience, they may not be of much help to your home.

Sadly, many are ignorant of these things. So, they will go and table matters of their marriages before preachers whose marriages are upside-down and who do not understand the will of God for married people. Yet they will be wondering why everything they are trying to do to build their homes is not working. How can you be applying wrong medications to an illness and expect them to work? If they work, evidently, that is going to be an accident.

I knew a pastor who used to beat his wife mercilessly. And he was so mean in treating the woman that she had no access to money. As I learnt from a reliable source, she would literally beg him to release money to her before she could do anything. But the woman used to work and make a lot of money. He was the one that made her resign from her a place of work to come and join him in the church that he was then pastoring. Yet, having come around to join him, he began to deny her money so that he would be able to control her.

Now what kind of counsel would that such a pastor give to you, as a man, if you should go to him with your marital challenges or opportunities? Would he not make a bad situation worse? I am sure you know the answer.

Also, there are people who are now single parents or who have been through two or more marriages. Can you expect a sound marital counsel from such people? It all depends on why their marriages crashed and what lessons they have learnt afterwards.

Well, the point I am still making is that you need to consider the measure of understanding anyone that you are discussing your marriage with or anyone that wants to get involved in your marriage possess in order to know whether they are fit to help you or not. Otherwise, you may be the very one calling the devil into your marriage to destroy it. And you can be sure that he will not miss such calls.

Furthermore, it is not only in matters that concern receiving counsel that we need to watch the kinds of people we bring into our homes. Even in matters that have to do with bringing house helps, family members or friends to live with us or to visit us, we need to be mindful of the character of the people we are dealing with it. Otherwise, they may just be an entrance for the devil to come into our homes and work in them.

The word of God says this about humans in general:

“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? "I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve." (Jer 17:9-10NIV)

Did you see that? Only God knows the hearts of human beings – no man knows it. So, regardless of how well you think you know someone, you may not be able to tell the exact reasons they do what they do or act the way they act. So, unless God reveals to you what they are secretly up to, you will never know

All of this is why before you bring anyone into your marriage, first, be sure that they have the fear of God and that you also know enough about their character. Then learn to talk to God about everyone that you are interacting with and that is likely to be a part of your home for one reason or the other. Otherwise, people who have mastered the art of deceit may just worm their way into your home. And before you know it, they will have begun to wreak havoc.

As we are shown in the bible, when the Gibeonites wanted to worm their way into the lives of the Israelites, they resorted to deceit. They pretended that they came from a very far place just to celebrate God in their lives. And the bible says this about how the Israelites responded to the matter: “The men of Israel sampled their provisions but did not inquire of the LORD.” (Josh 9:14NIV)

Did you see that? The Israelites only sampled the provisions of those Gibeonites but did not inquire of the Lord about their matter. But those people only showed them what they wanted to see. And if they had inquired of the Lord, He would have told them the truth about them. But they did not pray to Him about the matter. So, they were deceived by them.

Unfortunately, they had sworn an oath to them in the name of the Lord not to touch them. So, even when they found out that they had been deceived, they could not do anything to them. In like manner, many have sworn marriage oaths in the name of the Lord to liars and deceivers because they relied simply on what they heard and saw in them – they did not inquire well of the Lord about them. So, now they have to live with the lies and deceptions of such people. What a shame!

Well, the point I am making is that it is important that we always speak to the Lord about all our relationships with people, so that we will not bring into our homes the wrong people. It is not everyone that is posing as our friend that we can take as a true friend and bring into our home. And it is not everyone that looks calm and innocent around us that we can give access into our lives and homes.

Some people are snakes. And unless God reveals their true intentions to us, we will never know until they begin to misbehave. Could Sarah have thought that Hagar would try to take over her husband, Abraham? No! But she tried to do so. And if Abraham had not been determined to keep his marriage, that would have been the end of it. (Cf. Gen 16)

But why did Sarah choose Hagar for her husband in the first place? First, it was because it was not against the custom of the land at the time. Remember that both Rachel and Leah, wives of Jacob, gave their husband their maidservants, so that they could have children by them. And nobody fought them for doing so. Why? It was in agreement with the customs of the time. So, what Sarah did at the time was not something that was strange or outrage to those around. (Cf. Gen 29)

The second reason Sarah did what she did was that she thought she knew Hagar and could trust her not to mess up. But as the bible shows us, as soon as she got pregnant for Abraham, she began to despise her mistress. And as I said before, if Abraham had not truly loved Sarah and determined to keep his home intact, Hagar would have ruined it. Then whom do you think everyone would have blamed? Sarah! That was because she was the one that brought Hagar into her bed.
Now very similar things have played out in many marriages afterwards. Women have had their friends, housemaids, neighbours, church sisters and even blood sisters take over their husbands and homes. And men also have had friends, bosses, colleagues at work, neighbours, landlords, gatemen, church leaders and even blood brothers take over their wives. Yet the world has not collapsed because of it.

We read in the bible, for example, that Herod of the time of John the Baptist married his brother’s wife. And don’t miss the point here. It was not his brother’s girlfriend that he married. Rather, it was his brother’s wife. In other words, the woman was taken away from her brother’s house and brought into his own house. (Cf. Mark 6:17)

How did he succeed in taking over his brother’s wife? We are not told in express terms in the bible. Could his brother have thought that was going to happen? I doubt it. But he snatched the woman from him. And the world did not crumble because of it. Even when John the Baptist spoke against this, the man did not change his mind. Instead, he had him arrested and jailed. Later, through the scheming of the woman, he was beheaded. And did the heavens come down because of that? No! (Cf. Matt 14:3-12; Mark 6:17-29)

So, don’t think the heavens will come down, if you should give room for anybody to ruin your marriage. They will not crumble. And am I saying that God will not judge such wickedness? He will. But that will be in His own time and according His own standards. But will that change anything, as far as the enjoyment of your life and marriage here on earth is concerned? It may not.

That being the case, don’t carelessly introduce anyone to your home. Even if the person is a very good and upright person, be sure God is alright with their introduction into your home. That is because it may even be your spouse that will allow their weakness of character to cause trouble for the person. And what would you, if that should happen, God forbid? Whom would you blame? Whom would you take sides with?

Joseph was a good and upright young man. And his presence in Potiphar’s house brought tremendous blessings on it. Yet, at some point, his presence in that home began to threaten that marriage. We would not know whether Potiphar’s wife had been in the habit of doing that before then. We also would not know whether it was insufficient attention from her husband that led to misbehave the way she did. All we know is that Joseph’s presence in their home later became a threat to their marriage. (Cf. Gen 39)

Was it Joseph’s fault that something like that happened? No! Did Joseph force himself into their house? No! Would he rather not be elsewhere as a free man? He would. It was Potiphar, then, that was not paying sufficient attention to what was happening in his wife’s life. Otherwise, he may have been able to stop the harassment that the woman was giving Joseph and also prevent what eventually happened.

In any case, who did the man send away after the whole incident? It was Joseph. Why? He had to preserve his marriage. That, of course, may have made those who knew the truth angry with him. But he did the right thing, as bad as the whole thing looked. Could he have been happy sending Joseph to the prison, knowing that he was most likely framed by his beloved wife? No! But if he did not punish him, how would he look to the Egyptians in the land? Think about it yourself.

Well, my point is that you also need to be mindful of the character or disposition of your spouse before introducing people to them or into your home, even if the people involved are your siblings or very best friends. If your spouse has a bad history with men or women or if they are weak in the area of discipline, you don’t need to ignorantly tempt them with anyone. No, you don’t need to expose them to situations that will may make them misbehave. Otherwise, like Potiphar, you may someday have to choose between your spouse and a beloved sibling or a loyal friend. And I tell you, that is never an easy position to find oneself. So, watch yourself.

Now all this does not mean that you have to suspect everyone coming into your life. That is going to create another set of problems for your home. And I will share more with you about that during our next hangout, if Jesus tarries. My prayer is that God will see to it that your home is for all time established in His will, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you everyone for your time, patience, attention and contributions. 

In our last hangout, I rounded off by telling us of the need for married people to watch who they listen to in their marriages and the kind of access they give those around them to their homes. Should we put an end to all the beautiful relationships we have had and nurtured in life, having gotten married? No! The different legitimate relationships we have their various usefulness. And there is no way our spouses can effectively or adequately play the roles that God did not plant them to play in our lives.

So, we should not attempt to use our husbands or wives to replace our parents, siblings, neighbours, colleagues at work or in school, church members or church leaders, especially when these people are alive and well. Doing so is unlikely to give birth to anything good result.

However, in allowing others to play whatever roles they are meant to play in our lives, we must know pay attention to their limitations in knowledge, as far as marital matters are concerned. Otherwise, we may give them undue or underserved space in our lives and homes. And doing so will be as good as giving Satan a space or an opportunity to work in our marriages. The consequences of that, then, may just be too much for us to handle.

See, from what we see in Scriptures, Satan has very crafty ways of using even good people to injure others or to mislead them. That is why the word of God tells us not to make humans our enemies. Look at how that is presented to us:

“Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (Eph 6:11-13NIV)

Did you see that? Our real enemies are not humans; rather, they are demons. And these demons are wicked and powerful. They are wicked and powerful enough to fill people with evil thoughts, desires and schemes and to also make them restless until they carry them out. So, when people say or do certain crazy or wicked things, we have to look beyond them. We have to understand that some evil beings are behind what they are doing. Otherwise, we may foolishly make enemies of them and also fall into the traps of the devil.

For instance, we are told in Scriptures that there was a time that Satan stood against the nation of Israel and moved David, their king, to number them. But David was a lover of God. David was not someone that would deliberately want to sin against God. Yet, on that occasion, Satan succeeded in capturing his heart and pressuring him to number Israel, against all sound counsel. And it was after he had done what was in his mind that his eyes were opened to see that he had sin against God. But the harm had already been done. And seventy thousand men of Israel died as a result of his error. (Cf. 1Chro 21)

Interestingly, David himself did not die on that occasion. In fact, no member of his household died because of his sin. It was other people that suffered for everything. This, of course, is one the reasons we must learnt to regularly pray that we will not be victims of the errors of our leaders or of the errors of anyone in our lives.

In fact, we must learn to also pray for those in our lives that they will not do any wrong thing that will make us victims of whatever judgment that is meant to come on them. Remember the story of Hiel, the man thar rebuilt the city of Jericho. It was because of him that two of his sons came under Joshua’s curse and died. Those young men may have been good and upright people, just minding their own business. But the stubborn determination of their father to rebuilt a cursed city cost them their lives.

My prayer for you is that God will turn the hearts of all the people that have influence of your life away from any step they will take that will surely make you a victim. Amen.

Well, I am sharing these things with you to simply let you know that demons can use even good people to mislead us or to put us in trouble. And that is why it is important we know the will of God for our lives and for our homes and be determined to stand fast in it. That way, we will be able to tell if Satan is seeking to use any of our loved ones or any of those close to us to tear apart our marriages.

Remember that the word of God already tells us that what God has joined together, let not man separate (Matt 19:6). That, however, that some men or women will not attempt to separate us in our marriage. If there is a chance that Satan will be able to use someone to separate or scatter our home, do you think he will not use that person? He will use the person, even if that person is our father, mother, brother, sister, closest friend, business partner, neighbour or church pastor.

It is on us, then, to be able to tell if Satan is already moving or stirring up someone to hurt our home. And how shall we be able to tell? It is by knowing the will of God, as revealed in Scriptures, for our marriage.

How, for instance, was Jesus able to tell that Satan wanted to use Peter, one of his closest disciples, against Him? It was through His knowledge of the will of God for Him. He knew that it was the will of God for Him to die for the sins of the whole humanity. He knew there was no other way. So, when Peter began to rebuke and to tell Him that He would not die but live, He could tell immediately that it was Satan that was speaking through him. That was why He said this to him: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." (Matt 16:23NIV)

Did Peter really become Satan at that time? No! Yet Jesus referred to him as Satan. Why? It was because it was Satan that spoke through him. Satan literally borrowed his mouth to talk to Jesus, just as he once borrowed the serpent’s mouth to talk to Eve and deceive her.

Now can he still borrow the good people in your life to talk to you, to mislead you or to deceive you in any matter or your marriage? Yes, he can. And they may not even know that he is the one borrowing them to do what they are doing to you. They may think, in all honesty, that they are trying to help you do what is right.

Peter, in all honesty, was on Jesus’ side. He did not want him to die. But why did he not want Him to die? It was because he did not know the will of God for His life. And if Jesus too had not known the will of God for His life, that was how He would have been misled into accepting falsehood and frustrating His God’s purpose for humanity.

Not only that, if Jesus had not been determined to do the will of God that He knew, He would still have been swayed by Peter’s words and lost it. But He was determined to do the will of God for His life. So, He rebuked Peter severely and steadfastly on that occasion. And by so doing, He broke the hold of the devil on his life.

In like manner, we too must know the will of God for our marriages. And what is His will? His will is that we will always see ourselves as one flesh with our spouses. His will is that those of us who are husbands will love our wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for her. His will is that those of us who are wives will submit ourselves to our own husbands, as the church submits to the Lord Jesus. His will is that we will raise our children to be godly and to serve Him with all their lives. (Cf. Malachi 2:15;Eph 5:22-32)

If anyone, then, is seeking to teach us to act against these things, even if the person is our father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, friend or church leader, we must understand that the one that is trying to use them is Satan. And what should we do? We should take our stand against their counsel or action.

Now will that be easy? It depends on the character and passion of the person involved. But whether it is going to be easy or not, we must be determined not to give any space to the devil to work in our home. And if steadfastly resisting someone that we love dearly and respect is what will make that happen, we must do it.

Remember that the word of God says this to us about how to resist the devil:

“Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.” (1Peter 5:8-9NIV)

Did you see that? First, we must always be composed and alert in our lives and in our homes. We must not allow anything to distract us, so that we don’t pay attention to what is happening in our marriages or in the lives of our partners. Do you get me? Don’t let anything, life’s worries, your work, your business, your education or your children prevent you from knowing what is going on in the life of your spouse. Otherwise, Satan may have ensnared and destroyed them before you wake up.

Second, when we observe that Satan is rearing his ugly head to disrupt the peace of our home, we must be firm in resisting him and his works. In other words, even though he is a very stubborn enemy, we must be more stubborn and more determined to drive away from our lives and homes. But how do we do that without offending or hurting those that he is using against us, especially if they are our loved ones?

Well, we must always remember that people are not our real enemies but the devil. And so, in dealing with people who are being used by him, we need to separate them from the devil. Otherwise, we may ruin very good relationships in our attempt to resist the devil.

Observe that even though Jesus rebuked Peter on the occasion I mentioned above, calling him ‘Satan’, their relationship was not ruined. That, of course, was also because Peter had a good attitude towards rebuke. Some people don’t. That is because they do not think they can be wrong. But any of us can be wrong, for we are not God. And we will be wrong, if we place our desires, experiences and feelings above the word of God in any situation. If we are, then, rebuked or corrected in such situations, we should not take offence but humbly repent and set our ways right.

In any case, in dealing with some people, based on our relationship with them, we cannot be harsh in rebuking or correcting whatever they are doing that is against our marriage. Otherwise, we may make a bad situation worse. And we may not be able to set things right for life.

For instance, it will be foolish of any of us to call our father, mother or an in-law ‘Satan’ because the person said or did something that could destroy our marriage. Instead, we must humbly let them know that their counsel or action is unacceptable and will never be acceptable. That, of course, may still get them angry or make them turn their back on us. That is part of the price for doing the will of God.

But even at that, God will not forsake us. The bible says, “Though my father and mother forsake me, the LORD will receive me.” (Ps 27:10NIV) And that is the hard part? We don’t want anyone dear to us to forsake us. We would rather act against the will of God and ruin our lives or homes than watch certain loved ones leave us.

None of our loved ones, however precious they are to us, will be with us forever in this world. They will have to leave us at some point. What are we going to do, then, if we have allowed them to ruin our lives, our homes and the future of our children? What excuse are we going to give to God?

So, do your best to maintain the sweet fellowship you have with your family, friends and other people in your life. But always let them know that you will not allow them to make you go against the will of God for your marriage.

This is where we will end things for this hangout. I pray that God will continually equip us with everything we need to build and establish our homes in His will.

We have been looking at the need for us not to give Satan any opportunity to work in our homes. And we are doing so because the word of God says this to us: “Don't give the devil any opportunity to work.” (Eph 4:27GW) That means the degree to which Satan works in our lives or homes is not determined by God alone; it is also determined by us.

Yes, God has the power to stop Satan from doing anything in our lives or homes or affairs. But there are situations in which He expects us not to give him any room at all to work. And while we, as children of God, have the authority in Christ Jesus to resist the devil, it is always better to do whatever we can to prevent him from working in our lives. And we have looked at a number of things on how we can prevent him from using sex to work in our homes and ruin them.

Now we can also prevent Satan from working in our marriages and destroy them by watching the kind of people we bring into our marriages and the degree to which we permit them to function in our marriages. Getting married, of course, must never be an excuse to get rid of other people that have been in our lives and have played significant roles in them. So, when I am talking about watching the kind of people we bring into our homes, I do not mean that we shut the doors of our homes against our families, friends, neighbours, church members, colleagues at work and so forth.

Indeed, the marriage relationship, as we see in Scriptures, is the highest kind of human relationship we can have. For the bible says, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.” (Gen 2:24NIV)

Did you see that? When two people come together in matrimony, regardless of where it happens, they become one flesh, something that I will still talk about in a moment. This is not said about any other relationship we may have. We are not one flesh with either of our parents and we are not one flesh with any of our siblings. And of course, regardless of what we share together, we are not one flesh with any of our colleagues at work or in school, neither are we one flesh with any of our neighbours or church members. It is only when we get married to someone that this kind of oneness is born in the sight of God and of His holy angels. And we should take it seriously.

However, that we have become one with our spouses like this does not mean that other relationships in our lives are no longer important. They are important, to whatever degree God has made them important. For instance, our relationship with our parents is important and we cannot use our relationship with our spouse as a replacement for it. In other words, our spouse, however good they are to us, cannot effectively play the roles of our parents in our lives. I am not saying that they cannot try. They may try. But they can only try. They cannot be our parents.

Therefore, God wants us to take our parents seriously. He, in fact, tells us to put our religion into practice by caring for our parents and grandparents. Why? It is pleasing to Him when we do so. And He goes on to tell us that anyone, any so-called Christian, who does not take care of their parents and any other relative they are in a position to care for has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. (Cf. 1Tim 5:2-8)

So, don’t try to shut your parents or relatives out of your life or home. You have responsibilities to them. And you should see to it that you fulfil them.

In like manner, don’t turn yourself into an island in your neighbourhood, workplace or church. That is not the will of God for you. God has said that we are the light of the world. How, then, can we give light to those around us, if we will not relate to them at all? He has also called us the salt of the earth. And how can we be salt to them, healing them and ending corruption in their lives, if we will not relate to them? (Cf. Matt 5:13-16)

The word of God tells us this:

“Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.” (Rom 12:15-16NIV)

Did you see that? We are not to ignore the people in our lives and all around us, simply because we are Christians or because we think we are more sophisticated than them. That will be nothing but pride mixed with insensitivity. And we are warned to guide against such.

However, even though we are not to shut our family members and others out of our lives and homes, we must still know the kind of space we are going to give them in our lives. It is very important. And because it is important, we cannot do so thoughtlessly or carelessly. We must be prayerful and be devoted to practising the Scriptures in doing so.

Why is this important? One main reason it is important is that it is not everyone that knows the proper way to relate to married people, as outlined by God for us in Scriptures. Yes, our parents may be lovely to us and great in many ways. That, however, does not mean that they know how to relate to those who are married. And if they do not know how to relate to those who are married, we need to face the truth about it instead of being sentimental.

Look at health matters, for instance. Will you allow your father or mother, who is not a medical doctor, to dictate to you how to manage any health issue you may have? No! Why? You are aware that their knowledge in that area is limited and you will not allow any sentiments you have for them to cloud your judgment.

Or if your father or mother is not a lawyer, will you depend on them for legal counsel on any matter? No! You may ask them to pray along with you. But you won’t be asking them for legal counsel, for they cannot give what they do not have.

The same thing is applicable to other people in your life. You will not be depending on them for counsel in areas in which they have no knowledge or expertise. Otherwise, you may have yourself to blame. And there are people that are blaming themselves today for relying on certain people in their lives to guide them in certain matters of their lives. Why? Those people were themselves ignorant in the areas they were giving others counsel. So, they misled them and got them into trouble.

This is very common in people’s relationships with preachers. Some people just believe that inasmuch as someone is pastor, prophet, apostle or evangelist, whatever the person says is a law. But that is not true at all. And I don’t blame who reason like that. That is because many of us who preach have the tendency of imposing ourselves as God on people. But we are not God. We are not infallible. We can make mistakes. We can mislead people. And we will mislead people, if we are ignorant in areas in which we are seeking to lead them.

Yes, as preachers, we have the duty of feeding God’s people with His word and also praying for them. But we must know our boundaries. And our boundaries end where the word of God says that they end. In other words, whatever spiritual counsel or revelation we bring to anyone in our attempt to guide them must agree with entire body of the word of God. Anything beyond that is of the devil.

Then where it comes to natural matters, unless it is our area of expertise or we have a revelation from God that is in agreement with the word of God and with people’s peculiarities, we should refrain from giving anybody counsel. I have heard of cases of preachers with little or no education choosing courses to study for students in school. And when those students began to fail, they blamed everything on the witches in their families.

But if they had been educated enough, they would have known that people’s abilities are also important where academic matters are concerned. You are prophesying that a child, who has always been struggling with biology, will be a medical doctor. Unless a miracle happens to the brain of that child, so that he is suddenly able to understand biology, that prophesy is not going to come to pass.

Well, I said all that to let you know that even if someone is your parent or your pastor, it does not mean that the person knows the proper way to relate to you in your marriage. A dear sister told me that the pastor of her sister’s family once said something like this during a sermon: “Don’t trust women with anything. You cannot just be telling your wife everything that is going on in your life or everything that you want to do.”

What’s that, for God’s sake? Nonsense! Yet it fell from the lips of a pastor. And if you have someone like that as your pastor, even if he is a very good and kind person, he is not fit to counsel you in marital matters. He himself is ignorant and needs to be taught spiritual truths and values of the marriage institution. So, until he is well taught, you will have to watch the kind of access you give him to your home.

Now what does the word of God tell us about how we are to relate to those who are married? It says this:

“"Haven't you read," he replied, "that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,' and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh'? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."” (Matt 19:4-6NIV)

Did you see that? If you have any married person in your life, God wants you to see them and their spouse as one. He does not want you to relate to them as two different people but as one. Are there exceptions to this rule? No! Every marriage must be treated in this manner.

But what if someone’s life is already in danger in a marriage, are we still to relate to them and their spouse as one? Yes! See, what it means to relate to a man and his wife as one is to relate to them with the interests of both of them in our hearts. So, even if a marriage is in trouble and we want to help, whatever help we are offering must be that which will take care of the interests of both of those involved. That, of course, may include suggesting their divorce, if it is clear that they will destroy themselves unless they go their separate ways. But our intervention must never be one-sided or lopsided but balanced. Otherwise, we will be acting contrary to the will of God.

As we see in that Scripture, whatever God has joined together, let not man separate. Now, of course, I have heard some people say that it is not every married person that has been joined by God to their spouse. And they say that because they are ignorant of what Jesus means when He tells us not to separate what God has joined together.

Look, our Lord Jesus does not mean that it is God that joins every two people that marry each other together, when He says that we should not separate whatever God has joined together. Rather, what He means is that God is the author of the marriage institution, starting with Adam and Eve. So, wherever people are joined together as husband and wife and they are accepted as husband and wife by those in their lives, He too will accept them as husband and wife.

For instance, when Onan, Judah’s second son, took the widow of his brother, Tamar, as wife, in agreement with the customs of the time, did God accept them as husband and wife or not? He did! Is that to say that He was the one that literally joined the two of them together? No! But because their marriage was accepted by the people around them as valid, God also accepted it as valid. Therefore, when Onan began to cheat Tamar, preventing her from conceiving, God did not hesitate at all to judge him by putting him to death. (Cf. Gen 38:1-10)

So, wherever a man and a woman go through the wedding process that is accepted by their society, God is going to accept them as husband and wife. And He will do this, regardless of their religion. So, don’t think it is only weddings conducted in our Christian auditoriums that are valid in the sight of God. The so-called traditional weddings or engagements are as valid before Him as the ones we do in our church meeting places. To say the fact, many of us Christians have been having two wedding ceremonies.

Mind you, we are talking about the marriage between a man and a woman here; we are not talking about the marriage between a man and a man or between a woman and another woman. There are societies that now accept such marriages as normal. And are we also to accept them as okay? No, we are not. We are not because they are completely contrary to God’s design and will.

In any case, the point I am making is that every marriage between a man and a woman that is accepted by their families and other people in their lives as valid is also valid before God. And it is such a marriage that He says we must not separate. We must not separate them with our words. We must not separate them with our actions.

But how many people know these things? How many fathers know that they must not do anything that is capable of ruining their marriages of their children? How many mothers know that they need to be careful that their words or actions do not destroy the homes of their sons or daughters? How many brothers or sisters know that they cannot be careless or reckless in relating to their married siblings, so that they won’t be the reasons their homes will be ruined? Then how many pastors, evangelists, prophets or church leaders know that whatever they say or do to their married brethren must be geared towards building up their homes and not running them? I am sure you know the answers to these questions.

So, before you allow people to start counselling you about your marriage or to start getting involved in your marriage, be sure that they know the proper way to relate to married people and their homes. Otherwise, you may just be bringing another Hagar into your home. And the consequences may not vanish until Jesus comes.

We will continue from here in our next hangout. I pray that God will establish all our homes in His righteousness and goodness, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

HANGOUT 15TH FEBRUARY 2024
Let us pray: Our dear Father, we thank you for the privilege given to us again by you to be together on this platform. Our prayer is that you will open our hearts to embrace and act on the truths you will be teaching us about our marriages and homes, so that they may be all that you want them to be. For we have asked in Jesus’ name. Amen.


In our last hangout, we admonished ourselves on the need to watch our dealings with those of the opposite sex, so that we will not arouse jealousy in our spouses. Truly, we may not be involved in adultery with certain people that are in our lives. But if our relationships with them is already arousing suspicions in our partners, causing them to doubt our devotion to them, we need to do the needful about such relationships.

The bible tells us to abstain from appearance or shade or form of evil (1Thess 5:22). But this instruction does not apply to outright evils alone; it also applies to things that are good but that also have an appearance of evil. For instance, your interaction with that young lady or gentleman in your office, school, neighbourhood or church may not be unclean. But it does not look clean to your spouse or to some others who are watching you. And what should you do about it? Sanctify or end it! In other words, make it obviously clean and holy to those looking at you. Otherwise, end it.

Don’t say, “My conscience is clear,” and assume that is enough to make your partner look away. The fact that your conscience is clear does not mean that you are innocent (1Cor 4:4). So, don’t make your conscience the judge of your life and actions. God is the only true judge of all lives and actions. And He is telling you to avoid every appearance of evil.

Not only that, God, through apostle Paul, says this to us:

“For we are taking pains to do what is right, not only in the eyes of the Lord but also in the eyes of men.” (2Cor 8:21NIV)

Did you see that? As true children of God, our focus must not just be on doing what is right in the sight of God but also on making men see that what we are doing is actually the right thing. So, it is not enough for God to know that you are not involved in adultery with anyone – it also important that your spouse knows that you are not involved in adultery with anyone.

So, always do your best to give your spouse no reason to be suspicious of your relationship with anyone. How? Always relate to those of the opposite sex with absolute purity. As Paul says to Timothy:

“Treat older women as you would your mother, and treat younger women with all purity as you would your own sisters.” (1Tim 5:2NLT)

Did you see that? Even in the church, men are to treat older women as their mothers and younger women as their sisters, with absolute purity. In like manner, women are to treat older men as their fathers and younger men as their brothers, with absolute purity. We are, in fact, warned not to take advantage of anyone in this matter. Otherwise, God’s judgment may come upon us. (Cf. 1Thess 4:6)

Therefore, as a married man, relate to the women around you as a very married man. And as a married woman, relate to the men around you as a very married woman. Otherwise, you may give people an opportunity to slander the name of Jesus because of you, even though you are not involved in something immoral.

But then, while it is important that you do not give your spouse reasons to think you are involved in adultery and ruin your home, it is also important that you don’t do anything that will drive them to start sharing their body with someone else. Otherwise, you may give Satan an opportunity to use sex matters to ruin your home.

Look at what the word of God tells us again:

“Do not deprive each other except by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. I say this as a concession, not as a command.” (1Cor 7:5-6NIV)

Is that clear to you? Don’t deprive each other of sexual relations in your home except by mutual consent and for a time. As I pointed out in a previous hangout, this does not mean that we must have sex in our marriages all the time. That is practically impossible, if we are responsible and considerate at all.

Life is not all about sex. But that is the impression Satan and his demons are continually giving us. That is what they are continually whispering to our ears. And that also is what they are showing us through our movies and home videos and everywhere we turn.

You will agree that it is hard today to walk or drive around any town and not see something that will remind of your sex. And if you are not watching a truly Christian movie, you will agree that it is hard to watch a movie that does not remind you or encourage you to be sexually involved with someone. The usual promise is that you are going to be high and absolutely satisfied.

But we all know that is an exaggeration. While it is true that sex can give people intense delight, it does not always live up to expectation. Besides, however intense the delight it gives one may be, it is always short-lived. So, you are going to want to have it again and again and again.

However, can you keep having sex like water and not ruin your body? No! Or can you keep having sex like food and not make yourself unfit for other important responsibilities of life? No!

So, there are genuine reasons not to have sex with our partners, as there are genuine and legitimate reasons to have it. What we, then, need to do is to find a balance. And that is what Paul is talking about, when he says:

““Do not deprive each other except by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. I say this as a concession, not as a command.” (1Cor 7:5-6NIV)

What are the key points to note here? The first is a mutual consent between you and your spouse not to have sex. In other words, both of you must be willing to look at the circumstances of your life and tell when it is not wise or safe for you to have sex.

I have already shared some things along this line before. But I believe it is safe for me to still remind you of some of what I shared. Already, Paul tells us in that text that if we are going to be a prayerful family, we cannot be having sex all the time. Why? Sex requires energy. Sex consumes energy. And prayer also requires and consumes strength. If we are, then, using all our energy for sex, which will be left for prayer. So, it makes sense to stay from sex, from time to time, in order to be able to pray with our spouses. We just need to agree together on when and how often that will be happening.

What of when a partner is ill or obviously tired because of certain circumstances that came upon them, will it not be wise and also safe to abstain from sex at such times? It will. Otherwise, we may have a bigger problem at hand. You must have heard of people who had heart attacks or fits of asthma while having sex. And I am sure you don’t want that to happen to your partner. So, it makes sense to agree with your partner in such situations to stay away from sex.

What about those who want to engage in childbirth control? Will they not to agree on when to have sex and when not to have it, if they are not ready to take birth control (contraceptive) pills, injections or implants? It makes sense to do so. Otherwise, their children will have become a complete football team before they wake up from their sleep.

What is my point? It is that there are times that it just makes sense for us to abstain from sexual relations with our spouses. And as I showed us in a previous hangout, if we are considerate and not selfish, doing that should not be a problem.

However, having an agreement not to have sex with our spouse in this manner does not mean that the feeling to have sex will no longer be there or will be eradicated. No! It will be there. We will just have to control ourselves. And as children of God, we can control ourselves. That is because the Spirit God has given us is the Spirit of power, of love and of self-control (2Tim 1:7).

But then, where sex matters are concerned, God does not want us to take chances. He does not want us to overdo things. So, even though we are meant to exercise self-control in handling sex with our spouses, we must not stretch ourselves beyond what is reasonable and acceptable. That is why Paul, in that text, says that even if we are in agreement not to have sexual relations with our spouses, for legitimate and obvious reasons, it should only be for a time.

That means abstinence from sex in our homes, even though is based on mutual consent, should not be forever. No, it should not be forever if the condition that warrants is not forever. Otherwise, as Paul says, Satan may use the lack of self-control of one of the parties involved to lead them into sexual temptations.

The point being made here, then, is that don’t give room for Satan to lead your spouse into sexual temptations. Don’t abuse the fact that they are relating to you with understanding and consideration and begin to deny them their sexual rights. Instead, be determined to fulfil your sexual duties to them.

So, stop making sex timetable for your spouse. Also, stop overworking your body. Your body is not for you alone but also for your spouse. So, use it with consideration for them as well. That way, no one will be using you as their excuse for getting involved in adultery

In answering a question recently asked on the platform, I said that adequate sex cannot prevent a promiscuous spouse from being involved in adultery. But you have to be sure that what you are giving your spouse is adequate. And you may want to ask them what they will consider as adequate sex.

I know we hardly speak to ourselves in this manner in most marriages. I mean that we hardly deliberately talk about our sex lives, how healthy they are, if they are healthy at all, and what can be improved about them. We can talk accidentally about them. We can complain about them. But we hardly talk about them on purpose. All we do is to jump on ourselves when we feel we need to have something and then expect the cooperation of our partner. Can we, then, blame them for often handling it in a wishy-washy manner?

Well, my point is that nothing is wrong with talking about the sex life of your home on purpose. Talk about what you consider adequate and satisfying for you. And let your partner also talk about what they consider adequate and satisfying for them. That way you can truly see if your sex life has been truly uniting you or dividing you. And if it has been dividing you, then, you need to do the needful.

See, if your sex life has already been separating you and your spouse, it is only a matter of time before Satan finds someone to fill that gap. As I pointed out to you before, it is possible that the reason Bathsheba did not refuse David’s sexual advancement towards her was that there was a sexual gap between her and her husband. The bible does not say that. But considering how Uriah behaved when he was told by David to go home to his wife, it was possible that something was wrong with their sex life as husband and wife. (Cf. 2Sam 11)

So, if you give room for any unnecessary sexual gap between you and your spouse, you may be able to tell whom Satan will use to fill it. We have heard all kinds of stories along this line. We have heard of housemaids fulfilling the marital duties of their mistresses to their husbands, just as we have heard of houseboys doing similar things to the wives of their bosses. We have also heard cases of preachers sleeping with the wives of their church members, just as we have heard of church members sleeping with their church leaders’ wives. We have even heard of siblings taking over the marital duties of their brothers or sisters in their homes because they ignorantly or arrogantly made room for it to happen.

Now such cases are often terrible and difficult to hear, witness or resolve. Such cases often destroy homes beyond repair. So, the best thing is not to allow them to happen at all. As the saying goes, “Prevention is better than cure.” Therefore, prevent it. Don’t make room for Satan to use sex to ruin your home. And pray also and always for your spouse that Satan will not find them to be a useful instrument in using sex to destroy your home.

Yes, you may not be the one to blame, if your home is ruined, God forbid. Your partner may truly be the one to blame. But once a home is ruined, it is already ruined. So, who is at fault is of no consequence. And my prayer is that Satan will never succeed in ruining any of our homes, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

We will stop here this evening. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

Recently, we began to look at how not to give Satan a room or an opportunity to work in our marriages. And we began to do this in obedience to the word of God that says, “Don’t give the devil any opportunity to work.” (Eph 4:27GW) Satan is our enemy. And he is always looking for an opportunity to work in our lives and destroy us or make life difficult for us. But the word of God shows us that we can prevent him from working in our lives. Yes, he is a powerful and ruthless being. Yet we can refuse to let him work in our lives and destroy things for us, as we are shown in the bible. (Cf. 1Peter 5:8)

How, then, do we prevent the devil from working in our lives? First, we do so by resisting him. The word of God says this to us: “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” (James 4:7NIV) Can you see that? Can you see that we can actually resist the devil and expect him to run away from us? So, Satan does not have to prevail in any way in our lives or lord it over us. That is because we can say ‘No’ to him and his works.

But then, from that bible text, we see that it is not everyone that can resist the devil. It is only those who are submissive to God that can resist him. That means if you are not submissive to God, you are not in a position to effectively resist the devil in your life. And what does it mean to submit to God? It means to submit to His word, everything He says. It is the degree to which we submit to His word that we will be able to resist the devil in our lives. So, if you find yourself unable to resist the devil in your life, unable to command him to leave you and stop his works in your life, the reason may just be that you are not submissive to God and His word.

Another way to prevent the devil from working in our lives is not to give him any opportunity to do so. This is not about resisting him when he comes around to work in our lives; rather, it is about not giving him any opportunity at all to work in our lives. There is this saying that prevention is better than cure. In other words, if something can be prevented, then, it is better for us to prevent it than to start looking for a cure for it after it has already happened.

I said that to say that wherever it is possible for us not to make space at all for Satan to work in our lives, we should make sure that we do not make any space for him to work. That is better than working hard to resist him after he has already started working in our lives. Truly, whether we give Satan an opportunity to work in our lives or not, he will still find an excuse at one point or the other for wanting to work in them. But if we learn to deal with anything that can give him an opportunity to work in our lives and homes, then, there are struggles we will never have with him and his demons.

So, I will like you to take seriously the things I am sharing with you now on not giving Satan an opportunity to work in your home. Doing so will save you from unnecessary wars.

So then, we have been looking at how not to permit Satan to use sex to ruin our homes. And we all know that infidelity tops the list of those things that ruin homes. Yes, there are other things that ruin homes. And we will still look at some of them later. But why is infidelity in marriages number one among those things that ruin homes? It is because nothing stirs up jealousy like it.

Why do people marry? Often, they marry on the ground that they will be one with their partner. Even those who believe in polygamy and practise it also crave this kind of oneness. Otherwise, why do quarrels often break out in polygamous homes? Why do the women in them fight over the measure of attention their husbands give them?

Personally, I find it amusing that a second or third or twentieth wife in a polygamous home will be fighting for her husband’s attention and be blaming the other wives for not allowing her to have enough of him. What was she expecting? Even the woman who has only one husband has probably not gotten enough of him. She is most likely still praying to God to make the man start giving her all the attention she needs. And here are you, the second or third or fourth wife, wondering why your husband can’t spent a whole week with you. That is unlikely to happen, if you don’t manipulate or bewitch him.

In any case, my point is that people don’t marry so that they can share their spouses with another man or woman. But why is that so difficult? At least, we don’t mind sharing our parents with our siblings. We don’t mind sharing our friends with some other people. We don’t even mind sharing our carpenters with our neighbours, if we have not given them full employment in our companies. Why, then, should we find it hard or impossible to share our spouses with someone else? The thought of it alone could drive and have even driven some people crazy.

What exactly is the issue here? Well, the issue is seen in what we have been looking at for a while in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, where he says, “The wife's body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way, the husband's body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.” (1Cor 7:4NIV)

Did you see that? It is all about a private enjoyment of sex. When people get married, they become more seriously interested in what their spouses use their bodies to do. Why? It is because, even if they are not Christians, they just know somewhere in their hearts that the bodies of their spouses now belong to them as well. So, they don’t expect them to share those bodies with anyone else in sex matters or indiscriminately. Otherwise, jealousy will spring up in them, and rightly so.

Now I know there are people, especially women, who will say, “I can never be jealous because of anybody. Anyone that wants to mess themselves up in adultery can go ahead and do so. I will not lose my sleep over that.” But that is nothing but a lie. There is nothing like ‘I cannot be jealous’ for a married person. Even those who are not yet married to each other sometimes demonstrate mad jealousy, not to talk of those who are very married.

Well, the thing is that people who talk like that often repress the jealousy in them. That means they try not to show feelings of jealousy by lying to themselves that they do not have them. But those feelings are there. And if they fail to address them but continue to repress them, at some point, those feelings will turn to resentment or bitterness. That is when they will begin to wish their husbands or wives evil. That is when they will start saying things like, “If you contact any sickness from all those people you are running around with, please, don’t bring it with you to this house,” or “If you die anytime, I will not even mourn you.”

What is happening there? Resentment and bitterness are already manifesting. And these things are spiritual illnesses. So, if they are not cured on time, sooner or later they will manifest in the bodies of those who have them. They may manifest in form of cancer, heart attacks, strokes or some other terminal illnesses.

Therefore, if you are already filled with resentment or bitterness against your spouse because of their infidelity or some other things, you need to allow God to heal your heart. And the first step towards receiving His healing is to deal with the cause of your resentment or bitterness. If it is jealousy, for instance, you need to tell yourself the truth about it. You need to admit that you are jealous.

Now no one can blame you for being jealous for your wife or husband in your marriage, if they are getting involved with some other people sexually or they are being indiscriminate in their dealings with those of the opposite sex. Even God gets jealous when His people get involved in any form of idolatry. Otherwise, why is sending people to hell?

God is sending people to hell for not living their lives for Him but for self and for the devil. But why does He care? It is because He is jealous for us, seeing that He created us for Himself. He, in fact, refers to Himself as a jealous God (Ex 20:4-6; Ex 34:14).

So, if you are jealous for your spouse, we can’t blame you. It must mean that your spouse has given you reasons to be jealous, even if those reasons are founded on a misrepresentation of things. Whatever the case may be, if you allow jealousy for them to remain in your heart and destroy you, you will have only yourself to blame. So, you have to deal with it and make sure it has no root in your heart.

Now don’t say, “But why can God be jealous and I am not permitted to be jealous?” It is like asking, “Why can God be angry and I am not permitted to be angry?” or, “Why can God take vengeance and I am not permitted to take it?” It is because, just like the anger of man, the vengeance or jealousy of man does not promote the righteousness of God. (Cf. James 1:20)

So, make no room for jealousy in your heart because of your spouse. Instead, deal with it. Otherwise, Satan will step in and use it to destroy both of you. Look at what the bible says about a jealous husband, for instance:

“A husband is never angrier than when he is jealous; his revenge knows no limits. He will not accept any payment; no amount of gifts will satisfy his anger.” (Prov 6:34GNT)

Did you see that? When you are jealous as a husband, even you may not be able to tell to what extent you will go in dealing with your wife and whoever she is involved with. So, don’t even give room for any situation that will fill your heart with jealousy to arise in your home. And if you are already filled with it, you need to let God heal you before Satan takes over and leads you to do something you will forever regret.

Likewise, the bible says that when a woman is displaced from her husband’s life, especially by a person of inferior status, even the earth will tremble (Prov 30:21-23). In other words, there will be serious chaos, serious trouble. Why? A jealous woman cannot stay still. She will do things that will make her home and all the people in her life tremble.

All of this is why God, in His wisdom, permits divorce where infidelity or adultery is involved (Matt 19:9). That is because He knows that when people are motivated by jealousy, they are ready tools in the hands of the devil. And he will not stop using them until he leads them to destroy themselves and every good thing in their lives.

What is my point? It is simply that instead for you to allow jealousy to ruin you, your spouse and others, you may consider ending your marriage. Is that the best? No! But if that is going to save you from becoming a monster, you had better do it. I know what am saying is unpopular. But it is the truth of the bible. And many lives have been needlessly lost in several marriages because people did not pay attention to it.

As I said, divorce is often not the best way to solve marital problems, even where adultery is involved. But you cannot afford to live with jealousy in your heart in your marriage. So, if you don’t want to divorce your spouse and ruin your home and perhaps your children’s lives, then, call your spouse and deal with the sex problems of your marriage. Those are the things causing jealousy in your heart. So deal with them.

Why is your spouse unfaithful to you in sex matters? Is it because of your own unfaithfulness too? And when I am talking about your own unfaithfulness here, I do not mean that you too are involved in adultery. That is because it is not only the one that is involved in adultery that is unfaithful in their marriage; even the one that is denying their partner their body is also unfaithful. And unless that person admits this, the sex problems in their home may not be resolved.

Then could it be that you are just jealous for nothing? Could it be that your partner is not involved in adultery as you think? It is possible. And the only way to know is to confront them with the issue with a humble heart, with a heart that is ready to make peace. Perhaps you are just misrepresenting them. And where that is the case, all that you both need to remove is that thing that is giving you the impression that they are cheating you.

And let me say this here to those of us who believe that our love partners are just being unreasonably jealous for nothing. I am talking about those of us who think that our spouses are merely overreacting when they confront us with accusations of infidelity or indiscriminate dealings with those of the opposite sex. It is a mistake for us to think like that. It is a mistake to sum up the jealousy of your partner as overreaction.

I know for a fact that some people are extremely loaded with jealousy. So, they cannot stand seeing their spouses deal with an opposite sex at all. But you cannot say that you never knew that about your spouse before marrying them. Jealousy is not something people can hide very well, if they are not readily up to some dangerous act. So, unless you deliberately ignored it, you cannot confidently say that you did not know that your spouse was extremely jealous before you married them.

That being the case, you don’t give any room for them to be jealous. Don’t get involved with anyone in ways that will arouse their suspicions or jealousy. Otherwise, you will be letting the devil into your home.

But then, even if your spouse is not that kind of person that gets unduly jealous and suspicious every time they see you with an opposite sex, they are still capable of being jealous. Otherwise, they will not be able to caution you, if you should be having something inappropriate with those of the opposite sex. And if they caution you, then, you should correct yourself, if you have any iota of respect for them.

Well, my point is that we need to be careful not to give our spouses reasons to be jealous. But if we have already given them reasons to be, then, we should deal with such reasons immediately. End that interaction. Stop making or receiving those phone calls. Stop coming late home, if your job does not warrant it. Stop whatever it is that is sending negative impressions to your spouse. Otherwise, Satan will step in and use the situation to work in your home and ruin it, even if you are not involved in adultery.

Now remember that what led us into all this was a point I raised, which was that people don’t get married in order to share their partners with anybody. So, don’t do anything that will make your partner think someone is already sharing them with you. See, couples don’t get jealous just because their partners are spending more time with someone else. They get jealous because they think it may not end with just the spending of time with each other – it may end in their bedding one each other. That is what they cannot take.

So, avoid interaction with the opposite sex that will make your spouse start wondering what is it with the two of you. You may have no intention of cheating your spouse with anyone. But you cannot tell what is in the mind of the person you are dealing with. The bible says, “The heart of heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know what is going on in it?” (Cf. Jer 17:9)

That means you may not be able to tell why that man is being nice to you at work or why that lady is always wanting to discuss her love relationship with you. So, set boundaries for them, if you must interact with them. They must know what they can’t discuss with you, where you cannot go together or be together and when you are not going to make yourself available to do anything with them. That way, you will not be giving your spouse any room for suspicions or jealousy.

Then, as a matter of warning, don’t foolishly try to make them your spouse’s friend, so that you can have an excuse to remain close to them. You may just be setting a trap for yourself by doing that. If your spouse wants to be a friend of someone of the opposite sex that is your colleague at work, church member or neighbour, let it be at their discretion. Don’t try to work things out between them. Otherwise, if you are dealing with a snake, both of you may end up being fooled by it. And you will have to take the larger share of the blame.

See, it is not for Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. She does not need to tell Adam to try it. Otherwise, Adam may not think at all before eating it. Then the whole human race will go down the drain again. Do you get my point?

We will continue from here when next we meet. May God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, continually work out in your home all that is pleasing in His sight, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions. 

Recently, we began to look at how not to give Satan a room or an opportunity to work in our marriages. And we began to do this in obedience to the word of God that says, “Don’t give the devil any opportunity to work.” (Eph 4:27GW) Satan is our enemy. And he is always looking for an opportunity to work in our lives and destroy us or make life difficult for us. But the word of God shows us that we can prevent him from working in our lives. Yes, he is a powerful and ruthless being. Yet we can refuse to let him work in our lives and destroy things for us, as we are shown in the bible. (Cf. 1Peter 5:8)

How, then, do we prevent the devil from working in our lives? First, we do so by resisting him. The word of God says this to us: “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” (James 4:7NIV) Can you see that? Can you see that we can actually resist the devil and expect him to run away from us? So, Satan does not have to prevail in any way in our lives or lord it over us. That is because we can say ‘No’ to him and his works.

But then, from that bible text, we see that it is not everyone that can resist the devil. It is only those who are submissive to God that can resist him. That means if you are not submissive to God, you are not in a position to effectively resist the devil in your life. And what does it mean to submit to God? It means to submit to His word, everything He says. It is the degree to which we submit to His word that we will be able to resist the devil in our lives. So, if you find yourself unable to resist the devil in your life, unable to command him to leave you and stop his works in your life, the reason may just be that you are not submissive to God and His word.

Another way to prevent the devil from working in our lives is not to give him any opportunity to do so. This is not about resisting him when he comes around to work in our lives; rather, it is about not giving him any opportunity at all to work in our lives. There is this saying that prevention is better than cure. In other words, if something can be prevented, then, it is better for us to prevent it than to start looking for a cure for it after it has already happened.

I said that to say that wherever it is possible for us not to make space at all for Satan to work in our lives, we should make sure that we do not make any space for him to work. That is better than working hard to resist him after he has already started working in our lives. Truly, whether we give Satan an opportunity to work in our lives or not, he will still find an excuse at one point or the other for wanting to work in them. But if we learn to deal with anything that can give him an opportunity to work in our lives and homes, then, there are struggles we will never have with him and his demons.

So, I will like you to take seriously the things I am sharing with you now on not giving Satan an opportunity to work in your home. Doing so will save you from unnecessary wars.

So then, we have been looking at how not to permit Satan to use sex to ruin our homes. And we all know that infidelity tops the list of those things that ruin homes. Yes, there are other things that ruin homes. And we will still look at some of them later. But why is infidelity in marriages number one among those things that ruin homes? It is because nothing stirs up jealousy like it.

Why do people marry? Often, they marry on the ground that they will be one with their partner. Even those who believe in polygamy and practise it also crave this kind of oneness. Otherwise, why do quarrels often break out in polygamous homes? Why do the women in them fight over the measure of attention their husbands give them?

Personally, I find it amusing that a second or third or twentieth wife in a polygamous home will be fighting for her husband’s attention and be blaming the other wives for not allowing her to have enough of him. What was she expecting? Even the woman who has only one husband has probably not gotten enough of him. She is most likely still praying to God to make the man start giving her all the attention she needs. And here are you, the second or third or fourth wife, wondering why your husband can’t spent a whole week with you. That is unlikely to happen, if you don’t manipulate or bewitch him.

In any case, my point is that people don’t marry so that they can share their spouses with another man or woman. But why is that so difficult? At least, we don’t mind sharing our parents with our siblings. We don’t mind sharing our friends with some other people. We don’t even mind sharing our carpenters with our neighbours, if we have not given them full employment in our companies. Why, then, should we find it hard or impossible to share our spouses with someone else? The thought of it alone could drive and have even driven some people crazy.

What exactly is the issue here? Well, the issue is seen in what we have been looking at for a while in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, where he says, “The wife's body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way, the husband's body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.” (1Cor 7:4NIV)

Did you see that? It is all about a private enjoyment of sex. When people get married, they become more seriously interested in what their spouses use their bodies to do. Why? It is because, even if they are not Christians, they just know somewhere in their hearts that the bodies of their spouses now belong to them as well. So, they don’t expect them to share those bodies with anyone else in sex matters or indiscriminately. Otherwise, jealousy will spring up in them, and rightly so.

Now I know there are people, especially women, who will say, “I can never be jealous because of anybody. Anyone that wants to mess themselves up in adultery can go ahead and do so. I will not lose my sleep over that.” But that is nothing but a lie. There is nothing like ‘I cannot be jealous’ for a married person. Even those who are not yet married to each other sometimes demonstrate mad jealousy, not to talk of those who are very married.

Well, the thing is that people who talk like that often repress the jealousy in them. That means they try not to show feelings of jealousy by lying to themselves that they do not have them. But those feelings are there. And if they fail to address them but continue to repress them, at some point, those feelings will turn to resentment or bitterness. That is when they will begin to wish their husbands or wives evil. That is when they will start saying things like, “If you contact any sickness from all those people you are running around with, please, don’t bring it with you to this house,” or “If you die anytime, I will not even mourn you.”

What is happening there? Resentment and bitterness are already manifesting. And these things are spiritual illnesses. So, if they are not cured on time, sooner or later they will manifest in the bodies of those who have them. They may manifest in form of cancer, heart attacks, strokes or some other terminal illnesses.

Therefore, if you are already filled with resentment or bitterness against your spouse because of their infidelity or some other things, you need to allow God to heal your heart. And the first step towards receiving His healing is to deal with the cause of your resentment or bitterness. If it is jealousy, for instance, you need to tell yourself the truth about it. You need to admit that you are jealous.

Now no one can blame you for being jealous for your wife or husband in your marriage, if they are getting involved with some other people sexually or they are being indiscriminate in their dealings with those of the opposite sex. Even God gets jealous when His people get involved in any form of idolatry. Otherwise, why is sending people to hell?

God is sending people to hell for not living their lives for Him but for self and for the devil. But why does He care? It is because He is jealous for us, seeing that He created us for Himself. He, in fact, refers to Himself as a jealous God (Ex 20:4-6; Ex 34:14).

So, if you are jealous for your spouse, we can’t blame you. It must mean that your spouse has given you reasons to be jealous, even if those reasons are founded on a misrepresentation of things. Whatever the case may be, if you allow jealousy for them to remain in your heart and destroy you, you will have only yourself to blame. So, you have to deal with it and make sure it has no root in your heart.

Now don’t say, “But why can God be jealous and I am not permitted to be jealous?” It is like asking, “Why can God be angry and I am not permitted to be angry?” or, “Why can God take vengeance and I am not permitted to take it?” It is because, just like the anger of man, the vengeance or jealousy of man does not promote the righteousness of God. (Cf. James 1:20)

So, make no room for jealousy in your heart because of your spouse. Instead, deal with it. Otherwise, Satan will step in and use it to destroy both of you. Look at what the bible says about a jealous husband, for instance:

“A husband is never angrier than when he is jealous; his revenge knows no limits. He will not accept any payment; no amount of gifts will satisfy his anger.” (Prov 6:34GNT)

Did you see that? When you are jealous as a husband, even you may not be able to tell to what extent you will go in dealing with your wife and whoever she is involved with. So, don’t even give room for any situation that will fill your heart with jealousy to arise in your home. And if you are already filled with it, you need to let God heal you before Satan takes over and leads you to do something you will forever regret.

Likewise, the bible says that when a woman is displaced from her husband’s life, especially by a person of inferior status, even the earth will tremble (Prov 30:21-23). In other words, there will be serious chaos, serious trouble. Why? A jealous woman cannot stay still. She will do things that will make her home and all the people in her life tremble.

All of this is why God, in His wisdom, permits divorce where infidelity or adultery is involved (Matt 19:9). That is because He knows that when people are motivated by jealousy, they are ready tools in the hands of the devil. And he will not stop using them until he leads them to destroy themselves and every good thing in their lives.

What is my point? It is simply that instead for you to allow jealousy to ruin you, your spouse and others, you may consider ending your marriage. Is that the best? No! But if that is going to save you from becoming a monster, you had better do it. I know what am saying is unpopular. But it is the truth of the bible. And many lives have been needlessly lost in several marriages because people did not pay attention to it.

As I said, divorce is often not the best way to solve marital problems, even where adultery is involved. But you cannot afford to live with jealousy in your heart in your marriage. So, if you don’t want to divorce your spouse and ruin your home and perhaps your children’s lives, then, call your spouse and deal with the sex problems of your marriage. Those are the things causing jealousy in your heart. So deal with them.

Why is your spouse unfaithful to you in sex matters? Is it because of your own unfaithfulness too? And when I am talking about your own unfaithfulness here, I do not mean that you too are involved in adultery. That is because it is not only the one that is involved in adultery that is unfaithful in their marriage; even the one that is denying their partner their body is also unfaithful. And unless that person admits this, the sex problems in their home may not be resolved.

Then could it be that you are just jealous for nothing? Could it be that your partner is not involved in adultery as you think? It is possible. And the only way to know is to confront them with the issue with a humble heart, with a heart that is ready to make peace. Perhaps you are just misrepresenting them. And where that is the case, all that you both need to remove is that thing that is giving you the impression that they are cheating you.

And let me say this here to those of us who believe that our love partners are just being unreasonably jealous for nothing. I am talking about those of us who think that our spouses are merely overreacting when they confront us with accusations of infidelity or indiscriminate dealings with those of the opposite sex. It is a mistake for us to think like that. It is a mistake to sum up the jealousy of your partner as overreaction.

I know for a fact that some people are extremely loaded with jealousy. So, they cannot stand seeing their spouses deal with an opposite sex at all. But you cannot say that you never knew that about your spouse before marrying them. Jealousy is not something people can hide very well, if they are not readily up to some dangerous act. So, unless you deliberately ignored it, you cannot confidently say that you did not know that your spouse was extremely jealous before you married them.

That being the case, you don’t give any room for them to be jealous. Don’t get involved with anyone in ways that will arouse their suspicions or jealousy. Otherwise, you will be letting the devil into your home.

But then, even if your spouse is not that kind of person that gets unduly jealous and suspicious every time they see you with an opposite sex, they are still capable of being jealous. Otherwise, they will not be able to caution you, if you should be having something inappropriate with those of the opposite sex. And if they caution you, then, you should correct yourself, if you have any iota of respect for them.

Well, my point is that we need to be careful not to give our spouses reasons to be jealous. But if we have already given them reasons to be, then, we should deal with such reasons immediately. End that interaction. Stop making or receiving those phone calls. Stop coming late home, if your job does not warrant it. Stop whatever it is that is sending negative impressions to your spouse. Otherwise, Satan will step in and use the situation to work in your home and ruin it, even if you are not involved in adultery.

Now remember that what led us into all this was a point I raised, which was that people don’t get married in order to share their partners with anybody. So, don’t do anything that will make your partner think someone is already sharing them with you. See, couples don’t get jealous just because their partners are spending more time with someone else. They get jealous because they think it may not end with just the spending of time with each other – it may end in their bedding one each other. That is what they cannot take.

So, avoid interaction with the opposite sex that will make your spouse start wondering what is it with the two of you. You may have no intention of cheating your spouse with anyone. But you cannot tell what is in the mind of the person you are dealing with. The bible says, “The heart of heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know what is going on in it?” (Cf. Jer 17:9)

That means you may not be able to tell why that man is being nice to you at work or why that lady is always wanting to discuss her love relationship with you. So, set boundaries for them, if you must interact with them. They must know what they can’t discuss with you, where you cannot go together or be together and when you are not going to make yourself available to do anything with them. That way, you will not be giving your spouse any room for suspicions or jealousy.

Then, as a matter of warning, don’t foolishly try to make them your spouse’s friend, so that you can have an excuse to remain close to them. You may just be setting a trap for yourself by doing that. If your spouse wants to be a friend of someone of the opposite sex that is your colleague at work, church member or neighbour, let it be at their discretion. Don’t try to work things out between them. Otherwise, if you are dealing with a snake, both of you may end up being fooled by it. And you will have to take the larger share of the blame.

See, it is not for Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. She does not need to tell Adam to try it. Otherwise, Adam may not think at all before eating it. Then the whole human race will go down the drain again. Do you get my point?

We will continue from here when next we meet. May God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, continually work out in your home all that is pleasing in His sight, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Thank you everyone for your time, patience and contributions.