Warring Spouses

Do not look at another person who could threaten your relationship with your spouse

What happens to your spouse:

They feel rejected, inadequate and wonder why you do not do that with them but with another. If they were adequate you would be flirting with them, taking them out and having a closer relationship with them. A wedge is formed in the marriage relationship which if continued will eventually drive the spouse away to protect their emotions.

So if you want to start to destroy your marriage flirt with another, take them out and spend time with them instead of your spouse.

Hindrance to reconciliation:

The major hindrance to reconciliation is that the love of God is not in the relationship in the way it should be. The relationship has been damaged through fear and/or supposed or real rejection. We are commanded by Jesus to Love (John 13:34-35) and He states that we are His followers if we Love as He commands us too. This is not a discretionary thing. It is a command so we are to do it regardless of the cost to us. This lack of love results in four things that further poison the relationship with God and their spouse:

Each of these has serious consequences for the person holding them in their heart. It also result in small things irritating them and causing further problems. Often the small things themselves are of no eternal consequence and are used by Satan because of this as they do not raise warnings about them in our spirit.

Unforgiveness is the most serious of sins as it stops you from going to heaven. Jesus said in Matthew 6:15:

If you do not forgive others their wrongs against you (sins) then the Father in heaven cannot forgive you your sins and you do not go to heaven. It is not that He will not but that He can not as He has to reward you according to your choices and if you do not forgive another he cannot do to you what you have chosen not to do which is to forgive.

Bitterness is the next stage after unforgiveness. It will always have a hearing. Bitterness will find reasons to criticize another and results in maligning others and often slandering them and will always find someone to tell these things too. It is gossip in its worst form as it is vindictive. Bitterness definitely ensures you do not go to heaven if not repented of.

The resultant offence caused toward your spouse ensures that you cannot bring your gift to God, so anything you do is not acceptable to God while you knowingly do not reconcile to your spouse (the person you have offended).

The requirement for you is to try and reconcile. If they do not accept it then it becomes their problem but God can once again accept your ministry (your gift to Him). It is not the success of the reconciliation that restores you but the attitude of wanting to reconcile as in that is the love of God shown and not in the result which is an expression of the attitude.

The marriage covenant is binding. It is made before God and He alone can declare it broken. We are responsible to hold ourselves to the covenant regardless of the behaviour of our spouse and to try and sort out all the problems that arise in the relationship with our spouse. The fact that we follow Jesus as Lord keeps us to this covenant as it is really obedience, in regard to the marriage, of a requirement of His. The fact that a spouse is not keeping their part is irrelevant. We are responsible for what we do with our life and not what they do with theirs.

To break this covenant without His permission is to break the vows you made before Him to your spouse.

Spiritually, there may be no marriage as the other partner had rejected you as their spouse for various reasons. The vows made before God still stand though, unless the other spouse or yourself have committed adultery. The legal impediments of the land need to be removed through divorce though so you can remarry and protect each other legally. The vows made to God are removed through adultery or remarriage (which is adultery if the Lord has not declared the marriage over).

Jesus is merciful and if a person is too damaged to deal with their issues, He will often take them home before they loose their salvation or He will appear to them and give them a choice. He is merciful and not legalistic.

Both spouses need deliverance and healing to be able to relate as they should. I recommend that couples both have deliverance ministry before the marriage vows are taken in order to remove hurts and pain that will cause problems in the marriage.

Unfortunately many do not do this and later in the marriage one spouse usually gets deliverance while the other does not and the problems in the marriage worsen. One suffers while waiting for the other to go through deliverance. The spouse who has had deliverance has the responsibility to pray for the other until they are free of hurts and pain and can relate as they should. If the abuse is too great then the abused spouse can leave (for their own safety) until God deals with their marriage partner or removes their marriage partner from this earth.

Sometimes one spouse becomes a Christian and the other does not. The responsibility, then, is for the Christian spouse to pray the other into The Kingdom of God and not nag them into it. There is a promise in 1 Peter 3:1-6 for a Christian wife who is married to a non-Christian spouse.

How does this war of the spouses begin?

Satan needs to stop communication between the partners so they do not know how they feel about each other. He knows that if they knew their love for one other he could not poison their minds toward each other.

He starts by sowing doubts about whether or not their spouse loves them. Next he tries to make the husband/wife uncertain about their own love toward their spouse. Uncertainty about their love occurs and fear of the other partner’s motives starts to rear its ugly head. Fear of rejection, fear of inadequacy, low self esteem (fear of being worthless) all come into play and the walls and masks come up. Any attempt at communication with or relating to the spouse is rejected (as it threatens their self-worth), so that each spouse lives their own life and relates as little and as best as possible or divorce. There may be unrepented anger at the other spouse which stops deliverance and will prevent the angry spouse going to heaven.

The unforgiveness must be deliberate and not a result of hurts so that they do not realise they have it. God is merciful and understands and it is only for actions we have any knowledge of that we are judged. So if the person does not know they have unforgiveness then God will show them and only after they are shown are they in danger of losing their salvation if they still refuse to forgive.

The relationship becomes stilted and each partner looks elsewhere for fulfilment and meaningful relationships, so adultery or inordinate friendships occur. Each spouse devises their own coping mechanisms intended to restore self-worth and to cope with the situation. Coping mechanisms can include hobbies, more involvement in work, religious service, and other external activities that do not need to involve the other spouse. When hurts are taken into a new marriage, these breakdowns can accelerate quickly and after a short time they wonder what they saw in the other person.

If the emotional hurts are really bad, addictions occur to ease the hurt (sex, drugs, pornography, smoking and alcohol are common ones).

The Right to be offended

If I hold onto my hurts and choose to be offended I am saying I have a right to be offended. Jesus told us that we do not have this right to hold onto an offence and not forgive the person offending us. By holding onto this offence and not forgiving you are really being self righteous and in danger of losing your salvation.

In a marriage no spouse has a right not to forgive their marriage partner through holding onto hurts or offences. Doing this indicates a ‘holier-than-thou’ self-righteous attitude which destroys relationship and implies one spouse is better than the other. It also kills love for the spouse as love and unforgiveness cannot exist together.

If you love your spouse you will give up all rights so you can carry out your love for them as Jesus wants you to. Love ignores hurts and pain as it seeks the betterment of the other and the meeting of their needs (not greeds) before their own and any rights they have are ignored to do this.

Fault finding

If a person loves their spouse as Jesus does, when they see a fault in their spouse they discuss how to deal with it rather than criticise them for it and walking away.

They will determine their part in helping the spouse to deal with the problem and will lovingly support them as they work their way through the problem no matter how long it takes to resolve it.

If deliverance is needed they will help each other in this until they are free from the demons using the fault.

The is no self-interest in marriage. You are either helping others to realize who they are or serving Jesus and expressing His Kingdom in all you do to your spouse and others.

For a marriage to work each spouse must die to self interest and express Jesus in all they do.

Healing the relationship

You should never condemn, shame, judge, criticise, pour guilt on or abuse physically your spouse. This is a definite way to destroy love and marriage, and in really damaged people, destroy them as well.

Shame is triggered by guilt (we have failed the standard) and occurs where legalism rules instead of love. If you shame your spouse you need deliverance for perfectionism and legalism and the self-esteem problems that allow these to be present in you.

Shame is tied up with pride. The person needs to be important and have self-esteem by what they do but they fail so are ashamed of themselves. This also shows a need for deliverance in the person for low self-esteem and wrong attitudes to service and acceptance of themself.

When these attitudes occur in a relationship both spouses need healing before the relationship can truly be like it should be. This deliverance should have been done in the betrothal stage and not in the marriage which is why i recommend deliverance be gone through by betrothed people before marriage.

Perfectionism

Perfectionism is a sin.

Perfectionism denies this and states that God requires more than this of us. In the Bible a ‘perfect’ is one who lives according to their level of spiritual maturity and not one who does not make a mistake in anything they do. Only Jesus was perfect.

We are to use our God given abilities as best we can and trust Him for the result. To do more is to fall short of His requirements which is technically sin.

So do not let the devil convince you to be a perfectionist but work within that God allows and trust Him for the rest.

A perfectionist sees all others as inadequate to them and no one can satisfy their standard usually which is why this attitude is so dangerous to a marriage. Their spouse can never meet their standard, will always feel inadequate and unloved and as result will never be able to fulfil their role as a spouse as they should.

Problems with apologising

A person apologises for a few reasons:

If you apologise for the last two reasons you, the other person or both of you need deliverance in some way.

If you cannot apologise then you definitely need deliverance.

If it is not worth trying to apologise to a person as they will not receive it you must still try but it is obvious that the person needs deliverance.

Problems with apologising usually do with :

In a marriage where love is supreme there should be no fear of apologising as there is no fear of rejection by or being unworthy to the other person.

There is no fear or pride in love!