Articles

Healthy Confrontation

Presented by:  Suzette Humphreys-The Marriage Warrior

Marriage is filled with beautiful experiences and situations that test us.  God’s design for marriage is to provide opportunities for family, love, safety, comfort and companionship. However, He also uses marriage as a sanctifying tool.  The specific tool used within the union is a mirrored reflection of ourselves.  Without a mirror, we have no idea how we really appear.

When your partner informs you that you have spinach in your teeth, or that you’re dragging toilet paper from your shoe, you are thankful that they pointed it out.  However, when your partner corrects behavior in you, the confrontation is typically met with a negative reaction, and may even start an argument.  To avoid a fight, partners choose to stop reflecting back to one another and in turn, rob each other of opportunities for self-awareness and self-growth.

Think about it...  Have you ever pointed out a negative behavior in someone and they received it with appreciation?  When a person confronts you, do you thank them for their observation and consider that they may be telling you a truth?  Generally, people dislike confrontation and steer away from it.  However, the scriptures encourages confrontation… Matthew 18:15  “go to your bother and take up the offense”, John 1:47  “whoever speaks the truth gives honest evidence, but a false witness utters deceit”, James 5:17 says “when someone wanders from the truth…bring them back”.  Clearly, God does not call us to be conflict avoiders!  But how do we follow scriptural instruction when confrontation can feel intimidating and possibly risk negative consequences for both the confronter and the receiver? 

Those on the receiving end of confrontation tend to personalize and internalize correction.  These reactions indicate that self-esteem/value levels need strengthening.  Most confrontation is directed towards negative behavior, rather than a person’s value.  However, if the receiver regards the confrontation as a personal attack of “value”, defensive walls will erect and  personal benefits from the confrontation will be lost. 

BE WARNED!!!  This reaction is how the enemy eliminates opportunities for self-growth. 

Behaviors, whether positive or negative, have nothing to do with value.  In fact, when a person has positive self-worth, they do not fear correction, but rather embraces opportunities for self-reflection and growth.  They have learned to love self, flaws and all, and seek opportunities to enhance self by addressing flaws.  Those who have mastered correction operate with humility and the internal core strength allows them to respond with ownership that may sound like…“Others have pointed that out before…I will pray about it?  This type of response does not necessarily agree with the confronter or promise a change, but simply demonstrates a willingness to self-reflect.  On the other hand, individuals struggling with arrested emotional development may respond with prideful statements that sound more like…”who are you to tell me”. 

God warns us about pride because the illusion of the “puffed up self” harms us as it detaches us from others who are there to assist in the journey of self-growth.  Typically, underdeveloped self-value/esteem is rooted in childhood experiences, in which the enemy disrupted the child’s value and security sense of belonging to God.  However, as soon as an individual can recognize his/her value in God, for the mere reason that God made you as His child, the paradigm shift can change everything.  Once divine value/security is established, what should follow is a desire to learn, change and grow to become more of how God originally created human functioning, before corruption entered. 

Ephesians 4:15 instructs us to confront in love.  Many times, the confronter’s love disposition is overshadowed by underlying negative emotions.  Because confrontation is so risky, the confronter will procrastinate confronting, leaving room for tensions to build.  As anger, bitterness, blame and intolerance gain power, patience, humility and love is sacrificed. The agenda to “help one another grow” is replaced with a built-up internal pressure that will eventually ignite an unintended explosion.  This type of delivery causes the receiver to reject the message, and the relationship will suffer damage. 

Prov. 27:17 says “Iron sharpens iron” and within marriage, sparks can fly as toxic confrontations occur.  However, if each partner understands the sanctification process of marriage and approaches confrontation through love, the benefits will extend beyond personal growth, to encompass a shared experience of growth within the “oneness” that God created in the beginning. 

WARRIOR’S WISDOM:

1. Analyze your response to correction.  Repent for failures.

2. Master the skill of not taking things personal.  Embrace change.

3. Analyze your heart condition when you confront others.  Be open-minded.

4. Search your heart for pride.  Repent if pride resides.

5. Ask God to make a right Spirit within you.  Ask for dignity, honor and love.

6. Accept your value as a child of God, made in His likeness and in His image.

7. Learn to love yourself, even with flaws.

8. Be willing to address shortcomings and empower yourself to change.

9. Before confronting another, check your facts for truth.  Wait on the Lord for proper confrontation timing, but do not procrastinate.  Rebuke the spirit of fear.

10.  Don’t rob your partner of self-growth.  Bathe the confrontation with prayer for the person and allow love to flow.

Holiday Dollars and Dynamics

Presented by: Suzette-The Marriage Warrior

As the cool nights and fall breeze make themselves known, they bring with them a special energy and excitement.  As we gather the pumpkins and poinsettias, we look forward to the celebrations to come.  However, the emotions of reuniting with loved ones can range from a nostalgic sense of love and belonging to an uncertainty and anxiety.  Although facing the unknown and unexpected can offer a thrilling sensation, it also can create an unsettledness when reconnecting to family of origin members.

Life’s journey brings us through a plethora of experiences; some positive, some negative.  However, no matter how far the journey has brought an individual, the family of origin dynamic has a unique power to place us in the original state of family dynamics.  Sibling rivalry and childhood positioning somehow make an unexpected arrival at the thanksgiving table, as if we were still children.  For example, the youngest male of the family can currently own a fortune 500 company, yet when he enters the family Christmas celebration, he is still known as the “baby boy” and treated as such.  In the same way, the sister who has experienced 20 years of drug addiction sobriety will be reminded of her rebellion and family shame as the childhood story telling time occurs. 

Family of origin issues are commonly found within the marital dynamic.  From wounds and coping mechanism to power and enmeshment, the marriage suffers the residue of unresolved past family dynamics.  Unfortunately, the family of origin carries a solid infrastructure that is not easily altered, no matter where life’s course has taken its members.  Although family of origin issues are found within marital cycles the couple can disarm the past by focusing on healthy marital functioning in order to create present and future marital security.  The health driven couple will need to prepare for the rush of the season and guard from the family of origin subtle surprises and pitfalls.  Communicating about roles and expectations is paramount in decreasing holiday stressors.

Among marital stressors, money is often at the top of the list, especially during the holidays.  However, money is also related to dysfunctional family dynamics as the anxious drive system leads to over spending, to gain family acceptance within the dysfunctional system.  Perfection becomes the order of the day as we over-dress the holidays, fill the table with too much food, and over-exceed the holiday gift budget. The intent may not be to “show-off”, but rather to “show-up” as the new and improved “you”, all wrapped up in the need for family of origin acceptance and affirmation.  Although we are not typically consciously aware of such needs, they are there, looming beneath the surface.  As a result, the mounting pressure is placed upon the union in the form of mood swings, anxiety and over-spending.  At the end of the season, the marriage will bear the burden of exhaustion, strife and unexpected credit card bills.

As the healthy couple becomes aware of these nuances, together they will be able to resist the tempters that lurk.  The couple can continue emotional connection by having a loving, watchful eye on their partner, being alert, just incase an emotional rescue mission needs to take place.  Supporting the marital partnership with kind gestures, during the occasion, is always appreciated, as well.  Committing to a previously discussed budget will sustain healthy couple balance, long after the holiday season.  Lastly, updating your family perspective of old judgements and stale positioning, can bring a fresh approach to family relationship building and in the long run, save the marriage stress and money.

WARRIOR’S WISDOM

1. Welcome a fresh perspective and change the dynamic by accepting others as they are now, looking at their positives, without including the negatives.

2. Protect the marriage by getting on the same page regarding a holiday budget and plan a schedule. 

3.     Prior to the celebration, acknowledge and address past heart offenses and distancing walls.

4. Recognize how you negatively contribute to the tensions and heal within.

5. Judgment is always destructive.  Exchange it with forgiveness.

6. Confront the family past with the sentiments of Jesus “father forgive for they know not what they do”, understanding that people do better, when they know better.

7. Recognize that life is a journey, filled with many twists and turns, for both you and your family members.  Honor the changes.

8. Trade pride of boastful accomplishments with inward security in who you have become.

9. Be emotionally present during conversations, extending love, acceptance and blessings, rather than watching others, as they watch you.

10.  Enjoy your family…they won’t be around forever.

Madness or Miracle?

Viewing the National Crisis through a Spiritual Lens

Presented by Suzette-The Marriage Warrior

“Why, my soul, are you downcast?  Why so disturbed within me?  Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God” (Ps.42:11)

 As Christians comply with Covid-19 health and safety guidelines, we watch businesses suffer, education programs compromised, the economy struggle, churches close, constitutional rights questioned, and the family going stir-crazy.  Many leaders are urging people to pray, pray, pray!  However, with all the moving parts, it can be difficult to find specific prayer targets.  Generally, people tend to pray during times of crisis more than times of peace.  When people can’t find answers in the natural realm, they spontaneously begin to press into the supernatural realm to ease uncertainty.   The scripture teaches that “my people parish for a lack of knowledge” which relates a lack of knowledge with death, or at least the feeling of death.  As a result, when humans face unknowns, the innate response is to explore.  However, in the current national state of emergency, when we talk to friends…we find no real answers.  We search the internet, only to find confusion within polar opposite viewpoints.  Leaning on leaders seems to be fruitless as well, as we see the disunity emerging through “brother going against brother” (Matt. 10:12). 

As we observe important things unraveling around us, we feel powerless.  The state of powerlessness is one of the most damaging emotions that people experience. Powerlessness is not a God created condition for mankind.    This is why God provided scripture with messages to fill us with power.  Colossians 1:11 says “being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience”.  Ephesians 1:19 says “His incomparably great power for us who believe”.  1 Corinthians 2:5 says “so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.  Ephesians 3:16 says “He may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being”…and on and on it goes. 

“For you created my inmost being:  you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” (Ps. 139:13-14)

Christians are in the army of God!  Armies, by their very nature, are active!  God never expected us to be inactive, even when we are governed to stay quarantined.  He consistently encrypted scripture to demonstrate how we are to overcome powerlessness.  God is the Most High, the supreme power above all other powers.  In order for an individual to be powerful over a situation, he must be backed by a higher power than that of his opponent.  God is our heavenly father.  Because He is pure in love and long-suffering and doesn’t have evil within Him, he does NOT cause pain.  However, He never waste pain, either!  During times of uncertainty, God will strategically utilize maddening events to shift paradigms and reconstruct environments for a miracle to take place. 

As humans, we like our “norms”.  Typically, people move through rapid daily routines and neglect practicing spiritual reflection.  However, when things are moving too fast, or moving in the wrong direction, a natural implosion will occur.  What causes individuals to get uncomfortable is a crisis.  This disruption to norms creates uncertainty and the very nature of uncertainty creates environments for deep reflection. 

God did not desire for mankind to suffer, which is why He did not wire human capacity to endure much pain.  Pain, however, is the conduit for real change to occur.  Therefore, we don’t tend to change unless we become uncomfortable.  When pain occurs in God’s children, He knows that by design, humans will quickly make whatever changes required to get out of that pain.  This was God’s Design!

During this time of national crisis, we need to reach deep within ourselves to search what the spirit of God is wanting to change “for our good”!  Those who are able to seize this opportunity for change, must not fear, but rather fight through the shifting of the norm, in order to make the changes required for a new norm.  This takes inviting a spiritual view that is higher than the natural plain we are used of operating in. The first order of business must take place in changing our perspectives to things that are “above” rather than things that are “below” (Colossians 3:2).  Prayer is the facilitator that moves heaven’s agenda to earth’s manifestation.  Prayer is spiritually utilized as the shifting agent that calls things “from heaven to be done on earth” (Matt. 6:10).  However, for prayers to be effective in accomplishing such a broad task, we must first know…what is heaven’s agenda? 

The scripture says to “watch and pray” (Matt. 26:41). This passage instructs us to keenly observe our surroundings on earth, to know what to call down from heaven.  The scripture also tells us to “study to show ourselves approved”(2 Tim. 2:15).  We are required to research, educate ourselves and observe, in order to be aware of what is occurring around us.  As we become more observant, we will become more unsettled.  This uncertainty is the very tool that God will use to mobilize his people to secure things that are causing insecurity.  God desire for us is security within Him, having faith that “He will never leave us or forsake us” (Heb. 13:5).  In knowing that, you can activate the very role of the Holy Spirit as a “lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path”(Ps. 119:105).  Therefore, in engaging the Holy Spirit’s guidance, we can expect direction from God, who is “the way maker” (Isaiah 43:16), to show the pathway we are to take. 

Listening to God’s Spirit is often times more important than making request.  Learning to hear God’s voice and seeing the way He moves, is easier than you may think.  The scripture tells us “My sheep hear my voice, no other will they follow” (John 10:27).  During times of prayer/ meditation, ask God to speak to you on a matter and trust His voice (journaling the conversation is helpful).  He speaks deep within us in a “still small voice” (1 Kings 19:12).  The sound of His voice is peaceful and is filled with truth.  If God is desiring a change within you, he will reveal a truth that may be hard to confront, but it will be laced with sweet conviction and love.  The voices of clutter and distraction is of the enemy, so resist those voices (James 4:7) and dig deeper within you.  The scripture says “the deep calls to the deep” (Ps. 42:7), which means that the deep places within you will call upon the rich depth of God, your father.  This type of prayer will deepen your intimacy with God.  Many people doubt that they hear God’s voice and determine they are merely hearing their own inner voice.  The way to confront this issue is to recognize that if you were the one who had the question, you probably don’t have the answer.  So, if you receive an answer to your question, then it probably was not your inner voice.  Always “test the spirit” (1 John 4:1) to make sure it is congruent with scripture, because God will never go against His word (Ps. 89:34).  Also, watch for signs from God.  God will use all kinds of things to confirm what He is speaking to you.  However, this will require you to be present in the moments, aware, and noticing the little things.  God is Wisdom…He is Good…He is your Father, who loves YOU…and He is ACTIVE!     

WARRIOR’S WISDOM:

 TAKE A STEP BACK…AND RESET

 1. Observe your marital structure and pray for God to give wisdom on how to become more loving and unified.  Communicate it with your spouse.

2. Observe your family and pray for guidance on how to create more structure and cohesiveness.  Activate it.

3. Observe your career and ask God to show you creative ideas for effective strategizing.

4. Observe your mental, emotional, physical and spiritual health and ask God for directive steps for balance.  Plan your day.

5. Observe relationships and ask God to assist you to distance from those which are destructive and nurture those which are good.  PRAY for your friends.

6. Observe the nation-wide situation and ask God what direction to pray.

7. Ask God to specifically place upon you heart which leaders to pray for and what direction to pray.  Commit to pray that way.

8. Study the bible and discover the biblical signs as they relate to what is occurring globally.  Ask for God to have mercy.

9. Ask God for direction on the purpose and role He desires you to play as a spouse, parent, employer/employee and a citizen.  Write it down and commit to change.

10.  Pray for a closer, more intimate relationship with the Most High God of the universe. PRAISE HIM!

“My mouth is filled with your praise, declaring your splendor all day long.” (Ps. 71:8)

 “The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and he helps me.  My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. (Ps. 28:7)