A Study of an Unhealthy Marriage: Ananias and Sapphira

Ananais and Sapphira was a financially well off married couple.  The scriptures do not go into how they lived.  They never disclosed if she was a woman who was selfish or abused.  They as a couple, sold some property.  Her husband, Ananias decided that they were going to keep some of the money but claim to give the full amount to Peter.  Sapphira agreed to this deception.

The thing that I found so strange was that Ananais and Sapphira came to Peter separately.  For Peter had two different very short conversations with each of them.  To Ananias, he explained that this deception was unnecessary.  He did not have to sell his property.  He did not have to give all his money.  He could have honestly given whatever he freely wanted to give.  In this case, like Eve in the beginning, Satan tempted Ananias to lie to Peter.  Peter educated to all present that he did not lie to him but to God.  As we all know, Ananias immediately fell dead.

Now it was Sapphira's turn, in three hours she showed up--three hours!   They did not come together with this deception.  I wonder why it took three hours to go to Peter.  Was she conflicted in telling the man of God a lie?  Was she busy doing something else at home? We have no idea.  All I know is that in God's infinite wisdom, he was giving this woman a chance to tell the truth about her household.  If her husband was there, she would have possibly feared that angry look he gives whenever he is unhappy.  Was she just as greedy and deceptive as her husband or did she fear her husband more than God?  Peter asked her directly if this was the price "You and your husband received for the land?"  She responded with a yes.  Peter then reprimanded her verbally by saying how can "ye (you) have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord?"  She was then punished with the 'same' fate as her husband.

This story has shown me that in order to live for God, we need to live in truth and not fear what man may do to us.  In these last and evil days, we must stand up for what is right.  Even if it is standing up against family, children, spouses, and friends.  You may feel alone but you must know that this may be a test.   We MUST know in our heart and mind that we are never alone in Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World.  Because of him, we are able to freely and with power live an honest and upright life.

A Study of a difficult marriage: Nabal and Abigail

Nabal and Abigail
We begin  knowing that Nabal was a wealthy man.  It doesn't link Abigail as wealthy just Nabal.  The Bible names all of his property that has created his wealth status.   The Bible also tells us how these two married people are.  It first states that Abigail is sensible (with good understanding) and beautiful.  On the other hand, her husband Nabal is mean and dishonest.  We can assume that they did not have a good marriage.  We also know that at this time that it was not easy for a woman to leave her husband.  She was basically bound until his death.  There is no mention of her having children at this time.  It is safe to say that she was very unhappy in this marriage. 
In short, David protects Nabal's flock from enemies or predators therefore increasing his wealth status for that year.  David sends a servant to let Nabal know of how his situation of protection occurred.  Nabal dismisses David through his servant with an insult and David plans an attack on  Nabal's entire household.  This attack however is intercepted by the wisdom and intelligence of Abigail. 
Abigail is a smart young woman, and it can be assumed that she is respected and loved by Nabal's servants.  For Nabal's servants run to alert Abigail of Nabal's response to David's servant.  They view her not just as a woman but a very intelligent woman that can help this entire household.  She must live a godly and honest life.  Nabal's servant  daily observes a woman full of wisdom and integrity.  These servants could have run away and flee, but they had confidence that Abigail would know what to do.  Amazing! 
As we  read, Abigail runs to David, with food and supplies ahead of her, and alerts David of her husband's foolish behavior.  She tells David the truth and has confidence that God will quickly judge her husband himself.  Abigail  tells David that there is no need for David's vengence.  God will have vengence on her husband, she is confident of this and there is no need to interfere with God's plan.  The insight of young Abigail!  She knows the law and commandments of God.  Her only other request to David is for him to remember her after God administers the fatal judgement to her husband.
What happens next when Abigail gets home blows my mind.  She is not quick to speak.  She is patient and wise enough to wait until her husband is in a certain state to let him know what had transpired between David and herself.  She told Nabal when he was sober, and that was when God administered his judgement of sickness and death.
Did Abigail pray for God to deliver her from this man?  Did she know that her redemption was here when Nabal's servant told her folly of her husband?  I think she prayed and realized that her deliverance was here when  her husband disrespected and insulted the wrong man, David.
Living for God will be very hard at times.  We may be in a certain situation where we feel trapped unable to freely use our talent, intelligence, or gift.  But we must be ready when God tells us it's time for our deliverance from that situation.  It may be a very demanding and demeaning job.  It may be a marriage where there is physical, mental, or financial abuse.  It may be a relationship with a family member or friend that you are trying to get out of.  We have to not take things in our own hands.  We MUST continue to live honestly, godly, and full of integrity.  There is a saying that I love, 'you must live a life to where if someone tells a lie about you, no one will believe it.'
We must believe that we can give our life to God to where he will constantly perfect it and make us stronger.  He will guide us to all manner of truth.  We are limited and subject to mistakes and ruin, but God never makes mistakes.  He loves us and knows our end.  We must know and trust that truth.

The Absolute Necessity to Study the Word of God

This year, we had a conference on 'Women walking Into their Purpose' (April 30, 2016).
We all have different purposes in life.  We also do have two main purposes.  This is to live godly (to live for christ) and in our own way bring souls to Christ. 

Having children helped me understand and see the love and purpose of Jesus Christ in my life.  My children know that I love them.  I tell them all the time.   They know that they can come to their father and me for anything.  They can get a hug, food, snacks, information, and many other things.  They trust us.  On that same note, they fear their father and me.  If they break or disobey an order, lie, cheat, or steal, they fear the punishment that we are going to give.  
God is our father.  We trust him.  We know he loves us and provides everything we need.  Yet, I don't think we fear him enough as our father.  We still care too much of what this life has to offer.  We will be with our heavenly father one day.  Why don't we fear God.  We must know that judgement  will come if we are not obedient to His WORD.  We must study and learn his Word just like our children study and learn how to follow the rules to live in this world.   In the Word of God, we have learned and are learning  the many pitfalls, traps, and  dangers that will convince us to fall or go away from God's love and mercy.
Leaving off at 2 Corinthians 5, we find that we are and will struggle with the limitations, temptations, and weaknesses of our bodies.  We MUST know that these bodies are temporal.  They are not forever.  If we follow the Word of God, we WILL get new eternal bodies.  These bodies will lure us to be slothfulness, wanting to give up, or to live in the moment without thinking about the consequences and judgement of our actions.  We should focus on what it tells us in 2 Cor. 5.  The more we feel the weariness of these bodies, the more we need to be confident that this is not our home.  We need not to get fustrated or discouraged.  God has made these bodies to weaken with age.  This is to HELP us know that we serve a UNLIMITED God that will provide us a heavenly body that will never feel pain, sorrow, disappointment, fatigue, and many other burdens. 
Matthew 6 teaches us that we need to be genuine, unselfish, honest and generous.  We cannot be these things if we are just looking for accolades or a pat on the back.  If the Lord puts a work or a deed in our hearts, we should not  analyze and think about what we will get out of it.  We must do it.  We need to pray genuinely, unselfishly, honestly, and generously.  We should only try to please God.
1 Corinthians 10 shows how honoured and grateful I am that the Lord came to the Gentiles to offer his plan of salvation to us.  In Genesis, God chose Abraham and his seeds to be his chosen people.  These people were to show the omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience of God.  How? This power was shown by the plagues in Egypt, the deliverance out of Egypt, and the journey of his people in the wilderness from Egypt.  The children of Egypt should have unwaveringly believed in the power of God.  On the other hand, they doubted him and did one of the most offensive things to God, murmured and complained.  In this scripture, Paul warns us strongly to not do as what these people did.  He urges us to see what God's people had done in the wilderness and warns us of the propensity of us now as children of God to do the same.  Don't think you can be strong alone without the omnipotence of God.  If you don't recognize the power of God, we will fall in the SAME sin.  We must be careful in what we do on a daily basis.  Somethings may be allowed but it not helpful or necessary.  We need to make sure that in our daily and constant communication with God we are doing things that are necessary and helpful.
James 1 is so obvious in instructing us what we need to do in order to please the Lord and live for him.  Believe, have faith, and DO NOT WAVER in Christ.  Keeping the commandments of God seems overwhelming at times but we must realize that he has given us a way that we can follow that will help us in this walk.  We all CAN be like Solomon.  We can ask for wisdom and he will freely give it.  Don't think this walk is an impossible walk.  We can easily be what Jesus Christ wants us to be.  We just have to be QUICK to LISTEN and slow to speak.  This tongue can make this walk worthless.  We must study the Word to live for him and thus be more like him.
Romans 8, like in James helps us realize that Jesus has not left us alone here.  We may feel physically and mentally alone but we are not alone.  The enemy will try to convince our minds that we are lonely, powerless, condemned, forever flawed, forever broken, and so on.  In this chapter, it first tells us that there is NO CONDEMNATION for those who belong to Christ.  The definition of condemned is to judge someone guilty of a crime.  We are not guilty, Christ and no one else, has paid the price for our sins.   For the power of the life giving Holy Spirit has freed us.  We are not like those living under the Law.   We were bound to this flesh.  We, with our own limited energy and Will had to try not to sin.  And it was our nature to sin, we were born into sin.  But Christ with his infinite love and mercy, gave us a way where we can obtain help and be comforted  not to sin.  We are VICTORIOUS because of his Holy Ghost and the Word of God.  We are so fortunate and blessed beyond measure.  We can now have an intimate relationship with God through his Word.