marriage Archives - Dreaming Beneath the Spires

On Not Despising Deliverance

“Do not despise prophecy,” the Apostle Paul says, somewhat surprisingly.

Why would we despise it? Because we tend to suspect what we do not understand? Or because prophecy can attract fools, charlatans, the unstable, and conmen seeking to gain power over others—as well as, of course, those who can genuinely tune into God?

I no longer despise prophecy because of personal experiences with those who genuinely had the gift of prophecy.

* * *

What about deliverance ministries? In the first church I attended as a Christian, in a small American town in the South, an individual gained power by labelling everything untoward as a curse or demon-caused–infertility, miscarriages, ear pain, a fear of flying–and exorcizing people. He offered to baptise me to mark my adult commitment to Christ, and when I spontaneously resisted total immersion (I was afraid, having only learnt to swim as an adult) he halted the baptism for an exorcism. (But I remained nervous!)

Eventually that person left the church, taking the best tithers with him, and founded his own church, heavily based around deliverance—a spiritually unbalanced church which, fortunately, did not survive

So I had question marks about deliverance.

* * *

Around that time, however, I picked up a book by Billy Graham, which surprisingly claimed that 90% of Christians are “demonized,” (as opposed to possessed). A dark power, what Paul calls, “evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, mighty powers in this dark world, and spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places,” controlled aspects of their lives. They were not entirely free when it came to their inability to forgive, perhaps; their out-of-control spending, addiction to sugar, alcohol, porn, anxiety, or negative thoughts.

* * *

What happens in deliverance? Someone with greater faith or spiritual authority uses their faith to expel dark powers from areas of your life. Uses their intimacy with God to implore God’s protection, a hedge, a strong tower in that area of your life.

You find freedom. Your sleep becomes deeper and more restful.

* * *

I have been married for 26 years. Anger used to be an issue in our marriage, and we’d get all histrionic and historical, and have time-wasting fights. And since life was short, I no longer wanted to waste time on stupid fights. I wanted to use wisdom and intelligence, stepping back, thinking rationally about the issues, acting using my mind and spirit, not my agitated emotions.

I eventually decided no more. No more fights. I have had enough. I will act with wisdom. It takes two to fight, and I will not be one of the two.

In the Old Testament, people marked important junctures of their lives— a major decision, an encounter with God–by building stone pillars. I wanted to mark my decision. When I visited a worship festival which had a deliverance ministry, I signed up for one on one prayer. The prayer minister was not slick, or well-educated. He called the little area of my life which was out of self-control and Spirit-control “a critter.” He prayed with me to expel it. I sighed and sighed as I physically felt relief, sensed something leaving, something generational, felt a huge sense of relief, lightness and freedom.

Harriet Lerner calls marriage the dance of intimacy. If one partner had strong emotions they cannot process, they can press their partner’s buttons, and start a fight. So they get to avoid dealing with their own discomfort. Eventually, couples get addicted to the adrenalin of anger.

After prayer, I found less anger in myself. I might yell a little, and then find I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t summon up the anger, the passion. I realised that to act out would be acting like a fool.

It was as if God had erected a hoop, an invisible boundary around me that I could not cross. I was experiencing the paradoxical freedom of being possessed by God’s spirit… I did not have to retaliate, angry word for angry word, historical accusation for accusation, all that foolishness. I could be still and quiet and write. I could go for a run. I could have a nap.

* * *

The other deliverance was equally astonishing. I was having coffee with a Christian friend, a woman a couple of years older than me, whom I respect and like for many things…her love for people, her spiritual wisdom, her warm heart, her bounciness and cheerfulness. And, since as Thoreau says, “Every man is the builder of a temple called his body to the god he worships,” I admire her too for her body; she’s all muscle. She swims, plays tennis, and runs half-marathons, faster than most men. I once did a run with her, and she did 3 miles in the time I did one. Oh well!

My friend asked, “So how are you really?” And I said, “It is well-ish with my soul, but…” (choose the path of humility, Anita, I said to myself) “I have been told to lose weight for my health and immune system, and, well, I haven’t been hugely successful.”

And then she told me a story I would never have guessed at. This slim attractive woman had been a binge-eater in her twenties. She binged, then purged, so that though she had been twenty pounds overweight, nobody guessed at her secret sin. But she knew. And she could not break her addiction to binges. One day, she cried out to the Lord in her distress, and, she said the only way she could describe it was—she was delivered. She no longer binge-ate; she got a job which required physical activity, and for her to be at her goal weight, and, within the year, she was.

I sighed, and knew that this was a moment for humility. This was a moment of destiny. So I said with simple intensity, “Will you pray for me to be delivered?”

She prayed. Listening to someone pray I can often tell whether they have entered the Throne-room, whether they have connected with God, and, often, I can intuitively tell if the prayer will be answered.

I knew I had been delivered from an addiction to food. I had to wait to see whether the deliverance would work out as the blind man was healed, first by seeing men like trees walking, and then seeing them clearly.

* * *

My daughters noticed the change first. We were on holiday in Tuscany, which has some of the best comfort food on the planet, morish food which releases addictive dopamine, and I found myself eating some of my spaghetti alle vongole, spaghetti and clams; linguine gamberetti, zucchini e zafferano, linguine with shrimp, zucchini, and saffron; spaghetti carbonara; or ravioli with spinach and ricotta, noticing that I was full, and then offering tastes to anyone who wanted them. “Mum, whatever diet you are on, we like it,” Zoe said.

But I was not on a diet. I had begun to find it physically difficult to continue eating once I was full! There was a force within me, reminding me to stop once I had had enough.

The Spirit is a remind-er, Jesus says, an internal reminder, bringing things to our remembrance.

* * *

And then I returned home, and would reach for a snack, and Someone, a kindly Someone, asked, “Anita, are you hungry?” And I would say, “No, but I am sad. I am bored. I am agitated. I am stressed; I am feeling hyper. I need a snack to help me settle down before I write. I need a reward after I write. I need a snack to help me transition between two activities.”

And the Spirit would say, “Ask Jesus to fill your Spirit.”

I would remember: I could ask the Holy Spirit to possess my spirit. Or I could eat a bar of chocolate. I prayed; desire for the stress-relieving snack receded. (And sometimes I succumbed. Sometimes, you see men like trees walking before you see clearly.)

It kept happening. Someone would say something sharp or cross or stressful, and my blood sugar would plunge, and I would think, “I need chocolate. I need a slice of fruit cake.” And then I would think, “Anita, you are not hungry. Might the Holy Spirit do it? Invite him in.”

Voila, 100 calories saved.

I realised that I was rarely physically hungry, so much so that I almost wondered if I were getting ill again, but then I truly skipped a meal, and real hunger returned.

When I was hungry, Someone kept reminding me to ask, “Anita, what will bless your body?” And I would basically cook up a skillet of vegetables, toss in some shrimp or fish, and some noodles or brown rice or pasta. Good for my family, good for me.

And freedom too, to eat the odd bit of chocolate, the odd slice of pizza…

Simple changes, prompted by the Spirit’s reminders: Don’t eat when you are not hungry. Stop eating when you are not hungry. Choose what will bless your body.

I stepped on the scale today. A cumulative weight loss of 24 pounds, the easiest ones after that prayer. (I have more to lose, of course, but, by the grace of Jesus, want to keep my eyes on Him through the process).

Thoughts on my Twenty-Fifth Wedding Anniversary

By Anita Mathias

So Roy and I have been married for 25 years.

It’s customary to dispense advice on such occasions, but I have little to give.

The things that have worked for us have evolved slowly. And conversely, some advice from the marriage books—“Always go to the bed at the same time,” have wasted time.

* * *

Barbara Brown Taylor made famous the question, “What is saving your life right now?”

Well, here are some things that are saving our marriage.

1 Getting a weekly cleaner. Oh yes!

2 The weekly date. Or perhaps a walk together several times a week.

3 Deciding that throwing things is a very expensive way of resolving an argument.

4 Forgiveness. A mental act of balancing. I know Roy would do most things for me, within reason, and often without reason, and when I am very angry, I place that against my reason for rage!!

I remember that I have committed to love him, and that my discipleship of Christ isn’t worth much, if I can’t love the person who loves me most.

5 Travel. Ah, travel! Travel saves our marriage (a FACT hotly disputed by my other half!)

It gives us time to be together, to see new art and architecture, to experience history, to revel in nature, to eat new foods, and laugh at (and with) new people.

It’s time out that we’d be unlikely to take at home, given our busy-bee, workaholic driven natures.

Travel is a major source of happiness, as is our garden.

6 Learning that not every criticism needs to be voiced. I now quietly think, “My, isn’t he being annoying!!” For perhaps the first twenty years, I’d declare, “Roy, you are being very annoying!” Now I roll my eyes, and return to work.

Okay, I guess most people learnt this in kindergarten, but in many ways, I am a late developer!

In fact, much of this probably sounds so blindingly obvious to any mature adult that if you stop reading right now, I’ll forgive you!

7 Me, I increasingly do life by prayer, but for years I omitted to pray faithfully for Roy, and I often still forget. Mea Culpa, and I repent.

8 When our partner felt far too infuriating for any rational adult to endure, we got help, separately, and together, from some superb Christians. We are specially grateful to our dear friend Paul Miller, author of the excellent A Praying Life for discipling us over five years.

* * *

When Ruth, spunky wife of Billy Graham, was asked if she had ever contemplated divorce, she famously said, ‘Divorce? No! Murder? Yes.’

Divorce wasn’t an option for us, either. Ah, we’ve sat in exhaustion, sighed, and said brightly, “Let’s–get–divorced!!” and grinned happily and, in that instant, it seemed as if with that act all our problems would waft away, especially what seemed like our biggest problem: each other.

But then Roy remembered that I probably would get lost on the way to the grocery store or burn my dinner, and I thought he would let the house get SO messy and lose everything in it, while he played chess all day, and he thought I would be crushed by life’s practicalities, and I thought he would get too sad without me and live on oatmeal.

And so we checked the name of our marriage certificates, discovered that apparently we were married to the right person, and so we continued.

And our marriage has got better year after year.

And so it should, so it should, for Christians, who if they are half-way, quarter-way decent at following Christ should be growing each year in mercy, pity, peace and love.

***

At our wedding, the celebrant outlined all we had going for us. We were highly educated, with Oxbridge undergraduate degrees and US advanced degrees, intelligent enough, young, healthy, with at least one profession between us.

But we had liabilities too: intensity; type-A personalities; drivenness; hot, hot tempers… In many ways, we were too like each other.

We’ve had adventures. Married in Binghamton, NY; a year in Cornell, Ithaca, New York for a post-doc for Roy; another year at Stanford, Palo Alto, California another post-doc; and then two years in Minneapolis, Minnesota yet another post-doc; then 12 years at The College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia where Roy became a professor of mathematics, and then Roy won a prestigious mathematical prize and the world opened up, and there were job offers, and he was a visiting professor at the University of Manchester, and then at Oxford, and then got a chair at the University of Birmingham.

And I wrote, moving from poetry to prose, and then improbably started a business which within 3 years grew too big and too complex for me to run alone.

“20 years is far too long to be a mathematician.” I said, and Roy frowned.

Nah, I never saw the point of maths, just as he never saw the point of poetry…

And Roy quit maths to run the company I founded, morphing from a mathematician to an entrepreneur—something I can definitely see the point of!!–and I morphed from a poet to a memoirist and a blogger, writing about us on the world wide web, no doubt much to Roy’s embarrassment.

Our hair was black; now, there are shades of grey.

We were barely Christian; now we are thoroughly Christian. Yeah, we’ve come a long way, baby!

We’ve had two daughters, Zoe and Irene, happy and clever.

We’ve owned three homes in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Williamburg, Virginia, and Oxford, England (not at the same time).

We’ve had five dogs in the course of our marriage, all from rescues, except our current adorable, but not yet fully-trained Merry the Labradoodle.

We’ve travelled in so many countries. Too many to count, and we can’t, since we don’t know where our old passports are. (We’ve each changed citizenship three times, India-US-UK for me, and NZ-US-UK for Roy.) But let me try: Israel, Japan, Mexico, Costa Rica, New Zealand, Czech Republic, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Holland, Greece, Spain, Italy, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Malta, Luxembourg, oh most European countries…

Too much travel. Probably!

* * *

Marriage is a place of belonging and acceptance. It can also be a purifying fire, a place of rapid growing up, of growth in grace, in mercy, in forgiveness and wisdom

And what comes out of the purifying fire?

Eventually gold refined until impurities vanish.

The gold of a long marriage.

* * *

Sometimes at the end of a marathon, while the completers are savouring their iced lemonade and smuggery, and the cheers have almost died down, you see a couple emerging from the mist, arms draped around each other, staggering towards the finish line.

There they are, they have done it, they have limped their marathon, they have hobbled, but they have completed it.

And here they are, ridiculously grinning, so pleased with themselves, quite oblivious of the fact that others have long finished and are now napping at home.

And that too is success of the kind. The success of persisting.

Ah, see them now, the big smile on their faces. Against the odds they’ve finished that race, they’ve kept the faith, they are ready for the next marathon.

So Happy Twenty-fifth Anniversary, Roy. Happy Twenty-fifty Anniversary Me. Happy Twenty-fifty anniversary, Us.

* * *

Tweetables

What’s saving your marriage right now? Thoughts on my 25^th wedding anniversary from @anitamathias1

Lessons learned from 25 years of marriage from @anitamathias1

A Beautiful Train Wreck into Grace

By Anita Mathias

Sometimes, my tongue runs away with me, and I use my words to express anger and frustration rather than bestow grace and life, and those words steal life and strength rather than lavish them,

And I see the red flag of Jesus at the level crossing of my heart, and am stopped dead in my tracks.

But sometimes, I don’t stop, don’t listen to Jesus, and am out of control, a train rushing on…

I might eat whatever is quick and easy or delicious, rather than whatever is a blessing to my body.

Or my husband and I go on the attack

And there we go, rushing on, rushing on, knowing that no good can come from expressing runaway emotions, knowing that what one sows, one reaps…

On and on, we rush, speaking carelessly, smashing past the level crossing, speeding towards the onrushing train of consequences, heading for a crash.

And that’s when I understand grace.

For what I sow I should reap, right?

But that was before Jesus came.

* * *

My train hurtles on,

I drive recklessly, blinded by anger, negativity and despair

And Jesus sees that I am going to crash.

He steps in.

And still my train hurtles headlong; I am out of control. If I reap the consequences of everything I have sown, terrible things will happen.

But Jesus absorbs the crash in himself.

And I crash into grace; I crash into Jesus.

I am redeemed.

My marriage is redeemed

My mothering is redeemed.

Because of the grace Jesus died to give me.

Because of grace.

* * *

He keeps me on track, keeps my marriage on track,

Keeps me on the rails

Because he absorbed the impact at Calvary,

Of all this foolish, headlong sin.

Oh, I trust grace,

I trust mercy.

* * *

If the world were governed by dreary cause and effect,

And a woman could reap only what she sows,

Lord, who could stand?

But you stand between us and inexorable consequences

For this too we revere you.

For it’s not a mere mechanical world of crime and punishment.

It is a world of miracles.

It is the world of Jesus where he lives.

It is a world where Jesus stands in front of us,

Absorbs the impact of our bullet trains

Speeding at a million miles an hour towards self-destruction

He is smashed,

Rises,

And in that resurrection is hope.

For the risen Jesus now lives in me, restraining me

Helping me die to my wild self, making ever more room for the risen Jesus in me.

Helping me bear “in my body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in my body,” (2 Cor. 4:10).

* * *

Lord, sharpen my eyesight

Help me to see your red flags in time,

To repent in time

And when I do not,

When I crash,

Let me crash into grace!

The seventy times seventh chance,

The four hundred and ninetieth chance,

The infinite chances you lavish on me in the land of the living,

Grace for the asking,

The Holy Spirit for the asking,

Because you love me.

Have you experienced the inexplicable grace and goodness of God when you least expected it?

The Best Two Word Definition of Love

By Anita Mathias

There was a prophetically poignant moment in the otherwise fairytale romance of Prince Charles and Lady Diana.

Interviewer: Are you in love?

Diana, instantly, “Of course.”

Charles, qualifying, “Whatever in love means.”

Probably every marriage goes through “Do you love each other?” “Of course.” “Whatever love means…” seasons.

And then it helps to remember the best definition of love I know: Love Does. It is not just a feeling, an abstract noun, but a verb.

So, this Valentine’s Day week, I have been considering what Love Does, and how to make tiny changes in my relationship with Roy.

Well, a walking date together each week, and I will help clear the dishes after meals. Normally, he has been doing that while I deal with the email, tweets, Facebook messages and blog comments which have invariably accumulated during the meal. Yeah, social media is time-consuming!! And so is love!

Where 90% of marital problems begin (according to my pastor)

By Anita Mathias

About a decade ago, Roy and I presented ourselves for marital counselling with the very busy senior pastor of the mega-church we attended in Williamsburg, Virginia.

He had a three session rule. He’d solved your problem in three sessions, if he could, and then decide whether to embark on extended counseling with you, or refer you elsewhere.

And so, we described the presenting issues. Well, very soon dishes, and laundry and shopping and cooking and childcare and cleaning and who did them entered our conversation.

And he asked “How is your sex life?”

Sex?

Give me a break. We had come because we each secretly hoped that the other would agree to do more of the dishes and laundry and shopping and cooking and cleaning and childcare. What did sex have to do with it?

And then said, “90 percent of problems in marriage begin in the bedroom with an unsatisfactory sex life.

But, alas, sex is only ten percent of the solution, since you can’t spend your lives in bed.”

We stared hard, again.

He was a very proper Southern gentleman. And he wasn’t kidding.

Well, we had three sessions.

* * *

And ten years later, I have come to the reluctant conclusion that he was right.

Only A Like Button

By Anita Mathias

I was musing aloud to Roy, clarifying my thoughts through the process of talking as many extroverts do, when, suddenly, he contradicted me. What? Contradicted the truest truth. “Don’t contradict me before hearing me out, Roy,” I said crossly.

“Don’t you wish I were your Facebook with only a Like Button?” he rejoined.

The Law Simply Does not Work. In Marriage or Elsewhere. We need Grace!

By Anita Mathias

In the story of Eden, God gave Adam and Eve all the trees of the garden as food. Except, except–the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

And which tree which was the most attractive to them? And irresistible? And eaten?

That is the way of the law. It makes doing what you are not supposed to, and not doing what you are supposed to, most tempting.

It simply does not work.

Like many couples who have been married for nearly 24 years, Roy and I have had a bit of counselling. The less competent counsellors have tried the law. Made lists. Anita will do this, Roy will do this.

Human societies, after all, are based on ground rules, contracts, predictabilities. There is something to that.

But once the law is imposed, and each has their To Do and Don’t List, guess what happens? I personally have never been able to keep to these contracts imposed on me for a whole week. (Though I can be a perfect angel for an hour or two, let me add!).

The law, rules, simply does not work in relationships.

And so, when one simple law didn’t work, God hedged the ancient Israelites in with The Law. Whole books of it. Leviticus, Deuteronomy. Oh incredible tedium.

And could they keep it?

One purpose of the law was to teach man that we could not keep laws, that we need a saviour.

And so, God found a new way.

Jesus came and gave it all, freely, in grace. And asked us to give him our all.

A new model for marriage. Grace, kindness without strings or bartering.

The law and rules will not work long time in marriage just as they did not work for Israel. Grace is what lubricates relationships.

God help us, and Jesus, give us your grace, and teach us grace!

In which I discover that if you hire your spouse, you cannot so easily fire them.

By Anita Mathias

Hot tip to all small business owners.

DO NOT hire your spouse.

Roy just made a really stupid, and somewhat costly, mistake, and when I told him off in no uncertain terms, just stood there, grinning happily from ear to ear, as if he had done the greatest thing in the world.

” Well then, fire me,” he said.

And double my workload?

No way! I fumed, and growled; he had won that round.