Your Flesh Or Mine?

Help Me, I'm Married!
by Joyce Meyer

(Page 2 of 2)

If two people are to become one flesh, as God frequently repeats in His Word, it was obvious that one of us was going to have to make some changes. It seemed right to me at the time that Dave was the one who needed amendments.

When Dave and I were first married, we already had David, then I became pregnant with Laura a few months later. She was born in April 1968, and we were married in January of 1967. Then eighteen months later, we had Sandy. With three kids, we lived in a three-room apartment. There was just a living room, one bedroom, and the kitchen. The apartment was part of a four-family flat. Everyone else who lived there was quite a bit older than us.

We had one car and hardly any money. Dave went to work every day, and I stayed home with the kids. The first place we lived had mice. I was seven months pregnant with Laura, and mice were all over the house. I think that in one day we caught seventeen mice.

One time I called Dave to tell him that I had a mouse tied up in the bathroom. I had thrown a plunger over the mouse, tied a rope around the bathroom doorknob, strung the rope across the hall to a closet, and from there tied it around the bedpost. It took Dave half an hour to get my barricade unraveled. By the time he reached the plunger, that baby mouse had died and was on its back with all four feet stuck up in the air.

When I was in the hospital with Laura, Dave decided we should move out of our five-room apartment into the three-room flat to save money. The rent for the apartment where we had been living was ninety-five dollars a month, and the rent at the three-room flat, about sixty-five dollars a month. Without telling me anything about it, Dave moved all our things to the three-room apartment. Can you imagine how furious I was when Dave took me home from the hospital to a different, and smaller, apartment? After all, we had finally caught all the mice, or had become used to the ones that remained! He says now that he knew I would be mad, but since I was mad all the time anyway, he didn't think this would make any difference!

The new apartment had roaches. There was one that was so big we decided to name him Harvey When I sat up in the middle of the bed at night to feed Laura, Harvey would come flying around the corner. I was petrified of him, and at the sight of him I would go into a screaming fit! Then after screaming from seeing Harvey I'd start yelling at Dave for moving us to that stupid place. Dave finally caught Harvey, and after failing to successfully set him on fire with lighter fluid, he delivered the lively pest to his sister, who had lived there previously and talked him into moving there in the first place.

The neighborhood where we lived was small. There was a dime store on the corner, a bakery a grocery store, a little confectionery, and a beauty shop across the street. I never went anywhere beyond that neighborhood. Every Friday I'd walk across the street and get my hair done, and the rest of the time I stayed locked up with the kids. I was trying to baby-sit to make extra money, but I was the last person in the world who needed to baby-sit-I was on the edge myself!

But even in the midst of all that, we had a certain amount of fun. It wasn't all a nightmare and crazy, but it was the right setting for chaos and trials. Dave was always good to me and he tried to make me lighten up. He'd go to the grocery store with me, walk over into the next aisle and throw things over the top of the shelves at me! Then he would chase me around with the grocery cart until I became upset with him. Whatever he did, Dave was determined to have fun.

I had never been allowed to have fun when I was growing up. I was very insecure and felt as though everyone was inspecting me. Because I thought nobody really liked me, I acted as though I didn't need anybody-like I didn't care. Yet down deep inside, I really did care and tried to be what I thought others expected of me. But because I wasn't at peace with myself, the process of becoming one with Dave had a rough start.

I entered our marriage feeling as though each of us was out for ourself. Dave would do what was best for him, and I would do what was best for me. If Dave watched football on Sunday when I wanted to do something else, I felt that he wasn't interested in me. My thoughts nagged me with repeated agonies, You don't care about me; you are not taking care of me.

And I regularly had temper tantrums. When Dave watched football on Sundays, I cleaned the house, slamming and banging things around to make noise so that he could tell I was angry. I dragged the vacuum sweeper around while having a pity party, then went into the back bathroom to cry. With all my carrying on, I was trying to get him to do what I wanted. That kind of behavior is what I now call “emotional manipulation.”

I did this so many times that Dave became immune to my noise. He watched the ball game because he knew I was going to throw a fit anyway. Sometimes he played with the kids when he knew I was mad at him. They would be on the floor with the kids putting rollers in Dave's hair, all oblivious to my demand for attention. When you are hopping mad and obviously are not affecting anybody, it just drives you crazy.

I was always looking for worth in what I did. Even where I worked, I tried to climb the corporate ladder. And in church I tried to be in with the right groups and the head of this and the head of that. Of course, I did have a natural leadership personality, but my personality was so messed up that I wanted all this stuff for the wrong reasons. I wasn't trying to serve God; I was searching for ways to look important. My struggles to do good things were just for “appearances” from a works mentality, and my sarcastic mouth was not working to help me get what I really wanted.

About six years into our marriage, I nearly exhausted Dave's patience. He was always the optimist, always trying to help me look beyond my situation. But I couldn't understand why my efforts to manipulate him weren't working, and, of course, our sex life was messed up from all my anger. Finally one day Dave said, “You know, Joyce, you just about have me to the point where I can hardly stand you.” And he added, “The only thing I can tell you is if you continue the way you are, I cannot guarantee you a hundred percent what I'll end up doing.” His comments put the fear of God in me to seriously look at the value I placed on Dave and our marriage.

All during this time, we were going to church. I really loved God. I was born again and knew that I would go to heaven when I died. But I wasn't Spirit-filled. Dave was an elder in the church, and I was on the church board. We went out every week, knocked on doors for the evangelism program and told people about Jesus. We were seen as leaders in the church. We were living the pretend life, but behind closed doors, it was another whole world and existence.

I needed real answers from a real God. Of course I wanted the answers real fast, too. But one of the first things I learned was that happiness doesn't come from doing the right thing for the wrong reason. You can't do what's right to get something right to happen to you. You have to do what's right just because it's right. Then God will reward you. If your motive is, “OK, I'm going to do this to get you to change, but if you don't change, then eventually I'll quit doing it,” we will never enjoy the reward that comes from God. He sees our heart and knows whether we are trying to manipulate others or obey Him purely out of love for Him alone.

Dave wanted me to change, and I wanted him to change. But I had to reach the point of knowing that I had to do what was right whether or not Dave ever changed. Even if he played golf every Saturday and watched football every Sunday for the rest of his life, I had to reach the point of acting right no matter what Dave did.

It's amazing how God changes things. Dave wanted to play golf recently when I had some other things I wanted him to do with me. He countered me with, “Well, you can do those things by yourself.”

I said, “I'd really rather that you go with me. ”

He said, “OK.”

Fifteen years ago, he wouldn't have done that. I nagged him and was mad all the time, and he had learned to ignore me. But now, most of the time he can go do what he wants, and it's not a problem. But if once in a while I want him to do something different with me, he has the freedom to choose to be with me. He knew I wouldn't be mad at him if he really wanted to play golf, but he also knew that it must be important to me to want him with me this time or I wouldn't have asked him.

Bottom line, if he would have said, “No, I really want to play golf on Friday,” then I would have said, “OK, then I'm going to go pick out the things we need for the house, and you will need to trust my decisions.” And he would have agreed.

The same conditions still exist that used to bring separation and strife between us, but they no longer have the divisive effect on us. We've learned to be honest with our feelings without threatening each other's security. We've learned to find the right time to confront each other with the issues that used to throw us into opposite corners of the ring.

Dave and I learned to love each other, and out of our love a worldwide ministry was birthed. It was never my goal to start a huge ministry; I was just loving God and trying to learn to love Dave because that was what God was asking me to do. God has made big changes in our lives.

We learned to be good stewards when we were paying the sixty-five dollars a month rent we needed for our apartment. Today God provides all the funds needed each month for a world outreach. I share this with you only to show you the vast expanse of God's ability to take plain, common, and ordinary people like Dave and me through gigantic steps of faith.

I was a housewife with a twelfth grade education, making my bed in a town nobody ever heard of, Fenton, Missouri, when God called me to do this. I was not looking for some big ministry; I was trying to survive sexual abuse, failed relationships, a messed up mind, and messed up emotions. But I loved God.

It's amazing what God will do for you if you just love Him. We complicate Christianity to the point of losing the joy of our salvation. The primary thing we need to do is receive the love of God, learn how to love ourselves in a balanced way, love God back, and then let that love flow through us to the world full of hurting, dying people.

God will give back to us not only what we give away but will also give us a great deal of joy with it. The world is full of rich people who have “things” but are miserable. It's good to be materially prosperous, but it's even better to be happy and biblically blessed along with prosperity

The doors that God has opened for us amaze us. I can't figure it out, but I am determined that as long as I can breathe, I will keep walking through them in trying to help as many people receive God's joy in their lives as I can. Our society today is in a major, major, major mess, and people don't realize that they need God!

So many people have an impression of God that is just not true, and they don't know to turn to Him to solve their problems. God called Dave and me to a ministry in which we can show the world an exciting God Who is fun, generous, wonderful, and Who can solve their problems. We receive thousands of letters confirming that our simple message of trusting God by doing what He says to do is getting through to people.

One woman who wrote me said that she'd been living with a man for fifteen years. They weren't married; they had an eight-year-old son; they were drug addicts and they both had been abused in their childhood. She ran away from home when she was fifteen. She wrote:

We believed in God, but we lived in sin. One morning, I came across [your television program] Life In The Word. I don't even know why I stopped to watch you. But I began to watch you every morning as I cleaned my house, and I felt like you were talking directly to me.

Now I get up every day looking forward to watching Life In The Word. I watch you first, then I read my Bible, then I pray. Me and my boyfriend and our son started attending the same church that I went to when I was young. We both got saved two weeks ago. Joyce, we gave up drugs and we are getting married next month.

I wanted to let you know that you reached me and helped me and my family turn our lives around. Please continue doing what you are doing.

When Dave and I read the next sentence, we both stood in our bedroom and cried. She said,

Now our son will be raised in church by Christians and not by drug addicts.

There are many people like her who believe in God, but live in sin. Christianity is not just a trip to the altar to say the sinner's prayer. It is not just marching off to church on Sunday morning or having a bumper sticker, a tape recorder, and a Jesus pin. Christianity has to be walked out in a lifestyle that solves problems. We must learn to die to self and live like Christ.

Another woman wrote to us saying:

My husband had a gambling addiction. One night we had an argument because he was going to go out and gamble more of our money away. We were already in such a deep financial hole it was unbelievable.

We were arguing, and he was going to leave. He came into the bedroom to grab the keys off the dresser. I reached out and turned on the television. There you were and said, “You with the gambling addiction …” He stopped dead in his tracks.

We film these shows to be aired months later, so only God could orchestrate something like that. Isn't God powerful? The woman said her husband it still working through some things, but he's been attending Gambler's Anonymous and has made a real commitment to conquer his addiction.

One woman who started watching me said she didn't even believe in women preachers because she had been taught that it was wrong for women to teach or preach. The only reason she started watching was because she liked my clothes. (I told Dave, “You see Dave, my clothes are helping the cause of Christ. I have no choice but to shop!”)

The woman who liked my clothes was a seamstress and went out and bought a sketchpad. Every night at 11 o'clock, she sat and drew the outfit I had on. She said:

I added all the sparkles, and I'd look at the backs of your sleeves and draw them all out so I could make them. I have no idea when I started listening to you, but somewhere in the process of all that, God deeply touched my heart. I'm closer to God now than I've ever been in my whole life.

I've been a Christian thirty years, but I never had a really close relationship with God. [Your messages] drew me so close to God. My husband did not believe in women preachers, but he saw such a change in me that now if I get in a little bit of a bad mood, he says, “You'd better be sure to watch Joyce Meyer tonight.”

My favorite letter came from Rick Renner who has a ministry in Latvia. I have the privilege of being on television there, all over the former Soviet Union. The letter told how God was moving in a woman's life in a powerful way through the ministers she saw on TV. In many small Russian villages where it looks as though people don't have much of anything, most families still manage to have a television.

Rick wrote: “I think this story will bless you, Joyce.” He said a Ukrainian pastor took an evangelistic team into a little Russian village where they knew for certain there had never been a church or a gospel outreach. They believed it was brand new territory and anticipated awesome opportunities.

They knocked on the door of the first little house in the village and a little woman opened the door. When they began to share the Gospel with her, she said, “Oh, wait, wait, wait; come in. Let me tell you what's happened to me.”

When they went in, she shared that she had been watching “Good News with Rick Renner” and was saved while watching television. She said that on the lower part of her back, she had, had a cantaloupe-sized tumor that could not be removed because it was too dangerous. The tumor, which she had, had most of her life, caused her to slump over when she walked. She wore loose fitting clothes to keep people from seeing it. The tumor was very uncomfortable and had affected her whole life.

A month after being saved, she watched a minister on TV who pointed at the screen and said, “Healing belongs to you.” In an instant she believed. She heard a loud pop on her back, ran to the bathroom and saw that all the stuff that had been in the tumor was running down her back and the back of her legs. By the end of the day, the thing was completely gone-not one trace of it remained.

Another month passed. She was watching a different minister who began to share about the baptism in the Holy Spirit. The Russian woman said she received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and began to pray in the Spirit right there in her little home, in that Russian village. She was born again, healed, and baptized in the Holy Ghost, but felt there was something still missing. Then she told them, “Now I've found 'Life In The Word with Joyce Meyer.' I am getting my soul healed and am maturing as a Christian.”

In 1999, we had a rare opportunity to go on a popular network in Asia called “Starworld.” It is a secular network, but it's an English-speaking channel that reaches up to one-half billion homes of people who want to practice their English. They've never had any kind of religious broadcasting on that channel. This letter came from Asia where we are sharing the Good News of the Gospel every morning:

One day, at 6 A.M., I happened to get up early and turn on the television. I saw you for the first time. I've been watching Starworld for ten years, and I've never felt any program as inspiring as the lecture you gave. I was totally amused.

I've been feeling depressed for many years; sometimes I even felt like 1 was going to explode, although my students would never feel it. I never showed it outwardly.

Do you have any idea how many people are unhappy, but they never show it outwardly? They live phony lives, putting a plastic smile on their face every day and just trying to hide their misery from everybody. Jesus died for us to have more than a phony life.

At my work post, I think I can say I'm a qualified professor, but as a person, I always felt that I was unhappy inside. I tried to analyze myself- tried to find out what psychological problems I had-but I always failed. Really I was just very miserable.

But when I saw you, you said, “I want to share something with you that can help you come into a place of rest.” You said, “Frustration comes from works of the flesh,” and I'll never forget your description about the seeds in your hands, which was so impressive.

Your paraphrases are so amazing I can't even tear myself away from it. So from the first time I saw you, I've never missed the chance to meet you at 6 A.M. every day for nearly two weeks now. I'm totally obsessed with your lectures. I'm sure I'll follow your course.

I managed to borrow a Bible in English in order to follow your reading. I found no bookshops within my reach that sells the Book. When you asked us to open the Book and turn to 1 Peter chapter 5,1 opened up the Book I borrowed. It was not the Word you were reading. (The reason is that I read from The Amplified Bible.) She continued:

To tell you the truth, before listening to your lectures, I never thought that I would be interested in any religious beliefs because I knew too little about them. I think maybe the one I borrowed is not the same edition as the one you have. Mine is like this: 'Holy Bible placed by the Gideons.'

Could you please tell me where and in which way I can get the Book that you use. Thank you very much.

Sincerely,
Your listener…

Of course, we sent her “The Book” right away, and we are believing for her salvation. It is amazing how many people have never heard godly principles to apply to their lives.

Christianity has so much to offer people. It is a lifestyle. Christianity has to be walked out in our everyday lives if we are going to affect anybody else's life.

After I made a decision to become a Christian, I had to learn how to live like a Christian. I learned that God's blessings cannot be enjoyed with one worldly foot stuck in stubbornness, fear, and the rebellion and the other foot trying to touch the kingdom. I also try learned that God's blessings are not just for ourselves. When we do I what is right, it affects the lives of others.

That is part of the miracle that God works between two people. His plan is to restore our relationship with Him, then our relationships with each other. He didn't change our individual style or approach to life; He simply changed our hearts to be more accepting toward each other. He taught us to adapt to each other and attend to each other's needs when at all possible. He taught us to take care of each other as well as we would take care of ourselves.

If husbands and wives could practice this ability to accept and attend to each other at home, these relational standards could spread to how we treat people at work, in our neighborhoods, and in our world. Then the mystery of relationships that God spoke of in Ephesians 5:32 would begin to unfold its secret.

Copyright © 2000 by Joyce Meyer

About the Author

JOYCE MEYER has been teaching the Word of God since 1976 and in full-time ministry since 1980. She is the bestselling author of more than fifty inspirational books, including How to Hear from God, Knowing God Intimately, and Battlefield of the Mind. She has also released thousands of teaching cassettes and a complete video library. Joyce's Enjoying Everyday Life radio and television programs are broadcast around the world, and she travels extensively conducting conferences.