Are You Playing Your Part Right?

Sometimes we are quick to put limits on ourselves and others because we focus on what someone cannot do. When God writes to husbands and wives, He doesn't say if you have autism or some other different mind, marriage is off limits for you.

Little by little marriage and romantic relationships for people with autism are being embraced in the media. Yesterday I saw an advertisement for a new book on romantic relationships for people with autism. One of my favorite movies is My Name Is Khan, which features the romance of Rizvan who has Asperger syndrome, a form of autism, and Mandira, who does not have autism.

God wants us to have good relationships. God made us the way we are on purpose. He designed our qualities to be developed instead of destroyed. Rizvan doesn't like touch. Rizvan and his mom find a way to negotiate hugs in a way that is mutually helpful. While Rizvan is not a Christian, finding a way to get along with people is. Romans 12:16 Amplified Bible says, "Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty (snobbish, high-minded, exclusive), but readily adjust yourself to [people, things] and give yourselves to humble tasks. Never overestimate yourself or be wise in your own conceits."

Neither Rizvan's mom nor his wife try to takeover Rizvan and turn him into a duplicate of themselves. Sometimes in relationships the root source of conflict is trying to make people like us and doing what we want while failing to appreciate who they are and what they want. God made us different and with different desires.

Are our differences in line with the will of God? If not, we need to cooperate with God to correct our problems. If so, we are in position to be in harmony with and even help someone else.

Then we can ask are we willing to operate in the role God gave us to help others be what God called them to be? If we are and we do it, then playing our God-given role in romantic and other relationships removes a lot of conflict because we are building together instead of working against each other.

Some Things to Pray

What are some things to pray for? Jesus says in Matthew 21:22 New International Version Bible, "If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer." In John 17 Jesus prayed that He will be revealed to believers. God has to give life to our spirit in order for us to recognize who Jesus is. We can pray that Jesus will be revealed to people.

Unity is also something good to pray for. Psalm 133:4 New King James Version Bible says, "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity." Unity makes it easier to accomplish our purpose in life because we are cooperating with each other.

Living in unity does not mean that we are all the same. Pray to know your God-given purpose. This way we will fulfill all that He has called us to fulfill.

Don't try to fulfill purpose without consulting God. By ourselves we go into areas that are not productive.

When we live in purpose we also live with truth. We can pray for truth to be revealed. Truth may seem to be revealed by facts, but this is not always the case. Truth has a dimension that is both spiritual and natural. For example, in the natural the Apostle Paul had a thorn in his flesh, some type of problem in his life. In the Spirit of God, God turned the weakness this thorn caused into strength.

We can pray for intimacy with God. Jesus notes in John 17 that He is so close to God the Father that He is one with God the Father. Jesus is the manifestation of God that we can see. He had a physical body in His earthly ministry 2,000 years ago. Even before Mary was pregnant with baby Jesus, Jesus had a body. For example, in the Old Testament Jesus was the commander of the Lord's army in Joshua 5 that Joshua worshiped.

We can pray that God will not lead us into temptation. Temptation can bring out weakness that does not lead to giving honor to God. Avoid temptation. It can be enticing. Some can be passed, but not all.

We can pray for protection. Our ultimate enemy is the devil and his demons who have been around a lot longer than we have. God can take care of problems we have no idea about. For example, we live in a world where there is enough food for everyone, but political obstacles stand in the way. Respect authority. Pray for governmental leaders. May leaders let go of pre-destined failure and embrace win-win solutions today and every day. Anything is possible.

Living On Purpose

Prema Dhanraj's mom, Ruthie, like Hannah, the mom of Samuel, prayed for her first child. These moms dedicated Prema and Samuel to God. Prema became a doctor. Samuel became a prophet.

God gives us children for multiple reasons. Ask God to reveal the reasons, and then nurture them and the child. Proverbs 22:6 Amplified Bible says, "Train up a child in the way he should go [and in keeping with his individual gift or bent], and when he is old he will not depart from it."

Prayers are meant to be put into action. Eli trained Samuel in ministry. Prema completed medical school. Samuel became a premier prophet of the Hebrews. Prema became Head of the Reconstructive and Plastic Surgery department of Christian Medical College and Hospital in Vellore, India, and in 1999 she founded Agni Raksha to provide medical treatment to burn victims and to provide career training. Many of the hospital's burn patients are victims of bride burning which can happen when the groom's family is not satisfied with the dowry from the bride's family. Demanding a dowry is suppose to be illegal as of 1961, but it is still practiced.

Samuel and Prema did not forget the investment their God and their parents made in them. They returned it to their family, society and even the world. Samuel's testimony is available to readers of the Bible, the most-read book in history. In addition to her work in India, Prema speaks and trains people internationally to help burn victims. Both Samuel and Prema are committed believers with clear purpose in life. An African proverb says, "If you don't know who you are, anyone can name you; and if anyone can name you, you will answer to anything."

Please share some prayers for your children that were answered in a life lived with godly purpose.

Wealth and Relationships

When we are in love we move obstacles to learn everything we can about our loved one. God likes to be chased and loved in a certain, intense way. God likes for us to communicate with Him constantly and to read, study, mediate and live His Word, the Bible. Living the Bible includes loving God and people using and enjoying the material world God created without being consumed by it.

To be materially rich can be used for good, but many can't handle it and still keep a red-hot love affair going with God and people. Being poor is a problem because life can become consumed in survival leaving little time to nurture relationships with God and people. Middle class may be the balance most thrive in love of God and people while having material needs and many wants met. Agur writes in Proverbs 30:8-9 Amplified Bible, "Remove far from me falsehood and lies; give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, Lest I be full and deny You and say, Who is the Lord? Or lest I be poor and steal, and so profane the name of my God."

Wealth is not wicked. Make sure that God has developed you to handle wealth. Nice things need a lot of attention. Denzel Washington is a rich man who works very, very hard and can handle his wealth in a way that permits his relationship with God and people to thrive. In addition to an Oscar-laden acting career spanning three decades Washington is also a Christian who has been married to Pauletta Washington for nearly 30 years. This couple has four children, John David, Katia, Malcolm and Olivia, who they taught to say their prayers every night and who they encouraged to discover their-God-given purpose by annually writing down five things they might want to do or be when they grow up.

If you can be rich in a vibrant relationship with God and people and in material wealth like Washington, praise God and keep on being a good and faithful servant. If not, praise God and keep on being a good and faithful servant in the way God has empowered you to be.  

What impact has material things had on your relationship with God and people?

Sick and Strong

The prophet Elisha, who had a double portion of the prophet's Elijah's anointing, became sick as recorded in 2 Kings 13. Earlier in his life Elisha had laid on a dead boy, and God used Elisha to return life to the boy. But this time Elisha couldn't lay hands on himself and be healed of his sickness. Why? Autism, cerebral palsy, diabetes, clinical depression and other disabilities and sicknesses are a part of the will of God. God heals us from some disabilities and sicknesses, but not all of them because God loves us.

Joni Eareckson Tada is paralyzed from the neck down, married and in full-time Christian ministry. She and Steve Estes write in their book When God Weeps: Why Our Suffering Matters to the Almighty, "God uses affliction like a hammer and chisel, chipping and cutting to reveal his image in you. . . . God uses suffering to purge sin from our lives, strengthen our commitment to him, force us to depend on grace, bind us together with other believers, produce discernment, foster sensitivity, discipline our minds, spend our time wisely, stretch our hope, cause us to know Christ better, make us long for truth, lead us to repentance of sin, teach us to give thanks in times of sorrow, increase faith, and strengthen character. It is a beautiful image!"

Elisha is a beautiful image. Elisha lived consistently in a golden state of mind, in the mind of the Messiah which is the mind of God the Father, God the Son Jesus Christ and God the Holy Ghost. Even when be became sick Elisha was strong; He didn't hide himself and give up his ministry just because he had a big problem. Elisha didn't segregate himself into a special, separate ministry for the sick and disabled that was rarely included, involved and integrated with the larger society. Elisha interacted with all kinds of people. Elisha used his time wisely to know and to do what God asked him to; he was not shaken and swayed by popular opinion. Elisha prophesied to Jehoash king of Israel a victory over the Syrians. Instead of self-hatred, self-pity, shame and guilt about his sickness Elisha trusted in His God. Sickness did not spoil his relationships with God, himself or other people.

Elisha was so close and committed to God that even after he died of his sickness 2 Kings 13:21 says, "As a man was being buried [on an open bier], such a band was seen coming; and the man was cast into Elisha’s grave. And when the man being let down touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet."

Instead of focusing on our imperfections and inadequacies focus on the will of God and His ability to make a way at all times. Seek to leave a legacy beyond this life. Elisha did. Ephesians 5:17 Amplified Bible says, "Therefore do not be vague and thoughtless and foolish, but understanding and firmly grasping what the will of the Lord is." No time is a good time to wonder around aimlessly a bit blank regarding God's will for you.

Los creyentes son el ojo derecho de Dios (Believers are the right eye (the apple) of God's eye). Since God thinks the highest of us, loves us passionately and fills us with His wonderful love, we have what it takes to allow the love of God to pour out profusely perfecting us into people able to please God. Christian rapper Lecrae sings in his song "Don't Waste Your Life," "Magnify the Father." We cannot magnify the Father unless the Father lives in us. If you have the Father, you have the Son and Spirit. Like the Spirit lived in Joshua (Numbers 27:18), He also lived in Elisha empowering Elisha to magnify the Father right though sickness and death. Instead of wasting his life, Elisha has an eternal witness for God, and you can too.

What are some ways to avoid wasting your life living outside the will of God irregardless of the disabilities and abilities you possesses?

7 Ways to Stay the Course of Joy Through Conflict

Sooner or later every relationship encounters disagreements. Sometimes we cannot even remember what we were discussing, but we do remember the general way we feel about the person we were having conflict with. Philippians 2 shows us that joy is an internal celebration of God and His ways that overflows externally and gives us seven ways to stay the course of joy through conflict.

1) Continuously chase a lifestyle of relationships filled with harmony and being of the same mind, intention and purpose. Some differences accompany disagreements others expose lifestyles that are diametrical. Prune off the diametrical. Seek to find the source of disagreements and humbly resolve them. Sometimes self-denial is needed. Other times assertiveness is needed.

True friends support and complement our life purposes. Choose relationships carefully. Much conflict can be eliminated by careful initial selection.

African American Bethann Hardison helped launch Click Models after the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. A time came when it was time for her to leave the nest and build her own. Nurtured by legal and model friends she started Bethann Management. These friends really helped. No attitudes and actions of, "I wish you well, but I'm not going to give you on-going resources to work with." A mother and daughter in the modeling business gave Hardison money for real-life bills like rent, utilities and whatever was necessary. Another legal friend negotiated the office space for Bethann Management and didn't charge her legal fees.

Hardison was called to be a leader in the fashion industry. Her friends may have disagreed from time to time regarding how she lead, but they encouraged her leadership and supported it in profuse, physical ways. Hardison was also wise enough not to keep friends who were opposed to her being a leader.

In a similar way Paul and the Philippian believers were in Christian ministry. They could not have shared as much joy if either one of them did not support each others ministry.

 2) Helping people help themselves also helps ourselves. Friendship flourishes with reciprocity, so does almost everything else. In 1867 Marie Sklodowska was born in Warsaw, Poland. Early in life she showed enthusiasm about education and an extraordinary ability to learn. However, her father could not afford to educate her beyond early childhood. Instead of responding to the obstacle with fear, unbelief and self-limiting practices, Marie took a job as a teacher then later as a governess to fund her advanced educational dreams.

Marie paid for her sister's, Bronislawa's, education with her earnings from her governess job. When Bronislawa completed her studies, Bronislawa paid for Marie to attend university.

Both Bronislawa and Marie became scientists. By 1891 Marie studied at the world-famous Sorbonne in France. She also became the school's first female teacher. Marie married a physics professor in 1895. They devoted their lives to science. In 1903 Marie shared the Nobel Prize in physics with her husband, Pierre Curie, and Henri Becquerel. In 1911 Marie Sklodowska-Curie won a Nobel Prize for chemistry by herself.

Marie is the first person to earn two Nobel Prizes each in sciences. She developed a theory of radioactivity, techniques for isolating radioactive isotopes and discovered the elements polonium and radium.

Like Marie and Bronislawa helped each other to be educated, the Philippian believers and Paul helped each other share God and His Word, the Bible, with others.

3) Celebrate equality with humility. Black people are equal with white people and any other people. Women are equal with men. Galatians 3:28 New Living Translation Bible says, "There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus."

Revealing equality through humility works better than hate. Jesus Christ never stopped being God and equal with God the Father and God the Holy Ghost even when He experienced violence instead of the respect due royalty. Black American and Christian Marian Anderson kept her wisdom, elegance and humility even when she was rejected from opportunities because of her race. Anderson wrote in My Lord, What a Morning in response to a music school rejecting her admission due to her blackness, " . . . I could not conceive of a person surrounded as she was with the joy that is music without having some sense of its beauty and understanding rub off on her. I did not argue with her or ask to see her superior. It was as if a cold, horrifying hand had been laid on me. I turned and walked out."

Walking out on evil is walking into good. God ensures that good is honored in due season. Jesus Christ was crucified at the instigation of the local religious leaders, but three days later He rose from the dead and shortly after the Christian church was founded as God's means to express goodness on earth.  With donations from a local church, Anderson was able to take singing lessons with coach Giuseppe Boghetti. In 1924 she launched her career by giving her first recital at New York's Town Hall. Later she went on to have a flourishing singing career that broke through racial barriers including a 1939 Easter morning concert in Washington, D.C., to 75,000 present and millions by radio.

4) Be willing and ready to help. "The roots of happiness grow best in the soil of service," says educator and African American Ruth Love.

A husband was addicted to pornography. He confessed his addiction to his wife. He didn't try to blame her for his addiction or to blame his upbringing or someone or something else. He sought ways to overcome it. His wife was hurt by his addiction, but she was willing and ready to help her husband. She listened and talked with him to understand why he likes pornography and why its so hard to leave it. She didn't condemn him by thinking, saying or doing things that communicate, "You're so weak to be wrapped up in this trash." This couple participated in helpful activities like Christian counseling, and over time his pornography addiction was conquered.

5) Caress copiously through cheerfulness. When Paul wrote the book of Philippians he didn't know if his current jail sentence would end in death or release. Paul didn't shower people with self-pity, but rather he talked about and lived out God's wonderful ways of pursuing the best even amidst the bad. Paul probably didn't always feel cheerful, but he expressed an attitude and actions of cheerfulness because this is how God is and what pleases God. In Philippians 2:12 Amplified Bible Paul counsels us to behave, " . . . timidly shrinking from whatever might offend God and discredit the name of God."

That's an incredibly large request for imperfect people to fulfill. The good news is we have a power source living on the inside to help us fulfill it if we tap into Him. Philippians 2:13 Amplified Bible says, "[Not in your own strength] for it is God Who is all the while effectually at work in you [energizing and creating in you the power and desire], both to will and to work for His good pleasure and satisfaction and delight."

6) Cherish people in your real life and release comparisons and excessive thoughts about fantasy people. Not many people look like and have achieved career success like Hollywood and Bollywood celebrities Halle Berry, Angelina Jolie, Denzel Washington, Hrithik Roshan and others. If we spend too much time reading about, looking at and thinking about the stars, then what's on earth may become disappointing and breed envy and other negative qualities.

Our spouses, family and friends have a lot of wonderful qualities. Think a lot about these. Love grows when we nurture it. Conversely when we don't, it dies.

It may take a lot of work to think about the good in our spouse, family or friends, but God put it there! Psalm 139:13-14 New Living Translation Bible says, "You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it."

Five years ago you may have sent sexy and funny texts, emails and telephone calls to your spouse, but now it's mostly perfunctory. You used to enjoy the feel of mouth and tongue all over your spouse's body and yours, finding each others multiple moan zones, playing games like, "Does this feel good? How about this?," but now when was the last time you had sex? Try again. Ignite the flame of love that you let die, and keep it burning hot. Marriage is suppose to be filled with merriment.

7) Appreciate people especially spouses, family and friends. Sexual, emotional and other types of infidelity start by the negative way we are thinking about our spouse. Fault-finding is a negative mindset. Fault-finding is a focus on what is wrong with someone. We are betraying a sacred personal trust when we stew on the bad in our spouse instead of meditating on the good. If we have a low opinion of someone, then it is hard to feel good about them and to treat them well.

The Apostle Paul writes about his friend and co-worker, Epaphroditus, in Philippians 2:30 New Living Translation Bible, "For he risked his life for the work of Christ, and he was at the point of death while doing for me what you couldn’t do from far away." Paul thanked Epaphroditus for what he did without any undertone of criticism. A fault-finding person might have wrote about Epaphroditus, "Epaphroditus wasn't too smart in the way he tried to help us. He allowed himself to work so much for other people that he got ill. It's a miracle that we got any help."

A fault-finding person wouldn't make Epaphroditus or others feel good. Instead of inspiring others to choose to be together, to experience joy, the words of a fault-finder are repelling.

Fault-finding spouses, family members and/or friends are setting themselves up to seek appreciation in someone else. We all desire to be appreciated. Some fault-finders are surprised to find themselves sharing intimate thoughts, feelings and desires with the opposite sex that lead into sexual, emotional or other types of infidelity; they failed to associate the source of infidelity in their thinking unappreciative thoughts about their spouse.

The joy of God is in believers. If we don't seem to be experiencing it, then we aren't cultivating it.

With more than 300,000 people signing up for Twitter.com daily perhaps you are one of them? If so, let's
* tweet via my Twitter name "Michelelove30,"
* chat through the social networking site Google's G+
*and/or leave a comment at the bottom of this article.

Please share the juiciest details of the joy in your life. Sharing helps people grow.