Camp Relationship Seminar

Who of you are excited? But I mean really excited. Amen. Whoo. I mean really excited. There's something in me regarding what God has prepared for tonight. You need to embrace what the Spirit of God wants to do in your life tonight. The amazing thing about the Spirit of God is that He makes it personal. So what you will receive from tonight will be exactly what you need at this stage of your life, but it's up to you to receive it.

Father, let them have an encounter with You tonight. Let them be touched by the only living God. Become real to them like never before. Let them experience Your love, Father. It's all about You, Father. It's all about You. We worship You, and we glorify Your holy name, Father. Thank You, Holy Spirit, that You bring life to every word and every thought and every action tonight, in the name of Jesus.

Amen. So we have quite a diverse group here tonight, so you're going to have to bear with me. In some sense I'm going to cover some basics, and in some sense I'm going to touch on some advanced stuff. So what I really have in my heart about tonight is that, yes, it appears to be teaching, but what I have in my heart is that it is an encounter.

It is an experience. And like I said earlier, I want you to allow the Holy Spirit to touch you. Don't worry about all the facts and notes and, "Oh, I don't know why he said that, and I don't agree with that," and whatever. Just allow the Holy Spirit to minister to you. So open up your heart. Be willing to receive, be willing to be touched by Him, and He will give you more than what you have come for tonight. So I'm going to start.

Some of you have attended Purpose, a lot of you have attended Purpose, but I'm going to start right at the beginning and take it right to the end. So this is really one of those cases where I hope you have your seatbelt on, at least for the first few minutes, because I'm going to move at quite a pace.

So to talk about relationships – can I talk about the campers and the non-campers? There's a lot of you here for the whole weekend, camping here, sleeping here, and there are a lot of things we're covering over the whole weekend. Tonight we're focusing on relationships in the sense of marriage or intended marriage – the relationship between a man and a woman. So if we want to talk about marriage per se, and I'll maybe allude to that just now, there's no sense in being in a relationship if the intent is not to get married.

If we want to talk about relationship or marriage, we have to start right in the beginning, and that is: what was God's purpose with this earth? Now, that's way back. You didn't think I was going to go back that far. I am. I'm at Genesis 1:1. Okay, I'm going to end at Revelation. Is that okay?

So what was God's intention? I'm going to put it in a nutshell. We've got all the Purpose teachings on YouTube and audio – just speak to somebody, they'll give you the link, and you can go and listen to it. Obviously I can't go into all of that detail; that's fourteen hours of teaching on its own. So I'm not going to try to repeat that tonight, but I'm just going to give you the basics. God created this earth, and then His intention was to fill the earth with Himself, to fill the earth with His glory.

So He created Adam and Eve. The Bible says He created them in His image and in His likeness. They walked together in the garden. They had a different form. They were one with God. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply." But the intention was that right in the beginning, God put His life inside of Adam and Eve. So when God said, "Be fruitful and multiply," it was based on the intention that God had of filling the earth with His presence.

But then, because of the sin that Adam and Eve committed, separation took place between them and God, because God cannot be part of sin. So although they were one at that stage, because of sin they could not remain one, and separation took place. The fact that Adam and Eve messed it up, you must understand, hasn't changed God's plan. He had to now do it in a different way, but His plan hasn't changed.

So God's intention is still to fill this earth with His presence, to fill this earth with His glory. Now, what happened because of Adam and Eve – maybe I must just explain that component. I didn't want to dwell on it, but a few things flow from it. God said, "If you eat of this tree, you shall surely die." So they ate of that tree, but they didn't fall down dead. Why not? Because man is a spirit. That's why they walked with God.

Man is a spirit. God created you a spirit. That is who you are. You are a spirit. You have a soul, which is your mind, your will and your emotions, and you stay in a body. To function in this physical earth, you need a body. So you are a spirit, you have a soul, and you stay in a body. So what God meant when He said, "You will surely die," was the spirit man, because that is God's life and that was what it was in man, and that was what was priority to God.

So when that happened, Adam did die, but he died spiritually. And how did that happen? Because of spiritual separation from God. Spiritual separation from God is spiritual death. And then the Bible continues to explain to us – all of us, born from Adam and Eve, because we are the descendants in this life form, because that changed now because of that separation – that we are all part in sin. Romans 3:23 says we're all part in sin, but then Romans 6:23 says that the wages of sin is death.

So just by being born into this earth, we are actually heading for hell unless something changes. In the same verse it says, "But the free gift that God gave us in Christ Jesus is eternal life." So God's plan hasn't changed, but you have to understand: this world that you see at this stage, and what this world looks like, was not God's intention. We live in a broken world. We live in a world where somebody who doesn't have the life of God inside of them has been separated from God.

So this was not God's intention. If it was, He wouldn't have bothered to send Jesus Christ. But because this was not His intention, the Bible even says to us that God has the desire that not one person go to hell. Not one. God's desire is that not one person go to hell. So, God loved you so much He sent Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, so that the whole world, all of us, have the option to receive eternal life.

So God wanted to fix that. His plan hasn't changed. His intention is still that this whole earth is filled with His presence, because in His presence it looks different. We don't have pain. We don't have destruction. We don't have all these criminal activities. We don't have a lot of the things that you see around you at the moment. You don't have divorce. You don't have sickness. You don't have that in God.

So a lot of people will ask, "But where is God? When this thing happened in my life, where is God?" You must understand that we live in a broken world. We live in a dispensation where Satan is free to operate in this earth. He is free. That is why the Bible explains to us that the god of this age, the god with a small g, the god of this age, which is Satan, "has blinded the eyes lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Jesus Christ should shine on them that they may see."

There are many things that you will not understand with your mind. You need to understand it with your spirit.

Tonight is going to be, for most of you, a night of choices. God is a gentleman. He doesn't force anything on anybody. He presents you with opportunity. He says, "I put in front of you life, but you have to choose it," because there's another side if you don't choose life.

So there is something that God's intention for you in this earth still is, and you need to study the character of God in the Word of God so that you understand what is from God and what is not. It says God is light; in Him is no darkness. It says God is love. God is righteous. God is pure. God is holy, and He expresses in the Word of God what His intention for your life is.

“I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.”

John 10:10 (NKJV)

Life to the full, life to the overflowing, life in abundance. That is what Jesus came for. So I want to plead with you tonight: don't blame God for things that did not come from Him, because all you are doing is helping Satan achieve exactly what he wanted to achieve. God still has that intention.

You might be sitting here thinking, "Yeah, I hear all of this, but not me. You don't know me. You don't know my background. You don't know what I have done. You don't know what my relationship with God up to now has been like. You don't know all the things that I've blamed God for." I've got news for you. There is not one person here tonight by accident, not one. I'll need an hour just to explain to you everything that I saw when I prayed regarding this event. I've been ministering for ten years, and I can tell you this is one of the most significant spiritual encounters that I have had already, running up to this, in the presence of the Holy Spirit.

God destined you, and some of you had to jump over a few hoops and overcome obstacles and put things in place, and there are many of you sitting here who had to be dragged here kicking and screaming. But you are still here because God intended you to be here. He has an appointment with you tonight, and you're going to have to make a choice, because God cannot make a choice for you. God has chosen you to fill this earth with His presence.

Every one of you, God destined you to be here tonight because He wants you to hear a few things. And I am so thankful for the Holy Spirit, because what is welling up in my spirit I cannot communicate in words. You will continue to experience it throughout the night. You might not receive it when I say it to you in words, but you will receive it when the Holy Spirit touches you. God loves you. He really – no, no, no, no, no, I mean really – He really loves you, beyond what you can understand with your mind. That is why you need to receive it in your spirit.

God wants to fill this earth with His presence, and He wants to do it through you. No, not the person next to you – you. He wants to fill this earth with His presence through you. So we are still talking about what God's plan was originally.

So now let's move on, and I'm going to jump into the next step: where does marriage fit in? God's intention and plan for this earth, the way to do it right from the beginning, is He made Adam, and then He looked at this guy and said, "He's never going to make it. He's going to need some help." And He made a perfect help for him – like, "Phew, you think you've got a... I've got a plan for this guy, but you're going to have to help him." The plan that God had for this earth, to fill it with His presence, revolves around marriage.

It's marriage, and you're going to see as we continue – around about hour five you'll get into it – but you'll understand that marriage is not a sideshow. It's the show. It's the instrument. It is the way that God created to achieve what He wants to achieve in this earth. When He said, "Multiply and fill the earth," He wasn't just talking about having babies. He wanted His life form to be in them and His presence to be made known, so that the whole of creation can experience the ability and the authority and the glory of God.

So when we talk about marriage, that is the core component of what God intended to be the building block to actually achieve what He wanted to achieve on this earth. You're going to have to understand, as we continue throughout the night, marriage has a very specific structure, but it's not a man-made structure. You might think so, but people didn't come up with the concept of marriage. It's something that God instituted, and there was a reason for it, because, as you'll see as we run through some of the scriptures, the way that God functions in this earth now is through – can we call it Christ?

There is Christ that is in heaven, that is the head, and then the whole body is also Christ. So for the sake of simplicity, I'm just going to talk about the body, the body of Christ, which is the body of God, with Christ that is in heaven that is the head. The way that God functions now in this earth is through the body of Christ. He says, "You are all living stones." When He talks about your body, He says, "Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit." He says, "You are all living stones being built up into a temple," which is the dwelling place of the Almighty God.

So through the body of Christ, God is filling this earth with His presence. But to establish the body of Christ, it works in a certain way. It doesn't just function whichever way. That's why He compares it to a physical body, so that we can understand it. And the first thing He says about the body of Christ, the manifestation of God in this earth, is that it has a head. And Christ is that head.

So you can relax. There's somebody else in charge, okay? Relax. There is a head, and then there is the body, and we are the body. Now, because that is what God wants to achieve in this earth through His body that has a head and a body, when He starts talking about marriage, it looks exactly the same. And that is why marriage looks the way it does. Can I put it this way, if you can understand it: marriage looks the same way that God looks. His being has a head, and it has a body in this earth. And marriage as a structure resembles that. That's why it's important to understand that marriage can't just function whichever way we want. There's a specific way in which it functions.

And there's so much I need to cover in one night, but to build the body of Christ, Ephesians 4 explains to us:

“Till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”

Ephesians 4:13 (NKJV)

This is seven hours on its own, and I'm going to sum it up in one sentence, and you need to just allow the Holy Spirit to minister to you. We have been sent now to build the body of Christ in the earth unto maturity, unto dominion, unto authority, so that we can change this earth. Don't think that we as Christians are just going to live like this and suffer like this and see all this devastation in the earth, and then just suffer until Jesus comes. That's not consistent with what the Word of God says.

Even when Daniel had that vision, that dream he had to explain to the king, he explained that statue, and there was this rock that was cut out not with hands, and that stone came and destroyed that statue. And we know that is Christ. That rock is Christ. It was cut out not with hands. But then what does it say after that? It says when that rock destroyed that statue, which is all the earthly kingdoms, that rock grew unto a mountain in this earth. That's something you have to process. That's why I say that's a few hours on its own – to understand that it's not going to continue to look like this in this dispensation until Jesus comes. There is an expectation of what should happen.

Now that's the background and the foundation. Now I can explain to you how we're going to build it. It says every part does its share, and every joint supplies. So I've got news for you: if you don't do what God has called you for, the whole body suffers.

So don't think you are not important. I need you as much as you need me. You need the person next to you as much as they need you. It's the way God designed it, and there is not one who is not needed. There is not one who is a passenger, who is not significant and important. Unless we get every part – that's what the Bible says, I don't think up these things, this is what the Bible says – it says the only way you're going to build Christ to dominion and authority in this earth is that every part does its share and every joint supplies.

So when we talk about these building units, there is a model that the church should function according to – can we have Acts 2:46-47, roundabout there? I'll just briefly show you that the idea was never that the manifestation of God in this earth becomes a religion, and becomes a building, and becomes a structure, and becomes one man that stands in front and he's the only one that has the answers.

That was not the intention. The intention was every part does its share, every joint supplies. No passengers. Everyone is needed. Everyone on board – that's the only way we're going to do it. And then there's a way that they did it in the Old Testament, and you need to embrace this in between the lines, because that's my focus tonight. We actually talk about that tomorrow, but you need to read in between the lines that there is a way that God ensured we can do what we have been called for.

So if there is one thing you need to take out of tonight – whatever I say, maybe there are some things where I'm going to step on your toes, but I want you to get this tonight – it's not about condemnation. It's not about judgment. It is about establishing the truth, and that we help each other, that we walk in the truth. God never designed it that we should try on our own. Because I've got news for you: if you're going to try it on your own, you're not going to make it. You want me to put it differently? I can't. That's the reality. You're not going to make it on your own.

God designed us to be an organism. How many of you have seen a hand going down the street on its own? Can you just take him outside, please – he's got some issues. No, nobody has. So how come we think we can function that way? How come we think it's okay to be disconnected? You will not survive.

And the way that they actually did church in the Old Testament is that they lived together. I call it doing life together – not playing church for an hour on a Sunday, but twenty-four seven, three sixty-five. We need to get to know each other. We need to build a relationship. We need to become transparent. I'll talk about all of that probably tomorrow. But unless we have a relationship, how am I going to be transparent? If I'm not transparent, I'm not bringing things into the light that should be destroyed.

We brought this concept into Christianity that we think we were entrusted with the ministry of judgment. We were not. The Bible says we were entrusted with the ministry of reconciliation, which I'll maybe explain just now. But we need to understand that every one of us here, at least everybody that I know, is here with a willingness to help you succeed in what God has called you for.

Something the Lord showed me a few years ago – my life changed ten years ago, and from then I'm just living to manifest the Kingdom of God in this earth, and to get people to understand the only living real God, not the fake god, not the church, not the religious, not the dead God of the church. I'm talking about... not that I'm saying all the churches are dead. I'm just saying most of us grew up in this religious environment where it was just a whole bunch of lies and stuff that never produced solutions.

I'm talking about the real God, and this is what I'm living for: to manifest the reality, present truth, and when that truth has been manifested, then people can make a choice. And that's why I say to you tonight is about making choices. We were entrusted with the ministry of reconciliation, and the way the church is meant to look is that we are meant to live together and take care of each other.

The Bible says you don't belong to yourself anymore. If you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Saviour and as Lord of your life, when you become born again, it says you do not belong to yourself anymore. You belong to Him now, and you have a purpose. And we are here. The thing I wanted to say, that God showed me a few years ago, was that despite my passion and conviction and doing evangelisation, God said I cannot complete my purpose unless my interaction with somebody else leads to them walking in their purpose.

It's not me, myself and I. I can be the best evangelist in the world. I can be the best teacher in the world. It means nothing if it doesn't lead to the activation of everybody I have interaction with, to start walking into their purpose, and that's the way that God hedged it. It's not about how big an individual is. It is: can we, with every individual we interact with, activate them to walk in their purpose? It sounds simple, but it's totally different from how the world functions, because now it's not about me, myself and I. It is about what has God called you for, and how can I help you do it? Because if I don't, I have done nothing. I have not succeeded. But it applies to every single one of us.

So the way we do church is this:

“So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.”

Acts 2:46-47 (NKJV)

They just had a braai together. That's church – having the opportunity to talk to each other, having the opportunity to pray for one another. If we do life together the way that God designed it, the Lord will add people to the church. We would not even have to go and do evangelism. There is a purpose for it. Don't make that mistake. But I'm talking about in our environment.

So when we talk about building this, which is the body of Christ in this earth, this is how it functions. The building block of building that body of Christ in this earth is the marriage. That is the building block, the family unit. So husband and wife come together. They form a brick, and the components that come together have the ability to produce more than the combination of just putting the individual components together.

It has an exponential ability. The only way we can build the body of Christ in this earth is to sort out family units, which means the father, the husband, must know his role and his position and fulfil it. The wife, the woman, must know her role and fulfil it. If we don't do that, we are never going to be able to build the body of Christ unto the authority that we were meant to.

Now, understand something: the same way that religion took truth and turned it into a skewed thing, of how we think Christianity looks – I want to be bold enough to say... well, let me not link a percentage to it, but let me put it this way: you will not have to look far to find a church that has taken the truth and twisted it, and it doesn't present something that resembles God and manifests His love and His presence and His ability in that place.

But does that mean that reflects Christianity? No, it doesn't. Many of you have heard me tell the story about the fake Porsche. When this guy built a Porsche from spare parts he picked up everywhere, and he built it over ten years – he built this thing with scrap parts. And then, when he went to the scrapyard one day, he saw the badge of a Porsche, and he took that and put it on the front of his vehicle, and he called his friend. He says, "You want to take a drive in my Porsche?" This guy has never seen a Porsche. So he arrives, gets into the car. They go halfway around the block. The whole thing falls apart. He gets out, walks home.

Three years later, he's at the office, and a colleague of his comes in and says, "Yo, man, I'm excited. I bought myself a Porsche. You want to come and take a spin with me?" And he looks at him and says, "Are you crazy? I'm not walking home again." Because that thing that was falling apart was the only thing he knew was a Porsche, because that's what the guy said. It's a Porsche. It's the only Porsche he's ever seen in his life.

And that is what has happened in this country: people presented something they call Christianity that is more from Satan than it is from God, but people didn't know the difference. I've been counselling for nine years now, and I can tell you probably half of the people I counsel got more injured in the church than anywhere else, because of this religious thing that has no life in it.

But what I want to tell you is that doesn't change the fact that there is truth, that there is reality, that there is a life form of God and His intention to manifest it. So don't think that what you have experienced up to now – maybe you've only experienced the fake Porsche up to now. Don't measure it by that. Measure it by truth, and the amazing thing about truth is it exists, and it can be tested. The Word of God explains to us what truth looks like, what it is, and you can function in that.

So the fact that the world has constructed something that is a lie, that is fake Christianity with no life in it, it has done exactly the same with marriage.

The world made something of marriage which it is not remotely meant to be. And what are the implications of it? Just look around you. I think our divorce rate is more than 50% at this stage. Look at the number of broken marriages, abuse, pain. When I still had the audit practice, I had a few clients that I had to help going through a divorce, and it is not a pleasant thing, because that same husband and wife that stood there in front when they got married, and their eyes were shining, and they couldn't take their eyes off each other, now they still can't take their eyes off each other, but it's with a different look. It's the look of, "Can I take out this knife from underneath the table now, or shall I do it later?" They literally want to kill each other, because we started wrong in the marriage – the purpose, the intention, the structure, everything. It's not the way God intended it.

But because that is what we see in the world does not mean that is truth and reality, so we must get back to what the Word of God explains to us. The world has, through Hollywood and other movies, created this picture of a boy and girl walking past each other, looking into each other's eyes, and it's love at first sight, and before you know it the wedding bells ring.

It's not meant to be that way. Marriage, a decision to marry, was never meant to be based on physical feelings. That cannot be your foundation. Something that is meant to establish God in this earth, which is His life form, how can that be based on physical feelings?

Remember this: when you talk about marriage as a structure, the way it is applied in this country at this stage, is that most people still get married – at the court, at the church, at the traditional whatever – but they still call it marriage. But is marriage the significant thing? Marriage is not the significant thing, because the way we see it, it's a worldly structure. Let me tell you what the Word of God says about it.

“And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will also be in the days of the Son of Man. They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.”

Luke 17:26-30 (NKJV)

See? They married wives. These guys are so far removed from God, but they married wives. It should have just added there, "And they got married and so on." The story keeps repeating itself, and it's not done.

God chose you to manifest Himself in this earth. He says in 1 Peter 2:9, "You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood."

You have to understand something, and most of you have maybe read or seen the word that God gave me for this year, and it relates to: God desires a people. God wants to take a people for Himself again and set them aside so that they can live holy and pure and righteous, so that God can live through them and manifest Himself in this earth.

It doesn't help we keep crying about the corruption in the government. It doesn't help we keep crying about the gangs and the rapes and the shootings and whatever else. We can cry about it as much as we want; it's not going to change it. The only thing that's going to change it is the presence of God. But here's the thing: the presence of God is not manipulated. It's not a slap of a finger, and God is not this genie that we just say, "God, please sort this out," and when He's done, you say, "Okay, don't expect anything from me now, just park there." It doesn't work that way. It takes an intimate relationship. It takes a dwelling place. It takes a people that has been set apart.

“You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”

1 Peter 2:9 (NKJV)

Out of darkness into His marvellous light. God created you for a purpose, and He wants to fulfil that purpose through you.

It says God is a jealous God. He wants you for Him, but I've got good news for you. It is not maybe what you have experienced up to now – this condemnation, this heavy burden of religion. You know, just, "Oh, okay, now I must read my Bible every day," and it's such a mission just to read my Bible because it's like this burden. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about having the life form of God inside of you. I'm talking about a desire and a conviction that comes inside of you that desires the presence of God, that living God, and you can't wait to study the Word.

You can't wait to have fellowship with the Holy Spirit. You can't wait to worship Him, because He is putting that life in you, not that religious background. Don't let the fake Porsche prevent you from experiencing the real living God, who is only light, who is only love, and who only has your best interest at heart. But He wants to set you aside. The same thing that happened right in the beginning – why did separation take place between God and Adam and Eve? Because of the sin that they committed.

God expects us to set ourselves aside and say, "God, here I am. It's all about You, not about me. Here I am as a holy instrument. God, work through me." You can't just do whatever you want whenever you want and say, "God, come." It doesn't work that way. We've seen it throughout the whole Bible.

“And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.”

John 17:22-23 (NKJV)

That the world may know. How is the world going to know? It says Christ in us, the hope of glory. Christ in you, the hope of glory. There is a life form that God has put inside of you, an ability, an instrument through which He wants to manifest Himself, so that the world may know. Not the religious, not the judgment, not the condemnation, not telling people, "Stop doing that, stop sinning." No, He wants a relationship whereby He can put that life form inside of you, and He can express Himself into this earth, and then the world may know. Does it sound familiar?

The Acts 2 church – it says they just came together. They had everything in common. They just cared for each other. They just worshipped and glorified God. They were just enjoying life. For most people, church has become this burdensome, condemning thing. It says where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom – freedom to worship Him, not freedom to go and do your own thing, but to experience His life form through you. God has a plan for you.

So the world has painted this picture about marriage. Now, there are some people sitting here that maybe intend getting married, so I hope I'm not bursting that little bubble right now. If you are getting married for any reason other than to fulfil your purpose in this earth, it's the wrong reason. The only reason you get married is to fulfil your purpose in this earth.

It's the only reason. It's the primary reason. I'm not saying there aren't things that go with it. I'm not saying it's this business transaction with no feelings, no passion, no love and joy and peace and companionship. Yes, it comes with it, but that's not the reason. You don't get married so that you are not single. You don't get married so that you can be happy. You don't get married so that you can have children. You don't get married because you looked into somebody's eyes and fell in love. You only get married to fulfil your purpose.

That's why God said right from the beginning, "Adam, duplicate Me in this world." And He said, "Okay, but you're not going to be able to do it on your own. I'm going to create somebody for you." And the sole purpose for that person, for Eve whom He created, was to say, "You are going to help this man fulfil his purpose in this earth, and that is to fill the earth with My presence." Your job is still to fill this earth with His presence. That's why you have such a huge responsibility as far as your children are concerned – I'll touch on that a bit later.

“Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.”

Matthew 6:33 (NKJV)

Such a simple verse. We know it so well, but the reality is: the day that you put God first in your life, everything in your life will change. All these things that have been a burden, dragging you and causing you to struggle – when you put God first, those things will fall from your shoulders.

Now understand me very well: I'm not preaching a prosperity gospel where if you become born again and are filled with the Spirit, you will never have an issue in the rest of your life. That's definitely not what I'm saying. You will have challenges, because we stay in a broken world. What I am saying is you will be able to make sense of most of them, and you are definitely equipped to overcome all of them. God says you will never experience something in this earth that you are not equipped to overcome. That doesn't mean challenges won't come, but you will look at them differently and treat them differently.

It's like Moses looking at the burning bush. God did not speak until Moses actually fixed his focus on that burning bush; then God started speaking to him. When you have that relationship, when you put God first in your life, things in your life will start changing.

So when we talk about marriage, the same principle applies. Before you get married, you need to make sure that you put God first in your life. Can I tell the ladies here: if you marry a man where you are more important to him than God, your marriage is not going to work. Seek a man for whom God is priority, and from that will flow everything that you want from a man in a marriage, and more than what you expect.

The fact that the world has created this thing – the marriage, the wedding, this whole glamorous thing – look at the results. I've said to you earlier, look at the number of divorces. If you have done some counselling with a woman who came out of an abusive relationship after ten years, because of that intertwined relationship in marriage, because of that stigma in society, even women who get abused in marriage struggle to get out of it – maybe it's even the dominion or authority because of finances and whatever else. Counsel a woman who comes after eight years out of an abusive marriage, and tell me if it's worth it to get married for the wrong reasons.

It looks all rosy, and it looks all nice, because that guy is young, he's strong, he's dynamic, he's well-spoken, he's got the hairdo and everything, and maybe the bike and whatever. I always say I have the advantage in terms of counselling: I can take you where you are now when you get married, and let me quickly fast-forward – I can tell you what the picture's going to look like in 20 years, because they sit across the table and speak to me 20 years later.

So take my advice: if you don't want to end up like that, get married for the right reason. Get married with a man where God is priority. If God is not more important to him than you, don't marry that man.

Now, let's quickly talk about how God designed the marriage to actually function.

“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.”

Ephesians 5:31-32 (NKJV)

The two shall become one flesh, but I speak of a great mystery – I speak regarding Christ and the church. Remember what I said right in the beginning: marriage resembles God. Marriage resembles the body of Christ. There is a head, and there is a body. That is how it functions. We cannot decide how we want the marriage to function. We cannot decide that if the woman in the marriage has the stronger personality, more degrees, more finances and a stronger personality, the woman is the head in this marriage.

I'll explain to you a few things, and maybe I'll jump right into it, and, you know, the whole concept about the wife submitting to the husband. Can I talk about that? Then at least I know I've got the attention of the men for five minutes. Is that okay? So let me talk about that thing, so I can at least get their attention back.

“Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands, that even if some do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won by the conduct of their wives.”

1 Peter 3:1 (NKJV)

Now, the mere fact that you actually have all the facts already positions you differently. It's not, "Wife, please get me the beer. Wife, please get me the remote. Where's the chips? Have you started the fire yet?" No, no, no, no. That's not what it says. It says, "Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands," firstly. Somebody else can't just walk up to you and start giving you commands and instructions. You are submissive to your own husband. It's not a general thing. Not any man can speak to any woman and think that in general he is more superior or has authority over that woman. No, you don't. It's your own husband.

So be submissive to your own husband, but now I want you to start realising something here: there is a purpose with being submissive. So husbands, you need to understand what it means when your wife submits to you – there is a purpose.

It says, "Even if some do not obey the word." So even – there are other scriptures that explain: if you as a woman... Now, I've already said to you, don't marry a man where God is not number one in his life. Okay, if you are already married to him, it's too late. Don't say when you walk out of here, "Ah, this is my ticket, I'm getting out of this one." No, no, no, no. There's a verse that explains: even if you are married to somebody who is not born again, God says remain married.

But here, when we talk about the submissive function of the wife, it's talking about even if some do not obey the word. In terms of our seminars, in the past we typically had about 65% women and 35% men. Recently I've started seeing that it's actually changing, and there are more men, and that's really significant. But a lot of the time, from a counselling perspective, there would be women coming to me saying, "I love Jesus and I just want to live for Him, and He's my everything, but my husband – can't get him off the couch, doesn't want to leave the beer, doesn't want to know anything about anything." If they want to go to church, in some cases the husband will just say, "You can go, but don't ever talk to me about it." In other cases, the husband will even say, "You can't go."

The Word explains to you how to deal with that. When it says you as a wife need to be submissive, it says even if your husband is wrong, you are not the one to decide you submit to him because he deserves it. You don't submit because he deserves it. You submit so that God can function through you to effect change.

The plan here is: God says, "Even if some of them do not obey the Word" – and then it says, talking to women, "without a word." Does this make sense to anybody? I don't understand it – without a word. God has a sense of humour, right? But then it says that they may be "one" – W-O-N, won. So that they may be won.

So God says it's not about whether they are doing everything right. That's not what I'm talking about. I want you to act in a certain way so that I can impact their lives, so that we can gain them for the Kingdom of God. Again, it goes back to the purpose of marriage. Never get married to somebody who is not born again and believe that you will get them born again. No, I've seen that movie play a few times. If they are not born again by the day you get married, you don't marry them. The Bible is full of verses explaining that. So there's a purpose and an intention with the submission of a wife. It's not just, "Anything goes."

“When they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear. Do not let your adornment be merely outward — arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel — rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God.”

1 Peter 3:2-4 (NKJV)

Woman, He's talking to you. He says rather than all this makeup and earrings and apparel – let's face it, putting on fine apparel, I think nowadays it's about putting on as little as possible rather – but anyway, it says, "Rather let it be the hidden person of the heart."

You can do all these courses about changing your life and dynamics and personality and how to achieve things in life, but when you get to the bottom, it's about what God wants for your life. God wants a building structure through which He can build the body of Christ in this earth – a building block, a brick. That is your primary focus and priority. So that means you must first sort out your marriage. You must make it work. And in order to do that, if your husband is not born again, there is a process through the way that you live, to enable God to function in his heart and change his heart. That's why it says, "It's the hidden person of the heart."

Now first He says without words, now He says the hidden person – it's not getting better, is it? "Hidden person of the heart with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit." Not making it much easier either. "A gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God."

Now, can I just say something to men at this stage? It doesn't matter how physically beautiful you think that woman is. If you don't structure your marriage according to the principles that God shows you in the Word of God, that marriage is not going to work. It doesn't matter how beautiful that woman is, how well she's built, and how everything about her physically is just everything you have desired your whole life – it will not last. When that marriage goes wrong and they sit across the table from each other, that man doesn't see that physical beauty at all. Zero. It doesn't matter if she still has the same body shape – he cannot see it. Don't think physical attraction is going to make your marriage work. It's not.

So the same applies when you are looking for a woman to marry: look for one who can change your life without words. Okay, that narrows it down, I'm sorry. And if you so happen to find one in that category, then you must still seek further for one with a quiet spirit.

So God didn't make it easy, did He? But He made it worthwhile. So women, wives, there's a way that God functions, and God put the man as the head of the marriage, the head of the house, and that's how God designed it. Nowadays the women's liberation movement can tell you, "But it's your rights. No man should sit on your head. No man should tell you what to do. We are just as strong as they are. We are free." You can go through all of that to say, "No, my husband cannot tell me what to do." Okay, come and show me your marriage five years later. We'll see how it works, because God will not be in that marriage.

It's not about how much we can intellectually justify it. There's a principle through which God works, and I'll show it to you very practically now. There's a grace that God enables in certain situations, and the amazing thing is we talk so easily about grace, but do you know something? Grace can either work for you or it can work against you. So you can decide whether you want grace to work for you or against you.

One of the principles I'll continue to explain is that a wife does not have the grace to tell her husband what to do. I'm talking about big things now, not about you getting something and saying, "Can you please get that for me?" I'm talking about making life changes. You cannot, even now that you know these things, say to a man, "Man, take up your position in this marriage, become the man." You cannot. There is no grace for that. I've seen it in the past. Now this is where you need to tap in spiritually, because this is what the Word of God explains.

So some of these ladies who have come to me said, "My husband doesn't want me to go to church on Sunday. What should I do about it?" Now it sounds like the good answer is to say, "No, but it's about God, go to church, man, it's about God, go to church." No, that's not the right answer. There is no grace for that. That's why it says even if he's not born again, you submit to him. I'm not even talking about whether he's right or wrong. It says even if he's not born again, you still submit to him, because it was never about him.

So when your husband says you can't go to church on a Sunday, you don't go to church on a Sunday. And in that submission, in that obedience, you are activating the grace of God to start working for you. If you go against your husband, the grace works against you, even if he is wrong. It's how God designed it. It's like a physical law – if I drop this thing, who thinks it's going to go down? There is a physical law called gravity. There are spiritual laws too. We are so comfortable taking physical laws into consideration, but somehow we ignore the spiritual laws and still expect the grace of God to function in our lives. It doesn't work that way.

“Submitting to one another in the fear of God... Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord.”

Ephesians 5:21-22 (NKJV)

This is a picture the Lord showed me many years ago. The amazing thing that God showed me – can I use the two of you? Just come stand here, just look at me, both of you. Okay, you can stand there. Stand behind her, a little further, right behind her. Okay, so assuming this is the man and this is the woman – the roles are a bit confused now, but assuming that this is the man and this is the woman.

Now it says, "Submit to your husband for the sake of the Lord," in the fear of the Lord. So what does that mean? Now you have to listen very carefully. When you respond to your husband, you are responding as if he is transparent. He is like glass. So when you are responding, you are actually responding to Jesus standing right behind him.

That's why it says, "Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord." So now he makes me cross, and I respond in a certain way – but what am I doing? Take the husband in the middle out of the picture: you are not responding to him, you are responding to Jesus. So when you look at it that way, you can easily start adjusting how you are responding. Because now God says, "Do you want grace to work for you or against you?"

If you, as the wife, respond to the husband in an aggressive and authoritative way, it means you are responding to the physical being, and that response bounces right back – it goes nowhere. If you respond in a submissive way, then you respond right through that person and say, "Jesus, please come and help me with this," and then He comes and sorts out the problem. Do you understand? Let me talk about wives first.

You respond to your husband not as if you are responding to that man, but as if you are responding right through him unto the Lord. If you don't do it, it's like this physical demonstration I just gave you – it is as if Jesus cannot come and do anything for you.

I have seen many instances in the last few years, some of them sitting here amongst you, where the husband was not born again, where the husband was having an affair, where there was absolutely every physical reason for that wife to say, "I'm going to end this marriage. I want nothing more to do with him."

But her conviction, based on the Word of God, and the fact that she knew God had a plan for that husband – he wasn't even born again yet, he was having an affair – she knew God had a plan for him. So she had that perspective, and she had that support to continue to hold onto her belief. She continued to respond to him and submit to him. She continued to pray for him every single day. She would lay her hands on things of his – his clothes, his belt, everything. She prayed for him every day. It took years, and then he became born again and became a God-fearing man, and he is significant in the Kingdom of God today.

She could have said, "I have ten reasons to divorce this man." Or she could say, "God, I believe You are who You say You are, and I believe You will do what You say You can do, and I have expectation for my husband's life to change."

That's an example, woman, that you cannot act against your husband in a way you think is physically justified – not if you want God to work in that marriage. He made the rules. It's much easier in life if you follow His rules. There's a reason for this whole thing. Obviously the world has twisted it upside down in terms of this whole submissive concept.

“For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church.”

Ephesians 5:23 (NKJV)

Remember, there's a way that Christ looks, and it looks exactly the same way in marriage. That is how it functions. The husband is the head. Whether he looks like it, or acts like it, or not, it is a spiritual position. It's not about whether he has a strong personality, whether he speaks better than you, or is more physically authoritative than you. It's none of that. God put him in that position. Whether he responds to the position or not, God still put him there. But if you want to experience the grace of God in your life, you have to submit to him.

Although I'm talking mostly about the wife's side, can I touch on something husbands need to listen to here? It says, "For the husband is head of the wife" – but not just head of the wife so that he can be bossy. It gives an example: "as." You are only head of the wife as also Christ is head of the church. There's an example. If you want to see what your position should look like, look at what Christ's position is and how He looks at His body – that is how you should function.

The Bible continues to explain that. It says, "And He is the Savior of the body." Husbands, you are the saviour of your wife. That means you must function in a certain way – there's a way of looking at your wife, a way of treating her, a way of interacting with her. You can't just stop and say, "You are head in the marriage, and that's it." No, no, no – you are head as He is head. There's a model, there's a way. It's not a blank cheque that you can write whatever you want. It functions in a certain way, so there's a model to which you need to adjust and structure your life.

“Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything.”

Ephesians 5:24 (NKJV)

So men, let's talk quickly about how you should treat your wife.

“Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life.”

1 Peter 3:7 (NKJV)

Heirs together of the grace of life. There's a way that a husband and wife can structure their marriage to continue filling their lives with the grace of God. Or – although this sounds a bit harsh – they can live in a way that destroys the grace of God in their lives.

Something changed my life many years ago when I understood this. I had the mindset – I think most people have it – that we see God as this being who just comes and intervenes all the time. You ask Him, sometimes you don't even ask Him, but He just comes and intervenes. Then I started studying the Word of God and I realised God doesn't function that way. He doesn't come in person. If I drop this bottle, there's a physical law in place. Who thinks that when I drop it, God comes down from heaven and takes the bottle and puts it down there, just in case gravity doesn't work? No, it just works because it's a law. God put physical laws in place, and He put spiritual laws in place.

If physical laws work – remember, God is a Spirit, and the spiritual realm is the authoritative realm that preexisted the physical world – how much more do spiritual laws work? The way God set things up is not for Him to come down in person every time and intervene, moving us around like chess pieces. No, He put the spiritual laws in place, and they just work. He makes them available to us. He says, "You want to be blessed? It's more blessed to give than to receive." That's a spiritual law. "You want a blessed marriage? Make the husband the head of the marriage." Function that way whether you like it or not, whether you agree with it or not.

Who among you says, "I don't understand gravity"? Is that going to change the fact, if you walk off a sixth-floor balcony? Is it going to make any difference whether you understand it or not? The result is exactly the same. You can't say of a spiritual law, "Well, I don't understand it, I don't like it, I don't think that's what God meant." That's why many marriages look like somebody walked off a sixth-floor balcony.

“Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.”

1 Peter 3:7 (NKJV)

That your prayers may not be hindered. Now, the same way I demonstrated to you when the wife responds to the husband – you need to respond as if you are responding through a transparent glass, husband. You are responding to Jesus. You can only see Jesus, not what your husband justifies or doesn't justify. You say, "Jesus, I want to respond to You, and that is why I am submissive, that is why I'm responding in love." In the same way, when the husband responds to the wife, the way he interacts with her also has implications.

It says that if you don't treat your wife in this way – if you don't love her, if you don't honour her as the weaker vessel – remember that verse: as Christ is the Saviour, you are the saviour of your wife. It's not just a physical thing that every woman wants a hero. She wants to feel safe. She wants to feel she has a husband who will always stand up for her, who will take care of her, who will embrace her regardless.

God says that is not a nice-to-have – it's not optional. God says if you don't function that way, your prayers will be hindered. You think you can treat your wife however you like, then go into your inner room and say, "Okay, God, let's change a few things – now I'm going to pray"? God is not there. The Bible says God is not mocked; whatever a man sows, he shall reap.

I can only trust the Holy Spirit will start communicating with you, that you can start seeing – it's not even a resemblance, it's a manifestation of Christ within marriage. That is the way He expresses Himself. That is the way He builds Himself up – through every marital structure that becomes a stone in building that body. That is why there are implications. The way you as a husband treat your wife is a spiritual law – it can either work for you or against you. You can say you don't like it or don't agree with it. Well, jump off a sixth-floor building and say, "I don't agree with gravity" – it doesn't work that way.

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her.”

Ephesians 5:25 (NKJV)

You need to give yourself for your wife. There are things that maybe average men are not good at, but we need to learn to become good at them, and one of them is to be sensitive. We think that because we don't need something, our wives don't need it either. But our wives want us to be sensitive; they want us to anticipate their needs before they even express them.

It's a totally different thing from what the world has made of this bossy connotation of "I'm the head of the marriage." No – the head of the marriage is not because of a structure, it's because of a function. God said, "I give you a certain job, Adam." And then said, "You're not going to be able to do it. Let Me take Eve, and Eve's job is to make sure you can do the job I gave you." There's a way God put it together, and a reason. Now He says, "Husband, you have a role to play, and you must give yourself as Jesus, as Christ, gave Himself."

What is that example? It is the core building block and underlying component of us as the body of Christ – to understand you have died to yourself. The love we live is not, "I live love when it suits me." The love Jesus showed us is self-sacrificing love: "I will love you even though I don't want to, even though it doesn't suit me, because that is the love Christ showed me." Obviously it's not indefinitely sustainable if you only do it from that place, but as you start doing it that way, it will start changing you.

I grew up in religion, and I couldn't even read one page of my daily devotional that lay on my bedside – and don't even ask me the next day what I had read. I had no idea. Then my life changed, and I received the life and the Spirit of God into me, and for the first time understood that God is a living Being who actually speaks to me, who is alive in me, and with whom I interact. Then I had such a desire that there was not enough time in a day for me to spend in the Word of God. It's radically different. When you start making those decisions, you allow the grace of God to start functioning in you.

Some of these things will not be easy, they won't even feel natural. Your wife might say, "Is everything okay? Are you feeling a bit sick?" But there are things in our lives that we need to adjust. It says, "As to the weaker vessel," and we need to give ourselves wholly for that person, which means spending time and applying our minds to what God expects from us and how we should function.

“…that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.”

Ephesians 5:26-27 (NKJV)

Christ, marriage; Christ, marriage; Christ, marriage; Christ, marriage. Are you getting the picture? It's the same thing. Christ gave Himself so He could wash the bride with the Word, and then present her spotless, unblameable, a bride without spot or blemish, perfect. Christ had to function in a certain way so He could present the bride without spot and blemish, a perfect bride. We need to function in a certain way as husbands – to present our wives, washed through the Word, as the spotless, blameless being that is flesh of our flesh. It takes focus, it takes effort. There are practical things you can do that will help, but first you have to come to the understanding and conviction of what the Word of God says.

Not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing. You see, you can make sure your wife doesn't have wrinkles.

“So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself.”

Ephesians 5:28 (NKJV)

As you continuously read these scriptures, you see: Christ, marriage; Christ, marriage; Christ, marriage. It says you love her as if it's your own body, your own flesh, because Christ and the body are one – you cannot separate the head from the body. You cannot separate the husband from the wife and still expect both of them to receive and experience the fullness of God the way they would have otherwise.

We are not talking about condemnation tonight. If you got divorced, Jesus died for every sin we have done, are doing, and will do. The Word even explains that there are certain circumstances that justify getting divorced. So I'm not talking about divorce from the perspective of sin and condemnation – not even near that, not interested in that now. Doesn't matter if you are divorced. I'm talking about within that marriage: if you function in a way that separates the head and the body, but still want to experience the fullness of that body – it cannot happen. It doesn't logically make sense, and it doesn't spiritually make sense.

"Husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself." He cannot make it much clearer than that.

This might sound like I'm putting all the responsibility on the husbands, but it's not so. You will understand what I'm saying if I put it to you this way. To manifest the body of Christ, to build God in this earth, there is an essence – only three things that need to happen.

The husband needs to take up his position as head of the marriage. That is the first step. You must take up the position as head of that marriage, which means you must provide guidance, function in wisdom, function in love. It's not bossing everybody around – function in wisdom, in guidance, in love. So, first, you take up that position.

Second, man, you need to love your wife the same way Christ loves the church.

Third: wife, you need to help your husband to be able to do that. That's it. Did you get it? God said Adam couldn't do it alone. He made him a helper, so the helper can ensure Adam does what he was sent to do. God sends you as the husband and says, "Be the head; love your wife." That's your job – but that job is enough. All the wife needs to do is help you do that.

If every wife helps her husband be the head of the house – treating him with respect, uplifting him, empowering him to become the authority in the lives of their children, never humiliating him before other people, but treating him in love and respect, supporting him, praying for him every day – then the husband can do what he has been called to do: stand up, so that that building block is so solid and so strong that we can build the body of Christ in this earth. That is what marriage is meant to be about.

So wives, don't worry too much about position and where you fit in. You just need to make sure that marital structure does what God sent it for – that your husband stands up. We all know it; everybody speaks about it, ministers hold camps about it – that we live in an era where they say the fathers are absent. Studies done in prisons show that the majority of people there, by far, ended up there because they didn't have a father who guided them, loved them and supported them. So wife, if you can just ensure your husband fulfils that role, you have done what you needed to do.

Now I want to make something clear, something you have to understand. When you get married, you actually give away a lot of your rights. Marriage is not a simple thing – don't think you just add somebody to your life and continue as before. No, there's a lot of rights that you give away.

But that's not so much what I want to talk about. What I want to say to you is that as soon as you get into that unity, that oneness that resembles Christ, there is a way that your spiritual relation to God changes all of a sudden. It's not the same as before. You need to listen to this with your spirit and with intent.

Ladies, when you get married, your husband becomes the channel through which God will bless you. You might not like it, but that's what happens. There are some things you as the wife will not experience in your relationship with God unless they come through your husband. Why is it that way? Because – I can't find a better word than hedged, but I'm sure you understand what I mean – God hedged it, so that He protected the structure so it can only produce the required results when it functions in a certain way.

That's why it says, "Ladies, submit to your husband" – because he's transparent; you are submitting and responding to God. So there are some things you cannot receive from God if you do not treat your husband in a certain way. For a woman, as far as some things are concerned, your husband becomes the channel through which God wants to bless you. I'm not talking about how much of the Word your husband understands – I'm talking about the structure. It's like pipes. Now that you are married, there is a pipe flowing from God to you, and you cannot bypass that pipe. Yes, with certain things you can, but not with everything. There's a way that God says there are some things you can only experience through your husband.

Can you understand why it's even more important, if you intend getting married, to make sure your husband is at the right place in his relationship with God? I'll repeat what I said earlier: don't think he will sort it out afterwards, once you're married. I can count on one hand the cases where it got better afterwards.

Now husbands – I said wives, your husband becomes the channel through which you receive from God. Husbands, your wife becomes the channel through which you give to God. Why do you think it says that if you treat your wife in a certain way, your prayers will be hindered? God is saying the same thing to you: you cannot give to Me other than by giving within the body and in the structure.

It's like something God said to me long ago: "It's impossible to love God other than by loving people." I can be in my inner room telling God how much I love Him, and it's an expression, but actually loving God – the Bible says, "How can you say you love God, whom you cannot see, when you cannot even love somebody you can see?" The only way you love God is to express love to a physical human being, and through that it becomes the channel to say, "God, I love You," because I loved Him through a human being.

So husbands, your wife becomes the channel through which you give to God. That is why your prayers become hindered when you treat your wife in a certain way, because that channel through which you need to give is blocked. You might think it's more blessed for your wife to receive through you from God, but it's more blessed for you to give through your wife to God, because you will receive everything you require in life. So to give through your wife means you must act in a certain way.

The purpose of marriage, and the way it was structured, is that the way we conduct ourselves towards each other means the husband will actually show the wife what God looks like, and the wife will show the husband what God looks like. That is how God created it from the beginning: "This is what I send you – manifest My glory and My presence in this earth, but I'm giving you a helper to ensure you can do it."

So every day in our marriage we have a responsibility: the husband, by the way he functions, shows me what God looks like, shows me what Christ looks like. The way the wife functions and responds to me makes me believe there is a God.

If we only respond in the flesh, on the level of the resistance we receive, we have achieved nothing. Even Einstein said, "You cannot solve a problem at the same level of thinking at which it was created." If a problem comes to you at one level, if a response comes from your wife at that level, you can decide to respond at a higher level. It is your response, and in that response you manifest the presence of God and show her that God is alive.

That is why it says of a wife married to a man who is not even born again, "Your conduct will win him." When somebody continues, no matter what the husband does – I'm not saying if you are in a terrible, life-threatening, abusive relationship that you should stay there; that doesn't make sense and isn't consistent with the Word of God. I'm talking in general. When you get to the point where you say, "I don't feel like being in this marriage anymore," start with small building steps and you can restore that marriage by saying, "I don't see my husband, but I see God, and I will respond to him according to the way He prescribes," and you will see how God works for you and starts changing the heart of that husband.

Just last month I counselled a woman who came to me and told me everything about her husband – again, one of those who doesn't want to go to church and all these things. I said to her, "This is what the Word of God says." She was saying they were going through terrible things in their life because her husband hadn't taken up his position in the house. I said to her, "I've got news for you." The amazing thing I love about counselling is that I do it by the Holy Spirit. Every session I come up with things I could not have thought up physically, because the Holy Spirit has a desire to restore, to heal, to uplift.

In this case, what He showed me was a picture. I don't know who of you played with magnets when you were small, with those iron filings, those black things you sometimes got from the ground. If you put those iron filings on top of a white paper and move a magnet underneath, the filings move wherever the magnet is. God showed me this picture, and I shared it with her. I said, "Don't blame your husband. The problem is not with your husband. You have a relationship with God; he doesn't. The Word tells you how you should act. These iron filings are the blessings that should come into your husband's life – the things that should change his heart. But you are not there; you are here. You continue to condemn, criticise, complain, and whatever – you are changing nothing in your husband's life." I said to her, "Position yourself where you can attract the blessings of God through him to you, but you cannot do it unless you position yourself in a certain place."

When she started responding to him in that way – because it's such a simple illustration, she's the magnet, and those things that must change his life – she must act in a way that can attract it through his heart and start changing his life. Within a week she sent me a message: "Things have started changing in my life. I cannot believe it." Because that is the way God designed it. Don't think you are going to change your husband because you know better. You are meant to show God to each other.

I touched on something regarding children earlier – can I just say something about that? Children are not your own. They do not belong to you. Children are something God entrusted to you, and again, the purpose God has in this earth, the purpose God has with a family unit, the purpose God has for entrusting those children to you, is that you raise them as God-fearing children according to the principles in the Word, that they know these things.

Many of us - my life changed 10 years ago, so I was 19 then, right? Ten years ago I was about 19. Okay, I was 39. I was 39 the year my life changed, and I just wished my life had changed 20 years earlier. But we have the privilege of raising young men and women, young people, with these truths. They don't have to go through the same things we went through, the same lies, the same fake promises, and the same destruction.

We can raise them differently. So when God entrusts children to you, your responsibility is to raise them in truth and reality. Show them the truth in the Word of God. Enable that life of God to function inside of them so that they don't make these mistakes.

As far as children are concerned, there are two things on my heart that I want to say. The first is that we raise children to become independent. Don't cling onto your children and have them stay in your house when they are still 37, still carrying things to them - are you hungry, do you want chips, do you want television? No, that's not a biblical principle. It says a husband shall leave his mother and father and join his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Don't, if you get married, then every second day phone mommy and cry in mommy's ear, and the problem is long solved here in the marriage, but mommy still thinks it's not sorted. There is a goal when you raise children: you raise them to be independent.

Isn't it amazing - it's the same principle when we disciple people. I don't disciple people so that they can become dependent on me. I don't disciple people so that they can belong to me and to an organisation. I disciple people so that they can be equipped to go and function independently, even if I never see them again. It's the same way you raise your children.

Can I just comment on that and say that's why it's also important to understand the difference between baby dedication and baptism. Now, that's a whole discussion on its own. There's no example in the New Testament where water is sprinkled on somebody's head and it's called baptism. There's no example in the New Testament even of a baby getting baptised. But that doesn't mean that baby dedication is wrong. You need to understand what you do when you dedicate, and you need to understand what you do when you baptise. They are two totally different things.

So when you have a baby and you stand in front and dedicate that baby, what are you doing? Remember what I explained about the X2 church - the whole principle of the X2 church is that we become a community. It's a communal lifestyle. We belong to each other, we live together, we function together, and we take care of each other. That's the whole thing that is missing in the body of Christ: to understand that I don't belong to myself, I am meant to make sure that you are successful in life. We take care of each other, and that includes the children.

Baby dedication is: I stand in front here, I have this baby, and I say, I commit myself in front of you as witnesses that I am going to raise this child a God-fearing child. That is, I'm making a commitment and a statement as far as my responsibility is concerned. I cannot speak on behalf of the child; I speak on behalf of my responsibility. When you get baptised, that child needs to decide for himself, understand what he's doing, and then get baptised.

But that's a side statement, not what I want to say. When I make that statement of baby dedication, it means all of you also accept responsibility with me to raise this child a God-fearing child. It doesn't help if you stand and say, 'Ooh, did you see that one, he's a problem child.' No - it's your responsibility. As a community, we all accept responsibility to take care of each other, and that includes the children.

The last thing I want to say about children is - and if I step on toes here, I'm not going to apologise, okay - it's not a biblical principle to have a child-centred marriage. I see with so many people the issues they end up in because little missy child is number one in the house. She dictates everything, she's the boss; when she snaps her fingers, everybody runs. 'Little princess, sit there, everything happens around her.' I'm not saying don't love your children, but I'm telling you, if you are living a child-focused marriage, you are raising a problem.

God didn't design it that way. Children need to learn from early on that the husband is the head and that the focus is on him as the head, and then everything flows from that - the same way the Bible says, look unto Jesus Christ, look away from the earth, from the world, look unto Jesus Christ, the author and the finisher of our faith. So don't fall into the trap of living a child-centred marriage. It's not biblical.

I want to start wrapping up a few principles and concepts, but I want to get a bit practical. I know everybody here is young, but for those of you who are the youngest of all of us sitting here, who still have the desire to get married and have big expectations about that, I just want to touch on a few basic principles.

I want to go back to something I mentioned earlier: the world created a lie about what marriage is for and how it functions - the whole Hollywood picture, et cetera. But I believe, if not before tonight, then after tonight, you have a clear picture of what the purpose of marriage is. It is to manifest the presence of God in this earth. That is the primary, sole purpose of a marital structure.

So you need to understand that if you want to have a blessed marriage - if you want to choose to suffer, that's your own choice, but there are options. You don't have to. There are ways that work. God can show you in the Word, and then that functions. So young people, don't fall into that trap. Everybody here is over 18, is that right?

Romans 12 says to us:

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

Romans 12:2 (NKJV)

The word used there is actually 'metamorphosed'. Be transformed how? By the renewing of your mind. If the Word comes to you, you can start thinking differently. When you think differently, you can speak differently, and you can start doing things differently, and then you manifest the presence of God in that situation.

So it says, do not be conformed to this world. The problem is that even for us as Christians, we are living a lifestyle in a world where a lot of what we do is worldly influence. If you really had to take yourself out of the world at this stage, isolate yourself, and have only the Word of God - nothing else, sitting on an island, not knowing people - and you study the Word of God and create the picture from the Word of God of what marriage should look like, what church should look like, what business should look like, and then you come into this earth, you would not know what you're doing here because nothing looks that way.

But we are like a frog sitting in a pot, and it's just heating up and heating up, and we become used to it. Again, I'm not on the page of condemnation, sin and judgment - I'm on the page of there are principles, and they either work for you or they work against you. Gravity is working for me; I'm not all over the place, I'm grounded here because gravity is working for me. If I walk off the sixth floor, it's working against me. Same principle - it can work for you or against you. There are principles in the Word of God.

We need to understand that we have fallen into the trap of measuring what is right and wrong by what the world says is right and wrong. And that is why so many marriages end up in a disaster.

So young people, as unpopular as it is for me to say this to you, there is absolutely no reason for you to be in a relationship unless you intend marrying that person. Full stop. There is no dating, there is no trial and error, there's no 'let's see if it works'.

When I used to be more actively involved with the students in Stellenbosch, and I counselled a lot of the students - I'm not sure if, of all the ladies I counselled, there was even one I can recall who hadn't slept with a few men already. And they have no idea what the spiritual, physical and emotional damage is in their lives.

It's not about wanting to spoil their fun. My heart goes out to people who, through ignorance, destroy their own lives, because then three years later you have to pick up the pieces. And I can tell you, for some of those ladies, even with the presence of God, it takes them years to recover. And it's unnecessary.

This lifestyle has just become the custom - like when you start dating, you sleep together, it's just the given thing, it's just how it is. It's not how it is. And I'm not even talking about sleeping together - can I get more extreme? Because maybe you still tick that box - there's no reason to kiss a woman or a man unless you intend marrying them. Is that extreme? That's how it is from the Word of God.

God wants to set you apart. You young ladies who are not married, can you understand how precious you are to God? You are His prized possession. You are something He wants to nourish, strengthen, protect and love with everything He has. Just allow Him. Don't mess up your life.

When I moved to Cape Town 15 years ago, every second woman was saying, 'You know, there's three women for every man in Cape Town, and if you get a man, you must hold onto him, because there's three people competing for that same guy.' It's a lie from Satan, because then ladies start getting desperate.

I can't believe it - when I started counselling some of these people, they were 19, they were in matric last year, and they sleep together permanently, every night. They just stay together, sleep together, and they obviously don't just watch movies when they're together. And I think to myself, do they have any idea? And when I speak to them separately, I start understanding: this lady is so afraid she's not going to get a husband, so afraid she's going to be left out from society. So the lies and the fear of Satan start messing up people's lives. Don't fall for those lies.

The way that it works is this, and I'm going to combine two things. I'm going to quickly take a side tour and then come back to this point. The principle the Word of God explains about how the church functions is as a community, and within that community we take care of each other. And in that community there are elders that stand up - it doesn't have to be officially appointed, but the Bible says, how does one become an elder? It says, look at his family. Does he have God-fearing children? If not, he cannot be an elder.

Isn't that interesting - it comes back to the core of the structure God designed to ensure His people are kept holy and pure, a dwelling place for Him. He ensures this by saying, 'You can all talk, but where's the result? Show me the fruit. Show me what your children look like. Show me what the people around you look like. Are they strengthened? Are they nourished? Are they loved?' So we, as a community, are meant to take care of each other - it's meant to be a spiritual structure, not a dominion, an authority, a control thing.

Now we've all become control freaks, and everybody is running away from church because they say, 'The pastor wants to control my life, he's going to decide who I marry and who not.' It's not about that. It's about standing together. The pack of wolves is coming from the outside, but if we stand together, we can ensure that every single one of us remains standing.

And in that process, regarding your safety in ending up in the right relationship, we talk a lot about the principle of accountability, because we've moved away from structure and religion and all of that. We say, 'Now I have all the freedom, I can do whatever I want, nobody will tell me what to do.' That's also a lie from Satan, because we need to be accountable towards each other. The Bible says you don't belong to yourself, you belong to God now, which means you belong to the body of Christ - not from a controlling point of view, but from the perspective of 'I make myself accountable'.

I encourage every single person I know - we'll actually speak about that tomorrow, but a lot of you are not here tomorrow, so I need to touch on it now. Find two people who are spiritually mature, whose spiritual judgment you trust, and make yourself accountable to them. When you make big decisions in your life, you check with them - you say, 'I have prayed about it, what do you hear?'

But here's the thing: it's easy to have an accountability group. What if you feel something and both of those people say no? That's the problem we currently have in the body of Christ, where we can just say, 'I'm my own boss, nobody tells me what to do.' If you trust people's spiritual guidance, it means you need to follow it. The same principle applies when you are part of a community, which you should be, because people need to take care of you. You cannot just be out there somewhere - the wolves are going to get you, so you need people who take care of you.

And in that community, when you feel you have met somebody, and you go home and pray about it - not have dreams and start sweating and whatever, but you pray about it - and God starts speaking to you, God starts showing you something about that person. Then you go to the people you are spiritually accountable to and say, 'I feel God has said to me that this is my future husband or wife.' They pray with you, and then they say yes or they say no. And if they say no and you say yes, then you continue to pray - all of you pray. God is not confused. There's only one Holy Spirit, one Spirit, one God, one baptism, so you need to get to a point where everybody knows they hear God's voice, and that is where your protection is.

You marry the person God has destined for you to marry. There's no reason to have 14 dates and sleep with seven people and end up in a disaster before you get out of the disaster and still marry the wrong man or wife. You don't have to go through those ways. There's a better way - the way God designed it to work, where people who have no agenda other than to love you and take care of you can support you in making that decision.

So those are the two things I want to say. Don't mess around with dating and sleeping together and whatever else - you are messing up your life. It's not consistent with what God's desire for your life is. Step out of it, forget about it. If that's what you did in the past, make a decision. I said to you tonight is going to be a night of choices.

For yourself, make that decision today and say, 'I want to live a God-fearing life. I want to set myself aside for what God destined me for.' And then you start living that life - no matter what the world thinks about you, you start living that life. You will experience the blessing of God. That is the decision you make. And on the other hand, make sure you are part of a community that can take care of you. You don't have to do this on your own.

I'm going to end there. There are two things I still want to do. The one is that I've spoken a lot about that life of God inside of you, but I want to be sure that everybody here tonight actually has that life of God inside of them. I already told you what went wrong: spiritual separation. Separation from God was spiritual death because of sin - Adam and Eve got separated. But then God sent the solution; He sent Jesus Christ.

We can all say, what did Jesus come and do? Yes, He paid for my sins. But He did much more than that. He only paid for your sins because it was a means to an end. The fact that He paid for your sins was so that you can become righteous, so that the original problem of separation from God could be fixed. That is why Jesus came. So if you accept Jesus as your Saviour and Lord of your life, it's not a religious thing - it's actually receiving the life of God inside of you, and you receive spiritual life and eternal life.

It's got nothing to do with religion. It's the life of God that is inside of you. It's the only thing that makes you go to heaven - the life form that is inside of you, not whether you live right, or do good, or have no sin. None of that will get you to heaven. It's only whether you have the life form of God inside of you. Jesus Himself said in John 3:3, very clearly:

“Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

John 3:3 (NKJV)

Then how do you become born again? Romans 10:9 explains how:

“If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”

Romans 10:9 (NKJV)

So there are two things: you need to believe it, and then you need to speak it. The next verse confirms it:

“For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

Romans 10:10 (NKJV)

The amazing thing is: what does the heart believe? The heart doesn't just believe that Jesus died for you, or that Jesus paid for your sins - the heart believes unto righteousness. And that's amazing, because that is where our freedom is: you believe, no matter what your life has looked like up to now, no matter what you've sinned, what you have done wrong in the past and even currently - Jesus has paid for it. So when you believe with your heart, you believe the price Jesus paid was enough so that you can become righteous by nature, not by deed. You believe unto righteousness, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”

2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV)

So when you accept Jesus Christ, your spirit becomes born again.

But look at what verses 18 and 19 say. How can I be reconciled with somebody if we were not together at some stage, got separated, and now we are reconciled again? So we got separated from God through the sin of Adam and Eve, and now again Jesus makes it possible for us. In Christ, if we accept Him, we get reconciled. We become one with God - that's literally what happens, nothing to do with religion. You become one with God.

“Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.”

2 Corinthians 5:18-19 (NKJV)

Can you see what our ministry is? Not judgment, not condemnation, not walking around telling everybody what they are doing wrong. Our ministry is making people one with God. Whatever you've done wrong, Jesus has paid for it, but you need to accept it - you need to accept what Jesus has done.

So I want to be sure, because you can't enter into this journey we've spoken about - about relationships, about marriage, about the future, about manifesting God - unless you have this life form inside of you. So I'm going to give you the opportunity now to make that decision to receive that life form. I'm not going to call you to the front, don't worry - nobody's going to know. You're going to sit, be seated right there where you are. It's a personal decision. You can make it for yourself, but you need to make that decision, and I'm going to give you the opportunity by raising your hand while everybody's eyes are closed, okay?

So it will remain private. Can everybody close their eyes? Okay, so you have full privacy now. Maybe for the first time you understand what this life in Christ is all about. Maybe for the first time you understand what it means to be born again, what it means to accept Jesus Christ as your Saviour and Lord of your life. If you want to make that decision today, if you're not 100% certain and you want to confirm it again today, just raise your hand and keep it up if you want to accept Jesus as your Saviour today.

Can I ask you to let go of the hands of the person next to you - somebody might not feel the freedom and comfort to lift up their hand while you are holding it. If you want to make Jesus Lord of your life today, just raise your hand. Okay, you can drop those hands now.

So I'm going to ask you to pray this prayer with me, which basically does what it says in Romans 10:10 - you need to believe it, and then you need to speak it. Just pray this after me, because if you are born again already it doesn't matter, you can pray it again - but it just makes it easier for those who want to retain their privacy.

Thank You, Father, that You love me so much. You sent Your Son, Jesus Christ, to die for me. I've accepted Jesus as my Saviour and Lord of my life. I am born again. I am a new creation. I receive eternal life into my spirit. Thank You, Father, that You do not leave me alone, but You sent Your Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, come and fill me - come and fill my heart, come and fill my mind, come and fill my body. Thank You, Holy Spirit, that You stay inside of me and give me supernatural ability, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

That is just amazing.

I really have it in my heart - and for some of you this might also be different from what you are used to - but I want us to have communion together. We're going to end off with that, and I want to explain to you what that is all about, specifically tonight. You are meant to have communion all the time. Jesus said, 'Do this in remembrance of Me until I return.' It's one of the few commandments Jesus gave us: do this in remembrance of Me until I return.

I want you to listen quickly, because I could not nearly get to everything I want to cover tonight, but there are a few YouTube videos I've shared on some of the topics, on two different channels. The one is called Purpose Series - it's a whole range; if you listen to that, listen from one to six, because they follow on from each other. You can just search for Purpose Series, or otherwise send us a mail: life@fellowshipcommunity.co.za. You can write it down - life@fellowshipcommunity.co.za - and we can share the links with you regarding the Purpose Series. The other one is just called Fellowship Communities - the email is fellowshipcommunity, the YouTube channel is Fellowship Communities. Go and listen to some of the teachings there.

Regarding communion, you should have communion often, even at your house. And we spoke about the head of the house - the husband should continuously have communion in the house, because Jesus gave it to us as an instruction, and there is blessing in it, there is purpose in it. It's not a religious habit - it's again one of those things that religion turned into something it was not meant to be, but it's meant for us to celebrate life, and it can have a different focus every time although the core is the same.

Tonight I really have it in my heart that when we have communion now, we're talking about relationships, and you remember that verse I read you earlier when Jesus said, 'Father, the same glory You gave Me, I gave them, so that You are in Me, I am in them, they in Me.' It's like this whole one thing - you can't distinguish it anymore, and I really want us to celebrate that tonight, that we who are seated here and have accepted the life of Christ inside of us are all one. I want to celebrate it from the perspective that we are here to help each other.

I'm going to say something very bold tonight: if you have an issue and a challenge in your life and you don't ask us to help you overcome it and get out of it, it is your own fault if your life doesn't change. God is presenting the opportunity to you tonight through people who will love you unconditionally and help you unconditionally to get out of the things you have challenges with in your life. Make use of it - it's up to you.

So I want us to celebrate that from 1 Corinthians 11, from verse 24:

“And when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, 'Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.' In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.' For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till He comes.”

1 Corinthians 11:24-26 (NKJV)

You proclaim the Lord's death, and the fact that you proclaim the Lord's death also means you proclaim the Lord's life, because His death was a means to an end, a means to a purpose, and that is your reconciliation.

This principle I shared earlier, in terms of us being in Christ and Christ being in God and we all being one - we do not only celebrate communion with God, we celebrate communion with each other, because we now have the same life form inside of us and we have become one. So we celebrate our oneness, and we celebrate our oneness with Christ. So when you break the bread, have an expectation that it means something to you.

Celebrate life. There is a price that Jesus paid, the most significant price. I always used to have this picture in my mind when it said God sent His Son to die for me. I thought, if I had a son one day, would I be willing to sacrifice that son? But that is not what Jesus did. He did not sacrifice the Son that was standing next to Him. It says in John, if you read it, it says, “The Word of God became flesh.” It says, “The Word was with God, it was in God.”

That was Jesus Christ. So what God had to do is He had to take the Jesus Christ that was inside of Him. He had to rip out His heart to pay the price for you – not take the son that was next to Him. Totally different picture. So have an expectation that you are worthy. Did you hear that? Jesus, God decided to pay the ultimate price.

If it was only you, He still would have paid that price. You are worthy, you are valuable, you are precious, and His body was broken so that you can walk in victory today. So when you eat that bread, experience that in your spirit. You can even close your eyes and just experience in the spirit that restoration, that oneness, that life. And then when you drink this cup, the blood of Jesus, I really want you to just go beyond what you have been taught in religion before.

Go beyond that and have an expectation. The blood of Jesus paid for all your sins. Whatever you have done, whatever you are doing, whatever you will do, sin cannot separate you from God anymore. Will sin have implication in your life? Yes, because of spiritual laws that function disregarding. So I'm not advocating or advising you walk in sin, but it's not the ultimate thing. As you have a conviction of the life of God inside of you, you will sin less and less and less, but that is a byproduct of the conviction of what this did for you.

“Much more we that have received the gift of righteousness shall reign in life.”

Romans 5:17 (NKJV)

The gift of righteousness – remember Romans 10 explained to us it was the heart you believe unto righteousness. So you must really get into your spirit that the price Jesus paid was enough to wash you clean. When God looks at you, He cannot see sin, and that is what makes it possible for you to be one with Him. So have an expectation as you drink this that you are celebrating your oneness with each other and your oneness with God, because you have been purified and made holy and righteous.

I would like to pray for you. Thank You, Father, in the name of Jesus. What a privilege tonight, Father, to be in Your presence, to have experienced Your Word and Your ministration. I thank You for every person that is here, that You have touched them, that You have spoken to them, that You have revealed truth and reality, and that You have instilled love into their heart. Father, that heart that brings healing and restoration – even now, Father, as we pray, there is restoration and healing taking place in the hearts of many.

They are restored, they are healed, they are strengthened, Father. That guilt, that condemnation is leaving them now because of their awareness of righteousness. They are who You say they are. They have Your life form. They have eternal life, and You have set them aside unto the purpose that You have created them for. Thank You, Father. Every one of them is precious to You. They are precious.

They are precious. They are worthy. They are valuable. And thank You, Father, that You touch them through Your Spirit, that You strengthen them, uplift them, and enable them, Father, to do everything that You have destined them for. I also pray, Father, that every one of them that has isolated themself will find a spiritual family somewhere where they can belong, where they can be taken care of, and where they can grow. And they will be strengthened.

Thank You, Father, that the onslaughts of Satan cannot get to them and cannot be successful. No weapon of Satan fashioned against them shall prosper, Father. It will fall to the ground and come to nothing. Thank You that they increase every day in a desire for Your Word, for Your Spirit, for Your presence, and they grow in the knowledge of the Word of God that they may walk in victory. Thank You, Father, for overcoming life.

Thank You, Lord Jesus, that You paid the full price to make it possible for us to become one with our Father and live in victory every single day of our lives, keeping our eyes focused on Jesus. Thank You, Father, that You send forth Your angels to surround every person present here and their family and minister to them. Open their eyes and enable them to receive eternal life. Thank You, Father, that everybody will drive safely tonight, that they will have a blessed weekend and continue to experience Your presence.

In the name of Jesus. We also pray, Father, for every person that will listen to this recording, that they will be touched by Your Spirit, that You will give life to what they receive. In the name of Jesus, amen.