Reason #3
He Is in Bondage
What does this mean?
Just as it sounds, he has cords, chains tied around his life and he is unable to escape from his sins. They pursue him, overtake him, enslave him. He tries to understand. He explains to himself, rehearsing what he will say if confronted, all to very little avail. It is a rut. He is stuck, tortured, crippled. There seems to be no way out. The power of God over sin seems to be for everyone else.
Solution #3: How does this happen? Sometimes (most times) this condition in someone who claims Christ, comes from unforgiveness.
In Matthew 6:15 the Lord tells us that God’s people must forgive others to receive forgiveness from the Father. The man holding others in unforgiveness places himself in grave spiritual danger. He shows that even greater sin lies dormant within himself, awaiting a moment to manifest. He proves his need for the grace of God while risking forfeiture of that grace. In fact, he refuses grace.
Failing to go for grace when he is needy, he becomes enslaved. It is such a potential for great loss.
There is little you can do if your husband’s unforgiveness is plaguing your marriage. If he is sinning, you can hardly stop sinning for him. Your patience and prayers are the best you can give.
It’s a different story, though, if the wife is holding him in bondage through her unforgiveness. In Matthew 16:19, we find that if a Christian forgives someone, he is forgiven in God’s eyes. God gives us that authority. This means that when your husband is going too fast on the highway, you can forgive him and free him to receive grace to conquer lawlessness. When he overeats, you can forgive him and free him to receive grace to conquer gluttony. When he neglects to pay bills, you can forgive him and free him to receive grace to conquer laziness.
This makes an enormous difference.
Hard to believe? Look at the Apostle Paul. When he called himself “Saul”, he was one of the Romans who helped kill Christians, hardly a small sin, hardly something you could forgive if you found it in your husband. Yet, Stephen forgave Saul, freeing him for his future. Read about it in Acts 7:58 – 9:1. It really happened: A Godly person forgave the unforgivable. He released the sinner to receive Christ’s ministry and become Christ’s minister. What Stephen forgave on this earth was forgiven in heaven. Stephen was like Jesus in his death.
We are called to be like Christ. That is what the word “Christian” means. If Jesus Christ could love and forgive you when you were His enemy, if Stephen could forgive his murderous enemy, how much more should we be willing to forgive the husband of our heart, our beloved, the one we chose to share this life with!
This two-sided commission also gives us authority to hold a man to his sin, to hold him in bondage. Before we shrug this off, remember that if a husband is bound to a sin, the wife is too, because we are bound to them in marriage. Taking this lightly is dangerous because God takes it seriously. You bind your husband to his sin, yourself to him, your children to you both, to the third and fourth generations of them that hate the Lord. Hate is a strong word, but Jesus said it: You cannot serve two masters. You love only one and hate the other. Whomever you serve, is your master. If you serve the god of unforgiveness, I fear for your family.
There is one more fearful facet to this truth: If you hold your daddy in unforgiveness, binding him to his sin, you need to realize you are bound to him, too, as his daughter. Are you seeing some of his same sins in your husband or in your children? Is it beginning to make sense? Forgiveness IS the key, just as God said. The joyful thing is: you hold the key.
Matthew 16:18-19
Home's Cool! 
Wonderful and thought provoking post!
As my wife says (in Russian) – “horrors” – “ujas!”.
The God of Forgiveness vs the God of Wrath means Love Wins – ALWAYS. I am accused of being too liberal or too soft or too naive but the truth is: how to convey the ineffable? How can one describe the opposite of Love? How can a God (or a negation of same) provides so much (or conversely takes so much from us as sentient beings) and yet be couched in such ordinary human perspectives?
I was struck the other day by some interviewee comments on the Iranian (takeover by clerics of the country’s) leadership in the 70s and the commentator’s family’s’ subsequent fleeing to the USA.
The interviewee basically said that the family prayed to the “American God” since the deity they had up to that time prayed to (for the Shah to be returned from exile and the vile hypocrites which had taken over their beloved homeland to be ousted – or at least for their new life in America to be a good one) had not worked out for them nor for their country. They prospered in America the interviewee decided after many years to devote his life to the Word (and was ostracized by his family – who incidentally wound up one by one following him to the teachings of Jesus).
But the part that struck me most readily and ate away at my thinking was that they had even “considered” the existence of differing or multiple competing gods. This is the kind of muddy thinking which confounds all efforts to bring rationality much less harmony to the ideas of the world regarding morality and authority. Just some thoughts…thanks for your post!
Thank you so much for this amazing comment!
It is true that God hates sinners. And that could be problematic because He also loves people, who, sooner or later always prove they are sinners. I thank Him for His amazing solution, the awful sacrifice. Glad, I am.
Ineffable, yes; also infinite.
Infinite love always conquers hate because hate is not infinite. All hate and all wrong will be conquered. And the conquering will be done by Him, in His infinite power.
How amazing to me that other nations consider the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacom to be the “American God”! I think you would find a different thinking if you could ask the American President.
This God, though, has told us in His living Word that there are imposter gods about us, but His people know from centuries of experience that those who follow Him never need fear the others. He is all powerful.
He is all in all for those who follow His loving, merciful ways, for those who accept the sacrifice of His perfect Son, the Messiah, Jesus. So many love His teachings and fail to realize His main teaching: That He is the only way. The only way. He came to show that.
This God of mercy feeds and cares for His people as if they were ewes with tender lambs. The other gods feed ON their followers and destroy them in the end. It’s been proven so many times. Over and over, the waste places rejoice. He walks with us and He talks with us. He did not stay dead–He is that powerful.
I so appreciate your comments here. Please stop by any time and add your wisdom to what we are trying to do here.
Jesus is the narrow gate. We are commanded to forgive and love others as God has forgiven and loved us. We are called to be gentle and loving and yet strong in our faith and faithfulness. Forgiving our husbands is a balm for their soul and a healing for the woundedness. Loved your post, Katharine–
Thanks, Kate! A balm. Yes. A healing balm for their woundedness. I love that.