7 Ways to Affair-Proof Your Ministry

I have long adopted a similar set of rules for my own ministry.

Best way to affair proof one's ministry is to have a ministry to one's wife and home, which are touched on in the article cited above.

I can recall about three occaisons in the past 30 years where I have been alone with a woman who was not my wife.

In one instance, I was doing some sensitive counseling with a particular woman who cornered me after a night meeting of the church. She was not easily dismissed as she poured out her heart in tears. I did all this with church members in the building and an open door, but I just about freaked out when I discovered that we were the last two left in the building. I started calling deacons, my wife, and anyone else I could think of! What was made worse was what she poured out to me -- everyone in a church setting to whom she shared her troubles ended up "abusing here sexually." My word! I could see the HUGE target on my back! We NEVER met like that again and my wife was present for all later counseling. By God's grace, this woman repented and went on to become influential in national missions work including becoming the publisher of a magazine aimed at national missions work.

The other two cases were secular employment related where I simply had to do what I did or else loose my job for discrimination. No couseling, just riding here and there to do company business.

Over the years, my wife has come to apprecaite the fact that I REFUSE to be alone with any other woman and we have a most trusting marriage relationship because of that. She understands that I am willing to make her "unhappy" because she MUST sit in on a counseling session that she would rather not participate in than making here even "more unhappy" by what might come of such an encounter if I were accused of some sin by some person who may not be in right mind.

We teach marriage skills together and this has proven to be a most fruitful ministry!

Oh, and in case you didn't already discern, yes, I LOVE my bride. I am head over heels over her, more so now than the day we walked the aisle during our marriage ceremony. I "thought" that I loved her then, I know so much more now and love her so much more! She is God's best gift to me apart from Christ who makes this kind of love possible. We've only been married 34 years so far, but I'm sure that one of these days we will get out of the honeymoon phase... Or not... :laugh: :thumbsup:

 

I agree and that aspect of the article is un-workable in any true counseling endeavor. Body language and placement of one's eyes are critical and women are more apt to pick up on that than men.

Additionally, I reject the current fad in biblical counseling which seems to make emphatic that the man is the source of all the problems. In over 80% of the couples we've seen in the past 10 years the woman had more issues by far than the man, though he certainly was not lacking issues. Even when the man tried to extend biblical headship (which may or may not be exercised correctly, in love) in many occiasions the woman rejected his efforts causing him to seek elsewhere for fulfillment -- sports, television, other women, party life, etc. Not that any woman can actually fulfill the life of her husband, or even that she must fulfill the life of her husband, she must at least be congnizant that he -- just like she -- has needs and desires them to be met by his spouse.

 

Want to affair proof your marriage? Have a healthy and happy sex life with your spouse.

1 Cor 7 teaches us that.

 

That most certainly is not a proven fact.

A healthy and happy sex life is one where sex is enjoyed according to God's Word. Selfishness is minimized as common ground is sought. Sex becomes an act that glorifies God and both spouses take pleasure in pleasing the other. In practical terms that looks very different based on the needs and desires of each couple. It takes work, to be sure, but only at first. Intimacy, unity, and selflessness are largely learned in the marriage bed. That is how God designed it.Then, when life's circumstances change and sex is no longer that big of a part of life then marriages may be great without it.

 

When couples sit before me with that issue, I often counsel the woman to RAVAGE the man. Never let him have a breath of air. Before he gets to eat insist that he perform in the bedroom. Before he goes to work, make him late. Don't let him rest. Don't let him watch television. Constantly harange him for physical attention (best to send the kids to grandma for a couple days!) She can, of course, handle that much better than any man alive and no man can keep up with a woman who would do that. I've found that when desperate women work the ploy, by the end of the first day or so the man will tell her to stop and then they can get on with figuring out what a healthy marriage looks like. Especially when he has to explain why he was late for work, why he is still hungry, etc. :laugh:

 

There is only one way to avoid all sin, keep your eyes on Him, follow the Spirit!

 

Lord willing, we will celebrate our 46th anniversary in a few months.

 

We have to be careful to assess the issues, and we can most assuredly count on the fact that some very basic-level sins are in action, such as the most basic of all Christian commandments -- love one another. If we cannot do this in the bounds of marriage then how can we do it with others with whom we are not intimate with at that level?

And, in some (perhaps even many) cases there is a deficient leadership structure coming out of the "head" in that he has no clue how to be a priest in his home, how to "love" his wife as Christ loved the church, or even how to respect the helpmate that his wife is, created that way by God. But in other cases -- and I've probably seen far too many -- the woman is off the rails with emotional issues, lack of cognizant reality, envy, greed, selfishness, etc., and the worst of all, usurping the role of "head" in that the "husband" is in actuality treated just like one of the kids with "mom" trying to tone down his testosterone drive and get him to "obey," all of which lead to further strife.

God gave women a gift in that they seem more naturally inclined to rear children than men (and we can take that in an unhealthy way as well as a God-given healthy way!) but when that same "mom-ness" extends to also "raising her husband" then she has gone to far and forgotten that she is in fact a "wife" and not always a "mom."

There are, of course, a lot more dimensions to all of this. I'm just shooting off a couple of thoughts about the issue here. A good guide is what Peter wrote -- husbands are to love their wives and wives are to respect their husbands. Some who have studied this issue (myself at a rudimentary level) have noticed that men's natural language is "respect" and women's is "love." The problem comes when a man speaks "respect language" to his bride and his bride speaks "love language" to her husband. In a lot of cases they speak right past each other because they don't hear well what has been said -- or why it has been said!