You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand. Ken, Welcome to the
Jesus Christ Show. Hello Jesus you today. I'm good Ken, how are
you? I'm doing very well. I had a question for you. I'm
single and I want to be married, and I don't like dating. I
don't I would rather The question is, can I pray that God would lead
a specific girl to me or me to a specific girl, being that he
being that you know everything, and you know what you're around the corner and
down the road, and it would be very important to me that it would
be someone that would be very helpful. Sure, the soul mate, the
right mate. Well, a few things to look at. Is one,
there's nowhere in scripture that says there's one person for you until you marry them.
Once you marry them, that should be the person. So it's not
about you know, having a soulmate s o U L mate. It's about
having a soul mate, just one. So that's the important part. Now,
sometimes people get caught up in looking for the perfect person so intensely that
they miss all the wonderful, imperfect people just like themselves that are available.
So you do a little checklist with yourself and you say, because being single
and being available are two different things. You can be single and not have
someone in your life and still not be emotionally at that place or intellectually at
that place where you're ready to have that relationship. If you check all those
things off and you say, okay, I'm ready to go, then you
get. Then you move forward in prayer so that God will help you with
discernment. Not about you know, just lead me to this person. You're
a part, You're a participant in this. That's like you know, sitting
in front of your broken down car and say, God, fix this.
No, you know, guide my hand, give me the intellect, the
ability, the will, the desire to learn and to make the best decision
I can and to live with the consequences should I not. Those are the
things that you want, is that you God's given you the tools. When
you're a child and you're being raised your parents really is giving you tools.
A bad parent is the one that does everything for you that's not helping you
because sooner or later they're not going to be around. So God wants to
give you these tools on how to decide who's good for you. And it's
not just outwardly appearance. How to decide who's going to be a healthy partner
and what things is it? Does that mean it's somebody that believes everything you
do. No, there's going to be people. You're gonna have differences,
maybe in politics or different you know, tastes in food or music or what
have you. All that's okay, and you're gonna have similarities things that you
want to to, you know, share with one another. A good place
to find somebody should you be looking, is in places that you like to
go yourself. You know, people go to bars and things like that to
meet someone, and it's what are you gonna meet there? You're gonna meet
someone in a bar rather than if you like to read and you're in a
library or a bookstore or something like that. You're you're more likely to meet
somebody of like mind or even church. These types of things are you know,
if they're a part of who you are, then they're probably going to
be a part of who they are. Praying is a wonderful thing when it
comes to looking for a mate. Ken just don't get into that pattern of
kind of waiting for God to bring them to your doorstep, because it's not
about a special delivery. It's about, you know, being confident and knowing
what you want and not settling by way of you know, I see people
that they get in the same bad relationships over and over again just because the
man or woman is blonde hair and blue eyed. Well that's what I like,
that's what I and so they get lost in that rather than the character
of the individual. And and and looking at the outward outward appearance is going
to be what probably draws you in first. And these are general tools that
God's already given you. It's about using them, not about necessarily God bringing
them to your door. How long have you been single? Ken? For
years? Three years, yes, sir. And the last relationship how long
was it the lower fifteen years? And was it a marriage? Yes?
Okay, so three years out of a fifteen year marriage. Why do you
think now is the time that I certainly do not imply being single? Okay,
it's not I don't want to be married to be married, but I
want someone special in my life. And you know, unfortunately the marriage didn't
work out. Why didn't Why didn't work out? She fell in love with
someone else and she left you? Yes, And that's a rough one,
isn't it. Yeah, that was tough, and uh, you a little
gun shy this time around. I guess it would be a good way to
describe it. Just remember people are individuals, Ken, and not you know,
every woman's the same and not every man's the same. And and don't
put the sins of yor's wife on someone new, because that's a hard You
know a lot of times guys will come out of a relationship like that and
learning to trust becomes difficult. And uh, and you can't put that on
the new people in your life. You kind of have to trust them and
let them fall or stand as they may. But you you know what you
what you're looking for. What was it about your ex wife that attracted you
to her? She she wasn't necessarily Actually, my ex father in law also
wanted to introduce us Vietnam me for about eight years before I ever met her,
and so we introduced us and we started dating and she seemed like a
wonderful person. She is a wonderful person. But yeah, she she was
attractive and well educated. And what do you think went wrong then? Ken?
I guess maybe over a course of time we grew apart. Yeah,
I don't really accept that. So that's not how people work. People grow.
Life is constantly going back and forth and you're growing. People say growing
apart, but really that's that's laziness, that's just people not wanting to participate
in the marriage anymore. So what is it that did you lose focus and
start putting your attention somewhere else? Or obviously she did, but what was
it? If she's a good person, you're a good person. There's no
reason why the two of you can't be together. And something along the lines
there somebody stopped paying attention to someone else, or stopped paying attention to themselves.
There's nothing worse than watching a loved one let themselves go, whether it's
physically, emotionally or intellectually. They don't read, they don't experience things,
they don't care that really can you know, lead to problems in the marriage
too. But it's something happened along the line, ken, And I ask
you because I don't want you to bring it into the next relationship because you
play a part in it. You you understand that, right, yes?
Okay? In the in the works of my sister in law who called me
afterwards and talked to me. She said that, you know, I want
you to know that this is not the first time that you know, what
she described was nine years previous. You know, she had been seeing someone
else saying as well, and she said that, you know when she talked
to my wife, that she had told her years back that you know,
I'm just not in love with him, and yeah, I wish I had
not gotten married to him, and so, yeah, love is a strange
thing. People expect to stay in that feeling of love and no one does.
I mean, it's a process. It's something you you work into and
if you don't work at it, it's like anything else, it will atrophy.
But I think people use that as an excuse to kind of do what
they want. Most importantly, can be introspective, look at where you played
a part in that breakup, and don't bring that into the next relationship.
But if you really are seeking somebody and seek the will of God, and
you know, when you're going just after your own lust or after what you
want, let things grow naturally and healthily and they become more stable. And
make sure that the soil is good, and that means that you yourself are
healthy and in a good place, and you enjoy your own company, and
that you are well versed in who you are before you go bringing someone else
into that equation. Dave, Welcome to Jesus Christia. Well, thank you
for taking my call. I appreciate it, my pleasure. My question is
is that was invited to attend a church by a friend, a coworker,
and I did some inquiry on the church, and their policy is that if
you are a divorced person, which I am, and it doesn't matter why
you're divorced, whether you know your spouse had cheated or whether it was for
some of them, you may attend services and church functions, but you are
not able or allowed by their policy to hold membership and to hold a position
in leadership. Your phone broke up. Yeah, you're not allowed to hold
Actually you're not allowed to hold any type of church membership at all, leadership
or not. You're just allowed to attend. Oh oh that's different. Okay,
So I wanted to know your thoughts on that. Well, there's you
know, that's that's at the discretion of that particular church. If they perceive
things that way. I will say this, it makes for kind of a
strange situation. What if you were to have been divorced and remarried that same
person. You know what, I didn't ask that, but I did ask
about what if you were divorced prior to being saved? And what was their
response? His response was, it doesn't matter why you're divorced. And in
addition to that, it was, even if you're a church member and for
some reason or another you do get divorced, you still may attend the church,
but you are no longer a member. Yeah, it sounds a little
harsh to me personally looking at the fact that Jeremiah three talks about God divorcing
Israel. So now you have God committing a sin in their eyes, and
that would be a problem because divorce is one of those things that God hates.
But it's it's bigger than just the word or just the act. It's
the the attitude of a disposable marriage is what's what angers God. And I
think sometimes gets people get so hyper focused on the word and the concept that
they that they amplify that to a point where that becomes the big deal.
And in this particular case, now I've heard rightly so that many people,
many churches don't want anybody in leadership to have been divorced. Usually that's that's
under their understanding of Christianity. If they're not Christians, it's technically not a
sin in the church because they don't believe in the church. That's not to
say that you don't sin as a non Christian, of course you do,
but it's it's the Scripture talks about why would you judge them by the standard
of Christianity If they're not Christians, you shouldn't expect the world to act anything
different than the world because that's who they are. So I find it strange,
and they're not really here to explain themselves. I would say that that
sounds like a church. By the description you're giving, that maybe is not
the right one for you. Oh well, thank you very much taking my
call. I really appreciate it. You're welcome, Dave, and churches do
have their own insight in their own ways, and it is their church,
but it doesn't mean you have to participate in it. Chris, Welcome to
Jesus Christ. I've been a follower and disciple for the last thirty years of
you, and I have some confusion and sometimes frustration on how to pray to
the Holy Spirit. What do I say, What do I call them disease?
Well, what what do you mean specifically praying to the Holy Spirit?
Sometimes I just feel weird because I pray to my Papa and I pray to
you, and then when it comes to the Holy Spirit, it feels weird
sometimes to say Holy Spirit or Spirit. It's almost like it's a way out
there type of prayer. Oh, I see, because you're not. It's
it's because I came in the physical form. You get that. And even
the concept of Father, although you don't see him, you get that.
And then the Spirit seems well, in scripture, it's a dove and I'm
going to pray to a dove. It doesn't make sense. I understand that.
You the concept, Yeah, it gets. It's a little ethereal and
kind of hard to place. But in scripture you find that Matthew six talks
about praying to the heavenly Father, and and John fourteen talks about praying in
the name of Jesus Christ. And then there's scriptures that will say pray,
pray to the Spirit. But keep in mind that in throughout scripture when it
talks about the spirit, the spirit really is who's moving you to begin with
those moments. It even says that the Spirit is praying with you, it's
interceding with you when you're in prayer to begin with. So that quite frankly,
a lot of the emotional or that physical reaction you have to a scripture
or to being in a church service, hearing worship or doing some of those
motivations that make you even desire to pray are coming from the Spirit to begin
with. So you really are more intimate and understanding of the Spirit than one
may think because you're interacting with the Spirit on a daily basis. If you
imagine the Spirit is who brings you to me, to motivates you, motivates
you to open your heart to me, and I bring you to the Father.
So in that relationship, when you're praying to the Spirit, there's no
difference. If it helps you to see a physical shape or to understand that
way, then so be it. But don't think that it's The term spirit
just sounds so out there and so non tangible that it seems like it gets
in the way, but it really shouldn't. It's about taking the time to
pray and to focus yourself on the things of God and really I'll invite you
to do this next time you pray Chris. As Scripture says, there's different
ways to pray with others by yourself. Sometimes it refers to a prayer closet
of going away and kind of locking yourself away. If you remember in Scripture,
there was even times where I wanted others to sit and pray with me,
and then there's times where I just went and prayed by myself. And
I want you to take some time and go in maybe a little more of
a formal setting. And this doesn't have to be all the time, but
just for this moment and go somewhere where no one else is and get in
a position that's comfortable for you and clear your mind and clear yourself of the
worries of the day, and just receive and just feel the presence of God
and start to pray. And in that time and that opportunity, you'll be
open to the interaction of God and what God has and feel the spirit,
feel the spirit of God come upon you when you're starting to pray. John,
welcome to the Jesus Christ Show. Old Jesus call you today. I
am well John, and you good excellent. I have a question for you,
And just a little background. My son, my youngest son, is
in prison and the last time I visited him, we were talking and one
of the things he said to me was that he is lonely every day and
prison will do that. What to say? And I'm thinking you, i'd
have some good suggestions, because I'm sure the answer lies in your word,
and I would like to know what those words are. Well, he says
that, and may I ask what he's in for. It's uh, he
was charged with a sex crime, but I feel he's in there for extremely
bad decisions and lack of common sense because he was given many opportunities to avoid
confinement. It's bad. Okay. Well, there's there's a purpose to loneliness
sometimes, and in prison you can fight that loneliness. But that seems to
be part of the problem that he that got him there in the first place
was not understanding loneliness or not understanding proper relationships to begin with. When you
say that plays a part, yep, Okay, So there's a lot to
be learned here just on the face of things that taking this time or having
that alone time, there's different levels of loneliness. There's this the most simplistic
level of loneliness is the absence of another human being or the absence of that
kind of communion or companionship, Okay, and that that could be just someone
not there. You're by yourself, But being by yourself isn't always being lonely,
correct, correct? Okay, So there's different levels of loneliness. In
this particular case, I think that that your son's dealing with a lot of
issues of not knowing how to be with himself, for one, And in
the case of his particular situation, we don't know the details, and no
need to get into the details. I ask you those things about you know,
a little sketch of ways in the because that often points to other things
that are going on in his life. Well. Decision making skills are poor,
it seems, and also execution of emotions or certain feelings. And so
now as he sits lonely in a jail cell, which is not a bad
thing, by the way, he needs to start learning those things and understanding
as to why he doesn't want to be with himself. So with that being
said, when it comes to scripture and faith, religion and sharing those things,
you can only pass along what you do yourself and say, you know,
it hurts me to hear that you were lonely or that you have that
deep loneliness when you're here. And I can only tell you you know that
that's not going to change. There's nothing that's going to pull you out of
this jail cell. You have your sentence and you will be here for the
remainder. But I can tell you what works for me, and when you
read scripture or when you pray, or when you spend time with God,
that the walls don't matter, the roof doesn't matter, that the room doesn't
matter, Whether you're with somebody or not with someone doesn't matter, because you're
with God and you share those things and you give him the tools and what
he does with the tools is up to him himself. But there are Bibles
everywhere in prison, and it's a matter of using them. And he looks,
from what you've told me, tends to look for an easy way to
deal with things rather than the best way. And in this particular case,
he's not going anywhere, and he's confronted. He's forced to look at himself,
the ugly things he's done, the mistakes that he's made, and that's
probably not comfortable. There's no distraction, because that's another form of loneliness.
John, that people look for distraction. They're not lonely, they're bored.
They don't they don't want to think about themselves. They don't want to think
about ways to change themselves, ways to grow, they don't want to be
introspective. So they're looking for distractions. And that comes in the form of
another person. Can come in the form of, you know, video games,
it can come in form of a book, it could come in form
of a lot of things. But really he doesn't want to be confronted with
himself every single day. It sounds like I, I thank you so much
for these words, and I will try to put them together and send those
to them and pray with me that it will help. Oh. Absolutely,
And I know that the world is a very cynical place and the rolling of
eyes when it comes to people in prison, but they they're not over.
Their interaction with humanity will be different and rightly so, there are people that
absolutely positively should be locked up. And in the case of your son,
we don't have all the information here. So my outline to you was to
know that it's not necessarily a bad thing. And as a parent, I
know it's difficult when a child of any age calls out, even a child
who's in prison calls out to you in need or in pain. But remember
that you watched this child grow up and you watch them go through the pain
of learning how to walk or going to school, or learning how to read,
or any of these things, and the process of understanding your own space
and understanding how to interact with others or be alone. Being alone is a
gift. It really really is a gift. If you can learn to be
alone with yourself, you can learn to enjoy yourself, if you can learn
to take those moments of alone time and use them productively to get to know
yourself better, or to be so introspective that you're correcting those things that might
be annoying or problematic, whatever it is. If you take that time,
that alone time, and you use it like that, you will be the
most attractive human being to other people. Trust me. People look for relationships
and reach out and desire to not be lonely in quotes because they want that
distraction from their own self. And it doesn't mean that relationships are bad,
Oh goodness, No, the relationships are wonderful. The entire the entirety of
Scripture is about relationships between man and man, and man and woman and woman
and woman, and humanity in general, and humanity with God. So relationships
are wonderful. However, they start with an understanding of who you are.
It's not about putting two halves together to make a whole. It's putting two
holes together to make something greater, this tertiary property, this third thing that
comes together when these two are joined in any way, shape or foreign,
as friends, as business partners, as spouses. And unless you understand how
to be whole by yourself, you will never be a good partner. You'll
be used. Other people will use you as a distraction in their life.
Other people will use you in different ways. You'll even use them. But
you'll never have that true, that wonderful relationship, that balance, unless your
whole and being a whole comes from spending time alone, not lonely, but
alone. You know, time goes by so quickly around here. I wanted
to finish up just a real quick thought dealing with loneliness. In the New
Testament, the word for lonely only occurs twice, and it's never used to
describe people. It's used to describe desolate places. And I thought that that's
a very important and understanding of that concept of loneliness because we hear about it
on the program so often. Lonely and what does God have planned for me?
I'm so lonely, and you don't understand especially during the holidays, my
goodness, during the holidays, it gets even more compacted and more intense because
people feel the pressure, the outside pressure of the need to be home for
the holidays or have that connection. Look, you turn on the TV and
whatever those channels are that my producer Neil watches constantly over the holiday season.
But you see all those those shows are about the relationships, oh the holiday
times. You know, we're bringing these relationships together. But loneliness, the
experience of loneliness, happens at any time, not just over the holidays.
But the power of that thought that the word lonely never used in the New
Testament to describe people. You have Mark one forty five and Luke five sixteen
that are talking about the they're talking about the wilderness, like a desolate location.
And so that that points to the importance of spending time with yourself and
knowing and that's not always loneliness. It doesn't mean that there isn't times of
loneliness, real genuine loneliness, but finding yourself and empowering yourself to not be
caught up in those things, to to really enjoy who you are and who
God made you individually. That's just the best way to move forward into to
have better relationships in life. And there are extreme cases where you know,
people are in prison, that's a different type of lonely experience, but in
most situations, it's about not not being in a good place of comfort with
your own self, knowing who you are and understanding who you are and being
okay with that. The world is a weird place to begin with, and
the world wants to make you feel bad about yourself and good about yourself.
They want to raise you up and they want to knock you down. And
we talked a little bit about that last week. But there's that kind of
weird attitude where people want to pick on you know, people that are bullies,
or people that pick on you, or people that are always constantly nitpicking
about who you are and what you do. That's a deflection they don't want
to think about themselves. They don't want to worry about the things that they
need to change. And really that's a type of person that's not comfortable with
themselves. And what I want you to be is to be whole, to
be comfortable, and then that will get rid of loneliness. Thank you for
joining me this Sunday. I hope you join me every Sunday, and remember
these words above all else. I am with you always. Kf I A
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