Well I encourage you, over this next week or so, to consciously do that. Instead of fighting the thought, just superimpose a picture of the cross of Christ, believing for that to destroy that image. I literally picture it, disintegrating and fading away, and then its power is broken. I've asked the Lord, over the years, to bring everything up to my mind that has still got resident power; and as it comes up, I bring the cross of Christ, and declare its power broken, and gradually watch it disappear. It's been very helpful - so that's just not my message today but, it'll be helpful because the difficulty is we know what the scripture says, we don't know how to do it.
I want to share with you something else, 1 Corinthians, Chapter 11 and Verse 3. I want to move from where we're going, about building oneness; and I want to take a different tack. Now over the next three or four weeks I want to talk about "headship in the family"; and we're going to talk about God's order and government, and I want to open this area up. As we do it I want you to be very open to let God teach you something. The Bible says: he that has ears to hear, let him hear. Now when we listen to things, many times what happens is, we don't actually deny it; we just quietly lift our thoughts up against it, compare it with what we think, and then quietly go on our own way, and our thoughts remain unchallenged. The Bible calls that "hardening of heart". You can never grow, if you don't let the word of God into you, to transform you. Another reason that we resist being changed, is because when we hear the word of God, it requires something of us. We need to respond, and do something we didn't do before; and many times we just quietly nod our head: oh I wish so and so was here, this was a good message for them; and we don't actually let it get into our own heart.
Now I want to talk over the next few weeks just about Headship in the Family, and some of the areas we're going to touch will rattle your cage a little, and I'm deliberately going to do that. Today's subject is Headship is Male. If you don't like it, I won't change it one little bit. Headship is Male, and we're going to push on this area, because if we get the men thinking right, then I think we can make some major changes. So we're going to focus our attention on the men, but also bring it together. Now I can't in one session answer every question. Clearly there are specific situations, such as: what happens when a couple separates; what happens if there's a single parent situation; what happens if a couple divorce, what happens? We can't answer them all just at the moment, but what I want to do is, rather than look at the exceptions, which seem many; and your particular situation; I want to lay out first of all the principles, because if we build our life around the principles, then we will find our life will begin to start to be empowered by God.
If you want to try and build it into your life - the Bible says: unless the Lord builds the house, they labour in vain that build. In other words, you've got a heap of work, then and it doesn't get anywhere. You're frustrated and disappointed how little outcome you've got, but when the Lord builds our marriage - how does the Lord build your marriage or build your relationships? Why this: He lays out principles, He lays out ways of operating; and when I understand those ways, and come into agreement with them, His power's released, and things happen that I don't have to make happen. How many are tired of making your spouse change? [Laughter] Not very many, okay. [Laughter] You're still hardened in commitment to get them to change. You will never get them to change, I can tell you now, not by doing it that way. No, there's another way that we can influence our spouse powerfully, and we need to understand the principles of God in this area.
I want you to have a look with me in 1 Corinthians 11, and if I don't answer all the questions you have, that's quite acceptable. Over two or three Sundays we will actually get into quite a few areas and they will help you. Now if you're a man; how many men have we got here today? We'll get all the men to stand up. [Applause begins] Okay, now this is it - no, don't clap them yet. I want you to say after me, right - is any man sitting down? Grab him by the scruff of the neck and pull him to his feet. [Laughter] Okay, we've got the men. Okay men, I want you to say after me, come on: headship is male. [Headship is male.] Headship is male. [Headship is male.] That means me! [That means me!] Good, okay, sit down. You've just come into agreement with God. Come on, let's give them a clap. [Applause] Then all the sisters pray for them hard, because we're going to get into them over the next two Sundays; get all the men standing up inside, not just standing up on the outside.