Week 11: Unfaithful
Weekly Chapters:
Joshua 23 - Judges 17
Passage of the Week: Joshua 24:16-18
Adjective:
1. Not faithful, false to duty or obligation
2. Not sexually faithful to a spouse
3. Not accurate or complete
Thesaurus:
· Deceitful
· Cheating
· Double-crossing
· Untrue
· Faithless
· Adulterous
· Fickle
Father God,
Thank You for blessing us each with free will. You’ve given us a mind to choose, right or wrong. Lord as I read Your word, please speak to me and open my mind to Your teachings. Father God, I need Your reminders and Your guidance. I love You, Father.
Amen
Authentic vulnerability:
When we think of unfaithful many of us immediately think of our relationships with our spouse or boyfriend/girlfriend. However, there are many other means of unfaithfulness as well. While I may have been a faithful spouse, I may not be a faith employee or student. Our definitions this week paint the picture of both cheating on a spouse versus being deceitful with others, talking about them to our friends or coworkers. To further illustrate, being untrue to a boy/girlfriend versus double-crossing someone in a business deal. Committing adultery versus being false with friends and talking behind their back.
We may look at one side as a lesser form of unfaithfulness but they’re all the same. We are being untrue in some way. It’s easy to say “I would never do ______”, fill in the blank, yet turn around and commit some other form of treason without thinking.
Why do we go to an unfaithful and treacherous place even when thinking about it? What happened to our ego to allow us to go there? Did we feel slighted by something? Do we feel ugly today? Unloved? Unwanted? Passed over? Are we protecting ourselves from perceived trauma? Are there triggers that make you resort to unfaithful behavior?
What is your Authentic Truth?
Study:
God set his people up with a rule book early on. Recognize God as God and only worship God and He will make you a great nation. He reiterates this through His profits often. In His Commandments, God points to follow Him and His Commandments as a requirement in life. He further provides the mandates through Moses, Aaron, Joseph, and Joshua. He claims it often and punishes those who turn from the commandment. Yet over and over again we see the people of Israel go against his teachings and follow or worship idols.
In Joshua 24:16-18, the Israelites swear to be faithful, and then in Judges, we see them follow God and then waiver from his teachings worshiping idols over and over.
In our own lives, we often follow the same theme in all of our relationships. We can be loyal and then we can say something ugly, feel bad and make amends, remain faithful and then our stress behavior rears its ugly head and the cycle continues.
I find my weakness in my work relationships more than any, specifically those with authority over me. I don’t like to be told what to do. It’s ugly behavior of the youngest child who always wants her way. I will enter into a work relationship head-on and then I struggle to trust, then comes the ego, my ego rearing its ugly head and then I self-sabotage with unfaithful behavior like talking about my boss. Not good, not Christlike, and not helpful to me in any way in the long run.
Why do we do these unfaithful things to our friends to coworkers or our partners? What broken part of our ego comes to the surface like this? Where ugliness takes over? Is it jealousy, this is a feeling of being alone or unloved or passed over? Yes, all the above?
God teaches us that He is always with us, always supporting us. We are loved and we are enough in His eyes. God looks over us and provides for our needs, and from His world, we know that all He requires of us is our love and our following of His word, faithfulness to God, and His desire for our life.
Trust is difficult for many of us due to our past which shapes us, but our faithfulness to God requires that we trust in Him and His plan. We need to seek His guidance and listen to His quiet voice.
Father God,
Praise You today. Through You and only through being faithful to You can I achieve the life that You want to give me. Open my eyes when I act in a manner that is unfaithful and not pleasing to You. Father, remove the ugliness from my heart and replace it with love and grace, just as You give me every day. I love You, Lord.
Amen.
Homework:
Ask yourself before you are about to say or do something unfaithful, or after if the act has already happened, why did I do or say that? Do a 5 WHY exercise to get to the root cause as an example: I spoke to a coworker who said something about my boss that would poison their thinking.
Why: my boss told me to do something I did not agree with
Why: my boss thinks that he told me to do it was the right thing
Why: he/she may have either requirement from his or her boss or may have had the info I did not have
Why: because my boss was put in a position of authority did his or her ability
Why: because my boss is put in the hard work to get there.
We will have requirements of us which we sometimes do not like. When this happens we may feel the need to rebel in a way that does not honor our friend, people in authority, our partner, and especially God. Getting to the root cause of our issue through the 5 WHY enables a greater understanding and a better decision. Guard your heart and your mind from unfaithful behaviors.
