To Who Are You Giving Your Emotion?

Genesis 21:9-13 (NLT) 9 But Sarah saw Ishmaelthe son of Abraham and her Egyptian servant Hagarmaking fun of her son, Isaac. 10 So she turned to Abraham and demanded, Get rid of that slave woman and her son. He is not going to share the inheritance with my son, Isaac. I wont have it! 11 This upset Abraham very much because Ishmael was his son. 12 But God told Abraham, Do not be upset over the boy and your servant. Do whatever Sarah tells you, for Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted. 13 But I will also make a nation of the descendants of Hagars son because he is your son, too. Wow! What was Abraham thinking in the first instance? Ill bet he was thinking, Oh yeah! Im the luckiest man on the planet! Im going to party tonight! On the contrary, what about the wives who tell their husbands to stay away from certain women? What does a wife do when the husband will not listen and even pushes the issue. His reasons are Shes harmless, she just needs some friends, or the best one yet, I just feel like I need to watch out for her. What insane husband would say these things to his wife, knowing that his wife, for whatever reason, believes this other woman is a danger. Ive even heard of instances where one woman warns another that she should keep her husband away from a certain woman. Ladies, pay attention to those instincts which God has placed in you. Watch out! Satan is knocking on the door yelling, Let me in! Let me in! I can help! I dont think Sarah considered the emotions that would grow between Hagar and Abraham, from their physical connection or the birth of Ishmael. When two people join their bodies, they also share their emotions. They are giving away the one thing to which no other person outside of his or her marriage should ever be privy; the secret indulgence of intimacy that was designed especially for the married couple. To give it away, even in the form of emotion is to commit adultery. This is why: Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical (internal) and environmental (external) influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves "physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience. (Wikipedia) Jesus said that: Matthew 5:28 (NLT) But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in this heart.

Because women are creatures who live through emotion, for a husband to give his emotion to anyone other than his wife, is a grave error. In this instance, Ill bet Sarahs insolence had been building for a while. With every brick Abraham laid in the form of affectionate emotion directed to Hagar and Ishmael, Sarahs resentment and anger transformed into a nuclear explosion. Initially, she may have thought, Well I did it. Ill have to live with it. But when fission began to occur, KA BOOM! Everyone caught it! Ive seen this same relational error shake families to the core and very few recover. When a spouse shows inappropriate emotional attention to anyone other than his or her spouse, he or she gives power over their marriage to the outside person. Its a demonic spirit for which they have opened the door and said, Come in! Come in! The little Ishmaels of the world dont become so bold as to mock Gods children, unless one of Gods children opens the door and hands them the power. So now Abraham is upset because Sarah is demanding that he get rid of Hagar and Ishmael; send them away. He had become emotionally tied to his sin and Sarah was trying to untie it so to speak. 1 Corinthians 6:18-20 Run from sexual sin! No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. Dont you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a price. So you must honor God with your body. Sarah was probably full of anger, her mind reeling with every available crazy thought; the injustice, her lack of control over another human being, the disloyalty, unfaithfulness, the theft of her very private intimacy with her husband; deceit, resentment, violence, and payback. This kind of anger has an enormous physiological effect. The body tenses up, every muscle, fiber and ligament pulls taut like a rocket launcher, the chest heaves with every breathe of fury, the blood pressure rises, the pupils dilate; and then as quickly as it started, great sorrow. How could someone who promised to love me, hurt me in a way that destroys me? The body becomes flooded with degenerative emotions, hurt, sadness, depression, and hopelessness, and eventually, the mind stops all function, and there is no more willingness to love. Its a wild range of emotions to cover in such a short period of time; but there it is. I believe this is what Sarah was feeling. Even though she had planted this seed in ignorance, as she watched it grow, its possibilities terrorized her. Abraham, bless his heart, was clueless, but look at what God said to him . . . Genesis 21:12 But God told Abraham, Do not be upset over the boy and your servant. Do whatever Sarah tells you, for Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted. 13 But I will also make a nation of the descendants of Hagars son because he is your son, too.

God actually told Abraham to act on the directions of his wife. He was basically saying, dont worry about the sin, Ill take care of it. You go and take care of that which is your portion, your wife and son, which you have, just as I promised. I have made ignorant choices in my life that have flooded my emotions with good and bad mountains and valleys. Emotions are a tricky thing, they often dictate to our bodies what we will do next. Dont ever listen to someone who says Follow your heart, for the heart is the most deceitful of all things. I always have to check my emotions lest they cause me to also have to offer repentance for new sins. Thank you Jesus for making a way of escape. My first love and loyalty is to God. My second love and loyalty belongs to my husband. My God and my husband hold sacred positions in my life and therefore to each is a specific emotional bond, to which no one else will ever be privy. To whom are you giving your emotions? Jeremiah 17:9 The human heart is the most deceitful of all things and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?