Adultery in Marriage

 

 

INFIDELITY IN MARRIAGE

 Tiger Woods, one of the world’s most famous and wealthiest golfers, was caught with his dark secrets of infidelities and lies in 2009. At first, he vehemently denied and even concealed them. But, eventually, he was more forthcoming and apologetic to his fans and his family at several press conferences:

 "I have let my family down and I regret those transgressions with all of my heart. I have not been true to my values and the behavior my family deserves. . . I am not without faults and I am far short of perfect. . . I was unfaithful, I had affairs and I cheated. What I did was unacceptable. I hurt my wife, my kids, my mother, my wife's family, my friends, my foundation and kids all around the world who admired me."

 But Tiger Woods’ serial adultery and cheating made it difficult for his wife to accept his sincerity and true repentance. They were divorced in 2010.

 Maybe in one of his statements to the public, Tiger Woods was telling the truth of adultery:

 “I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to. I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled, and thanks to money and fame, I didn't have to go far to find them.”

 Tiger Woods was awakened to the reality of accountability. With fame and money, he thought he could get away with anything. That was his self-awakening, but it came with a hefty price—a stain on his legacy.

The reality

 The purpose of a married couple is to glorify God in everything they say, do, or accomplish, and to be an expression of sacrificial love, grace, mercy, and justice to everyone—especially to each other and their children.

Biblical Adulteries

King David’s adulteries

In spite of his efforts in seeking God’s wisdom, King David also demonstrated his darker side of the sin of lust.

One night, King David saw Bathsheba, the wife of one of King David’s generals, bathing on the rooftop. Succumbing to his own sin of lust, King David sent for Bathsheba, and committed adultery with her. To gratify his lust, King David even purposely sent the general to the war front to have him killed so that he could marry the general’s widow.

King David eventually married Bathsheba. Although penitent for his sins, God punished King David, and their firstborn son died. 

King Solomon’s adulteries

King Solomon, the second son of King David, despite his profound human wisdom, violated God’s standards of sexual purity. His decision to disobey God and marry foreign women with their different gods led to his own idolatry. As a punishment for his sins, God divided Israel, and Solomon suffered bitterness and emptiness at the end of his life.

The difference between King David and King Solomon is that King David always lived in the presence of the Lord. So, King David always turned back to God with remorse and repentance, while King Solomon only distanced himself from God with no contrition and remorse.

So, living in the presence of the Lord always reminds you of your own accountability to Him, without which you will do anything and everything, thinking that you can get away with it.

The reality

Always live in the presence of the Shepherd. Always let the Shepherd guide you in the green pastures. Always let the Shepherd overcome your enemies of pride, lust, and deceit. Always let the Shepherd use His rod and staff not only to protect you but also to restrain and discipline you. Always let the Lord be your Shepherd throughout your marriage journey.

Adultery is a conscious and deliberate act to do just the opposite of what a marriage commitment requires. Adultery is prevalent because it has become the new “norm.” According to many, adultery is just a sin, not a crime, and everybody commits sins of some sort anyway. But adultery is a sin directly against God, who creates the marriage, joining the two as one. So, committing adultery is lack of accountability to God, and is unforgivable without judgment and repentance.

Getting Married to Make You Happy?

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

The Bag and Baggage

The Bag and Baggage

Life journey is forever on a long and winding road with many detours and sideways. On this bumpy life journey, we all carry with us our own bag and baggage, containing our individual beliefs, feelings, and skills, some of which may ultimately become the signs and symptoms of our own depression.

Thinking questions

What are you carrying in your own bag and baggage?

Who packed your bag and baggage? Did others help you with your packing?

How long have you been carrying your own bag and baggage?

Is your own bag and baggage getting heavier with each day passing?

Does your own bag and baggage serve the purpose of your life journey in any way?

Have you ever thought of unpacking some, if not all, of what is inside your own bag and baggage?

What is inside an individual’s bag and baggage could be anything from anger, bitterness, frustration, regret, sadness, shame, to “what-if”—the major components of depression.

TAO is the human wisdom, which is The Way of going through what is in your bag and baggage.  

Emotions and feelings are two sides of the same coin; they are closely related, but they are two very different things in that the former create biochemical reactions in the body, affecting the physical state, while the latter are mental associations and reactions to the former

Depression involves the numbing of strong emotions and feelings, especially anger, fear, and shame, that an individual often experiences and carries in his or her own bag and baggage.

According to the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), we all have qi (氣), which is the internal life-giving energy circulating within each of us, giving us internal balance and harmony. Emotions are energy states, which may either contribute to or deplete our own internal life-giving energy, causing harmony or disharmony, and leading to positive or negative emotions and feelings.

The Seven Emotions

According to the Traditional Chinese Medicine, there are seven emotions that are the underlying causes of many internal diseases, and they are anger, anxiety, fear, fright, joy, sadness, and worry. Because Chinese medicine is all about internal balance and harmony, these seven emotions may even affect different human body organs. For example, excessive anger impairs the liver, causing headaches, while excessive joy dysfunctions the heart, leading to mania and mental disorders.

Generally speaking, any “excessive” emotion or feeling may trigger insomnia and loss of appetite, which are some of the common symptoms of depression.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

The TAO in Anything and Everything

 

The Bible says wisdom is everything. "Joyful is the person who finds wisdom, the one who gains understanding." (Proverbs 3:13) 

Without wisdom, there is no understanding. 

But why is understanding important?

Without understanding, anything and everything in life may seem paradoxical and inexplicable. It is this mindset that may make many people "not living in reality" -- in their minds they only see "unfairness" and "inequality." This distorted mindset may even lead many to committing crimes and violence: "Why shouldn't I rob them who've the money that I don't have?" or "They too have broken the law, so why shouldn't I do the same?"

Biblical wisdom is about "accountability" to God, which will give you spiritual "understanding." But if you are not a believer, that "understanding" may be irrelevant to you.

Having said that, human wisdom is indispensable in contemporary living. Human wisdom is not the same as acquisition of knowledge; human wisdom is the application of what you feel and understand to your everyday life and living. So, being knowledgeable does not necessarily mean being wise.

The TAO is the profound wisdom of Lao Tzu, an ancient sage from China more than 2,600 years ago. The TAO has survived and thrived for thousands of years for a good reason: it is applicable to anything and everything in contemporary daily life. The TAO shows you all the hows and the whys of anything and everything happening in your life, including the following: growing up, receiving education, earning a living, making money, getting married, starting a family, raising children, staying healthy, growing old, and dying.

The TAO helps you confront all your daily challenges, and live in balance and harmony.

TAO in Anything and Everything

Stephen Lau

Living in the Now

In this day and age with the advancement of technology, living in the now is not easy. Speed is everything, and performance is based on speed and efficiency, which has much to do with speed too. As a result of the craving for speed, the human mind slowly and increasingly becomes more compulsive.

According to the most recent NBC news, even young children have become addicted to speed with their multi social media in their digital world that they have become disconnected with the real world and the people around them.

As a parent, you should make sure that your child or children stay more in the present. Of course, you, as the parent, should also set a good example, such as, not talking on the phone while driving.

Are you yourself living in the present? If you are, your mind should not be focusing on the electronic gadgets, which you are holding in your hands. According to the NBC news report, some children are even texting hundreds of messages a day, and they have lost physical contacts with their families and friends. Instead of eating their dinners, they are looking at their electronic devices. This multitasking is not living in the present, just as texting while driving is not living in the present

Not living in the present is akin to the mind shuffling between the past and the future. Your actions or inactions are derived and driven by your thoughts and memories of your past experiences, and how you project them into the future as desires and expectations. Accordingly, the human mind constantly shuffles between the past and the future. As a result, it seldom stays in the present moment. To illustrate, while talking on the cell phone, how often do you talk about what happened or what you are going to do next? If you think more deeply, the subject of your conversation mostly involves the past or the future. In a worse scenario, if you are talking or texting while driving, your mental focus is certainly not on the present—which is driving your car.

The first step to train your mind to focus more on the present is to concentrate on your breathing. Most of us are totally unaware of our breaths, unless we are short of breath after running or climbing stairs, or due to some medical conditions that may cause difficulties in breathing. Concentration on how you breathe in and breathe out, as well as your body’s sensations during the inhalation and exhalation trains you to develop mindfulness. It is important to know that your body is yours only, and it is always with you. Finding the moment-by-moment relationship with your body through your breathing is your key to wellness of the body, the mind, and the soul. Be mindful of the present.

Mindfulness is your deliberate attention to the present moment. This purposeful focus enables you to recognize your thoughts as they occur, but without paying judgmental attention to them; in other words, they neither distract nor disturb you, and you just observe them objectively, like watching a movie about yourself unfolding before your very eyes. Essentially, letting the mind stay in the present is a simple way to meditate.

Learn mindfulness from an expert who provides a useful guide to harness the power of your mind with mental training tools and techniques to perfect the art of mental transformation. Are you living your life, or your life living you?

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Power and Wealth

 The Chinese Proverbs

"Look not for the donkey you are sitting on." Dao Yuan

"So you want to rule the world? That is like climbing a tree to look for fish. It is impossible." Mencius

Living in this world is all about control, which comes from power and wealth. Control means you can make people do what you want them to do for you. But people want to do what "they" want to do, and not what "you" want them to do. So it's like "climbing a tree to look for fish." 

Wealth is getting "more and much more." You may already have the wealth--like riding a donkey and looking for another donkey.  Even though what you already have may not be too much for you, at least learn to count your blessing, instead of your greed for more.

No matter what, power and wealth can never satisfy you because "nothing lasts" and everything will become nothing, no matter you're riding a donkey or climbing a tree.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

 

Disbelief and Unbelief

A description of the book:

The objective of this book is to help any unbeliever to find God, as well as to believe in the disbelief of salvation.

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A sample from the book:

What is disbelief?

Disbelief is a state of mind of an individual who finds it difficult or almost impossible to accept the reality of a situation that is incredible but nevertheless real.

For example, an individual has just won a lottery with the payoff of millions of dollars. The disbelief is that it is just too good to be true!

For example, an individual is standing in front of the scattered belongings in front of his or her house destroyed in a tornedo. The disbelief is that it could have happened only to others but not to him or to her!

For example, it was disbelief that during the Roman Empire, spectators in the amphitheater could “enjoy” watching gladiators fighting and killing each other. Then, on January 1, 404 A.D., a monk named Almachus jumped into the arena attempting to stop the senseless killing. It was disbelief that the monk was stoned to death by the spectators. But it was also disbelief that the monk’s sacrificial death finally inspired the Emperor to bring an end to the senseless gladiator fights in the Roman Empire.

For example, Jeffrey Dahmer, a serial killer who had killed more than 17 young men in more than a decade, was convicted in 1992 and sentenced to life imprisonment. In prison, Jeffrey began studying the Bible with a church minister, and was then subsequently baptized in prison. Jeffrey’s conversion was disbelief to the public. Another disbelief was that some Christians even told reporters: “I don’t want to see Jesus in heaven if I find Jeffrey with Him.” In prison, Jeffrey was harassed and life-threated by his inmates. It was disbelief that Jeffrey did not want any isolation or even protection; as a matter of fact, he was looking forward to his anticipated judgment from God. In 1994, Jeffrey Dahmer was beaten to death by two prison inmates while cleaning the bathroom. His own anticipated death was disbelief to many.

Indeed, we are living in a world of disbelief in what humans desire to do and what God allows them to do.

DISBELIEF AND UNBELIEF

You Just Don't Die

 Words of Wisdom to Live to 100 Years and Beyond

     Life might not have been fair to you with happenings that might have been beyond your control. No matter what, life is not meant to be a punishment for you. If you just don’t die, you will have the wisdom to live it through.

“Life begets death; one is inseparable from the other.

One is form; the other is formless.

Each gives way to the other.

One third of people focus on life, ignoring death.

One third of people focus on death, ignoring life.

One third of people think of neither, just drifting along.

They all suffer in the end.

 

Trusting the Creator, we have no illusion about life and death.

Holding nothing back from life, we are ready for death,

just as a man ready for sleep after a good day’s work.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, chapter 50)

“Abiding in the Creator, we do not fear death.

Following the conditioned mind, we fear everything.

Fear is a futile attempt to control things and people.

 

Death is a natural destination of the Way.

Unnatural fear of death does more harm than good.

It is like trying to use intricate tools of a master craftsman:

we end up hurting ourselves.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, chapter 74)

 If you just don’t die, the wisdom in living the rest of your life is no more than . . .

Just like eating a meal

Living the rest of your life is just like eating a meal.

Before your start your meal, say your grace. (Just like being grateful and thankful that you just don’t die and that you can still have this meal.)

Before you pick up your food, take a minute or two to still your mind. There is no need to hurry; you’ve all the time in the world to finish this meal. (Just like being conscious of living in the now.)

There is no right or wrong about eating the food in front of you—eating is just a process, a way of living and surviving, just like breathing in and out. (Just like knowing that now you don't need to eat to socialize, to relieve stress, to satisfy your food cravings, or to make yourself feel better—you eat simply because you just don’t die.)

Look at the food in front of you. Notice the color, the smell, and the texture of the food. (Just like being conscious of the people and the happenings around you.)

Now, begin eating. No matter how small the bite of food you have, take at least two bites. Take your first bite. Chew it very slowly but thoroughly, noticing and enjoying your actual sensory experience of chewing and tasting. Chew every morsel of food to explore the differences in their taste, texture, and smell. (Just like enjoying whatever that is still available to you that you still find enjoyable.)

Continue to eat in silence without any distraction. (Just like you continue to live without being distracted by what might happen tomorrow.)

 Just like watching a suspense movie

     Living in the last days is also like watching a suspense movie, full of unpredictable twists and turns: you don’t know how it would end until the very end; otherwise, it wouldn’t be worth watching. Don’t turn your head away, and don’t cover your eyes with your hands. Just watch and enjoy the movie!

YOU JUST DON'T DIE!