The Long-term Effects Of Abuse And How It Changes People by Rev. Sam Oye: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

The Power of Relationship

Relationship ultimately determines your output in life: how much you become, how much you have, how much you achieve, how much you accomplish. All of that is predicated on your ability to relate well with people. Those who master relationship with people usually excel in a remarkable way in life. Those who undermine relationship, those who don't value it, get to struggle a lot in life. The more people you are in relationship with, the more productive you can become.

The Destructive Pattern of Abuse

One of the deadliest negative patterns that destroys relationship is abuse. This destructive pattern destroys love, destroys safety, destroys trust, and destroys human dignity. Some of us have become so used to abuse that it has destroyed us. We don't see anything left in ourselves, and now we don't see anything wrong with it.

Abuse is a negative, repeated pattern that destroys relationship, and it starts with attitude. It is repeated in such a manner that this attitude is used to control, to manipulate, to dominate, to humiliate, and then to diminish another person. This has been a major destructive force in relationships. That is why people go to church praying for destiny helpers and open doors, not realizing that people with this destructive attitude do not keep good relationships. They do not keep destiny helpers.

From Love to Fear

The dangerous thing about abuse of any kind is that it has the capacity to transform a loving relationship into a fearful relationship. A relationship that was once filled with love will now be filled with fear. Where abuse comes into a relationship, whether in an office, an organization, a ministry, or a family, safety gives way and survival begins to take over. Survival becomes the focus once safety has been eroded by the infiltration of abuse.

Abuse Is a Pursuit of Power

Those who function in abuse do not realize that what they are looking for is power, not partnership. The pursuit of abuse indicates that the person practicing it is personally dysfunctional.

• Abuse seeks control, not partnership. A pastor does not need to control his members; he teaches them the word of God and shows them the principles.
• Weakness in another person is not a measure of your strength. The reason a person appears to be a king is because others around them are not as empowered, not because they themselves are strong.

God Defends the Abused

Some people are predisposed to being abused, but there is a God who watches over the abused, and his might is beyond any human might. He remains the King of kings, the sovereign ruler, the monarch of the universe, and he comes to the defense of the weak.

When God saw that Leah was hated, an act of emotional abuse, he opened the womb of the one who was abused and shut the womb of the one who was supposed to be loved, Rachel. Abuse can attract the judgment of the God of the abused.

Stay away from abuse.