Creflo Dollar - Castrated Manhood - Part 1
We've started a few, about a month ago, we started teaching on grace-based relationships. Because throughout the pandemic, the one area that was attacked the most, I believe, was the area of relationships. People found out how they felt about each other. There were a lot of pandemic divorces. There were a lot of pandemic separations, a lot of things you found out about one another. And marriages and relationships, and not just marriages, but all relationships were under attack. And so, we decided well, instead of teaching relationships from a traditional point of view, we needed to teach it from a grace-based point of view because those of us who are born again, we've been saved by grace.
We got it through faith. And we've got to understand, you know, according to God's Word and under the grace of God, how to carry on successful relationships based on this grace that we live on. And so, we identified that there are two basic relationships that exist, a relationship between God and man, and a relationship between man and man, or human beings. And so, we've got to understand that the priority is very important. You've got a relationship between God and man. You have a friendship, or godly relationships, and then you have the marriage relationship.
Now, you cannot ignore those prior relationships and expect to be successful in the marriage relationship. You must understand that as a Christian, that the number-one relationship that you've gotta make sure is right in your life is your relationship between you and God. Your relationship between you and God is going to establish, you know, the success of those other two relationships. And so, you cannot have a relationship with God outside the Word, it cannot happen. You cannot have a relationship with God outside the Word. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. There are still lots of people who try to have a relationship with God, but they don't have a relationship with the Word. And if you are ignorant of God's Word, you will be ignorant of God.
And so, I mean you can fight that all day long. You can listen to the opinions of other people all day long. But Christianity is not a religion. Christianity is a personal relationship with God. And too many people have taken Christianity and tried to create it like all other religions, that God's intent was for us to have a relationship with him on a day-to-day basis, to talk to him, to learn about him, to take the knowledge about him and exchange it for knowing him until we're walking day to day with him so he can begin to help us and to create something beautiful in our lives. And so, that relationship with God is the most important one. And the question this morning is, how's your relationship with God?
Okay, you say, "Well, I got problems in my marriage, or I got problems where friends are concerned". How's your relationship with God? Now, the world right now today, they're not concerned about that because they think that's just, you know, that's just a mute issue. And I'm telling you, as humans who have come from God, we are nourished by God. And when you come from God and you don't have a relationship with God, then the nourishment you get will oftentimes be perverted nourishment, instead of getting the nourishment from the place you came from. You've come from God, you need him, and you need his Word in order to be properly nourished in this life. The second relationship that now derives from your relationship with God is godly friendships. Godly friendships, God wants that to happen. Relationships are of God. Godly relationships are used by God to help mature us, to help convince us of certain things in our life. It's a bridge that helps us to get from one point to another point. Relationships are important.
And so, it's important that, as Christians, we know how to initiate godly relationships and how to maintain godly relationships. You know, if you're getting ready to marry somebody and they have no friends at all, you need to pause and find out because everything they have in their relationship with God, and everything they have in their relationship with other people, they now bring that into the marriage. You have to pause. You know, a woman asked me one time, she says, "I don't understand. Why do I keep ending up with the same kinda no-good-for-nothing man"? It's because you keep ignoring the signs that God shows you in the very beginning. You saw in the very beginning, he was all about himself. You saw in the very beginning how selfish he was. You saw in the very beginning that he wasn't interested in you or your God. You ignored the signs, you started listening to your biological clock, and you married that devil knowing he was the devil the day you went out with him. Maybe not quite a devil, but you know what I'm saying.
And so, now we have to understand how to have godly relationships, how to walk in respect with one another, how to treat one another, how to serve one another, how to be people that will give other people the advantage instead of you just always taking the advantage. If you want to identify a toxic relationship, you can identify one by taking note of those who are always wanting to take advantage of you, rather than people that want to give you the advantage. And if you can be successful in godly friendships, then you're gonna be successful in choosing the right mate so that you can understand, you know, some things that you can see at the very beginning. And so, now we're at that place of marriage.
Marriage is a gift from God. We're at that place of marriage that sometimes people don't see it as a gift because we try to get a whole new set of rules for marriage when God has used those first two relationships to try to train us and to use those relationships as apprenticeships so that we can know how to live in a marriage. People now today will tell you, "Marriage is no good. I don't need to get married. Why should I get married? I mean, it's just a piece of paper". And they'll do all of that because they don't really understand the honor that God has invested in the marriage relationship, a relationship where you both now have a relationship with God, a relationship where you both now can experience godly friendship, and a relationship now in marriage has that extra to it where Jesus now is the third party in that marriage and those two become one. But now, I want to look at the progression into that successful marriage.
What does the Word have to say? And we began in 1 Corinthians chapter 11, and verse 13. And we're gonna look at this from the perspective of how the world sees it, and we're gonna look at it from the perspective of how the Word sees it, the Word of God. Now, 1 Corinthians chapter 11, verse 3. Excuse me, 1 Corinthians chapter 11, and verse 3. He says, "But I would have you to know that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God". Now traditionally, somebody would read the Scripture, especially in church, and they would give the traditional, and might I add wrong, interpretation of what that says. They would look at this and they would define head as someone that is dominating, in dominance.
So, you know, they would look at this like the boss or the dominating person of every man is Christ, and the boss and the dominating person of every woman is the man, and the boss and the dominating person of Christ is God. That's not what he said. That's not what that means. But for a long time, that's what we've heard. I can remember being in church and preachers used to tell me, "You need to control your wife now. If she ever got out of place, you gotta control her because if you don't control her, then, you know, you can't work in the church. Because if you can't control your home and control your"... See, this is not about control. "If you can't control your home and if you can't control your wife, then you can't hold a position in the church".
And I swallowed it, I mean, I'm a new Christian, I don't know. I'm trusting these people to tell me the right thing. And so, there's a level of dominance, a level of carnal authority, that the man is the authority over the woman. And they took that from Genesis. I believe it's chapter 3 where it said that a man will rule over the woman. And you see what happens when you don't rightly divide the word of truth between the grace of God and the law? There are church people today that still believe that a man should rule over a woman. And so, the other part of this is the pressure that it puts on the man to try to rule and dominate. And he didn't even have that kind of personality.
In fact, God made a woman with more of an ability to lead and made a man with more of the ability to submit. And then when they got married he says, "Now I'm gonna switch the role so it'll keep both of you sharp". And I'm like what? Somebody said, "What? Man ain't got no ability to submit," you do it all the time. "Sweetheart, what you want for dinner"? "It don't matter, whatever you do". "Well, baby, where you want to go tonight"? "Just let me know," okay? And so now he's switching. He says, "Now man, I want you to do what's challenging to you and lead. And woman, I want you to do what's challenging to you to do is to submit. And then I want both of y'all to learn the power of submission in what I ask you to do". But that's not what this means. Can you see the problem that's caused just in marriage? A woman works the same job, number of hours than her husband works, and she comes home, but now she got to be the slave while you sit back and look at the basketball game.
You've known for all your life that something is wrong with that. But because the church taught you that, you were trying to just be obedient to what the church said. Does everybody understand what I'm saying? So, if we're going to, if we're gonna get it right, we gotta get the headship thing right. If we don't get the headship thing right, then if everything stop, you know, everything about my body movement, and whatever, it starts with the head. So, if we don't get this head thing right, everything else is gonna be wrong. So, that's why I've gotta spend some time talking to my brothers. I gotta spend some time talking to my sons. I gotta spend some time talking to men because we got to get the headship part right, and then everything else is gonna.. seriously, everything else will flow like it needs to flow. A woman's disrespecting you for a reason. She's not trusting you for a reason. There's a reason she don't believe you or like you or want to question you.
And, you know, they'll say, "You know, I'm the head. You're not supposed to question me," that's stupid, that's dumb. How are you gonna ever grow if you ain't got nobody asking you a question about the tomfoolery you getting ready to involve the whole family in? There's nothing wrong with, "Hey listen, I'm talking about this. Can I ask a question? Well, why you doing this"? "There you go again questioning me". "No, no, no, you came up with this before you even talk to me, I want to know where we going". Had my wife done that, we were both trying to be obedient to the traditional view. When we first got married, a lot of stuff we wouldn't have got into. I thank God that God pulled her away and gave her a private tutoring session and she says, "No, I'mma start opening my mouth, why"? Amen?
So, what does head mean? Well, let's go to Ephesians chapter 5:21 and 23. I decided on this series quit trying to rush. I'm just gonna take my time, go through the thing, review it because there'll be new stuff that come up as I review it. I don't know when Jesus is gonna come back, so I might as well make sure I got something to preach while he on his way. But I'm not gonna try to finish it all today. I won't finish it today, okay? All right, now watch this. He starts off in verse 21, "Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of the Lord". Out of respect and reverence from God, he wants us to submit sub, like a submarine under, get under, submit to the thing that got more to the thing that God's instructing you to do right here. And in doing that, you'll be submitting to one another. The next verse, here we go. "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husband". Say, your own, "Your own husband as unto the Lord". Some lady said, "Leave mine alone, submit to your own".
All right, okay, so I mean in these days and times, you know, you gotta watch it. You know, shh, let me hush, 'cause hopefully I'mma talk about some sugar mamas today. Sugar mamas. Some of y'all don't know what a sugar mama is. You remember the sugar daddy? Same thing in opposite term. All right, some of y'all said, "Ooh, let me get out of here, I'mma"... All right, for the husband, all right, here it is again, "the husband is the head of the wife". It sounds like authoritative person, sounds like a dominance. "The husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church". Well, now we got a problem because Christ's headship of the church is not dominating. "Even as Christ is the head of the church, and he's the savior of the body". So, what is this headship all about? The Greek word translated "head" is the word kephale or kephale. It is a Greek word which means, it means literally, source of, the source, the source of, the source. The husband is the source of the wife. And God is the source of Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is the source of the church.
Oh, now that's going in a different direction here. It literally means source. It's how something grows or comes into being, the source of something. Headship is a source of love and cherishing and nourishment. He's saying that the man is the source of nourishment, the source of love, the source that will cherish. The husband is the source of love and nourishment of the wife, that's a big deal. The head of the source by which love flows. Wherever you came from or wherever you come from, you survive from that same atmosphere. A cow comes from the dust of the ground and his survival will also come from the ground, he eats from that. The fish born in that atmosphere of water, and he will survive. His nourishment will come from that same atmosphere where the water is concerned. A woman came out of man... well, let's back up a little bit. God spoke to himself and he said, "Let there be a man". The Chemosh says, let there be another speaking spirit like God, let there be a man. And then he made this man and he says, "Out of the man".
So, a woman comes out of the man. God didn't take the woman from the back of a man. He took the woman from the side of the man or from a cell of the man. And so, that woman came from the man. And so, God designed it that way and said, "Now, she is going to reach her, the greatness in her life from the nourishment that she gets from that husband, that man". So notice, God spoke words to the atmosphere and said, "Let there be a sun. Let there be a firmament in the midst of the firmament". And his words, his word began to bring those things to pass, and they nourished them. If we came out of God, men, we're nourished by God. You can't dis-attach, you can't be attached from... you know what I'm saying. You, man, came from God. You, man, are nourished by God. You're nourished by God's Word. How do you ever think you're gonna reach the pinnacle of manhood without being nourished by God's Word? How is it that we walk around and invent the laws of what a man is and we're not nourished from the place that we came from, or from the person that we came from?
We came from God, gentlemen. You will never be successful in your manhood unless you start eating from the faucet of God, unless you're nourished from the Word of God. And we've sent our women to church to get all the Word, and you the one need to be eating yet. Because everything that's gonna come to that woman, from that woman to that children and to those families, and to other... it's gonna start with you. The number-one priority for a man is his relationship with God and his Word. Why is it that the church is not filled with men? Satan knows what he's doing. Keep the man from the Word. Don't let that man get in no relationship with God. Make it a weak thing to know God, make it a weak thing to know God's Word. And he stays away from the Word and he knows nothing. And when asked anything about God, the weak, little, castrated man says, "Ask my wife". And you should know. And my heart just, Lord, how do we, how do we call every man to his rightful place of nourishment? How do we call him to the feeding trough where he can eat from God? He eats from everybody else but God. And he's the faucet that should flow into a woman.
The woman is a magnificent work of art, I might say. But God made her extremely intelligent. That's why he put submission on her 'cause she's smart, and she continues to learn 'cause you might have that dumb kind of man who think he knows everything, and don't want to listen to God because he thinks going to church is a weak thing. You ask, go out in the street. "Why don't you go to church"? "I don't get into church no more". "Well, why"? "Well, I don't do that no more, I don't do that," and he comes up with some cracker jack excuse, "Okay, you don't go to church, do you get in the Word"? "No, I don't read the Bible, you ain't got to read the Bible". Well, how else you gonna know a God you can't see? And I'm gonna tell you this, you ain't gonna be able to be successful staying at home trying to read the Bible. You know how confusing the Bible is if you don't have a teacher? That's my God said, "I give unto you fivefold ministry gift, the apostle, the prophet, the pastor, the teacher, and the evangelist for the perfecting of the saints, so they can do the work of the ministry, which is edifying and building up the body of Christ".
Kephale, the source, the source of nourishment, the source of cherishing, the source... oh, my goodness. So, what happens when that man becomes the faucet that love flows, the faucet that love flows, nourishing his wife with what God, what Christ has nourished him with, what God has nourished Christ with? He's nourishing his wife, not just knowing the Scriptures, but he has a relationship with God so he can nourish his wife. And his wife receives that nourishment. And, man, she begins to, oh, grow all kinds of wonderful fruit. And she could nourish the children. And what goes around comes around, and then you getting some of what she's growing all because the right stuff's coming out you as the faucet. The God stuff's coming out of you, the faucet.