DO 19327/84

—Maria No.25

1. (WHY IS IT THAT A MAN OR A WOMAN IS OFTEN MORE ARDENT & MORE ROMANTIC WITH THEIR FISH THAN WITH THEIR MATE?) I think that when you're FFing or when you're with somebody that you aren't normally with, that you're bound to be more ardent & maybe in some ways you'll be more excited, because your time with them is so limited! You don't have a chance to show them every day in all the little ways how much you love them, so you have to put a lot more into that short period of time than you do in the times you spend with your mate whom you live with all the time. You show your mate you love him or her in all kinds of ways day & night, so he or she really shouldn't take it so personally & feel like it's a sign that you love them any less just because you have to really pour it on for your fish.

2. I KNOW THAT EVEN DAD HAS PROBABLY THOUGHT THAT A FEW TIMES IN THE PAST, when he has watched me making love with a fish. And by the same token I've thought the same when he has been with some other women. I'd see that he was a lot more ardent & passionate when he was with them, & I thought he must have cooled off towards me, he must not love me so much. But after I thought about it logically & prayed about it, I saw that it was pretty obvious that if you only have one chance to be with somebody then you're going to put an awful lot into it! You may only have one chance to say everything you want to say & do everything you want to do, but that doesn't mean you love that person more than your mate!

3. I THINK IF YOU HAVE THIS TEMPTATION to think this & to be jealous, if you'd pray about it you'd realise your mate doesn't love you any less‚ although maybe in such cases you'll need a little extra reassurance that they do still love you & how much!—We all just need to remember that when we're with somebody only briefly & we're trying to show them the Lord's Love, then we've got to put everything into it & try to convince them in one fell swoop! We don't have weeks or months or years to do it, so we've got to give it our all!

4. (WHAT DO YOU DO TO COMFORT YOUR MATE WHEN HE IS IN A TERRIBLE STATE THINKING YOU DON'T LOVE HIM ANYMORE OR THAT YOU LOVE SOMEONE MUCH MORE THAN HIM, & HE'S TERRIBLY JEALOUS?) Here you've just come back from being with your fish & you're all excited & thrilled because maybe he has just gotten saved & filled with the Spirit. You've made a lot of progress with him, so of course you are happy & thrilled about it! But to your mate it seems like you're so much more excited about being with your fish than you are about being with him, so he interprets that to mean that you love your fish more than you love him.

5. WHAT DO YOU TELL YOUR MATE IN A CASE LIKE THAT? Well, then I suppose you could just tell them all these things that I've just said, & of course you should explain to them that you don't love your fish more than him. Your mate may say‚ "Well you sure don't act it!" So you should explain why you have to put more into it & why you have to act more enthusiastic & excited about it. Of course you also have to go the extra mile to help your mate believe that you do love him more, even if it takes more time & more loving!

6. (BUT ISN'T IT TRUE THAT SOME PEOPLE DO FALL IN LOVE WITH THEIR FISH?) Yes‚ of course, sometimes the girls fall in love with some of their fish, & for a time they may feel more for the fish than they do for their mate. But that isn't to say that they don't love their mate anymore, because you can be in love with two people or more at the same time.

7. YOUR MATE SHOULD TRY TO REALISE THAT IT IS A NEW SITUATION & that you're concentrating your interest on your fish because you're trying to get them to know the Lord & you're trying to show them the Love of God which they've never seen before! You're thinking about them & you're concentrating on them & you're really caught up in the thrill of seeing what the Lord is doing in their life. You may be feeling more for them at the time than you are for your mate, but that doesn't mean that you love them more than your mate! You may feel more‚ but from the Word & even your own experience, you should know by this time how unreliable feelings are, & that we are supposed to live by our faith, not our feelings.

8. I'M AFRAID THAT SOME OF OUR GIRLS GET SO CAUGHT UP IN THE ROMANCE & THE WONDERFUL FEELING THAT THEY THINK, "I MUST NOT LOVE MY MATE ANYMORE, I'M OUT OF LOVE WITH HIM & IN LOVE WITH SOMEBODY ELSE." But that's not true & they shouldn't look at it that way at all because there is such a thing as a deeper love that goes beyond the feelings of being "in love." We don't go by feelings, we need to go by faith! What is faith? It's the knowledge that even though we don't see that these things are so, we believe & we know that they are so!

9. REAL LOVE IS NOT ALL FEELINGS & most of us are grown up enough that we should know that by now, but we do get tested sometimes in these situations. You can still love someone very deeply but not have an orgasm & go weak in the knees every time you come near them or wilt just because they pass by you! To think that such exaggerated feelings have to accompany being in love is a very mistaken idea that we probably have all grown up with from the time we were little!

10. IT DOESN'T SEEM TO MATTER HOW MUCH THE LORD HAS TO SAY ABOUT IT, NOR HOW MUCH IS WRITTEN IN THE LETTERS, WE STILL OFTEN FIND THAT OUR FEELINGS ARE STRONGER THAN OUR FAITH & that's why we get into all this trouble with discouragement & jealousy & all kinds of trials & battles, because we're going on our feelings instead of by faith in what the Lord said! That's the big problem of living by faith, it's always a test & a battle of faith versus feelings!

11. WHEN YOU'RE SICK, DO YOU HAVE THE FAITH THE LORD IS GOING TO HEAL YOU? Well‚ sometimes you don't, because your feelings get in the way & you feel so rotten & so bad & it goes on so long & you're feeling so sick that your feelings almost overcome your faith, but the Lord said He'd do the miracle, so you have to believe, you have to have faith to believe beyond your feelings!

12. THAT'S THE BATTLE IN THIS CASE TOO‚ that even though you feel some passionate love for someone else, you have to have the faith to know that your love for your mate isn't any less! Just ask yourself, "What is it that made me love my mate in the first place? You'll probably see that he still has the same qualities as before, & the reasons you loved him in the first place are the same reasons you still love him‚ even though you don't always feel this same great burst of emotion when you're with him.

13. JUST DON'T DO ANYTHING RASH & DECIDE TO TELL YOUR MATE, "I DON'T LOVE YOU ANYMORE BECAUSE I DON'T FEEL ANYTHING FOR YOU & I DO FOR MY FISH, SO I THINK WE SHOULD HAVE A SEPARATION. I used to feel differently about you, but now I've lost a lot of these feelings, so therefore it must be that something is terribly wrong in our relationship." Well, I don't think that it's necessarily so‚ & I think you'd better review the reasons why you loved your mate in the first place & realise that the real love you have for him is probably a much deeper love than the new feelings you have for your fish.

14. BY THIS TIME SOME OF OUR GOOD FFers WHO HAVE FFed A LOT UNDERSTAND THAT WHILE MAYBE THEY'LL BE VERY MUCH IN LOVE WITH A FISH FOR AWHILE, THE LORD DOESN'T ALWAYS LET IT LAST VERY LONG, IN FACT HE USUALLY ONLY LETS IT LAST AS LONG AS THEY NEED IT! It's like the verse says, "The love of Christ constraineth me" (2Cor.5:14)—to be in love with that person for as long as it is necessary to get them saved or get them into the Family, but then there are other fish to go on to.

15. YOU CAN'T BE MADLY IN LOVE WITH FOUR OR FIVE OR SIX PEOPLE AT ONCE! Although you can love them all with a certain measure of Love, it's just impossible to divide your time & your emotions like that, you can't spread yourself out that thin! But usually you don't have to, because the Lord knows if the man is going to make it or not, & if not, then He usually allows things to cool off. The Lord gives him all that love through you to make him accountable, but then if the Lord knows he's not going to make it, then it's time for him to be on his way & a new one comes along.

16. IT DOESN'T ALWAYS LAST FOREVER BECAUSE THE LORD ONLY ALLOWS IT TO CONTINUE AS LONG AS IT'S ACCOMPLISHING HIS PURPOSE. It's not that we women are necessarily fickle & whimsical & fall in love with every new person that comes along, it's just that we're tools in God's hand & empty vessels that the Lord can move in the direction He wants & fill us up & let us overflow on whomever He wants to bless. The Lord has control of whom we fall in love with & how deeply & for how long!

17. I WAS IN LOVE WITH A LOT OF MY FISH, but I didn't stay "in love" with them forever! I loved them & I still love them, but I'm not passionately in love with them now. At the time I was quite ardent in my love because the Lord knew that's what they needed & that was the only way that they could make it & the only way He could show them His love to the extent that He wanted to show it to them. So just because your mate falls in love with another person doesn't mean it's going to last forever!

18. (IT'S A PRETTY TENDER TIME FOR THE MATE, WHO OBVIOUSLY REALISES THAT YOU ARE IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE ELSE, SO DO YOU HAVE ANY COUNSEL ABOUT HOW TO HANDLE YOUR MATE WHO IS HURT BY IT ALL?) Well, you don't just say, "Get the vic!", because usually they can't just get the victory that easily & it's a difficult time for both of you. It's difficult for the woman to try to keep two men happy & it's difficult for the mate who thinks he sees his wife getting further away from him all the time.

19. I PERSONALLY FEEL THAT IT IS BETTER TO SPARE YOUR MATE FROM HEARING ALL THE GORY DETAILS of all the lovemaking & all of what the fish said to you & what you said to him & what you feel for him. I'm for giving a brief victorious testimony of how the Lord's working in his life & in general what you're doing to help him & letting it go at that. Unless it's obvious, I don't think it's even necessary to brag about how tremendously he's fallen in love with you, because even that makes your mate feel that naturally the next thing to happen is for you to reciprocate if somebody's in love with you. Even if you haven't expressed your feelings, if your husband knows that someone has fallen deeply in love with you, it's still going to be a tense situation & he's going to worry about it.

20. MY PERSONAL OPINION IS THAT IT'S BETTER TO KEEP IT REAL LOW-KEYED & NOT MAKE A BIG SCENE OUT OF IT TO YOUR MATE. Of course sometimes you can't help it, the man may be living in your Home or something, but there are ways you can tone it down & not have to constantly bring up the whole situation & talk about it & act so thrilled about it & expect your mate to be just as thrilled about it as you!

21. YOU MAY SAY, "LOOK, WE'RE REALLY WINNING THIS GUY TO THE LORD & WE'RE DOING IT TOGETHER!" But your mate may say, "Yes, we're doing it together‚ but you're doing most of it! You're having most of the fun & I'm having the pain!" So for the very important sake of saving feelings & in some cases saving your relationship, in a case where a mate is having a very difficult time with your FFing, I would just not discuss it any more than necessary.

22. OF COURSE, YOU SHOULDN'T BECOME SO SECRETIVE TO THE POINT THAT WHEN YOUR MATE ASKS ABOUT IT YOU FREEZE & SHUT UP & DON'T SAY ANYTHING! That's very suspicious & of course that will cause him to get even more worried. Your mate knows you've got to love the guy to some extent to FF him & that both of you are in it together, working in a team effort, so you can't just say nothing! You have to be truthful, but like Dad says, "You must be truthful but you don't need to tell all the truth!" Why do you need to tell everything if it's just going to hurt your mate's feelings? Why should they even ask you to talk about things that they know will hurt them?

23. (YOU SAID IN THE PAST THAT YOU REALLY HAD A PROBLEM WITH JEALOUSY. HOW DID YOU GET THE VICTORY OVER IT?) At a certain point I guess the Lord was ready to give me the victory & He just gave it to me! I don't have a particular thing that I could say turned the tide & gave me the victory, the Lord just did it!—He gets the credit! There used to be a time when I was very unsure. I knew what the Lord had promised me‚ but then every time I really blew it I thought, "Maybe I've lost the blessing & I've lost the opportunity & the honour of having this special place with David." Sometimes Dad would come along with some other woman that he really fell in love with & I thought, "Maybe that's the end of me!"

24. HAVING GONE THROUGH THAT, I CAN UNDERSTAND THAT IT'S VERY DIFFICULT WHEN YOUR MATE WHOM YOU LOVE GETS INVOLVED WITH SOMEONE ELSE & YOU'RE REALLY UNSURE & AFRAID THAT THIS MIGHT BE THE END OF YOUR RELATIONSHIP & THAT YOUR MATE MIGHT LEAVE & YOU MIGHT NOT SEE THEM ANYMORE. It's much easier to take if you are assured that‚ even if your mate's feelings for you change, at least they still love you & they're going to stick by you no matter what happens. In that case you can endure it a lot better. Even if their feelings for you are less, at least you can comfort yourself with the fact that they're not going to leave you, they still love you anyway!

25. IT'S WHEN YOU'RE UNSURE & YOU DON'T KNOW, THAT YOU'RE TEMPTED to think‚ "Maybe my wife's going to fall so in love with this guy she's going to run off to live with him & leave me!" It's a real fear in the Family because it has happened a few times! The only thing I can say is that you just have to trust the Lord!—And know He knows best, & in most cases it doesn't happen. If it does happen, maybe the Lord wants to give you someone better. All things work together for good to them that love Him!

26. IF YOU KNOW THE LORD HAS PUT YOU TOGETHER & HAS GIVEN YOU A RELATIONSHIP & A LIFE TOGETHER, THEN CERTAINLY THINGS SHOULDN'T CHANGE JUST BECAUSE YOUR WIFE MAY HAVE TO TEMPORARILY HELP HER FISH. Your wife has a responsibility to come back to you & love you & stay with you! If she doesn't, then maybe she's not good enough for you anyway & the Lord wants you to have a change!

27. IF YOU'RE ON SHAKY GROUND FROM THE VERY BEGINNING & YOU DON'T KNOW whether the Lord wanted you together in the first place & you still, after all this time, haven't had any confirmation that your union has been of the Lord, then maybe the Lord is showing that your union wasn't of Him in the first place! In a case like that you need to pray for the Lord's Will & then trust that whatever happens is His Will! Of course, you have to be really yielded to the Lord in a situation like that & it's not easy.

28. I CERTAINLY THINK THAT IF YOU'VE HAD A CONFIRMATION IN ANY WAY THAT YOUR UNION IS OF THE LORD, THEN JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE FFing SOMEONE & HAVE FALLEN MADLY IN LOVE WITH THEM, THAT YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO LEAVE YOUR MATE NO MATTER WHAT YOUR FEELINGS ARE! You have a duty & obligation to stick with your mate & your children no matter how long you have to have the other one on your hands! You've got to stick with your mate & make sure that your union is secure & that you convince him of it, unless the Lord tells you it's time to go!—And for Him to show you to leave a mate & children that He put you together with & has shown you that it is His Will to be with would take a rare miraculous sign!

29. MAYBE IN SOME VERY RARE CIRCUMSTANCES IT COULD HAPPEN‚ but I don't think it would happen by your just getting that feeling, it'd be more widespread & there'd be a lot of confirmation & a lot of unusual circumstances! In most cases, however, after it's all over & the ardour dies down & your mate doesn't have her mind so much on the fish, she will usually come back to her original feelings & original attention that she had for you, so just be patient! A classic example is Ho's Esther!

30. (WHAT DO YOU RECOMMEND FOR CASES WHERE A MATE IS EXTREMELY JEALOUS & DOESN'T SEEM TO BE ABLE TO GET A REAL VICTORY?) A lot of jealousy is extreme & if you can't battle it by yourself you'd better ask for help! If you can't battle it by just asking the Lord for help & by quoting Scriptures & talking to people about it, then it may require a laying on of hands & desperate prayer‚ or even an exorcism! Jealousy can be a real spiritual force & can have a strong hold & be real bonds & chains on a person to where they can't seem to control it, so they may need definite help & fasting & prayer & the laying on of hands to get rid of it! Perhaps they've yielded to it to the point that now they just can't seem to control it, so they've got to have extra help!

31. IF THEY'RE NOT GOING TO BE THE ONES TO ASK FOR THAT KIND OF PRAYER, THEN SOMEBODY ELSE SHOULD ASK IT FOR THEM, because bad jealousy is a dangerous thing! Of course the "offending" mate can do a lot to help to keep things on an "even keel" & not to provoke more jealousy, but in some cases people get insanely jealous even over small, imaginary things to the point that you can hardly do anything to suit them, no matter what you do, & that makes it hell! You just have to help them get the victory, because if they don't, the Lord will do something to get rid of them because you can't live with that kind of insane jealousy, at least not for very long.

32. IN OUR FAMILY WE SHARE & THAT'S THE WAY IT IS, & IF YOU KNOW & ACCEPT THIS FROM THE VERY BEGINNING, IT'S A LOT EASIER & YOU'RE A LOT LESS JEALOUS. But if you think that there's any way you can fight having to share & any way you can get around it or resist it‚ or any way you can get your way in selfishness & jealousy, then you'll always try to, & that's what makes you miserable, trying to get more than your share! Most people tend towards jealousy, & if you know that there's any chance that you can have your way & have someone all to yourself, then you'll try!

33. THAT'S WHY IN THESE MULTIPLE OR PLURAL MARRIAGE SOCIETIES, WHERE THIS IS A LONGSTANDING THING FOR GENERATIONS & GENERATIONS, THEY HAVE LESS PROBLEMS ALONG THAT LINE. I'm sure they have some measure of jealousy, but not the kind of jealousy that fights against the whole system, because they just accept it. There is a far greater acceptance of it in general, because that's the way they're brought up from the beginning, that that's the way they're supposed to live & so there isn't that much rebellion against the system itself.

34. IN SOME WAYS JEALOUSY IS NATURAL BECAUSE IT'S PART OF MAN'S SINFUL NATURE CAUSED BY THE ENEMY, & everybody in the World is jealous & selfish at some time! In our Western society where we're not used to sharing, we're used to being very selfish & trying to fight to hold on to what we think is ours alone & what we want to keep strictly to ourselves, & this makes it a lot more difficult.

35. OUR BABES WHO HAVE BEEN WON THROUGH FFing & HAVE LEARNED ABOUT FFing RIGHT FROM THE BEGINNING & THAT THEY'RE GOING TO HAVE TO FF THEMSELVES, HAVE AN EASIER TIME ACCEPTING IT! They understand that we share & we FF & that this is the way it is if you want to live in the Family! They do a lot better along this line than those who had to be introduced to FFing years after they had joined & had learned to live selfishly. Some babes do a lot better than some of us did, because we had our set little ways that we were going to do things & our set little selfish lives & we didn't want anybody taking anything away from that.

36. WHEREAS THE NEW BABES COME IN & IT'S ALL NEW TO THEM & you tell them, "Well, this is the way it is & if you want to join the Family, you'll just have to accept it!"—And they do because they don't know anything else! Sure they're jealous, everybody's jealous, but they don't fight so hard against it because this is the way it is & they accept it & they get the victory! It's a completely new life for them, so they're completely ready to change & they accept it & it's easier for them! They know that it's part of our basic doctrine & our principles & they want to do the Lord's Will, so that's one of the things they just do automatically!

37. WHEN I HAD TO SHARE SLEEPING IN DAD'S BED WITH BOTH EVE & MARTHA, I JUST KNEW THAT WAS THE WAY IT WAS GOING TO BE & THERE WASN'T ANYTHING I COULD DO TO FIGHT OR COMPLAIN OR MURMUR‚ BECAUSE I KNEW THAT NO MATTER WHAT, I COULDN'T GET MY WAY, SO WHAT GOOD WAS IT TO MAKE MYSELF MISERABLE?—HA! Why not just accept it & be agreeable & try to cooperate & try to be as happy as possible? But if you think there's any loophole & any way you can get out of it or change things, then you're going to make yourself & others miserable by being jealous & selfish.

38. IT'S JUST LIKE WITH CHILDREN, if you give them too many loopholes, then they fight, but if you put your foot down & say, "That's it! No more argument!", then they usually do it because they're convinced that there's nothing they can do to fight against it. We're all little children that like to push as far as we can for as much as we can get, but when we're given an ultimatum & the rule is rigid & there's nothing we can do to change it, then we all acquiesce & agree & settle down & do the best we can & it goes a lot smoother! That's why rigid discipline for us all really helps & does the trick!

39. DAD DID HAVE TO GET PRETTY FIRM WITH ME a few times & tell me‚ "Look, you get the victory or else the Lord's not going to stand for it!" That really threw the fear of the Lord into me, & made me desperate to get the victory, which I finally did‚ thank the Lord, & thanks to Dad's firmness‚ along with his great love & reassurance. PTL! Amen? GBY! ILY! (Amen!—And she survived all the others! GBH!)