{"id":13927,"date":"2016-08-18T00:45:52","date_gmt":"2016-08-18T05:45:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/25-never-defend-yourself\/"},"modified":"2016-08-18T00:45:52","modified_gmt":"2016-08-18T05:45:52","slug":"25-never-defend-yourself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/25-never-defend-yourself\/","title":{"rendered":"25 NEVER DEFEND YOURSELF"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'><b>E<\/b>xcuses. Excuses. Excuses. You\u2019ve heard people try to weasel out of a sticky situation with a feeble excuse. It would\u2019ve been better for them and everyone else if they\u2019d just admitted the mistake and gotten on with life.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Excuses in marriage are like a tomato that has a rotten spot. It may look good, but when you pick it up, your finger pokes right through. Yuck!<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Defending yourself sets the stage for attempting to excuse your behavior. That\u2019s what an excuse is. Too often, though, the behavior cannot be excused because it was wrong!<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Adam was the first recorded excuse-maker in the world when he told God, \u201cThe woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate\u201d (Gen. 3:12). Adam\u2019s feeble attempt to justify what he\u2019d done only drove him farther away from God. Likewise, when you try to excuse your actions, you are only driving yourself farther away from your spouse.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>Try this: Next time you\u2019re caught in an embarrassing situation, instead of making excuses just tell the truth. Avoid using blaming language and own up to what you\u2019ve done. Stop trying to justify and instead begin to rectify. If you do this, you\u2019ll be amazed at how much easier it is to get past the problem and get on with life.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: 18.0pt;line-height:normal'>If God is your sure defense, then why do a poor job defending yourself?<\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal'><i>To You, O my Strength, I will sing praises;<br \/> For God is my defense, My God of mercy.<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=MsoNormal align=right style='margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:right;line-height:normal'>Ps. 59:17<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Excuses. Excuses. Excuses. You\u2019ve heard people try to weasel out of a sticky situation with a feeble excuse. It would\u2019ve been better for them and everyone else if they\u2019d just admitted the mistake and gotten on with life. Excuses in marriage are like a tomato that has a rotten spot. It may look good, but &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/25-never-defend-yourself\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;25 NEVER DEFEND YOURSELF&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13927\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}