Love in the Making 2019

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Proverbs 365 Ministries

Ivonne Betancourt

Michael Carducci

Dee Casper

Kezia Chisholm

Andrea Deckert

Thomas Jackson

Dwayne Lemon

Melody Mason

April Nixon

John Nixon II

Eric Walsh

Q&A panel - Love in the Making 2019

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this time and this fellowship and time to reflect in your Word, and we just pray right now for wisdom.

Both for us and each 1 here in this room, you promise when we don't have what we need, when we recognize that you have all we need.

So just bless this panel and the questions.

May all that we say and do glorify you right now.

So our first question that we've received, And it reads, this is a little brief overview of this person's situation.

And they say, I'm a young adult who is HIV positive.

And I've always believed it to be God's will for me to be involved in medical missionary work.

After applying to 1 of the medical missionary institutions and informing them of my status as it was indicated when applying to state if 1 had the illness, I received a rejection letter upon asking I received a rejection letter upon asking If I can be guided into a program more suitable for me, I was told I could not be admitted to their institution for any program at all.

I was devastated and I have been struggling spiritually since it happened.

Does my illness disqualify me from medical missionary work and where do I go from here?

Well, let me say that I've advised 2 U.S.

Presidents on HIV and AIDS and helped direct money to Africa through PEPFAR, and I've done a lot of program work in my last public health position in Pasadena that was really the pride of the work we did was to bring in money to assist individuals suffering from or just infected with the HIV virus.

The fact that someone who says they teach medical missionary work would not take someone with HIV tells me they don't really know the medical side.

It's a statement that they actually don't understand the disease.

And if they don't understand that disease, I would question how much they know about any other disease.

So that would really be my answer is that it is a blessing in disguise.

You should go somewhere where you can actually get really good medical training.

The next question, again, people have texted us to let us know a particular question for presenters, but all presenters, please feel free to Chime in this 1 is for John and April This person asks is it okay for girls to ask guys out?

We actually talked about this beforehand because I believe this question may have come up before in another 1 of these sessions.

And so as we were preparing for our sessions down there, there were several questions that were listed and that was 1 of them.

And there were actually more than 1 question that had to do with the woman in the situation being the aggressor, I guess is what we think of in this case.

Sometimes, 2 people that come together have personality styles that fit each other where the woman might be a little bit more type A, and the man could be a little bit more reserved.

And for those 2 to be together, we think it's fine if the woman asks the man out.

I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

Though it may put certain men off, but that kind of man's probably not the 1 that she wants to be with.

So we think it's okay, but it may be a little bit awkward in some situations.

I don't think there's any kind of biblical mandate that says women should not ask a man out.

I personally think that If you want to have a godly man leading in a marriage, you need to allow him to lead from the beginning and not start the process.

God is able to bring that person along, so I would say we do not take that initiative in the beginning.

Let me respond to that, because that's good.

When the Bible talks about spiritual leadership in the home, I don't think it means that in no case can the woman voice her opinion about something needing to be a certain way.

In our family, April and I have made a decision that in certain cases, sometimes we may have a disagreement between each other for which we do not have, there may be a case where both of us disagree about a particular issue in such a way that we need somebody to break a tie, okay?

I feel 1 way about something, she feels another way about something, and this may be about something that's not necessarily spiritual, right?

How do we decide who the person is who is going to break that tie?

Well, in our relationship, what we have done, as we have said, there are certain aspects of our home that she has the tie-breaking vote, and there are other aspects where I have the tie-breaking vote, I'll give you an example.

With our children, we have decided that April has a better understanding about certain things about child rearing than I do.

So when it comes to that, if we don't agree about a particular thing, and we decide that we're gonna go different ways, we're not gonna go different ways, we're obviously gonna walk together, sometimes she is the 1 who gets the tie-breaking vote.

Some person might say that's her leading.

I don't know how you would put that, but the reality is just because I am the spiritual head of the home does not mean I'm the best person to make every decision.

When it comes to child rearing, we have determined my wife is better to make that decision than I am.

So anyway, I think it might be the same in this case.

I don't think that just because the woman asks the man out on the first date, It means it's setting the relationship up where she's going to be the leader and he's not.

This May, the 25th, will make 22 precious years that I've been privileged to be married to my bride, Alexandra.

And 22 years ago, 23, my wife proposed to me.

And We were excited, we were in the church, but there was much that we did not understand.

We often mingled a little bit of what we thought was right and also what the word of God said.

As we began to read at Venice Home and Child Guidance and, you know, these books that we understand to be inspired by God.

As we began to read those teachings, and 1 of the books I read was Education, the book Education.

And in there, it talks about Eden being the model church, the model school, and also the model home.

And as we began to study Eden, we started to look at all the principles you learned through Eden.

And in Eden, I believe God left an example, and I don't believe it was a mistake, for the Lord said that what he did was good after he did it.

And that was that God, when creating the relationship between the man and the woman in marriage, he brought the man to the woman.

And I see beautiful demonstrations of how we love him because he first loved us, you know?

And so when I see in scripture, if I look at Eden and allow that to be the model of even how the relationships are to come together, then we would all have to admit that according to the word of God, the man is brought to the woman, not the woman to the man.

And so my wife said, oh, you know, as she realized this, she says, I wish so much you would have proposed to me.

And in 2017, we were at Meet Ministry and the Lord blessed in many, many ways And I had the privilege of, before all of these witnesses, I went on my knees and I proposed to my wife to remarry me.

And it was a beautiful event, And we ended up having another ceremony where we were able to look at it.

And we were grateful to experience more carefully and more closely the biblical example of what God has said.

We all got an opinion, and I understand that.

But even our opinions have to be submitted to the word of God.

And I just want us to get to a place where we look to the word.

Say, Lord, okay, what do you show us in your word?

And the trend of scripture is that God speaks to the man, the man goes to the woman, and this is how the relationship is established.

And I believe we need to let that be our model because I don't believe God makes mistakes.

All right, our next question is directed for Jacob and Yvonne.

It reads, What do you do as a woman if a divorced man is wanting to date you?

It says, What do you do as a woman if a divorced man is wanting to date you?

It's a question you need more details to answer.

If he's not scripturally divorced, you just say thank you but I'm not available for you.

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Q&A panel - Love in the Making 2019

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