Nr 09/10
September 2010

Dear Member/Guest

1. Emotional Abuse - The Silent Killer Part 2
2. Kehrhahnministries featured Christian Song - “Give Thanks” by Don Moen
3. Kehrhahnministries attends the Dutch Reformed Church: Piet Retief - Daniel Conference 2010
4. Kehrhahnministries condemns National Health and Teacher's strike in South Africa
5. Monthly Devotional - God is unchangeable in His Way

1. EMOTIONAL ABUSE - THE SILENT KILLER PART 2

Danielle Steele tells of a woman’s struggle in her book “Answered Prayers”. The story starts off when after the death of her brother; Faith (the name of the main character) had to start dealing with her abusive past as a child, while being married to a successful and very demanding merchant banker. Her dreams were on a hold while she took care of her two girls who are now out of school and studying in other towns. The events in her life causes her to take a look at her own life, which causes her to make a decision that plunges her marriage into a crises ending up in divorce, lies and dissent. The decision she took was to have a career of her own and applies to law school against her husband’s wishes, igniting a barrage of anger and resentment.

This story clearly illustrates the different types of emotional abuse and underlines it clearly that the people the closest to you can be the most abusive at times. When emotional abuse is happening within any context, the abuser might become abusive either to hide something away, which they had done or hiding their own iniquities and weaknesses.

Dr Jantz in his book “Healing the Scars of emotional abuse” shares with his readers in his second part, three common diameters of emotional abuse. Emotional abuse occurs through words, actions and neglect. Like with all these three sections, Dr Jantz divides all three sections into sub-sections showing us the different types of personalities who instigates these forms of abuse. Concerning words, the sub-sections are:

1. The Overbearing Opinion
2. The person who is always right
3. The Great Guilt-Giver
4. The Preacher
5. Turn up the tape
6. The judge and jury
7. The Put-Down Artist
8. The Stand-Up Comic
9. The Historian
10. The Silent Treatment

When one of the ten points is you, then you are probably a victim of emotional abuse and used the same methods in your own relationships with others. Emotional abuse through words is a marriage breaker, since communication is used by human beings to express their feelings and the results often comes depending on the hearer, since they interpret what you are saying through the lenses of being a victim of emotional abuse themselves. Your words thus show your hearer more than you might have wanted to reveal. Knowing and being aware of these forms will help individuals to realize that all of us are carrying hurt within us and by getting real with one another and naming it will enable you to speak directly and open to one another, helping one another by improving our communication skills, which ultimately limits differences between us or at lease taking off some strains in our relationships with our colleagues, but especially our spouses. Doing this will help us become more sensitive to what our spouses, girlfriend/boyfriend is saying to us, since through communication and the way in which we do it reveals the true nature of our hearts.

With communication technology increasing so does the human skill in communication decrease. Working with youth on camps, I find that boyfriend and girlfriend speak to one another on mix-it and facebook while sitting in the same room, telling one another how much they love one another over their cell phones instead of talking directly to one another. In questioning them why they do it, I find that mostly guys are afraid of being rejected and digging a bit deeper one realize that the fear of rejection came from previous bad experiences of being rejected either as a child or in previous attempts of expressing your feelings after experiencing failed romance. Previous words spoken will result in action with unnecessary caution.

In Dr Jantz conclusion, “A time to heal“he writes “The work and phrases we use are very important, as it is the way they are delivered. Yet often we are the most careless with this vital form of communication. Now that you have read over this chapter and identified verbally abusive patterns in others, take some time to consider the type of communication you have with other people in your life:

Is there someone in particular who speaks to you in an abusive way?
How do you speak to family members?
How do you speak to people you don’t know?
Is there someone you speak to inappropriately?
Are there patterns of speech you have identified in this chapter that you’d like to change?
List the main types of verbal abusers you dealt with.
What effect did their words have on you?
How do I feel about them today?
What lies have you believed because of their abuse? Be specific
Internalize this statement: “I will strive to speak to other people the way I wish to be spoken to—with kindness, respect and consideration” (Jantz, 2003:68-69).

Kehrhahnministries would highly recommend this book to all its readers as we all fall into the trap of being abusive even though we do not always acknowledge it, We will bring you further reviews of this book in the month’s to come. Our reviews should not be seen as a replacement, since there is a lot more information, which we do not cover.

Bibliography
Jantz, Gregory L. with Mcmurray Ann (2003) “Healing the scars of emotional Abuse”, Ravel; Grand Rapids

Communicating with Love!!

Georg Kehrhahn
CEO: Kehrhahnministries

2. KEHRHAHNMINISTRIES FEATURED CHRISTIAN SONG—“GIVE THANKS” BY DON MOEN

3. KEHRHAHNMINISTRIES ATTENDS THE DUTCH REFORMED CHURCH DANIEL CONFERENCE (30-31 JULY 2010)

Kehrhahnministries’ CEO Georg Kehrhahn attended the Daniel Conference, which was hosted by the Dutch Reformed congregation Piet Retief. The theme for this conference was “Live life as a Man of God.” Men across denominations attended this conference and were touched in many ways by what they have heard. Four sessions were held during this conference which dealt with; you’re your relationship with God; Your Marriage; your family and your work and environment.

As men of God, we once again realized how important we are to our families and that it is one of the biggest challenges what men face, in being a Man of God testifying of our love for Him in every aspect of our lives. We learned about making Godly directed decisions with confidence, knowing who we as men of God are. The benefits of dealing with stressful situations and how men standing together in God’s power can change not only one another’s lives but ultimately a whole town or village.

We experienced men asking one another forgiveness for not being there for one another in times of sickness. We experienced men asking God for forgiveness for not always trusting Him when it came to business and family decisions. Kehrhahnministries would like to encourage men from all over the world to form men groups like this where men can speak with one another without being judged about the difficulties we as men face. It will make a tremendous difference in your life personally but mostly in the lives of your children and wives, who depends upon you to be their rock, their shelter in difficult times.

During our breaks, we were nourished and re-vitalized with food and snacks that was prepared by the women of that congregation and since August is a national women month in South Africa, the saying that behind every strong and courageous man there’s a stronger woman is absolutely true. To the women we applaud you for sticking to us with your love and tender care, without you our lives wouldn’t have been the same.

From men with thankful hearts!!!
Georg Kehrhahn
CEO: Kehrhahnministries

4. KEHRHAHNMINISTRIES CONDEMNS NATIONAL HEALTH AND TEACHER’S STRIKE IN SOUTH AFRICA

Kehrhahnministries condemns the Health & Teacher’s national strike which is happening all over South Africa. COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) and its affiliated unions strike took place from the 19th-26th August and are still going on, not considering the rights of people to healthcare and education while withholding the pupils of their right to education. Those who are willing to work in these days are intimidated and even threatened if they do not comply with the rest. I would like to see union leaders laying on their death beds simply because their rights for higher wages are more important than people’s right to life.

Kehrhahnministries also condemns the “fat cats” in the South African Government who made promises they knew they couldn’t keep, yet they gave themselves salary increases. May God empower the people to do the right thing and change the government who did not fulfill the mandate which they were given? Mr. President how will your government console those who lost love one’s due to your government’s unwillingness to keep your promises and your lack of commitment of following through on your promises. Your government has failed the people once and you continue to show your failure.

Kehrhahnministries would like to thank all volunteers who were willing to help during the time of the strikes. Thank you churches for showing that God’s mandate to serve His children is more important and greater than race, religion or political affiliation. Your reward may not be rewarded to you on earth, but know that your reward in heaven is awaiting you for your selfless efforts. You deserve a medal. Thank you for showing what life is all about and for being angels to those who so desperately need people like you.

In God’s Service!!!
Georg Kehrhahn
CEO: Kehrhahnministries

5. MONTHLY DEVOTIONAL - GOD IS UNCHANGEABLE IN HIS WAY

Devotional text: Hebrews 6: 17-19 (ESV)

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Dear Friends

Dealings among human beings lead to many disappointments. No disappointment is greater when you realize that your spouse, friend or boyfriend/girlfriend isn’t the person whom you got to know and this becomes clear only when you have journeyed with the individual.

As time changes so does our perceptions change and most of the time we cannot adapt to these changes since there are some many things happening , so many changes that all seemed much to bear and it starts to overwhelm us so much that we do not even know where to start. Changes happen because external factors are behind them. People experience changes emotionally, physically, financially, spiritually and psychologically bringing out the worst in us from time to time. We change careers and are at times forced to do something else, which we know deep within us wouldn’t bring us fulfillment since it isn’t our passion, but we do it to make a living anyway. Living in stressful times, our moods changes and we use these changes to hurt the people we love sadly even justifying our wrong actions.

Our text shares with us a God who is unchangeable. A God who remains consistent in His ways, whose decisions isn’t influenced by the events that are occurring. A God who is firm in His principles, His purpose for us and that becomes the anchor which holds us during over-bearing times. In speaking of a God who uses changing times to His benefits and those he loves even though we do not recognize it immediately. A God who isn’t affected by our mood swings and interpretations of events. A God who sticks to His redeeming message of love and acceptance. Since God is unchangeable when it comes to loving us, we can be anchored in Him, meaning holding on to his promise of never letting you go even if people let you down. Being anchored in God’s unchangeable ways means that you do not need to listen to others opinions to validate you as an individual, since you are unchangeable due to the relationship you have with God. It is God who molds you into the person he wants you to be and not others. The writer of this letter confirms this when he writes that there are two unchangeable things, one being it is impossible for God to lie and that by him and through him, we have hope that he will make things better for us to which we can hold on. These two aspects are traits of the anchor which is holding us. If God loves you, you better believe it for he is going nowhere.

Your life is a visual presence of God’s unchangeable anchor, drawing people to you where they can hold on when things get rough. So next time when someone seems not able to let you go consider the fact that they have seen your unchangeable anchor, meaning that they draw close to God through your steadfast anchor, which God himself has placed in you. His ways and plans haven’t change for you at all, then why should you who live in Christ change your feelings for that someone special? Or changing your opinion of something just in order to experience another disappointment since you left your steadfast anchor in the first place. Be anchored in God’s unchangeable anchor!!

Amen
Georg Kehrhahn
CEO: Kehrhahnministries