Agnate Manifest

Just a note to anyone who doesn't get it:

A man and a woman should not become business partners unless they are married to one another. Any other combination is bad joss all the way around. Because you are starting a new company, you will spend all of your waking hours with someone who is not your spouse. You will laugh together. You will cry together. You will make critical financial and logistical decisions together. You will come to understand each other's hopes, dreams, fears and aspirations. You will gain intimate knowledge of likes and dislikes. You will begin to see common ground. And, if you are married and things are not really wonderful at home, you will begin to yearn for attention and appreciation from someone who REALLY understands you. If you do this for long enough, you are guaranteed to build an unholy bond that will decimate your personal life, your marriage, your business, and all those involved in any aspect of these things.

If you are the married person and you want to do the right thing, you will have to separate yourself completely from your business partner and cling with everything you have to your marriage partner. You will be forced to sell off your half of the business you have worked to build. You will spend hours in personal and marital counselling trying to heal your marriage. You will lay awake at night and fight the yearning to return to your emotional mistress, to re-establish contact, and to allow your heart to go there one more time. You will resent your spouse, and they will resent you. You will have to fight to restore what was destroyed by adulterous thinking. You will be a mess for many, many weeks, fighting depression, remorse, anger and condemnation. You will understand why people used to ask you if your relationship with your business partner was a problem with your spouse.

If you are the single person and you want to do the right thing, you, too will have to separate yourself completely from your business partner. You will have to cling to your God and to your close friends for comfort. You will be forced to make a decision about whether or not you want to continue the business. You will wonder what you are going to do now that this person who was so integral to the business and to your life is gone. You will lay awake at night fighting the frustration of wanting something you can never have, and fighting the craving for something that you know is forbidden. You will resent the person you once thought of as invaluable, and you will be forced to confront the fact that you did not guard your heart. You will be a mess for many, many weeks, fighting depression, remorse, anger and condemnation. You will understand why people used to ask you if your business partner was your spouse, and why that was wrong.

In time, you will see that God is faithful, your sins are forgiven, and you will go on to success and restoration. But it will be a long, long road.

How about this sales pitch:

I can fly. Really, I can. I've been able to do it since birth. It's not something I usually talk about, but you are a special person, and I want you to know this about me. I'm telling you this because I want to teach you how to fly, too. In fact, I'm forming a core group of people right now who I will personally mentor, and show them how they can teach others to fly. I want you to be a part of this group, because I think you have what it takes to fly almost as good as me. Now, you will probably never be able to fly as good as me, but let me tell you, flying is great! Even if you never achieve the level of flying I have in my life (and you just need to prepare yourself for the inevitable truth that your probably won't), you need to get on board and join this exceptional group of people.

This fine gentleman went on to tell me that he is a personal friend of a nationally known Christian speaker and that he has spoken for well known Christian organizations at the national level, not to mention the fact that someone who is very successful has come to his house a number of times for dinner. He told me how important it was for him to see others succeed, how servant leadership and personal integrity are important to him, and how he knows I share these values. He offered me a job working for him at 5% above the market maximum for my professional skill set (which, for those who are wondering, is not what I am making at my current place of employment).

I checked him out.

The personal secretary of the nationally known Christian speaker has never heard of him. The Christian organization is actively looking for him to ask him what the hang-fire he thinks he is doing using them as a reference when they've never heard of him. Apparently I'm not the first person to call them about this fellow. The highly successful person's company has stiff-armed all of my inquiries.

Note to Dude:

Your actions are trashing the Name of God, the names of His people, and the work of their hands. Your false associations are deceptive and inconsistent with the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Your pride and ego are in direct opposition to the Creator of the Universe, and though you claim His Name, your behavior is a denial of any concern for it. You are recruiting heathens into your little scheme using these tactics, which will be a millstone around your neck in the final analysis. Repent now and pray for mercy. God will hear you, and will forgive you, and will heal whatever sad, sick and twisted things have happened to you to make you think that preying on people for financial gain and a validation of your depraved ego.

Whew. I feel better.