Marriage After God - Biblical advice, practical tips, and inspiring stories to strengthen your relationship and deepen your spiritual connection

There are many reasons why you might want to make some side money. Getting out of debt was the reason we did. In this episode, we share with you some very unique and creative ways to make some extra cash today. We start off the episode with how the Bible teaches us to view money to get our minds and hearts in the right place. PRAYER Dear Lord, Thank You for providing scripture about money, about how we should view it and how we should steward it. We pray we never have a love of money. We pray we would be wise in how we make our money, how we spend it and save it. We pray our finances would honor You. Help us to be united in marriage when it comes to money. Help us to communicate respectfully about money. In times that we are striving to make extra cash, we pray that You would guide us and show us what we should do. If any of the striving is in vain, please convict our hearts and redirect us. May the pursuit of money never be at the cost of our relationship with You, Lord, or with our families. Thank You for your provision, thank You for the opportunities we have to grow and thank You for the moments we get to share Your Gospel with others. We pray we would be a light in this world. In Jesus’ name, amen! Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

The Bible tells us in James 5 to "confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working." Confession is one of the most powerful gifts God has given us. It is by confession that we are saved. (Romans 10:10) It is by confession that we are healed. When we confess our sin we are saying that God is right and we are not. It is humbling our selves. It is the killing of our flesh just as Jesus tells us to take up our cross and follow him. But confession can be hard especially because it is exactly the opposite of what our flesh wants. Confess exposes our nakedness and our natural instinct is to protect that nakedness and to cover it up. But when we hide we allow our sins and wrong ways of thinking to live on instead of being cut away. In this episode, we talk all about the power of confession and how it can be done well in our marriages. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

We all need a little inspiration every once in a while. Who am I kidding? We need it all the time lol. Here are some fun and creative date night ideas for you to try out with your spouse on your next date.Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book, The Marriage Gift - 365 Prayers for your Marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

FREE EBOOK ALERT! We wanted to give away a fun and free resource to help you and your spouse go deeper on your date nights. http://datenightconversations.com This episode of Marriage After God is reflection back on our first few years of marriage, including what we went through and how God saved us. We vulnerably share about pornography addiction, our experience with painful sex, a discovery that helped us heal, and much more. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

Download our FREE eBook and take your date nights to a new level! http://datenightconversations.com Subscribe to the Naked Marriage Podcast Today. http://nakedmarriagepodcast.com Dave & Ashley Willis have become some of America's most trusted teachers on marriage. Their books, blogs, videos and speaking events have been reaching millions of couples worldwide. They are part of the MarriageToday team, which is the largest marriage-focused ministry in the USA. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

Download Our FREE 52 Date Night Conversations Starters eBook Today!!!! http://datenightconversations.com TRANSCRIPT Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God. Helping you cultivate and extraordinary marriage. And to day we're gonna be talking about fears of a growing family and how to combat them biblically. Before we get started today, because this topic is kind of surrounded around growing family and having kids, I wanted to share that we do have resources for parents called 31 Prayers For My Son and For My Daughter, and these are great resources for you to pray over your children. They're 31 prayers in each book talking about different topics in the child's life and there's also journal pages that after each prayer you can just make it more personal and we've had some positive feedback about these resources. Parents are really loving them, so make sure you get a copy. Yup. Well first off I just wanna thank everyone for joining us today, listening. And we want to encourage you to grab your Bible so that as we go through scripture you can participate. So the first thing we're gonna do before we start talking about these fears that a lot of us go through in our marriages as we start growing our family with children, is I just wanna go straight to scripture and read God's word about fear in our lives. And this is in Second Timothy. This is Paul talking to Timothy and encouraging him in his ministry. And he says, So I just wanna start off as we go into this idea of the fears that we all experience and explain that God has given us, just like He's given Timothy, just like Paul reminds Timothy, He hasn't given us a spirit of fear, but a spirit of love, power, and self-control. And then second verse I wanna start us off with is in Psalms 127 and I just wanna get a biblical, godly perspective on children. And in Psalm, the psamlist writes, So God's perspecive in this one verse, there's hundreds of verses that talk about who children are to us and to God, is that they're a heritage, that they're a blessing. That they're a weapon wielded in the hands of parents for his purposes. I'm so glad that we started with those two verses 'cause I think above all else, it's so important to remember what God's perspective and heart is towards children. So as we move forward and navigate through these fears, how do we remember what God believes is true about growing family? And as we always say to the Christian marriages out there, that we found our, a marriage after God founds their marriage on the Bible, on the word of God. We don't do it in our feelings, we don't operate in our opinions, we don't operate in our ideas. What we try and do to the best of our abilities through the spirit that God's put in us is we run to the word of God. So as we talk through these fears that we're dealing with right now, our way of dealing with them is the word of God. And so that's why we encourage you to have your Bible and as we go through these fears that we're gonna bring up right now, we're gonna try and find scripture to combat those fears. So Aaron, you walked us through those two scriptures, which again were very powerful, and they're ones that I'm actually really familiar with, but how do we look at our lives and use those scriptures to encourage us in a practical way? So the first practical thing, the Bible tells us to meditate on God's word. And that word, meditate, it comes from this idea of like a cow chewing cud. And it's like we chew it, we mull it over, and over, and over again, and we continue to bring it up and remind ourselves of it. And we go back to it over, and over, and over again. We don't just hear it one time and then all of a sudden, oh that's just into my heart and got it forever. That might happen in some cases, but for the most part, like for you, you have to be reminded. Yeah. Especially when you're going through hormone changes. Yeah. Because you're going through hormone changes and that can feel totally chaotic. And so instead of just trying to address the symptoms and like, well you need to change the way you're thinking, you need to, which is how I tend to approach you. Sometimes. Which is not always effective. But meditating on scripture. So when we're in those moments of the things that we're specifically going to talk about, we go back those scriptures and be like, well, I'm thinking this way and I feel this way but this is the truth. And I just need to remind myself of that, even though it doesn't feel like the truth. That's good. So even having like maybe these scriptures written out on hand so that they're next to you bed stand or in the kitchen window, or some-- Or on our chalkboard right over there. Or on a chalkboard, in your house somewhere. I think that would be really encouraging for those listening to know that a very practical way of being reminded of these scriptures is to just put them in front of you. Yeah, have them on hand. Memorize them. So one of the reasons why I really wanted to talk about this topic today, about fears of a growing family, is because this is exactly where we've been for the last month. I am right almost into the second trimester of our fourth baby. Woohoo! We're so excited about that. And I've just been wrestling with having some fears about our family getting a little bit bigger. And I don't know for those of you listening, if you guys have jumped in and had any kids yet, or maybe you're on two or three, maybe some of you are on six or seven, like some of our friends. Yeah. But I know that some of these fears that we're gonna talk about are super relatable and so hopefully it's encouraging for you to hear what we're gonna talk about today. So why don't you share with us some fears that you're going through right now. Because, although we learn from scripture in second Timothy that we don't have a spirit of fear, when hormones rise up, when your body starts changing, when you start realizing the logistics of the day and you have an overwhelming morning you know, they come up. And it's our job to navigate that with God, so. So yeah, a lot of the things that I've been wrestling with is feeling like, I can't handle it. I can't manage my home, or keep up with the demands of all of the dishes, or feeding everyone, or keeping up with the laundry. And just little things like that. Getting all the crud off the floor after meals. Yeah, from our youngest spilling food on the floor. Yeah so, having to meet all those demands of the day and then looking to our future and saying, and we're gonna have another baby being added to the picture and it just feels overwhelming. That's just one fear that I've been wrestling with. So you're talking about not being to handle it. That just the demands of the day, of life. Feeling exhausted emotionally, mentally, physically. Which are real things because your body has limitations. Especially when I'm pregnant again. Exactly. And your home has limitations, and your time has limitations. The thing that I immediately thought of is acknowledging the weakness 'cause we all, moms out there, you look at any Instagram about moms-- We want to be superheroes. Superheroes, like you're the superhero mom and you're like, oh my gosh she's got a beautiful Instagram feed, and her home's always perfect, and her kids are beautiful and wonderful and act perfectly all the time. And that's just not reality. I think you might have a expectation of yourself that isn't a real expectation, and since you can't live up to it, it hurts. It does hurt. And it breaks you, and it makes you feel more emotional and like a failure. So one thing that husbands can be doing is reminding your wives that they are great. And that the things you're doing are wonderful and you don't have to do everything perfectly. Another thing we should be doing as husbands is cultivating an environment in the home where we're helping. I can't help all the time because I have a job. Many husbands, they have full-time jobs and a lot of wives and moms might have jobs also. That might be adding to the stress also, but cultivating an environment where you know you're helped. Yeah. And I remember reminding you, this morning even when you were dealing with this, I said, "Babe, I'm here with you also." Like you don't need to feel like you have to do it on your own. But the weakness part of this, it reminds me of the scripture of when Paul, in Second Corinthians, is talking about a thorn that's been given to him in his side. It's either an ailment, or someone who's pestering him and we don't know exactly what it is, he never says exactly what it is. But Paul tells us the torment that this thorn is causing him and this is what God's word to him was about this weakness, in Second Corinthians, chapter 12, verse nine it says, And so, reminding ourselves of like it's okay to be weak. We're human. Weakness is a part of who we are. We're in this weak flesh that has cravings, and desires, and hormones, and brokenness. But we have a savior and we have a god that's given us His Holy Spirit that we can actually operate in His strength. And that actually, when we recognize our weakness and we humble ourselves, we actually can glorify Him and his strength. And Paul says, I'll boast all the more gladly in my weakness. So my wife can actually say you know, recognizing that I can't do all of this reminds me of my need for God and His peace, and His comfort, and that I need to run to Him. Because, did you run to Him in those times when you feel the most weak? Not always. Is that your first-- It's not usually my first-- No but, that's what God wants 'cause he wants us-- It's not my first thing ever. I usually go like my own strengths, and my own like, oh I'm gonna get some consulting, I'm gonna get-- I don't run to him first, I don't follow my faith and say, "Okay, Lord, I cannot do this today." I feel like we continue to keep ourselves trying and striving for that ideal perfection or expectation that we've placed on ourselves that we don't slow down enough to do this, what you're saying. Right, and that idea that we can recognize our own weaknesses and our own limitations. You remember a long time ago, on our road trip, or actually we were driving up to the mountains, and we were talking about just time, and strength, and energy. I was telling you how frustrated I am because there's all these things that I wanna do and you told me-- And that was so long ago, and you're right back there. I know. But I explained, I said, being human, we're limited. We can only hold so much weight up. We can only speak so many words. We only have so many hours in a day. We can only stay awake so long. That if we want to accomplish something over here, then there inevitably will have to be other things that will have to be laid aside. Yeah. It's just the reality. So a good example of this is if we want to have, let's say you wanna stay quality time with all your kids. Right? The dishes probably go-- There might have to be some dishes in the sink. And I'm gonna be honest personally, I would rather you spend some quality time with our kids. I think that's really important to acknowledge real quick, just so that people listening can understand this. So understanding each other's expectations of what we're called to do in the home. So knowing that you're okay with dishes in the sink, helps me understand that I can spend that time with the kids and I don't have to rush to go do the dishes in order to please you. Like ultimately we need to understand-- Or please yourself, because you could easily see a clean house as the most important thing for the day, and drop the ball on the children. And then you still might feel like a failure at the end of the day. Yeah. You have a clean house, and kids that are vying for attention. So I do want to encourage those listening that it's really important for a husband and wife to vision together, and to talk about expectations, and figure out what are priorities for your family. And this brings me back again to a husband cultivating a safe environment in the home. If you come home from work and you're bothered that the dishes are dirty, yet your wife had spent all day with your children, and had taught them, and loved them, and fed them, and took care of them, and took them on trips, or did play dates, then you might need to-- You either let the dishes go, or clean them. Or clean them. And that's kind of, or find a time to give her time to herself. If she likes to take care of the house, take the kids and you go spend time with the kids and let her have an hour or two to herself to do what she wants. Yeah. Like I know that sometimes you just wanna clean the house. Yeah. "Hey, Aaron, go play with the kids, I just wanna just clean." Yeah, especially 'cause I like the way that I do it. And since we're a team, I should be like, "Deal, I'll take the kids we're gonna go to the park, we're gonna go for a drive, we're gonna be gone. You won't hear from us." But husbands, cultivating an environment that's healthy and safe for your wife, the mother of your children, because is she feels like you expect her to be everything, perfect for you, perfect for her kids, perfect for your home, you're gonna break her. And this something I have to learn, and we also have to balance, but it also takes communication. You know, talking through these things. And as we're talking about fears of growing family, when those conversations come up, where you guys are talking about maybe growing your family you need to be honest with yourselves and know that your wife might have fears of, well I can't do all the demands of the home if we bring another child into the world because I already can't do it. Right, because like if you're a husband that is just absent, you get home, turn that TV on, get into your video games, hopefully you're not playing video games, but you just kinda check out when you get home and you expect dinner to be ready, and you just view your home time as your sanctuary time, and your wife just kinda keeps going 24/7, I wouldn't wanna have your kids either. That's harsh, but-- I'm just being honest. But that's the kind of men we need to be. If you wanna have a marriage after God and one that's free from fears of a growing family, I think it's really important to talk about expectations and to be a team when considering how it needs to be done when you do have little kids running around and you wanna spend that time with them or do things that are a priority in your family. So you shared with us that you feel like you can't handle it, which is a totally normal and common feeling because of everything in life. What's something else that just wells up in you, just it's those emotions, those feelings, what else was coming up in you today? So another one was that fear of missing out. FOMO. Yeah, FOMO. I have that, all the time. All the time, with friends and things-- With everything. I have a fear of missing out with my children. The ones we already have. So we already have three and I see them growing up and every day I'm just amazed by them and I just feel like there's been certain seasons where I was either pregnant or had morning sickness where I did miss out a little bit. Post-partum with Wyatt, that was another one where I felt like I was missing out with Elliot and Olive a little bit. So I don't wanna miss anything in their lives. I just don't. And so one of my fears is if we have another child, what else am I gonna be missing with them that maybe I wouldn't have if we didn't have a growing family? And that's a totally legitimate fear that people have. It's not unfounded, you just look at numbers, you look at time, we just talked about this, how we're limited creatures. We're not infinite, we're finite. But what we need to do is we need to change our perspective on things. That's what this whole video's about is perspective. If the perspective is, unless we can spend equal amount of time with every single child, then we're not gonna be giving them what they need, I think is inaccurate. And this is a personal opinion but I do feel like there's a level of-- You know, if that's the case, then let's just have one kid. Because they can get all of our love. But in reality, the love and the experience that we want our kids to have, our oldest, it's gonna be inevitable that he learns that the world doesn't revolve around him. It's inevitable that he's gonna learn that he has other responsibilities. So where you wanted to spend time with our oldest, Elliot, but you also wanna spend time with Olive, and Wyatt, and then the new baby, well Elliot needs to learn how to spend time with his siblings. And they need to learn how to have alone time and play well with each other. This is true. One thing that I've been noticing lately in our relationship with our kids is we've been teaching them a lot about how to walk in the Spirit and they're free to the Spirit and so it is having siblings does give them the opportunity to learn compassion, and learn kindness, and learn sharing, and gentleness, and love, and all of that. Well, and responsibility. Responsibility. How they participate in the family. We can easily recognize just the spiritual state of our son that he does feel like he's not getting as much as he used to from us, as much attention. So a couple of things happen. We can recognize that and make sure that we're a being extra intentional with him, right? Which we do, and we try to do, and sometimes we drop the ball of course. But then we can also find other ways of redirecting, 'cause he's craving attention from us but usually that's a craving that God's wanting, right? And so we can slowly start teaching him about that desire that he has for that relationship, and that he's not gonna always get it from us, and that Mom isn't the only person to get energy from, and all those feelings met, and those needs met. Because what's gonna happen is one, two, three, four, five kids, however many kid we have, if every single one of them think that they're owed that same exact amount of attention from you, what are we teaching them? And can you possibly ever fulfill that? No, and we're essentially teaching them to have that same perspective toward God. They're gonna expect you know, that-- Yeah, they're gonna look at Joe over here-- That same perspective of God owes me this or that. Yeah, or they'll look at this, oh, so and so has been given so much and they have this ministry, and like He hasn't given me that. And that's just the wrong perspective. The Bible actually tells us that the entire body is knit together as one unit. And then it says that the lesser parts of the body are glorified, and the greater parts of the body are brought low for the sake of equality. So giving him a perspective that he actually can't get everything he wants from Mom, he has to understand that. And he actually can start, instead of wanting to just take from Mom, he can actually learn how to give to his siblings. And so we're teaching him responsibilities in the house. So instead of just going to Mom and being, "Mom, Mom, Mom can you just spend all the time with me," we're like, "Actually, Elliot, we need your help. Can you go put trash bags in the trash can? Can you go vacuum the floor? Can you go--" And you gotta be able to trust your kids because Elliot's been stepping up and doing great. And every time we ask him, you know require something of him he's been fulfilling that. So it's been great to see the maturity in him excel. It's amazing actually, he puts the trash bags in every time I ask perfectly. One thing that you did mention when I shared this fear with you was the reality that we will miss out. Even it if was just one kid. There are gonna be times that we miss out which means the time we are present we need to be so intentional, and that really meant a lot to me. Which is true. Again, the same way we recognize we are weak and that makes God more strong in our life. The other thing we recognize is we are gonna miss out. We can't control everything, we can't have everything and we have to be okay with that. We have to be okay that Dad's gone a lot of the day, but when I'm home, I should not be gone at home. Even if that means on the couch, on your phone. You should be present, you should be engaged. Which is something that the Lord convicts of me every single day. I'm trying really hard to not be on my phone in front of my kids 'cause I want them to know that they have my eyes when I'm here. But then there's also times when I'm around that I have to say, "Daddy's busy, and you need to go play quietly. You need to color, you need to--." So just understanding that we cannot be everything in all things to our children. We have to recognize where we're at. That's good. And that missing out is a part of life. And that's gotta be okay. I know it doesn't feel good, but it's gotta be okay. Yeah. So why don't you share this one more fear that you are currently dealing with know that we're about to have four kids. I don't know if everyone can relate to this but it's just that fear of losing my personal time. The time that I like to pour into things I'm passionate about. One of them spending time with the Lord. You know, I feel like with each kid I have to really fight for that time. Or working in blogging, you know. I feel like I have to really-- Or time with your girlfriends. Or time with my girlfriends. Just going to get a cup of coffee, you know, and sharing that time with either myself, or with a girlfriend. I feel like the thought of bringing another child would mean now I gotta find someone that could babysit four kids you know if I wanna go on date night with you, right? That's $5 a kid, that's two to four hours-- It's a lot. So, being conflicted with am I gonna lose more me time. And I know that's really selfish, but it does come up. But it's real. Yeah. You know so, I'm gonna keep going back to this, 'cause it's a balance of like, it'd be easy just to tell you like, "Well, you just gotta get over it, 'cause that's selfish." But the other side of it is, the Bible tells us husbands to walk with our wives in an understanding way. And it tells us to love you as Christ loves the Church. And it tells us to serve you, and to honor you, and hold you up in honor. So on one hand, recognizing selfishness. Yeah. Recognizing like, well like this is my lot in life. This is what God's given me. I've children to raise to know Him. And having a positive perspective about that. And having a positive perspective, having a biblical perspective knowing that our jobs as Mom and Dad is to raise children that know and love the Lord. Which is a super powerful purpose. It's the most powerful purpose. That our kids will actually go to Heaven. Yeah. Right? But on top of that, how can I, how can you as a husband, cultivate an environment for you to thrive in that? Not that you just hold all the weight of everything because remember, the Bible tells us that you are the weaker vessel and that I need to recognize that and be like, I can't just put everything I want on top of my wife and expect her to hold it all up. That's my job. I should hold everything up, right? So knowing that if I want you to just love your role as a mother, I'm gonna give you time to yourself. Do I ever do that for you? Yeah, I was just gonna say I feel like you've been really great at-- This pregnancy. This pregnancy, I've been really good at it. You've been learning with each one, but you do recognize a lot faster now when I'm kind of reaching that breaking point, or need a breath of fresh air. Just the other day you came home for lunch and you were like, "Hey, you wanna go take lunch by yourself?" And it felt really awkward saying yes 'cause I thought to myself, I'm not gonna go sit in a restaurant by myself, but I did it, and it was great. It was so refreshing. She came back, like kicked the door open, she's like, "Hey, kids, let's go do something." I missed my kids. And so it refreshed that positive perspective. Recharged you, gave you a new perspective. So, on one hand, yes we need to recognize that it's a self dying that happens every day. Not just in our child rearing, raising children. And be okay with that, embrace it, and accept that responsibility from God. On the mother's part. But on the husband's part is a self dying also that I would lay down my life for my wife and say, "You know what, I don't want to sacrifice my time, I'm going to though. Because I want you to feel energy and recharged." And also, husbands, dads out there, it's our jobs to be leading our families spiritually. Are you giving time for your wife to go and recharge in the word of God? So important. With no kids around? Not in the bathroom when she's on the toilet and the kids are trying to come in. This is like serious, do you like, "Hey, Babe, go and just spend an hour or two in the Word." And of course that can't happen every day, there's logistics in life, but is it on your mind? Are you saying, man I need to figure out a way to get my wife to just some her time. And that's you dying to yourself, and your desires, and lifting her up. So it's not just, "Well you need to get a right perspective, Hun. You need to just tough it out." Which she does. I do. But you need to tough it out too, men. You need to lay down your life and say, "Well, I need to make sure that my wife feels loved, cherished. I need to make sure that she has time for herself so that she can get regenerated, have a bath." Like, how often am I like, "Go take a bath." Yup. It doesn't happen all the time, but once a week maybe I just, I'll draw a bath for you. I'll give you a bath bomb, I'll put some essential oils on. Sometimes music. Yeah, I'll put some music on, and I put the kids to bed, and it's just her time. So that she can get her mind rested. And her spirit rested, and that's what we need to be doing. This is what a marriage after God looks like. It's not just all on my wife. It's teamwork. If you look at almost every scripture in the Bible about children, it's always tied to the fathers. So that should tell you how much weight should be on you as a father. That you are teaching your children, that you are discipling your children, that you are responsible for your children. That you don't just leave and say, "Oh, my wife's gonna take care of it. My wife's gonna read the Bible to them. My wife's gonna teach them the word of God." I will say if you assume that position and you put that weight on your wife, her fears will mount. Like she will have so many more fears. And those will be legitimate fears. 'Cause she is doing it on her own and she has a husband that's absent. And you don't wanna be that husband. You're not that husband. And because she'll be so drowning in her own fears that it'll probably stimulate fears to grow inside you. Oh, is my marriage not gonna work out. Or are we not gonna ever have intimacy because she's too tired to, you know what I mean. So like it starts spiraling to of control when there's not a team action. Yeah. So I hope this encourages you today. We're gonna read a couple scriptures to close out. As we're talking about fears today there was a specific scripture that was on my hear that I really wanted to encourage specifically the moms with, but dads too. Listen up, it's in Psalm 34, verse four. It says, Now when you are acting out of fears or you're spiraling in your mind, kind of out of control because of these fears that you have and you're motivated by your fears, you're not going to the Lord. Everything that you do in that moment is based off of what you believe to be true, which are the lies and the fears that you're struggling with, and it's just gonna get worse if you do not seek out the Lord. And I've experienced this first hand. I had a almost total meltdown today because I was so emotional over these fears that we just talked about. And so it's really important that we seek after the Lord and that we come back to His perspective and what His truth is for our life and family. So we walked through a bunch of fears, this is reality for us. It's something that we're gonna have to daily go through and we're gonna be running to the scriptures. I'm gonna be taking on my role as a spiritual leader in the home to encourage you, inspire you, remind you of the truth so that you can walk in it. And I think it's really important for me to clearly communicate to you when I am having these fears, when they are coming up in my heart because if I'm operating in them and letting them spiral in my mind, and I'm not confronting them or talking to you about them, then things are just gonna haywire in or whole family. And then we start feeling crazy. Yeah. So we just wanna thank you for watching today and we just pray that this message just encourages you if any of you are going through this right now and walking through fears of a growing family. And so if you enjoyed this video, please hit the subscribe button and also hit the bell next to it so you get notified every time we upload a video. And please leave us a comment. Let us know if you are planning on growing your family, 'cause we'd love to be excited and praise God with you. Thank you, we'll see you guys next time. Did you enjoy today's show? Find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

What is God's Calling for your marriage? Listen to today's episode and find out :) Download our FREE 52 Date Night Conversations Starters. DOWNLOAD HERE - > http://datenightconversations.com TRANSCRIPT Aaron Smith: We're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God ... Jennifer Smith: ... helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. Aaron Smith: Today we're going to be talking about God's calling for your marriage. Lots of people think they have a calling, or don't know what their calling might be, but we believe that there are six callings that every Christian marriage has, and we're here to share them with you. Jennifer Smith: So, Aaron, before we get started, can you just explain a little bit about what does it mean to have a calling? What does it mean when you hear the word I have a calling on my marriage? Like, so people understand what we're saying. Aaron Smith: Just growing up in the church, we've all heard this idea of our calling, and a lot of times it's our individual calling, like what's God called ... ? Am I a missionary? Am I going to be starting a church? Am I going to be a pastor? Am I going to be a worship leader? There's all these finite things that people might feel called to. But when it comes to our marriage, do we believe our marriage has a calling? And we believe every marriage has a specific calling- Jennifer Smith: A specific purpose- Aaron Smith: ... a specific purpose- Jennifer Smith: ... that God's going to use them for. Aaron Smith: Yeah, based in their unique giftings, talents, position in life, that God wants to use in those marriages, for his purposes. But that might be vague for some people, and some marriages might be thinking, "Well, what's my purpose?" So what we thought we'd do is sit down and share with you six callings that we believe every Christian marriage is called to. These are callings that God has for your marriage today, whether you know what the specific calling is from God, and in the ministry that God has for your marriage as a couple, these callings are for every Christian marriage. Aaron Smith: There's more than this, but we picked out the six that we love the most and that we've kind of walked through in our life. So this gives you a place to start in marriage and say, "Okay, God already has a calling for us. We don't have to guess or we don't have to pretend we don't know or not know how to figure out where to get that calling." You can actually start today and say, "Oh, this is ... at least we know these callings, that God has for us." Jennifer Smith: That's really cool. I'm so excited to jump in. I just want to encourage you listening, if you, as we go through each six, if you could just take evaluation of your marriage and see if you guys are already fulfilling these callings in your life, or if you're not, if these are areas that you're wrestling with or struggling with, then hopefully our encouragement today will help you step up in those areas. Aaron Smith: Yeah, and you can let us know in the comments what areas that you think you've already been walking in, you're like, "Oh," and you never saw them as callings. Or you can let us know areas that you didn't recognize, that you needed to be walking in. Let us know in the comments. We like to read through those. Aaron Smith: So let's get started. We're going to start. We have six of them. The first calling that every Christian marriage has is to prayer, and this could be together or separate. It should eventually be together, but some of you might not be able to do that. Aaron Smith: But let me read the verse that goes with this. Philippians 4:6-7, and it says, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to god. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Aaron Smith: Every marriage, every Christian marriage, has a calling to pray, and that seems easy. It seems like the easy Bible answer, but I want to talk a little bit about this, real quick, from our own life, and I have a question for you. How would say prayer has played a role in our marriage? Jennifer Smith: Well, I would say it was significant in saving our marriage, for sure. We started out in our relationship with praying for each other and praying for the purpose that God had for our marriage. Aaron Smith: We prayed every night during our dating years. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, and throughout our engagement. Aaron Smith: Yeah. Jennifer Smith: And then even through our marriage, and when we hit that hard spot in our marriage, when we were contemplating divorce and just were both really isolated from each other- Aaron Smith: And broken and frustrated, yeah. Jennifer Smith: ... and broken, you were really adamant about prayer. So every night, you were still praying for us. My heart was a little bit harder towards God and I was really frustrated and wrestling with the issues that we were facing, but you were faithful to prayer and- Aaron Smith: Which was hard. For all the husbands watching, my prayers started off very hopeful in the first few years of my marriage, and eventually got very angry and bitter, but I still prayed because I had that foundation in my heart, and I was like, "No, this is the only way I see us getting healing," and so I kept praying. You actually got to a point where you stopped praying. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, we used to pray together every night, and then slowly I just kind of faded out and listened to your payers, still participated but didn't pray as much. Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: But I will say that your faithfulness in praying every night really helped me to embrace God and come back to him, to turn my heart back to him, and to trust him because I knew that you trusted Him. So that did play a big role in saving our marriage. Aaron Smith: Yeah, so prayer's a little ominous for a lot of Christians, which it shouldn't be, but there's no classes on prayer. I know some churches probably have that, but it's not like a ... We just assume, like, "Oh, prayer's supposed to be easy to us." You know, what would you say are some ... ? Is prayer just talking to God? Is it like you have the right words and you have ... you bring in scripture at the right time in the prayer? Is there any ... ? Like, how does it look in our marriage? What does prayer look like for us? Jennifer Smith: Well, how I've always viewed it is it's just our way of communicating with God, so it's basically opening up our hearts and just sharing what's on our hearts and what's on our minds, and sharing it with God. What's really cool about what I've experienced through praying with you, is that not only are we submitting everything to God and asking for his guidance in our relationship, but every once in a while there's a compliment in there about me when you're praying, and thanking God for me, and- Aaron Smith: Well, when you hear me pray for you, you actually hear my heart for you. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, exactly. I get to hear your heart for me, and that affirms me, and it affirms my relationship with you, so that's been a huge encouragement. But I think that people can get really overwhelmed when they think about prayer and going to God and overthinking it. Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: You know, feeling like it has to be done perfectly, and it doesn't. Aaron Smith: So you're saying that the couples that are watching now could start today? Jennifer Smith: They can start today. Aaron Smith: They can just say, "Okay, Lord, I don't know what I'm saying to you, but I want help," or, "Thank you," and it could be as simple as that. Jennifer Smith: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Aaron Smith: Yeah, so we encourage you. So the first calling that every Christian marriage has is to prayer, and this means together. Some of you might be married and your spouse, your husband or your wife is not a believer, or is where my wife was, in a place where she's kind of angry or bitter, or they're angry or bitter. You can still pray without them, for them, and with them, and over them. Aaron Smith: So don't let a disunity keep you from prayer because you have a unity with Christ. And Christ, as our mediator, gives us direct access to the throne of God, that we can actually open up our hearts and we can pray directly to God. We don't need a high priest anymore because we have Christ, who is our perfect high priest. Aaron Smith: So we just want to encourage you today. You can actually start praying today, whether together or individually. Start praying today. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, and if you're doing it individually, which is great, every once in a while, invite your spouse to pray with you, or say, "Hey, I'd love to pray for you. Can you give me a list? Can you give me like five things that I can really focus on." I know that that's super helpful. Aaron Smith: And I know it'll totally bless them, too. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: I just want to bring this quote up, that our pastor always says to us, "Prayer isn't preparation for the battle, prayer is the battle." So we don't look at prayer as, like, well, that's a supplementary thing that we do for our faith, or it's something that we do only when it's really bad. Prayer is the battle, and we're in a spiritual warfare every day, against our own flesh, against the enemies in the world and in the spirit. Aaron Smith: And so prayer, we need to go to battle on our knees in prayer, in praying for the things that we care about, and praying for the things that we are concerned about, and going to our Father and saying, "Lord, we need your mind on this, we need your heart on this, we need your help on this." Aaron Smith: So prayer is the first calling that every Christian marriage has. Okay, so what's the next calling that every Christian marriage has? Jennifer Smith: Okay, so the next one is love, and I want to share a scripture but it's probably not the one you're thinking. Most people go straight to 1 Corinthians, chapter 13, which defines what love is, which is great, but today I'm going to share Matthew 22:37-40, which says, "And he said to him, 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.'" Jennifer Smith: So contrary to how culture will tell us that love is a feeling and love is something that we ... Aaron Smith: Fall into. Jennifer Smith: ... fall into, God is saying that love is a command. He commands us to love him, and he commands us to love our neighbor, or in this case, in regards to marriage, our spouse. Aaron Smith: Yeah, and so for all the marriages out there, your calling, our calling is to love. Not just love each other, because it says love your neighbor as yourself, that's the second and greatest commandment. Because my wife is my closest neighbor, I am her closest neighbor, we practice loving our neighbors by loving each other well. Aaron Smith: And then the second part of this is that, as a couple, we love the Lord with all of our hearts, minds, soul and strength. So if you're sitting out there, wondering what your calling in life is, this is a amazing calling, is to love each other well and to love God. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, and I just want to share that, because of the way our culture is very self focused, especially in marriage, we can get caught up in thinking that, "I can't love you right now because you're not loving me," and that can just cause a crazy cycle to happen. I know we've experienced it before. Aaron Smith: Yeah. In the beginning of our marriage, because I wasn't living up to the high expectations you had for me, you would just withhold all of your love. You would- Jennifer Smith: Yeah, so I would get really frustrated because I- Aaron Smith: You would tell me. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. I had all these expectations of romantic love and these grand gestures of you showing me love- Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: ... and I relied on you to initiate all of that. And when you didn't do it, I didn't want to do it. Aaron Smith: And you wouldn't initiate it, because you were expecting, like, that's what my husband does. He's going to pursue me and he's going to do all the loving. And I'm sitting over there thinking, like, my wife's not even pursuing me, why would I give her love? Aaron Smith: Now, we were both wrong because we both were commanded to love each other. I was commanded more specifically from Ephesians 5:23, I am supposed to love you, but we're supposed to walk in love the way the Bible tells us to. Jennifer Smith: Right. Aaron Smith: So we were totally dropping the ball on that calling in our life, and it's only been the last three, four years that we've been learning to actually walk in that calling for us. Jennifer Smith: In that command. Aaron Smith: And what happens when you start walking in that calling, just with each other, as most areas of marriage, in a Christian marriage, we start loving each other more biblically and more authentically and we start pursuing each other more. So what happens is we have extra in us to ... Jennifer Smith: ... love others. Aaron Smith: So then we can actually, instead of you just always constantly thinking, "I'm not getting what I need," you have more than enough and you actually have the energy, I have the energy and the love available, to be able to sit and love our other neighbors. Jennifer Smith: Right. Aaron Smith: Our friends, our family. So that's where that calling gets even wider- Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: ... is showing that love to the world, so ... Jennifer Smith: There was a turning point in our marriage, where I felt like we really began to understand God's command on love, but also the way that he set the example for unconditional love- Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: ... and I wanted you to share a little bit about your vision of being with Jesus in the garden, just a really brief version. Aaron Smith: So, just really briefly, when we were at our breaking point in our marriage, I felt the Lord bring me a vision of Jesus being in the Garden of Gethsemane before he goes to the cross. I remember God showing me Jesus weeping and, as it were, great tears of blood because he was so anguished over what he was about to go through. Aaron Smith: We've all heard the story, we know exactly what it's about and we understand it, but I felt like God showed me a new perspective on it, and he was saying like ... because in the garden, Jesus three times said, "Lord, let this cup pass for me," the cup of wrath, essentially, is what he's saying. Jennifer Smith: He knew what he was about to do, and he knew who he was doing it for. Aaron Smith: Yeah, who was he doing it for? His bride. So, essentially, what he was saying is, "Lord, I don't want to die for my bride, because this is too painful." Jennifer Smith: Especially knowing that part of his bride would reject him, or not- Aaron Smith: Or spit on him. Jennifer Smith: ... want him, yeah. Aaron Smith: Or turn away from him. Instead of what he wanted, in his flesh ... because his flesh was saying, "I don't want to do this," ... his spirit submitted to the Lord in his will for her. He said not my will be done, but your will be done. Jennifer Smith: And he did it. Aaron Smith: And so he went to the cross anyway, for a broken and filthy bride, an adulteress bride, knowing that that was what God's will for him was, and that's how he was going to love us. Jennifer Smith: So here you are, already married to me, three years in ... Aaron Smith: Yeah, and I feel like I had a choice, but the choice was this, was, in my flesh I was saying, "Lord, I can't do this," and God was saying, "Sure, you can, because Jesus did it." Jennifer Smith: Not your will, but mine. Aaron Smith: Not your will, but my will be done. So God's will is that I would love my wife anyway. If my wife never gave me what I feel like I deserve or what she's supposed to give me, I should be able to love her, still, through the Holy Spirit. Jennifer Smith: We were in church, it had just gotten out so people were scurrying all over the place, and we were just standing in the middle of the sanctuary and you were crying, telling me all of this and- Aaron Smith: I had something in my eye. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, sure. Aaron Smith: I wasn't crying. Jennifer Smith: But right there, we committed to walking, as Jesus walked, in unconditional love for each other, regardless- Aaron Smith: If nothing ever changed- Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: ... in our physical issues that we were having. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: And you know what changed? Jennifer Smith: Our hearts. Aaron Smith: Everything. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, everything changed. Aaron Smith: Our hearts changed and our hearts melted. The Bible calls our hearts stone and he takes our hearts of stone and he turns them to hearts of flesh. I feel like that's what he did, in that moment, was turn my heart from a heart of stone, and your heart from a heart of stone, to a heart of flesh. That's the power of the calling of love in our life. Jennifer Smith: Exactly, and our obedience to this command is not reliant upon what other people are doing, especially your spouse. So our encouragement to you guys today is to love anyways, and to love unconditionally, and to let- Aaron Smith: It's your calling. Jennifer Smith: Yeah, it's your calling. Aaron Smith: Yeah. So let's move onto the third calling. We have three more after this. So the third calling that every Christian marriage has is to forgive. This is a hard one. I'm going to read the scripture, it's Colossians 3:13. There's lots of scriptures on forgiveness. I'm not going to even read the harder ones. I'm just going to read this one. Aaron Smith: So Colossians 3:13 says this, "Bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." So just like that last command to love, forgiveness is a command. Forgiveness is not an option for the believer, especially in marriage. We don't get to choose not to forgive. We don't get to say, "Well, my wife wronged me so badly that I don't have to forgive her." Aaron Smith: Well, it's actually a command to forgive, and I always tell myself ... because when we were going through what we were going through, I felt like I didn't have to forgive you, and there was a lot of things that I did, that you just held onto, and you're like, "I can't forgive you for that." Jennifer Smith: I didn't want to forgive you, no. Aaron Smith: You didn't want to forgive me. And you know what the Lord showed me? Showed us? Who are we to hold forgiveness against anyone? For what God forgave me of, and the patience that God had with me, how dare I withhold forgiveness from anyone? Especially my bride, who is one with me. So technically, if I withhold forgiveness from my bride, I'm withholding forgiveness from myself because she is me and I am her. But we did this. It was so destructive. It was not a oneness, it was complete disorder. Aaron Smith: And just think about this, the calling in your life to forgive your spouse, you have nothing else in you to withhold against your spouse that you did not do to Christ, himself. Now, when Christ died on the cross, he forgave all sin, just like that. The thing that he was praying that he could have the cup passed for him, he did anyway. He drank that cup, every last drop of it, the cup of the wrath that we deserved. Aaron Smith: That doesn't mean we don't repent. It doesn't mean that things that happen to us don't actually hurt us, and that it doesn't take time to learn to trust again, and that it doesn't take time to figure out how to walk with each other and get back into oneness and unity, but that does not mean we get to not forgive. So if you're wondering what your calling is in your marriage, as a marriage, it's forgiveness, towards each other and towards others. Aaron Smith: So I have a question, has it been easy for you to forgive me? Jennifer Smith: Not in the beginning. There's definitely been times where forgiveness was too painful to accept in my heart. Aaron Smith: I just thought of something. What was it that you were afraid it would mean, if you forgave me? Remember, there was something you used to say? Jennifer Smith: Do we want to say what, specifically, we're talking about, in regards to- Aaron Smith: No. Jennifer Smith: Okay. Aaron Smith: There was a reason you withheld forgiveness, and you were afraid of me not changing. You were afraid of, like, if you forgave me ... Jennifer Smith: Then you would just have the freedom to do it again, or ... Aaron Smith: Right, and so you would withhold that forgiveness because you used it as a tool to control the situation. Jennifer Smith: Well, I wanted you hurt like I was hurting. Aaron Smith: Exactly. Jennifer Smith: I thought if I withheld forgiveness, then you would feel the pain of not being reconciled. Aaron Smith: Right. So you were breaking this command in your heart because you thought that you had the right to, because of what I did, but in reality we don't, right? Jennifer Smith: Yeah, we don't. Aaron Smith: We don't have the right to withhold forgiveness from anyone. There's another verse that's terrifying, and we'll put it in the comments, in the description below, but it essentially says if you don't forgive ... Jennifer Smith: Your Father won't forgive you. Aaron Smith: And that is terrifying. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: So this third calling for every Christian marriage is to walk in forgiveness. Jennifer Smith: And to encourage you, what I've experienced with us is the more you practice forgiveness, and your heart is motivated toward reconciliation, the easier it becomes, because you have this bigger picture of what it means to forgive and why it's so valuable for oneness in marriage. Aaron Smith: Right. So why don't we move onto the fourth calling that every Christian marriage has? Jennifer Smith: So the fourth one is trust, and I feel like it goes hand in hand with forgiveness, because in order to trust again, you have to be able to forgive- Aaron Smith: It's true. Jennifer Smith: ... and reconcile, and experience oneness and intimacy again. But I know that for a lot of marriages, trust is a big issue, and it's really hard once you've been sinned against or hurt, to extend that trust and rebuild it again. Aaron Smith: Yeah, and so I would encourage one thing, is this is not a calling to just blindly trust. When I would wrong you, in things that I was walking in, right, and I broke your trust, your calling wasn't to just be like, "Well, I'm just going to trust you again." Your calling was to forgive me, and your calling was to reconcile with me, and to walk with me as we grow towards oneness again and heal, right. Jennifer Smith: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Aaron Smith: But what were you supposed to trust in, in that season? Jennifer Smith: No matter what, I was supposed to trust God. Aaron Smith: With what? Jennifer Smith: With my heart, and with you. That he was working in your life- Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: ... and that he was there to help us. Aaron Smith: And that was actually hard for you, because the first four and a half years of our marriage, you didn't trust God. Jennifer Smith: No, it was definitely a learning curve. Aaron Smith: So it was impossible for you to trust me. I mean, I didn't give her a reason to trust me, but you didn't trust God, you didn't trust me, you didn't even trust your own emotions. Jennifer Smith: I think that's why I felt so lonely and I felt so ... Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: I just felt so alone in what we were facing as a couple, because I felt like I wasn't connected with you, and then I felt disconnected from God, so there was a lot of mistrust, and not having that really hindered my ability to experience intimacy with both of you. Aaron Smith: And trusting God, with your spouse, puts you on the right path of the spirit of God, helping you trust again. Because as you see God work in your spouse as you pray, and as you forgive, you start seeing the transformations and you say, "Okay, Lord, I can trust you. I can trust my spouse with you, I can trust me with you, and I can trust my marriage with you. And so I'm just going to walk in the things that you've asked me to because I trust you, Father." Jennifer Smith: And a foundational verse for trust, and especially trusting God, is Proverbs 3:5-6. "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths." Jennifer Smith: And I had to lean on this verse, especially in regards to our marriage, because I felt like I had all this understanding of what I should do as a wife, and how I should respond to my husband, but I couldn't lean on my own understanding. Every time I was faced with this verse, I had to remind myself, I can't do that. Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: I need to be able trust God and- Aaron Smith: Well, and your understanding kept you from being able to trust me, and kept you from trusting God because you're like, "I just don't understand-" Jennifer Smith: Yeah, and kept me from reconciling with you- Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: ... because my understanding lacked ... Aaron Smith: The spirit of God. Jennifer Smith: ... the spirit of God. Aaron Smith: Yeah. Jennifer Smith: It really did. It was selfish. Aaron Smith: Yeah, right. Jennifer Smith: It was very selfish. I was trying to preserve myself and protect myself, instead of re-engaging with you and trusting that God was going to walk us ... bring us to a better place. Aaron Smith: Well, and going into the word of God and into prayer, and actually battling for me and being my helper, because you were just thinking, like, "No, I've been hurt, so I'm not going to try." Jennifer Smith: Yeah. There's this picture that I see when I think about trust in a marriage relationship and I hope that this encourages you guys, but it's this idea of all the walls in a person's heart, that we've built up over time. Every brick that is placed to build that wall will keep your spouse out of your heart. The whole idea of oneness is to understand each other and to know each other intimately, and you can't do that unless you bring those walls down, so this picture of taking these bricks down from these walls in your heart and building a bridge to close that gap and to allow connectedness, bring you guys together. Aaron Smith: Right. Which could take a lifetime, to break those walls down, but through the Holy Spirit, could happen overnight. Jennifer Smith: True. Aaron Smith: So we just, we encourage you guys, in your marriage, to take up that calling of trust, and trusting God with your spouse and your marriage, and seeking his word on how you should live, and how you should be, and how you should act towards each other and towards outsiders, and walk in that, and you'll see what will happen. You'll see, like, what we've experienced is freedom. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: Freedom from the bondages of our own desires, our own misunderstandings, our own- Jennifer Smith: Sin. Aaron Smith: ... sin. Which brings us to the fifth calling for your marriage, and it is purity. In Hebrews 13, verse 4, it says, "Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous." Aaron Smith: I did not do this. I totally broke unity with my wife, often. I had dealt with pornography my entire life. I thought marriage would fix it, and it didn't, of course. I'm sure a lot of you out there, that are watching this, could understand this, but I walked, actually, worse in it during the first few years of our marriage, and that, by itself, broke unity, spiritually unprotected you and us, brought in all sorts of filth into our home, brought in filth into my mind, made me see my wife in a broken way. It encouraged you to have lack of trust with me, rightfully. It made it hard for you to forgive me, rightfully. Jennifer Smith: Made me not want to be with you, physically. Aaron Smith: It made you not want to pray with me. Jennifer Smith: Made [crosstalk 00:24:43]. Aaron Smith: So all the things that we've been talking about, that are callings in our life, my daily decisions hindered from making it easy and possible for us to do. That doesn't mean that they're not callings, still, for us, but my own impurity, my own walking in filth, my porn addiction- Jennifer Smith: Hindered all those other callings. Aaron Smith: ... hindered all of those other callings, which, when we're walking in that sort of sin ... and I know there's a lot of marriages watching this that are dealing with that, either both or one of the spouses is dealing with pornography on a daily basis, is walking in this unrepentant sin ... and it literally is going to not just bring death to your home, because the Bible tells us that our sin will find us out, and sin leads to death when it's full-grown. And we had spiritual death in our marriage. Praise God that he was patient with us and kind to us and extended grace and mercy, and I just always think about his patience because of how long I was walking in that, and how he didn't just destroy us, because he totally could have. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: And it almost did destroy our marriage. Aaron Smith: But purity, and walking in all these other things, make our marriages into a ministry. But when we're not walking in purity, we have zero authority. I had no authority to lead my wife. I had no authority to lead myself. I couldn't sit with another brother in Christ and say, "Hey, let me encourage you. Let me walk you through this," because I was completely walking in unrepentant sin. Aaron Smith: I thought I was repenting, but the fact that I just kept going back to it without having an actual change in my heart, without having an actual understanding of what I was saying yes to ... I was completely destroying our marriage, and that is a calling for your marriage as much as it's a calling for our marriage. This isn't unique to some marriages. Your marriage is called to purity, husband and wife. Aaron Smith: So I'm talking about my own impurity that I struggled with, with pornography on the internet. What areas of purity did you struggle with, that you didn't recognize in the time, and to be honest, I wasn't even able to bring up to you because of my own sin, but I was able to bring up to you after I started walking in purity. Jennifer Smith: Well, the first thing I want to just share very vulnerably is that I also had my own struggle with pornography for a season. I'm sharing that because I know that there's wives listening, and it can be so hard to confront and admit that you're wrestling with this. Once you confess that sin and repent of it, you will find so much freedom. You need to deal with it, but one of the other major impurities in my life was hiding the fact that I had a problem with food and using it whenever I was emotional, whenever I felt down or defeated, whenever I had a craving. I was so selfish with my desires for it and used it as a crutch. Jennifer Smith: Anytime we were facing discord or disunity, I went to sugar, you know, anything that would make me feel better. I knew that I was living in an unhealthy way and I kept that from you because I didn't want you to point the finger at me, or challenge me, or keep me accountable in any way. Aaron Smith: When you thought I didn't have a right to, anyway, because of the way I was walking. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. When you did try and step in and encourage me to be healthy, I wouldn't let you. Aaron Smith: You'd use my sin as an excuse for your own. Jennifer Smith: Right. Yeah, so that was this crazy cycle in itself, of not being able to walk in the freedom that Christ gave both of us because we were stuck in- Aaron Smith: Impurity. Jennifer Smith: ... impurity. Aaron Smith: Yeah. So the fifth calling for your marriage is to walk in purity. And if you are struggling, or ... I don't even want to say struggling. If you're in these problems, these sins, addiction to pornography, eating habits, things that you haven't submitted to the Lord and you're holding onto and saying, "This is mine," you need to repent today and walk in the freedom that Galatians 5:1 tells us we have, "For freedom Christ has set you free. Stand firm therefore and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery." If you have the Holy Spirit living in you, you have the power to walk in freedom and purity. Jennifer Smith: And as you're evaluating your life, I would also suggest that, you know, maybe it's not pornography, maybe it's not food, but maybe it's music, maybe it's what you're reading, maybe it's the ... Aaron Smith: Yeah, maybe you love romance novels- Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: ... and you dwell on those and you read them often and ... Jennifer Smith: Maybe it's other types of websites that you're viewing online or maybe it's a bad shopping habit. There are so many different ways that we can live impure lives, and God calls us to a higher standard than that. And it's for the protection of our hearts, for the protection of our marriages, for the protection of our families, that we live pure lives. Aaron Smith: And in doing so, it makes our marriages be able to walk in the higher calling that our marriages have, which is ministering to the world, which is doing the will of the Father, and when we aren't walking pure, we're missing it. We cannot do that. It's the plank eye effect. Aaron Smith: The Bible doesn't say not to go take the speck out of your brother's eye. It says you can't see the speck in their eye clearly because we have a plank in our own. So the idea is that we need to remove that plank. We need to be walking in purity, we need to repent of our sin and accept the freedom that Christ has given us, and the authority and power that he's put in us. So let's move onto the last one. Jennifer Smith: The last one. Aaron Smith: And this is a fun one for us, but it's also a hard one. Jennifer Smith: It was a hard one for me, for sure. Aaron Smith: And this isn't an extensive list of all the callings that every Christian marriage has, but these are the six that we chose for this podcast, this video, and so what's the sixth one? Jennifer Smith: So the sixth one is generosity, and I'm going to read 2 Corinthians 9:6-7. It says, "The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver." Aaron Smith: So what do you have to say about that in our marriage? Jennifer Smith: Well, I want to be honest with them and say that, in the beginning of our marriage, I fought generosity and I didn't realize that I was fighting it. I didn't know that I wasn't a generous person, but- Aaron Smith: Yeah, when I said I wanted to start giving to our church or to some non-profits, what was your answer? Jennifer Smith: I thought that by giving of my time, was enough. Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: I really believed that, and- Aaron Smith: I remember you telling me, be like, "Why do we have to give our money? We give our time." Because we volunteered a lot at the different churches we were part of and ... Jennifer Smith: We also didn't have very high paying jobs and what we did have went to our living situation, and I never- Aaron Smith: And debt. We were getting out of debt at the time. Jennifer Smith: And debt. And I just, I never felt like we had enough, and so to give away the little bit that we had was really frustrating to me and I didn't understand why it was of importance. Aaron Smith: Especially when we didn't have the things that a lot of our friends and married couples had. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: We didn't have our own home. We only had one car. We didn't have- Jennifer Smith: When we did have an apartment, I remember going down to the thrift store to get a can opener- Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: ... or whatever little thing that we needed to be able to live. Aaron Smith: And we were doing all that for the purpose of getting out of debt, but in our mode of getting out of debt, I believed what the scripture said about generosity and giving, and so we wanted to walk in obedience to that. So even though we were trying to get out of debt, we're like we're also going to give to what God's doing. Jennifer Smith: And I will say that this is a huge testimony to God's way of submission, because as your wife, I submitted to you in this call of generosity and it actually changed me. It changed me heart. It changed my perspective and my view. Aaron Smith: Right. Jennifer Smith: At first, it was challenging for me and I complained, and I do feel bad about that still. But over time, I saw this verse come to life, that when you sow bountifully, you reap bountifully. I saw it even in our own marriage. Aaron Smith: Yeah. Jennifer Smith: The times that you were generous with me, whether it was with your time or your resources or with gifts, I would feel something in my heart to want to do it back. Aaron Smith: Yeah. Jennifer Smith: So I even saw that come alive in our own marriage, but also out in our other relationships. Aaron Smith: And this calling for your marriage, of being generous, there's not a dollar amount on this. This is not a, like, you have to give this amount of money all the time. The New Testament, specifically, is very clear that God wants all of it. He wants to know that our hands are open and that whatever he puts in, he can also take out. So this isn't a prosperity gospel of, like, if you put money in the basket, money's going to come right back out to you. Sometimes that happens, but in many ways, the blessing that we've gotten from walking in generosity, just in every aspect of our life, is having a healthy perspective on money. We don't crave money. We don't crave more money. We don't seek wealth. Jennifer Smith: Or things, really, I mean we just- Aaron Smith: I mean, even things, yeah. We see things as useful objects. We don't see them as things that are going to fulfill us. Man, the amount of things that God's been able to do, just through our little bit of generosity, in other marriages lives, in other people's lives, around the world, has been a huge testimony to God's goodness in our life. Aaron Smith: So what happens is, God blesses us, because we're all blessed. Everyone's blessed, right. Just Jesus Christ alone, he's the best gift anyone's ever been given. But even just in our day to day life, the things that we have, recognizing that they're not ours. Jennifer Smith: Yeah. Aaron Smith: That they're used for his Kingdom. Aaron Smith: So in your marriage, the calling of generosity, are you being generous with your home? Are you being generous with your cars, with your finances, with your time? Are you walking in a marriage, in a level of generosity where you just trust God and say, "Okay, Lord, we're open to what you have for us and we're going to do it." We don't know what's that looks like means, but we're going to say, "Lord, this is your money, how do you want us to use it? Do you have someone that needs help in the church, that you want us to bless? Is it $5 to help someone with a meal? Is it $20 for gas for someone? Is it $100 to a missionary?" It could be anything. Jennifer Smith: And when you submit your heart to God in prayer and you tell him, "I'm yours and everything I have is yours," you will hear him speak to you, as far as that tugging on your heart to give. In those divine moments where someone else is in need, he'll show you. Aaron Smith: Yeah, and he does it all the time, and that's where our hearts are at. "Okay, Lord, what do you have next for us?" We actually start the year off, every year, "God, how do you want to use us this year, financially?" Jennifer Smith: Yeah. It is a part of our goal setting. Aaron Smith: Yeah. So we hope you enjoyed these six callings that the Lord has for your marriage. We try and walk in these calling ourselves, and we hope that by you walking in these, and chasing after these biblical concepts and callings for your marriage, that you'll be led towards God's greater calling for your marriage, whatever that may be, and that your eyes would be open and that your heart would be open into receiving what he has for you as individuals in your marriage, and as a unit, as a whole. Aaron Smith: If you enjoyed this video, please hit the subscribe button and also hit the bell next to the subscribe button so you get notifications when we post new videos. Jennifer Smith: Also, leave a comment. If there are other callings that God has for Christian marriages we'd love to be encouraged by that and see more. Aaron Smith: See you later. Aaron Smith: Did you enjoy today's show? Find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

Times of doubt and fear will come and how we handle it matters. If you have been blessed by this podcast and would love to support it please take a moment and pick up a copy of our new book Marriage After God. https://marriageaftergod.com PRAYER Dear Lord, Thank you for the gift of marriage. Thank you for the gift of life. We pray that doubt and fear would not overwhelm our hearts and minds. We pray we would not let doubt or fear keep us from doing the things you have called us to do. May your Holy Spirit remind us of Your Words and encourage our hearts to be faithful and brave, people who rely on your strength and power. We pray we would be quick to encourage one another through moments when doubt or fear arises or when something happens that triggers these emotions to stir up. Help us not to worry and help us not to be anxious. May your peace comfort us and remind us of our security in You. In Jesus’ name, amen! Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

Having a mission statement for your family isn't required but it can be very beneficial for creating and maintaining the culture of your home. Jennifer and I have never created a mission statement before so we thought we would make one while you listen. If you have been blessed by the Marriage After God podcast please consider supporting it by picking up a copy of our book titled Marriage After God. https://marrigeaftergod.com READ TRANSCRIPT [Aaron] Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with "Marriage After God". [Jennifer] Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. [Aaron] And today we're gonna do something fun and we're gonna talk about creating a family mission statement. Welcome to the "Marriage After God" podcast, where we believe that marriage was meant for more than just "Happily Ever After". [Jennifer] I'm Jennifer, also known as "Unveiled Wife". [Aaron] And I'm Aaron, also known as "Husband Revolution". [Jennifer] We have been married for over a decade. [Aaron] And so far, we have four young children. [Jennifer] We have been doing marriage ministry online for over seven years, through blogging and social media. [Aaron] With the desire to inspire couples to keep God at the center of their marriage, encouraging them to walk in faith every day. [Jennifer] We believe that Christian marriage should be an extraordinary one full of life. [Aaron] Love. [Jennifer] And power. [Aaron] That can only be found by chasing after God. [Jennifer] Together. [Aaron] Thank you for joining us on this journey as we chase boldly after God's will for our life together. [Jennifer] This is "Marriage After God". Firstly, we want to just thank everyone for joining us on this podcast today. We're super excited just to have you join us 'cause this is gonna be an interesting episode. We have a lot in store for you, but first we just wanna ask that you would take a minute to leave us a review. It's easy, you just scroll to the bottom of the app and just leave us a star rating review or comment review. This is one way to support the podcast "Marriage After God" because it allows other people to find the podcast, and we wanna do that. So, please take a moment to help us out there and thank you. [Aaron] Also, our book's out. Our new book, "Marriage After God", is available. It's been such and awesome ride seeing the response we've been getting, and if you have not picked up a copy yet, we'd love for you to go to shop.marriageaftergod.com, and pick up a copy today. One of the most powerful ways you can support us, is by buying our book, and it also supports your marriage and your life. We wrote the book for you. We wrote it to encourage you in the ministry that God has for you and your spouse, so go grab a copy today. [Jennifer] Okay, so we are going to start off here with an ice-breaker question, and Aaron came up with this question, so I'm hoping he has an answer. What is the ideal family trip or vacation? [Aaron] I actually didn't think about it when I said it, so I don't have... Okay, let me think. Ideal family trip. So, I can look back on something we have done that I really enjoyed, when we went to the East Coast, but we did like a plane-drive, plane-drive. [Jennifer] It was over a period of a week and a half, two weeks. [Aaron] Yeah, and I thought that was a lot of fun 'cause we got to fly the portions that I thought would've been boring, maybe. Get to a new area and then drive around, stay for a day or two, go to the next place-- [Jennifer] And here, you said, "Ideal family trip". That doesn't sound ideal for any family. [Aaron] For me! Oh, are you saying ideal for everyone? [Jennifer] Yeah, I don't know if that was your question, but I'm just thinking everyone listening right now is probably shaking their heads, no. [Aaron] I thought that was a fun trip for us. [Jennifer] I think the majority of families, especially with young children, would say flying and driving multiple times in one trip would be a difficult challenge. [Aaron] Okay, I didn't know it "ideal for everyone". Ideal for everyone would be like, going somewhere awesome and staying there for a while. Like, with a house that's comfortable and you have all your family with you, and there's a pool or a beach. [Jennifer] Where would that place be, Aaron? [Aaron] Maui? I don't know. [Jennifer] Awesome. [Aaron] What's ideal for you? What would that be? [Jennifer] So, I think you and me just like adventure because I really had fun that time too, that we went to the East Coast, but I think an ideal family trip is visiting family in California. I think that's just because I know it's something the kids enjoy. We usually hit up the beach. We stay there all day. [Aaron] Yeah, that is fun. [Jennifer] I think it's just an easy, kind of, go-to is when you're visiting family somewhere, you're staying with them, and you're just doing something simple. [Aaron] All right, that's good answer. [Jennifer] Relaxing. [Aaron] I'm sure everyone listening has their own ideal. Like, staying home. Eating ice cream, that sounds ideal. [Jennifer] Now that it's summertime, I'm sure there's a lot of people traveling and doing, you know, maybe family vacations or summer trips. [Aaron] Camping. So, we hope you guys are, and we hope that if you can spend that time with your family and doing something fun, even if it's local, like camping in the backyard, you're doing it, 'cause those are memories that your kids will love forever. [Aaron] Oh yeah. So, I just wanna, before we get into the main topic, I'm gonna read a quote from the book "Marriage After God", and it's about this idea. It's from Chapter 13 of "Marriage After God". [Jennifer] About what idea? Just that you clarify. [Aaron] Yeah, it's about the idea of creating a vision statement or mission statement for your marriage. It says this, "Casting a vision together for the future "of your marriage is an intimate experience "where hope for the future "stimulates perseverance for today." What's awesome about that is, when we create a vision for the future, it doesn't mean we're necessarily planning to the "T" everything that's going to happen in the future, it's just saying like, "This is where we'd like to be." [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] "This is what, you know, "the trajectory we want to be on as a family." It helps in those moments when it's tedious; when it's hard; when you're going through something and you say, "Well, we're in this together. "We're going the same direction. "We know where we wanna be, and even if we never get "to that exact point in time, or ideal situation, "we're going there together." [Jennifer] Yeah, and in Chapter 13 of "Marriage After God" we really, you know, drive home this idea that this is an intimate experience that you guys get to do together, and it's something to look forward to casting a vision together and having hope for your marriage and hope for your future together and for your family. This is something that we've kept as a valuable thing in our marriage for years, and I enjoy it. I enjoy the process with you, and so even though in "Marriage After God" we don't strictly talk about creating a family mission statement, we do talk about casting a vision together. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] And in the back of "Marriage After God" we even list some questions for you to sit down and have one of those date-night conversations and be mindful of the next five years, the next 25 years and what that looks like, because when we look to the future of things, there is hope there. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] I think that's important. [Aaron] And we have, like you said, we've always cast vision, planned for the next 60 days, next six months, next year, five years. [Jennifer] We kinda do seasons. [Aaron] We do seasons of that, but we've never sat down and actually wrote down a family vision statement. [Jennifer] Yeah, so even thought we kind of operate out of this same understanding, we've never sat down to do it, and it was actually because of the "Marriage After God" podcast series, which if you guys haven't checked that out, we've been going through-- [Aaron] Yeah just-- [Jennifer] Yeah, 16, 17 episodes about this idea of 'Marriage After God' but several people who we interviewed brought up this idea of creating a family mission statement, and how it has impacted their marriage. I know people share about it online too. So, we just kinda wanted to use this time to, first, encourage you guys in your marriage. [Aaron] Mm-hmm. [Jennifer] Encourage you guys to have hope for the future as you vision plan together, but even more so create a family mission statement. That's our challenge for you at the end of this episode and because Aaron and I have never officially done this before or wrote it down, we thought it would be fun to-- [Aaron] We're gonna do it with you. [Jennifer] Do it with you, so-- [Aaron] We're just gonna start talkin' about it in this podcast episode, and we're gonna start coming up with kinda the foundational ideas for our own mission statement. [Jennifer] This was an idea that I had after having those interviews and being encouraged by people because I thought, "So often we hear people say, "'We did this thing. "'We created this family mission statement "'and here it is, or it's still a work in progress.'" [Aaron] That sounds wonderful. Good for them. [Jennifer] That's awesome, but where's the example of doing it? Which I don't know if everybody needs an example of that but sometimes it's helpful to go, what does that actually look like in a conversation? [Aaron] Yeah, how do you have that conversation with you spouse? I feel like every time a couple that we interviewed brought it up, we looked at each other and we're like, "We need to do that!" We wave our hands like, yeah, we just need to do that. [Jennifer] So, the unique part of this episode today is actually that we're gonna be jumping in here in a bit to kind of experience it with you guys. This is like a behind the scenes kind of-- [Aaron] We have not talked about this before recording this. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] So, you'll hear the candid conversation about how we see our family, where we see we're gonna go, yeah. So, you're gonna join us on this little adventure with us. [Jennifer] Okay, so-- [Aaron] Before we start, why don't you read that quote from "Seven Habits of a Highly Effective Family" by Stephen Covey. [Jennifer] Okay. [Aaron] 'Cause it's in his whole book about creating a mission statement. [Jennifer] So, I will let you guys know that we actually haven't read this book, but I just jumped on really quick and I typed in Google and said, "family mission statement". [Aaron] This is a part of the process. [Jennifer] Yeah, I encourage you guys to do that too. So, we haven't read this book. We probably will in the future, but there was several people who were quoting this from his book, and it says, "A family mission statement "is a combined unified expression from all family members "of what your family is all about, "what it is you really want to do and be, "and the principles you choose to govern your family life." [Aaron] That's cool, and that's essentially what we're doing. We're not doing it with our kids this time. Our kids are, I think, too young. They'll eventually get older and then what we'll do is we'll probably sit down with them and invite them in and we'll adjust 'cause maybe our kids will have other perspectives they wanna bring in. I know that we have families that they have large families, lots of kids, and they bring their kids in, their older kids, and invite 'em to be a part of this vision planning and mission statement. [Jennifer] So, two things, since we're being candid here. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] The first one being, I don't think our children are too small to be incorporated, even at this stage of the game because it's not finalized yet, right? [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] This is our initial go at it. And so I think-- [Aaron] And Elliott is pretty smart. [Jennifer] Yeah, Elliott's smart. [Aaron] He'll be like, "Why don't we..." [Jennifer] But I think... Okay, so our kids are six and a half, four, two, and eight months. So obviously, Truit's not gonna say much. [Aaron] I don't know. [Jennifer] But having a family fun meeting, where we're saying, "Okay guys, here are some questions "mommy and daddy have for you", and getting them involved. Maybe even if some of the questions are over their head, it'll still be a fun time to spend together and maybe we'll be surprised." [Aaron] Let's write down the funny answers and then we'll keep those for the future and say, "This is what you said when you were four." [Jennifer] Maybe we'll be surprised by them. [Aaron] That's probably true. [Jennifer] So, I do-- [Aaron] I concede. [Jennifer] The second thing is I wanna encourage those listening, if you do have children, that you do find a way to incorporate them in this process because they are a part of the family; and if you're doing it and you don't have kids yet, that's okay too. You and your spouse-- [Aaron] And I guess it's gonna give them more ownership and be like, "Hey, you are members of this family, "not just people that are in it." [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] "You're part of it." [Jennifer] Yeah, and I think what I've gathered from trying to understand this family mission statement saying, is that it's not something that is like, "here are the rules", you know. It's more of something that's supposed to encourage the family unit to be in agreeance and have the same understanding of what those family core values are. So, even though this quote up here says "to govern your family life", I think there's freedom in that. It's not like a list of rules, but it's something creative, a creative way to establish standards and core values. [Aaron] Okay. So, should we do it? [Jennifer] I think we should jump in, yeah. [Aaron] Should we start working on this? I know our kids aren't here but we're gonna start at least with the foundational stuff, maybe? [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Answer some questions. [Jennifer] And just again to preface, this is not something that's... There's not a final answer to. We're kinda just jumping in to show you guys how the conversation could go. [Aaron] Well, it's gonna go. [Jennifer] Well, it's gonna go. This is it. [Aaron] This is our legitimate conversation that we're gonna talk about our mission statement as a family. [Jennifer] Okay. You might hear keyboard typing 'cause I'm taking notes. That's how I'm doin' it. [Aaron] Yeah, so you have a question there, but I guess I wanna start with the first one. I know we kind of hit it up, but when you hear "mission statement"... 'Cause I'm sure everyone has their own little definition of it, and you even had to Google it, like, "What's everyone do?" Everyone's got a little different take on it. When you think mission statement, what do you think? Like, is this our one word phrase or few words phrase? Like, when we are out and about we say, "This is who we are!" [Jennifer] Yeah, we get t-shirts made, right? [Aaron] Yeah, we can get some t-shirts made. [Jennifer] That's not a bad idea. The word that comes to my mind is it's a motto. It's a way of being. It's a way of doing life together, and I do think it is something that should be shortened and concise so that it's easy to remember. [Aaron] I agree. [Jennifer] There might be portions of it that are expanded upon, but I think it should be something that is easy to remember. [Aaron] Okay, it's almost like a statement of faith on our website [Jennifer] Exactly! [Aaron] It's like, "This is what we believe, "this is who we are." [Jennifer] Exactly. [Aaron] Yeah, and this is how we're gonna live. Of course, because we're believers and we love the Lord and we love the Bible, that's probably gonna be a big part of this. [Jennifer] Well, yeah. I would assume that Christians who create a family mission statement, it's built upon the Word. [Aaron] Right. Okay, so we're gonna have to have some verses and we'll get to that probably. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] So, here's the first question. What are some words that describe our family or what we want our family to be? [Jennifer] Hmm. [Aaron] I'm just gonna throw out the first thing-- [Jennifer] Okay, go. [Aaron] I thought of is generous. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] And for those listening, a lot of the things we're gonna say, because we kind of have just walked in certain things over the last 12 years that we've been married and even before then. I think there's just gonna be some natural things that come out of us. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] But now it's gonna be solidified as, "This is who we are." So, generosity is something I believe has been a mark of our marriage for a long time. [Jennifer] I like that. A word that comes to my mind is, I think I already said it, but "adventurous". Meaning that we find the fun in things. [Aaron] Write that down, "we find the fun in thing", 'cause there could be lot's of different "adventurous." Adventurous like, we like to take financial risks. Or adventurous like-- [Jennifer] No, more like, we do fun things. [Aaron] Okay, that's a different kind of adventur-- [Jennifer] We like to explore. We like to eat. We like to go-- [Aaron] We love change. [Jennifer] We love change. [Aaron] Not too much change but we like new environments. We like-- [Jennifer] Yeah, I would say, not change so much to our rhythms and routines, because those are important but more so just experiential. I don't know how to explain it. [Aaron] Like new environments. [Jennifer] New environments. [Aaron] It goes into the adventurous side of... We like to go to new places. We like to be around new people. [Jennifer] I don't know if we've shared this before but we've kind of done these Saturday adventure days with the kids throughout the summer time. [Aaron] Mm-hmm. [Jennifer] 'Cause we go through seasons where it's just easier. [Aaron] We did a podcast about the adventure days. [Jennifer] Okay. So, that's an important thing. When I think of adventure, I think time set aside where we know we're gonna be doing something with the kids, whether it's local or maybe a-- [Aaron] Out of the norm. So, like, we have our normal flow. We have our normal rhythm, and then we're gonna go do something 'not'. [Jennifer] Go on a hike. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] Go look at the river. Go whatever it is. [Aaron] Go for a long drive to a new place through a rose garden or apples. [Jennifer] I do, I make... You guys don't know this about me. I make Aaron go out of his way for me all the time because-- [Aaron] She's like, "I found this orchard "on the other side of the mountain. "Can we go?" And then like, it's not open or... I'm just kidding. No, we've actually had a lot of cool adventures just 'cause you Google and find a cool place to go see. [Jennifer] Yeah, even like, we were in Portland this time last year. I remember it was hot and only Elliot was awake, the other kids were napping. I was like, "Will you just pull over and let me go see "the rose garden? "I've been wanting to see it." You know, but it was a fun little detour and it worked out for everyone. I like that kind of stuff. [Aaron] So, adventurous in the fun kind of way, in the environmental kind of way, the experiential kind of way. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] I would say another word I think of is community. [Jennifer] Mmm. [Aaron] I know it's like an easy buzz word for Christians. [Jennifer] No, it's good. [Aaron] We've made big decisions in our life and one of the main criteria in that decision was community. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Often. [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] When moving, our prayer was, "Well, we can't move until something changes "in our community because we have these relationships, "we have these connections. "God has us here." [Jennifer] So, being loyal. [Aaron] Yeah, I like that word, loyal. We walk with people and we don't just say, "Well, "they'll get over it, we're gonna move on "and find new friends." [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Not that we've been perfect at this, but community's been a huge part of how we make decisions. Even now we think, "If we ever had to move, "who's are we gonna convince to move with us?" And it's not that we don't like being... Like we couldn't do it on our own. We know that community is so important and we want to take it with us. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, I would say a part of that is also walking in light, and we've done this time and time again where it's just being transparent, being able to communicate-- [Aaron] Oh, put that word, that's a good word, transparent. [Jennifer] Okay. [Aaron] I guess it is tied to community, but it's transparent in other things too 'cause our online communities we are transparent with and we don't know any of them. [Jennifer] If nobody knows what he's talking about, we have these online communities who are amazing people. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] Who have been following us [Aaron] Facebook, Instagram. [Jennifer] For eight years now. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] It's so awesome. [Aaron] Yeah. So, we try and be the same person to every person we meet. Would that be like-- [Jennifer] Integrity? [Aaron] Integrity. [Jennifer] I like that. [Aaron] I don't know if that's in-Integrity's like being the same person when no one's around. Right? [Jennifer] But also when different people are around. It's all the time. [Aaron] Right, okay. Say like, I'm not showing this person that face, and then that person this face. [Jennifer] I only show you different faces. [Aaron] Okay. [Jennifer] I used to have to work on this. [Aaron] Showing me like... I'd be like, "Why do you give everyone the 'good' face?" And then when you get home I get that face. [Jennifer] Yeah, you said, "I want the best of you." [Aaron] Yeah, that was-- [Jennifer] 'cause I had a problem with showing you too much-- [Aaron] Well, I think it's normal. Just as a little tangent. It's easy to let down the face you have on for everyone else, when you're around the person you know loves you. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] But we should really say, "No, I'm actually gonna work harder to give the best "to my closest neighbor, my spouse." It doesn't mean we give the worst to our other neighbors. [Jennifer] Everybody else. [Aaron] Yeah, I guess it's just-- [Jennifer] I needed balance in my life when it came to that. [Aaron] Yeah, it's learning how to be real. Like, when you're around someone, you could at least be real and say, "I'm not feeling good right now" or "I'm not"... Anyways, that was a tangent. So, transparent, I like. That's a good word. That's something that's always been, we've always prided ourselves in... I don't wanna say "prided ourselves". Just being transparent. Not wanting to hide things, be open. Integrity is a good word. So, I think community, transparency, generous, let's think... [Jennifer] I would say faithfulness to our Christian walk, to being obedient to God's Word. Our faith is foundational. [Aaron] I like faithfulness though as the word, because it's easy to say faith. Faith's important, but faithfulness means to our faith and to the Word, and to God. [Jennifer] It's like active. [Aaron] Yeah, it's like a movement word. Is that a verb? It's an action word. What are some... I feel like there's other words that we often say. [Jennifer] Just real quick as a side note to those listening. [Aaron] Extraordinary. I just wanted to say before I forgot it. [Jennifer] Okay. That's fine. [Aaron] Extraordinary is a big word for us. [Jennifer] Yes. Do you wanna explain why? [Aaron] Well, we talk about it a lot in the book "Marriage After God". [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] But it's this idea that we've always had a heart to not just be normal. [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] And that doesn't mean that our goal was to be special and like how we wanted to have this... 'Cause starting this ministry online wasn't even an idea in our hearts when we first got married, but our idea was like, "Well, let's just do what God wants "and that's going to be extraordinary." [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] We went to the mission field for a while and then we went to Canada, and we went to Florida, and we did all these different little things. [Jennifer] I can actually see how even smaller decisions in our life, like buying this house, that wasn't a small decision, but-- [Aaron] It was at-- [Jennifer] But I just think of decisions that we've made together and we've even out-loud said to ourselves, "Well, that's extraordinary", or "That's not the normal way!" [Aaron] Right, well we could do the ordinary or we could do it the extraordinary way. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] And the reason you brought up this house, for those that don't know, they can actually find a YouTube video about us doing the house process. We bought a, I wanna say a fixer-upper. [Jennifer] Decrepit. [Aaron] But it was a beater-upper. It was really bad. We had to tear down most of the house to fix it back up, but when we thought about it we were like, "Well, this is how we're gonna get what we can afford." [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] "And then we can make it ours." Which, lot's of people do that, but it was extraordinary in my mind. So, extraordinary is a good word for us. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, when you paused back there I was just gonna note that that's okay when you're doing this process together. There's gonna be times when something might be on your heart or right at the tip of your tongue, and you don't know how to explain it. I think that's why the majority of people will say, "You don't just sit down and write a mission statement. "It's a process, and the process is what counts. "The process is the important part "because you're actually communicating with each other "on what matters most to you." [Aaron] Good tip. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, you just mull it over and come back to the drawing board over and over and over again until you narrow it down. [Aaron] Yeah, and I think after we go through this, we'll be able to see these words and think of better words. [Jennifer] Probably. Or use the good old dictionary! [Aaron] Or just the thesaurus. [Jennifer] Thanks, Google. [Aaron] Thesaurus. [Jennifer] Okay, so are there any phrases that we repeat often or say? [Aaron] Yeah, there's a-- [Jennifer] I know one! Go ahead, what were you gonna say? [Aaron] We do hard things. [Jennifer] Yes! That was what I was gonna say! [Aaron] That was... But you know what? That's a phrase that we only started saying when our kids started getting older. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] But-- [Jennifer] To encourage them we would say things "We're the Smiths and we do hard things." [Aaron] And so they own it, and they say, "Oh, okay. "This thing that I said is hard, we do those things." [Jennifer] Yeah. What's cool is they've recognized when we're doing Bible time, certain stories in the Bible of people doing hard things they'll recognize and go, "Hey, David does hard things!" [Aaron] Yeah! So, I think "We do hard things" is a important phrase, and we didn't come up with that of course. [Jennifer] But we use it. [Aaron] We use it often. [Jennifer] I don't know where it came from. [Aaron] And it doesn't just remind our kids, it reminds us because how many times a day do we get to this point of like, "Ugh, I don't wanna do this right now." And they're like, "Ugh, we do hard things." [Jennifer] It's the fight against the flesh. [Aaron] Yeah, we just did our lawns for the first time this season, and I just kept wanting to quit. I was like, "I did enough. Next week I'll finish the weeds." And I'm like . And then I go through and I'm like, "Oh, I'm just gonna go "a little bit further and make this look nice. Then I'm like, "Ugh, I just wanna give up." And then I go a little bit further, and I just kept telling myself, "No, I can finish this. "It's like my first time ever doing this, I should be fine." [Jennifer] That same conversation happens to me every single time I go to work out. It's like, you have ten squats on the list to do and you get through four and you're like, "Ahh!" [Aaron] "I should be able to do this." [Jennifer] "Okay, I'll do one more." And then you want to bail out but then you just keep going, you keep going, you keep going. [Aaron] I think it's a good phrase. What's another phrase that we say? Oh, it's kind of a word but we use it as a phrase. [Jennifer] What? [Aaron] "Gotta have self-control." [Jennifer] Oh, self-control. [Aaron] So, it's a word but-- [Jennifer] Self-control. [Aaron] We use it in a sense that we say it probably a million and a half times a day to our kids. "Are you having self-control? "You need to have self-control. "Remember self-control!" [Jennifer] We say it to each other now, too, because in conjunction with "We're setting the example. "We're setting the example". [Aaron] One of us will be having an attitude about something, just tired or exhausted or frustrated; and I'll be like, "Okay, are you self-controlled right now?" We say it a little quieter to each other. [Jennifer] Okay. So, what-- [Aaron] Is there any other phrases? We say other things. [Jennifer] I'm sure there are and we can come back to this if we think about it, but I was gonna ask, "What is it that we value? "What are some things that we really value?" [Aaron] The Word of God. We have to start with that. I know that sounds like the default answer, but it has to be the number one thing we value. It's what we tell our kids is the most important thing, it's what we try and teach them, we try and live it. So, I think the Word of God is... Now, I will say this, and it's something I've been convicted on recently and something that God's been convicting me on for my whole life, probably. I think this, and then I'm like, "But do I actually show this?" Am I in my Word as much as I could be? I don't want to say "should be" because I don't think there's a number or how many chapters or how many words or how many verses, or whatever; but I know in my heart when I'm in and out of it. I know when I'm giving God's Word the attention it deserves in my life. We could feel it. [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] Recently you've been kind of just overwhelmed with the book launch that-- [Jennifer] Lots of stuff to do. [Aaron] Lots of stuff to do and I was just thinking to myself, I'm like, "I wonder what-I didn't say this to you, but I was wondering when you were in the Word. [Jennifer] It's so funny, it's not funny, it's... Wow, this is really convicting because I know exactly the moment in that conversation where I had this thought that, "I wouldn't be feeling this way "if I was in the Word", and-- [Aaron] When was it? 'cause I was thinking about it. I didn't say it to you, I was just... 'Cause I was just encouraging you and comforting you and letting you know it was gonna be okay. [Jennifer] No, it was really impactful for me, and I've been in the Word since. I think sometimes we just get in these ruts or seasons where we're busy or we're going strong on certain areas of our life, and we don't realize when another area have kind of-- [Aaron] Yeah, we've neglected an area. [Jennifer] Been neglected, and that was happening with me for a couple days. I'd say about a week and a half. [Aaron] Well, me too, and I was feeling... Remember I told you how I was feeling? [Jennifer] Yeah, I think it was compiling. [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] I think the Lord is good. [Aaron] Well, I was just thinking on Sunday, the message was about... Actually the message wasn't about it, but Matt said, "Hey, we can't know all of this in one sitting. "We have to just go line by line, verse by verse, "chapter by chapter, over years of reading and reading, "and re-reading and re-reading, and re-memorizing "and re-stating, and chewing it over." Then this morning, I was listening to J. Vernon McGee, and he was in Isaiah and he was bringing up the scripture that talks about "precept upon precept, line by line", and he was saying... You know, it took five years for J. Vernon McGee to teach through the Bible. That was just him going through one time. [Jennifer] Mm-hmm. [Aaron] Five years. How much do we go 'precept by precept'? Are we just reading through it? Laying on the knowledge that we're getting out of it. That was another good tangent, but Word of God I think is the most valuable thing. It needs to be-- [Jennifer] Bolded? [Aaron] Yeah, bolded and-- [Jennifer] Italicized? [Aaron] Italicized, highlighted in green, but I think it needs to be more evident in our own lives for our kids sake and for our own sake. [Jennifer] Yeah. What a great tool, this mission statement, to remind us to do that. If this is gonna be a foundational thing that is in front of us by maybe putting it on a plaque in our house or however we're gonna display this once we do finalize it. To be reminded of that, you know, every single day. [Aaron] Yeah, "Let's go back to the Word of God. "What does the Word say about this situation." [Jennifer] So, what other things do we value? I feel like we value-- [Aaron] Stewardship? [Jennifer] Stewardship. [Aaron] Is that a good word? [Jennifer] That's good. [Aaron] Like we value-- [Jennifer] I'm gonna write that down. [Aaron] Being good stewards, which we talk a ton about in 'Marriage after God'. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Because of how important it is to our ministries. [Jennifer] It's like the whole book's message, really. [Aaron] "Are you stewarding the way God's given you well?" That's the whole book actually. [Jennifer] I guess part of what I was gonna say goes along with this. I don't know if you would agree, but recognizing our need verses want in minimalism. Not that we're minimalist people because we have stuff. We have stuff, but I don't feel like we exaggerate and go outside of what we need. Does that make sense? [Aaron] I would agree. I think there's been seasons in our life that, because of discontentment or dissatisfaction or whatever, we've chased after things. [Jennifer] Or acquired. [Aaron] Collecting things, or buying things that we don't need. That's rarer, I would say. I'm not gonna say, "It's not super rare", but we tend to get what we need and not much more. Again, there's plenty of things that we have. [Jennifer] I think we've been good over time of challenging each other or encouraging each other, you know, "Maybe we don't need that thing right now", or "Hey, if you are gonna go get that, think about this." [Aaron] Right. [Jennifer] You've done it with me with kids clothes before. "Hey, instead of buying off that website "can we just try and"-- [Aaron] "Because they're not gonna fit in it "in six weeks." [Jennifer] "Or they're gonna be stained up." [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] Or whatever the reasoning's were. That was just the first thing off the top of my head. I think that... [Aaron] Stewardship minimalist. Yeah, I agree. We're not minimalist, but we definitely think on a more, "What do we need verses what do we want? "And what do we want, is it something we need, "and is it something we can use and is it gonna be"-- [Jennifer] We're willing to be confronted by that, for sure. [Aaron] Right. What is other things we value? Relationships? [Jennifer] I was gonna say people. [Aaron] People, yeah. I would say this goes up higher. [Jennifer] You can even see this in our kids because Olive really values relationships. [Aaron] Mm-hmm. [Jennifer] All of our kids do, but I could just see it in them. [Aaron] Yeah. Well, it's of course, the Word of God points us to-- [Jennifer] God's relationship. [Aaron] I would say that's almost the number one message in the Bible, other than Jesus Christ and him crucified, which everything points to that, is why he died for us is to give us relationship with the Father, and then through that gives us relationship with other people, right? Like, John 17, which we should put down because the next thing we're gonna talk about is scripture, but John 17 is a major one, which is the high priestly prayer Jesus prays for his disciples and for everyone who believes in the message that the disciples bring to the world; is that we would be one. That we'd be unified just as Christ and God are unified. [Jennifer] Yeah, but before we move on to the scripture section, I had some things I wanted to share about the values. So, 'cause this is all about brain-dumping and just getting out of our minds and heart what we believe to be true about our family, to build up this mission statement. So, words like 'creativity'. I feel like we value. Inspiring each other towards greatness. [Aaron] Can I throw in a word? Creating. [Jennifer] Creating, okay. [Aaron] I mean, we've done the self-publishing thing, the blogging, the social media. It's just kind of been a part of what we do. So, creativity, inspiring, but we also create. It's part of us. [Jennifer] Mmm, that's good. [Aaron] Elliot loves to draw, Olive loves to paint. [Jennifer] Yeah. That's good, lots of Lego building. [Aaron] Lots of Lego building! By the way the Lego thing you built yesterday is awesome. It's like this huge city. [Jennifer] It was supposed to be Bleecker St. in New York. [Aaron] Okay. [Jennifer] I just didn't get to finish it. [Aaron] I didn't see the signs. [Jennifer] Oh, go back and look at it. So yeah, some of the things that we value are experiences where, being able to go to a museum if we're near one, or-- [Aaron] I feel like that falls under adventure, adventurous, right? [Jennifer] Okay. Yeah, but it's like learning experiences. [Aaron] Well, put learning then. That's a good word. [Jennifer] Learning. So, whether that's-- [Aaron] Learning is a big thing-- [Jennifer] Experiences or books, resources, pretty much anything I can get my hands on for us or for the kids that encourages growth and investment. [Aaron] All the educational films like Marvels, Avengers, and Iron Man, those are really for us. [Jennifer] For us. [Aaron] For us, yeah. Yeah, I think learning is a great word. So, under value... [Jennifer] Does food count? [Aaron] Oh, you know, can I say wisdom? [Jennifer] Wisdom, yeah. [Aaron] And you actually should put food on there because that is a huge thing for us. Food. We love food! [Jennifer] Not just food. [Aaron] God loved food. [Jennifer] I know but the experience of food, like the actual tasting good and figuring out what flavors are there, but then the experience of eating with people. [Aaron] Yeah, so actually food kinda encompasses all these. [Jennifer] Okay so, on our family mission statement it's gonna say, "The Smith family", and then in bold right beneath that-- [Aaron] "Food." [Jennifer] 'Food'. [Aaron] That'll be our... It's short. [Jennifer] Semi-calling Gods word. So, it's like both, right? It's like the Word of Life. [Aaron] Well, God's Word is the bread of life. So, it just literally all fits in. Everyone here that's listening, our mission statement is [Jennifer And Aaron] Food. [Jennifer] This is how our conversations really go in real life, to you guys. We're not makin' this up for you. [Aaron] I'm pretty sure I can fit every single one of those things into food. [Jennifer] We'll figure it out. [Aaron] Yeah. Wisdom, what I mean by wisdom is, wisdom is the application of knowledge. [Jennifer] Yup. [Aaron] 'Cause you can know lots of things and do nothing with it. [Jennifer] Not ever implement it. [Aaron] Yeah, wisdom is like, "Oh, I actually know how "to navigate this kind of relationship, "therefore I'm going to navigate it that way." Or, "I know that I should keep my mouth shut "in this situation", so I could choose to act on the knowledge or not. So, wisdom is taking the Word of God, taking life experiences and letting it teach us and then saying, "Oh, last time we experienced that. "Let's make a different decision this time." [Jennifer] Mmm. [Aaron] We were actually just talking about this in the car. All the experiences the God's given us, hard ones that have taught us things. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] That a lot of people won't ever experience. [Jennifer] Right, but everyone listening has their own set of experiences that-- [Aaron] That no one else will have. [Jennifer] No one else will have. [Aaron] That God wants to use to teach them wisdom. [Jennifer] Yeah, but wisdom is saying, "Okay, I'm going "to learn from that, and not just learn from it, but"-- [Jennifer] Apply it. [Aaron] "I'm gonna apply the knowledge to my life now "regardless of how easy it is or how it feels to my flesh." [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] Right. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] So, wisdom is a big one. [Jennifer] Okay, cool. So, moving on, were there any more scriptures that you wanted to share? [Aaron] Think of some scriptures... [Jennifer] One, you brought up generosity earlier, and so one of the scriptures that came to my mind was 2 Corinthians 9:6-8, it says, "The point is this: whoever sows sparingly "will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully "will also reap bountifully. "Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, "not reluctantly or under compulsion, "for God loves a cheerful giver." So, I just thought about that. [Aaron] That's a great one. Cheerful giver. [Jennifer] I think it defines how we give, which I love. [Aaron] Yeah we don't ever, I mean we try not to give out of compulsion. As in, "Oh, we must do this!" No, we'd be like, "We want to do this." [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] So, that's a good one. Another one I think of is the Great Commission in Mathew 28, where Jesus literally tells the church what it's job is. It says, Mathew 28:18, "And Jesus came and said to them, ""All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, "baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son "and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe "all that I have commanded you. "And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." [Jennifer] I love that last portion. [Aaron] Yeah, and we can take this as our individual mandates, but really it's the mandate for the church as a whole, 'cause there's all these different functioning parts. [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] Discipling, evangelism, teaching-- [Jennifer] Baptizing. [Aaron] Baptizing, all these different things, and we sometimes get to do all of them, and sometimes get to just play at planting or watering. [Jennifer] A portion of it, mm-hmm. [Aaron] It's what the church's job is and I think it should be what our job is. [Jennifer] I feel like if I could summarize that whole verse, it would say, "to make Him known", you know? [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] Like, to know Him and to make Him known. That's such a big-- [Aaron] Put that down. That's a awesome thing, make Him known. I think that should definitely be in our statement because that is our life. We want our children to do that. [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] We want our children to know Him. [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] And then we want our children to make Him known. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] Is our desire. [Jennifer] Okay, so we want to encourage you guys that as you do jump into experiencing this process of creating a family mission statement, to go to scripture, to see where your family values line up according to His Word, because it is foundational to how we live our lives and do what we do. This was just to give you guys a glimpse into the behind the scenes, Aaron and Jen, and how we communicate through things like this. Being able to share your vision for your family and life, being able to come up with, and create a family mission statement. It's supposed to be a unifying experience of togetherness, intimacy, understanding one another, identifying "who are we" and "what are we doing"? [Aaron] Yeah, "Who are the Smiths?" [Jennifer] Well, "who are they listening, who are you?" And kinda just build this missions statement to look forward to sharing it with your family. [Aaron] Yeah, and we're not done with this. We are going to on our own, now, finish this up; but this was our getting started. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] We started it out. We're glad that you got to join us on this candid conversation of us trying to think out "who we are and what we're about". [Jennifer] Yeah. I did want to share a couple practical things. When you do do a family mission statement, based off of what I've seen and you guys have probably seen too. Some fun ways to have this experience and share it with each other is use a whiteboard, or get some poster paper, or a pen and paper, or like we just did, use your computer, your phone, whatever it takes to make those notes. You can brain-dump and then cross stuff out as you go, but have fun with it. Also, some examples of making it visible in the home. I have some people say, "In this house", and then they list all their words. [Aaron] So, once we're done with it we can put this up somewhere so we're always seeing, "Hey, look what we... "We're not acting the way we say we're gonna act." [Jennifer] Exactly. Some people do the last name in bold at the top and then share the core values or the mission statement. Some people put it in a frame. Some people put it on script, on canvas. There's so many different ways that you can visibly show it in your home and the great thing about that is-- [Aaron] Tattoos, that's a really good one, right? [Jennifer] Just tattoo it on our backs? [Aaron] Yeah. [Jennifer] No, but this is a great thing, like you said, to be mindful of how we operate as a family. We can even share as our kids get older, and teach them through it like, "Hey, we're the Smith's and we do hard things. "See it says it right there." So, those are just some things and we wanted to encourage you guys in that. [Aaron] Yeah, and I hope you had fun with us, too. We had fun. We're gonna finish it up, we'll probably do it on a date night or over the next... It doesn't have to be done right away, right. It's something that we can evolve with us. [Jennifer] It's a work in progress and so many people who have shared theirs with ours have said, "It's still a work in progress, "and you can change it and alter it as you go." Remember, you can incorporate your family, your kids and everyone to participate in it, but we did wanna challenge you guys with doing it. Even if it's just the initial go at it like we just did. [Aaron] Start it on your next date night. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] That's the reason, you're like, "Oh, we have to go "do our mission statement. "Oh, we'll need a babysitter! "Let's go do this." [Jennifer] Have fun, have fun, have fun! [Aaron] Yeah, and then invite your kids into it also. Not on date night. Go to date night, start it, come home, invite them in afterwards, or on another day. [Jennifer] And you guys don't need a specific set of questions to figure out. What we just did is we just said, "What are some phrases "and words that define our family, "of what we know of our family already?" [Aaron] We just started. [Jennifer] We just did it. Ask each other hard questions. [Aaron] Cool, so we like to end our episodes with a prayer, and so, Jennifer, would you pray for us? [Jennifer] Sure. Dear Lord, Thank you for the gift of marriage. May we continue to walk in obedience to Your Word as we seek to fulfill Your will for our lives and our marriage. We pray, we would consider the purpose You have for our marriage and we pray we will work together to communicate what our family mission statement is. We pray we would humbly submit it before You and that it would become a pillar in our family and in our life, that reminds us what we are doing and where we are headed. May this family mission statement build up according to Your core values, be an anchor for our marriage and family, motivating us to live our lives on purpose. May the experience of considering and building our family mission statement be a time of togetherness intimacy and understanding. Thank you for the hope You give us every day. May we honor You with our lives. In Jesus name, Amen. [Aaron] Amen. So, we just want to thank every one for joining us this week and listening to this episode. I hope you had fun with us. It was a lot of fun for us, as I said earlier. But go, start a mission statement with your spouse and with your family, and see what happens. See how it focuses you. You might end up finding out that you're participating in things that don't even line up with what you guys believe as a family. That might be cool. Or you might realize that there's opportunities out there that you could be tapping into because of it. We just wanted to thank you. We look forward to having you next week, and if you have not yet went to shop.marriageaftergod,com and picked up a copy of our new book, "Marriage After God", we'd love to invite you to do so. We thank you for everything. You guys are awesome. All the reviews, all of the comments and stuff we get on our social media, and just all the listens. You guys listening to these podcasts, we just so appreciate you guys. We look forward to having you next week. See you later. Did you enjoy today's show? If you did, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a review on iTunes, also, if you're interested, you can find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com, and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. Connect With UsInstagram | @marriageaftergodInstagram | @unveiledwifeInstagram | @husbandrevolutionCheck out our marriage resources!SponsorsGet our new book The Marriage Gift - 365 prayers for your marriage!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mr. Pen and use my code MAG10 for a great deal: https://mrpen.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/marriage-after-god-biblical-advice-practical-tips-and-inspiring-/donations

Join the Marriage After God Movement! Thousands have already said yes and we want to invite you to join them. Learn More Here http://marriageaftergod.com Is love something that we can fall in and out of? Can I still be in love if I don't feel like it? What if I'm not happy in my marriage anymore? If I fell into love once can I fall into love again with someone else? READ TRANSCRIPT [Aaron] Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God. [Jennifer] Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. [Aaron] And today, we're gonna be tackling the question, can you fall out of love in marriage? Welcome to the Marriage After God podcast, where we believe that marriage was meant for more than just happily ever after. [Jennifer] I'm Jennifer, also known as Unveiled Wife. [Aaron] And I'm Aaron, also known as Husband Revolution. [Jennifer] We have been married for over a decade. [Aaron] And so far, we have four young children. [Jennifer] We have been doing marriage ministry online for over seven years through blogging and social media. [Aaron] With the desire to inspire couples to keep God at the center of their marriage, encouraging them to walk in faith every day. [Jennifer] We believe the Christian marriage should be an extraordinary one, full of life. [Aaron] Love. [Jennifer] And power. [Aaron] That can only be found by chasing after God. [Jennifer] Together. [Aaron] Thank you for joining us in this journey as we chase boldly after God's will for our life together. [Jennifer] This is Marriage After God. [Aaron] Hey, thanks for joining us on another episode of the Marriage After God podcast. We just wanna invite you at the end of the podcast or anytime, really, to leave us a star rating and a review. That helps other people find our podcast, and we also love reading those reviews. So if you wanna take a minute, and again, the easiest way to do that is just to hit one of the stars at the bottom of the app, and that will just give us a rating right there, or you can leave us a text review. We love reading those, so we just wanna invite you to do that. [Jennifer] Another way you can support the podcast is by shopping on our online store, shop.marriageaftergod.com. We have a ton of resources that we've wrote for you guys, including some prayer books, but also, I wanna take a minute to highlight our newest book that we wrote for you, Marriage After God. In fact, today's episode, we're gonna be sharing from Gary Thomas's book, but he read Marriage After God, and this is what he had to say about it: "Marriage After God is not your typical marriage book. "Rather than focus on the common symptoms "of marriage dysfunction and lack of intimacy, "Marriage After God dives into and focuses "on the root causes: the need for faith, biblical truth, "fellowship, ministry, and God-ordained vision. "The Smiths take the wise path of urging us "to grow a better marriage by focusing first "on growing closer to God." [Aaron] Yeah, so we just wanna invite you to pick up a copy of that. We wrote it to encourage your marriage, to find out what God's purpose for your marriage is, and we believe God has a purpose for every one of us in the body, especially your marriage. So please pick up a copy of that book today, and we'd love to get it in your hands. [Jennifer] All right, as always, we're gonna jump into our icebreaker question. Aaron, why don't you start by answering this? What is your favorite game or activity to do with the kids right now? [Aaron] I think I really like wrestling on the ground with the kids. They all climb on top of me. Partly, it lets me lay down for a little bit. Or building forts with our huge, big couch pillows. I think that's awesome. With Elliott specifically, I like practicing drawing. We put on a YouTube show and learn how to draw a dragon or a dinosaur or something like that, and that's a lot of fun. [Jennifer] Yeah, some other games that I would say we've been really into lately is Blokus or Blokus, I don't really know how to say that. [Aaron] Oh yeah, I just played with that them. [Jennifer] So that's super fun, super easy to catch onto, and we've been playing Battleship a lot. [Aaron] Oh, that's a good one. [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] But he gets frustrated when I win. [Jennifer] Everybody gets frustrated when they don't win. So we're working through some of those things, but yeah, those are some games. [Aaron] That was a good question. [Jennifer] That we love with the kids right now. [Aaron] So before we get into our topic, discussing whether or not we can fall out of love in our marriage, I wanna read a quote from Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas, on page 157. "The opposite of biblical love isn't hate; it's apathy. "To stop moving toward our spouse "is to stop loving him or her. "It's holding back from the very purpose of marriage." [Jennifer] Well, I feel like that answers the question right there. [Aaron] Yeah, and well, it's a great start to the conversation, because I feel like people might think, of course, yeah, you can't fall in and out of love, but that's kind of where our world's gone, in the secular world and in the Christian world, and we see it often in emails we get, in messages we get on our social media. We just thought it's a very pertinent topic to bring up with our communities. It's something that we've had to deal with in our own marriage, just feeling that like, well, maybe this isn't gonna work, maybe this isn't right, and just maybe dispel some of the lies about it, think biblically and clearly about it, so that those that might be feeling this way can think better and pursue God in the decision. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, when I thought about this topic to discuss today, the first thing that came to my mind is we need to be aware of the things we're saying, the phrases that we use to describe the life that we're living, the things that we're choosing. And so I just kind of went back to the beginning of like, okay, so where did this phrase come from? What does it mean? [Aaron] Yeah, 'cause we grew up, this is like. [Jennifer] This is what we know. [Aaron] I wanna fall in love. Everyone wants to fall in love. [Jennifer] Yep, or people ask you, oh, when did you fall in love with each other? [Aaron] Right, like it was a day. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, I Googled where this phrase came from, and Wikipedia says this: "falling in love is the development of strong feelings "of attachment and love, usually toward another person. "The term is metaphorical, emphasizing that the process, "like the physical act of falling, is sudden, "uncontrollable, and leaves the lover in a vulnerable state, "similar to fall ill or fall into a trap." [Aaron] I love how it uses those negative phrases. [Jennifer] I know, I was gonna say, as I kept looking into this, I found other phrases like fall asleep or fall behind. Someone else likened it to a surprise, like falling down the stairs. [Aaron] Yeah, there are all these negative connotations with falling, which is really unfortunate, that one of the most, supposed to be the most euphoric and most powerful and magical things that we get to experience is love with another person, and we've turned it into, with our common language and how we describe things, it's so weak, in my opinion. [Jennifer] Yeah, that's exactly what I was gonna say. It kind of strips the beauty of one, knowing what true love is, and then choosing it, because here it's making you sound like it's just happening to you, that there's no control in any of it. [Aaron] Yeah, and I think that one of the traps of the enemy, you know, falling into the trap, like you said, that's he's taken something so beautiful that God invented and created and something that he's given as a gift to his children, and boiled it down. You know, if he can change the terms and the words and the definitions, then he can change the meanings of thing. And so, I think that's the first thing that our listeners can start to think about, is if they fell in love, right, and I know people are really thinking, like, I think you're just going overboard. What's the big deal? It's just a phrase. But it's not just a phrase, because like you said, if we're not aware of the things that we're saying, we don't realize that we define things by the things we say. Words do have meaning, and if we say them over and over and over again, they have meaning, and if we believe them, like, if I believe we fell in love, then it's not hard to believe that we can fall out of love. [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] Because the definition, it's something that happened to me, I had no control over it. We were just in this whirlwind, and oh my gosh, the passions, and you're beautiful, and I love you, and oh, we have similar things that we like, and oh, and the way you think, and you're so funny, and all these things, which are totally good things, and they totally add to my attraction to you or attraction to another person and draw us, and actually do invoke emotions in us and feelings. And those are all given to us by God. But if we boil down love to just those things, those feelings, then the moment those things change, the moment those things disappear, the moment those things that we used to be enamored by now bug us, because that happens. Like, oh, it was so cute the way you would say that one thing, and now that way you say that all the time really bugs me, and I don't like it. [Jennifer] Yeah. So, here's the other just sad, sad part about all of this, is that in marriage, we come up against this very thing that you're talking about, is if things change. So let's say there's hard circumstances, or you really get to know each other after years and years of marriage, and there's just things like, as you said, bug you. If we say that we fell into love with one another and that goes back to this sudden thing that there's no control over, who's to say that we can't fall in love even after we're married? [Aaron] Right. [Jennifer] And someone else comes along, and no, I've done it again. I've fallen in love again, but not with you. That's dangerous. [Aaron] Yeah, and you know what, I had no control over it. We've actually heard this. I'm sorry, I love you still, but this other person came along, and they're feeding my love tank. [Jennifer] It becomes a justification for sin, and nobody's taking responsibility. That's shat I'm trying to get at. [Aaron] Right, and I think that's what we wanna talk about in this, and where we're gonna try and go with this, is to take away the decision and the control and the thoughtfulness in love is to take away the power of the love in the first place, of what God's doing. The Bible says that God is love. So he invented it, he designed it. It's his creation. It's something that, something that he is love. It existed with him. And so for us to boil it, like, oh, I fell in love, oh, I fell out of love, it's something I go in and out of, and it's not a choice. It's just whatever I feel at the moment. And what's so dangerous about that is the Bible tells us to not operate in our feelings. That's what's called carnal. Our carnal flesh is our feelings, the chemical reactions in our brain, which is exactly what feelings are. You get a burst of oxytocin, and you get a burst of all these different hormones that are good hormones that God created us with, and we define something very spiritual with a very fleshly reaction. And I think that spiritual things definitely bring those emotional reactions, which is why they're good: God made it that way. But love's not defined by those things. And a perfect example is if we're thinking about falling in and out of love, or when things are hard, I must not be in love anymore, or they must not love me anymore, or maybe they've fallen out of love with me or we're falling out of love with each other, I just think of Christ on the cross, you know? He goes into the Garden of Gethsemane, and he prays, Lord, let this cup pass from me. And he's praying that the suffering he was about to partake, that he was about to be obedient to endure, was for his bride. And he's saying, I don't know if I can do this, but I'm not gonna choose. Lord, you chose. And his will was that he went to the cross, because salvation was at hand, for the body of Christ, for the world. And so, if we look at Christ, would he fall out of love when he's on the cross? He's like, oh, this is too hard. I just don't love them anymore. No, he loved us beyond what his flesh wanted, and that's exactly what I wanna talk about. The power of love goes way beyond how we feel, because there was times that you didn't feel in love with me. [Jennifer] No, definitely. In those early years, when our circumstances were really hard, yeah, I didn't feel very much in love with you, and it even brought us to a point of seriously contemplating divorce and separation, but there were other factors involved. Walking in sin, just choosing to isolate from each other time and time again led to that in our marriage. [Aaron] Yeah, we tried. We stayed together. We were friends, to an extent, and there was areas of our marriage, intimacy, sexual intimacy, that wasn't exactly how we wanted it to be. It was actually the opposite of what we wanted. And it led to thoughts in us, sinful thoughts, and I remember me thinking, man, I should have experimented before I got married. I should have had more partners before I got married. [Jennifer] And I remember having thoughts of, well, maybe we're just not compatible, physically, emotionally, mentally. I just thought like, we're not for each other. [Aaron] And wasn't there even a season where you looked outside of our marriage? You didn't go actually do anything, but you desired? [Jennifer] Oh, for sure. [Aaron] Another man, and your heart wasn't with me? [Jennifer] Yeah. [Aaron] And that is what happens when how we feel is defining what we do. [Jennifer] Yeah, and I wanna get to some of those things that come up, reasons why people would feel as though they fell out of love with one another, because I think it's good for us to acknowledge them and address them, because we're all experiencing this thing called marriage, and if we're not willing to confront the hard things, then maybe our hearts would be prone to wanna avoid them or not confront them, and that's not good. [Aaron] Well, and before you get into that, I think the reason, again, going back of the beginning of this, of like, love being something that you fall into, it's accidental, it's I had no control over it, it leaves room, because that's what we believe about it, it leaves room for us to use that lack of control, like, it has nothing to do with me; therefore, when the things we're about to talk about come up, well, I'm just not in love anymore, and that, you know, that's what it is. You can't force me to love someone I don't love anymore. Unfortunate, but that's how it is. Thanks, God. [Jennifer] And that it's his fault for making us wrong or something. [Aaron] Yeah, or taking away the love or whatever it is, and now we have an excuse that's outside of us. Well, see, I mean, too bad I don't love him anymore. I would love to still love him, but it's just not working out. It's not where my heart's at anymore, and I'm moving on. And so it leaves a back door that you don't have to be responsible to go through. You just get brought through it, without any of your own control, when in reality, that's not true. [Jennifer] Yeah, we want everyone to hear this right now. We have an obligation to each other. [Aaron] It's called oneness. It's called a covenant. It's not just an earthly contract. It's not just like a, well, if you fulfill your end of the bargain, I'll fulfill mine. That's actually not what biblical marriage looks like, sounds like, smells like at all. It's a choice that we make to walk in, 'cause Christ chose to walk in his relationship, going to the cross regardless of how we responded to him. And that's our example. It's exactly the picture we get in Ephesians five. Like, hey, bride, you're the church. Hey, husband, you're Christ. You're the picture of Christ in this marriage, and this is how you act. And so, as long as it's something that happens to us, we have no control over it, we have no responsibility to it. [Jennifer] So, I've gotta bring this up real quick. This isn't in our notes, and it's not the direction we were gonna take it, but I think it's important to ask, and so I'm just gonna put it out there, and then maybe you guys can have a conversation about this with your spouses. We can even talk about it later. You talked about love being a choice. You talked about it being a powerful experience and not something that we don't have control over or based on feelings. My question is, do we fall in and out of love with God? Because I would look at Christian culture and say there's a lot of people that base their relationship with God off of how they feel. [Aaron] And what they get. [Jennifer] Or what they get out of it. [Aaron] Yeah, what they believe they deserve. [Jennifer] And so you see this tendency of flowing in and out of God during seasons of, I'm for him, I'm not, I'm for him, I'm not. And so I think that it's important to consider this question in light of our relationship with him. [Aaron] Well, before we move on to some of the reasons why people might feel like they fell out of love, let's talk about how we fell in and out of love with God, because of our marriage, because of the things that we were feeling and going through and experiencing, the hardships within our sexual relationship, the hardships with the sins that we were choosing to walk in and being unrepentant of, and walking in total immaturity and bitterness and anger that man, you had your own relationship dealings with God where you were just angry at him 'cause you were like, God, I deserve a good marriage. [Jennifer] Yeah, I felt like I did all the right things to equal a good marriage, like it was some sort of formula, so when I didn't get it, I was mad at him, because I believed that he was powerful enough to just make everything perfect, give me everything I want, and it be beautiful, and I believed this. I truly believed that. It wasn't just for my benefit that I had a perfect marriage, that it would be so that we can do ministry together for God. [Aaron] It was good reasons, yeah. [Jennifer] Yeah, there's always good reasons. [Aaron] Well, and we wanna be happy. We wanna have joy in our marriage. But this relationship with God was built on what he owed you. And like you said, you fell in and out of love with God the same way you fell in and out of love with me. I couldn't give you what you thought you deserved in a husband. I wasn't giving it to you. It's not that I couldn't give it to you. I was treating you the way you thought you deserved to be treated. I wasn't acting the way you thought I should act. I wasn't speaking the way you thought I should speak. And so your love with me was conditional. It was based on those things. Your love with God was conditional. And I was the same way. I thought that, all I wanted was a wife that I could love and be with and have sex with and enjoy and that would go and do amazing things for God together, and none of that felt like it was real. I was like, okay, God. I wait for marriage, I save myself, I try and be pure, which, in reality, I wasn't. My addiction to pornography, my other things that I was dealing with. I had a picture of who I was. I thought I was better than I was. And then I'm like, God, you owe me this thing, and you're not giving it to me. And so my relationship with God was transactional. Like, hey, I did this thing; now you do this thing. What are you doing? So I think that's a great thing you brought up, that we think our relationship with God is something outside of what we choose and something that happens to us, or our feelings. Like, I feel close to God, which is so dangerous, because I would imagine there's times when Paul, naked and beat in prison, did not feel close to God. I would imagine when Joseph was in the pit after being thrown in there by his brothers and then sold into slavery and then lied about by the wife and then put in prison and forgotten about by the baker, or the cupbearer, I believe there was times he did not feel close to God, but the truth would be is God was close and was doing something very specific in all of those situations. [Jennifer] Greater than what they could even have imagined. [Aaron] And so, we don't get pictures in those stories of them saying where's God, where are you. God was close, whether they felt him close or not. And that is the reality, that God is so close to us. He's not far off, even when we feel like he's far off. [Jennifer] Was he close to us when we were enduring those four hard years of our marriage? [Aaron] He was probably closer then. When I look back, I'm like, oh, God was there every moment. [Jennifer] But did it feel like it? [Aaron] No, it didn't feel like it. It felt like I was praying and he was just ignoring me. It felt like I was being picked on, or that he was being vindictive, like laughing at me. That's how I felt sometimes. But that's not true at all. So just like we're talking about this falling in and out of love, what I felt about God was false. My feelings were lying to me. [Jennifer] What changed? How did you go from that to being able to choose to love God and remain faithful to him, no matter what? [Aaron] Him confronting me with the truth that what he says is true and what I feel is false. I brought up Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. He brought that story to my attention, and said, look what Jesus did for you. And then he was like, are you not willing then to do the very little thing of just loving your wife, even if you can't get what you want from her? Like, what it cost Christ on the cross is infinitely heavier than what it's gonna cost you to say yes to your bride and keep going. And he just revealed the fallacy in me that my feelings are true and that that's how I'm gonna dictate where I'm gonna go and the direction I go and what I believe, and they're wrong. The Bible tells us, and we'll get to that scripture in a minute, just to not walk in the flesh, but to walk in the Spirit. [Jennifer] Let's talk more about that. So, we're gonna first go through a brief list of why people feel as though they "fall," air quotes here, "out of love." [Aaron] So going back to things that don't feel good, and especially when it's in conjunction with your relationship with your spouse. So tough times. [Jennifer] Yeah, hard circumstances. [Aaron] Like, financial situations and pain and suffering and confusion and those sorts of things, crazy things like loss of children. The hard things can immediately make us not feel good. And you know what? When we don't feel good, Christ wants us to lean on him. He wants us to have his strength and his peace, you know, that surpasses all understanding, and when we don't go to God for those things and when we look to our spouse to fulfill them, which we did that. [Jennifer] Yeah, it's so dangerous. I remember feeling so disappointed in you and in our relationship, because you couldn't do the things that I wanted you to be able to do, which only Christ could do. [Aaron] To fulfill those desires in your heart or to take away the fears that you had, the insecurities, and only God gets to play that role in our life, because you know what, I'm a human. [Jennifer] Yeah, you will fail me. [Aaron] And I remember I tell you this, I even told you this when I asked you to be my wife. I said I'm going to fail you. [Jennifer] Yeah, I should have listened. [Aaron] I warned you. I gave you a little, what do you call it. [Jennifer] Framework, I don't know. [Aaron] Yeah, I gave you a pre-warning. This is what you're getting into. [Jennifer] Okay, so yeah, tough times definitely. Needs not being met. So I'm over here thinking, no, I need this from you and being convinced that I can't continue on in my part until I get what I need. [Aaron] Right, so in our situation specifically, we couldn't have sex. [Jennifer] Yeah, it was painful. [Aaron] And that was very painful. [Jennifer] For me. [Aaron] And I'm thinking, in my mind and in my heart, in my spirit, okay, the one thing that my spouse is supposed to be able to give me directly to me physically is sex, and she can't give it to me. Well then, I'm validated in my sin over here, or I'm allowed to be angry like this, or God, how dare you? And so my love for you was dictated by what you can do for me or what you're not doing for me, and vice versa. You put me on that pedestal of holding you up emotionally and being strong for you when you weren't strong, which husbands should do, but I'm not the main source of that. [Jennifer] Right. [Aaron] I can never fulfill that. That's called idolatry. We can actually put our spouses in a position of God, and what happens is because they're not God, you immediately translate that, we translate that to, oh, they must not love me. [Jennifer] But God is love. [Aaron] God is love, yeah. [Jennifer] Your spouse isn't love, although your spouse is called to love you. God is love. He's the only one that can truly fulfill that. [Aaron] So needs not being met spiritually, emotionally, physically, and I just wanna mention that there are some relationships. I think of veterans that have been hurt physically, or mentally, and they might not be able to fulfill a certain marital role, physically and emotionally and mentally. Does that mean they don't love you? Does that mean you've fallen out of love? No, that's a situation that God's allowed to happen, and that has to be navigated through the Word of God, through the Holy Spirit and patience and perseverance and recognize that those things don't define whether or not you're in love with your spouse or not. And that's a reality for some people. There's some people that will permanently never be able to have sex. [Jennifer] And that's just one thing. [Aaron] That's one thing, yeah. [Jennifer] There's other people who can't walk or can't talk. There's a lot of things. [Aaron] There's people that deal with postpartum depression, wives, moms that go through postpartum depression and might not be able to give emotionally, and that's gonna take a husband to step up more, be like, well, I'm gonna love more right now. I'm not gonna make them feel like I'm abandoning them and skipping out. [Jennifer] Yeah. Okay, so another one would be desiring a different kind of life because of unmet expectations, and you kind of touched on this before, but I struggled with this. I felt like I had these expectations of what marriage should be like. [Aaron] Yeah, what our life should be like, where we should be. [Jennifer] And after years of not receiving that or them being unmet, I started desiring a different kind of life. And that can easily feed a wandering soul. [Aaron] Right, so we fell in love, and we individually had unique pictures of what our relationship would look like, what our life would look like, what our marriage would look like. And so what we do is, well, so I have this picture, picture A, and my marriage is picture Z. Oh, we must not be in love. This must not be right. Something's wrong here. Let's throw this out, start over. And so we look over the fence, or we look other places. So, and this leads to happiness. [Jennifer] Desiring happiness. [Aaron] Desiring happiness. The Bible doesn't promise happiness, but being a Christian should guarantee, if we choose it, joy. [Jennifer] Right, which is more powerful. [Aaron] Which is more powerful, because Paul, when he was naked and beat and in prison, had joy. All the disciples, all of the missionaries and martyrs had joy amidst terrible things. But happiness is not something necessarily promised. Now, happiness can be a fruit of joy, but does lack of happiness equate to lack of love? Like, we're no longer in love, I'm not happy anymore. I wanna speak about this happiness for a second, Jennifer. [Jennifer] I was just gonna say, I hear it all the time. People say, doesn't God want be to be happy? [Aaron] Yeah, well not just doesn't God. They actually, and I don't know who has taught them this, but they literally, they start their message off to us about why they're leaving their husband with saying, God wants me to be happy, and I'm not happy. Therefore, I'm leaving. And so, what they've done is they've literally turned their disobedience and their sin into approval by God, because they've equated happiness to God's will. And that's not true. [Jennifer] Is there a scripture in the Bible that says God wants us to be happy? [Aaron] No. Not to my knowledge. But there's plenty about joy in all circumstances. The joy of the Lord is our strength, and that's something that can come amidst, so if happiness is God's will for us, take that truth, take that gospel, to all of the people suffering through terminal cancer. [Jennifer] Or famine. [Aaron] Or yeah, hunger, or loss of children or worse. I can't even come up with all the situations that a Christian might go through, or even a person, and go to them and saying, hey, God wants you to be happy, and then the moment they're not happy, God doesn't love me, or I'm outside God's will. It's a false gospel. The happiness is good, and it comes. But I think joy, the Bible talks of joy, which is a fruit of the spirit. Happiness is not a fruit of the spirit. So if we equate, again, if we take words and we equal them to other things, like happiness equals love, happiness equals God's will, the moment we're not happy, boom, we're no longer in love, we're not in God's will. We can make all sorts of crazy decisions based off of that equation. And it's just wrong. [Jennifer] So, moving down the list, we have two more. One is just experiencing overall discontentment in life. [Aaron] Right, I'm not happy with what I have. This isn't what I want, that I want more. [Jennifer] Just constantly, like you're playing that mental reel over and over and over again about all the things that make you not content, and then desiring a pain-free or comfortable life, which I think everybody, at the root of their heart, wants a pain-free life. But is that a reality? [Aaron] It's not that we need to pursue that. I don't think that's what our goal is in life. But if our goal is in our marriage, if that's our definition of a good, healthy, loving marriage, 100% of marriages are gonna be let down. But that's why we see such a high divorce rate in the church and in the world, because we've defined love with all of these terms. Comfort, happiness, fulfillment, contentment. And if I don't feel those things, boom, I must not be in love anymore. [Jennifer] Okay, so what's the bottom line? [Aaron] The bottom line is love was never intended to be just a feeling. God gave us these feelings as a gift to accompany our love, but when those feelings disappeared, love doesn't disappear. It's called the honeymoon phase. Like, you're enamored with your spouse. Everything's new and fresh. But what happens when it's not new wand fresh? What happens when life's boring? [Jennifer] Or hard. [Aaron] What happens when life's hard? Love in this situations should grow. [Jennifer] And endure. [Aaron] Yeah, because they endure. The relationship turns into one of stamina, endurance, perseverance. [Jennifer] I Corinthians 13:7 says love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Not some things, not the few things that I can handle. It's all things. So if we say that we love one another, we have to be able to bear all things and endure all things and have that kind of perseverance. [Aaron] And it comes down to, that's what Christ did. He endured the cross, because he loved us. And that's amazing. Even now in the church age, in the age that we live in now where God's grace and mercy is just poured out on the world and he's being patient, it says that his patience and kindness is to lead us to repentance, talking of love. Why doesn't he just strike us all down, because we are sinners, you know? He's righteous; we're not. But he's patient with us, and his love for us is in such a way that he shows us by example of how we should love, in forgiveness and patience and endurance, because that's what Christ did on the cross. He took the sins of the world, that anyone who believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life. That is love, and if Christ can love that way, and this is what God showed me, is if Christ can love you like this, Aaron, what has your wife ever done that's worse than what you or the world has done to me? Nothing. Literally it doesn't matter what you do to me. It's not unforgivable. So I guess I would just say, if love is based on something that we have no control over, something that happens to us, if love is a feeling, then we're literally basing the most beautiful thing that God has ever given us, love, which he is love, it's who he is, and we boiled it down to a fleshly thing. Like, that is a fleeting, like, oh, some might get it, some might not. And I think we should rather look at love as a muscle that needs to be strengthened. [Jennifer] I like that, exercised. [Aaron] Or, actually, here's a better analogy. Love is a seed. You plant a seed, and then you nurture it and you grow it. Our love started, I should say. We didn't fall in love. Our love started back when we were dating, when we were learning each other. [Jennifer] We were attracted to one another. [Aaron] We were attracted. [Jennifer] We chose to spend time with one another. [Aaron] Yeah, back then, our love was so, if you think about it, our love was so immature, because it was based on very vain things, how we looked, how we talked, how we spent time with each other, things that made us laugh. And now, our love is based on. [Jennifer] So much more. [Aaron] Oh my, so much more. Surviving hard things, flourishing in hard things, renewing in the way we think about each other, communication, knowledge. [Jennifer] Ministering to our kids. Ministering to others. [Aaron] Yeah, having children and learning how to become one in our parenting. So our love now is built, it's growing. I wouldn't say it's a big sycamore tree or something. But I would say it's a tree now, where it once was just this seed that could easily be stamped out if we didn't take care of it. So I think that is a more accurate way to take a picture, is that love was something we planted, we chose to plant. Hey, we're gonna take a risk on this seed. We're gonna love this, and let's grow it. So then, if that's the case, then "falling out of love," air quotes again, is really choosing to let the tree die. [Jennifer] Right, which, I mean, going back to that quote by Gary Thomas from Sacred Marriage, biblical love isn't hate; it's apathy. [Aaron] Letting it die. [Jennifer] Letting it die. [Aaron] Stop watering it, stop feeding it, stop giving it sunlight, smother it, and it can even be worse than that, intentionally harming the love because you want out, because you're not happy, and now doing very hateful, wicked things within the marriage. [Jennifer] Being disrespectful, letting your anger lash out. [Aaron] Cheating. [Jennifer] Cheating. [Aaron] Yeah, unfaithfulness with your heart, eyes, physically. [Jennifer] All things that are lack of self-control, because you're not exercising that muscle of self-control. [Aaron] So here's another quote from Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas, and it says this: "Christian love is an aggressive movement, "an active commitment. "In reality, we choose where to place our affections," which goes back to, are we gonna choose to nurture our love seed? Feels so weird. But this tree that we're growing together, as we're being weaved together and we're growing this love. And I just love that picture of that. It's an aggressive movement, an active commitment, that we are not going to just whimsically and apathetically see if love continues on without us doing anything, that we're gonna recognize that it's no, no, I'm going to choose again to love you today, and then when something happens, actually, I'm gonna choose right now to love you anyway. [Jennifer] Yeah, and I like that. This quote, you know, when it says in reality, we choose where to place our affections, I think sometimes we can choose to place our affections on what we see outside the marriage. [Aaron] So, let's just give 'em some practical ways, 'cause now we've dispelled it. You don't fall in and out of love. It's a lie the enemy uses to break up marriages all the time, and as mature Christians, we're gonna pursue loving our spouses the biblical way and saying, yes, Lord, I'm gonna choose to love, because you are love, and I wanna love like this. So what are some practical things that the couples listening can start thinking about, start pursuing and saying, oh, we're gonna invest in this seed that we've planted, at whatever point that seed was planted. [Jennifer] Okay, so first thing I would say is intimacy. I think I had this idea in our marriage that intimacy just happened, and it was something that was natural. [Aaron] It was always gonna be magical. [Jennifer] Yeah, I came to find out, it's actually something that needs to be planned for and prepared for. [Aaron] Sought after. [Jennifer] And requires intentionality. And so, I would say, be intentional in pursuing one another in those ways. And intimacy is a lot of different things. It's not just physical. It's also in the way that you communicate and just being thoughtful of one another. [Aaron] Yeah, but intimacy, the physical intimacy cannot be neglected. [Jennifer] Sure, so important. [Aaron] But the emotional intimacy can't be neglected either. [Jennifer] Either, yeah. [Aaron] The Bible, I just wanted to bring this up, it uses the word knew or knowledge when it comes to physical intimacy in the Bible. It says so-and-so knew so-and-so, and it's talking about sex. This intimacy we're talking about, it's radical transparency, radical openness, that you're not afraid to be naked emotionally, naked physically, naked spiritually before your spouse, and that you know each other, and that's a lifelong pursuit. So, and that combats falling out of love, or feeling like you're falling out of love, or in the truth, choosing to not love anymore. [Jennifer] Yeah, and if you do feel like, you know, not that you're apathetic towards one another, but that you just have some isolating tendencies going on in your marriage, be the first one to initiate intimacy. [Aaron] Yeah, go open those doors, go open those windows. Let light in. [Jennifer] Okay, another one is have an eternal perspective and a hope that fuels your heart so that you can persevere. Having a hope for why we're doing this thing called marriage and what we have to look forward to changed the way that we were able to persevere in our relationship. [Aaron] Yeah, and so recognizing that my wife is also my sister in the Lord. Like, the Bible tells us how to interact with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Then I get to see her and say, well, I'm gonna treat her well. She's my closest neighbor, so I'm gonna love her as myself. I'm gonna use the gifts that God's given me to bless her and to serve her. And so if we recognize that, that we are both part of the body, then we're not gonna mistreat and take advantage of and do things that we wouldn't do to another believer. So, another one is discipline yourself in walking faithfully and humbly. [Jennifer] So real quick, I just wanna read one another quote. I know this is a heavy Gary Thomas episode. [Aaron] Well, this book was hugely influential on our marriage. [Jennifer] Yeah, if you guys haven't read Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas, you should definitely go grab a copy. But on page 156, it says this: "One of the great spiritual challenges for any Christian "is to become less self-absorbed. "We are born intensely self-focused. "The discipline of Christian marriage "calls us into the Christian reality of sharing "and enjoying fellowship in a uniquely intimate way. "Maintaining an interest in and empathy for someone else "is by no means an easy discipline to maintain, "but it is a vital one. "It is a skill that must be learned." I love this quote, because I think it's so important to recognize that there is discipline required of us, and there's an obligation, like I said earlier, to one another, to love one another, but to also enjoy fellowship with each other, which is what Gary's saying right here, and to maintain an interest for, an empathy for each other, and again, he says this isn't easy, but it is vital, and it's something that we need to learn. Like you said, it's a muscle that we should be exercising. [Aaron] Yeah, a lot of times, the Bible uses the term walk in love. So it's something that you walk out on a daily basis. In I John, it says practice righteousness. So these are things that we get to practice toward each other, with each other, for each other, on a daily basis, on a moment by moment. And even if you're in a super, super hard situation and season of your marriage, you can right now choose to walk in love with your spouse. [Jennifer] And truly, this is walking in maturity. This is what makes us mature, is by choosing to walk this way. [Aaron] Yeah, so again, walking in maturity. I would say be okay with hardship, and ask God how it can be used to mature you, to mature us? So God, this season's hard. God, I don't feel in love. I don't feel close to my spouse. Help me, show me how I should see correctly. Show me where I can change. Show me how I can love my wife still, love my husband still. How can I serve them? Help me do it in your Spirit. And then another one is the last one, actually, is recognize there's something greater at risk. It's what we talk about in the Marriage After God book, is that our marriages are meant for more than just happily ever after. Having a good, strong, healthy, mature, growing, thriving, loving, intimate marriage isn't for that alone. That's not the end. It's the means to the end. The end is that we are witnesses for Christ, that we are preaching the gospel with our words and our lives, that our marriages are pictures of the gospel to the world, that the husband represents Christ, that the wife represents the church, that their relationship represents an unconditional love that Christ had for his church, and how we interact with each other and how we raise our children and how we treat each other. And so, and not just that, but in I Timothy chapter three, it talks about the ministry of an overseer in a church and how it's a noble task, it's a noble thing for any believer to pursue, any man in the church, and it talks about having one wife and managing their home well, and it says, how can you manage the household of God if you can't manage your own home, right? If there's no self-control within me, if there's no love between me and my wife, if my children don't honor me and cherish me, those are things that the Bible says are results of how we choose to walk with our spouse. And our authority, our power, our message gets diluted or destroyed when we don't love that way. When love is something that we can just fall out of, what it essentially is saying is God can just fall out of love. Like, oh, today I don't love you anymore. And that's just false. He is love. He cannot not love us. And so, we need to show that. And so the greater thing that's at risk is the gospel. And when we don't have a correct understanding and definition of love in our marriage and what that looks like, we show an incorrect gospel to the world. And we need to recognize that. [Jennifer] So, the beginning of this episode started with can you fall out of love in marriage. That wouldn't be the right way to say it. It would be, are you choosing to not love your spouse anymore? And so I think that this is a really important topic, and it's something that we should address, even if maybe you're not feeling this way. If you feel like you love your spouse and you're walking the way you should be biblically, I think it's still important to address some of these things and these practical things that we've brought up and just see, you know, evaluate your marriage and see, are you walking the way that God wants you to be walking, and are you choosing love, regardless of your circumstances and regardless of anything else that's going on? [Aaron] Yeah, and maybe you're not, like Jennifer said, not at that place of not in love anymore, but are you choosing apathy? Are you just not caring? [Jennifer] Are you being lazy? [Aaron] Yeah, are you being lazy? And I think that's something that we should be aware of and repent of if we are. If we're being lazy in our marriage, then we're not loving. We're kind of being self-focused and hoping that our husband or our wife is gonna love us the way we wanna be loved, but we're not gonna give the love the way we wanna be loved. I just don't think that's the way a Christian should walk, and I think we need to, I mean, I'm guilty of this sometimes and need to change. Like, I'm being lazy, I'm gonna step up, I love you. Let's work on this, let's grow, let's water this tree. [Jennifer] I love it. Okay, we wanna invite you guys to join us in prayer. Dear Lord, may we always choose love. May we always have hearts that are motivated by love to be unified, pursuing intimacy and peace in marriage. Thank you for equipping us and empowering us by your Holy Spirit to choose to love unconditionally and sacrificially. We pray against our flesh from getting in the way, and we pray against our selfish ways. Please continue to sanctify us and transform us so that we would be more like you. Protect our marriage from the threats of the enemy and his evil desire to tear us down. Lord, please help us to be unified as one and help us to love each other in the way we interact with each other every day. May our commitment to remain steadfast in our love for each other glorify you in our marriage. In Jesus's name, amen. [Aaron] Amen. Hey, we just wanna thank everyone for listening this week, and we pray that this episode blessed you. We pray that it's gonna cause some good conversations, and we look forward to having you next week. Did you enjoy today's show? If you did, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a review on iTunes. Also, if you're interested, you can find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. 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