Marriage That Last

Well, good morning.

I didn't realize this until this week.

My oldest daughter, who is 37 years old,

you say, why are you telling that?

Because I'm going to tell you a story about it.

She said, are you preaching at Pick and Sunday?

I said, yes.

She said, are you going to preach a sanctity of life message?

And I had already prepared a message.

I said, I'll take care of it.

So I'll mention it.

Today is Sanctity of Human Life Sunday.

And we should care about life.

We should not just be against abortion.

We should be for adoption.

And we should practice it.

My oldest daughter that I mentioned is 37 years old.

Over five years ago, she finally came to a conclusion after going through surgeries and different drugs and all kinds of specialists.

And the doctors told her that most likely she would never be able to have children.

So she and her husband started the adoption process.

And usually they had been told it could take up to two years.

Well, within a matter of nine weeks, they had adopted a little boy and brought him home from the hospital.

Now, people ask her, she started getting phone calls from all over the place.

And how did you do that?

And she said, the only thing I can tell you is just God answered our prayers.

And that little boy is a little over five years old now.

His dad is left-handed.

And guess what?

He's left-handed.

And he looks like his papa.

And he is as much a part of our family in any way, in any depth.

He's one of us.

He's with us.

He's ours.

He's ours.

But a few weeks ago, she sent us a text.

It had a picture in it with one of those sticks that women use to tell if they're pregnant.

And it was showing positive.

And then at Christmas, they gave us, as we were opening our gifts,

we opened one package and it was a frame.

And it says, we're having a boy.

And not only that, but the doctors told her that everything so far in the development of this child is perfect.

And he doesn't consider this an at-risk pregnancy at all.

When she went to the doctor and he was examining her, he said, now you've had this and this and you've had this surgery and this surgery and you've been on these drugs.

He said, and you're pregnant.

And then the doctor said, wow.

And my daughter said, well, I want you to know that there's some women in my church that have been praying for me to get pregnant.

And his nurse said, oh my goodness, that makes the hair stand up on my neck.

But we think our first grandson in that family was a miracle.

And we're sure that the second grandson is a miracle too.

So, sanctity of human life is about respecting life.

It's about opposing things that would destroy life, but promoting things that bring about a better life.

Well, this morning I want to talk to you about marriage.

Now, I know some of you have been through, I don't know, I've done three seminars and then I've done retreats twice.

So, probably everybody here has heard this.

Let's just be dismissed and go home.

I know you're going to want to pray for Fred as he recovers and hope that that procedure, as far as the recovery goes, will be quick and he'll be on schedule for Wednesday night.

We have been away a lot.

I did tell Fred before we joined, we would be the sorriest members that you have.

And we've pretty much lived up to it.

We went to one interim and then two weeks later we went to another one and then we stopped that at the end of the year.

And then I started a Bible conference on Sunday night in Inman.

And we finished that tonight.

And then next Sunday we go to Union Baptist Church in Iva for no more than three months.

And then, to highlight it all, on the first Sunday in April, we'll be going to preach at the First Baptist Church of Lowndesville.

Do you know where Lowndesville is?

A man came to the convention and came up to our booth and said, would you preach for me sometime?

I said, I'd be delighted.

And he said, well now we just got a little old church.

And I said, you do not.

He said, what do you mean?

I said, you got the biggest church in Lowndesville.

He said, that's right.

That's what he tells everybody.

Well, Genesis chapter 2 and verse 24 is the most important verse in the Bible about marriage.

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

It's quoted by Jesus in Mark 10, Matthew 19.

It's quoted by Paul in 1 Corinthians 6 and in Ephesians 5.

It says, for this reason or for this cause,

A man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife and they shall become one flesh.

We've heard for some time, for a period of years, that we had a divorce rate in this country of about 50%.

And then the last few years we began to hear, no, that's way down now.

We don't have a divorce rate anywhere near 50%.

Well, Bella DiPaolo, writing in a recent edition of Psychology Today, said,

The chances that a marriage will end in divorce is probably somewhere between 42% and 45%.

But couples who go for at least eight hours of premarital counseling increase their probability of staying married by 32%.

So it's important to prepare for marriage.

Dysfunctional marriages includes divorce is about 50% of all marriages now.

Well, when you get married, you should prepare for it.

We should enter it thinking you want this to last a lifetime.

If you want to be an electrician, approved electrician, you have to work and get a license.

If you want to be a contractor, you have to get a license.

If you want to be a driver, you have to take a written test and then you have to drive to get a license.

Oh, and pass them.

To be a counselor, you have to get a degree, a graduate degree, and then you have to do two years of clinical,

and then you have to take an exam.

So in just about everything that you're licensed or certified in, you have to have some kind of preparation.

But in order to get married in this country, all you've got to do is go down to the courthouse,

get you a license, get somebody to sign it, and you are married.

Preparation precedes blessing, and that includes marriage.

Now as I look out, I can tell in some of your faces, you look at me and you're saying,

but I've been married for a long time and I don't need this.

And I love you, but you do.

Because if you're okay, there is somebody else that needs your encouragement and your help as they build their marriage.

So when you look at Genesis 2.24, he's really talking about doing three things.

The first thing he's talking about, he said, for this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother.

So the first thing is leave.

Now what does that mean?

Well, I've had people over the years when I was doing counseling,

and a fair amount of it would come for premarital counseling,

and I would ask the question, where are you going to live?

Sometimes I'd get this answer.

Oh, we've got a place, we've got a lot next to mom and daddy.

And I would respond, can you live at least an hour away from your mamas and your daddies?

And the reason for that is, you have to achieve some emotional distance from your family of origin

in order to establish your own family,

and it's easier to achieve emotional distance if you have geographical distance.

That and some other practical things.

If you live next door, it's real easy for anybody to just pop in anytime unannounced.

But if you live an hour away, they've got to make some preparations to let you know they're coming.

So leave.

He says, leave your family to build a new family.

And then he says, and shall cleave to his wife.

And if the Hebrews had a word for super glue, this would be it.

To stick together, through thick and through thin, through sickness and in health,

to stay with each other, to cleave.

And then the third thing is implied.

It's weave.

Have you ever seen those ladder back chairs that had cane bottoms in them?

They were woven?

Anybody?

We can be interactive.

Anybody?

Okay.

If you took a ladder back chair and you took a five-gallon bucket of water

and you poured it in the seat of that chair, what would happen to the water?

You got the answer.

What is it?

It would go through.

That's right.

Thank you, Mike.

It would go through.

Then you wipe it off because it's covered in polyurethane and everything.

You wipe it off.

Then you sit down in that chair.

What's going to happen to the chair?

And the answer is nothing.

And that's the way marriage ought to be.

We ought to have enough space between us that a lot of stuff can pass through.

But we need to have enough strength in that weave that we're going to stick together.

So he says, leave and cleave and weave.

Now, I want you to look what he says for this reason, for the reason for the cause of marriage.

A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and they too shall become one flesh.

So if you look in Genesis chapter 2 and verse 18, it says,

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

The Lord said, it is not good for the man to be alone.

I will make a helper suitable for him.

And that operative word in that verse is suitable.

It means to correspond to each other.

It doesn't mean to be exactly like each other.

And it doesn't mean that you complete somebody else.

I heard it when I was growing up.

Many of you heard it.

I heard preachers preach it.

They'd come and they'd preach on the family and they'd say,

You need to find you a young man.

You need to find you a young woman.

We're talking about young people.

And you can complete her and she can complete you.

And I bought it.

I thought, yeah, that's the way it is.

Until years later, I realized that's just not true.

There is nobody on this earth who can complete you but Jesus Christ.

Augustine says man has a God-shaped vacuum inside of him.

And the only thing that will complete him, that will fill him, that will make him whole

is a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

So what does he mean when he says suitable?

He means someone who can complement the other.

Not complete, but complement to aid each other.

Well, I want to share with you this morning what I call the four F's of marriage.

And the first one is the foundation.

The foundation of marriage is commitment or love.

The greatest commandment is love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind.

The second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself.

And your number one neighbor will be your mate.

So you love God, that's the foundation.

And then the very next thing is you love your neighbor.

Who is your neighbor?

Anybody that God puts in the path of your life whose needs you can help meet.

So you love your wife, you love your husband.

Well, what does that really look like in practice?

Well, first of all, it's the word agape.

And agape is not necessarily a feeling word.

It's a word of commitment.

So sometimes we talk about love.

And in our culture, we bandy around a word.

And we have one word that covers a multitude of things.

The Greeks had four.

And they were more specific in what that word meant.

But love that's talked about in Scripture.

For God so loved the world, for example.

Love one another.

Love the brethren.

Love your enemies.

That word is agape.

And it's not talking so much about feeling as it is a commitment.

Have you ever noticed when two people meet?

And they meet because, well, they like the way each other looks.

And then they like each other's personality.

And then they like some of the things they have in common.

And they date for two or three weeks.

And invariably, somewhere along the way, somebody's going to say,

I love you.

And what they mean is this.

I am infatuated with you.

And we know that all relationships begin with infatuation.

We also know if it doesn't grow out of the infatuation stage,

before people get married,

it becomes a predictor for trouble later in the marriage.

But in a practical sense, what does that look like?

How does it show up in marriage?

Well, 1 Corinthians 13, verses 4 through 7,

1 Corinthians 13:4–7

describes agape, describes this love.

It's not a definition of it.

It's a description of it.

Love is patient.

Love is kind and is not jealous.

Love does not brag and is not arrogant.

Does not act unbecomingly.

It does not seek its own.

Is not provoked.

Does not take into account a wrong suffered.

Does not rejoice in unrighteousness.

But rejoices with the truth.

Bears all things.

Believes all things.

Which, by the way, means gives the other person the benefit of the doubt.

Hopes all things.

Endures all things.

Love is from God.

God is love.

The fruit of His Spirit is love.

And we can't really love another person

until we have the love of God inside of us.

But it's seen.

It shows up.

What it looks like in practical ways,

when you love your mate,

you show your mate that you value them.

If you devalue them,

it is the opposite of love.

So, two people that say they love each other

and are going to build a marriage

are two people who are going to be showing that other person value

throughout their marriage.

Even when they get angry with each other.

Even when they don't agree with things,

they still show the other person value.

So the foundations.

Love God.

Love your neighbor and your first neighbor as your mate.

The second thing is friendship.

Our best friends should be our mates.

That's not always the case.

And a lot of dysfunctional marriages,

it's not the case at all.

And some people have even been taught

that your wife or your husband should not be your best friend.

Your wife or your husband should be your best friend.

Have you ever heard of a man named John Gottman?

Anybody?

John Gottman?

He was a professor out at the University of Washington.

He had a place called the Love Lab.

And it was an apartment that the university set up for him.

Couples that were having trouble in their marriage would come.

This apartment was set up with cameras and microphones.

They would take their blood pressure and their heart rate periodically.

And you'd think that going into a situation like that,

it sounds kind of clinical and sterile,

that there would be, people would be so self-conscious about,

how am I going to act?

What am I going to do?

But they found out that after being there,

get settling in,

for two hours,

they started acting like themselves.

And in over 35 years,

they recorded all this stuff.

And Gottman and his associates put it all together.

And he started to publish his material

and then write popular books.

One was called Why Marriages Fail.

Another one was The Seven Principles to a Successful Marriage.

If you were to go to the Gottman Institute today for 2018,

they've got a program.

You go online to Gottman Institute.

He's Professor Emeritus at Washington now,

and he heads up the Gottman Institute

with his wife, who's also a clinical psychologist.

But they've got this plan.

Now you go there, I think it's for 10 minutes a day

for a certain period of time,

how to build, how to strengthen your marriage.

Now, John Gottman is a Jewish man.

John Gottman is not a Christian.

But he is regarded by those who look at relationships

as one of the leading experts.

He's been called the guru of relationships in America.

Well, friendship, is it important?

This is what Gottman says.

The determining factor in whether wives feel satisfied

with sex, romance, and passion in their marriage

is 70% by the quality of the couple's friendship.

For men, the determining factor

is by 70% the quality of the couple's friendship.

And then he makes this little caveat here

that sounds like a shot at John Gray,

who wrote the book,

Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus.

He said,

So, men and women come from the same planet after all.

We need to build friendship.

Song of Solomon, chapter 5 and verse 16 says,

Song of Solomon 5 · chapter mention

The king is admiring his wife,

Nesheulamite.

And he says,

This is my beloved and this is my friend.

Well, if we're going to keep our friendship,

and that's going to be a big part

of keeping a marriage strong,

making a marriage last,

what do we need to do?

We need to make sure that the positives

are more than the negatives.

That pleasing behaviors

are more than negative behaviors.

Gottman also came up with this formula,

and he says,

Any successful marriage

will have a ratio

of at least five positives

to one negative.

And he said,

Anything less than that

brings about a degree of tension

and even dysfunction

inside the marriage.

1 Corinthians, chapter 7,

1 Corinthians 7:32

verse 32,

Paul wrote,

I want you to be free from concern.

One who is unmarried

is concerned about the things of the Lord,

how he may please the Lord.

But one who is married

is concerned about the things of the world,

how he may please his wife.

Because marriage is an earthly institution.

It is of this world.

And his interests are divided.

The woman who is unmarried

and the virgin

is concerned about the things of the Lord,

that she may be holy

both in body and spirit.

But one who is married

is concerned about the things of the Lord,

how she may please her husband.

So what he says in that verse is this.

Here's the ideal thing to do.

Don't ever get married.

Spend all your time,

all your money,

all your devotion

in serving God.

But he goes on to say,

but most of us,

I'm thinking 99% of us

don't have that gift.

And then he comes with this principle.

So,

if husband,

you have a wife,

he says,

please her.

And wives,

if you have a husband,

please him.

Now I think that has to be

disciplined by reason

and common sense.

If my wife told me

I would like a new,

a spanking new BMW,

my response would be

we can't afford it.

She would say,

but I've been watching,

I think it's Snyder's in Greenville.

She said,

I've been watching Snyder's

and between 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning,

there's no security.

She said,

I've got this thing

that I downloaded,

here's how you hotbar

one of those BMWs

and get inside of it.

She said,

you could steal it for me.

Now she said,

and then she said,

that would please me.

And I'm going to say,

nothing doing

because I'm not interested

in starting a prison ministry.

So it has to be with reason

and good sense.

But husbands,

please your wives.

That's what he's saying.

Wives,

please your husband.

And now,

in order to do things like that,

we have to communicate.

Inside a relationship,

in any kind of relationship,

there's a communication equation

that equals 100%.

7% are the words we use

and we thought they were so important.

7% of the words we use,

38% is the way we say the words,

and 55% are non-verbals,

body language.

And all those years

I spent preaching

and doing the seminars and stuff,

I developed a gift.

When I'm preaching to a congregation,

I can tell.

100% of the time,

I look out

when somebody's not listening.

I can tell.

Somebody's got their legs crossed like this,

they got their hands crossed like this,

their heads roll back

on the back of the pew

and I hear this noise.

I know they're not listening.

I know they're not listening.

Non-verbals are important.

How you look at somebody

in a relationship is important.

One of the things

that's real important

is how we have an open posture

to one another.

How we imply to that person,

I'm open to you.

And sometimes we don't.

Sometimes it's a habit.

Sometimes we're talking to people,

we automatically do this.

Well, that's an example

of closed posture.

Sometimes you do it

because you're cold.

I was leading a retreat

in Ridgecrest

and there was a group of people

and there was this one

little woman on the front.

This was in February

and it actually was snowing

a little bit that night.

It was cold.

They had problems with the heat

and she's doing this

the whole time like this.

And I said, stop.

I shouldn't have done it.

I've asked God to forgive me.

But I said, stop.

I said, this is an example

of closed posture.

Well, we had a break.

And then she comes up to me

and she's,

I'm talking to somebody

and she tugs on my sleeve.

She says, Dr. Gray?

I said, yes, ma'am.

I want you to know

I was listening to you

but it's so cold in here

I'm about to freeze.

She was right.

It was cold.

She was trying to stay warm.

But there are clues.

Maintain contact.

A little principle of solar.

If you want to really

communicate with somebody

face that other person squarely.

Square it up.

Have an open posture.

Don't close anything.

Lean slightly forward.

By the way,

you listen to sermons better

if you find yourself

leaning slightly forward.

Just lean slightly forward.

Maintain eye contact

with that person

and then breathe and relax.

And that helps you become

a better listener.

Now, sometimes men

have a problem with listening.

How many women in the room

would say, I agree with that?

If you agree with that,

would you raise your hand

high and proud?

Okay.

Alright.

In fact, the number,

you know what the number one

complaint that women

have about men is?

They don't listen.

So then I ask the men,

is it true?

Do you listen?

Jeff said in the first service,

he's listening as long as

there's not a ball game on

that he's interested in.

Men, Deborah Tannen

wrote a book called

Men and Women in Conversation.

She'd done her PhD work

on communication,

especially in relationships.

And she said that men

actually hear.

But she kind of explained it

this way,

that because men

don't like to get

all involved in messy

emotional stuff,

because men just don't

like that stuff,

that they kind of,

we kind of come

to this conclusion.

Okay, she's going to

share something with me.

I can tell this is going

to be emotional.

It's going to take a while.

It's going to tear me up.

So, I'm just not really

going to listen.

I hear her.

I know what she said,

but I'm not going to listen.

And she gets mad at him

and she goes off

and they have a little

dispute.

And he thinks he's won

because he thinks he's won

because he thinks

her anger is less

than him having to go through

dealing with all that stuff.

Well, since I said something

about number one complaint

women have about men,

what's the number one complaint

that men have about women?

Huh?

Talk too much.

That's not right,

but that's good.

All these seminars

and stuff I've gotten,

that's the top answer I get

is women talk too much

and women are more verbal

than men.

But here's the number one.

Women say their number one

complaint about men

is that,

men say their number one

complaint about women

is that women are always

trying to change them.

Always trying to change them.

And I suppose you have

to talk some in order

to do that.

Well, the third F

I want you to look at

is finances.

Finances.

For years and years,

the top three problems

in America

has been sex,

in-laws,

and money.

Today,

and it has been

for the last several years,

number one is money.

We have over

one million bankruptcies

a year.

We've had that

since 2007.

We have a total

credit card debt

for all Americans

of around

700 billion dollars.

Most couples

in America

have a debt problem.

The average amount

of unpaid credit card debt

per family

in America

averages

15,355 dollars.

And the average debt

excluding the mortgage

is 129,579 dollars.

And we've got

an undisciplined

approach

to finances.

Now, Gottman,

Dave Ramsey's one,

Larry Burkett was one,

say everybody

should have a budget.

And like I told

the service at 8 o'clock,

I would not suggest

to the First Baptist

Church of Pickens

that everybody here

doesn't have a budget.

I know you do.

I know you follow it.

I know you plan it

every year.

I know that everybody

here has got a budget.

But for those two couples

that don't have one,

this is what they say

how you go about

preparing a budget.

You list all

of your expenditures.

All the money

you've got going out,

you list it.

You come up

with a total.

And then you come over here

on this side of the ledger

and you list up

all of your income.

List all of your income.

And if your expenditures

are greater

than your revenue,

guess what you've got?

You've got a federal government

on your hands.

No, you've got a problem.

You've got a problem.

And so the idea,

and all of these

finance councils

say the same thing,

you've got to cut down

on expenditures

because you have to have

a balanced budget.

And in that balanced budget,

you should leave room

for tithing.

Not just nodding to God,

but to actually tithing.

And here's the good news

about that.

Tithing ought to be

a part of our budget.

And the good news is,

you don't have to give

just 10%.

We live in the age of grace.

You can give 20%

if you want to.

Saving should be

a part of that.

I have had couples

over the years,

usually the man

would say to me,

and this happened

to one guy in particular,

I still remember it,

and he was a student

at Southwestern Seminary.

He said,

I can't afford to tithe.

And my response to him was,

you can't afford

not to tithe.

Years later,

he came back to me

and he sat down

and he said,

I want you to know something.

That was right.

He said,

when I stopped tithing,

we got in all kinds

of trouble,

all kind of financial trouble.

He said,

we finally got it

straightened out.

But yeah,

tithing should be a part.

Our children should know

that we value God enough

that we put aside

what we're going to give

to God

in our family budget.

And God calls us

to be good stewards,

to be faithful stewards.

1 Corinthians 4 and verse 2

says,

it's required of stewards

that one be found

trustworthy or faithful.

And Malachi says,

bring the whole tithe

into the storehouse.

We don't love money.

We shouldn't live for money.

But everybody here

has to use money

for certain things.

And we should be good stewards

with what God has given us.

In fact,

Proverbs 13 and verse 22

says,

a good man leaves

an inheritance

to his children's children.

So finances.

Our finances could be in shape

because if it's the number one problem

that couples have now,

then it means that

once we get that in shape,

then we've reduced

the number one problem

that most couples have.

Well,

the last thing is

finishing well.

Finishing well.

Marriage is an earthly institution.

The Bible says

they're neither giving

nor receiving

in the resurrection.

It's made for the earth.

No marriage in heaven.

I know some people

have been married a long time

and love each other

and care for each other

and just have endeared themselves

to each other

will say things like

I can't imagine heaven

without my husband

or without my wife.

I even heard a president

of a Bible college

at one of our conferences

he was speaking

and he said

I can't imagine heaven

without his wife.

But the truth is

when we get to heaven

that is such a higher,

greater experience

than we've ever seen,

it won't matter.

I mean,

it'll be something

so much greater

it'll be enveloped

in something greater.

We'll know people

but we'll know them

and understand them

at such a higher level,

such a spiritual power

and dimension

that there won't be

the need for marriage.

Well,

couples get into difficulty

along the way

and sometimes

they don't finish well.

So I want to give you

four things

that Gottman says

and he says

these are core things.

He says

if these four things

are present in a marriage,

there's a 94% chance

that marriage

is going to fail.

So number one

is contempt.

Contempt.

And that is the intention

to insult,

to hurt,

or to damage

your mate.

It's things like

name calling

and hostile humor

of ridicule,

mocking,

negative body language,

sighs,

eye rolling.

Have you ever been

talking to your mate

and they do something

like this?

Or they just

roll their eyes at you?

How do you interpret that?

Well,

what Gottman says

is they're sending you

a message.

That's a message

of contempt

and he says

don't do it.

The second one

is criticism.

Now,

he makes a distinction

between a criticism

and a complaint.

He says

a criticism

is global.

A criticism

is broad

and a complaint

is specific.

A criticism

is an attack

on somebody

and a complaint

is pointing out

something

that can be done.

Suppose that Mike

is kind of

sloppy at home

and he gets ready

to go to bed

at night

and he just

throws clothes

all over the place

before he gets

to the bedroom.

And finally,

his wife just had it.

Oh,

that's you.

Oh,

we'll just reverse it.

So,

and then

she finally

had it with him

and she says,

Mike,

honey,

look at this.

I want you

to pick up

your clothes.

I don't like it

when you leave

your clothes out.

Now,

that's a complaint.

He can do

something about that.

She hasn't attacked him.

But if she said,

Mike,

look at this,

look at this,

you are a slob.

That's criticism

because he's

attacked his person.

So,

Gottman says

marriages

can thrive

on complaints

when they're

delivered rightly

but they'll dry up

from criticism.

The third thing

is defensiveness.

You retaliate

against your mate

in order to

protect yourself.

In other words,

you make something

the problem

that's not a problem.

For an example,

you get married,

guys,

and you promise

your wife,

I'll always

carry the garbage,

put it in the can,

I'll always

push it out

to the curb

on the days

when the truck

comes to pick it up.

And that

goes good

for three months

and then you

stop doing it.

and the garbage

just piles up

right there

in your mud room.

Maybe spills

over in the garage.

And you know

what happens

to garbage

if it sits

around a few days?

What happens?

It stinketh.

Yeah,

it stinks.

And she's

just had it

and she comes

to you

and says,

you promised

you would carry

this garbage

always out.

The house

smells as a stench.

You need to

take this garbage out.

Well,

he gets defensive

and he says this,

well,

you don't cook

anymore.

You used to cook

supper every,

and you don't ever

cook anymore.

What's going on

with that?

And all of a sudden

she's kind of

backpedaling

and she's thinking,

wait a minute,

is that true?

I don't cook

supper anymore?

That's a simple

illustration,

but that's what

defensiveness is.

It's putting a

problem out there

that's not a problem

in order to

protect yourself

against something

that's presented

to you.

And then the last

thing,

the fourth one

is stonewalling.

And when you

stonewall,

you send a message.

Have you ever

heard of people

in the south,

I know this is

true,

that say that

they're not getting

along with each

other and they

say,

what's going on?

They say,

we're not speaking

to each other.

You ever heard

that?

You ever seen

people do that?

Not speaking to

each other?

I remember

watching my parents

do it.

One day I went in

and they both were

sick and I go in

to see them and

they're sitting on

different ends of

the couch and

they're not talking

to each other.

And I'm there for

several minutes and

they're not talking

to each other.

They talk to me but

they're not talking

to each other.

What's going on

with y'all?

We're not speaking

to each other.

Stonewalling is

like that.

It's a deliberate

move to build a

barrier to get

away from dealing

with the other

person.

Now the big

question is,

who does it the

most?

Men or women?

We did this at the

8 o'clock service,

let's do it today.

How many of you

think women stonewall

the most?

Would you raise

your hand?

Oh, not many.

Not many.

How many of you

think men do it

the most?

Would you raise

your hand?

Oh, and the rest

of you are non-committed.

I see.

Gottman says 85%

of the time it's

done by men.

And it goes back

to what I said

earlier, men

stonewall because

they don't want to

have to deal with

some of that messy

emotional stuff that

they may have to

deal with.

When all four

things are present,

Gottman says there's

a 94% chance that

marriage will fail.

So if you want your

marriage to last,

these are four

important principles

to keep in mind.

Life is short.

James says it is a

vapor that appears

for a little while

and then vanishes

away.

This year is going

to be a banner year

for Ann and myself.

Coming up soon,

she's going to have

both her knees

replaced.

We are going to

turn 65.

We are going to

sign up for

Medicare this year.

Looking back over

the years, I wonder,

you know, sometimes,

how did they go by

so fast?

I used to hear old

people say that

when I was younger

and I said, can't

they talk about

anything else?

And then I got to

be old and I

realized, well, they

were telling the

truth.

It's like, bam,

it's gone.

Life is short.

Life is precious.

Marriage is something

given to us by God.

It deserves our

attention.

It deserves our

time.

It deserves our

energy.

It deserves our

commitment to God

and to one another

to do those things,

to please that other

person, to please

God, to love him

and to love our

mate.

Well, what's the

state of your

marriage?

How are you

getting along?

If you're not

married and you're

preparing, you think

someday you will be

married, I hope

you'll prepare for

it.

Don't just do it,

prepare for it.

But how about your

marriage?

You say, my marriage

is great.

Can you help

others?

Can you encourage

others?

Can you let them

be a part of your

life?

Your marriage is

going good.

And if you're

struggling in your

marriage, try to

put these things

into practice

because they work

and your marriage

can be better

because of it.

You know, one of

the things they

used to say, it's

still true, that

repetition is the

mother of learning,

that you repeat

it enough, you

repeat it enough,

it becomes second

nature with you.

Just like some of

these things.

You repeat it

enough, it becomes

second nature.

How's your

marriage?

How's your

influence with

others?

Most importantly,

how's your

relationship with

God?

Do you know,

do you walk with

Jesus Christ as

your Lord and

Savior?

Would you bow

your heads?

A musician is

going to play,

Jeff's going to be

here.

if God has

spoken to your

heart, you need

to make some

kind of public

commitment.

You have a

prayer request,

you have a

concern, or God

leads you in any

other way, maybe

to trust Christ.

If God speaks to

your heart and

leads you, while

she plays, but you

listen to God, you

come as He leads

of one half of

couple weeks.

All right.