Sex, Love, and Jesus, Part 5 // Marriage & the Glory of God

Welcome to the Lookout Weekly Podcast.

The Church of the Lookout is an older Colorado, and our vision is Jesus, abiding in his presence, growing in his family, and living on his mission to transform the world with awe-inspiring love.

Visit us online at the lookout.church.

Hey, good morning, everybody.

Got a special treat for you this morning.

You get to hear a lot from me, maybe sometimes too much from me.

But this morning you get to hear from my amazing wife, Megan.

Can you guys welcome Megan this morning?

And uh if if you guys have been tracking with us the last several weeks, um we have been in a uh a longer series called Sex, Love, and Jesus.

And uh we've tackled a lot of different um uh both topics and biblical themes that are really, really important for us to think through in this time that we're living in.

And sometimes we we we talk about uh these types of things um and we can settle for simplistic answers, but but I believe there's an opportunity for us to get a clear picture of the way God has designed us to both receive his love and express his love.

And so to uh last week we uh we actually talked about singleness.

If you guys were here, last week we talked about the gift of singleness, singless and the glory of God, and had a chance to play for singles.

This week we are um uh we're talking about marriage.

And so, kind of like last week, if you're uh if you're single in the room here and you know we're talking about marriage, do not check out, okay?

Don't check out.

This is for you, this is for all of us.

This is something, this is a family conversation, and it's actually very important that we all uh stay engaged.

But before we jump into the word, you guys just heard Josh uh bring an announcement about a dream workshop that's coming this next weekend.

And uh this is this is important.

I know that that that might even feel just so out, just outside of your paradigm or box, like what do I do with my dreams?

Does it even matter?

I wanted to ask Megan to share a dream that she had even just a few weeks ago that I think is actually important for us as a church, and you can kind of see why it's important that we know what to do with our dreams.

So would you mind sharing, Megan?

Yeah, so I'll do a little plug on the dream interpretation class.

If you have not signed up, I feel like it is important for everyone, even if you are not a dreamer, you should still come to this class because um just asking God to awaken your spirit at night and speak to you through your dreams, He He will.

And I'm a super logical person, so for me, like day-to-day life, I'm like, that's not possible, but my spirit is awake at night, and so oftentimes God will speak to me through dreams.

So um a couple weeks ago I had this dream, and we were actually up here in the auditorium in a circle, a big group of us.

The only person I recognized was Jeanette, and Luke was there, but other than that, it was just a group of you know people in the church, and we were praying and asking God um for heavenly things, but also, God, if you want to take us, take us, take us to heaven, show us something new.

And all of a sudden, he lifted me up and I like went through like up through the ceiling, and I remember saying, like, I love you to Luke, like waving bye to him.

It's like I don't know if I'm coming back.

And I went up through like the ceiling and like through atmospheres.

I remember like seeing like like stars and going up through, like, I don't know where I went.

But I ended up in this like hallway that looked like an office building, and down the hallway there was a young man, he was probably like late teens, early twenties, um, dressed in white, but he had red hair.

And I remember like feeling like he's not Jesus, but I can feel the love of Jesus.

So I believe he was an angel, and he took me into this room, and he there was a bunch of socks, and we started putting on socks, and he was showing me how to put on um different socks, and then we went to another room, and the next room was a room full of fabrics, and we were looking through all the fabrics, and he didn't speak to me this whole time.

He he was just like smiling but quiet.

But then I asked him, I said, Are there any animals here?

Because if you know me, I love animals, so animals show up in my dreams all the time, and they're usually not what they actually mean in the interpretation world because I love animals.

But anyway, so I asked him, Are there animals here?

And he said, So many.

And all of a sudden I was back in the auditorium, back over here.

And I went up to Jeanette and I said to her, Um, I feel like we are supposed to pray and have the faith for heavenly things.

And so I feel like I'm after actually interpreting that I woke up from the dream, but actually after interpreting it with Jeanette and processing that a little bit more, I feel like it is a call from the Lord as a church that we are called right now to a level of prayer, like we need to spend time in prayer together, um alone, whatever that looks like, but also to be um praying for heavenly things and asking the Lord for heavenly things.

And so it's just an invitation, but it is also interesting that this was just a dream.

Like it's so important that we're in tune to what is going on in our spiritual lives, and part of that is our dream.

So a little plug, come to the dream workshop, it's completely worth it.

That's awesome.

That's so good.

Who's who could use some more heavenly things in their life?

Yeah, let's just pray into that for a second.

I believe there is an invitation for us, and so God, um, we receive this dream in whatever way you want to deposit that into us as a church.

And and I know that the way that works is each of us have a choice, a responsibility to receive that word, God.

And so God, we do pray, Jesus, that in this next season, this next year is marked by um by new realms of heaven, Lord God, that we would walk in the kingdom of heaven like we haven't walked before.

We thank you, God, for um uh a release of your power, a release of the glory of God in our homes, in our lives, in our church, Lord God.

We want that.

We want that so bad.

We need it, God.

We love you, Jesus.

May it be so.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Amen.

All right.

We got we're we ready to do this?

I don't know.

Awesome.

So we're gonna start in Ephesians chapter 5.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

If you have your Bibles, open up to Ephesians chapter 5.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

I always encourage you to bring your Bibles to church.

There's something about it, even a physical book, just having a relationship with the scriptures, it's so important that you know where these books are.

Okay, so Ephesians 5, I'm gonna ask Megan to read this passage for us as we get settled in.

So would you mind, honey?

All right, Ephesians five, twenty-two through thirty-three.

Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord.

For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.

Now, as a church, submit to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church, and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own as their own bodies.

He who loves his wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother, and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

Amen.

Amen.

So it was a hot August day in 2003.

I had uh just come returned from Indiana for a couple months visiting home, and I came back to this room and uh and was gearing up to come to the young adult group, which is Sunday night.

Well, young adult, youth group, youth group, youth group, young adult.

And uh we were told it was a young adult.

And uh I came, I came in and I walk in the auditorium, I kid you not, um, over near the baptismal over here, I see a ray of light from heaven.

And and uh and it's like the heavens parted open, and I said, What Lord, do you want me to be baptized?

And he said, No, son, look over, look closer.

So I I looked over, and uh, and sitting on the stage was an angel, I kid you not, and I heard the angels of heaven, and and and and I came up and it was the face of Megan sitting right on the stage, right over here.

Just my head, it's just the face, it's just the face of Megan.

So I went up to Megan and and uh didn't know what to say, so I said, I said, Hey, hey there, pretty lady.

I said, uh, have you ever heard of the story of Joshua and the walls of Jericho?

And she said, Of course, it's my favorite Bible story.

And so I said, Well, if I marched around you seven times, would you fall for me?

None of that happened.

She said, No, and then she pushed me in the baptismal.

I wish, I wish that was true.

No, uh, it was, it was 2003.

We met over here by the baptismal, and uh it was kind of fun because we started this friendship like right away, and we pretty much started falling in love right away.

I was finishing up an internship here at the church, and uh and so we start we waited a while to date and uh call me old school.

Uh I had made a commitment to my parents when I was in high school that I was when when I was ready to date or to even pursue marriage, that I was gonna include them and and whoever's parents.

So I called her dad and asked um for permission to date her and later on did the same thing uh when I asked her to marry me.

But um it was it was amazing though because I met her and she was one of the first women uh that I knew.

She was the first woman that knew that just walked with such confidence.

Like she, if you know anything about Megan, you know that she she she she knows what she believes.

Like when she talks, she talks so confidently that even if she's not telling the truth, you believe her.

And uh no, but we but I I loved it because it was just like she she knew what she wanted and she she was pursuing the Lord, and she had just come come from a season of giving her heart back to the Lord, and it was just so attractive to me, and I could see Christ in that.

And I I don't know exactly what you saw in me.

I think some of it was my hair at the time, but what anything you're gonna do.

Yeah, definitely his long locks.

Yeah.

Oh, there's a picture.

So this is our engagement.

This is an engagement photo.

Um for me, it was just his Luke's heart for the Lord.

Um, because I was coming out of a kind of a crazy past, and so um just seeing the love of God through Luke was so refreshing for me and so new, it was just like, okay, this is what I want in life, this is what I want um to be with, or somebody I want to be with.

And then his integrity and um he just wanted to do everything in a godly way, which I appreciate.

I mean, I was in my mid-20s, I'd bought a house, and here he is calling my dad to ask if we could date.

And my dad's like, She's an adult, she can do whatever she wants.

So it was kind of funny, but I appreciated that about him because he was um full of integrity.

Yeah, and full of a head of hair.

And so we have a uh photo, our wedding photo, which is similar to our engagement photo, so you can put that on the screen.

So this is our wedding photo uh that was actually took place right here.

So so here's the thing you need to know about this about us the entire context of our marriage and our family is in this church, okay?

That's how deeply embedded we are in the history of this church and this people, and so and it's shaped us, it shaped our entire marriage.

And, you know, and after the wedding day, it was very transformational.

Um, within a year of marrying Megan, I was already becoming a new man.

I was already starting to love the things that she loved, including cats.

I think we have a photo of about a year in.

You can take a look at this.

There we go.

I mean, I just changed into a new man, everybody.

How long should we leave that photo?

Okay, all right.

Gotta get that out of your heads now.

Okay.

So so we do want to talk a little bit about marriage.

Um, and as we do, you know, we're sharing from our story and our perspective.

And I we have to kind of just acknowledge right right off the bat that this might be different than your story and your experience and your perspective.

Um, you know, and and and and and as you're listening to us, there may be a temptation to even think today, like, wow, that's great for you guys, but that hasn't been what I've learned about marriage or relationships.

And as we discussed last week, there's some here that are single, and maybe you've been longing for a spouse, um, and that opportunity hasn't come yet.

Some some of us here today, and you're here without your spouse, because maybe you're on different wavelengths of the faith journey.

And uh, and I want to say to you, if that's if that's the case for you, I want to say that God is with you and He He He's with you in the the desire and the longing, okay?

And we're with you too.

Some of you in this room have experienced the the pain of of divorce and separation.

You've experienced that firsthand.

Maybe you've experienced it with your parents, maybe you've experienced that personally or others around you.

And and again, I want to say the grace and peace of God be with you today.

Okay.

Um some sheer have lost their spouse, and maybe you're living out your days alone and holding on to memories of of a time, you know, that you were together.

And uh and again, the comfort of God be with you today.

Some of you are sheer and maybe you're kind of in a marriage and and it's been a little tense, right?

Um, because uh maybe you feel like you've been pulling more weight than your spouse, or you know, for whatever reason, maybe you feel like it's just it has been unequal as far as you know both of you kind of sharing the load or building into your marriage.

And listen, our heart today isn't to put a heavy weight on anybody, but really it's just we want to turn our eyes to Jesus.

This is really about Jesus and what Jesus is trying to say to us in the midst of all of our brokenness, and we're not perfect, and you you guys need to know all of our friends that that know Megan and I, they know our our gaps and our weaknesses, um, you know, and and and they've befriended us in that.

And as a community, we befriend each other in our gaps.

But today, we just want to humbly offer to you guys what we've learned about Jesus and about each other from from our years together.

One of the things, one of our favorite things to do actually is with younger couples is doing some premarital counseling as they're as they're making their way towards um a wedding day.

And uh, and one of the questions we always ask is we read that passage, Ephesians 5, that we just read together, and one of the questions we always ask is, Why do you want to be married and what does marriage mean to you?

And it's you know, it's um the answers we get are very similar every time we ask those questions because the couples usually just say, you know, I I we want to get married because we want to spend the rest of our lives with each other.

We we want to be partners in crime, so to speak.

We want to grow old together.

We uh I want a chance to love this person unconditionally.

And those are all great answers, by the way.

Um but what's interesting is when we look at the passage that we just read that Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, and he's writing as a single man, and he's writing um in this part of scripture what we know as the household codes.

It was very kind of common in Greek culture to write about relationships within a household, you know, uh uh masters and slaves and children and parents, and then husbands and wives.

But when he was started to write about this union of husband and wife, his vision for marriage was so much bigger than oftentimes our vision for marriage is.

And so oftentimes we see marriage as this kind of close, self-contained relationship that just exists for the good of the marriage.

But he caught a vision of marriage, Paul caught a vision of marriage that illustrates what he would call in the scripture a profound mystery or a mega mystery.

And he he talked, he went all the way back to Genesis and talked about the two becoming one and how something happens in marriage where two become one.

And for Paul, he said, this is the profound mystery, and it's not even about the marriage, it's actually about Christ and the church.

Okay?

So for Paul, it has nothing to do with just growing old together or being happy or completing each other.

It has to do with this huge picture and living out a picture of what Christ, how Christ is trying to love the church.

Now, to be fair, when you're neck deep in laundry or you're chasing kids around or you're paying bills, you're not thinking about the profound mystery of Christ and his church all the time, right?

Um it's so otherworldly, it's hard to appreciate like on a practical level.

Um, so that's why we're gonna take a just spend our time trying to elevate our thinking a little bit to catch up with this vision.

And why is that important that we share a larger vision of marriage?

Because we're living in a time where we don't, we this generation no longer uh understands the purpose of marriage, so much so that this generation doesn't even want it anymore, for the most part.

So a lot of our generation actually sees marriage as uh an archaic, outdated institution.

It's basically seen by many as legalized oppression.

Historically, it's just about economic trade, and at the end of the day, it's seen as this unnecessarily restrictive, um restrictive and hindrance to our best and happiest lives.

And there's, you know, this is kind of what's there's a whole movement of people just trying to find a happy, fulfilling life without having to give themselves in a covenant relationship, without having to commit themselves to one person for life.

And so we can see this in the stats.

This is really interesting.

So in the church, sometimes we we we we get concerned with the stats about divorce, right?

So we talk a lot about divorce in the church and how alarming those rates are.

But what's actually even more alarming now is the marriage rates, the marriage stats.

I'll just show you a couple marriage stats and then we'll talk.

So the US marriage rate plummets nearly plummeted nearly 60% over the last 50 years, okay?

Over the last 50 years.

The marriage rate in 1970 was 76.5%.

Today it stands just over 31%.

Okay, and not only are people getting married less, they're getting married older, they're waiting a long time to get married too.

And so the number of women entering their first marriage uh uh between the ages of 40 and 59 has jumped 75% since 1990.

Okay.

So people are getting married less, they're getting married older.

And uh and and and so one of the observations that uh that in some of these stats that some of these st um uh writers were offering was that we're living in a time where we're just prepare yourself, we're gonna see far fewer fewer 50th anniversary parties in the future.

That's gonna become a rare celebration to actually walk in to actually celebrate a 50th anniversary party.

Now, just I I want to do something together in the room because we have a kind of a diverse age group here, but I want to just want to just if if you have been married, if you're married in here and you've been married for 30 years or more, I want you to stand up.

30 years or more.

Oh my gosh, come on.

Okay.

If you if you and and this doesn't you your your spouse doesn't necessarily they don't need to be here.

You can stand up even if your spouse is not here, okay?

So that's 30 years or more.

Now, if you've sit down unless you've been married 40 years or more, you can sit down unless you've been married 40 years or more, okay?

So we got several here, okay.

And again, uh take a seat unless you've been married 50 years or more in this room.

50 years or more.

Look at this, guys.

Come on! 50 years, come on, get them on your feet.

Get them on your feet, let's honor these guys.

Let's honor these guys.

So amazing.

So amazing.

Uh, you can take a seat now.

See, it's it's really important we do that.

And listen, we we understand it.

If you guys understand it, we understand you haven't had a perfect marriage.

It hasn't been just all unicorns and ponies, right?

Um, it it hasn't been picture perfect, but I just want to thank you on behalf of the church for your faithfulness to stay the course.

It's a picture for all of us of covenant love over time, okay?

And so that it's so so we we should be thankful as a church that.

That we can share, we have people that are modeling this in our community.

And we just gotta pray that God continues to reinforce all of our marriages.

Now, um, as we look at this passage, we want to look at a few hallmarks of a great marriage.

A few hallmarks, these aren't the only hallmarks of a great marriage, but these are the only ones we have time for to talk about.

So the first one is we have to talk about the S word, right?

Um, because this passage is full of the S word.

It really is.

Do you know what S-word I'm talking about, Megan?

I don't know.

A lot comes to mind.

Oh, okay.

If you had to take a guess, if you had to take a wild guess, the S word.

Submission.

Submission, oh! And you hear a collective groan across the room.

Our culture's favorite word, submission, authority.

We love these words.

Now, we have to talk about that because the the truth is, from a biblical perspective, kind of the first thing we want to look at here is marriage is marked by mutual submission.

And this is very important that we understand and we understand what submission means and what it does not mean.

So, Megan, do you want to talk a little bit about it?

Yeah, so culturally, when you think of submission, the first thing that comes to mind is a 1950s housewife cooking, cleaning, doing everything for the family, having dinner prepared, ready to rub their husband's feet when they get home.

And that's I still expect that.

Yeah, yeah, right.

Um but that's not that's not where we're at anymore as a culture.

A lot of um women work outside the home.

A lot of husbands stay home and take care of the kids as caretakers.

And so culturally that's shifted um a lot in our in our brains when we think of that.

Um we can't expect the traditional gender roles to be the norm anymore.

Um we need to embrace equality in the home.

And while the scripture talks about submission, it assumes that the husband and the wife are contributing equally.

So that scripture is not just about the woman is submitting and doing everything the husband says, it's an equal contribution.

Umiss is a gift you give, it's not something that you demand and expect.

So that's an important one.

It's a gift, it's not something that you demand and expect.

Um and I remember when Luke and I got married, um, I remember feeling a shift spiritually as I would lean into Luke's leadership to guide us um from a spiritual perspective over our household, knowing that he was following Jesus.

And it was as if like a weight had lifted off of my shoulders, like something that I didn't have to carry any anymore.

And I could trust in his protection and um his discerning guidance as we made decisions together for our marriage.

Um, but knowing that he was following Jesus in that.

Yeah.

Yeah, and it's it's a it's a word that some of us have had bad experiences in.

Maybe you've been in a marriage where there has been kind of unequal power dynamics and and you feel like you've been just you've lost power uh in the marriage.

But and and and that's that's not okay, and we'll talk about that here in a second, but it's it's really important that when we talk about leadership in the home, when we talk about submission, it's it's it's framed in the context of the way that we see Christ.

We submit to Christ because he's trustworthy.

And why how do we know he's trustworthy?

Because the the leadership in Christ is not predominantly about just telling us what to do.

It's marked predominantly by the laying down of his life.

Okay?

And this is this is what marks the leadership of Jesus.

A lot of times when we have bad experiences with leadership of any kind, we just think, all right, no more leadership, we're not doing that anymore.

But the solution to bad leadership, bad leadership isn't no leadership.

The solution to bad leadership is good leadership marked by the laying down of one's life.

And this is what Jesus modeled for us.

And so in our home, the the way, the way that this works out, if you were looking at our marriage from the outside in, it wouldn't look as if I'm leading the home necessarily.

When you look at our marriage, it's it's like like she said, it's it's two becoming one.

It's there's an equality.

And I don't call all the shots, though, sometimes that she'll ask me to pray about certain things and and and tell her what I'm hearing from the Lord.

Um, but oftentimes I'm part of leadership is knowing when to let the other person lead too.

And so uh there are so many times in our marriage that Megan is actually leading us through very specific times.

I remember a story even several years ago.

Um, I I was kind of in a discouraging season, and I wasn't even sure, even in my position here at the church, I was like, man, I don't know if I have the grace to just keep going.

This is really, really hard.

And I came home and I confessed that to her, and I was like, I don't know.

I don't know if I can do it.

And she more or less, and using different words, she said, Okay, you know, you can cry about it, but you're gonna get back up and you're gonna get back in the game, all right?

You you don't get to do that.

Like, that's not what God has for us, and and you're going, you know, and and she started leading me.

She's like, No, you're gonna, I I I understand how you feel, but God's not done with us yet, and he's not done with you yet, and you're gonna keep moving, you're gonna keep moving forward.

So in that moment, yeah, and so she had to she had to correct me, right?

She had to call me back into something I forgotten, but it was in that moment I had to submit to her sense of what what what God was speaking uh to both of us.

And so in that way, it's a dance, and right, and so I don't know a lot about dancing, so I can't speak authoritatively on this subject, on this topic, but while there's a leader in a dance, when you're looking from the outside in, it it there's a um you wouldn't necessarily be able to know who's leading, and that's how it is uh living with each other in the spirit of God, coveting to Jesus and trusting this the the leadership of God in a household.

Um and that's why it's so important that that in the church that we're not just married the two of us, that God is equal parts with us in our marriage.

So yeah, and to be clear, submission is not about settling for abuse.

Um physical, mental, psychological, sexual abuse is not tolerated.

If you think, if you're in this room and you think you're in an abusive relationship where you have no power, no voice, um, you need to get help and likely be removed from that relationship.

So that's a whole nother topic.

Yeah, that's a whole other thing, but it's it's really important that we say within within this particular thing that if if that's your story of your relationship and you've been and and you feel like you've only been taken from, you need to just the best thing to do is just ask somebody about it.

Come through a ministry team or find a counselor and just and and and ask them about that.

We can't give a blanket statement of what to do in every particular situation, but I just want to say here abuse is not okay.

So you cannot put a submission card on top of an abusive relationship and and act as if God is still glorified with that.

He's not, and he doesn't want that for you, he doesn't want that for anybody, okay?

Can we be clear on that?

Amen.

So, and you know, and and one of the questions is what if my spouse is not a follower of Christ, you know, what would a submission look like there?

You know, the it's it there's there's different dynamics that happen in a home when we're on different wavelengths within a spiritual relationship.

And listen, we get that, and we're talking from a you know, from the vantage point of we're both pursuing the Lord.

But I just want to encourage you, if you're not in a situation like that, um I'm gonna read a passage in just a little bit that just talks about the importance of in a in a home where your spouse is not believing in God, that your example to them still creates the conditions of holiness and salvation in the home.

I just want to encourage you to pray for them, to be with them, and and and and to just just ask the Spirit of God to continue to meet your spouse and to love them like Christ has loved you.

Okay?

And there's probably a lot other questions that you have, but I just want to say stay in the game, love them as Christ has loved you, and pray for them that as you set an example for them, that they will know the love and the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Amen?

Okay, so that's marriage is marked by mutual submission.

But the set second thing is um this is very important, marriage is for the sake of Christ's likeness.

Marriage is for the sake of Christ's likeness.

So to Paul, marriage wasn't just about individuals living happy lives.

And it's not even really just about the marriage working and surviving 50 years, right?

Um, it's about the witness that the marriage actually offers to the world that's looking in.

That's what Paul is like, that's what he's trying to say, is there is a mystery that's actually being proclaimed through the marriage.

And so we talked about last week uh one writer, uh Sam Albert, he said us that singleness shows us the sufficiency of the gospel, but but marriage shows us the shape of the gospel.

So for singles, your devotion to God proclaims to the world the sufficiency of the gospel.

But for the married in the room, your marriage is proclaiming to the world what the shape and the texture and the color of what the gospel looks like.

And what is the shape of the gospel?

It's laying down the laying down of your life or self-sacrifice, which is incredibly countercultural because you guys know everything in our particular time and space, the age that we live in, is not about self-sacrifice, it's about self-fulfillment.

Everything is about self-fulfillment.

Sex is about self-fulfillment, even singleness, a lot of times, can be about self-fulfillment, you know, just not wanting to do the married thing because I want to hold on to my life.

But marriage, surprisingly, has become about self-fulfillment.

You know this because you pay attention to the ways that we talk about it.

And uh we mentioned the movie last week, Jerry McGuire, the famous line, You complete me.

We search for our spouse, our spouses to complete something because we're looking, we're actually looking for ourselves.

And it's almost like we're saying, I was I was wandering through life trying to find myself, but now I've found myself because I found you.

You helped me find me, right?

And and we we talk about marriage and relationships as if you have finally completed what I was looking for about myself, and and and we can say it in a lot of different ways, but but more or less it's this idea of I was incomplete and you were the one who made me feel complete, and so that's why I want to give myself to you because you make me feel better about me.

And it really, at the end of the day, it's still kind of all arrows are back to my desires and my needs.

But through sacrifice, it's through sacrifice, through the way of Jesus, which is the laying down of one's life, through sacrifice, that's actually how we become more like Jesus.

And we how we help the other person become more like Jesus, right?

It's through sacrifice that we find the pathway to Christ's likeness.

And marriage is not just about fulfillment, it's about Christ's likeness, which ultimately leads to fulfillment, but it starts with the laying down of one's life.

Yeah, so marriage is a sacrifice, and we've all grown up watching Disney princess movies where we've been taught that you meet your Prince Charming and you live happily ever after, and your life is just perfect.

And not saying that Luke's not Prince Charming, but come on.

Come on.

You know what I'm talking about, that um so yeah, it's it's never meant to be perfect.

We go through life sacrificing in so many different ways, and this helps us to grow and to draw from the love of Jesus.

And um a story I have for you.

I remember Amelie when she was first born, she was probably a couple weeks old.

I was like at the point of exhaustion that you don't even know exists unless you had a newborn.

And I was up at 2 a.m.

feeding her, um, and I was literally sitting there thinking, like, everyone, I was going through all my friends, everyone is sleeping.

Like Luke's next to me, he's asleep.

I was sleeping.

Like I was going through a list of friends.

Shannon, she was she doing, oh, she's sleeping.

Like the neighbors, like I was like looking out my window, I'm like, oh yeah, they're sleeping too.

Like everyone was sleeping, but here I am awake.

And I remember just being like so frustrated, and like, I just want to be sleeping, and I am laying here awake.

And um that was a huge that was a season of sacrifice um for me that nobody else could be a part of.

Luke, there was nothing that he could do in that.

It was something that I personally had to um go through.

And when we lay down our lives um for him, we become more like him and reap the blessings.

And it was a short period of time in my life that I felt like an eternity, but it was worth every moment because finding the joy in those little moments, like the smiles, you know, when your baby looks up at you and smiles, or they grab your hand or their hand and touch your face.

And so it was those moments that made those 2 a.m.

um feedings like feel worth it.

And even when it feels like our greatest sacrifice, God meets us there with the greatest blessings.

So it's it's in those little things that you can look for to see the blessing in it.

Yeah, that's so good.

And and and and truthfully, the the pathway to fulfillment, marriage is very fulfilling, but the pathway to fulfillment Tim Keller said it like this he said it's a mutual sacrifice that leads to mutual fulfillment.

And and you'll find that the path when you pursue happiness, you really never ever find happiness.

Happiness is not something you pursue, it's something that ensues an honorable life, and it ensues a life of sacrifice and giving yourself to something meaningful.

And so it is fulfilling, but it's fulfilling through the pathway of sacrifice.

And so, but to be clear, sacrifice isn't just losing your sense of personhood, it doesn't mean you become a non-person in the context of marriage.

And this is, I think, something that's worth talking about, because sometimes in marriage, over time, you can lose a sense of who am I, uh, what do I even have an identity?

Do I have my own desires?

And listen, I just want to say to you, you you two flesh become one, but you're still, you still maintain a personhood and you're still a person made in the image of God, distinct from another person.

It's just you're creating a space to meet together where God is honored, right?

But God honors your hopes and your dreams and your motivations and your desires.

And they aren't meant to be lost.

It's just they're meant to be surrendered back to Jesus in the context of marriage, saying, God, here's some things that matter to me, but I'm gonna surrender these things to you as I learn to love my spouse and and sometimes my kids the way that you loved me.

And I'm trusting that as I surrender these desires, that you're going to fight for the desires of my heart so in a way that I can't right now, or I'm not going to be able to right now.

Okay?

So the sense of personhood is very important that you don't lose that, but you surrender, and in doing so, it shapes not only you, it shapes the other person.

Jesus said, Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

And so the laying down of life is so powerful.

It's so powerful.

And marriage is the kind of a lifelong relationship that is marked by the laying down of each other's lives.

And Megan, I can brag on her because ever since we've been together, she has sacrificed so much for the sake of our marriage.

You've sacrificed so much for the sake of this church, for the sake of the people that you've loved, for the sake of our kids.

You've made sacrifices so that I can do what I'm called to do.

And certainly we're together in our life mission, but we also have different assignments.

We have different, you know, um things that God has called each of us to do.

But I I can do what I do because of her sacrifices.

Um, some of you might might know this, but pastoring isn't necessarily the most economically lucrative profession on the face of the earth, all right?

Um, it's it's not necessarily a career pass that's gonna lead to a lot of stability and financial freedom necessarily.

But it's a worthy calling, but it it requires sacrifice, not just for me, but from the whole family.

And I just want to honor Megan uh for the grace that she's even offered me to be able to do what I do, and even late-night meetings, phone pastoral phone calls, the things that um that have just shaped our family because we're pursuing, we're laying down our lives, not just for each other, but for the sake of God's mission and what he's called us to do in each other.

And I've been changed by that.

I know that she's been changed by that, and it's out of reverence for Christ, but it's in this reverence for Christ that we actually enter into the life that we're praying for and the life that we're wanting.

That is the pathway to a blessed life, is to lay it down.

Now, back to Tim Keller in his amazing book, Um Meaning of The Meaning of Marriage, he wrote with his wife.

A couple excerpts I want to read from that.

He said, Romance, sex, laughter, and plain fun are the byproducts of this process of sanctification, refinement, and glorification.

Those things are important, but they cannot keep the marriage going through years and years of ordinary life.

What keeps the marriage going is your commitment to your spouse's holiness, your commitment to his or her his or her beauty, your commitment to his greatness and perfection, your commitment to her honesty and passion for the things of God.

That's your job as a spouse.

Any lesser goal than that, any smaller purpose, and you're just playing at being married.

He continues, he says, What then is marriage for?

It is for helping each other to become our future glory selves, the new creations that God will eventually make us.

The common horizon husband and wife look towards is the throne and the holy, spotless, and blameless nature that we will have.

I can think of no more powerful common horizon than that.

Isn't that beautiful?

What we're doing is we're not just trying to create a life together, but as we model Christ-likeness to each other, we in turn become more Christ-like, which prepares us for the ultimate wedding in heaven with Jesus, the Son of God, the bridegroom, who is preparing us, and we are preparing our whole lives, the entire church, the whole point of the church is to prepare ourselves for Him.

That's why marriage can't be an end of itself.

It's a means to an end, and but the byproduct is a lot of fun, a lot of passion, and uh and and a life together that we can really enjoy together.

So the third thing though, we're gonna talk, we've we've talked about marriage is marked by mutual submission.

Marriage is um uh for the sake of Christ-likeness.

The third thing we're gonna talk about here, though, is marriage is two becoming one.

And again, back to the picture, back to the picture of Genesis of two becoming one.

When Paul was talking about this Genesis story, he was almost saying that marriage was God's intention from the very beginning, that God always planned to send Christ to form for himself a people called the church.

And that was always part of the design, even from the very beginning.

That wasn't plan B.

It was plans A, plan A was the marriage between heaven and earth, between God and His people, two becoming one.

And that's nothing short of a miracle when two become one.

Have you ever, let me just ask this question, how many of you have ever flown to a different country and experienced some measure of culture shock in this room?

All right, right.

You've experienced culture shock.

You get off a plane and then you experiencing different smells, different languages, different sights, and different sounds, and you're like, oh my gosh, this is crazy.

The truth is every marriage is in some sense a cross-cultural experience.

None of us come into marriage with a blank slate.

You think you think you do, but you don't, all right?

We all bring to, we all bring into our marriages the reality of our past, our baggage, our assumptions, wounds, desires, passions, and even the blessings of our family.

We bring those too.

But check this out.

This is one of my favorite quotes.

David Brooks writes about this.

He said, psychologists joke that marriage is a battleground in which two families send their best warriors to determine which family's culture will direct the couple's lives.

And we all know who won that one.

Her.

Okay.

Um and it's and it's funny because if you've if you know what that is like when you when two flesh become one, that's nothing short of a miracle, people, all right?

That's that takes the work of God to merge two lives together.

Just take the holidays, all right?

Just take the holidays.

I think it was the first time Megan and I realized, oh dear Lord, are we gonna make it?

Are we gonna make it?

Because we come at holidays so differently.

So when I moved, when we were dating and I she was sort of inviting me to family gatherings, um, I I come from a smaller family, and so I was shocked because we went to one family gathering at five o'clock on Christmas evening, and then we stayed there and just it was an explosion of Christmas gifts, just just wrapping paper being thrown through the air, right?

It was just like loud and just like you didn't even know what was going on.

It was a complete circus, just like there's 45 people in the room.

And then, check this out, then she's like, okay, we need to leave because we need to go to my aunt's house.

So we went, we get in the car, we went to her aunt's house, and it was the same thing.

It was like 30 people, we're just throwing gifts around, just food and loud.

And then we leave that, and it's like midnight.

She says, All right, now we need to go to my parents' house.

And we did the exact same thing.

At the end, I I was dead.

I was like, I don't even know how you do this as a way of life.

I don't think this is sustainable, I don't think I can make it in this marriage.

And I don't even I did anybody even see what.

Gifts they got?

Like, did you did you even look at that?

Because it looked like you just ripped the whole thing up and walked away, right?

Um so for me, uh that was a testing point.

Now I haven't even talked about Christmas decorations.

That's all me.

That's not fancy.

But but what was your experience like with the Well, to be fair, what he's talking about, my grandparents, three of four three out of four of my grandparents were all alive at that point in time.

So family gatherings looked very differently because we had to gather with every family member.

So that was part of it, why it was so shocking for him.

Um but when I went to his family, it was in Indiana, and it was a quiet little house with just his family.

I remember it being like, wow, this is this is it.

This is this is what you guys do at Christmas.

I mean, his whole family fit around one little table, and it was like we dinner, it was quiet, played a game, maybe watch some TV.

And then they open one present at a time, which was I actually really like that, but it was new for me because I was like, my family was just like, here's your pile of presents, just open them.

And his family was like, okay, everybody watch.

It's Luke's turn.

Everybody watch now, it's Megan's turn.

Open the present, see what you got.

And um, so it was just it was very culturally very different for me to experience a whole new way of doing Christmas.

Yeah, a little anticlimactic, probably.

Yeah, very anticlimactic.

So um, you know, and that's just holidays, right?

Um, and so I've made a lot of sacrifices.

We set up our Christmas decorations yesterday.

I sacrificed because I love my wife like Christ loves me.

We only set them up outside.

It was because it was warm outside.

Okay, okay, let's just settle this right here.

Let's just settle it out.

Who thinks here, who believes that Christmas decorations should go up post-Thanksgiving?

Raise your hand.

Okay.

All right, all right, all right, okay.

A lot of traditionalists post-Thanksgiving, right?

Who here is like more Christmas the better?

Just bring it on as soon as possible.

Okay, all right.

I got Piper on my side.

Okay, you got Piper.

Well, that's on the the the Okay, the scales.

I'm gonna say here, judge by the show of hands, I think I win this one.

Well, it doesn't matter because we already put them up.

So it's a moot point.

I already did it.

I already did it.

So I know Betty agrees.

But it's because Christ loves the church.

That's why I did it for you, babe.

Um but merging two lives together, it's holidays, it's communication styles, it's introvert and extrovert, it's the way we spend money, the way we save money, it's roles and expectations, it's how you vacation, it's how you parent and discipline.

I mean the the list is endless, which which is why it really takes the power of God, right?

Um it takes uh it takes a lot to navigate the difference.

Now, our former pastor Walt Robertson, he he had he had said it like this to me.

He said, when you first the first stage of marriage is you're attempting to change each other's differences.

Then you graduate into a stage where you begin to respect each other's differences, and finally you actually begin to adore each other's differences, where the things that you first kind of you first clashed at, you you begin to actually see, oh, you are actually that's actually the image of God inside of you that's clashing with with parts of me that actually need uh a little space or that need to need to be uh to be shaped by God.

And that's part of the the beauty of marriage.

Now, uh a few years ago, my my son Asher got a rock tumbler.

I don't know if you guys have ever seen a rock tumbler, but he got a rock tumbler for Christmas, and a rock tumbler is essentially just this little cylinder that just spins constantly.

You put rocks in it, some sand and some water, and you just let it go.

And the whole idea is over time uh the rocks become beautiful.

They actually become beautiful.

Now, when I got this thing, I followed the instructions to help help them set it up and put the rocks in the tumbler, some sand, some grit, some some some water, and put it in the tumbler, and then I'm reading the instructions and said, Okay, now now that you have all the sand and and rock there, all you need to do is give it six to eight weeks and just let it tumble.

Or yeah, yeah, month, yeah, months, three, three to four months, and just let it tumble and then um and see what happens.

And then the instructions said that may seem like a long time, but it's a lot less than 10,000 years, which it would normally take.

I'm like, oh my gosh.

And you turn this thing on, it's just this grinding sound.

It's just like, oh my gosh, like how many months?

Like, what?

This is supposed to be this was a Christmas present.

Um, and so I we I just like, all right, I've I gotta put this in the garage.

So I put it out in the garage and I plugged it in, and every day I'd come home and open the garage door just and there it is again, you know, just grinding away.

And every day is this reminder of like, okay, something amazing is supposed to be happening in this tumblr, right?

And certainly uh over after several weeks, and you pulled out the rocks, and it was like, oh my gosh, these things are like beautiful, they're like they're the different versions of what they were, but it took uh a period, it took the patience of waiting for the process to work, right?

And I I think it's like actually a beautiful picture of marriage.

And um, you know, marriage obviously it's not all just rock tumbling, it's not just grinding and this painstaking process, but there is part of the process that requires a certain amount of friction and collision with the power and the spirit of God.

You add some sand, you add some water there, and over time, what happens is over time, God, the work of God, he begins to chip away at us, and over time we become a beautiful version of the image of Christ that he actually put inside of us, he always destined us to be.

Do you guys catch that picture?

Um and so we've actually become more like Jesus through each other.

This is part of Christ's likeness.

And so you want to talk about that?

Yeah, um, in the beginning of our marriage, I remember getting frustrated with Luke because he would just take forever to make decisions on things.

I'm like, and I'm a like, let's make a decision, move on.

And we'd be like looking at a new TV, and three weeks later he's still looking at TVs and reviewing them and figuring out which one's gonna be the best.

And it would frustrate me, but over time I've realized like he's helped me to learn to be more patient, and it's um it's a huge quality that I needed in my life to actually take the time and slow down and be patient, even parenting and our kids and all the things.

Um definitely still working on it because not easy, but um, that's one of the things that he showed me um to be more like Jesus.

And another way is um just how to deal with conflict.

Uh Luke is really good at seeing different perspectives and saying staying calm um through conflict with other people.

And I'm an eight, an Enneagram eight, if you're familiar with the Enneagram, and I'm like justice and revenge.

That's all I want.

Most of the time, revenge.

Like, I'm just gonna go after them.

And he's like, no, no, no, calm down.

Like, let's re look at this.

So he's really helped me to see conflict in a different um perspective and walk through things that could be done very differently if I were to be in control.

Yeah, yeah, and it's and the opposite's true as well.

She has taught me so much about the gift of assertiveness, the gift of decisiveness, and how that actually images Jesus.

So the part that like would become frustrating was actually the part of Jesus being expressed through her that I just hadn't learned yet.

This is and this has been so important that over time I used to really fight it, sometimes still do.

Um, but I have learned over time that she has been given zeal to fight for things that feel unjust to her.

So she has no problem sharing with me what she thinks.

One of the beautiful things in our marriage, I never have to guess what she's thinking or feeling, because she just tells me.

I I could, you know, I knew it 10 minutes before I got home, like what she'd be feeling or thinking.

You could feel there's an aura, right?

And uh and but it's become a gift because it's taught me that you don't have to hide, you don't have to pull back, you can be, you can have a voice and you can be strong, and she can be strong.

And that's actually the gift of God inside of that.

It's I've actually learned a lot from that of not cowering, but being more direct and more decisive through that.

But it has taken the rough and tumble kind of commitment that we're going to let the Christ in us shape each other over time so that together we can start to reflect his image in our marriage together.

And the cool thing about it is it's actually reflected, it's created a whole new value set in our family.

So as we brought ourselves together to becoming one flesh, I would say our shared, it's not just my values and her values, our family values now get to be expressed.

And so a value for worship and faith and just kind of a uh just in our home, a prayerfulness to how we talk, creativity, hospitality.

We love hosting together, we love creating environments to host um a value for adventure, just getting to the mountains and getting, you know, and actually being having a lot of fun together and connection and um and just being even around the table.

Um we we're happy because uh we have the privilege of being able to still spend about four nights a week with our kids around the table eating dinner in a time where but a lot of families aren't able to do that for a variety of reasons.

We've like been able to clarify that, and and God's allowed us to kind of forge a new set of values because that's what happens over time is to become one, a new picture emerges, and it's a picture that I believe pleases God because it's a merging together ultimately of heaven and earth.

So are you guys with us this morning?

Are we guys we're still here?

Okay, we're gonna share a couple just a couple more practical things, um, and then we're gonna just spend uh some time praying, and we'll we're not gonna keep you forever, um, um, but in just a little bit we're gonna uh have a moment to pray for the couples here.

But do you want to talk a little bit about um some of the next steps?

Um, yeah, so next step for this is not just marriages, this is any relationship.

Um, we offer a course that um Pete and Jerry Schazero um wrote, and it's called Emotional Emotionally Healthy Relationships, and it is an amazing tool set that you can walk away with.

Um, a lot of you in this room have been in that course.

We've taken it several times, like five times probably.

Yeah, and it's just so good, and you learn new things every time you take it.

But it walks through different tools you can use in your marriage, but also just with other relationships, friends, coworkers, you know, whoever that might be.

So um that'll be coming up in February, and would highly encourage you to um attend.

It is a six or eight week, eight-week course, and we do meet in person because it is done um around some table groups.

So that is a commitment to look forward to in February.

When it's cold out, it's great to just come and have some snacks and actually get into the nitty-gritty of um your relationships.

So that's a big one.

Yeah, a lot of the tools at the in the in that course are actually about communicating, about how to fight well, clean clean fighting versus dirty fighting, uh, how to kind of uh understand and name the emotional energy that we bring, and then how to communicate things.

It's stuff that all of us really need to know.

So, like she said, yeah, bookmark that beginning of 2024 at some point, we're gonna do that.

Another thing that um that we have done that we have really enjoyed, that we just want to plant a seed with you as well, especially for married couples, is you know, certainly date nights are important, but like we have done this thing, we haven't done this every year, but we've done this for several years, where uh beginning of the year we have an annual kind of like a weekend away.

And sometimes we'll just book a night in in Denver, just a hotel for a night.

And we use that to actually just think forward over there.

We we reflect on like what are what are the celeb what are we celebrating from this last year?

Uh what are the pain points from this last year?

How are we doing?

Um, what are our uh like our energy tanks like right now?

How are we doing with each other?

How are we doing with the kids?

We just kind of reflect on a lot of these questions and look at last year, how did that go?

And then we look forward.

What are the desires?

What are our prayers together as we come into another year?

All right.

So I know a lot of married couples are used to like doing date nights, but I just want to encourage you to consider a date weekend.

It's a little bit different than a vacation.

A lot of times in vacation mode, we're just literally escaping everything.

But this is a more of like a night or a weekend that's marked by intentionality.

And uh, and if you want to, we can send you some of the questions that we've used before that are super helpful, but intentional weekend to propel you into the year so that you're together, one heart, one mind, um, that you're speaking, you're communicating what matters to you.

What is God asking us to celebrate and how is where is he inviting us to change as we get into another year?

And it allows you to sink your prayers, it allows you to sink your desires.

I'm telling you, it's it's actually reaped a lot of fruit in in the years that we've been faithful to do that.

Um and then uh, and then I think the last one, going back to Pete and Jerry Schizero, who've been meaningful for us, Jerry Schizero, when they were here and they did a marriage workshop, they just really encouraged us.

Like part of practicing two flesh, becoming one, is actually putting your flesh up near each other.

And uh and they call it the practice of skin to skin.

It's they actually wrote it into their marital vows, uh, where they every night they lay together, naked, together, just just just embracing each other, not even not just for sex, um, but it was it's just the the the Genesis mandate of being naked and unashamed, just being together.

And um, and and Jerry Skyra said one of the most powerful things, again, this goes back to um the um uh the picture of of marriage not just existing for itself, but existing for the world.

She said about her marriage, she said, every time we make love, we are saving civilization.

Every time we make love, we are saving civilization.

And that's what I try to tell her too.

Every time we make love, we're saving civilization.

Um, but but serious, but but seriously, profoundly, profoundly.

There's something about the the the two flesh becoming one, the making of love together that it's it actually is it announces to rulers and principalities in heavenly places that God has done a great work through his son Jesus Christ.

And two flesh can become one, right?

And uh, and so it's a powerful picture, but skin to skin, just being together in each other's arms, it's a it's a huge thing.

It doesn't even have to lead to anywhere else, but just being close together.

Just try it, just try it.

I'm just I'm just telling you, it's a powerful, it's a powerful way of being together.

Okay.

Enough talking, enough talking.

Any is anything else you want to say, honey?

Um, then lastly, just something to encourage you with.

Um, even just this week, finding something that you can choose to do to bless your spouse that is a sm maybe a small sacrifice for you.

It could be as simple as I'm gonna clean up the kitchen before he gets home because I know that would bless him to come home to a clean kitchen, or I'm gonna go out and get his favorite or her favorite um dessert, or whatever, whatever that looks like.

But just encourage you to choose something this week that you can do for your spouse that would be a small sacrifice, but a blessing to them.

So good.

That's awesome.

This has been fun.

It worked.

We did it.

We did it.

We did it.

Um so I want to invite we want to invite uh Bob and Betty Young to come to the stage.

They were one of the one of the couples in in our community that have been married 50 plus years.

And uh, and they're gonna lead us in a time of prayer, and they have a few um uh uh points of prayer that they want to lead us through, but we're gonna receive them and let us lead them in this moment together before we end the service.

So, you guys, can you help me welcome Bob and Betty?

Yeah.

Okay.

Amen, huh?

Is that good?

Wow, these guys are so much fun.

And I knew Luke when he had all that hair.

And I didn't have any then anyway.

So, um yeah, we've been married a while.

And when we were asked to pray, um we went to the Lord earlier this week.

Uh we have lots of good ideas.

I mean, do you realize how many mistakes you can make in 53 years?

It's really you have a lot of opportunity.

But what we wanted to know is what is it that the Lord's ideas were for you who were married today?

What is it that we are to impart?

And so we prayed all week.

And one of the things that uh thank you.

One of the things that came up is you know we have five senses, right?

We have sight, we have hearing, we have taste, we have smell, we have touch.

And uh the Lord said, I have five senses I want to release into your marriages today.

So that's what we want to talk about, and then we want to pray about it.

So the very first sense is a sense of humor.

Okay?

You heard a lot of that today.

And I think you'll see a lot of similarity between what Luke and Megan were giving to us and what the Lord was giving to us through the week.

So in 53 years of marriage, I can tell you this we've never used the word divorce.

We've never used the verb divorce.

Now, there have been a few occasions when Betty used the word homicide.

Uh however, uh I'm still here, obviously it didn't go anywhere, but a sense of humor helps us get a healthy perspective on some of the circumstances that we encounter with one another.

Not everything's funny, of course not, but sometimes it's that sense of humor that um serves as the antidote to our own ego.

Uh sometimes it is uh something that dilutes the toxicity of selfishness, of jealousy, of miscommunication.

And sometimes even in the marriage covenant, it helps us see the absurdity about how we strive so hard for something we actually already have.

So a sense of humor is a real blessing.

Now Betty's gonna talk about the next one, which is a sense of celebration.

I'm not like God.

I don't speak in front of people all the time, so I'm going to read what I'm going to say.

Celebration.

Marriage is not just something God endorses, it is something he participated in with us.

The first recorded miracle performed by Jesus was at a wedding.

His miracle was not one of healing or mercy or grace.

It was a wedding gift focused on the celebration of a marriage.

Every day we choose conscious gratitude to our provider.

In his letter to the church at Philippi, the Apostle Paul wrote, Rejoice.

Again I say rejoice.

And I will tell you the day that I married this man was the biggest rejoicing I ever did.

Because I have loved him for 50 plus years, and I plan on loving him till the last breath I take.

So that is what I call a celebration.

Wow.

Wow.

The next one's about promise.

You know, uh when we got married, we all covenanted with each other, and we gave we made promises at the time.

And we all know that there's power in words, right?

God spoke everything into existence.

If somebody jumped in this up in this room right now and screamed fire, you know there's power in that word, right?

Things would happen.

When we got married, when you got married, we all made promises.

Now, in our day, the promises were more uh liturgical.

And uh, I know we read Ephesians 5 today, uh, but we made promises about love, honor, cherish, obey.

Detty says she never said nothing about obey, but uh that that one didn't didn't uh didn't make it.

But we made promises, for better or worse, sickness and health, richer and poor, all those.

And sometimes we make promises uh in vows that we write ourselves.

It's the overflowing of the move of the spirit in our heart as we're called into a place of one flesh, right?

And then what happens?

Life.

Man, the kids show up, little ankle biters, feed me, feed me.

All of those things happen, and those promises get lost.

And one thing the Lord wants us to do is to remember those promises because there was power in them and there's still power in them.

They're as true now as they were the day you made 'em.

And you need to hold to those things because that was the the word of the Lord flowing through your spirit.

When you made those promises.

Okay.

Wonder.

Marriage is a journey of unfolding revelation, and that is the truth.

Sometimes that might mean we wonder what we are doing.

Marriage is an adventure with all the surprising twists and turns of an odyssey.

Bound together in the vessel of marriage, we do know our destination, well, to some degree anyway.

And by holding on to our sense of humor and of wonder with childlike faith, every day can be a preg can be pregnant with amazement and joy at his never-ending presence and power over our lives.

And thank God he has power over our lives.

Okay, and the fifth sense is exclusivity.

Exclusivity.

See, your marriage covenant, our marriage covenant, the marriage covenant, only has room for three.

Oh, now everybody we mean three.

Three, three, three.

Okay.

Don't forget Jesus is central.

It's everything Luke and Megan said today.

This is all the dress rehearsal.

This is all the prelude for an eternal wedding celebration.

Is it not?

And so there's not room for anybody else to participate in the dance of love that we have.

Now, sometimes marriage is described as as the um the way of the wound, okay?

Because there's a pattern of loss and renewal.

And that pattern of loss and renewal is all through scripture.

It's all through scripture.

Jacob had to wrestle and be wounded to become Israel, right?

Jesus had to be wounded even unto death to become our Savior, right?

So that's a pattern that is normal.

And there's no room for anybody else in that.

When we have that attitude of exclusivity, then it allows us to undertake what we happen to call acts of love, but it's what Megan described at the end of their comments.

And that is when you prefer one another, then you submit yourself to the desires of the other person joyfully, and you undertake an act of love and you do something that you probably rather not do, but you're glad to do it, right?

Preference.

That's what it's about.

You prefer the other.

Don't you sometimes wonder what you're doing?

And a sense of exclusivity.

And those are the things that are to be deposited into you today.

So if you're here, you're a married couple, you want to receive this, go ahead and stand up if you would.

If you're here and your spouse isn't here, that's okay.

Stand up.

If you're at home, get off the couch, stand up, okay?

Because we're going before the Lord to deposit into you what's called an evident token.

It isn't, you're not going to walk out of this room suddenly totally changed.

But there's a seed planted.

There's a token deposited into your relationship.

And because you are one flesh, it's in both of you.

So let's pray.

Lord, thank you for this moment.

Thank you for all that you've done this morning in all of this time.

Lord, none of us can know where everybody else is, but you do.

You know every single thing we need.

You know in this moment where we're hurting, where we're laughing, where we're victorious, where we're struggling.

And Lord, thank you that you bring your wisdom for each of these couples at the very point they're exactly at right now, today.

In this moment, Lord.

And so, Lord, today, as you commanded us, we want to release into every couple a refreshing of their sense of humor.

Lord, we want to release to every couple a renewed sense of intentional celebration of everything that you have brought into their marriage journey, Lord.

Lord, you said we are to pursue those promises that we made.

Help us, Lord, to find those promises and help us to re-embrace those.

Help us to renew them, Lord.

Help us to recommit to them.

Lord, your ways are greater than ours, your thoughts are higher.

We have no idea how to imagine what you are doing in our lives.

Thank you for a sense of childlike wonder, Lord.

Thank you that we can experience all of the nuances and all of the subtlety of how you love us and all of the hopes you have for us and all of the places that you're taking us to, Lord.

We want to enjoy your abundant love every day.

And Lord, today we reaffirm our sense of exclusivity.

We reject any temptation for regret or imagination or comparison.

We take captive any thoughts contrary to the knowledge of God, and we stand today in firm obedience to Christ.

Lord, let us go forth as that model of eternity.

Help us to grow, help us to change, help us to flow and prepare ourselves for that ultimate wedding, that ultimate wedding feast, that time when we're all together with you.

And we say all of this to you this morning with the authority of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Amen.

Thank you all very much.