You only need One in marriage - Pastor Kipp Penrod

Thank you for listening to this message from Life House Church.

Turn to somebody right now.

Tell them I'm so glad you're here.

Just tell them that.

Turn to somebody.

Well, only do it if you mean it.

But turn to somebody.

Tell them you're really glad they're here this morning.

Yeah, it's good to have you here this morning.

Really just appreciate it here and you worship the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and just dive into worship.

I encourage you to do that on a daily basis.

I know we come here and we do this for corporate worship, but there's something to doing that privately as well.

And just getting with God on a daily basis and you should start your day.

I know of devotions we read a word sometimes, but sometimes you just need to get in praise, right?

Maybe it's in the shower, right?

How many of you shower singers?

You all are behind me.

I couldn't see who all raised their hand, but we want you to do that and engage in that.

Yeah, it's important.

It's amazing.

I'm not going to go there this morning, but I want to give you, I want to start off this message.

And I know I got told a couple of times this week I need to be on my game because we don't have any movie clips.

We don't have any snacks for you in the sanctuary this morning.

So yeah, at the movies is over.

We'll probably do it again next year, but I'll do my best this morning.

But I wanted to start off with a message title this morning, which is you only need one in marriage.

You only need one.

Now, I know that sounds like a complete contradiction, right?

That sounds like when you're talking about marriage, you're thinking just the opposite.

You need more than one for a marriage, right?

When I talk about marriage, you're thinking about wedding day.

You're thinking about wedding plans.

You're thinking about a bride.

You're thinking about a groom, right?

My son and his lovely wife, Mara, here, they just got married.

And I know for Levi, yeah, come on, give me a hand.

Yep, and they're still in the honeymoon, right?

And when we talk about weddings, we think plural, right?

Because if Mara wanted to show it up on wedding day, Levi would have been really bummed out, right?

He just went home with the cake and that's it.

That's all he would have had.

So when I say you only need one in marriage, some might think that sounds kind of contradictory, right?

That doesn't sound right.

It sounds a little crazy, but it's true.

And this is true on multiple levels spiritually.

For a marriage to thrive, for a marriage to survive, and not to survive, we need one God.

Say this with me, one God, one principle, and one plan for marriage.

Okay, I'm going to give you some slices, some things that you want this morning for marriage.

One God, one principle, one plan.

And I'm always excited to talk about marriage because I'm passionate about marriages.

And it breaks my heart when I see marriages fall apart.

And I know when I say something like this, like one God, one principle, one plan,

some of you are thinking, well, that sounds way too simple.

I've been married a while, right?

That's way too easy.

You might be thinking, he doesn't know what he's talking about.

He's just after a three-point message, right?

He's trying to be dramatic.

I don't know what you're thinking back there, right?

He's just looking to get a good sermon out of the whole thing.

But I've been, a couple of things here.

I've been married for 33 amazing years to my lovely wife.

Thank you, thank you.

She's not here this morning.

She's at East Shore.

She's up there taking care of things at East Shore with worship.

But I've been married for 33 years.

But number two is that it doesn't matter what I say about marriage.

It matters what God says about marriage.

It really does.

It matters what He says.

And we need one God, one principle, and one plan.

And great marriages are some product of adding and subtracting the right things in marriage.

It's adding the right attitudes.

It's adding the right words.

It's adding the right actions.

It's adding the right attitudes.

It's all those things, the right mindsets.

And it's subtracting the wrong ones.

A good marriage is like solving a math equation.

It really is.

How many of you love math out there?

Raise your hand if you love math.

One of the kids told me the last two weeks ago, I hate math.

I hope they're not upset this morning, right?

But a good marriage is like solving a math equation.

It's like a math problem.

It's a math thing.

And today we're going to focus on solving the problem of marriage.

Because marriage by nature, by nature is a problem to solve.

Sorry to crush all the romantic notions in the room.

All right?

I'm sorry to come down that way.

But Paul gives instructions to the Corinthians.

And he talks about marriage.

And he's talking about single life.

And he says this in 1 Corinthians 728.

He says, but even if you do marry, he's had this discussion,

his dialogue about marriage, you have not sinned.

And if a virgin marries, she has not sinned.

Nevertheless, such will have trouble in the flesh.

Right?

So he's talking about marriage, but I would spare you.

That last little statement is like, I would spare you.

You could stay single like he was, right?

But if not, you're going to have trouble in the flesh.

So when it comes to relationships between a man and a woman

and marriage, temper your expectations.

Just assume that you're going to have some trouble in the flesh.

All right?

Some of you back there, amen.

All right?

Amen.

Assume if you got married, you just bought into a problem to solve.

Okay?

You just bought into a problem.

And I'm trying to help you this morning.

I promise you, all right?

The other person that's there is not to fulfill you.

I know they, we think that sometimes we get to marry.

Some of you have been married a long time.

You're like, yeah, sorry, brother.

Okay, they're not there to fulfill you.

That's Jesus' job, right?

They're not there to guide and direct you in everything life.

In life, that's the Holy Spirit's job.

Please don't put that kind of pressure on another flawed human being.

Right?

Don't do that.

As attractive as they are, they're trouble.

All right?

So, turn to the person beside you this morning.

If you're dating, if you were married, look him square in the eye and say, what's up,

trouble?

Come on, what's up, trouble?

What's up, trouble?

You picked yourself a problem to solve.

All right?

It doesn't matter how good looking and sweet they are, how successful they are, right?

How warm and fuzzy they make you feel.

You got some trouble.

You got a problem to solve.

And so, we're going to do math this morning, all right?

We're going to solve the problem a little bit or some of the problems maybe in marriage.

With one God plus one principle, plus one plan, helps you to have a strong marriage.

Say it with me, one God, one principle, one plan.

I want you to get this in your spirit.

And all the factors and add-ins, right, must factor together and come up with the sum of

a solid marriage.

And if you're not married here this morning and you're single, well, listen, you might

be in the dating scene or maybe you're thinking I'm single and I'm loving it.

And I can tell you right now, just somewhere along the way, God might bring you some trouble,

okay?

Somewhere off the long way.

You might get into some trouble, all right?

You'll find that person.

So, listen up.

If you're single, if you're married this morning, if you're somewhere in between, whether you're

loving being single or you're single and looking to get married, whatever it is, if you're already

married.

The bottom line is it makes all the difference with one.

One, one, and one.

So, we're going to add them up.

So, I'm going to start with one God, all right?

One God.

If you're in a relationship with any possibility of marriage on the horizon, singles, listen

up.

You can listen with a grin on your face because you're trouble-free right now, right?

You can do that.

But listen up.

If you're thinking of and considering marriage, think about one God.

If you're a believer or you're an unbeliever or you're married to an unbeliever, think about

one God.

If you were married and you wish you were single, think about one God, all right?

Second Corinthians 614 says this, do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers.

For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness and what communion has light with darkness?

And what accord has Christ with below?

Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever?

And what agreement has the temple of God with idols for you or the temple of the living

God as God has said, I dwell in them and walk among them and I will be their God and they

will be my people.

Now the first factor in relationship equation, first thing you got to ask is, is the other

person following Jesus?

That's kind of a yes or no thing, right?

That's an up or down thing.

Are they following Jesus?

Now back when I was a youth pastor, that was a long, long time ago, but back when I was

a youth pastor, the youth group, we would get all the youth group together and I'd ask

them like, hey, and I still do this with some of the girls in the church.

I'm like, so are there any men in your life, right?

Actually I mean boys.

Are there any boys in your life?

And they're like, well, yeah.

And they'd be like, yeah, there is.

And I'm like, really?

And they'd be like, my next question was, did they know Jesus?

And they'd be like, well, well.

And I'm like, if I see you at the mall, you know I'm going to come ask you if they know,

right?

I'm going to come ask them.

And I literally would tell them that.

I didn't really do it, but I would go to the mall and no kid, I'd see kids in youth group

maybe ducking into stores like Zoom.

They're going this way.

They're like, you know, you know how you do.

You hide from somebody in the store when you don't want to talk to them.

You all do that, don't you?

I know.

You're all laughing.

All right?

But do they know Jesus, right?

Are they following Jesus?

Do they trust in Jesus?

Not that they just hear about Jesus.

Not do they just like Jesus, right?

Not that they just think that Jesus was a great man.

Not that they're not opposed to Jesus or they could potentially follow Jesus, which is everybody

in the whole wide world, right?

The girls used to say that.

Well, they could potentially follow Jesus.

I'm like, that qualifies everybody, right?

Are they following Jesus as Lord and Savior?

And scripture says, are they, you know, are they sold out?

And scripture doesn't hit this principle lightly.

It's not a quick tip here, right?

It says, do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers.

And it drives home for what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness and what communion

has light with darkness.

So it's talking about opposites, right?

What accord it has, Christ will be allowed, or what part has a believer with an unbeliever,

and what agreement has the temple of God with idols?

So what's the idea?

Well, if you're unequally yoked with an unbeliever, you're running in opposite directions.

If you're tied together, there's going to be sections or areas of your life that you're

going to be pulling the opposite way.

And what you buy yourself is a little more extra trouble, right?

You're going to be in trouble anyway if you get married, but you're going to have some

extra trouble.

And it may even feel impossible at times in certain slices of your life.

It's going to feel like you're pulling this way and that.

And understand what God is saying here.

He's not trying to limit your options.

I hear that all the time, sometimes from young people, like, well, listen, there's not a

very big pool to pull from in this church.

All right?

I've heard those kind of things, right?

God's not trying to limit your options, right?

And I think what God is saying here, David, is because he's designed us body, mind, and

spirit.

You got to know that.

God put us together and you're not just one dimensional.

Your body, your mind, and your spirit, right?

Your soul.

So you got your physical body, you got your mind.

That's that gray stuff up in your head that you use to think every day.

And then you got your spirit, which is the eternal part of you.

And when a man and woman come together in the context of marriage, God wants you to connect

on all three of those.

Body, mind, right?

You can connect bodily.

We know that, right?

That's a sexual connotation with things.

You can connect with your mind.

You can think the same and like the same things.

But he wants you to connect spiritually, too, because that's the eternal part of you.

That's the part that goes on forever.

And God says, he says these things so that it's healthy for you, so that it brings health

in your life, and so you got a little less trouble going on.

So you know, what?

And you got to understand, this is important because you got to understand that there's

things that you're going to have to work through, if not, right?

Because you have different end goals in mind.

But you know, as Christians, our end goal is to die to us and to live to Christ.

So it takes Jesus, right?

We're chasing hard after Jesus for the end goal.

For an unbeliever, and honestly, a lot of times, like if I say Jesus is first in my life,

for somebody that doesn't follow Jesus, that's a hard thing for them to understand.

They're like, why am I not first, right?

Why aren't the kids first?

What kind of thing gets tough?

So the end game is different.

And how you live might be different, and the things you should participate in.

So unequally yoked can bring you some extra trouble.

Just know that because of the connection in spirit is different.

So scripture tells us, don't be unequally yoked for your own health and well-being.

Now if you're dating and you're single and loving it, and trouble walks into your life,

make sure they're walking with Jesus.

Ask them.

Ask them about that.

See where they're at, right?

You hear me, teenagers?

All right?

I promise I won't ask you if I see you out in public.

My wife used to smack me for doing those kind of things.

Like, stop it.

You're embarrassing those kids, all right?

Now let me talk to you if you're married, all right?

What if you already bought in to some kind of trouble?

And what if you got married and you're unequally yoked?

What if you got married and you got saved and your spouse didn't get saved, right?

Sometimes that happens.

They come to Jesus, and one spouse comes to Jesus and the other doesn't.

And they choose that.

And I don't want you sitting here thinking, oh man, I'm doomed.

Like, oh, I got all this extra trouble in my life, right?

The rest of my life is going to be terrible.

What does God have to say about that?

And He says that, first of all, let me tell you something.

You're never doomed in Christ Jesus.

Ever.

Ever.

Hear me in this.

Ever.

We are more than overcomers in Christ.

Know that, live that, believe that.

Whatever situation you're in.

Jesus paid a great price for our victory.

He went to the cross so you could live as overcomers so that you could come on, strive

in life.

He did that.

Secondly, God changes the hearts, okay?

God can change the heart.

I do what I do because I believe God can change the heart.

I do what I do because God changed my heart and He changed my life.

He makes all things new, and I believe that.

So your journey might look a little different if you got a spouse that's an unbeliever,

but you are not doomed by any stretch.

As a matter of fact, you just got a little different mission field than some of the rest

of us.

That's what the Word of God says.

I'm going to take you to two scriptures in particular.

One's in 1 Peter 3 1, and the second one's in 1 Corinthians 7 12.

The first one's addressing a wife, okay?

It's husband and wife.

It's just addressing a wife.

You got to hear the Word and the scripture here.

And then the second one's talking about husbands and wives.

And it says this, wives, likewise be submissive to your own husbands that even if some do

not obey the Word, they without a word may be won by the conduct of their wives.

When they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear, that's not fear of the husband, that's

fear of God, right?

By your fear, do not let your adornment be merely outward, arranging the hair, wearing

gold and putting on fine apparel.

Rather let it be the hidden person of the heart with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle

and quiet spirit, which is a very precious gift to God or in the sight of God, all right?

So what this scripture is saying, listen, if you're married to an unbeliever, if you're

unequally yoked in some way, if you got saved and they didn't, the Word of God says that

as a wife, it's your conduct that's going to begin to affect the other person.

It's how you handle that other person, that person that doesn't follow Jesus.

And Paul addresses this, and he gets a lot more specific.

He says this, but to the rest, I, not the Lord say, if any brother has a wife who does

not believe and she is willing to live with him, let him not divorce her.

And a woman who has a husband who does not believe, if he is willing to live with her,

let her not divorce him.

For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife.

And the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband.

Otherwise, your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.

But if the unbeliever departs, let them depart.

A brother or sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace.

For how do you know, oh wife, whether you will save your husband or how do you know,

oh husband, whether you will save your wife?

Let me remind everybody what I said at the beginning.

The other person is not there to fulfill you, right?

That's Jesus' job, right?

They're not there to guide you.

That's the Holy Spirit job.

Your job is to show the other person the love of Jesus Christ.

You're there to model that for that other person, if they're an unbeliever.

And we're supposed to do that.

We're on the mission field, right?

I don't know if you know that or not.

We're supposed to be going out and winning the loss in our communities, right, in our

neighborhoods, at our place of work.

You know these different places.

You just started home.

Some of you got relatives, right, who don't know the Lord.

We love them into the kingdom.

We show them the love of Christ.

You know I love somebody.

I love my wife a lot better because I'm a Christian.

You know that?

I learned a lot of things along the way, and I learned how to love my wife a lot better

because of Jesus.

And that's exactly what the believer does.

When there's a believer and an unbeliever in marriage, you love that other person into

the kingdom.

You respect them.

You don't preach at them and Bible beat them and shame them.

You don't do any of that.

You love them into the kingdom just like somebody loved you into the kingdom, right?

It's a mission field.

It's a place for you to start.

It's one God, right?

Paul addresses it.

He says, just by your conduct, win them.

Be salt and light to that other person.

One God in marriage.

Say it, one God.

Second factor.

First factor.

Say one principle.

Now this is going to be super easy for you to remember because I named the principle,

and I made it really easy because I named it oneness.

One principle, and I named it oneness.

Now any of you that have done premarital counseling with me or sessions with me, you know where

I'm going.

You could probably get up and actually tell this portion of the message.

But oneness is a principle that is in God's Word.

And this principle is extracted from Genesis chapter 2 verse 24.

Genesis 2:24

It actually shows up in Mark 19.5 or Mark 10.8, Matthew 19.5 and Ephesians 5.31 and says

this in Genesis 2.24, Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined

to his wife.

You hear this in weddings all the time, right?

And they shall become one flesh, one flesh.

The same principle is reiterated in the Old Testament and in the New Testament.

It's literally quoted.

And the idea is this, that the two shall come together and become one flesh.

Now this idea of one becomes a very deep running idea, especially if you study out Ephesians

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

chapter 5.

It runs deep.

It goes way under the surface.

And as you think about this, you've got to think about marriage, you've got to think

about weddings, you've got to think about two people coming together because when two

people come together in marriage, they come from two very different backgrounds, right?

Most of the time they come from very different backgrounds.

They have different personalities.

They have different ideas.

They're different genders.

They've got different ways of thinking.

They might do everything different because a lot of times opposites attract and they've

got to come together and become one.

And it almost, when you say it like that, it almost sounds like an unreasonable expectation,

doesn't it?

You've got these two people who've lived decades apart and lived individually and all

of a sudden they've got to come together and they've got to be one, right?

And on this wedding day, this particular day that's called wedding day, that we're going

to come together, we're going to have a ceremony.

They say, I do, it's wonderful, we all clap.

Now you've got to be one.

You've been different all this time, right?

You've been individual.

Now you've got to be one.

Doesn't even sound reasonable, does it?

So how do you get there in a practical way of speaking?

How do you get to this place of oneness?

What does that look like?

Because it's not easy.

It doesn't just naturally happen because you said, I do.

Anybody ever have a personality clash in your marriage?

Come on.

Say amen.

Help me out here, all right?

Be honest.

Come on.

You had a different idea.

Anybody have a different idea this morning in marriage, right?

On the way to church.

Thank you.

All right.

Appreciate the honesty, right?

You wanted to go to Duncan's?

You wanted to go to Starbucks?

You didn't go anywhere because you got in a fight, all right?

Come on.

He's grunting at each other the whole way to church.

I've been married a long time.

All right.

Listen.

How do you get this right without killing each other?

How do you work this out practically?

Listen, the Bible, I believe Scripture has to be something that has handlebars.

You've got to be able to work it out.

And what does that look like?

So I'm going to do this very practically.

I want to give you a little visual this morning.

So when you get to a disagreement, when you get to a place where you don't agree with

each other, you got to think about a table of disagreement.

I'm relabeling this, okay?

This is a table of disagreement this morning.

How many of you know what I'm talking about?

All right.

You get to the table of disagreement.

You're on this side.

She's on that side because there's always sides in a disagreement, right?

And one's on one side, one's on the other side.

And you got to come to the table of disagreement and you got to figure out how are we going

to get into unity?

How are we going to come to a place of oneness?

What's that look like?

So I'm going to make something up here.

Dixie's not here.

I'd have her up here.

But I'd say this, we're going to buy a new car.

Our car broke down this week.

It's been stressful week.

The car's a piece of junk.

We need to get a new car.

And my wife's over here and she says, well, good, let's go to the Ford dealership and buy

a car.

And I'm like, I hate Ford's.

And she's like, well, I've always driven a Ford.

Ford's have never left me down.

My dad has a tattoo of a Ford on his folder.

He doesn't, okay?

I'm making this up.

All right?

And I've had a Ford forever.

I love Ford's.

There's no way I'm stepping foot in Chevy.

And I'm like, oh, I've driven Chevy's my whole life.

There ain't no way I'm getting in a Ford.

Right?

They're garbage.

And my whole family's a bunch of GM people.

Right?

And you get into this argument and you go back and forth.

How do you get to, how do you fix this?

So you take the third seat, which should always be in a Christian marriage, right?

And this is Jesus.

And Jesus should come to the table.

And you invite Jesus to the table.

And one of the first things you have to do is say, whatever we're disagreeing about,

is it in Scripture?

Right?

Is this in Scripture?

If it is, and you're a Christian couple, you have to say, okay, Jesus said this, that

settles it.

Doesn't matter what your opinion is, doesn't matter what my opinion is.

If Jesus said it, it settles it.

If you're unequally yoked, you're going to have to get a little better negotiating.

All right?

You got to sneak Jesus in the conversation.

Okay?

You got to give principles and not Bible beat somebody.

Right?

But what we got to do, now here's the thing.

So we disagree by a Ford or a Chevy this morning.

And we consult Jesus, Jesus, should we buy a Ford or should we buy a Chevy?

Jesus doesn't care if you buy a Ford or a Chevy.

All right?

You can look in Genesis, you can go to Psalms, you can go to Revelation.

You're not going to find Ford or Chevy in the Bible.

Right?

So there's going to be a lot of decisions you're making that Jesus says, you got, I gave you

a brain, I gave you a mind, your body, mind, and spirit.

Right?

Use your brain.

All right?

You too can work this out.

Commit immunity.

So you're not going to find it.

So Jesus says, I'm out on this.

Peace out.

All right?

This is up to you too.

Because there's a lot of things, there's a lot of things you want to find, there's things

you're not going to find.

So how do we get to a place of agreement here?

Now you can argue the other person to death, which I'm really good at.

All right?

I can fill a bus to anybody.

Like I can just go and go and go.

Right?

And some people do that.

They'll get married and they'll grind the other person down.

They will wear them out till they say, I don't care anymore.

Just get it.

Can I tell you something about a negotiation?

A good negotiation means both people win.

If one person walks away from this table of disagreement and they won, you already lost.

Because if this person won, that means this person lost.

If this person lost, that means they've got resentment they're tucking in their pocket.

They got frustration.

They're packing away, they're like, go ahead, buy a Ford.

I'm going to tell you, I told you so for the next 13 years when that thing breaks.

Right?

That's passive aggressive.

All right?

So you can get all this stuff going on.

And if one person lost, you might have won the battle.

You just lost the war.

You're not in unity.

So what you have to do is you have to come to the table.

She wants Ford, you want a Chevy.

And you have to say, you have to realize something in a marriage.

To get into unity, neither one of you are going to get exactly what you want.

So you have to come.

And you can't come in rude.

You can't come in arrogant.

You can't come in driving the other person into the ground.

You can't come in calling names.

You can't come in.

This has to be a good negotiation where both people win in the negotiation.

So you know what you start doing?

Well, maybe we need to go look at a Subaru.

All right?

You both get into Subaru.

You hate it.

Okay?

Let's go look at a Hyundai.

All right?

You get into Hyundai.

That's not bad.

Then you go look at a Toyota.

Whatever.

I drive Toyota.

You go look at a Toyota.

And sooner or later you can hit something because you're negotiating, right?

And she goes, you know what?

This isn't bad.

And you go, you know what?

I think this is okay, too.

Should we do this?

And we make a we decision.

And all of a sudden you lock the arm and arm and you make the decision.

Now it might be a good decision.

It might be a bad decision, right?

You might buy a Hyundai.

And two weeks later the engine blows up and it's horrible.

But at least you did it together, right?

You did it in unity and you can laugh about it.

You can say or you can cry about it, but you can say we did it, right?

Not see I told you.

Right?

Come on.

You want to get into unity.

This is what God's talking about becoming one.

It is Jesus first.

You consult Jesus.

If Jesus didn't put it in the Bible, then he left it to you, too.

And you got to step in unity and you say, well, that's just a little thing and it's

kind of funny.

But I've watched this.

I've worked with so many people that break this principle over and over and over again.

And it's the little things and they build up and they build up and they tuck it away

and it's one and then it's two and then it's three and all of a sudden they're carrying

around a bag of a hundred things that they disagreed with and they never got into unity

and they're so angry with one another, so frustrated with one another and there's no

intimacy mentally, physically in any other way.

And that's when they come to my office.

Right?

And we got to start talking about how to unpack this and how to fix this.

This is unity.

This is oneness.

One God, one principle, one principle, oneness.

Two have to come together and become one.

Get good at this.

I've seen people who do not follow Jesus, who are not Jesus followers and they do this

well.

I don't know how they figured it out, but they did.

They do this well and I've seen Christians who have lousy marriages because they won't

do this.

They won't follow what's in Scripture and the unbelievers, they got a great marriage

because they do this and they do well.

Practice it.

Listen, if you're dating somebody and try this out on them, start a disagreement.

Just do it.

They're just for fun.

Okay?

Seriously.

Just start one just for fun and see if they're able to do this.

If they don't, take them back to the curb you found them on, drop them off and let them

there.

Seriously.

I know that sounds harsh, right?

But it's true because if they can't do this, you're going to have misery up the line.

Come on, I'm helping you out this morning.

I told you this is about getting past trouble.

I told you this morning, right?

One God, one principle, one plan.

The key to marriage, the key to contentment in marriage, the key to intimacy is being

able to do this and then working the plan.

Once you agree to the plan, you walk through this together arm in arm.

You can't back out, right?

You don't get to say, hey, here's the plan just to help the other person out, right?

Because they'll feel good about it.

And then you change your mind midstream.

You just gave that person permission to call you out and you need to repent and go back

to the plan, right?

If the plan's not working, if all of a sudden the circumstances change in the middle of

the plan, guess what you got to do?

You got to come back to the table of disagreement.

You got to get back into unity again, however long that takes.

This does not always happen in 10 minutes.

It doesn't always happen in two days.

You got to come back.

You got to get to the table of unity and you step through again, but you got to stick with

the plan.

You got to guide or give you a vision.

If you consult him, if you talk to him where we're going to go, what we got to do, but

get there and stick with the plan.

Rock arm and arm.

Go through together.

Because if you don't, right, you either got unity or you got division.

Die, which is where you get diverse.

Okay?

You either got unity or you got division.

Get to a place of unity.

Amen?

I'm going to ask you to stay.

Stick to the plan.

Can I tell you something else?

Don't be lazy with this.

I talk to a lot of people in marriages.

They're just stinking lazy with it.

They won't do the work.

Get down to get to a place of unity.

Can I give you the cycle?

Here's how it works.

This is real life.

I'm preaching real life this morning.

Here's how it works.

You get all angry about something.

You disagree about something.

Everything blows up.

Throw something.

Smash, crash, whatever.

You have a big old argument.

You say things you really didn't want to say.

And then everybody's mad and tense.

And then what do you do?

You let it go for a while.

One day, two days.

Three days it finally starts to subside.

You actually get dinner, right, together.

You say a few things about the news.

And after about a week, things start to subside.

The problem is you didn't fix the problem.

You never got into unity.

I assure you it will come back around again.

And it will come around worse the second time and the third time and the fourth time.

Don't get lazy with this.

The word of God says be one.

Get to the table.

Smash it out.

Talk to Jesus.

Talk to one another.

Get into a place of unity wherever that is.

And lock arm in arm and go forward.

I am sick to death of the devil.

Trash in marriages.

Because people don't understand godly principles of marriage.

It kills me to watch that happen.

It kills me.

God wants you whole.

He wants you in a place of one.

Now I know this isn't a fix all for everything in every slice of marriage.

But it's a great place to start.

Huge.

Huge.

Man, I'm asking you about your heads.

Lord, we come before you today.

God, thank you.

God, for each person in the house that's in a relationship.

God, maybe it's dating.

Maybe it's marriage.

God, maybe they're equally yoked.

Maybe they're unequally yoked.

Lord, you gave us plans.

God to have success in marriage.

God, you gave us a way to walk.

And God, I pray right now, God, that you would just move in the hearts and lines of every

marriage in this house.

God, those who are listening on the east shore, those who are listening online.

God, I pray that a spirit of unity would come about them.

God that they would understand how to get to the table of disagreement and come out

of the other side of unity.

God, I pray that they would look to you, one God.

And Lord, if there's a believer who is yoked with an unbeliever, God, I pray for a special

nobility, God, that you, God, that they would be such salt and light to the other person

that they would see Jesus shining.

God that they would love that person with all their heart and all their soul and all their

mind.

And just let them see Christ and the one who believes.

Lord, God, raise them up.

God, let that one who doesn't believe see you.

See you.

Lord, I ask for this.

God, for the person who's searching and wants to get married.

Lord, I pray, God, give them eyes to see and ears to hear in all this.

And Lord, we just give you praise.

We give you glory.

God, we're looking for strength in marriage.

God, we're looking to be able to solve the problem of marriage.

God is indirect.

Jesus, name our prayers.

Thank you for tuning in to this message from LifeHouse Church.

We pray that you were impacted powerfully by this message.

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