Rick Warren - Unlocking the Marriage Matrix—Part Two

Everybody longs for deep, lasting love. But strong relationships don't

just happen by accident. Today on Pastor Rick's Daily Hope,

we're continuing our series called Finding and Keeping the Love

of Your Life. Rick Warren will share practical biblical wisdom

for building healthier, stronger Christ-centered relationships. So whether you're single, dating, engaged,

or married, this series will help you grow in love, communication,

and lasting commitment. And now let's join Rick for the

final part of the message called Unlocking the Marriage Matrix.

As a human being, God gave you skin for a reason.

You're not just a spirit. You have a body, and

skin is meant to be touched. And all of us, everybody,

married or unmarried, need human contact, physical contact. Hugs, pats

on the back. Handshakes. Everybody needs physical affection. Everybody does. Now,

that's why in our church, every week, we touch each

other at least twice. At the beginning and at the

end of every service, we say, turn around and hug somebody.

Turn around and shake hands with somebody. I've had people

tell me, Pastor Rick, the only physical affection I get

all week is at church. That's it. When I'm out

on the patio after the services, greeting people and hugging people,

when people walk away, I often look and I wonder,

I wonder how long that hug's got to last that person.

I've thought about going into full-time Christian hugging. I mean,

I think it'd be a legitimate ministry because everybody needs

to be. Did you know that babies can die from

a lack of touch? Failure to thrive syndrome. If they're

not stroked and touched enough, they can die and so

can marriages. In fact, I read this last week. I'm

not making this up. UCLA did a study and discovered

that if you hug your husband at least three times

a week, you can increase his lifespan up to three years.

Did I say it? Hug your husband at least three

times a day. Did I say day or week? It's day.

If you hug your husband at least ten times a day.

You can increase his lifespan up to three years. And

some of you are going, tough luck, honey. It's been

nice knowing you. If you're too busy to date your mate,

you're too busy. You see, if there were more courting

in marriage, there'd be fewer marriages in court. And the

problem is, what you did to win your mate's love,

you haven't continued to keep your mate's love. Before you

got married, man, you couldn't keep your hands off each other.

And you're hugging and you're kissing and you're walking arm

in arm and you're holding hands. Now that you're married,

you never hold hands anymore. And the touching and the

tenderness slowly fades away. And when that happens, the devil

has won a victory in your marriage. And he's setting

you up for failure. Now, I know the old excuse,

and I've heard it many, many times. It's, well, you know,

I just don't feel affectionate. I just don't. Well, there

could be a lot of reasons for that. Maybe you're

just too tired. Maybe you're too busy. Maybe there's a

health issue. Maybe you've got unresolved resentment. There could be

dozens and dozens of reasons. You're not interested in affection

or sex or anything else. Lots of good reasons that

you could deal with and discuss. But I will tell

you this. It's easier to act your way into a

feeling than it is to feel your way into an action.

When you say, well, I'm gonna wait till I feel

like it to act romantic, it ain't gonna happen. The

devil will make sure you never feel like it. You

have to act romantic even when you don't feel like it,

and when you do, the feelings will come. In fact,

I guarantee it. I guarantee it. Because feelings always follow behavior.

And if you act in a loving way, you act

in a romantic way, you act in an affectionate way,

the feelings will come back. Don't wait for the feelings.

Just do the right thing. And never let a day

go by without some kind of physical contact. An attorney

gave me this story. He said, a woman came into

our law office seeking a divorce. And she said, I

not only want a divorce, but I want to hurt

him badly. Because all the times he's ignored me. So

the attorney said, okay, go home and compliment him every

day until I can get the papers drawn up. Tell

him all the good things that he does. And especially,

smother him with affection every day. Act like you really

adore him. And then we'll file for the divorce, and

it'll devastate him. A month later, she called back the attorney,

and she said, cancel the divorce. We've both fallen in

love with each other again. It's easier to act your

way into a feeling than to feel your way into

an action. And physical affection is as vital to your

marriage as communication... And consideration and compromise and all these

other keys, they're all important. Now, of course, in marriage,

that includes sex. And the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 7, 3,

the husband should not deprive his wife of sexual intimacy,

which is her right as a married woman, nor should

the wife deprive her husband. Now, God doesn't intend for

your marriage to be boring and lifeless and passionless and

pleasureless and dull. But sex has profound implications for your marriage.

In fact, God gave sex, listen, to cement marriages together.

The primary purpose of sex is not to have children.

Not what the Bible says. The primary purpose of sex

is to cement a husband and wife together in a

spiritual union and a bonding that is exclusive to them

that involves nobody else in the world. And that's why

God says don't have sex out of marriage. It has

profound spiritual implications. It is meant primarily for bonding a

husband and a wife together. Notice the next verse, 1

Corinthians 6. There's more to sex than mere skin on skin.

Sex is as much a spiritual mystery as a physical fact.

As it is written, the two shall become one. There

is a spiritual connection there. Now I read an article

just recently called The Yuppie Dilemma, Too Tired for Sex.

And that's sad When marriage deteriorates into simply a business partnership,

or two roommates living together to save on the bills,

as I said, Satan has won a major victory. Because

that is not what God wants for your marriage. That's

not what God designed for your marriage. And you are

setting your marriage up for failure. Now I want to

beg you, if you are having problems with your sexual

relationship in your marriage, Please, please, please get help. It

is available. It is unnecessary for you to suffer in

silence in this area. It just isn't necessary. And you

can get help for all of the possible causes if

you will be honest. Now I want you to rate

yourself on contact. How do you rate yourself on daily

physical affection? Are you too busy? Do you have at

least a weekly date? A date night? Do you need

to touch more in order to stay in touch? Give

yourself a NW, needs work, or an okay. And would

you welcome Terry and Susan to come share their story.

In September of 2001, our small group decided to attend

the Keeping Your Marriage Like workshop here at Saddleback. My

first response to my wife was, why us? I thought

we had a strong marriage and did not need it. However,

I was outnumbered and trapped into attending the workshop with

the rest of our small group. Actually, it was a

lot of fun, and it gave us some great tools

to enrich and strengthen our marriage.

Going to the marriage workshop created the climate where we

could talk about some very delicate issues. One of those

issues was expressing physical affection. We were given homework assignments

to talk with each other in a loving, but open

and very honest way about how we really felt.

We had some very intense discussions. We were talking about

things I had completely avoided in the past. We discussed

what we liked and disliked about each other. And I

realized we should have had these discussions years ago. The

more we talked, the more we opened up to each other.

And as Susan mentioned, one of the key issues we

talked about was showing affection. Growing up, my family didn't

show a lot of physical affection to each other. We

loved each other, but we didn't touch very much, and

we never hugged or showed physical affection in public. I

thought that was normal, so I had no idea how

important it was to my wife and how essential affection

is to a healthy and growing marriage.

On the other hand, my family was very loving and

very affectionate, so I couldn't understand why Terry was so

reluctant to show me affection in public and around our friends.

I thought he was ashamed of me. By discussing our

childhood backgrounds, I discovered why he was so unaffectionate, and

he discovered how important a hug was to me. That

changed everything. Today, Terry is very affectionate. He not only

hugs me, but now he hugs everyone in our small group.

I've created a monster for Terry.

As Pastor Rick says, you keep in touch by touching.

I've learned how important this is, especially when you are

facing stress. Physical closeness helps you realize that you're not

alone in the world, and that it's part of what

marriage is all about, sharing the load. Recently, the company

I work for outsourced my entire department. For the past

three months, I wasn't sure if I'd have a job

after May 2nd. Previously, I would have kept this problem

completely to myself, but with our new emphasis on staying

close and in contact with each other, Susan and I

tackled the problem together. We worked on my resume, we

role-played the interview process, and most importantly, we prayed about

it and turned the problem over to God. The problem

actually brought us closer together instead of driving us apart.

I was devastated when Terry told me he might lose

his job. But by staying close to each other, to God,

and our small group, we survived this difficult time.

Then the day.

Before Terry's termination, the company offered him another job. That

was great, but even if it hadn't happened, we felt

more connected to each other through the test of our relationship.

In closing, I'd like to say a word to all

the guys. Hug your wife more often. Shower her with affection.

You'll feel a lot more connected to her. Thank you.

The fifth key we want to talk about this morning

is the key of commitment.

Commitment.

If you're really going to take one word that would

best summarize the whole marriage relationship, it wouldn't be the

word love. It would be the word commitment. Any two people,

given the right circumstances, the right environment, could develop romantic,

loving feelings towards each other, but that's not really at

the heart of marriage. In fact, the difference between marriage

and just living together is commitment. And God expects us

to keep that commitment. In fact, look at that verse,

the one verse there under point number five, comes from

the book of Malachi, the last book in the Old Testament,

and there are very strong words. I hate divorce, says

the Lord. So make sure that you don't break your

promise to be faithful to your maid. Now, divorce is

a reality in our world, and there are many, many

people in our church who who have been through the

painful experience of divorce and thank God for his grace

and for his forgiveness. But let's be honest this morning,

it's not God's ideal. God wants every man and every

woman who stand together and make marriage vows to stay

together for life, no matter how hard it gets or

what happens along the way. And you will never build

a strong, intimate marriage relationship when divorce is always an option.

And there are many people who carry around secretly this

little escape hatch. And in their minds, they think if

it gets really hard, or if things don't go like

I thought, or if I get really unhappy, I've got

this little key to the escape hatch that will always

allow me a way out. And the reality is that

in our culture, it has become far too easy to

run away. So let me just encourage you, if you're

married and you're here this morning, throw away that key.

Don't leave yourself that escape hatch. Don't leave yourself that option.

When you said, till death do us part, that was

a lifelong commitment. Don't leave it as an option. Here's

one of the things that people often don't realize is

that commitment somewhere along the way will mean being willing

to be unhappy for a while. Somewhere in your journey

in marriage, your commitment will require you To be willing

to be perhaps unsatisfied or unhappy for a season until

things work out. And some people have this attitude, if

I could just get out, if I could just be

with that person, or if I could just get this

kind of relationship. It's the whole idea that the grass

is always greener over there. But friend, the grass is

greener where.

You water it.

And it starts with your commitment. That no matter where

you are right now or what's going on in your relationship,

that you are committed. And I cannot even begin to

understand and relate to some of the pain that I

know some of you must be going through in your

own relationships right now. But stay committed. My wife and I,

this summer, will celebrate our 25th anniversary. We got married

when we were 12. But just honestly, in the early

years of our marriage, I was clueless about how to

be a good husband. I had distorted ideas of what

it meant to be a spiritual leader in my home,

and far more than I would ever want you to know,

I damaged her self-worth and self-esteem. But even through all

of those hard times, she never threatened to leave me.

She never threw up divorce as an option. We were

committed to each other as hard as it was. And

I can tell you now that after 25 years, it's

richer and more rewarding and more fulfilling than ever before.

But it started because we had a fundamental commitment. And

I want you to hear the story of someone, a couple,

who's worked through the hard difficulties of this word commitment.

Would you welcome Gary and Lisa and hear their story?

Thank you.

Fourteen years ago, Lisa and I fell in love, and

in 1991, after I returned from the first Persian Gulf War,

we were married. In 1995, we had our little girl, Megan.

But because we didn't have the skills or knowledge to

build a strong marriage, four years ago, we found ourselves

planning our divorce.

Like most marriages, ours was filled with both good times

and bad times. But as time passed on, we argued

and fought incessantly. During our arguing, Gary and I threatened

each other with divorce all the time. We each used

that threat to hurt each other because of the deepening

hurt and pain we were feeling. I felt hopeless and

finally came to a point where I was done. I

was scared out of my mind to think of raising

my daughter by myself alone, but I became more and

more determined that I wanted out of this marriage. I

listened to the same old faulty logic that Satan has

used on millions of others. I justified in my mind

that God wanted me to be happy, and I was

not happy. So I assumed that it would be all

right with God if I left our marriage. We both

were amazingly calm and deeply saddened that we both had

failed at this marriage of ours.

Lisa was unhappy all the time about everything. At first,

I tried to fix her problems by giving her my

great advice and criticism. Surprisingly, that didn't work. Then I

would get angry at her. I felt that all our

conversations were about her problems and that there was no

room for any of my problems. Finally, I stopped talking

to her altogether. I found ways to avoid her. I

worked late.

I read. I watched TV.

The more I withdrew from her, the unhappier she got.

And the unhappier she got, the more I withdrew. It

was a cycle we couldn't break out of. I remember

the exact point when I reached rock bottom in our marriage.

We had been arguing. And I went to our bathroom,

which doesn't have any windows, and I shut the door

and turned off the light. I just sat there on

the edge of the tub and realized that I had

nowhere to go and that our marriage was over. But

then God reminded me of two important truths. First, that

quitting is a choice. I was choosing to break a

commitment and a vow that I had made to God. Second,

God reminded me that I cannot make it through life

on my own steam. I needed Jesus in my life

and marriage to make it work. So I sat Lisa down,

and I told her that I did not want to

divorce her, and that I was willing to do whatever

it took to make our marriage work. I told her

I was open to getting help for our marriage.

When Gary said he was willing to work on our marriage,

I felt a little hope, but I was still skeptical

that anything could miraculously turn our relationship around. But we

came to Lay Counseling here at Saddleback, and our journey

to restoration began. It began with putting God at the

center of our marriage, Our counselors, Larry and Barbara, told

us straight out that God did not want us to divorce.

We had a commitment, and God expected us to keep

it no matter how we felt. Well, with the divorce

taken off the table as a threat and no longer

an option, all our energy suddenly shifted to making our

marriage work. God started working miracles in our life, and

within weeks we started remembering the reasons why we fell

in love in the first place. We learned how to

communicate better and learned some new tools. One of those

tools was to never, ever threaten divorce again. That option

is off limits.

Our testimony is brief, but it has an important lesson

we've learned. You'll never be able to fix your marriage

if you continue to harbor the possibility of divorce in

the back of your mind. You must focus on keeping

your commitment. Otherwise, you will not put in the effort

needed to build a great relationship. If you focus on

your commitment, not your bad feelings, The good feelings will return.

We continue to work on our marriage each day. And

now over the past two years, we have volunteered to

help other marriages. We can now see how God has

used the pain in our relationship for good. In closing,

we want to say to those of you who are hurting,

don't give up. Thank you.

Thank you.

If you have been married 25 years or longer, would

you stand up right now and stay standing? Now, let

me ask you, before you sit down, let me ask

you a couple questions. How many of you would say,

we have had some major conflicts in those 25 years

or more? That's what I thought. How many would say,

sometimes I felt like giving up? That's what I thought.

I want to say to you, I honor you. I

honor you for understanding the meaning of commitment in a

world that knows nothing about commitment. Now here's the sixth

key to unlocking the marriage matrix. It takes communication and consideration.

It takes compromise and contact. And it takes commitment. But

most of all, it takes Christ. Christ. It takes three

to make a marriage stand. Not two, three. You, your spouse,

and Christ. God never meant for you to go through

your marriage just with the two of you working on it.

Marriage is a three-legged stool. It takes three legs for stability.

You've never seen a two-legged stool. A two-legged stool will

fall over. It has no stability. And if all you've

got in your marriage is each other, it isn't enough,

I'll tell you. It isn't enough. You need you, your spouse,

and God. It takes a three-legged stool to stand up

to stability. And Jesus Christ is the key to all

the other five keys in the marriage matrix. Colossians 2

says this out of the Bible. God's secret is Christ himself.

He is the key that opens all the hidden treasures

of God's wisdom and knowledge. Now, we live in earthquake country,

and we all know that if you don't have a

strong foundation, when the earthquake comes, your home's going to fall.

In the same way, your marriage must have a solid foundation,

because you're going to face a lot of earthquakes in life.

You're going to have some health earthquakes. You're going to

have some financial earthquakes. You're going to have some emotional earthquakes.

You're going to have all kinds of different problems and

stresses and earthquakes in your life. And if you don't

have a solid foundation for your home, it's not going

to be stable. What is the foundation? Jesus Christ. Look

at the next verse. He will be the sure foundation

for your times. A rich store of salvation and wisdom

and knowledge. The fear of the Lord is the key

To this treasure. What's the fear of the Lord? It's

respecting God for who he is. God, you're God. And

you have a right to be number one in my life,

in my spouse's life, and in our marriage. And we're

going to build our marriage around you. I want you

to listen to our last couple, Don and Desi. Give

them a warm welcome.

Hi.

Hi. Desi and I were married in 1991, but it

didn't take long for the magical bubble of newness to

wear off. We soon realized that marriage requires a lot

of give and take.

I was a new Christian, but Don had not yet

committed his life to Christ. Of course, that caused many problems.

Our first year was a major change because we were

both very used to taking care of our own lives

as single adults. It was a new stress to share

one checkbook and one bank account. I was not used

to sharing each and every item I purchased or being

accountable for helping keep our budget in line. I was

used to spending my money on what I wanted and

just squeaking by, paying my bills each month. Don, on

the other hand, wanted to save money each month, so

he had many heated arguments over finances. And I'm sure

none of you have ever had that problem. I was

so discouraged because my idea of marriage had been, you

get to have the person you love around all the time,

Have fun, have a family, but still keep on spending

money any way you want to.

When we moved to the Saddleback Valley, we were invited

to Saddleback Church by our good friends, and our lives

began to change rapidly for the better. We began to

come close to God and have an understanding of the

gift that he's given us in Jesus Christ. I don't

have time to share all these details, but the bottom

line is this. It wasn't until I allowed Jesus Christ

become the center of my life and our marriage that

that our relationship began to improve. We took the focus

off of ourselves and we put it on to Jesus.

That caused us to be more accepting and more understanding,

more loving and more forgiving of each other. Now I

know this sounds funny to some of you, but our

marriage actually got better when we started to tie as

a couple. You may wonder why, and I thought about

it a lot. I came to a conclusion. It's because

we consider money to be so important to us that

tithing is the practical proof that Jesus really is the

center of our life and our marriage. So many marriages

fight over finances. Once Desi and I committed the financial

part of our marriage to Jesus, we began to see

incredible changes because God could see that we were trusting

in him and that we put him first. God has

so blessed us for this commitment many times over.

One of the ways that has helped Donna and I

keep Christ at the center of our marriage is is

being a part of a small group. I can't say

enough about how important our small group is in helping

us maintain a Christ-focused marriage. We've grown so much through

the fellowship love, praying together, and being there for accountability

in both good and difficult times. In today's world, marriages

need all the support they can get, and our small

group has provided that. They've encouraged us as we've faced

financial issues, miscarriages, the responsibility of trying to raise two

godly children, and many other issues.

In closing, I'd like to say a word to those

of you that are married to a believer, but you

haven't made your own personal commitment to Christ yet. I

know what this is like, and I know how you feel.

I stood in your shoes. My advice for you is

open up your heart to Jesus today. It'll be the

best thing you ever do for yourself, for your marriage,

and for your family. Thank you.

Thank you. I love what Don said. The best thing

you can do for your marriage is open your life

to Jesus Christ. You want a strong marriage? Become a

godly man. You want a strong marriage? Become a godly woman. Now,

how do you do that? First, you open up your

life to Jesus Christ. Second, you commit your life and

your marriage to Jesus. Third, you get involved in a

small group where you're going to get the support you need.

And fourth, you talk about these six issues. Communication. Commitment. Contact,

all of these issues compromise. Now listen, you can read

your Bible all you want and pray all you want

and your marriage isn't going to get any better. It

takes more than reading your Bible in prayer. You've got

to work on the things that God tells you to

work on. But listen, if you will both love God

with all your heart and if you will both do

what he tells you to do in marriage, these six

keys to unlocking the marriage matrix, you can have an

outstanding relationship incredible, great, strong, healthy marriage, no matter what

the past has been like. And it's your choice. So

I challenge you to commit your life to Christ and

then commit yourself to these other five keys. Good marriages

don't just happen. They are intentional. And these are the

keys in the next few weeks. We're going to look

at them in detail. Now, let me tell you personally,

In all the things I've done in my life, and

I've done a lot of things, the most challenging challenge

in my life has been my marriage. Without a doubt,

the hardest thing I've had to work on in my life,

building this church is far easier than building my marriage.

But it has also been the single greatest source of

growth in my life, and it has also been the

most rewarding thing in my life. What you put into

it is what you're going to get out of it.

Now let's bow our heads. Today could be a fresh

start for your marriage. Would you like that? Would you say, yeah,

I'd like some of the barriers to come down that

have never fallen. I'd like to work through some of

the hurt, the pain, some of the issues we've never

talked about. I'd like to build our marriage. If you'd say...

You know, I'd like to work on our relationship and

make it better during these weeks ahead. You might, as

a sign of intent, just reach out right now for

your husband or your wife's hand and squeeze it and

hold it as we pray together. And pray this in

your heart. Dear God, help us to learn to communicate better.

Help us to be more considerate of each other's feelings.

Help us to compromise in areas of disagreement. Help us

to forgive each other. Help us to make contact with

each other every day in some way. Help us to

deepen our commitment to each other and to you. Help

us to show affection. Jesus Christ, we need you in

our lives. In your name we pray. Amen.

Hey, thanks for listening to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. And

now here's Rick with a special message.

Friends, we believe that God wants everybody to be saved.

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2 Peter 2:9

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