In Relation To: Safeguarding Your Marriage

Amen.

You guys doing well?

Good.

Good.

Before we jump into the specific message for this morning, I want to remind everyone about this season that we're in as a church.

It's actually a really exciting season.

God is doing things.

In fact, we have five people getting baptized today.

Two got baptized at the first gathering, three that are about to get baptized, which is awesome.

And uh, heck yeah.

And we've had someone get baptized at every service that we've had for the last several months.

God's just doing some really incredible things.

He's bringing people to himself.

We're also in this season right now as a church that's defined by this phrase, our turn.

And I've talked about this over the course of the last few weeks.

We exist as a church in large part because 13 years ago, a couple named Stephen Susan Craig said yes to a call that God put on their hearts to start a church.

And for them, that meant giving$16 million so that this could exist, which is a really big deal.

Six years ago, before I was in the role that I'm in now, I was reading in the Old Testament, 1 Chronicles chapter 29, the story of King David who wants to see the temple get built.

1 Chronicles 29 · chapter mention

And so he gives everything he has for that to happen.

And that was enough to get the temple started, but it wasn't enough to bring it to completion.

That required all the people of Israel coming together and stepping up and saying, essentially it's our turn now.

And they they finished what was started.

And here we are 13 years later as a church, we've seen over 1,500 people give their lives to Jesus in that amount of time.

How awesome is that! Praise God for that.

That's huge.

We've seen marriages saved and addictions broken.

We've seen so much, so much happen in the community as the result of this church.

God is doing great things through this place, but it's our turn now financially to step up and say, hey, let's do this.

We've we've never done a giving campaign or anything like that in 13 years.

But right now we've got about$1.3 million of needs that we've got to take care of.

And we're saying, hey, if this is our church, it's our turn.

This has been given to us the steward.

And so you can listen to the message a few weeks ago.

We go into all kinds of specifics.

We're super transparent.

You can go on our website, hishandschurch.com, you'll see a breakdown of everything that we're gonna do.

You can ask any questions.

Um the curtain's totally pulled back.

Most of what we're doing is addressing things that are broken or like this close to breaking, because we're 13 years in and we've we've been milking everything for all that it's worth, just keeping it going.

A lot of duct tape has been used, it's been exciting.

Um, but it's time to take care of some things.

So, all that to say, if if this is your church and you give on a normal basis, thank you for that.

Keep it up.

And we're asking that for the months of March and April that you would bring an offering to our turn on top of what you normally give.

You don't have to give two separate donations uh via cash check or even at the kiosk at the back online.

You can put your amount to the general fund into our turn in one transaction.

If this is your church but you haven't given yet, financially, that's something you haven't started to do, this is when to start.

Start by giving to our turn.

Let's take care of this together.

Let's see what God does.

After April, we'll shift in more of a long-term plan.

But right now, what we're really doing is saying, hey, just like God told Stephen Susan to do something, let's go to him, let's pray, say, Lord, what do you want us to do?

Let's be open to whatever he challenges us to do, even if it requires great faith, which for some of us it might.

God might put something on your heart and you're like, oh, okay.

Do that with him, trust him with that, and we'll see what he does with it.

I believe he's gonna do some amazing, incredible things, but it's our turn to step up.

So let's do that together, okay?

You can do that today, um, the kiosker at the back.

You can do it online, our mobile app as well.

That said, let's jump into what we're actually talking about this morning, and what we're talking about is marriage.

We started a series a few weeks ago called In Relation to.

The reality is really simple.

Once we have a relationship with Jesus, we have to do everything in our lives in relation to him, in relation to God.

I have to live my life in relation to who God is and what he has for me and what he wants me to do.

And sometimes I think it would be a lot easier to live in relation to God if I didn't have to live in relation to other people.

Because other people can make it hard to live in relation to God sometimes, you know?

And so we have these relationships on this earth that affect us, and sometimes that's really good, and sometimes it's really challenging, and it stretches us.

Sometimes the most frustrating situations that we have involve the relationships closest to us.

But the amazing thing about God is that he never calls us to live in relation to him apart from living in relation to one another.

He wants your relationships to be healthy and good.

Jesus always, always connected loving God to loving people.

And in the book of Ephesians, which we've been going through for a while, there's this section where the writer, Paul, addresses three specific relationships that touch virtually every single one of our lives at some point in time: husbands and wives, children and parents, and employers and employees.

Every single one of us is going to be impacted in a significant way by one or more of those relationships.

So we're just going through that, unpacking it, and trying to learn what God's Word has for us as far as how to live in relation to each other.

So the last few weeks we've been talking about marriage.

I know that not all of us are married.

Just a show of hands, real quick, so I can have a gauge for that.

How many of us in the room are married right now?

Cool.

That's a lot of us, but it's not all of us.

For some of us, not raising our hands is kind of a hard thing because maybe that means that we want to be married, but we're not.

Someone might be nudging someone next to them right now, you know, like, uh, no pressure.

But like, if it's been a while, they get married.

Um, some of us, it's hard because we have been married and it did not work out.

And that can be very, very difficult.

It's interesting because I I exist in part because of that happening.

My dad was married once before he married my mom.

And so I was, I was, I wouldn't be alive.

It's a weird thing to think about if a marriage hadn't not worked, you know?

And that to me has always been this really interesting reality of the fact that, well, I don't believe it was God's will that my father's first marriage didn't last.

God can take mistakes or or or opportunities, like he can take the moments in life where it doesn't work and he can use it to do something we could have never imagined otherwise.

So there should be no shame, no, no guilt for that.

But I would imagine that if you're in the room and you've been through a divorce, you wouldn't wish that on anyone else.

And so you might be the person in the room who's actually like the most for the marriages in the room right now because you know what it feels like when it doesn't work out, and you would want to see those marriages succeed.

Two weeks ago we talked to husbands.

And if you weren't here that morning, men, listen to that message.

Even if you're not married, like, listen to that, be prepared for that one day.

Ladies, last week Elan talked to wives, and I thought Elan did an absolutely phenomenal job with that conversation last week.

That was, I am so glad I didn't have to give that message.

Because I've never been a wife and I don't really know what to say.

But Elan did a phenomenal job.

If you weren't here last week, listen to that message.

It was it was awesome.

Before we shift and go into that next relationship, I want to take one more week, though, and really focus on how to safeguard your marriage.

Because we've talked to husbands and we've talked to wives, but marriage is such it's such an important thing.

It has the capacity to do so much good, but also has the capacity to cause so much heartache and disappointment that I think it's really important for us to pause for one week and say, okay, how do we how do we keep this going?

What are some things we can do to ensure that our marriages are built to last and just to be a little vulnerable?

Like our church has been attacked previously in the area of marriage in a really big way.

We've had key leaders in the past whose marriages dissolved.

And I was here for that.

And that created emergencies in our church.

I've watched how how much a marriage not working can actually impact an entire church.

And so I want my marriage to be safeguarded.

And the same for all of you.

I believe that God is for your marriage and He wants it to be safe.

He wants it to be something that's sacred.

He wants it to be something that lasts.

He wants you to fulfill those vows till death do his part, which means you have to be married even if it kills you.

That's what that means.

So we want to talk this morning about how to safeguard your marriage.

Then we'll move on to those other relationships.

Now, I've got six decisions that I want to go through.

And it's gonna have to be a little bit like drinking through a fire hose this morning, okay?

And the first service went a little long, so we're gonna have to drink faster from a fire hose.

I'm gonna do my best.

But these are these are six decisions that we can all make that will safeguard your marriage.

And if you're not married this morning, you can safeguard it before it starts.

So let's just go through this real quick.

Again, fire hose, bear with me.

It's gotta be fast.

I'm aware that this gathering has lunch right afterwards, so your patience is just a little less.

Um, decision one number one, really simple.

Be wise.

Be wise.

If you want to see your marriage safeguarded for the long run, you have to be wise.

And wisdom is a choice.

Absolutely.

Proverbs chapter 4, verse 7 says, getting wisdom is the wisest thing you can do, and whatever else you do, develop good judgment.

Proverbs 4:7

In other words, seek wisdom.

The wisest thing you can do is to get wisdom.

So go get some.

Seek it out.

The Bible is full of wisdom and wisdom is so valuable.

In fact, elsewhere in Proverbs, it says that wisdom is far more valuable than riches.

And we have a hard time actually believing that, but it's so true because if I gave, if I gave a thousand dollars to a wise person, it would grow.

But if I gave a million dollars to an unwise person, it would shrink and fast.

So wisdom is actually more valuable than wealth.

The Bible actually says in James chapter 1, verse 5, if you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you.

James 1:5

He will not rebuke you for asking.

So if you need wisdom, if you value wisdom, ask God for it.

Study His Word, be wise.

I am so grateful for the fact that I have had wise people in my life give me the wisdom that God gave to them to apply to my marriage.

I remember really early on in my time here at His Hands, I was working with the youth and my two bosses, Steve Craig and Doug Bennell.

They had a meeting with me, and what they were sharing with me was that they wanted to give me a filter, a rule basically, that I needed to live by if I was gonna be part of the team here, and that was to never be alone in a room with a woman who wasn't my wife.

They said, look, we want you to do this.

Don't be alone in a room with a woman you're not married to.

Ever.

Because it's really hard to have an affair with a woman that you're never alone with.

You know, like just logistically, that's tough.

That's difficult to pull off.

And they were saying that because in the church world, you know, there's a lot of stories of not having the right boundaries in place.

And the result of that is that, you know, you put yourself in a position that you shouldn't be in, and they just really wanted to garment you.

What's funny is at 23 years old, I actually thought that was a little like that's kind of extreme.

But here I am, years later, 13 years later, and I've I've kept that.

And I'm so grateful for it.

There have been times where it's caused issues.

There was a woman who left our church a few years ago, which is kind of what's kind of a funny story.

Well, it's not funny that she left, um, but I was telling you, sorry.

So she emailed me and she was like, hey, I'm going through a really hard thing.

Can we meet for lunch?

And I said, no.

Um, you can meet Elon for lunch, you can meet Megan for lunch, you can meet Sheila, you can meet Shelby, you can meet with any of our female elders, you can meet with any of our leaders, but I I don't I don't meet women for lunch that are not named Megan McTear.

And she was really offended by that, like, really offended.

I need my pastor.

I was like, there's lots of pastors here.

Um, and they can understand you, and they can they they're ladies, they can understand whatever you're going through.

I promise, they are better to meet with than you.

I'm not going to do it.

And I got to this point where, like, she was like, Are you seriously saying you will not do that?

I'm like, yes.

And she left the church, which is probably a good thing.

And like, that was a joke.

Guys, sometimes I'm sorry.

It's just difficult people.

Um, but the reality is that was not me being unloving, that was me being loving to my wife.

So many marriages struggle because there's not wise boundaries in place.

And if you value your marriage and you want to see it succeed, you want to safeguard it, you've got to have wise boundaries.

Like super wise boundaries.

You have to have windows with your spouse and walls with other people.

In other words, you have to be more open and transparent with your spouse than with anyone else.

Sometimes marriages fall apart because you build walls with your spouse and you don't talk to them, you don't open up.

They ask how your day was.

You're like, good, fine.

And that's about as far as it goes, but maybe there's someone else in your life that you kind of open up with more and you share more of your heart with, and eventually you start to feel like, oh, this person, like, they get me.

Well, yeah, they get you because you share you with them in a way you don't at home.

But if you have windows with your spouse and it's just transparent and open and safeguarded boundaries with other people and other relationships, your marriage is safeguarded.

You have to be wise.

Great example, social media.

There is no reason to be friends on Facebook with someone that you used to go out with that you're not married to.

That's just like what good can come of that?

What bad can come of that?

A lot of things.

But like, what good?

There's just no there's no reason to do that.

There's no reason to like to text someone that's of the opposite sex that you're not married to and just like have open-ended texting conversations, like, hey, how you doing?

Nope.

That seems extreme and harsh, but it's not, it's loving, because if you love something, you take care of it.

It's not unloving for me to put my my infant child in a crib at night.

You might look at that as a cage.

From one perspective, you'd be like, wow, you really you are putting your child in a cage, like an animal.

You know?

He should be free.

He's one.

And he will literally kill himself if given five minutes alone in a room.

You know?

Like, it's not unloving, it's it's wise.

And I think the reality is we we want to believe that, especially in the, I think in early stages, we want to believe that our our marriages are maybe more solid and more invulnerable to all kinds of temptations and other things than they actually are.

But the reality is, safeguarded, healthy marriages have wise boundaries, wise boundaries in place.

This is gonna sound harsh too, and I'm not trying to, it's just fire hose time.

Like, I'm not friends with any woman that is not my wife.

Now, hold on, I'm I'm friendly.

Some of you are looking at me like, I thought we were friends.

Um we're not.

I'm friendly, but I don't open up my heart and bare my soul to any woman other than my wife.

She is the only person that I do that with.

Because she's my best friend, and I'm really careful about that.

I'm really careful about that.

So, like, I have really good friends who are dudes, and I've got a lot of women that I really respect and I'm acquaintances with, and we talk, and and and that's great.

Like in the office, the ladies who work here, that's great, but we're friendly, but we're not friends.

Like we don't, we we're not intimate and close.

That that's that's something that's for my wife.

That's just to be wise.

If you want to have a safeguarded, healthy marriage, be wise.

Here's a wise piece of advice have sex with each other on a regular basis.

I thought I'd have like one amen for that.

Seriously?

If medically able, have sex.

And I've seen the commercials, consult your doctor and make sure your heart is healthy enough for sex.

But if it is, have sex.

Like the Bible actually talks about this.

The New Testament, look it up.

I don't I don't want to put the verses on the screen because I want you to go home and read the Bible, where Paul, like, search Bible telling me to have sex with my spouse.

And just don't worry about, yeah, just search that.

It'll pop up.

And uh other things might pop up, just focus on that.

Um, but like, but no, seriously, Paul actually talks and he says, hey, unless you both decide for a season to not have intimacy in your marriage for prayer or for something like that, don't do that.

Like God, God created that to be something that's intimate and helpful.

And if you're at a point in your marriage ever where that's really hard because you're just off and you've been off for a while and you can't seem to engage and that's not there, then get counseling.

Like get counseling, pay for it.

Pay money to have someone help you with your marriage.

If you bought a new car today, it would be like it's it's off the line and it's perfect, everything works great.

You would never assume that you're never going to need to invest money to maintain that car.

Because it's just so good right now.

If you bought a new house today, you would never think, I'm never gonna have to spend any money to invest in the maintenance of this home because it's perfect.

And yet we get in relationships, we get married, and we're like, I love you, I love you.

This is so perfect.

We're never gonna have to spend any money to maintain our relationship.

No, counseling is is awesome and really good.

I've been in a lot of counseling, and that should either make you happy or fearful as a pastor, but I've been in a lot of counseling, like a lot.

And Megan and I have done a lot of marriage counseling, and it's been good.

And so if if if engaging has gotten hard, be wise and invest in the health of your marriage.

Decision one, be wise.

Decision number two, I'm gonna keep going.

Right expectations.

Anybody ever see the Lord of the Rings movies, like the original trilogy?

Ever see those?

No?

You guys, you guys gotta participate.

It's not that early.

I know it was daylight savings, but y'all came to the late service, so I need you to like, come on.

Like, who has seen the Lord of the Rings movies?

I I knew it! I see, I knew it.

Y'all weren't raising your hands, but you you lied.

You have seen it.

So when I was in college, those movies were brand new.

And they were like the big thing.

When I was in school, midnight release, like college, we all three of those movies, it was a big, big deal.

And I enjoyed the movies.

I never read the books.

Never read the books, just didn't want to commit that amount of time to that.

I was like, the movie's coming out?

It's probably close enough.

And I would go to these movies and walk away, blown away by the movies, but I had friends who would go and they'd leave angry because they had read the books.

And the movies messed with the books just a little bit.

This character wasn't in it.

This happened out of sequence, and I'd walk out and be like, that was incredible.

And they're like, that was awful.

And I'm going, we saw the same movie, but we went in with very different expectations.

The one thing you can control in your life is the expectations you bring to something.

You can't control what happens in your life, but you can control your expectations.

And oftentimes marriages, they fall apart under the weight of unspoken and unrealistic expectations.

Unspoken, unrealistic expectations.

If you're married, you you made a vow to someone.

And you promise till death do you part to do some things.

But what often happens is we get frustrated with our spouses for not doing other things that they never vowed to do.

But when they made those vows, we thought that just went along with it.

Just to pull the curtain back, be really transparent, a few years ago, Megan and I were, we just weren't clicking and we were fighting a lot, and I was being a jerk.

And so I didn't realize at the time, I thought I was right, because that's how relationships work.

But but I was shifting into this mindset, this probably five, six years ago, I was shifting into this mindset of just being very like, she should do more of this.

She should, you know, I was stressed, but I was putting that on her.

And if you know my wife well, you know, she is direct.

She is not afraid to tell you the truth as she sees it.

Doesn't have a problem with that.

So one day we're kind of fighting, and she said, you know, it seems like you expect me to uh keep the house clean, to cook all the meals, to take care of our kids, and be in the mood.

Pick three of those.

You can have three, but never four at once.

You know?

And even though it was kind of half-joking and facetious, it hit me that I I was really placing very unloving expectations on her.

And it was, it was it was ruining our marriage.

You know, look at Jesus.

Jesus had this unbelievable ability to really believe in someone and at the same time not be that surprised when they didn't live up to a certain standard.

He did that with his disciples all the time.

For example, when he calls this man named Peter to be his disciple, it says in Matthew chapter 4, one day as Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, also called Peter and Andrew, throwing a net into the water, for they fished for a living.

Matthew 4 · chapter mention

And Jesus called out to them, he said, Come, follow me, and I will show you how to fish for people.

And they left their nets at once and they followed him.

In that culture, rabbis would choose the best and the brightest to be their disciples.

Andrew and Peter had been passed over.

They weren't picked for something like that, so they fished for a living.

But Jesus shows up and he sees something in them, he believes in them more than anyone else ever has.

He said, I see a destiny for you that's really great.

I'm gonna teach you to fish for people.

So they leave their nets and they follow Jesus.

Short aside, I think one of the biggest challenges we have as Christians sometimes is we want to follow Jesus, but we don't want to drop our nets.

Notice that they did.

And so they followed Jesus, but then they messed up a lot.

And Jesus kind of expected it right before he goes to the cross, Matthew chapter 26.

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

Jesus told them, Tonight all of you will desert me.

For the scriptures say God will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.

But after I've been raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and meet you there.

Peter declared, Even if everyone else deserts you, I will never desert you.

Keep in mind he says that in front of all of the people.

Like these guys, they might desert you, not me.

And Jesus says, I tell you the truth, Peter, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny three times that you even know me.

And that happens.

And it crushes Peter.

So Peter does what anyone would do.

He goes back to his day job.

He goes back to fishing.

He feels like he's blown the whole fish for people thing and be a disciple of Jesus.

He goes back to fishing.

And one day, Jesus, after he's resurrected, he finds Peter fishing in a boat.

And he calls Peter out, and he sits down and he has breakfast with Peter and they have this conversation, and essentially, Jesus restores Peter to his calling.

And so Jesus believed greatly in Peter.

At the same time when Peter messed up, it didn't catch Jesus off guard.

He expected Peter to mess up.

And when that happened, he restored Peter back.

And if we could just have similar expectation levels with our spouses, we would find our marriages very well safeguarded.

You should believe in your spouse, believe in them, believe that they're capable of more than anyone else sees.

At the same time, when they make mistakes, don't be surprised.

They're people.

And don't let those mistakes define them.

But be like Jesus and have the ability and the grace to restore what gets broken when those mistakes happen.

That brings us to decision number three.

Forgive aggressively.

This is a fast one.

To have a healthy marriage, safeguarded for the future, there has to be this short conversation that can happen and it can like free-flow in your marriage often.

And it's this conversation, I'm sorry, followed by I forgive you.

Simple as that.

I'm sorry, I forgive you.

So often we can't say the words I'm sorry because of pride, and we can't say I forgive you because we don't sometimes want to forgive.

Sometimes it's kind of therapeutic to hold on to unforgiveness.

We feel like we kind of need that until the person shows us they're really sorry.

And it gets really hard in marriage because when you when you let someone get so close to you, they have the capacity to hurt you more than you could possibly imagine, more than anyone else could.

And it's very normal in marriage, I think, to almost maybe we've never done this consciously, but if you could think I could forgive anything but fill in the blank.

You know, when it comes to my spouse, I I could forgive them for anything, but if they did that, I don't think I could forgive them for that.

Realize for a moment that Jesus has never had that thought about you.

There's never been a time where Jesus has thought, I will forgive them for this, for that.

And if they ever did that, I'd forgive them for that.

But ooh, if they if they did that, I could never forgive them for that.

With Jesus, there's no such thing as like 99% forgiveness.

Jesus dies on the cross and says, I'll forgive all of these things.

There's a small category over here that I will never forgive it.

If you do that, it's over.

He forgives you completely and totally.

Now, I'm not saying that in marriage practically it's easy to live like Jesus in that way.

I'm not also saying that there aren't certain times where something is broken so severely that maybe forgiveness can't happen in the relationship, the relationship can't stay together for a variety of reasons, but forgiveness is so much more powerful than we think it is.

I have seen marriages healed by forgiveness through the power of the Holy Spirit, even when things like infidelity are involved.

You would be amazed how much stronger forgiveness is than sin.

In fact, our kind of entire theological belief about God is based on the presumption that his forgiveness and grace is greater than our sin.

But oftentimes we live the opposite or we view sin as greater than forgiveness.

Forgiveness is stronger than you know, so forgive aggressively.

Forgive preemptively.

Like if you're married right now, look at your spouse and say, I forgive you, go ahead.

You guys don't even mean it.

Nope, nope, gotta do it later now.

Gotta do it later.

First service to the same thing.

Like, I forgive you.

Because you're gonna make mistakes, and I'm gonna need your forgiveness as well.

If you want to have a safeguarded marriage, forgive aggressively.

Decision number four: love actively.

Love actively.

Love is an action.

It is something that we do, not something that we find.

Jesus always connects love to action.

In John 15, this is my commandment: love each other in the same way that I've loved you.

There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends.

Jesus says, if you want to show me that you love, do something.

We have this belief in our culture, and it's been heavily influenced by like movies, romantic comedies, and all that kind of stuff, you know, when a woman's just walking down the street and Matthew McConaughey shows up and he's single, you know, somehow, and uh and rich, and he falls in love with her, and they get married, and unlike most men, he never loses his hair or gets out of shape or has a midlife crisis, you know?

He just he's immune to all that.

So we have this idea that that's that's what love is.

You bump into love, you fall in love, like love's on the ground.

You I fell in it, I fell in love, and it's just I'm in love, and that's how we feel.

And that's not really love.

Love is an action.

There's a great book called how to uh well there's a bunch of great books.

I was gonna name another one.

There's a great book called Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, written by Stephen Covey.

And he has this conversation in this book with a guy who says, My wife and I don't love each other.

And so the author, Stephen Covey, says, Well, then love your wife.

And he's like, No, you don't understand.

I don't love her anymore.

He's like, Oh, okay, then love her.

But I don't I don't love her, then love her.

I don't feel oh, oh, okay.

You you think love is a feeling.

Love is not a feeling, it's so much more than that.

Love is an action.

Love is something you do, and that feeling of love you have, that's actually the natural result of the action of love.

And so if you feel out of love, then just love each other, serve each other, pray for each other.

Like, do you pray for your spouse?

Pray passionately and fervently for your spouse.

Ask God to give you his heart for them.

Ask God to help you see that person the way he sees them, root for them, pray for them, serve them, and then see how you feel about them.

Love is not something that we find.

That's the way our world sees it.

That's why love is so fickle.

I found love and then I lost it.

No, every day choose love.

It's an action, it's something that you do.

Decision number five, know your enemy.

And your enemy is not the person you're married to.

Okay?

Know your enemy.

Now I'm gonna be like, I'm gonna do something kind of kind of self-indulgent for just a second, if you don't mind.

Um, one of the best kept secrets about me is that I'm a big Duke basketball fan.

I really like Duke basketball.

And uh I know that you a lot of you didn't know that, and it may have changed your feelings about me.

I don't care.

So um, this has been an amazing season to be a Duke basketball fan.

We've been ranked number one for most of the season, not currently, but it's okay, you know, hills and valleys.

It's been an amazing season, also a very frustrating season, and all for one reason.

Now, I know that not all of you in the room follow, you know, sports or or college basketball, but quickly before I raise your hand if you've heard of someone named Zion Williamson.

Okay, I'd say about 25% of the room.

The rest of you, let me educate you.

Uh, this is Zion Williamson.

That is an 18-year-old human being who is six foot seven and weighs 285 pounds.

He is he is incredible.

He might be the greatest athlete to ever play the sport of basketball.

You can laugh all you want.

I'll prove you wrong.

Wait, the person that just laughed, is that you?

How old are you?

Oh, okay.

Well, you're older than I thought.

Sorry, you look young, 35.

So I I'll show you why.

So this is a picture of Zion taking a basketball away from a guy in a basketball game.

And you can't quite see it from that distance.

So zoom in just a little bit.

You see how the ball is literally denting in and about to explode?

And you see the look on this poor grown man's face?

Like, someone please help me.

Okay.

And he's got like three fingers on the ball.

He's a he's a freak.

He's so powerfully strong.

We've never seen someone as big and strong as him who moves like this, who's as fast.

He, guys, guys, he can jump.

Like, not a little bit.

Like, just be in awe of this for a second.

He weighs 285 pounds, which would make him the second heaviest player in the NBA today, and yet he would have one of the highest verticals.

He just does things, just marvel for a second.

Look at it, it's beautiful.

It's like ballet.

Okay?

Watch this.

Watch this, hold on.

Watch this from the side.

This is so, this is so amazing.

Look at that.

He's incredible.

And he plays for my team.

And like, and this season, it's actually been funny.

Like, no one can do anything.

It's just like, it's it, you watch like there's, I didn't have the video of it, there's a play of a guy taking a charge.

One person this year has taken a charge, which means you stand still on defense and let the guy run into you.

And there's a reason that only one guy has done that, because in slow motion, the man just like his body like collapses in on itself and he has to stay on the ground for a while.

He's he's just he's huge.

All this has been happening all season long.

He's been dominating, building up to two weeks ago.

We're about to play North Carolina at Duke.

The rivalry game, right?

The buildup for this game was huge.

Like celebrities are tweeting that they're gonna be there.

President Obama says, I'm gonna be at this game.

Tickets are selling for$10,000 apiece.

$10,000 for one butt.

That's it.

One seat.

The cheapest tickets are$3,000.

There's all this buildup, it's this huge deal.

And then 30 seconds into the game, 30 seconds, this happens right here.

Okay, now you can't quite see it in slow motion, but he puts his foot down and his shoe just explodes.

Like the shoe explodes.

Because shoes aren't designed for people who weigh 285 pounds with 45-inch verticals, who can run a 40-yard dash as fast as an NFL football player.

Shoes were like we didn't think about a person like this when we made shoes.

He was wearing Nikes, and Nike's stock dropped a billion dollars the next day.

Because his shoe just exploded and it caused him to sprain his knee, and he didn't play the rest of the game, and North Carolina won, and then he hasn't played since then, and we played for a second time last night and we lost again.

And like, if he was in the game, it'd just be different.

I'm just gonna say, be a lot different.

I'm not bitter or anything, but like it's been hard.

So here's here's here's why I say all this.

Now, I don't think this actually happened.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, okay?

But like, sometimes bad things happen.

Sometimes your shoe explodes, I guess, if you're a person.

I've never had that happen to me, but whatever.

But what if, and again, I don't believe this is true, but what if?

What if it came out that someone tampered with the shoe?

Any UNC fans in the room?

I wouldn't put it past you.

Wouldn't put it, I'm just saying.

Known a lot of UNC fans.

But like, if if someone, if it actually came out that someone tampered with that shoe, there'd be a lot of people upset.

He would be upset, right?

His family, the coaching staff, all the fans, the guy or girl who paid$10,000 for that seat, probably pretty upset.

They were there to watch him play, they got 30 seconds of that.

President Obama, upset.

Nike, Nike lost a billion dollars the next day.

Like I imagine Nike would be upset at whoever tampered with that shoe if that happened.

And I don't think that happened, but however, I will say that we often forget, as followers of Jesus, that we have an enemy who is tampering with us.

That we have a force that is actively working against us, and it's not made up and it's not myth.

And I don't care if it's not culturally relevant and people don't like to talk about it because it makes them uncomfortable.

We live in this time right now as the church where we'll talk about God, but we won't talk about Satan.

We'll talk about heaven, but we won't talk about hell.

We'll talk about love, but we won't talk about judgment.

But when you read scripture, those things go hand in hand together.

And if we're gonna be mature believers, we've got to talk about both.

We've got to be able to handle both.

And so the Bible says clearly in Ephesians chapter 6, verse 12, we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.

Ephesians 6:12

We have an enemy.

And it should anger us that he's messing with our lives.

That's why Jesus prayed in the Lord's Prayer.

He said, Lord, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Anytime I'm talking to a Jesus follower that asks the question, do you really believe in like Satan and demons?

I'm a Jesus follower.

And when I read Jesus teach, he clearly believed in Satan and in demons.

Because he prayed for things like that.

Deliver us from the evil one.

We have an enemy, he messes with us.

I've seen it work in so many interesting ways.

Great example.

Last Sunday was the very first Sunday of our our turn giving campaign.

Never done a giving campaign in 13 years.

Talking about this for weeks.

Very first Sunday we've ever done it, we're saying, hey, this is the time to start, let's get this going.

It's time for us to take care of this need.

We have this company that manages all of the online giving.

They do it for us and for hundreds of churches in the country.

We've been using them for a decade.

And what's never happened before in the whole decade we've worked with them is that on a Sunday, their servers all go down and cannot accept any donations.

Except for last Sunday, during our service.

So you might be thinking, Justin, are you really saying that you believe that the reason that this company's servers went down in the middle of your service was because for the first time in 13 years you're doing a giving campaign and it happened to be that day?

Yeah, I do.

Because that's like the one thing we didn't think about as we prayed.

And that's how Satan operates.

We have an enemy, and he is laying traps for us.

And so if you're frustrated in your marriage and all of a sudden some other person comes along and they just seem like they're really nice and really great, and they just get you, that's Satan.

That's what that is.

Like, like there was a person I was talking to years ago, they were they were in the midst of an affair, and they'd come asking for advice, and they were describing this person they were in the affair with, and they described this person as a great person.

And I was like, hey, I don't want to be mean, but they're having an affair with a married person.

That doesn't sound like something that like a really great guy would do.

Sometimes we we forget that Satan comes as an angel of light.

And what Satan likes to do is he likes to make himself look attractive and he likes to make he likes to make the things he he tempts us to do harmless.

You know, it's just harmless, it doesn't hurt anyone.

Great example, pornography.

Pornography is 100% from Satan designed to destroy your ability to have a healthy marriage.

100%.

And I'm not just talking about, unfortunately, we live in a world that classifies pornography as a very small thing.

Like, there's a lot of stuff that's on TV that's just pornography with a story.

Like, I know this makes anyone feel uncomfortable that I use that word.

Um, if it does, first off, I was addicted to pornography for 15 years.

It's been almost 10 years since I've been free of that, but for 15 years I was an addict.

And so don't clap for the addiction.

Freedom's good.

But like, I feel a little awkward, but I watched porn almost destroy my marriage.

And I would hate to see that happen in someone else's life.

I just use this because it's a really common example of this.

Sometimes we forget that the Bible actually talks about pornography a lot.

I've heard people say, well, the Bible doesn't really talk about it.

Oh, it talks about it constantly.

For example, 1 Corinthians chapter 6, verse 18.

1 Corinthians 6:18

Run from sexual sin.

No other sin clearly affects the body as this one does.

And before we keep, we'll pause there.

The words sexual sin, sometimes that's translated sexual immorality.

Okay?

Well, that's one Greek word that we translate either sexual sin or sexual immorality, and it's the word pornaya.

P-O-R-N, the rest, I think it's E-A-Y.

It's it's Greek, it's a different language.

Um, but it's literally the word porn.

That's where we get the word porn from, is that same Greek word the Bible translates sexual immorality.

I don't have time to go into all of it, but what I'll say is this pornography is not harmless.

It is like a custom-designed tool from the enemy to destroy your marriage.

It will make you feel inadequate about yourself, it will make you feel inadequate about your spouse.

And if you're if you're stuck, if pornography is part of your life, I I can't speak to women.

I know that women are affected by it.

I know that statistically, the vast majority of men are.

God wants you free of that.

It will help your marriage, it will help your marriage grow, succeed.

It will like you need to be completely done with it.

And I know that that's like opening up a huge can of worms.

But I will say this if you're if you're in the room and you want to be done with porn, you want it to be gone, a part of your past, you're tired of the effects that it's having on your life, you know that it's wrong, but you don't know how to stop, be here at the building this Wednesday morning at 7 o'clock.

Find a way to be here.

We're gonna start talking about that.

We're gonna have a group of people coming together.

It's time to get free of that and be done with it and move on because it's from Satan, it's from the enemy.

Final decision.

No Jesus.

And if you're listening to the podcast, it's K-N-O-W Jesus, not no Jesus like N-O-Jesus.

I'm not saying no Jesus.

Um, like and this is the biggest one.

Worship team, you guys can make your way out.

If you want to see your marriage truly safeguarded, Jesus needs to be your foundation.

He needs to be your foundation.

Megan and I are married to this day because Jesus is the foundation of our marriage.

There have been times in our marriage where our love for one another, our passion for one another, it was not strong enough to hold our marriage together.

There have been times in our marriage where our friendship, Megan and I are really close friends.

I've known her since she was like 15 years old.

We're really tight.

But there have been times in our marriage where our friendship with one another was not strong enough to keep us together.

And the reality is that your friendship with your spouse should be should be powerful, but it's not it's not strong enough to be the foundation.

Like there's there's strong and then there's foundation strong.

And your your attraction to your spouse, like I think my wife is very attractive.

I do, I'm in love with my wife.

I love her.

I can see my I can see my wife from like way far away, and I kind of like stop like, oh, that's my girl.

You know?

I love her.

But my attraction to her is not strong enough to be the foundation.

It's strong, but it's not foundation strong.

And one of the reasons that that marriages struggle is they just don't have a foundation strong enough to carry the weight.

Your feelings, your attraction, your friendship, those are all really good things.

But if you make them the foundation of your relationship, they're gonna be carrying a weight they're not meant to carry, and they'll crack.

Jesus, he's different.

If you're here this morning and you don't know Jesus, I'm telling you, he's different.

He is strong enough to take the weight.

And he makes those claims himself in Matthew chapter 7, verse 24, Jesus is talking.

Matthew 7:24

And he says, Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on a solid rock.

Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against the house, it will not collapse because it is built on bedrock.

In John 15, 5, he says, I'm the vine, you are the branches.

Those who remain in me and I in them will produce much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

That's an intense thing to say.

But Jesus is strong enough to take the weight.

And if you're here today and your marriage is struggling, and it feels like it's cracking under all the pressure, might I suggest making sure you have the right foundation?

Jesus is real, he is alive, he is powerful.

There is nothing that he cannot do, there is nothing that he cannot heal.

Death itself could not stop him.

And so he can fix a dead marriage.

He can fix anything.

He's Jesus.

And if you give your life to him, you're putting your life on a foundation that can take the weight.

It can take the weight and then some.

You can build on it and build on it and build on it, but Jesus, he's strong enough.

And so I implore you if you're here this morning and you don't know Jesus, you haven't accepted him in your life, just right now, in your heart, say, Jesus, I believe in you.

I need you, I need a different foundation, and I'm gonna build my life on you.

That's how it starts.

And once you do that, sign up to be baptized right away.

That's the first step of obedience and following Jesus.

Sign up to get baptized.

You can do it in the main lobby today.

And married couples, if you're here and you need something to happen, if you haven't gone all in with Jesus, do that for your own sake, but also for the sake of your spouse and your marriage.

One of my favorite things that that happens sometimes is when we see people get baptized together as married couples.

It happens really, really often.

I don't know if it's happening today, but it happened last week.

We had a husband and a wife get baptized at the same time.

It was really powerful.

And if if you and your spouse have yet to take that step and you haven't gone all in with Jesus, you want Jesus all in when it comes to your marriage.

He is, he's all in for you, but you want to be all in with him.

And so I would encourage you, if that's something you haven't done, do it together.

For your own sake, but also for your marriage.

Build it all on Jesus because he can handle the weight.

We've got a few people right now who are about to do that very thing.

They're about to get baptized.

We're gonna wrap up with that.

Six decisions to safeguard your marriage.

I'm sure you remember all of them, right?

If you have the mobile app, though, they're all on there, right?

Be wise, have the right expectations, forgive aggressively, love actively, know your enemy, and most importantly, know Jesus.

Do those things and watch what God does in your relationships.

With that said, let's pray together.

Lord, I want to thank you so much for this church.

I want to thank you, Lord, for everything that you're doing here.

I want to thank you specifically, Lord, for these people who are about to give everything to you.

Help us as a church support them, come around them.

Help us be committed to their growth just like you are.

We love you so much, Jesus.

We're grateful for all that you're doing, for all that you've done, and we ask all this in your name.

Amen.