Brenton
 Welcome back to Further. I am Brenton Grimm. How's it going, Chris?

[00:01:27:10 - 00:01:28:21]
Chris
 Pretty good. How about you?

[00:01:28:21 - 00:01:30:12]
Brenton
 Yeah, doing well. Yeah?

[00:01:30:12 - 00:01:30:23]
Speaker 3
 Yeah.

[00:01:32:07 - 00:01:38:00]
Chris
 I don't know. Excited to talk about marriage. I mean, you're kind of a romantic guy, right? I'm married. Yeah.

[00:01:38:00 - 00:01:38:23]
 (Laughter)

[00:01:40:10 - 00:01:42:09]
Brenton
 I don't know if romantic's the word that my

[00:01:42:09 - 00:01:46:09]
Chris
 wife would use, but-- Do you have plans for Valentine's Day?

[00:01:46:09 - 00:01:55:10]
Brenton
 It is February, isn't it? Well, yeah. It's 11 days, 12 days away. We are not great at holidays in general, which actually works out pretty well, because--

[00:01:56:17 - 00:01:59:10]
Brenton
 although maybe I'm just fooling myself, and she actually does care. I don't know.

[00:02:00:19 - 00:02:02:18]
Brenton
 Anyway, the answer to your question was no.

[00:02:02:18 - 00:02:04:05]
Chris
 Did she listen to this podcast?

[00:02:05:23 - 00:02:06:19]
Brenton
 She'll hear it. Yeah.

[00:02:08:04 - 00:02:08:15]
Brenton
 There's no secrets.

[00:02:10:21 - 00:02:13:03]
Brenton
 Yeah, good. Good intro there. Perfect.

[00:02:14:13 - 00:02:30:03]
Brenton
 All right, so yeah, we talked about marriage and the importance of covenant this week. So I want to start with-- one of your points in the message was how much the culture has shaped the way the church actually engages with marriage.

[00:02:31:22 - 00:02:45:04]
Brenton
 First, in what ways do you see that playing out, most obviously? Divorce is obviously part of this, but what other subtle ways are we giving into the wrong view of marriage inside of the church?

[00:02:47:09 - 00:03:09:23]
Chris
 Well, I think it definitely impacts before we even get into marriage, or whether we get into marriage at all. So we could talk about dating, and I don't even know if that's the term the kids are using anymore, or what it is. But courtship, dating, talking, talking to them,

[00:03:11:05 - 00:03:29:12]
Chris
 whatever label we're using now, it certainly affects that. We know that there's a huge number of people who are cohabitating either before marriage or just kind of in place of marriage. And that, I think, very much in the church

[00:03:30:16 - 00:03:45:20]
Chris
 is a huge, huge issue, because we see many professing Christians who are cohabitating and really not thinking that there's any issue or any problem with that. So the culture has definitely impacted us in that way.

[00:03:47:06 - 00:03:56:08]
Chris
 And obviously, as you mentioned, divorce, and it's impacted us in divorce in, I think, just a number of different ways there.

[00:03:57:11 - 00:04:13:17]
Chris
 It's impacted us in terms of remarriage and how we should view that. One of the biggest ways, I think, is we tend to now view marriage as almost with a little bit of a fatalistic view, is that we're expecting it to end.

[00:04:14:19 - 00:04:20:23]
Chris
 People are going into it with a lot less confidence that they're actually going to stay married.

[00:04:22:09 - 00:05:50:02]
Chris
 And I think that that's in part just simply because of the rates of divorce. And we just kind of see, like, well, this is kind of what happens. But I also think it's just the influence of culture and how often people are actually in the media. And like I talked about celebrities getting divorced, I think we have this view. And when you tend to think, sometimes it becomes, I believe, a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's like you're expecting it to end. And so I think that impacts behaviors and choices that we make and things like we were going to get into maybe a little bit later here about being known and loved. And you're not really letting yourself be known or you're not seeking to actually know the other person. And we become guarded in regards to relationship with this person we're supposed to be pursuing oneness with. And I think all of those things, you could, we could probably spend a significant amount of time talking about each of them. But our culture quite honestly gets marriage and the relationship that leads to marriage, relationship, they just kind of, they get it wrong in so many different ways. And I'm not saying they get it wrong in every way, but in so many different ways. And all of those influence us to one degree or another.

[00:05:50:02 - 00:06:29:01]
Brenton
 Yeah, there's obviously a push in Christian culture to push back against what the culture's view on marriage is. Right? And I think we obviously have those issues that you just talked about and probably many more that are subtle that we don't realize as much. But as we think about how to push back on culture and how to influence, instead of the culture influencing us, how do we influence outside in regards to marriage? What would you say? Like what is some ways that we can think about doing that?

[00:06:30:04 - 00:06:34:09]
Chris
 Yeah, I'd say that's a great question.

[00:06:36:12 - 00:06:54:19]
Chris
 One of the best ways I think is for us to actually live out the biblical vision for marriage in which it is a covenant. But it's more, and again, I think we very well, if we have time, get into this more. It's more than simply just staying faithful to your vows. Like we're going to hold fast.

[00:06:57:00 - 00:07:35:02]
Chris
 We're gonna cleave to one another in the sense that we're not gonna get divorced. Like there's much, much more to it. And when we're actually seeking to live out that weaving aspect of it, like we become one. And so we actually show the world our culture, what marriage can be when it's at its best. Not that we're gonna do that all the time. And that's actually plays into what we're gonna talk about some this coming week in terms of fulfilling marriage, marriage roles and husbands, loving wives, as Christ loved the church.

[00:07:36:11 - 00:07:46:01]
Chris
 And so one of the reasons that the world doesn't, or the culture doesn't really today,

[00:07:47:04 - 00:08:00:23]
Chris
 really say, hey, we really wanna listen to you on this issue is because so often what we claim to believe we're not actually living out, or we see some of the things in scripture

[00:08:02:16 - 00:08:06:12]
Chris
 carried out in a wrong way.

[00:08:07:15 - 00:09:01:05]
Chris
 And so I think it is not only affirming what the Bible teaches, but it's actually putting those things into practice so that people can actually see what does it really look like when Paul's talking about an Ephesians five for a husband to love his wife as Christ loved the church, and for a wife to respect her husband. And even as I say that, and I know a wife should respect her husband, that all of a sudden, at times people can hear that and go like, oh, I think they can be as, the word is overused today, triggered, even by that there is such a thing as roles in marriage, and a wife is called to respect her husband. So, and I think that us truly understanding what does it mean for a husband to love his wife

[00:09:02:14 - 00:09:44:22]
Chris
 as Christ loved the church? And what is Paul, what is the Holy Spirit calling wives to when it means to respect her husband? Oftentimes those things have been mistaught and or misapplied. And so for us to know exactly what the biblical vision is for it, and for us to strive in the power of the Spirit to live that out, I truly believe that when we do that, pursuing oneness with one another, that that's when the world can see where we can actually influence the world. I think when we do harm oftentimes is when we say that we believe in covenantal marriage, but then our,

[00:09:46:06 - 00:09:57:04]
Chris
 sometimes even when we speak about it, like how that actually should play out and then how we at times live that out, actually does maybe more harm than it does good.

[00:09:58:10 - 00:10:02:16]
Chris
 Yeah, so live by example, is that what you're saying? Well, I mean, it is,

[00:10:04:08 - 00:10:35:01]
Chris
 there are some and I mean, like just to speak about this positively, I think that there are a lot of marriages in Harmony Bible Church that actually do do this. And again, not perfectly by any stretch of the imagination, but we really do see that God's biblical vision of marriage is being carried out over a long period of time and is given a great testimony to what God would call marriage to. I think we've also got to be careful. We can certainly be guilty of making marriage an idol

[00:10:36:05 - 00:10:55:13]
Chris
 in the church and we've got to be careful that we don't do that. And it certainly is absolutely essential. It's foundational. We've seen that the last couple of weeks. We know that marriage is meant to be the preeminent illustration of the gospel.

[00:10:57:06 - 00:10:57:18]
Chris
 And yet,

[00:10:58:19 - 00:11:20:20]
Chris
 and that doesn't mean that God calls everybody to be married and it doesn't mean that marriage is actually like it's so, so important and so, so vital that we fail to recognize that God's calling on some people's lives is for singleness. And that's as much of a, as what Paul would call it is a gift. Like marriage can be a gift, but singleness can be a gift.

[00:11:21:21 - 00:11:29:05]
Chris
 And for all of us, you know, everybody's single for a significant period of their life, right?

[00:11:30:10 - 00:12:02:16]
Chris
 Sometimes we're single for quite a while before we get married. But even if we get married early, most people will be single at some point in, I mean, they will. Like it's rare that both husband and wife die at the same time. And so, and obviously then we have all kinds of situations where there's divorce, whether it's biblical or unbiblical. And so the singleness is something that the church needs to honor and uphold and value. And I think that we can actually,

[00:12:04:03 - 00:12:11:18]
Chris
 speak to our culture in regards to that and upholding the importance of marriage by also honoring singleness.

[00:12:11:18 - 00:12:12:08]
Speaker 3
 Yeah.

[00:12:12:08 - 00:12:18:06]
Brenton
 Is that what you mean by making marriage an idol in the church that we hold it above singleness?

[00:12:18:06 - 00:12:23:01]
Chris
 Well, it's, I mean, anybody who's been single

[00:12:24:20 - 00:12:52:19]
Chris
 in mid 20s or after in the church, I just like, I know this because I've come, not personally because I was like 23, I'm not gonna get married, but just from conversations that I've very good had with single people that are part of the church is like, if you're not married by the time you're 24, 25, something's wrong, like what's going on? Why are you not married? I bet you can't wait to get married. And we just say insensitive things.

[00:12:54:01 - 00:13:00:15]
Chris
 That's, I think sometimes reveal that we have, we've made marriage to be more important

[00:13:01:17 - 00:13:35:20]
Chris
 than God would actually make it. Now I'm not saying that it's vastly important, but it doesn't mean it's the end all, the be all. And you particularly talk to any single female in the church that hits, it doesn't even sometimes like have to get to mid 20s. It can be like early 20s. It's just like, you know, and we're trying to set, we're trying to set singles up and we're trying to like, and all of those kind of things. And not again, most of the time people are well-meaning in all of this and yet it's just,

[00:13:37:13 - 00:13:50:08]
Chris
 it's often not helpful to the single people. It's actually hurtful. And it just, I think reveals like we maybe don't fully understand here where marriage fits into the picture.

[00:13:51:14 - 00:13:53:05]
Brenton
 Yeah. All right.

[00:13:54:17 - 00:13:57:07]
Chris
 Paul actually said, I would rather you all be single as I am.

[00:13:58:11 - 00:14:01:11]
Chris
 So, and Jesus was single. So, yeah.

[00:14:02:11 - 00:14:06:18]
Brenton
 Yeah. You talked about the concept of leaving, cleaving and weaving.

[00:14:08:11 - 00:14:18:11]
Brenton
 What are the struggles in each of these that people run into today? Like what is underneath the issues that would fight against these things?

[00:14:18:11 - 00:14:29:05]
Chris
 Yeah, we really want to get into this because here I can make some more comments. That'll be probably a little tough to take.

[00:14:30:20 - 00:14:47:08]
Chris
 I would say there's a lot of them around leaving and a lot of people need to learn to actually leave their parents. Like there are still a lot of people that are in mesh with mom,

[00:14:48:11 - 00:14:49:18]
Chris
 maybe less with dad.

[00:14:50:19 - 00:15:08:01]
Chris
 But sometimes that's the case too. And when you talk about in mesh is like that relationship. Mom still is the dominant relationship and is influencing and maybe even sometimes controlling

[00:15:10:00 - 00:15:43:05]
Chris
 the marriage relationship and is not helpful. And then just say even to parents and like we really need to support our kids who get married and make sure that we are letting them leave. We're not letting, we're making it as easy for them to leave in the sense that we're not trying to hold on too tightly and we realize that they need to cleave and weave with their spouse. So there's that.

[00:15:43:05 - 00:15:50:02]
Brenton
 Can we pause there real fast? How would you define leaving in this context? Like what would constitute leaving and what?

[00:15:51:04 - 00:16:00:12]
Chris
 Well, yeah. The word literally the Hebrew word means to abandon. That's how strong it is.

[00:16:01:13 - 00:16:16:07]
Chris
 And it's a word that's used obviously that's not, you're still just to honor your mother and father. So it's not like, okay, I'm never talking to you again. And in fact, in that culture, the woman would actually move in with a husband's family.

[00:16:17:10 - 00:16:39:20]
Chris
 Okay, so they wouldn't even be a lot of times physically because Genesis is written, we believe by Moses to the people of Israel. And so he's establishing here, here's what it means, here's God has ordained, here's what it means to follow him, like in especially marriage and family. So it's not, it's actually not even a physical leaving, but it's in the sense of,

[00:16:42:23 - 00:16:49:10]
Chris
 before, if you can say before maybe the most important woman in a man's life would have been his mom appropriate.

[00:16:50:11 - 00:17:04:09]
Chris
 Well, that's not the case anymore. Now the most important woman, and it's not even close by far is the wife. And so sometimes we get in these situations where as men,

[00:17:05:09 - 00:17:45:04]
Chris
 we give what our mom thinks and what our mom wants becomes more or just as important as what our wife wants and what our wife needs. That's not it, that leaving is like, okay, it's not severing the relationship, but in terms of like, we've got to have that understanding. Now, moms are really helpful if moms can recognize that, okay, and think very carefully about how interacting with their sons. But the same thing is oftentimes with a wife, like the woman, like the mom has too much influence on her and what she's thinking, feeling, doing.

[00:17:46:17 - 00:18:11:18]
Chris
 And so like, yeah, mom's still important and moms are really important to daughters. Like that relationship, especially a lot of times a new mom and all of that, that should be really important. But in terms of recognizing like, there are certain things that you're looking to me for, you shouldn't look to me for you, you need to look to your relationship with your husband for and move towards that.

[00:18:12:19 - 00:18:14:07]
Chris
 So does that-- Yeah, that makes sense.

[00:18:15:10 - 00:18:20:00]
Chris
 So that's what I'm talking about leaving. I don't know if you, we could talk more about that.

[00:18:21:04 - 00:18:49:05]
Chris
 The cleaving is really, that's the key covenant term. Like I said, on Sunday, it means to stick together like glue and what Jesus says, what God's put together, letting not men separate. He's picturing like he's put them together, he stuck them together. So it's something like, we're in this together. That's kind of the foundational thing. And then the weaving is pursuing this oneness. And that means is like, we've got to recognize,

[00:18:50:23 - 00:18:52:15]
Chris
 here's what we see happen a lot of times,

[00:18:53:20 - 00:18:57:10]
Chris
 is that couples, they get married, they have some time before they have children.

[00:18:58:20 - 00:19:37:12]
Chris
 And during those times, and I'm generalizing here, like it goes all over the place. But those years are the husband and wife can be pretty well connected. And then the kids come and all of a sudden, now it's all about the kids and we get busy and we're involved in all these kinds of things. And then the couples, they drift apart because they're just not spending time together. They're not prioritizing their relationship. They're not talking and communicating. And I just want to say, even I have four kids in five years, okay?

[00:19:38:15 - 00:19:52:10]
Chris
 And in those years, it's crazy and it's really, really hard to have two minutes to talk, let alone go on a date night or talk about, by the time you have free time, you're absolutely exhausted and all you want to do is go to bed, right?

[00:19:53:16 - 00:20:05:13]
Chris
 You've been there. And so I know personally it's hard. And then you get to my age and you're just tired because well, you've been up for nine or 10 hours.

[00:20:08:03 - 00:20:37:03]
Chris
 But that's why you've got to fight for it. You've got to seek to make it like, how can we have these conversations at whatever time that we can carve out? I think it's also why it's important why the church is there so the church can support and hopefully help to provide babysitting and just kind of the different things that can come along to help the couples to actually pursue this. But recognizing, so many people today, the kids, they're staying together maybe

[00:20:38:03 - 00:20:54:00]
Chris
 till the kids are out of the house. And then they're like, I don't even know, I don't know this person I'm married to. And sometimes I don't even like this person anymore that I'm married to. And by that point, it's like now,

[00:20:55:03 - 00:20:59:10]
Chris
 it's in a really, really bad place. And so I know it's hard,

[00:21:01:01 - 00:21:18:17]
Chris
 I know it's easy to say one thing and to actually pursue another, but weaving means like, obviously there's the sexual aspect of that. That's what's first and foremost, the two will become one flesh, the consummation of the marriage. But it actually involves more than that when we understand that in the Bible,

[00:21:20:09 - 00:21:52:14]
Chris
 sexual union is more than about the physical act. It's actually about a relationship. And we know that because in the Old Testament, and we'll see this very clearly, we're not gonna look at it, but you can see this very clearly in Genesis, Adam knew his wife and she conceived and gave birth to someone when he says that word no there doesn't, that means he knew her sexually, like that sexual intercourse. But the word is used there to say, this is more than about the simple physical act.

[00:21:55:08 - 00:22:01:15]
Chris
 It's about knowing on the deepest levels possible.

[00:22:04:08 - 00:22:12:22]
Brenton
 What are some signs that a couple is still living largely separate lives instead of actually weaving together as one?

[00:22:16:04 - 00:22:26:00]
Chris
 Yeah, I mean, I think I kind of hit on this a little bit when I was talking about, like we just, we have our own hobbies, we do our own thing,

[00:22:27:12 - 00:23:06:07]
Chris
 we are just living in the same house, but basically living separate lives. And we're helping to care for the kids and we're maybe both working and providing and all that kind of stuff. We got the same bank account or whatever, but it's just like, we're not, much of it is we're just not spending time together communicating and we just see, sometimes what actually happens is actually it's more roommates than actual partners.

[00:23:08:02 - 00:24:08:10]
Chris
 I mean, there's a lot of different aspects of that. Before we started to say a lot of this is case by case basis and that would be one of things, but it's just like, he's got his stuff and I've got my stuff. And that doesn't mean like, you always have to be doing the same thing. You can have your own hobbies and own friends and all that kind of stuff. But a lot of times it's like, he's hanging with the guys and she's hanging with the ladies and there's no, we're actually doing stuff as couples and we're, he's downstairs watching the game and she's, I'm gonna get myself into trouble here so I'm just gonna stop on that. But she's got her thing that she's doing and it's just like, and again, I'm not saying women should sit and watch sports with their husbands or like husbands should, be out gardening with their wives or anything like that. Just saying like, what are we actually doing? What are we doing together? Yeah.

[00:24:10:04 - 00:24:29:20]
Brenton
 You talked a decent amount about you, yourself and Eva's relationship and kind of the struggles that you guys went through, which thank you for that, that was good. But what role does hardship play in weaving together?

[00:24:30:20 - 00:24:53:12]
Brenton
 I just, I think I've found like in my own relationship with my wife, like the more hard stuff we've been through, the closer we've come out on the other side of that. And it seems to be an important part, but I think on the flip side, sometimes those hardships will drive couples apart, right? So what role can that play in this?

[00:24:53:12 - 00:25:07:05]
Chris
 Well, I think a lot of times people think that hardship is what brings about struggles when really what they mostly tend to do is they tend to reveal the struggles that were already there.

[00:25:10:05 - 00:25:30:19]
Chris
 And so when that happens, then we, this is why a covenant is important. Like we are committed to sustain in this and to not just staying in this is, so I probably should add, it's like, we're gonna work, we're gonna work through this together. We're in this together.

[00:25:31:20 - 00:25:47:04]
Chris
 And I think that that's an important distinction is that couples who have that mentality that it's not okay, we're just gonna white knuckle it because I said I do and she said I do. And so like, all right, well, I guess we're stuck with each other.

[00:25:48:16 - 00:25:53:12]
Chris
 It's like, no, we're gonna work, we're gonna work through this together.

[00:25:55:09 - 00:25:57:21]
Chris
 Then I think that,

[00:25:59:20 - 00:26:24:16]
Chris
 I know enough about you and your wife that that's kind of your, definitely your mentality is like, we're gonna go forward here together. And I think that that just can make all the difference in the world where you can take suffering and you can say like, okay, we move forward together and we made it through and we can look back on that.

[00:26:26:17 - 00:26:44:03]
Chris
 And that actually can build, like you have that, okay, that mutual experience of we survived. And actually, and I think when we can do that, then you start not only to survive, but okay, yeah, there's good things that we can do. Yeah, there's good things that got brought out of that.

[00:26:45:09 - 00:27:01:18]
Chris
 I don't think it's simply just you go through suffering and because you went through suffering, like, okay, it actually strengthens it, no. But I think when you are like, okay, we're in this together, we're committed to one another, we're gonna strive to,

[00:27:02:23 - 00:27:06:18]
Chris
 what can we do to learn from this, to grow from this, to trust God in this?

[00:27:07:22 - 00:27:14:04]
Chris
 Then I think it can actually build a resilience. That's actually what we need, we need resilient marriages.

[00:27:15:04 - 00:27:20:23]
Chris
 And resilient marriages come about when we work through those hard things together.

[00:27:22:03 - 00:27:22:07]
Brenton
 Okay.

[00:27:24:18 - 00:27:33:16]
Brenton
 One of the things you said, you suggest that covenant as opposed to a contract or commodity view creates the conditions for being truly known and truly loved.

[00:27:35:01 - 00:27:40:19]
Brenton
 You alluded to having a lot to say about this, and so I'm giving you the floor for a little bit.

[00:27:42:05 - 00:27:45:09]
Brenton
 What would you like to say about this that you didn't have time for on Sunday?

[00:27:47:20 - 00:27:48:02]
Chris
 Yeah.

[00:27:50:01 - 00:27:58:09]
Chris
 I think I would start by going to Genesis 2.25, where it says they were both naked and unashamed.

[00:27:59:12 - 00:28:16:14]
Chris
 All right, so we've got 24, leave, cleave, and weave, and then they were both naked and unashamed. So that's where you can get at, and I think we can see the unconditional love in a relationship where they are fully known.

[00:28:17:20 - 00:28:39:16]
Chris
 They were naked, doesn't mean just physically naked. They could see everything about the other. Nothing was being hidden from one another. And they were unashamed, which means they were like, I don't feel shame at all, like there's something wrong. I'm not being made to feel like there's something wrong with me.

[00:28:42:22 - 00:29:19:05]
Chris
 And so Adam was looking at Eve, and that's who she was, and he was fully accepting and showing her, explaining to her love and vice versa. In the moment that sin comes in, what do they do? And I've talked about this, I feel like at length over the last year, but they run and they hide and they cover up, and then they start to blame, and they blame each other, and all of a sudden, this conflict is on with them and God, but also with them and with one another.

[00:29:20:13 - 00:29:32:07]
Chris
 And so what God actually does is, what they would cover themselves up with was insufficient,

[00:29:33:07 - 00:30:00:23]
Chris
 you know, leaves from trees. And so God sacrifices the first animal and covers them, which is a picture of how, pointing us to how the cross and through Christ covers our shame. And so that's absolutely essential in what we're talking about, about being truly known and truly loved and is actually what can enable us to be able to pursue this with another person.

[00:30:02:22 - 00:30:44:19]
Chris
 Because we really do want to be known for who we truly are, because when we can be known and love for who we truly are, that actually deals with, in my opinion, probably our biggest challenge is dealing with the shame in our lives, the shame that we feel like there's something wrong with me. I'm not enough. I'm a failure. I mean, all of those things, I'm inadequate and all those kinds of things. But when we are in a relationship where someone, when we're able to actually reveal our weaknesses and our struggles and maybe our doubts or our flaws, and the other person meets us with,

[00:30:45:19 - 00:31:10:19]
Chris
 love and turns, doesn't turn away from us, but moves toward us, that actually has the ability to heal our shame, which further enables us to, to experience the love and to further let us ourselves be known, which is actually what brings a relationship closer together.

[00:31:11:19 - 00:31:28:22]
Chris
 Now, massively difficult because both people are struggling with this at the same time. And it's also massively difficult because in any human relationship, there are gonna be times where you're not gonna be met with love.

[00:31:30:00 - 00:31:30:05]
Chris
 Okay?

[00:31:33:10 - 00:32:00:06]
Chris
 And so, you know, and so that means like this, we could talk about forgiveness is why forgiveness, is why forgiveness is so important. And this is again why the cross is so important, to remind us of the forgiveness in Christ, because we have to recognize that being fully known and fully loved is gonna be a battle, it's gonna be difficult, it's gonna be a struggle, because there's gonna be times where the other person, we're gonna reveal things, they're gonna see things about us and they're not gonna respond in love.

[00:32:01:19 - 00:32:18:17]
Chris
 And so how do we practice forgiveness so that we can give them, that there's another opportunity? You know, Peter comes to Jesus and he says, "How many times should I forgive my brother?" Seven times? And Jesus says, "No, 70 times seven," which means repeatedly.

[00:32:20:20 - 00:32:56:02]
Chris
 And I don't know, again, this is such a big topic that it's really hard to get into in a short setting, especially when I haven't laid out prepared notes and all those kind of things. But it goes back to really God knows us fully, he knows us even more fully than we know ourselves, and he loves us and accepts us as we are. Now, he doesn't leave us where, that doesn't mean, you know,

[00:32:57:05 - 00:32:58:14]
Chris
 he leaves us where we are,

[00:32:59:19 - 00:33:26:13]
Chris
 but his love is intending to change us and to grow us. And so our relationships are supposed to be modeled off of God's relationship with us. And so when a husband and wife are weaving, really the goal of weaving is how do we seek to know the other in a relationship where we are loving, showing them love.

[00:33:28:20 - 00:33:44:08]
Chris
 So that we can, as we, our love frees us up to know each other, and as we know each other, that is where we actually feel more loved. So is that, you need to follow up on any of that.

[00:33:44:08 - 00:33:56:11]
Brenton
 I was going to steal a word from last week and ask just like, how do we intentionally cultivate this? But I think you answered that there too. Do you have any other thoughts on like practical?

[00:33:56:11 - 00:34:15:00]
Chris
 Well, I'd say like, again, I know some people especially have been hurt massively. And so I just add that two things. One, we've been broken in relationships, so we have to be healed in relationship.

[00:34:16:10 - 00:34:41:05]
Chris
 I mean, and so like relationships, we all have wounds from relationships, but only relationships are going to heal those wounds. And it's not simply a relationship with God that will do that. Yes, that's absolutely essential, but God has created us to live in relationships. And so healing forces are going to come in relationships. And the second thing is we're just going to have to risk.

[00:34:42:23 - 00:35:19:08]
Chris
 It does require us to risk something and to trust the Lord in it. And C.S. Lewis, I think it's in mere Christianity, but he has, there's a place where he talks about, "Hey, you can shut your heart off. You can close your heart off, and that'll keep you safe." Okay, but actually what it'll do, it'll turn your heart. And I'm very much paraphrasing there. Okay, because like, yeah, if you can close your heart, don't let your heart like open to being hurt. Okay, but if you do that,

[00:35:21:01 - 00:35:52:23]
Chris
 then the heart becomes hard, and you actually will lose the ability to actually experience the thing that you need the most is to be loved. And that's actually true when it comes to relationship with God, but what he was talking about is primarily in relationship to other people. And so I can say to you, Brent, like I'm not really going to move forward in a relationship with you. I'm going to keep you at arm's length, because I'm not going to allow myself to get hurt. And if people get too close to me, you'll hurt me.

[00:35:54:04 - 00:36:30:14]
Chris
 And I have a lot of compassion for people who are in that place, like because people have, in some ways, all of us have been hurt by other people in significant ways. And that's true in very, very deep ways for a lot of people. And yet the risk that we run in just walling ourselves off from that is that we become harder people, and we wall ourselves off from the thing that can actually heal our brokenness, our broken hearts.

[00:36:31:14 - 00:36:31:18]
Chris
 Yeah.

[00:36:32:21 - 00:36:33:02]
Brenton
 Yeah.

[00:36:34:06 - 00:36:36:05]
Brenton
 Okay, we'll wrap up on this one.

[00:36:37:19 - 00:36:56:00]
Brenton
 You emphasized that marriage ultimately exists to showcase the Gospel, and this is found specifically in Ephesians 5, but how should this change the way that we think about conflict, the way we think about forgiveness and perseverance in our marriages?

[00:36:57:20 - 00:37:03:20]
Chris
 Yes, thanks for, you know, a pretty very specific question there.

[00:37:05:10 - 00:37:14:19]
Chris
 I mean, we've already hit the big one that you mentioned there, is forgiveness. Yeah. Well, I will maybe go a little bit further with this,

[00:37:15:19 - 00:37:19:18]
Chris
 because something that I've read in my studies has just kind of hit me.

[00:37:20:21 - 00:37:24:15]
Chris
 How do we deal with our anger in our,

[00:37:26:12 - 00:37:31:19]
Chris
 really any relationship, but we're here talking about marriage. How do you deal with your anger to your spouse in your marriage?

[00:37:32:21 - 00:37:38:00]
Chris
 And anybody who is married for any length of time,

[00:37:39:01 - 00:38:04:12]
Chris
 like I said on Sunday, you might make it through the honeymoon, but it probably will come at some point fairly quickly after that. By the way, I've gotten in kind of trouble with my comments there, so this, on that. But how do you deal with anger or, well, let's use a Biblical term, wrath, your wrath towards your spouse.

[00:38:05:19 - 00:38:13:12]
Chris
 And the answer to that is, is in remembering how God has dealt with his wrath against you.

[00:38:14:22 - 00:38:26:14]
Chris
 And you deserved God's wrath to an infinitely greater degree than your spouse deserves yours, no matter what they've done.

[00:38:27:15 - 00:38:30:11]
Chris
 And I literally say, no matter what they've done.

[00:38:31:19 - 00:38:33:03]
Chris
 And so,

[00:38:34:05 - 00:39:19:19]
Chris
 going back to the truth and just really immersing yourselves in the reality of this big word called propitiation in the Scriptures, which refers to how Jesus turned aside God's wrath by taking, from us, by taking that wrath in our place. So, God's wrath was bearing down on us, rightfully so, justly so. And instead, the wrath went on Jesus at the cross. And so, now his wrath has angered us. It's no longer directed at us. And that's honestly, quite honestly, something I really think is at the core of this, because so many people think that God, believers, think that God's still angry at them.

[00:39:20:19 - 00:39:31:02]
Chris
 Now, he may be angry at what we do, because we still sin, but that anger is not a personal anger at us.

[00:39:33:12 - 00:39:47:19]
Chris
 His anger, his wrath was exhausted on the cross, like it was gone, all of it. The Scripture, the Bible clearly teaches us, one of the greatest truths in the world. And the more that that gets into our heart,

[00:39:48:19 - 00:40:50:18]
Chris
 and we truly understand it and believe it, both from the fact that we deserved it, and that it's gone now, the more then we'll be able to free, that'll free us up to let go of our wrath and anger at our spouse. And it's really, we talked about it on Sunday, is like you're taking the vertical experience of God's grace and then turning it out horizontally unto you. And so, you know, you mentioned, as it changed the way we think about conflict and perseverance inside our marriage, you could talk about, you know, like, what are the opportunities that conflict brings? Like, okay, how do we, this conflict, okay, how do I think about this in a positive way? In other words, okay, this is an opportunity, there's a great book called The Peacemaker by Ken Sandie, he says, "Conflict is an opportunity to glorify God, serve other people, and grow to be more like Christ." Okay, so like, okay, yep, I hate conflict, but hey, there's opportunities here. And then perseverance is, I think it goes back to what we talked about earlier.

[00:40:52:06 - 00:41:09:18]
Chris
 It's like, if we will engage in marriage and suffering and difficulty, if we will engage in it with a gospel focus, that actually will produce good things in our lives.

[00:41:12:09 - 00:41:20:18]
Chris
 It will produce, it will produce fruit. It has a lot to say about perseverance, and almost all those things apply inside of marriage.

[00:41:20:18 - 00:41:21:12]
Speaker 3
 Yeah.

[00:41:22:14 - 00:41:27:17]
Brenton
 All right. Well, we covered quite a bit of ground there today. Good job. Yeah.

[00:41:27:17 - 00:41:31:21]
Chris
 Maybe everybody's realizing I have a lot to say on this, but...

[00:41:32:22 - 00:41:35:20]
Brenton
 I don't think I need to be here for this. I'm just going to hit record for you.

[00:41:37:10 - 00:41:43:19]
Brenton
 Yeah, appreciate it. We will be back next week. I think you're in Ephesians 2.

[00:41:44:19 - 00:41:54:10]
Chris
 All right. No, we're going to be back in Genesis chapter. We'll be in Ephesians 5 some, but we'll be in Genesis 2 again for the most part. Okay.

[00:41:55:11 - 00:41:58:06]
Brenton
 Yeah, so if you have any questions, feel free to reach out,

[00:41:59:08 - 00:42:00:11]
Brenton
 Ask