Equip your Marriage

Two Lists Your Marriage Needs This Christmas

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Checklist to follow
Tis the season of lists! You have wish lists, shopping lists, and TODO lists to manage. Santa is keeping track of a naughty list and a nice list. But there are two more lists that your marriage needs this season.
 
Two lists your marriage needs this Christmas
1. Truths I know about my mate
2. Lies I believe about my spouse
 
There’s a battle being waged for your marriage every day. On your best day, it’s an innocuous battle in which you must decide to give your mate the benefit of the doubt and interpret his or her thoughts and actions in the most gracious way possible. On your worst day, your marriage is under a full-scale spiritual attack. In response, you need to equip your marriage with two essential lists.

List #1 – Truths I know about my mate

Your marriageJesus declares the import of truth in John 8:32 – “Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” Truth is the cornerstone upon which the success of your marriage must be grounded. However, it’s likely that neither you nor your mate have then time to identify and consciously embrace the truth you know exists.
 
As a first step in that direction, ask yourself a few questions:
  • What do you objectively know to be true regarding your life partner?
  • What sort of person is he or she?
  • Think about your mate’s character and values.

Reflect on the answers to these questions. Now build a list of objective truths that describe this unique and gifted person that blesses your life daily.

List #2 – Lies I believe about my spouse

We all have lies and half-truths that we believe. We repeat ideas to ourselves so much that we come to believe them. Sometimes these are fairly harmless myths. In other cases these are dangerous lies that distort your perspective, poisoning the relationship.
 
Common lies in marriage:
  • My mate doesn’t care.
  • When my spouse says or does something hurtful, it’s not an accident.
  • He or she doesn’t appreciate me.
  • I’m the only one actually making an effort.
  • My spouse can never change.
  • My partner is intentionally avoiding me or withholding love from me.
  • And etc.

Common elements in lies we propagate:

  • Question the motive
  • Malign the intent
  • Exaggerate the attitude
  • Assume the emotions
  • Repeat a single word/statement to give it more punch
  • Read between lines that aren’t there
  • Put words in the other’s mouth
  • Go to extremes

At the core of all of these lies you will find an assumption that your spouse intended to hurt you and/or doesn’t care or notice you have been hurt. Furthermore, you’ll find an underlying fear that your needs will continue to go unmet and that the relationship can’t or won’t improve.

The Power of Truth

On your best day, what do you know to be true about your husband or wife? What prevents you from living in the bliss of that knowledge? An internal dialogue crammed full of doubts, half-truths, assumptions, and fears. These manifest themselves as lies that you repeat to yourself often enough that you begin to believe them. On rougher, more difficult days when you are tired and stressed, you’ll readily reach for one or more lies to use as a filter for actions and words. Suddenly, you’ve gone from optimism and clarity to a clouded mess of bitterness and growing resentment grounded in assumptions and a steady mental diet of lies.
 
How do you break this crazy cycle? Hold tight to Truth and reject the lies. Earlier this year we shared Five Lies that Can Wreck your Marriage along with five truths to counter-act those lies. Paul wrote to the Corinthians that in order to be victorious in spiritual warfare, they must “take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ” (II Corinthians 10:3-5).
 
Truth counteracts lies the same way that light counteracts darkness. You and your spouse must each take ownership of your respective thought lives and battle against the temptation to entertain these lies and pessimistic assumptions.

Challenge

Let’s put all of this into action with a hands-on challenge:
 
  • Assume the best about your spouse in every situation for one weekCommitment – Assume the best about your mate in every situation. Every action. Every word. Every non-verbal expression. Interpret every point of contact in the most gracious way possible. When something seems off, assume that you misunderstood rather than assuming that your spouse intended harm.
  • Duration – Try the challenge for one week. Next, stretch the challenge out to two weeks. Eventually work your way up to a full month.
  • Accountability – Journal daily regarding how the challenge is going. Also, identify at least one person that can hold you accountable to the challenge. Pray together and connect periodically to help keep you on track.
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What Jello Taught Me About Conflict Resolution

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Conflict resolution can be tricky

Conflict_Resolution_Jello-tallWorking with jello offers three important insights into conflict resolution in relationships.

  1. Give it time to cool off, don’t mess with it when it’s still hot.
  2. Stop trying to nail it to the wall, some things can’t be solved by brute force.
  3. Don’t forget it in the fridge, at some point the issues must be dealt with.
Conflict resolution is tricky. People often feel like they can’t win. If you attempt to fix it immediately, you get your face bitten off. But if you do nothing, you run the risk of sending the message you don’t care. Aye Carumba! It’s enough to make you toss your hands in the air and give up! Allow me to share three lessons jello has taught me about conflict resolution and offer you a simple strategy for addressing conflict without the extremes of pushiness or apathy.
 
Lesson #1: Give it time to cool off – You might try to fix the problem immediately. That’s a big no-no. Give the situation and everyone’s emotions an opportunity to cool down. For some people, it may be your natural posture to give things time to simmer down, but for others, this will be extremely challenging. Please note, “giving it time to cool off” does not mean that you are allowed to make a parting shot, fire a verbal arrow, or make some melodramatic overture as you exit the room. It means that you kindly and lovingly retreat from the conflict to allow the emotional heat to dissipate.
 
Lesson #2: Stop trying to nail it to the wall – Some try to force resolution to occur in an effort to tie everything up in a neat little bow. You can’t nail jello to a wall and even once its cooled you have to be patient with it. It jiggles, slides, and breaks into small pieces on your plate that are hard to scoop up. Resolving conflict is much the same. You have to flexible and patient. Reject any vestiges of rigidity or expectations about how quickly conflict should be resolved. Prepare yourself for a thorough, relentless, but loving endeavor to find and scoop all the remnants of pain and conflict that are left on your plate. It won’t be easy, but you’ll enjoy your jello a lot more than if you try and cut it with a knife and eat it with a fork the way you might a pork chop. 
 
Lesson #3 – Don’t forget it in the fridge –  Once you’ve learned to let it cool off and to be patient with the process of resolution, you must fight the tendency to let it sit on ice indefinitely. The storm has calmed and it appears that we have all moved on with out lives. Why would I want to drag that old issue back out? After all, we’ve finished dinner and we didn’t even notice the jello never made it to the table! The whole thing seems harmless until you’re looking for some yogurt in two weeks and you inadvertently knock the jello off the shelf and it spills all over the floor. Or perhaps you are digging through the fridge at just the WRONG time. “Oh, I remember this argument…” However it comes up, the unresolved issues never vanish. They merely wait to be rediscovered and wreck another perfectly good meal. It’s better to pull out the conflict on your own timetable and lovingly work the issues all the way through to resolution.
 

A simple strategy for handling conflict.

How do you address a conflict without hitting the extremes? If you are too quick to fix things, you run the risk of aggravating your spouse, friend, or co-worker. If you wait too long you run the risk of not remembering the issue(s) or of being blind-sided by the residual pain and frustration. 
 
Take the conflict at hand and break it into two fundamental categories – squishy (the emotional stuff) and crunchy (the logical stuff). You can’t force squishy things and you can’t ignore crunchy ones. 
 
Step #1 – Lovingly apply a dollop of truth and love to the affected squishy aspects of the conflict. Then step away and allow that truth sufficient time to soak in.
  • Example 1 – “I apologize for being insensitive. Your friendship means the world to me and I didn’t mean to be a brute. Let’s talk about it later when we both cool off.”
  • Example 2 – “I’ve clearly miscommunicated here. Please know I love you dearly and I had no intention of saying anything hurtful. I’d love to talk through the details after we put the kids to bed or perhaps tomorrow.”
Dollop and soak. Don’t force it and don’t try and fix it. Avoid the desire for a quick resolution. Squishy issues of the heart need time to absorb new information and change feelings. Allow time for the truth and love you have applied to run it’s course and seep into the other person’s heart.
 
Step #2 – At some point the two of you will need to roll up your sleeves and get to work. The two of you have pain to unpack and a connection to rebuild.
  • Example 1 – “Remember the other day when you stole my Cheetos and called me a baby for crying about it? I was hoping we could talk through that and clear the air a bit.”
  • Example 2 – “I feel like we need to talk about our miscommunication earlier today. It’s important to me that we throw fewer sharp objects at each other and work as a team to avoid cuts and bruises.”
Unpack and rebuild. Don’t ignore the tough issues. Crunchy things tend to be resilient and stick around for months of even years. If you don’t unpack the pain and rebuild the lines of communication, you run the risk of being surprised by the pain like stepping on a LEGO in the middle of the night.
 
Next time an important relationship experiences conflict, remember the simple lessons jello teaches us. Let it cool off, don’t try and nail it or force it, but also be sure you don’t forget about it. Instead, respond immediately with truth and love (dollop and soak) followed later by a collaborative effort to solve the fundamental issues (unpack and rebuild). Relationships are both squishy and crunchy. Respond accordingly.
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Marriage Intimacy Meter

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Intimacy in marriage is one of the most important indicators of your relationship’s health. If you and your spouse are not bonded spiritually, emotionally, and physically, you become far more susceptible to conflict and division. Quality time, vulnerable communication, and generous affection knit your hearts together into a beautiful union. Fortunately, there’s not much going on in your life to get in the way of these essential aspects of your relationship. Right?

Intimacy Killers

  • Stress
  • Work
  • Financial strain
  • Kids activities
  • Hobbies
  • Health problems
  • Family drama
  • Moving
  • Home maintenance
  • Life

With so many obstacles, it’s important that you periodically take time to evaluate your level of intimacy and determine if sufficient priority is being given to your relationship.

Gauging Your Marriage’s Intimacy

While couple’s build intimacy through a wide range of methods, there are a handful of classic elements you can evaluate to gauge your current level of marital intimacy.

Marital Intimacy Meter from Equip Your Marriage

Just like we describe in Chapter 11 of The Phoenix Marriage:

Marriage is your most important earthly relationship. When you marry, the two of you become “one flesh.” If you starve your marriage, you starve yourself. Nourishing your relationship and prioritizing your mate is one of the most important things you can do each day. The only thing more important, is your relationship with God.

Commit today to taking one or two concrete steps to invest in building more intimacy in your marriage. The rewards you’ll reap will last a lifetime.

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How to Save Your Marriage – Part 3

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Your marriage can be saved through healing, rebuilding, and grace
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.  – II Corinthians 5:17
If anything in your life has ever been worth fighting for - Fight for your marriageGod is in the business of renewal and restoration. If you put God at the center of your relationship (Part 1) and commit to investing deeply in your marriage for 40 days (Part 2), God will breathe new life and energy into you both. But how do you transition from that intense focus to a more maintainable level of energy? The level of intense focus and energy that your marriage renewal requires initially cannot and does not need to be maintained indefinitely. After 40 days, you’ll want to transition into the new phase of your renewal.
 

Phase Two – Healing and Rebuilding

In the initial phase of your renewal, you are working to enrich your marriage, recapture your friendship, and put God at the center of your union. Making these changes permanent requires an important transition in your mindset and your activities.
 
As I describe in chapter 7 of The Phoenix Marriage:

Your first forty days were likely a roller-coaster of emotion, intimacy, and vulnerability. Many couples get caught up in the energy and the excitement of breathing new life into their marriage. However, the critical season following those first forty days will determine whether these changes will last or if the couple will slip back into old patterns and behaviors.

You want this new version of your marriage to last, don’t you? Rebuilding your bond and healing relationship wounds characterize much of this second phase. Additionally, you will be transitioning to more sustainable levels of focus and energy. As with the first phase, defining goals and concrete actions will be critical for success.
 

Rebuliding trust in your marriage is difficult but it can be done.Goals for this Phase

Defining goals for each phase of your renewal is important. Without goals, it is easy to drift aimlessly, not actually making the progress necessary to renew your bond. Without goals, it is easy to lose sight of why the two of you began this renewal and what you need to do in order to maintain the momentum. Thus, each couple much define goals that make sense for their marriage, given the unique challenges and heartaches that they have experienced together. While no definitive list can be included, but common themes will tend to exist amid the goals which couples define for this phase. These themes include trust, forgiveness, and healing from whatever hurts lie in your collective past.
 
As the two of you consider the pain that you must overcome and the trust you must rebuild during this phase, be prepared for a lot of work. The following, prior blog posts may prove helpful:
 

Taking Action

As with the first phase of renewal, all of this just talk unless you put it into action. We explore a long list of concrete actions in The Phoenix Marriage, but here’s a few general themes you can except for your actions to align with:
  • Find your new normal – In the first forty days (phase one) couples tend to prioritize their marriage, letting non-essential activities fall away (hobbies, outings with friends, family outings, etc.). This is necessary, because you need focused attention to build healthy patterns. But now the two of you must find a way to fold some of those activities back in while also identifying what changes need to happen. You’ll also be trying to find your new normal in terms of routines, frequency of contact, and how you communicate with one another. It’s normal for their to be anxiety over anything that feels like previous routines. You’ll need to work together to build confidence that this “new normal” won’t result in falling back into old patterns.
  • Lovingly, patiently rebuild trust – The loss of trust, in whatever measure, the two of you have experienced can be devastating for a couple.  As I write in chapter 7:

Prior to beginning this renewal process, your spiritual and emotional connection had faded and your bond had weakened. While this will look different for each couple, the simple fact is this: trust has been broken at some level. In most cases, the trust has been broken by both the husband and wife. You trusted your mate to love you fully and selflessly, and he or she fell short of that mark. In more extreme situations, you find yourself coping with betrayal of trust from addiction, abuse, or infidelity. Wherever you are on the spectrum, trust has been violated, and rebuilding it will require time and patience. It won’t be easy, but take heart, trust can be restored.

  • Battle your demons – We all have something we must battle as a part of the renewal and healing process. Insecurity, guilt, doubt, fear, and resentment are common obstacles. One of the couples we are walking with recently shared a fear with us: “I’m 46 years old, I just don’t know if it’s even possible for me to change at this point. Things will inevitably slip back into their old patterns.” You have to resist this sort of negative self talk and embrace the reality that each day you can decide who you want to be and how you will behave as an individual and as a member of your marriage team.
  • Grieve and process emotion in healthy ways – There is pain in the collective past of your relationship. During the intense focus of the first 40 days, you may find that you swept much of these issues under the proverbial rug. But you can’t ignore them forever. They will either come out unexpectedly and explosively or you can choose to let them out a piece at a time as part of a healthy and constructive healing process. One couple that we mentored last year experienced significant challenges when alcohol was used as a coping mechanism. Another suffered from wild emotional swings when safe, healthy outlets for emotion were not provided. Processing all of the past hurt is crucial and it is an on-going process, because “wounds heal crooked” (see article referenced above).
  • Extend grace to one another – Be gracious and understanding with each other as you transition from the intensity and excitement of the first phase of renewal, into a focus upon healing an rebuilding in this second phase. You will both need to extend a lot of grace toward each other as you collectively heal and rebuild. Tammy and I have come to learn that grace, is the universal love language.
 

Ingredients for Success

Prayer is the key to building a long and lasting connection with your spouse.We have found that prayer is the single most powerful ingredient of our revitalized marriage. In fact, our most popular post to date: “We tried something new in the bedroom and it saved our marriage” explores that very topic. Another important ingredient for success is to be gracious with each other as you each process past hurts and work to put into place your new normal. One of you might heal and move on faster than the other. Grace and patience should permeate the relationship. My wife and I are 22 months into our renewal, and there are still hurts and hangups from my affair that we have to deal with periodically. I had no idea how expensive my affair would be, but I realize it now.
 
This second phase will likely be harder than the first, but it is rewarding in terms of intimacy and depth that it yields for your relationship. There’s a lot of work for you both to do, but it’s worth every painful conversation, every raw prayer, and every tear.
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Is Your Love Unreasonable? It Should Be.

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Is your love unreasonable? Because that's the standard.

Throughout time, humans have elevated reason – our ability to rationalize and make judgement calls regarding good and bad decisions. In Aristotle’s Ethics he describes human beings as rational animals and identifies reason as a uniquely human characteristic. Our ability to justify and rationalize our decision-making is God-given. But dependence upon reason can also get in the way of God’s call for us to love unconditionally.

Human reason is great, but God’s wisdom shames the wise (I Corinthians 1:27). Where we see only failure, He sees a future. Where we see destruction, He sees destiny. In the middle of our mess, He begins a miracle. And so, He calls us to love like He does — unreasonably…[read more]

 

[This is an excerpt from a guest post over at Husband Revolution. You can read the full article there.]

 

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I had no idea how expensive my affair would be

Posted on by Posted in Marriage Renewal, Our Story .
I had no idea how expensive my affair would be!
Nineteenth century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, is famous for his use of metaphor, irony, and parable in explaining ethical and religious concepts. One particularly famous parable describes a rather odd crime:

Two thieves broke into a jewelry store one night, but instead of stealing the jewels they simply switched the price tags. They put high-priced tags on cheap jewelry and low-priced tags on valuable gems. For several weeks no one noticed. People bought cheap jewelry for exorbitant prices and rare jewels for next to nothing. 
Kierkegaard’s point is that we sometimes have difficulty assessing the actual value or cost associated with something. If we are told it is valuable, we believe it. If we are told something is cheap, we accept it as fact. Our concept of “price”, “worth”, and “value” are subject to the costs and benefits that we assign. But what happens if you assign these incorrectly? Worse yet, what happens if you accept a lie about what something is worth? We live in a fallen world where someone has switched all the price tags around. We assign unmerited value to things that are worthless, and overlook priceless items as inconsequential. We take the most valueable things for granted (integrity, honesty, commitment) while minimizing the full consequences of selfish actions.

 

Sin is expensive

Sin is expensive. Incredibly expensive. But the price isn’t paid in cash, it’s paid in mental, emotional, and spiritual pain. God didn’t create an arbitrary list of “DOs” and DON’Ts” to see if we could follow them. No, He laid out a set of essential guidelines for living. His anger towards lying, stealing, cheating, coveting, murder, jealousy, and pride is because all of these behaviors destroy relationships. Everything that the Bible labels as sin is something that God is trying to protect us from. His desire is love, peace, grace, and harmony with Him and with all of creation. Sin is our defiant rejection of this in an effort to satisfy our own selfish desires. Almost two years ago, I set out on a destructive path of selfishness that culminated in a two-month affair which nearly destroyed my family. I had no idea just how expensive that path would be. Sadly, we are still paying the price for my selfishness.

 

Every decision has a cost

What have you sold too cheaply?My economics professor told me years ago: “there is no free lunch.” If someone offers you something for free, you need to dig deeper. Every decision has a cost. Nothing is ever truly free. Even something that appears to be inconsequential initially, may have substantial long-term effects. The decision to eat unhealthy food has both an initial cost and a long-term cost. The same holds for decisions within relationships. 

 

At its core, all sin is selfishness. In some cases, that selfishness leads us to rationalize actions as being relatively inexpensive (“this will only really affect me, not anyone else”, “I can play near this fire and not get burned”). In all cases, the full emotional and mental cost of our selfish choices is not paid until months and years later. I truly believed that my affair in 2012 was a victimless crime. I naively thought it only impacted the two of us. I was dead wrong. In reality, it hurt every person in my family (myself included) and devastated my wife to such a degree that she is still paying the price nearly two years later.

 

The full cost of my affair

It is difficult to fully appreciate all the ways that my sin has impacted my life and the life of my family. There were initial costs, short-term costs, and long-term costs.
 
Initial Costs
  • Integrity – I have always been a fiercely loyal person. Loyal to family, friends, employers, hobbies, churches, etc. But in a moment of weakness, I sold my integrity as quickly as Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup. After I sold it once, I bought into the enemies lies that I had ruined everything and I might as well throw in the towel.
  • Self-esteem – Worthless. I felt completely worthless. Unworthy of Tammy’s love. Unworthy of God’s calling on my life. My best bet was to cut Tammy and the kids loose and move on so they could heal.
  • Stress – I lived a double life for two months. While I was trying to delicately unwind my marriage and let the kids down easy, I was under a terrible amount of stress. I’d never lived a life full of deceit and I don’t recommend it. I was constantly on edge and even developed a habit of grinding my teeth at night.
Short-term Costs
  • Heartache – As our relationship unraveled and I began pushing for divorce, Tammy and the kids were crushed. All six kiddos had been through divorce before. Those old wounds opened right back up, but this time they would be losing their step-siblings that they had grown to love. Tammy was confused, hurt, and frightened about her future and the kids future. 
  • Distance – My relationship with Tammy and the kids was frayed and distant. I pushed friends away, mentors away, and God away. I was too busy rationalizing my behavior to listen to wise counsel.
Finally, that fateful day at Starbucks arrived. Tammy and I sat down to divide assets and get everything ironed out for the divorce. She confronted me, the Holy Spirit worked on my heart, and we turned a crucial corner. We decided to fight for our marriage and for our family. But the full cost of my selfishness had not been paid yet.

 

Long-term Costs
  • Wounds – I wounded my children and my wife deeply. It took over two months before one of the girls began to trust me again and three more months for another (the third doesn’t really talk, so we aren’t sure). But Tammy has paid the highest price for my infidelity. Nearly two years later and she still has days that she must battle with ghosts from the past. Every day is a little easier, but sometimes we take a step back. Wounds heal, but they heal crooked.
  • Trust – Rebuilding trust has proved to be extremely difficult, as you might imagine. A big part of this is that talk is cheap. So we had to move past just talking about rebuilding trust and actually doing it. We have made great strides, but it hasn’t been easy. Throughout the rebuilding process, we have identified eight rules for re-building trust.
  • Peace – I robbed us of peace. I wrestle with forgiving myself. Tammy wrestles with trusting me. On occasion Tammy will have an angry outburst. In other cases, a song, movie, or date on the calendar will bring back a flood of painful memories for one or both of us to unpack.

 

What have you sold too cheaply?

My selfishness was incredibly expensive. But I only see that now in hindsight. What seemed at first to be a personal decision that impacted no one else, turned out to be slippery slope of pain and anguish that devastated my entire family. I sold my integrity, self-esteem, peace of mind, family unity, and marriage at rock-bottom, discount prices. These things were incredibly precious, and I sold them for pennies on the emotional dollar.
 
As I have shared my story with other men, I have heard from so many that they see ways in which they have allowed their own selfishness to chip away at the joy in their marriage. We have all sold something precious in exchange for meeting a selfish desire:
  • Those little white lies you tell your spouse make things easier on you at the cost of your integrity.
  • Pornography costs you pure, genuine intimacy with your mate.
  • Discontentment with what you have or where you live robs you both of peace.
  • Manipulation might pay out at first, but it poisons your relationship, sowing seeds of bitterness.
  • Dismissing your spouse’s need for sexual intimacy could be more convenient, but it damages his or her self-esteem in the process.
  • Harsh words may win an argument, but your emotional bond suffers.
Maybe its time to start putting the correct price tags on your own actions within your marriage. Recognize the ways in which you have played fast and loose with your mate’s heart. It’s time to stop the cycle of selfishness and honor your marriage as the precious gift that it is.
 
So the question is, what have you sold too cheaply?
I had no idea how expensive my affair would be!
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Six ways to equip your mind for spiritual warfare

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Equip Your Mind for Spiritual Warfare

Spiritual warfare — it’s all in your head. How you feel about good days. What you think when you have bad days. Your response to circumstances is a choice. It’s all in your head. You can choose to be a glass half-full or a glass half-empty type of person. You can choose to look at things in the best possible way or find some reason to be grumpy. It’s all in your head. The apostle Paul recognized this simple truth centuries ago:

“I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know both how to have a little, and I know how to have a lot. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being content — whether well fed or hungry, whether in abundance or in need.” – Philippians 4:11-12
In today’s post we’ll take a look at what a movie taught me about marriage, six ways to equip your mind for spiritual warfafe, and the importance of trusting God’s path for your marriage and your life.

The movie Inception says that its all in our headsWhat a movie taught me about marriage

Leonardo DiCaprio taught me the importance of mastering your own mind in the blockbuster movie, Inception. In that film, characters embark upon a mental odyssey by experiencing layers of dreams (dreams within dreams) to unlock information and explore new possibilities. Unfortunately, some characters lose a grip on what is real and what is mere fiction. As DiCaprio’s character, Cobb, explains: “Dreams feel real while we’re in them. It’s only when we wake up that we realize something was actually strange.” The solution, according to Cobb, is to maintain a totem (a unique object with a particular size, shape, and weight) which keeps you grounded, knowing which world you are in.
 
Are our lives so very different? Don’t we have trouble maintaining our grasp on what is real and what is an illusion? The enemy is cunning and will attempt to distort your view of reality. Paul cautions the church at Corinth:
“For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” – II Corinthians 10:3-5 
Indeed, we must be on guard and “take every thought captive” by testing it’s origin. Is this thought holy or harmful? Is this thought consistent with what I know to be TRUTH? It’s a mental battlefield out there and it’s so very easy to run away with our thoughts.
 

Six ways to equip your mind for spiritual warfare

In our up-coming book, The Phoenix Marriage: God creates beauty out of ashes, I acknowledge the importance of preparing yourself to combat the enemy’s lies against your marriage:
“The renewal of your relationship depends upon your ability to reject the lies of the enemy and hold firm to the truths of your marriage.” – Kyle Gabhart, The Phoenix Marriage p125
In chapter 8, I go on to describe the value of creating reminders or cues to maintain a vigilant grasp on the reality of spiritual warfare. I offer six ways to establish mental reminders:The Phoenix Marriage - God creates beauty out of ashes
  1. Memorize scripture.
  2. Keep scripture and encouraging quotes on note cards and keep them in places you will see them.
  3. Christians have used physical reminders for centuries (prayer beads, prayer bracelets, some even feel comfortable getting tattoos).
  4. Set visual reminders such as pictures of armor or weapons.
  5. Find encouraging songs and listen to them repeatedly.
  6. Engage social media for reminders and tips. Join marriage-building Facebook groups and follow pro-marriage feeds on Twitter.
Victory goes to the prepared. If you are going to withstand the constant onslaught of doubts and fears that will invade your brain, you must feed your mind a steady diet of optimism and biblical wisdom.

Trust your path

Hindsight is not always 20/20. Sometimes as you reflect on past decisions, you start to second-guess yourself. Distanced from the particular circumstances, facts, and emotions you felt at the time, you can begin to question your own judgement. So when you hit a rough season in your marriage, it can be easy to think back and be unable to clearly recall why the two of you got together to begin with. Or you might reflect on other pivotal points in your relationship and lose confidence that it was handled properly or even fairly.
 
To survive the mental quagmire, you have to trust the path that God has walked you down. 
  • Trust God’s ability to bring you the right person, no matter how long ago it was. (Proverbs 18:22, Psalm 103:19, Matthew 10:29)
  • Trust your decision to marry that person. (Proverbs 3:6)
  • Trust that any difficult times the two of you experience are part of God’s refinement of you both through your marriage. (Psalm 66:10-12, James 1:2-5)
  • Trust that God has a plan and a purpose for your marriage. (Romans 8:28, Jeremiah 29:11)
EYM_Podcast_FeaturedThumbnailIn this week’s podcast, The Creep and The Cougar, Tammy and I reflect on our own courtship. We note how God brought us together and confirmed his intention for us to be together. When we met years ago, this was crystal clear! It was so obvious how God was moving in our hearts and lives. But as we point out in the podcast, we lost sight of these truths as our relationship stretched from weeks to months to years. In time, it became easy to lose sight of these fundamentals and start to question God’s plan. Holding firm to the path God set you on and trusting in that path and that process is essential. When patience wanes and stress is applied in your relationship, you have to lean on God’s wisdom, not your own.
 

It’s all in your head

As believers and as spouses, we are called into a mental battlefield. Each of us must daily fight to prioritize God and prioritize our spouse. Establish mental cues to remind yourself what is reality and what is fiction. Trust the path that God has set you both on following. Finally, reflect upon how and why God put you both together in the first place. Celebrate that shared history and prepare to battle daily with your thoughts. It’s all in your head and in your mate’s head. Speak life into one another daily and find comfort and peace at the feet of your loving father.
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Podcast Episode #1 – The Creep and The Cougar

How to Save Your Marriage – Part 2

Posted on by Posted in Marriage Renewal .
How to save your marriage Part 2

One advantage of marriage is that, when you fall out of love with him or he falls out of love with you, it keeps you together until you fall in again. – Judith Viorst

As we shared in Part 1 of the “How to Save your Marriage” series, we recommend a phased approach to marriage renewal. This post explores that first phase.

Phase One – The First Forty Days

Whether you are renewing your marriage to avert an apathetic decline or you are rebuilding after a near-collapse of your relationship, the first phase is critical.

As I explain in Chapter 7 of The Phoenix Marriage:

“The first forty days of your marriage renewal are crucial in changing the atmosphere of your relationship and generating the momentum you need to carry you forward. It won’t be easy. Breaking patterns and habitual ways of thinking and interacting will prove an enormous challenge. We’ve chosen forty days, in part, to help you establish new patterns of behavior. Throughout the Bible, forty days has been shown to be a significant time period. “

During those forty days, you need a clear set of goals and practical actions that you and your spouse can take to put your marriage restoration on a solid footing.

Setting Goals to Save your Marriage

Goals are key to your renewal processLike any endeavor, by establishing and articulating goals it crystalizes your focus and builds a sense of urgency. During your first forty days of renewal, the two of you will want to identify a set of goals to achieve. Some of these goals will be unique to the particular challenges faced in your relationship. Others address more general issues which we found to be common amongst many couples.

Common Goals for Marriage Renewal

  • Break old habits and start new routines
  • Learn to communicate openly and authentically
  • Rebuild your friendship

Of course none of these goals will amount to anything if you don’t put them into action.

Taking Action to Save your Marriage

Take practical actions to renew your marriageIdentifying practical actions to rebuild your relationship is essential. There’s a long list of potential actions the two of you could choose to take, but we identify three common categories here.

(In the book, we describe the set of actions you and your spouse could take in much greater detail.)

  • Action 1: Clean house – A lot of factors contributed to the problems in your relationship. One step you want to take is to clear out any negative influences that are holding you back (alcohol or drugs, prioritizing other relationships, bad communication patterns, toxic relationships, etc.).
  • Action 2: Fresh start – Establish new patterns and routines to change the dynamic of your marriage. The tone and the tempo of your interaction must change. Open communication is a necessity. Prioritizing time together is essential. Grace and love must be the guiding principles of your union. Finally, daily and persistent prayer makes the whole thing work.
  • Action 3: Have fun – Your renewal won’t last if its all about work and sacrifice. You’ve also got to have fun together. Especially during these first forty days you need lots of time together. Time to talk, laugh, play, and recapture the friendship you had when your relationship first began.  

Make it real. Make it practical. And give yourselves some grace and understanding as you work together to walk out your renewal day by day.

What’s Next?

If you want to save your marriage, you have to fully commit to the process. The first forty days are intense and require a tremendous degree of dedication. Through your combined efforts and a dependence on God, you will establish invaluable routines and a firm foundation for your new relationship. The next phase – “Healing and Rebuilding” will involve a greater focus on rebuilding trust and healing the wounds from the past. For now, enjoy the excitement and simplicity of this initial phase of renewal. The journey to restore your marriage has just begun!

The Phoenix Marriage - God creates beauty out of ashesThe content in this post is adapted from our upcoming book (available on Amazon September 2014):

The Phoenix Marriage – Your most important earthly relationship can be restored, renewed, and reborn. God creates beauty out of ashes.

To be among the first to know when the book is released, join our Marriage Booster newsletter.

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