– as we’ve gone through the series, people have been giving me all kinds of stories
i. a man was involved in a serious car accident and when he awakened, he was in the arms of his wife
– he began to talk to her and as difficult as it was, he began to say things like…
– honey you have always been there for me
– you were there when I lost my job
– you were there when I fell off the ladder hanging the Christmas lights
– you were there when my appendix burst
– and now here you are again
– he said, honey
– she said, yes dear
– he said, I’m beginning to believe you’re bad luck!
– sometimes just living together can be dangerous
ii. one lady said, “I never knew what happiness was until I got married… and then it was too late!”
– her husband said, “Yes, and this lady converted me to religion. I never believed in hell until we got married!”
iii. I heard the other day that most girls tend to marry men just like their fathers. That probably explains why so many mothers cry at weddings!
iv. Love and marriage are subject to the second law of thermodynamics
– the second law of thermodynamics says that anything left to itself will break down from order to disorder
– every homeowner knows this law
– given enough time, the roof will leak, the house will need painting and the yard will grow weeds
– every car owner knows this
– every car needs regular maintenance
– you have to change the oil, wash off the salt, rotate the tires, get tune ups
– without maintenance, sooner or later you are going to need a major overhaul
– well, love is no different
– without daily, weekly, monthly and annual maintenance, you are heading down a road to major difficulty
– when that happens, you will either need a major overhaul which can be costly or you will be tempted to trade your spouse in on a new model
– but both of those options bring a whole range of complications
– I find that couples often assume that their instincts will carry them through their relationship
– They think, we’ll just do what comes naturally and if problems come along, they’ll somehow work their way out of it
– And if and when their instincts fail to produce the marital bliss they had hoped for, they say they are incompatible
– They describe themselves as having grown apart
– They use phrases like irreconcilable differences
– What we’ve been saying in this series is that the best option is to fulfill the commitment of your wedding vows, “Till death do us part”
– the best plan is to work regularly at the relationship so that love never dies
– the fact is: love is either growing or dying; it never stays stagnant
– it grows or dies based on the quality and quantity of maintenance you give it
– your relationship requires just as much care and attention as anything else you care for
EG. Nurturing
– my wife is great at nurturing the plants in her garden
– she plants seeds, waters them, talks to them, fertilizes them and they grow into healthy plants
– she grows a lot of fruit and vegetables
– if I go near the garden, everything dies
– she knows how to nurture her plants so they are beautiful and productive
– that’s what’s needed in every marriage
– love needs to be nurtured
– and both husband and wife need to do the nurturing
– I want to remind us this morning that love grows apart when we don’t work on growing together
– Many of us are what I call “love-lazy”
– We don’t put in the energy and effort that is required to keep love alive and to keep the passion burning
– And as a result, we’re often frustrated
– the University of Minnesota’s Dr. David Olsen’s research of 100,000’s of thousands of couples indicates that 65% of married couples are profoundly unhappy
– this goes along with another study…
– given the opportunity to remarry, 7 out of 10 American couples would not marry the same individual again
– how tragic that is!
– Yale’s Robert Steinberg says, “The most satisfied couples, put the same amount of thought and effort into their marriages that they put into their children or their careers
– If we’re going to have a love that lasts, we’ve got to stop being love-lazy and become love-intensive
– we need to be proactive towards the loving aspect of our relationship
– this morning I’m wrapping up our series and I want to mention several ways to nurture your marriage
1. CONSTANTLY REINFORCE YOUR LOVE COMMITMENT
– how do you know when you have fallen in love?
– Some say… you just know
– It’s that itch you can’t scratch
– Do you believe in love at first sight?
– 7/10 Americans believe in love at first sight to some extent
– there’s nothing amazing about love at first sight
– the amazing thing is people who live with each other week after week still loving each other
– everyone knows that love at first sight is nothing more than puppy love and everyone knows that puppy love leads to a dog’s life
– Norm Crosby has an interesting comment on love
– Teenagers don’t know what love is. They have mixed up ideas. They go for a drive. The boy runs out of gas, They make out in the front seat. And the girl says she loves him.
– He says here’s what’s real love: Love is when you’ve been married 25 years, you are smooching in the living room, the boy runs out of gas and she still loves him anyway!”
i. settle the commitment to be a loving person in your own mind
– the issue is not whether you are married to the perfect person; you aren’t
– the issue is are you a loving person?
ii. regularly reaffirm that commitment verbally
– tell your partner that there is no person or situation that would make you want to leave the marriage relationship
iii. do things that reinforce love & stop doing the things that negate love
iv. close all the doors to other alternatives
– eliminate the “D” word; it just isn’t an option
– when both you and your partner know there is no option but to work things out, it increases the commitment to work it out
2. FILL YOUR MATE’S EMOTIONAL TANK
– we know what it means to fill the gas tank in the car
– and many of us have experienced the frustration of running out of gas
– similarly, each of us has an emotional tank
– God is emotional and he made us in his image
– he made us emotional people
– and just as your car won’t run with an empty gas tank, so you can’t function on an empty emotional tank
– the Bible is full of teaching on this
– one of the keys to marital happiness is keeping your partner’s emotional tank full
– many of our marital difficulties arise because we haven’t kept our partner’s emotional tank full
– most of our misunderstandings come when our emotional tanks are empty
– when our emotional tanks are empty, we instinctively seek someone to fill them for us
– that’s why when love grows emotionally cold, people seek someone outside the marriage to talk to so the emotional tank can be full
– almost every affair is the result of an empty emotional tank
– love burns on the fuel in your emotional tank
– this is why it’s so important to understand love
– love is a thoughtful, calculated choice to love your partner
– love is not an emotion
– but true love sees the emotional needs of a partner and seeks to satisfy them
– catch the distinction I just made
– love is not an emotion that I feel
– and I do not love in order to meet my own emotional needs
– but if I have true love, I will meet the emotional needs of my partner
– when we meet emotional needs we strengthen marriage
– when we drain each other’s emotional tanks, we jeopardize the marriage
– when we meet each other’s motional needs, we make deposits in their emotional tanks
– when we ignore or don’t meet those needs, we make withdrawals from their emotional tanks
– men and women have their emotional tanks filled in different ways
– we need to learn how to feel our mate’s tanks
– we fill the tanks by meeting basic needs
– how do you make a deposit in your partner’s emotional tank?
i. talk
– women enjoy conversation simply for the sake of conversing
– she needs daily conversation
– how much? … You are not going to like the answer!
– Most studies of successful couples 10-15 HOURS a week!
– This is what causes love to grow and keeps the emotional tank full
– Most men get troubled when they hear that
– Where are we going to get 15 minutes a day let alone 15 hours a week!
– the problem is that after marriage, the average couple spends 37 minutes a week in meaningful conversation
– is it any wonder that in our fast-paced worlds, America leads the world in marriage breakups
– when a woman says, let’s talk, it’s a sign that the emotional tank is empty
– women don’t communicate for solutions but for sharing
– for a woman it is not the topic, it’s the process
– a man responding to his wife’s request to talk, saying, Sure, what do you want to talk about? is the same as a man saying to his wife, let’s make love and the wife saying, why? Do you want to have a baby?
– The husband is not saying he wants a baby. Rather, he’s saying, I just want to be intimate
– The same is true when a woman says, let’s talk
ii. touch
EG. Ruth reaching out to touch my hand when watching TV
– holding hand up when she walks by
iii. time
– how much time alone do you have together?
– when you spend time together, you fill your emotional tanks
iv. space
– how close do you sit with each other?
– you are sitting together here in church
– men when you do that, you are filling your wife’s emotional tank
3. GUARD AGAINST HARDNESS
– when things get tense in a marriage, you can become hard in your spirit or you can remain tender
– this is not the same as strength and weakness
– to remain soft and tender in the face of difficulty is a mark of great strength
– it’s easy to become hard
– it’s easy to erect a firewall
– we become hard when we begin to withdraw
– we become hard when we play and replay negative situations over and over in our minds
– we become hard when we withhold things from our partner
– Jesus identified hardness as a major spiritual issue
Matthew 19:8
Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning.
Mark 3:5
He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts (KJ. hardness), said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored.
Romans 2:5
But because of your stubbornness (hardness) and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.
4. MAKE YOUR MARRIAGE RELATIONSHIP THE CENTER OF YOUR FAMILY
– kids were never meant to be the hub of a marriage
– yet, far too many couples, only relate together when the kids are involved
– they have no relationship with each other apart from the kids
– family time is important
– but family time will be meaningless, if there is not separate couple time
– the family will be no stronger than the marriage relationship
– schedule events and activities when the kids aren’t around
– hiring a baby sitter from time to time, is a necessary investment in your marriage, if you are going to nurture your marriage
5. LEARN TO LIVE WITH CONTENTMENT
– our society is driven by advertising that attempts to persuade us to buy things we don’t really need or want
– advertising is in the business of creating dissatisfaction with the status quo and creating appetites for more and more things… now
– it’s when couples buy into the thinking that you have to have more and more that dissatisfaction creeps into the marriage
– couples then spend more than they have to buy what they don’t need
– and it all builds tension in the relationship
– and it’s one of the underlying values that destroys marriages
– this mindset is absolutely opposite to the teaching of Scripture
Philip. 4:11-12
… I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.
1 Tim. 6:6, 8
But godliness with contentment is great gain… But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
6. COMMIT YOURSELVES TO PURITY
EG. Husband watching pornography and then expecting his wife to match the pornographic fantasies
– it destroys marriages
– commit yourselves to…
– purity of thought
– purity of behavior
– purity of heart
– purity of lifestyle
– impurity will undermine any marriage
– impurity will create mistrust
– impurity will create evil desires and unwholesome desires
– impurity will foster unfair comparisons
– just establish up front there will be no unwholesome movies or videos, no unwholesome literature and no impure talk or humor
Hebrews 13:4
Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.
7. GIVE YOURSELVES JOINTLY TO A SIGNIFICANT PURPOSE
– every marriage needs a cause that is bigger than the marriage and bigger than the family
– every couple needs a purpose that transcends the marriage
– that purpose will not detract or pull away from the marriage; rather, it will strengthen the marriage
– every couple needs a joint project
– that can be a joint hobby
– it can be a joint ministry (EG. Community groups)
8. BOND SPIRITUALLY
– you can have a one, two or three dimensional relationship , but God’s plan for all of us is for us to have a three dimensional relationship
– we can’t neglect the spiritual dimension of your life
– you have to be growing spiritually together
– you have to be worshipping together
– you have to be serving the Lord together
– not only do we have different individual needs, we have mutual needs
– one of these needs is for spiritual fulfillment
– this is because we’re three dimensional beings
– each of us is comprised of a body, soul and spirit
– we are spiritual beings living in human bodies
– God intends us to become one with one another through marriage
– And true oneness, can only happen when there is a bonding of all three dimensions
– The bonding of your bodies comes through physical touching and sex
– The bonding of your souls comes through relational and emotional interaction
– The bonding of your spirits comes through a shared faith and shared spiritual experiences
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