Marriage Love and Respect

We talk about from time to time, and it's a very important issue because of the society we live in and the stresses, and it's marriage. My wife always says, oh, another marriage sermon? That's because I'm picking on you. It's like sometimes when you say I'm giving a prophecy sermon, there's always a few people that say, oh, no, they just have no interest in it. Not that my wife doesn't have interest in marriage. Boy, am I setting myself up here, so let's move on. You know, the relationship between husband and wife can be one of the most rewarding and incredible relationships of life. I mean, you get to the place, especially when you've been married 45 years, you know, we can complete each other's thoughts sometimes, which is a little scary. It's easy for her to complete my thoughts because I'm pretty simple. It's a little more difficult for me to complete her thoughts, but sometimes I do. She'll pause and I'll finish the thought for her, you know, whatever she's saying. And I don't know, we're to the place now, if we're apart for a day, it's like, oh, man, I want to go home. I don't care what I'm doing, you know, I just want to go home, see her. So, you know, it's just this closeness forms. But there's also a lot of challenges in marriage. You know, the course of a marriage, if it goes 30 and 40 and 50 years, there's a lot of challenges in there. And when it first starts, everybody believes we won't have any problems. Everybody starts every marriage with the same thing. And then you start to find out all kinds of things about each other you thought you knew and you didn't. And you really think you know this person. Kim and I really knew each other when we got married. And there wasn't a lot of surprises to me. There were surprises to her. You know, his friends thinks that he's so easygoing and you thought he was so easygoing and nothing bothered him. And then you find out that he can be very, very childish about the texture of cooked carrots or how soft his pillow is. And everybody says, well, she is so... she just never loses her temper. And you married her thinking, wow, I dated her for a year and a half. She never lost her temper. And then the first time you forget to put down the toilet seat at night?

And then things change in life. I mean, when you marry her and you think, I can't believe she looks beautiful all the time. And then the first baby comes along and about a month after that, she's walking around exhausted, frazzled, and looking like an extra out of a zombie movie. You know, just... just... fried. Because she's just exhausted, right? I'm exaggerating, ladies, you know. And of course, you think he's so tough. And then the first time he gets a little cold, he wants you to call an ambulance? Because he knows he's dying, right?

And you get... as you learn these things, you get to know each other and you appreciate each other, and it's fun. But then life can throw all kinds of things at us that affect our marriage that we're not prepared for. Job problems, health problems, children. These things come at us from all different directions.

Monetary problems. You know, and every stage of life has a whole new set of problems that throws at you. As you try to deal with. Well, I'm going to look at today... I'm going to go through some very basic verses about marriage. Usually when I give a marriage sermon, I try to bring out something that's not just so basic, you know, maybe one basic verse, and then build off of that. I want to go through some very basic verses.

But what I want to do is then try to look at it and begin to open sort of thought processes on how do we make this practical. I mean, you and I know the verses about. You know, all know he's going to say, you know, husbands love your wives, wives submit to your husbands. There you go. There's his whole sermon. And sometimes we hear entire marriage sermons. That's all there is. We're going to talk a little bit about that, but we're going to talk about that in a greater concept, and then we're going to have to look at how to make it practical. And we're going to talk about how to make it practical, too, in the Bible study.

In the Bible study, we're going to spend some time doing that. And Mr. Bittner, too, has been working on, he wants to, as part of the Bible study, he wants to give a presentation on what he learned in all his years of marriage. So I thought that was great. He's been working on it for a while. So he's going to give that as the first part of the Bible study. Then we're going to talk a little bit about how to make this more practical. And I think, you know, some things he's going to cover is going to help us think about that, how to make this practical.

It has to be lived, right? So we're going to talk about, in the beginning. So let's, very basic, Genesis 1. Genesis 1. Okay. Genesis 1. But you know something? The foundations of marriage in Western society, the United States and Europe, have never been under the pressure that they are now. I mean, in Amsterdam, prostitution is so legalized, it's all over the place.

Divorce is nothing anymore. Just people living together is just nothing. It's just the way it is. And that's the pressures of society. And those pressures are on us, too. So we have to go back and look at, why did God do this? And then there's responsibilities we have as husbands and wives.

And when we take the marriage vow, we take on certain responsibilities to each other, but we take on certain responsibilities to God, which supersedes, by the way, anything your mate does. It is a responsibility in your personal relationship with God. So let's go to verse 26, Genesis 1. Then God said, and we know this, but let's go back to foundational concepts. Let us make man on our own image according to our likeness, let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the earth, over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

So he created human beings and said, I'm giving you the earth. You are going to have the power to rule over your environment. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created them. Male and female, he created them. So male and female isn't like, oh well, God made men first because they were in his image and women were a lesser image. That's not what this is. We all have, and there are differences between men and women.

That can be made into ridiculous in terms of stereotypes, right? But there are differences that are more than just biological, and there's reasons for that. We'll talk about that. And in those differences, we're all on a scale. You know, you'll hear men say, oh, women are just so emotional. But if you had a scale of somebody has no emotions, which would be mentally ill, and someone who has nothing but emotions, which would be mentally ill, okay.

Between those two extremes, we're all in there someplace, right? And women, if you get in the middle, tend to be a little more tend, be a little more on one side, and men on the other side. We're made that way. The difference is sometimes as we cross over that, right? And sometimes the man can be more emotional, and the women more, a woman more logical.

But there's a tendency there, and that tendency has reasons, and the reasons is in verse 28. Then God blessed them, and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Be fruitful and multiply. Now, God doesn't command us to be married. Actually, He doesn't command us actually to have children either. What He does say is that, and you look through the Scripture, marriage is the foundation of the concept of family, and family is the concept of basic concept of society.

Therefore, for the reproduction of the human race and the reproduction of God's family, He could have done this like I was told as a kid. You know, you just find children under the cabbage patch, or the stork brings them, or whatever, right? My parents never told me that. I read that in a book, when the first book said, storks bring them? Mom, is this right? No? Okay, so He could have done it any way He wanted to. He chose this way because of what we learn as being male and female, and having this kind of relationship. What we both bring to the table are certain aspects of who God is, and we learn to work together.

So, in order to build a society, He based it on the family. And He gave us differences, one, so that we could learn to love each other and grow in our relationship with Him and understand Him. And, you know, the New Testament, we're actually told that. The reason for marriage is to help us understand the relationship between Christ and the Church, in a very minimal way, but it helps us understand it.

But also, so that we can raise children. And so, men bring certain important elements to children, and women bring certain important elements to children. The destruction of manhood in this country is creating, over the last 50 years, is creating the absolute chaos we're seeing. It's one of the reasons. The absolute chaos is the destruction of what it is to be a man. So that brings us to our first point, then. Okay. What is the role of men? As a husband.

Now, I say as a husband because I've actually had a couple very serious talks with men in the Church who were bachelors, had been bachelors all their lives, and believed every woman had to submit to them. And I said, no, they don't.

Sorry, they don't. And I'd like to see you try that with my wife. I'd pay for tickets to watch that. Because that's not your role. Husband role is all different. We have a role in the family. And it's important in the development of children and to help our wives reach their potential, just like they're designed a certain way to help us men reach our potential. That's an important understanding of this. That's why God made us male and female. In His image, was to help us learn certain things and grow through the marriage relationship.

So let's go to Colossians 3. All know He's gone to Colossians 3. I know everyone goes there. Paul, in his shorthand way, and sometimes we don't realize how radical Paul was in the first century Roman world. There's certain things that we read that we don't even understand why he would say it. There's certain sexual instructions he gives that would be weird in that age. And I won't get deeply into this, but basically that women in marriage have sexual rights. That was a whole new concept. That just wasn't there in the Roman world. And he goes through great detail.

Because he said marriage is designed for a lot of things. And he goes through that in Corinthians. But he says, verse 18, wives submit to your own husbands as is fitting in the Lord. And husbands love your wives and do not be bitter toward them. Now, when we go back to this word submit, I'm going to substitute a word that sort of summarizes the spirit of that word. It's respect. In fact, there's a place where women are actually commanded to respect their husbands.

Now, submission doesn't mean I'm your slave. That's not the point he's making here. The point he's making is you must respect him. That means sometimes you take a step back. That means sometimes you're not always trying to force your will. But the men are told, interesting enough, make them submit. No, that's not what he says. The command of men are to love your wives and do not be bitter towards them. So if we as men, and this is what I really would like to do, is have all the men and women as we go through this, start doing some study, personal study on what this means.

If you are to love your wives, where do you start? Oh, I would say 1 Corinthians 13. Don't be rude to your wife. Well, wait a minute. What's that? What are we talking about here? No, that's what 1 Corinthians 13 says. There's a whole list of how we are to treat her. So that's where we start. We start as men in our role is to learn how to apply 1 Corinthians 13 to our wives and lead in that. It took me a number of years to figure out if Kim and I had a disagreement, I had to go first and say, you know, I didn't handle that right or I didn't understand you.

Let's talk about it. Because I was waiting for her to do it because she's supposed to respect me. The problem is I'm supposed to lead. Leadership is always stepping to be the first to step forward. That's what leadership is. I found out things were so much easier if I looked at it and realized, oh my gosh, her feelings are hurt. And I just stepped in and said, I hurt your feelings. I'm not sure I understand what's going on here. And all of a sudden, she was just so happy because I was leading it. That's leadership. Leadership is always being the first to step forward.

And you know, sometimes she may be wrong and it doesn't make any difference. You're the one who steps forward and says, how do we work this through? If you're always waiting for her, you're not being the leader. This leadership is difficult because our pride gets in the way. And it says, do not be bitter against her. It is something that a lot of men have to deal with this.

We can become bitter against our wives. And sometimes it's because they're doing things that hurt us. Or maybe they don't understand us. I mean, we're men. They don't understand us sometimes. So we become bitter towards them. And wives, when we get to your role, your biggest issue sometimes, once again I'm talking general terms, is you can resent him. You can resent him. Man can become bitter. And so a bitter man is just sort of not mean.

He just pulls away. Sometimes they can be mean. Sometimes they just work all the time. Because I don't know how to fix the problems. I don't think she wants me to fix the problems. So, because I feel like I have to fix them. That's a male thing. So you become bitter. And it's interesting, he says to the wives, you've got to respect him now. And he says, okay, husbands, you must love them.

And you can't become bitter towards them. You have to fight that emotional response to she doesn't understand. She doesn't care. Whatever. Whatever it is that causes that bitterness, you have to resist that. This is the leadership role of men.

This is very complicated. I do have a study sheet I'm going to hand out to you afterwards to go home and study. One page is for men, one page is for women. But men, we start in 1 Corinthians 13. What are some of the things you could do?

And by the way, you and I are responsible to this before God. And it doesn't matter where she is at the time. Men tend to thrive when they take responsibility. When we pick up a load and say, yes, this is mine. Young men don't learn that. Young boys don't learn that sometimes. And they don't grow in the manhood. Manhood is there's a point where you say, I carry this responsibility.

And you carry a responsibility to love your wife and to lead her in what that means. And to not be bitter against her. And responsibility, when carried out properly, leads to a sense of accomplishment. And we need that. All human beings need some sense of accomplishment. But we're also culpable if we fail. We're culpable to her, but more importantly, we're culpable to God. I say culpable to her because you promised to when you married her. But God gives us that responsibility. So this is our responsibility to be this way.

Before God. That means we can go to God and talk about this. We can go to God and talk about the difficulty we're having. So, one of the first things we can do after reading, studying 1 Corinthians 13, and saying, how do I apply this to her, is we pray for her. We pray for our marriage, but we pray for her.

Sometimes it's how do I help her. How do I lead her? I don't know. She doesn't seem to be responding. What do I do? Help her heart. Not to resent me. Help me not to be bitter. Help her. You go lead. I don't mean together. Some couples pray together. Some don't. There's no proper way to do that. I learned very early in our marriage, Kim just doesn't want to pray together. I mean, at meals. I mean, there's certain times she'll say, let's pray together. But I don't even initiate it.

I wait for her to do it because she just doesn't do it most. Her relationship with God is very personal, and I can walk around the house and find her sometimes in any room in the house praying. And that's between her and God. And I wouldn't make that happen because I'll be a happier man the closer she is to God. There's a selfish reason. Because she'll be patient with me.

So, pray for them. Pray for her. And for you. That you will understand, that you will grow, that you will be a good husband. Also, you have to take this responsibility, and as I said, that responsibility is between you and God. Yes, it's between you and her, but her actions are in some ways immaterial. In other words, if she's not doing something right, and she's not treating you right in a certain way, you're still supposed to do what is right.

1 Peter 3 2 Peter 3 Every time I do a married sermon, I think, wow, I can tell them all kinds of times when I haven't done that right. Because it's a learning process. It's a learning process. No two people get married because they already have figured it all out. I can only tell you, after 45 years, the whole journey is great. The whole journey of figuring this out is great. At times it's confusing. At times it's frustrating. At times it's like, I don't even know what to do. But it's a great journey. It really is.

1 Peter 3 7 Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding. In other words, we are to try to understand them. Good luck, you'll never do it entirely. But we can grow in understanding. We can grow in understanding them. Because sometimes the process is a little different. How they process things can be different than us. We have to help understand that process. And that understanding is also the understanding of what God requires of us.

Having, I'm sorry, understanding, giving honor to the wife, we're to honor her. We're to hold her up and create esteem as to how important she is to us. As the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered. Now there's the weaker vessel, something that's misunderstood. It's interesting. In the theology of Europe in the 17th century, there was an argument over, since women are weaker vessels, does that mean they don't have souls?

Which means they're just a higher form of animal. It didn't last very long, but they actually were... written material still exists where that was being debated. The point here being is usually they're physically weaker. I mean, men can, through violence, enforce their will on a woman. And he says that is unacceptable under any circumstance. God just doesn't accept that. Being heirs together, so the point is, since we're both made in the image of God, we're both heirs of God's Kingdom. We're equal heirs of God's Kingdom. So we have to see each other that way.

He's... I'm thinking husbands here. You can't look on her as less in the eyes of God. Because if you do, you will have a problem, because it says that your prayers may not be hindered. In other words, if sometimes it seems like maybe you're just... you're praying, but you don't feel like God's listening, and what's the wrong? There seems to be a break between me and God. Maybe you look at how you're treating your wife, because God says, no, no, no, no, no.

I'm not listening to you until you fix it, whether... I put you in charge. Go do what you're supposed to do as a man. That's how personal God takes this. That your prayers be not hindered. So there's times when we have to... maybe our issue is God saying, no, you're not leading this properly. Go... go help her. Go deal with this. Maybe go apologize. Maybe go give a solution. Maybe just go listen, but go do what you're supposed to do.

Boy, this is sort of hard. This is very deep Christianity. The husband-wife relationship is actually very deep Christianity. We also have to learn to rule ourselves. That's a whole other subject in itself. We have to rule our own minds, our own emotions. You spend a lifetime trying to learn to rule yourself without becoming a stoic, right?

So we have to learn to rule ourselves. Then we can help lead her better and help lead children better. And remember that Jesus said, if you want to be the greatest, be the servant. So there's a certain servant attitude we're supposed to bring to marriage. I am here to help you. How do I help you? I'm here to serve you. How do I serve you? That doesn't mean, okay, there's times of conflict where you have to step in and take a leadership role.

But leadership, according to Jesus Christ, also involves, I'm here to serve you. What do you need me to do? Ephesians 5, 25, and we won't go there, but it says that, and you've read that so many times in marriage, or it's been read in marriage sermons, that the relationship between the wife and the husband is a type of relationship between Christ and the church. Now, Christ and the church is a much more deeper relationship than husband and wife, and no man can say, oh, that means I'm like the Messiah of my family.

No, you can't do that. That's a sure way to end up alone. The point being is, he's trying to say Christ acts as a husband, leading, but very patient, very kind, caring for the needs of the church. So that's what we're supposed to do. Patient, kind, caring for the needs of our wives. Which brings us to some very difficult questions. Do I follow Christ by putting my wife first? Do I follow Christ by giving my life for my wife? Do I give the same attention to her that I do myself? Those are all things that Paul mentions in that passage. So we have to look at how we define the role we're in, because you and I have been given the strengths to do that.

Now, some of those strengths are developed as young boys and young men. Sometimes, anymore, it's not taught. It's just not taught. I was watching a video the other day on toxic masculinity. Basically, the definition was, whatever the Bible says is toxic masculinity.

Because it was just a ridiculous discussion between people. One person couldn't even explain toxic masculinity. He just looked at another man and said, You, you're the perfect example of toxic masculinity. He said, Why? Explain it! Why anybody could see you know? So I looked at the guy saying it, and he must have been 120 pounds, and real skinny, and very effeminate looking. And the other guy was bigger, looks like he was in really good shape. You're toxic! Why? The guy said, Why? Why am I toxic? Well, anybody that knows what toxic masculinity is means you! Okay. So he says, What are you? Are you masculine? Or are you effeminate? I don't understand. How are you comparing us? And the guy said, Your very question proves you're toxic. There's no logic to this. I turned it off after that. The debate wasn't going anyplace. Okay. Now that's just a brief overview. Now let's talk about the role of women in marriage. Brief overview. Remember, your role is also ordained by God. Well, does that God, did God make me less? Which is what we're told in society today. God, to say this, that you have to respect your husband, and there's times you actually say, Okay, this is your call. I will, I will do what you say. Only when there's great conflict. I mean, Kim and I work out most of our issues pretty easily anymore. It's taken 45 years, but we know, you know, most of the time we sit and talk, and there's no real problem. And every once in a while, she submits. Because, give you an example, I've always wanted to go to the northwest part of the United States. Never been there. You know, see the national parks of Washington and go along the coast of Oregon. Well, I got a call from the home office, and they said, We want you to go do a men's weekend in Washington. Oh, and we want Kim to go to and spend the weekend with all the ministers' wives there. And we'll pay for your airfare. Oh, okay. I said, I'm going to stay an extra week as a vacation. Now, I know Kim hates air travel, and I know she has no interest of walking through the rainforest of Olympic National Park looking for Roosevelt Elk. And she just looked at me and went, It's on your bucket list. Let's do it. I think, wow, you know, I said, I promise we'll stop at every coffee shop in Washington because, you know, and she said, I'll go. I'll go. Okay. You got me now. I'll go. I said, But, you know, we don't have a lot of money for this. They're paying our airfare. But, you know, we're going to be staying in really cheap motels. Okay. We got to get up at 6 30 in the morning to get into the rainforest to see the elk. Okay. So after a while, she started getting sort of excited about it because I came along and said, Hey, I found where they grow most of the lavender in the United States. We're going to the lavender fields. Oh, I would like that. So now I'm moving, putting into the itinerary things I know she would do. But I knew she really didn't want to do it. But I knew she was going to do it because she thought it was good for me. That's respect. I, it's just remarkable to me. And we'll have a good time. We'll have a good time. But she'd rather stay at home.

So you must take responsibility. Now, I'm just using that as an example, but you know what I mean? I know her and I know she was giving in to me. Because she felt like it was best. You're a child of God, just like your husband. Saying, I have to submit sometimes doesn't make you less. It just means it's your responsibility. Just like it's our responsibility to lead. When we don't lead, she suffers, right?

Children suffer when we don't lead. That's truth. Children suffer when we don't lead. Well, okay. There's this give and take. That's why Genesis 2.18 is so important. Genesis 2.18, because you need to understand this, ladies, as a wife. And the Lord God said, is not good that man should be alone. I will make him a helper comparable to him. Okay? A partner. In fact, that's translated. Comparable is actually translated in many translations as a partner.

I will make a partner for him that helps him. Now, the last thing a man wants to ever admit that he needs help doing anything, right? And God said, I made you so that in marriage, you're his helper. That's a role. And actually, it's something we all need.

I'm to the place now, I don't care what's happening. I get to go say, Kim, what do you think about this? Every email I send out, hey, what do you think about this? That's a little harsh. Okay, I go back and rewrite it. I need this helper because she helps me sort of balance me out.

So we need our wives as helpers. Now, wives, here's what you can do with resentment. You decide to help him is to correct him over everything you think he does is wrong. That's not helping him. That's beating up on him. And there's two things that can happen. One is he'll treat you like a man. And you don't want that because he's going to argue back just really hard. That's what we do. You're going to treat you like a man now.

I mean, two men can get watch two teenage boys, they can have a fight, a fistfight. And two days later, they're best friends. That's not what happens between men and women, is it? So you push that hard enough and he's going to treat you like a man unless he's learned, okay, I can't do that. Or he'll just pull back from you. He'll emotionally pull back from you. He'll do what he's supposed to do. He'll be there as your husband. But that emotional connection will get farther and farther apart. So you're there as a helper, but that doesn't mean you're there to correct him on everything that he does.

Remember, part of your role is to respect him. And part of it is you're respecting his role. You know, sometimes we're told to love our wives, right, gentlemen? Sometimes that's hard. Or we're told not to be bitter. Sometimes that's hard. We do it because it's what we're supposed to do. And ladies, here's what your responsibility is. Sometimes you respect him, even though it is hard. So that he makes a mistake in some decision, and you say, I don't think I'd buy that car.

No, let's not get that. Here's why. And he gets it anyways. And a week later, the transmission falls out. It does you no good to say, I told you so, you stupid man. You show him respect when he says it was a bad decision, and you say, okay, what do we do to fix it? What do we do now?

What do we do now? Men thrive on respect. The command is we both love each other, but it is interesting that it's separated at times. Love her. And you know, here's the problem, gentlemen. If we're going to love her, she has to define what that means. Because what you think is loving her... I mean, as I've mentioned before, I can bring Kim, you know, a box of chocolates. I can bring her flowers. And she likes that. I mean, from Mother's Day, I got some flowers.

But if I really want her to give me a big hug and say, wow, what a guy, you know, I just go...unstop the toilet. I go trims and bushes. That act of service means so much to her. That's what she saw. Thank you. She has to define sometimes for us what she means by feeling loved. And ladies, sometimes he has to explain to you what he means by feeling respected. And you can't say, oh, that's just male ego. Male ego could be bad, but you strip us of that self-respect or try to, and you won't like the man you have. And you can tear it...because you were designed as a helper and we have this need for a helper, you can tear a man down quicker than you can imagine.

And once again, what's he doing? He treats you like a man or he just ignores you. He'll do his job, but...because that's his job, but emotionally he'll ignore you.

So you have to let him define respect and what makes him feel respected. I read a book many years ago, The Joy of Committed Love, and Gary Smalley, there was a time period back in the 80s and 90s, he wrote all kinds of books on marriage that were really big in the Christian community.

But he lists, how do you do this as wives? And this is what I want to do now, and then we'll stop and have lunch and then come back for the Bible study, where we're going to break this down into things we can do. We're going to have a discussion on things we can do after Mr. Bittner gives his presentation. He said, here's some things women can do. I gave some things men can do, pray, what we can do as leaders.

Here's some of the things you can do. Seek his advice and opinions on decisions. You know, sometimes roles get reversed. And maybe you have a decision you have to make, and you still have to go ask him. Once again, you learn these things over years and years and years. My wife, dad died, her and her sister went through the whole process of selling his house, and now she's going to get some of that money that's being divided up.

And she says to me, what do we do with that? We have to prepare for retirement, we've got our future ahead. What do we do with that money? And I said, well, that's between you and your dad. I will give you suggestions. I won't make the decision for you. Because it's hers. That money was given to her from her dad. So I reversed roles. I'll give you advice, I'll give you opinions, but what you do with that money is your call. Because I think it should be. Now, we'll end up working together and making a joint decision. Because that's how we do everything.

But I wanted to let her know, I'm reversing this here. I'm taking a role in leadership. I'm reversing this and saying, I'm giving advice, final call is yours. Final call is yours. You know, sometimes as leaders we actually give off responsibilities to different people, don't we? Do that all the time. So begin to seek your husband's advice and opinions. And that also can be reversed the other way. Make sure you seek her advice and opinions. Make an effort to remember your husband's past requests so that you're not resenting him.

Look for occasional opportunities to draw attention to your husband's positive qualities with other people. There can be a proclivity of women to talk about their husbands in a bad way. And you know what I remember my mother doing? She always talked about my dad in a good way. To us kids, there was never a put down of him. So you have to be very careful not to put down your husband to other women or in front of children. Make an effort to gain an appreciation for your husband's occupation.

And try to understand why those activities are so important to him. A man, part of a man's identity is the job that he does. Now I know that's true for women too, but it's especially true with men. And you strip them of that and they sort of lose part of their identity. Because the idea that I am achieving is very, it's just built into them. That's what's so hard on so many young men today.

They can't achieve in real life. Mainly because they haven't been taught how to work and they haven't been educated to work. So you know what they do? They play video games. You know why? Because they feel an achievement. You don't see very many girls addicted to video games. Every once in a while you see one. We are rampant with video game addiction among males. Because of the endorphin rush, I feel like I've achieved. I cheat myself with that once in a while.

On the internet, if you have, I forget what program it is. They have Solitaire, all these card games. I play Ma Jeong. Anybody ever play Ma Jeong? Not very often. Maybe once a week and I usually play, I limit myself to two games. I usually play easy, the easy level, because I beat it 90% of the time. Oh, that was fun! Four minutes and 30 seconds. And then I can go on and do something else.

But once a week, I play Ma Jeong just so I can feel like I accomplished something because I'm usually mired in something I'm not accomplishing. I'm doing something I've been working on for two hours and I'm not getting anything done. Five-minute break. I play Ma Jeong. I get that shot and I go on. That's sort of cheating, but I do that. I can imagine if you were 15 years old, you could do that hours every day.

You become addicted to it. So, appreciate his work. Thank him for his work. I mean, thank her for her work, too. But Hebrews brings this out because he says, that is such an important way to a man's heart. Carefully consider your negative reactions to him.

I'll misread a negative reaction from Kim sometimes and later go back and say, why were you so negative against that? I mean, I felt like you were upset with me or something. If I had nothing to do with what I was saying, what I was doing, it was a negative reaction to something I said that made her think of something else that made her go over here to him. Okay, I see how you got there. My brain doesn't work that way, but I see how you got there. Fifteen steps later, you had a negative reaction to something I did here, which actually had nothing to do with me. Okay, we're good.

Don't let a day go by without verbally or through something that you know means something to your husband. Just a hug, verbally saying something of appreciation. There's no rule in marriage counseling for every negative thing you say towards your mate, male or female. Say five good things. Take a week and do that. Men, too. Think of everything negative you said towards her or him, and then how many good things you said. And try to do five to one. Well, I don't know. I didn't think anything good about him today. Well, then go find something. Thank you for still being alive. Okay? I mean, go find something.

Also, he says this is very interesting. Use your sensitivity to appreciate and help support your husband in his goals. Now, this is a reverse, too, man, because sometimes we don't help them pursue their goals. It's like they have a... It's our life, and they have a separate life, and they're trying... You find out your wife? I don't know. I just make up something. She's always wanted to learn to play the violin. Then you say, okay, let's find how much it costs and figure out how to get a babysitter, and let's make sure you get your violin lessons. If that's what you really want to do. Help each other meet some personal goals that you're willing to sacrifice, and you do the same thing for him. You find personal goals of his and say, how do I help you do that? In my wife's case, she said it out loud. It's on your bucket list, we'll go.

And I'm thinking, wow, I just... Good, we're going.

And also, for men and women, when there is a problem, go seek their forgiveness.

Go seek his forgiveness. Go seek her forgiveness. Didn't handle that right. I'm sorry. Just go say it. Seek forgiveness. Let them have the ability to forgive, because when they do, this is things God teaches. When you go to your husband and seek his forgiveness and think, well, he was acting like an idiot, but I shouldn't have said that to him. I shouldn't have said to him, you're acting like an idiot. Okay, it just made it worse. So I'm going to go tell him, sorry for saying that to you. When you do, you're now doing part of your responsibility of helping him grow as the Son of God. Just like when you seek her forgiveness, you're helping her grow as a daughter of God, because she's learning what? How to be the image of God, which is forgive. You're actually doing that to each other. This is why God designed us. We pull each other up in so much time in marriage, because it can get so difficult, because of our carnal human nature. We're pulling each other down. The whole purpose of this is to pull each other up. This is a grand thing. Kim and I have talked about. We just believe it says there's no marriage in the resurrection, right? We both believe. The first thing when we're resurrected or changed, we're going to look for each other and walk into the God's Kingdom holding hands. Okay, that's the way it's going to be. That's what we're going to do. And I think God will allow that. So, basic scriptures. What we'll do now, take a break. And then I think we'll do the Bible study in the lunchroom. That way everybody can sit around the tables and have better conversations. Because we're going to work on some practical things. After we eat. Yes, I have to eat. Oh, eat dessert while we're doing it. Oh, that's good, too. I like that. It's hard to be upset when you're eating dessert. Okay, so we have our closing hymn, our closing prayer. Take our break to eat. And then we're going to talk about some practical things. And Mr. Bittner is going to talk a little bit about what he learned in the wonderful years of marriage he had.