A6 - MC

We've now unpacked five of the seven factors that I believe help contribute to dynamic, healthy, vibrant marriages. Now let's look at the final two to look completely at the roadmap. I'm trying to give you some things that I think it's important for you to pay attention to engaged couples and spouses as you're doing marriage work. The sixth factor is sacrifice, hence the title of this three part series, A Marriage to Die For. If people want to have a marriage to die for, it often takes two people who are willing to die for it. Sacrifice is an important part of any healthy marriage. It's certainly a theme that is expressed many times over in scripture, is it Not necessarily the story of Christ and his coming to the Earth and his work on the cross. It's a matter of sacrifice. Sacrifice is defined, Thus, forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of something considered to have a greater value or claim relinquishment at a cost. Boy, I like that forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of something considered to have a greater value. I think it's important for husbands and wives almost to see the marriage as an entity, as having greater value than either of them individually. I've talked to couples before, they'll say, hey, we have a great marriage, we got a 50, 50 marriage. And I'll say that's half a marriage. And look and say, no, no, no. Both say, listen, 50, 50 is not a whole marriage. You giving 100 and your husband or wife given 100, that makes for a whole marriage. It's equal in that sense. What did Jesus say in Luke 923? He says, if anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me with any marriage relationship comes a little bit of the need to be able to lay down my rights, my wants, my wishes, my needs, my expectations for the sake of the other. I realize there's balance. I realize there's principles here and certain boundaries in terms of morality and a number of things. But a healthy marriage often is when two people come together, and at some level they can both say, listen, I get it, I get it, that I don't get everything I want when I want and how I want it, and that's okay. I'm thinking of my spouse. It's practicing what I call

relational gift giving. Most couples you work with, if you said, hey, have you ever given each other a gift, Christmas, a birthday anniversary, Valentine, whatever most husbands and wife would say. Sure. If you said, well, why did you give a gift to your spouse? Many people would say, well listen, I give gifts because it's a way of saying I love you. It's a way of saying you're important to me, I care for you. I enjoy seeing you blessed and happy. All great answers, right? So I often say, listen, as you're shopping for a gift or as you're considering a gift, maybe you're making it or producing it or buying it. The focus is where the focus isn't on the one who's purchasing the gift or making the gift. What would please them or make them happy, right? For example, I don't have a, I don't care a whole lot about jewelry. I don't wear a lot of jewelry. Watches, necklaces, bracelets, what, whatever. But my wife loves jewelry. Okay? And so it's easy to shop for her. Sometimes she particularly likes rings. And so as I'm shopping, I'm like, it doesn't matter if the jewelry, if the ring doesn't give me a great wow, it's not for me, it's for her. And so I talk about relational gift giving in terms of hey, it's okay if it's not about you, it's for your spouse, it may be sacrificial. You are no doubt familiar with Gary Chapman's, the five Love Languages. And you might say, but my love language is words of affirmation. Gee, I sure wish that they would speak more words of affirmation to me. But the spouses might be quality time, so I say, hey, sacrifice time. And it might be a sacrifice for you to give time, if that's your spouse's love language, because it's a way of being sacrificial. The longer I've walked with God, and perhaps this is for you as well. Have you ever had the sense that God has asked you to do something sacrificial on his behalf or for another? Probably you have. I have, but there are also times when I feel like God has come to me and said, Eric, I'm not necessarily asking you to do something sacrificial for somebody I'm asking you to be the sacrifice, and that's a whole different game, and there are many, many times in a marriage thank God is saying no, no, no, no. Yeah. There are

times I want you to do something sacrificial, but there are also times I want you to be the sacrifice for your husband or your wife. I often ask couples when they come in, like I do with many clients. Okay. What are we aiming at here? What's the goal of counseling? What are we looking at? Because I like to get a sense of the target. Right? And so I was talking and I asked the couple, I said, okay, so help me understand, you know, what we're aiming at. And he looked at me and he said, I'm hoping I want resurrection in my marriage. That's how we framed it. I want our marriage resurrected, which is a fine goal. It was perhaps in the moment, but I looked at him on the spot and I said, okay, are you willing to experience the death that precedes it? I'm thinking, well, resurrection is great, but you can't have resurrection unless something died. In essence, I was saying, what is it you need to die for or die on behalf of your marriage or your spouse in order to experience the resurrection that you're saying that you want to focus on? I think that's important. Um, sacrifice is part of any healthy marriage. I help couples unpack that. What does it look like? Are you willing are you willing to carry that cross if Christ asks you to do that? It's an important piece. A marriage to die for, not just one. Both are willing to die. I get it. Then the last factor I want to look at is accountability. Call it coachability. If you want, the great ones seem to surround themselves with others who continue to speak in their lives. It is such a critical factor. Listen, Michael Jordan, as great as he was, had a coach. Tiger Woods, as great as he is a golf player in his prime, had a swing coach. I mean, the thought of someone teaching or helping him swing a golf club seems on the surface ludicrous, right? Yo yo ma. The great cellist. Guess what? He has a music coach, Pavarati, the great Italian tenor, had a voice coach. The people who are great surround themselves with others. And they invite others to continue to speak into their lives, train them, orient them. That is such a critical factor. Someone once told me that accountability was the breakfast

of champions, but too many of us skip the most important meal of the day. Let me give you a definition of accountability, answerability, a willing obligation to accept responsibility to account for one's actions. It's a form of trustworthiness. I really like that because I so often see people, No, no, no, no one's telling me what to do. Right. It's part of broken, fallen human nature. To be self oriented in a marriage, we have to be thinking of the marriage and the spouse, and so I get it. Accountability is good. Ecclesiastic. 49 Solomon says this two are better than one. If either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion, woe to the one who falls, and there's not another to lift them up in a three fold cord is not easily broken apart. Listen, I used to climb quite a bit, used to mountain climb, and so I'm very familiar with the metaphor of being roped up with somebody. When you're at 3,000 feet up on the face, a piece of granite, life becomes a little bit more focused for you. And I was always tuned in to if I was leading the climb, that I literally had my climbing partner's life in the palm of my hand because I might be anchored in, but the rope is just around you and you're just blaying them up that mountain. And so I often see marriage the same way. There are some risks out there on the face, but the goal was not for me to sum it, and my partner not to, or vice versa. The goal was, hey, let's both get to the top, Let's do it together because we're roped up and we have some accountability and responsibility with each other in overcoming these obstacles called the mountain. Marriage is much the same way, but I understand that there is warfare. I already mentioned that I think the enemy of our soul, Satan, hates the picture of marriage, and he'll try to destroy that any way he can. And so we have to understand there is a spiritual warfare component in doing marriage work within a Christian context. I was channel surfing some time ago and I was, I think it was animal planet, I don't know why, but it was a story about lions and how they hunt. It interested me, so I paused and I found out, actually the lionesses do the hunting. The guys just eat first. And I thought, okay, I get it, I'm watching. And apparently, intuitively, lions will seek out of a herd, a weak, a sick, an injured, or a smaller animal. And they'll work

in 2.3 to target that identified animal and try to glean it out of the herd because they would sort of chase it and run alongside. And you think, well, why didn't they just jump on the one that was closest? Because they're working together very intentionally to glean out that targeted animal. And it was a herd of water buffalo, and there was one that was limping that these two lionesses had their eyes on, and they kept scattering the herd. Scattering the herd. And when this targeted limping water buffalo was all alone, they broke off what they were doing and they jumped it. And the minute I saw that scene on television, the scripture and first Peter 58 came to me says, be wary of your adversary who prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. And I thought, wow, that is an important principle in working with couples because the enemy of our soul prowls around looking for a lion. But I noticed this, he's looking for some one. Satan rarely looks for the many. He's a coward. But he will look for the one, he'll look for the one that's isolated. The one who's cut off, the one who has no support systems. The one who is just, you know, in that victim place or wherever it is because they're the vulnerable one. They're the one most at risk. And he'll look to pick that one off. And so it's important that we work with couples to have accountability. You as a counselor will be an accountability partner for a season. But I love the thought of marriage mentoring. I love the thought of couples working with couples. I love the thought of established, healthy older couples working with some of those young or newly married ones. And so I believe that we have to encourage this. Let me share a scripture in closing that highlights this, because this is, to me, is a really important principle. I was doing my Bible reading. Reading the Bible through a year. You read some Old Testament, some New Testament, five Psalms and a proverbs, right? Some of you maybe have done that before. I'm reading my Old Testament passage from the day I'm reading in First Kings, Chapter four. I don't know about you, but I don't particularly like lists, especially lists of names. I can barely

pronounce. I'm like, why is that in the scripture God? What relevance does it have? I'm reading in first Kings four and I'm reading out of the new American standard here. Says now King Solomon was king over all of Israel and these were his officials. I'm like God. It's a list really these are his officials. As the son of Zadok was the priest, El Hoof and Asha, the sons of Shisha, were secretaries. Say that three times. Real fast. I thought, well, it's interesting the guy had two secretaries. But so what? I don't care. Jehoshaphat, the son of a hilud was the recorder, whatever that is. Ben and I, the son of Johda, was over the army. Zadok and Abathar were priests. I don't care. As the son of Nathan was over the deputies, Aisha was over the household. Adar, the son of Abda was over the men's subject. I'm like, yeah, okay, interesting. But what relevance? And then I read this and Zabud, the son of Nathan, a priest, was the king's friend. Oh my goodness. All of a sudden, it makes sense. Here's the wisest man supposedly, who ever lived, who had the wisdom to have on his team. At least one person who appeared to serve the primary role of being his friend. The question I have of a couple is, who is around you? That their role is to be that friend, to be that accountability partner, the person that you can unpack your dirty laundry with, that you can be honest and real with, and you allow them to be a truth teller back into your life. Let me say it again. The son of Nathan, a priest. Now I want you to think about this. Who is Zabsatherathan? Do you remember the story of Nathan and Solomon's father, David? Nathan had some interesting things to say to David when he sinned with Bathsheba, didn't he? Here is the prophet's son, now, the best friend of the king's son somewhere. Solomon got it. That was probably a good thing for my dad. It's probably a good thing for me. As you're working with couples, encourage them to find a zab. Yes, husbands and wives within their marriage need to help have some accountability. But listen, men and women are wired a little differently and husbands need other men, and wives need other women That we surround ourselves

with a few key people, a few people that can help hold them accountable for the things that God might be doing in their life, in their walk with him, and in their marriage. So I've given you seven factors in what I believe helps create healthy gold medal world class marriages. Capacity, having a focus or a goal orientation, right? Time, perseverance, consistency, sacrifice and accountability. These are all very critical. And so I hope as you're working with couples that you have an opportunity to engage them on some of these topics. And if they engage in a way that's dynamic, forthright, honest. And they will, I believe, have the right kind of roadmap, the right kind of tools that they can have a healthy marriage. So I just wanted to say God bless you in your work, hope this is helpful in your own ministry or career path. God bless