on his arms.
Song 104,
lean on his arms.
Just lean upon the arms of Jesus,
He'll help you along, help you along.
If you will trust His love unfailing,
He'll fill your heart with song.
Lean on His arms, trusting in His love.
Lean on His arms, all His mercies prove.
Lean on His arms, looking home above.
Just lean on the Savior's arms.
Just lean upon the arms of Jesus,
He'll brighten the way, brighten the way.
Just follow gladly where He leadeth,
His gentle voice obeying.
Lean on His arms, trusting in His love.
Lean on His arms, all His mercies prove.
Lean on His arms, looking home above.
Just lean on the Savior's arms.
Just lean upon the arms of Jesus,
O bring every care, bring every care.
The burden that has seemed so heavy,
take to the Lord in prayer.
Lean on His arms, trusting in His love.
Lean on His arms, all His mercies prove.
Lean on His arms, looking home above.
Just lean on the Savior's arms.
Just lean upon the arms of Jesus,
then leave all to Him, leave all to Him.
His heart is full of love and mercy,
His eyes are never dim.
Lean on His arms, trusting in His love.
Lean on His arms, all His mercies prove.
Lean on His arms, looking home above.
Just lean on the Savior's arms.
Great singing.
Let's open in a word of prayer.
Heavenly Father, thank you so much for the opportunity
to be gathered together as a church this evening.
I pray that you please go pass this value to the Holy Spirit
and just help us to have a great church service
and fellowship this evening.
We love you, and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
For our second song, we'll just go to the right page there,
105, All That Thrills My Soul.
Who can cheer the heart like Jesus
By His presence all divine
True and tender, pure and precious
Oh, how blessed to call Him mine
All that thrills my soul is Jesus
He is more than life to me
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my blessed Lord I see
Love of Christ so freely given
Grace of God beyond degree
Mercy higher than the heavens
Gaper than the deepest sea
All that thrills my soul is Jesus
He is more than life to me
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my blessed Lord I see
What a wonderful redemption
Ever can a mortal know
How my sin, though red like crimson
Can be whiter than the snow
All that thrills my soul is Jesus
He is more than life to me
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my blessed Lord I see
Supplying every good in Him I see
On His strength divine relying
He is all in all to me
All that thrills my soul is Jesus
He is more than life to me
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my blessed Lord I see
By the crystal flowing river
With the ransomed I will sing
And forever and forever
Praise and glorify the King
All that thrills my soul is Jesus
He is more than life to me
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my blessed Lord I see
Thank you so much for coming to Sidfast Baptist Church.
If you didn't already get a bulletin, you can lift your hand nice and high.
And one of our ushers can come by and get you guys a bulletin.
Also on the inside we have our service and soul winning times as well as our church stats.
We also have a list of expecting ladies, our prayer list.
If you'd like to add to that, please email us.
On the back we have the upcoming events for Agdal Bridal Shower on July 2nd.
And then the details, it's going to be meeting here at 1230 to 2.
They register to Amazon and Target.
And it is a nursing's only preferred event.
We have a men's conference August 18th to the 20th.
We did get some more waters in the fridge, so hopefully there's some.
Sorry it's really hot in here. We're going to try and get somebody out here to see what we can do this week.
So thanks for bearing with us.
It's still not quite hell though.
We still won't ever go to hell.
And I apologize, it's a little warm in here.
But you know what, it's better than outside.
If those people can stand outside, we can sit inside.
FYI, whenever exiting the property, just try to avoid any people that are standing in the way.
And let our security team guide you out if you need that kind of help.
That way we're not causing any more issue than we have to.
That's pretty much all I have really for announcements this evening.
Let's go ahead and go to our third song.
We're going to do a new song.
It's in our handouts.
I don't know how many we have. Try to share along.
If you have to, you can use a bible.
The tune's the same tune over and over, so hopefully you can kind of pick it up pretty quickly.
But we're doing a new one, Psalm 147.
And hopefully you can follow along and sing the best you can.
Also, if you see that there's a couple in your row and none behind you, go ahead and help your neighbor out and pass those back to them.
Psalm 147.
Praise ye the Lord, for it is good to sing praises unto our God.
For it is pleasant and praises come, leave the Lord doth build up Jerusalem.
He gathereth together the outcasts of Israel.
He healeth the broken in heart and bindeth up their wounds.
He telleth the number of the stars.
He calleth them all, he calleth them all by their names.
Great is our Lord and of great power.
His understanding is infinite.
The Lord lifteth up the, casteth the wicked down to the ground.
Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving.
Sing praise upon the harp unto our God, who covereth the heaven with clouds.
Who prepareth rain for the earth, who maketh grass, grass to grow upon the mountain.
He giveth to the beast his food, and to the young ravens which cry.
He delighteth not in the strength of the horse.
He taketh not pleasure in the legs of a man.
The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear him and those that hope in his mercy.
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem.
Praise thy God, O Zion.
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem.
For he hath strengthened the bars of thy gates he hath blessed.
Thy children within thee he maketh peace in thy borders and filleth thee.
With the finest of the wheat he sendeth forth his commandment upon earth.
Runneth very swiftly he giveth snow like wool.
He scattereth a hoarfrost like ashes.
Scattereth a hoarfrost like ashes.
He casteth forth his ice like more.
Souls who can stand before his cold.
He sendeth out his word and melteth.
Them he causeth his wind to blow.
And the waters flow he showeth his word unto Jacob.
His statutes and his judgments unto Israel.
He hath God dealt so with any nation.
And as for his judgments, they have not known them.
Praise he the Lord.
Good first try.
As the offering plates are passed around,
turn to Proverbs chapter 18.
Proverbs chapter 18.
You can follow along silently in verse number one
as we'll be reading the whole chapter before the sermon.
Proverbs chapter number 18.
And the Bible reads,
Through desire a man, having separated himself,
seeketh an inner metallith with all wisdom.
A fool hath no delight in understanding,
but that his heart may discover itself.
And the wicked cometh, then cometh also contempt,
and with ignominy reproach.
The words of a man's mouth are as deep waters
and the wellspring of wisdom as a flowing brook.
It is not good to accept the person of the wicked
to overthrow the righteous in judgment.
A fool's lips enter into contention,
and his mouth calleth for strokes.
A fool's mouth is his destruction,
and his lips are the snare of his soul.
The words of a talebearer are as wounds,
and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly.
He also that is slothful in his work
is brother to him that is a great waster.
The name of the Lord is a strong tower.
The righteous runneth into it and is safe.
The rich man's wealth is his strong city,
and has an high wall in his own conceit.
Before destruction, the heart of man is haughty,
and before honor is humility.
He that answereth a matter before he heareth it,
it is folly and shame unto him.
The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity,
but a wounded spirit who can bear.
The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge,
and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge.
A man's gift maketh room for him
and bringeth him before great men.
He that is first in his own cause seemeth just,
but his neighbor cometh and searches them.
The lot causeth contentions to cease,
and parteth between the mighty.
A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city,
and their contentions are like the bars of a castle.
A man's belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth,
and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled.
Death and life are in the power of the tongue,
and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.
Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing,
and obtaineth favor of the Lord.
The poor useth in treaties, but the rich answereth roughly.
A man that hath friends must show himself friendly,
and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.
Let's pray.
Father God, I pray that you would fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit now
and help him to preach the sermon that you've laid on his heart
and minimize distractions for us and give us ears to hear
so we can apply the message and walk out of the building as better Christians.
In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.
Amen.
Thanks for indulging me on Psalms 147.
It's kind of a song that's a little bit hard to pick up right away.
You get all the tone and the lyrics and everything right at the timing,
but I think if you listen to it a few times you can start picking it up pretty fast.
I'm going to try and make a video out there so that way...
Some of you are asking me if I'm going to do it from the Baptist for you this time.
I don't think so, but I'll at least put something out there
so that way you can kind of start learning that song a little bit,
but I definitely like it.
We have here in Proverbs 18, if you look at verse 22,
the Bible says,
Whoso findeth the wife, findeth the good thing, and obtaineth favor of the Lord.
The title of my sermon this evening at first when I was thinking about it
is I was thinking about how marriage is a good thing,
and really the Bible teaches that marriage is a good thing,
but I have a different title for this evening's sermon.
I think it will help you.
Marriage is like a swimming pool.
The reason why I compare it to a swimming pool
is because a swimming pool is a good thing.
In fact, it's a lot of fun.
My family loves a swimming pool.
You can have a lot of enjoyment from a swimming pool.
Swimming pools are really nice,
but here's the thing about a marriage,
and here's the thing about a swimming pool
is it takes a lot of effort for you to enjoy it
in the sense that...
Who owns a swimming pool?
Does anybody even own a swimming pool?
I know a couple people do at our church,
but, you know, who knows about swimming pools?
Who's swum before?
Okay, all right, there we go.
Here's the thing.
I'll teach you a little about swimming pools then, okay?
Swimming pools take a lot of work, okay?
You have to do a couple things,
and this is my three points for tonight, all right?
Number one is you have to have the chemicals right, okay?
With a pool, you have to kind of constantly put in certain chemicals
to make sure that the balance of the pool is done correctly,
and so you have to buy all these chemicals,
and you have to constantly put them in the pool
and make sure everything is kosher, as it were.
Another thing you have to do, though, is you have to clean it.
You have to clean your pool on a regular basis
in order to enjoy it,
and the third thing you have to do is you have to fill it.
So I don't know if you know about this,
but there's a thing called evaporation,
and so, you know, if you don't keep filling up your pool,
it'll get to a point where it doesn't have any water in it.
So those are the three things that you really need to do to a pool,
and I feel like these three points can translate into marriage very well
when it comes to having a marriage,
and if your marriage you say,
well, you know, my marriage isn't the best,
or I'm having problems with my marriage,
or I want to just maintain a good marriage,
I think all three of these points will help you in your marriage
if you're looking to get married in the future.
These are good things to think about,
but point one, you know, was chemicals, right?
You have to have the chemicals right,
and whenever you get married,
you want to make sure your chemical composition is right, okay?
You got a male and a female, right?
Otherwise, you don't have the right chemicals, okay?
But, you know, when it comes to a marriage,
you know, there's going to be an intimate relationship here
that's different than every other relationship you've ever had.
It's a completely different relationship,
and if done correctly,
it's going to be the greatest relationship that you've ever had, okay?
And really, that's what the Bible is teaching here.
When you find a wife, you find a good thing,
because a spouse is a really good thing,
and there's a special intimacy that comes from marriage.
Go if you would to 1 Corinthians, chapter number 6.
1 Corinthians, chapter number 6.
Now, when I think about chemicals and kind of relating that to marriage,
I think about it when people use this word, chemistry.
You know, you kind of hear people talk about in a relationship
having the right chemistry,
and that's where you get the same concept with the pool,
is having the right chemistry, the right chemicals in the pool,
and this is what I find.
If you're a man and she's a woman,
you're going to have chemistry to some degree, okay?
That's how it works.
I mean, and in fact, that's the main reason why you get married
is because you're male and they're female,
and there's something that God did inside of every man
and every single woman that's normal
where they have a strong bond.
They have this strong connection.
Just like magnets want to come together,
men and women want to come together,
it's a normal, natural thing, okay?
And people want to celebrate, you know, pride this month.
Why don't we celebrate marriage this month?
You know, the right attraction, the right affection, the right things,
and you know, it's good that men are attracted to women.
It's good that women are attracted to men.
You know, as you're a child, you don't really get this.
Then eventually, you go through what's called puberty,
become a teenager, and you start realizing,
I'm attracted to them whether I want to or not, okay,
because it's just normal, it's natural.
But of course, with that good desire
comes the temptation to sin through fornication,
and fornication is going to bed with someone that you're not married to.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 6, verse 18,
flee fornication.
So of course, the Bible is just condemning
any kind of relationship outside of marriage.
So there's nothing wrong with this particular bond between men and women
as long as it's within the marriage bond, okay,
as long as it's within the marriage vow.
And this is a good chemistry.
If you look at chapter number 7,
we're going to see that this is a really important aspect of marriage.
It says in chapter 7, verse 2,
Nevertheless, to avoid fornication,
let every man have his own wife,
and let every woman have her own husband.
Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence,
and likewise also the wife unto the husband.
The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband.
And likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.
To Friday not one the other, except that be with consent for a time,
that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer,
and come together again,
that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.
Now, there are some weird religions out there,
even pseudo-Christian religions,
that will claim that the only reason a man and woman come together
is simply just to procreate,
and that in fact it's even wrong to enjoy it or something like that.
Those people are freaks.
God gave us this unity, this bond, this intimacy to enjoy.
And God wants men and women to enjoy their spouse.
And if you don't get this aspect of your marriage in the right chemical balance,
it's going to cause problems in your marriage.
If you want to improve your marriage,
you need to improve this area of your marriage,
and men and women need to have that strong bond.
The Bible teaches this all over.
You can go to Song of Solomon,
and you're going to find all kinds of mentions about
their close, intimate relationship, their desire for one another.
And because we live in a sinful world,
it's really easy to get satisfaction in this area from other places,
from online or movies or magazines or all kinds of stuff out there,
but that's all junk.
We really should be getting it from our spouse,
and we should try our best to have this kind of relationship with our spouse
and improve in this area,
and making sure that we're not defrauding each other in this area.
Most marriages, when they're not engaging in this duty of marriage,
are going to have problems, if not 99%.
I mean, it doesn't really matter the circumstances, age,
or any of that kind of stuff.
This is an important aspect for all marriages,
and both people need to be actively engaged in this area.
This is a very important area,
and it's an area that fortunately can bring a lot of joy
and happiness and satisfaction if you're doing it within marriage.
When you don't do it in marriage,
you end up becoming very tempted to go outside of marriage
to fill that gap, as it were, that need that you have,
and that causes a lot of pain and suffering and frustration and sin,
and it's a natural, normal thing.
So if you would to Genesis chapter number 2 for a moment,
we'll go to Genesis chapter number 2,
that's how you even flee fornication is by getting married.
And the reality is for 99% of men and women today,
if they don't get married, they will commit fornication.
It's just an inevitability.
That's why it's also when Jesus is bringing up divorce,
he's saying, man, if you divorce your spouse,
you're going to cause them to commit adultery.
Now here's the thing, the divorce didn't cause the adultery.
It's the fact that that person has that particular need,
and they're going to end up satisfying it when you divorce them,
and them satisfying that need is going to end up being adultery.
So you end up making it worse for them,
and you cause them to commit more grievous sin because you divorced them.
Now that's not a license to sin.
I'm not recommending adultery.
Jesus wasn't recommending adultery.
He's not saying go and commit adultery now.
What he's saying is it's just going to probably happen.
It's just an inevitability.
That's what people do because being celibate for your life
is just kind of like a physical impossibility for many people.
It's just like I'm never going to become vegan.
It's just not going to happen.
So if my wife said, you know what, from now on, no more meat,
I'm never going to cook meat ever again,
I'd probably find meat somewhere else.
You know what I mean?
I would go out and eat as much meat as I can and then come home.
Again, that's a different scenario.
There's nothing wrong with going out and getting meat.
But in the context, the symbolism we're using here,
it is wrong to commit adultery.
Very wrong, very wicked.
But when you shut down the kitchen,
when you don't put the ribs on the wrap,
when you're not bringing out the breast and the thigh
and all the cuts of the meat that are there, you know what?
Don't get mad when they go and get a KFC or whatever.
Yeah, KFC is kind of gross, but it's got meat.
What I'm telling you is if you want to improve your marriage,
if you have to, you must get the chemistry going,
you must get the chemicals going,
and in fact, this will cause you to like your spouse more.
Say, I don't even know if I like my spouse that much.
Well, start doing this a lot and you'll like them a lot more.
I'm just telling you, this is how it works.
In fact, there has been tons of studies that have proven
that this particular part of your relationship,
when done, it ignites things in your brain that literally say,
I'm enjoying this so much and I like this person so much more.
It's just like your brain is just firing all of these hormones
and enzymes and all kinds of stuff in your frontal cortex
and it's the reward center of your brain
and it's the same thing as drugs or anything.
That's why drugs and substitutes for this trigger the same responses
and it can cause you to not want to have this relationship with your spouse
and you don't want to go down that road.
You want to constantly have it being fired inside of marriage.
Look at Genesis chapter number 2.
Genesis chapter number 2 and I want to look at verse 18.
And the Lord God said, it is not good that the man should be alone.
I will make him and help meet for him.
Notice, some people are down on marriage.
Marriage is a good thing.
A swimming pool is a good thing.
Don't get mad at the swimming pool just because you don't have one.
You know what?
Get a shovel and start digging.
Yeah, it might be hard to get one but once you have it, it's great.
And once you have it though, you've got to keep getting those chemicals
put into the swimming pool.
Go to Proverbs chapter number 5.
Now here's another thing.
No matter how long you've neglected that pool,
as soon as you start putting the right chemicals back in it,
it's good to go.
And see here's the thing.
Even if you struggled in certain areas of your marriage
or even if certain areas of your marriage aren't going well,
okay, let's get the chemicals going again.
And you know what?
You can go all the way back to where you were or even better.
You know, we sing that song, sweeter as years go by
when people have an anniversary.
It's true.
You can enjoy these things in your life better and better.
You know, I find that I get better at things over time typically, not worse.
You get better at when you learn things and you grow and you mature.
And the same can be with marriage where you can get better
at all these areas in your marriage.
You can get better at the chemical composition.
You can figure out what really works and what doesn't.
But you know what?
You should work on that with your spouse
and try to get the chemical balance going.
Proverbs chapter 5, look at verse 15.
Drink waters out of thine own cistern
and rotting waters out of thine own well.
Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad in rivers of waters in the streets.
Let them be only thine own, and not strangers with thee.
Let thy fountain be blessed and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.
Let her be of the loving hind and pleasant roe.
Let her breast satisfy thee at all times and be thou ravished always with her love.
So really, you know, men, and they'll say this,
they think about some of these topics like every 5 seconds or something,
or every 20 seconds, I mean it depends on what study you're thinking about.
But here's the thing.
Let your wife always satisfy that need.
And vice versa.
You know, we should be the example of marriage in this world.
Fundamental Baptists should be the example in every area of this world.
And we set the bar and people are looking to us to say,
you know, well what do their marriages look like?
You know, what does this hate cult look like?
And it's like, wow, well they have these happy marriages
and all these kids and everything's going well.
You know, it's really hard to speak against.
And there's been a lot of Fundamental Baptist churches that had some things right,
but then all their marriages split and all their marriages went sour
and they got all these divorces and they got all these problems.
And it's destroying the church.
Ends up ruining the church.
You know what, in order for our church to be healthy,
we need the marriages in the church to be healthy.
And you know what, no one is perfect.
No one has arrived.
We can all improve in these areas.
Let me tell you something.
You say, my marriage is struggling.
We're going to do more in this area.
Get the chemicals.
Chemicals will improve your marriage, I guarantee it.
That's what the Bible teaches.
You know, and a lot of times you have problems
because you have a problem in this area.
I don't care what problems you've had in this area.
Just forget all of it and just start going again.
Just get the chemicals flowing again.
You know, and it seems like our church is really good at this,
at least in the sense of procreation.
But, you know, it also needs to be in just the satisfaction of your relationship.
Where you're getting that true satisfaction and you're enjoying one another.
And both men and women need this.
Now, one note that I'm going to make here about these situations,
and this is kind of going into my second point.
When it comes to a pool, you have to filter it, okay?
Or you have to clean it.
You have the chemicals and then you've got to clean it, right?
Well, the same is with your marriage.
That sometimes you have to clean things up a little bit.
Because even if you get all the chemicals right,
you can have a lot of other things in the pool that make it where it's not that enjoyable.
And if you don't know anything about pool,
I'll kind of give you some things that make pools not fun.
When it's filled with bugs, okay, or it's filled with leaves,
or it's filled with dirt.
A lot of times people, they even have vacuums for pools.
You basically have to vacuum the pool,
or you have to get some kind of a wand and you kind of pull out the leaves and bugs.
We had a pool, I used to live here virtually.
I lived in Keller.
We're really like super close to here and we had a big pool.
And we didn't clean it very often, okay?
I was five, so it wasn't really my job, okay?
But it was other people in my family's job and they weren't doing it.
And there's an ant problem with pools.
Like I don't know if you know this, but ants just love pools for some reason.
Especially ones that can fly.
And they'll fly right into the pool.
Now they don't die.
It's the weirdest thing.
But what they do is they'll just float on the pool water.
They just like the water, just float on the water,
and then they'll start clumping together.
They'll just like all, they'll look at this weird like clump thing in the pool
and you're thinking like what is that?
I remember one time I went and it was like these little mini pyramids in my pool.
And then I looked and it's just like hundreds or thousands and thousands of ants
and they've all just like formed this little pyramid like swamp that's all in the pool.
And I was just like, I was five, so I was just like I'm not swimming in that.
And my brother, instead of cleaning, he's like I'm going to do a,
I'm going to basically jump right into the ants.
You know, I'm going to do a cannon ball right into the ants.
I'm like what in the world?
He gets on our diving board and just jumps up and just splashes all the ants.
They go everywhere.
But then they just come right back in.
You can hornets, goombugs, you can get all kinds of stuff that'll just get in your pool.
And a lot of times they're not even dead.
It's just really annoying.
Because the pyramids were like moving and I was thinking like what is that?
It's just like all these little ants just everywhere.
And it's like that doesn't make the pool fun when you have, hey, I got the chemicals right,
but I got all these ants in my pool.
I got all these bugs in my pool.
I got all these leaves in my pool.
I got all this dirt in my pool.
That's going to ruin your experience in the pool.
It's nice to have it clean and fresh, okay.
And the same is sometimes with your marriage where you got some bugs in your marriage.
You got some leaves in your marriage.
You got some dirt in your marriage and you need to clean it up.
Now, this is my way of cleaning it up, forgiveness.
Sometimes you have an issue in your marriage that you're not forgiving each other on.
You're still bitter towards them on.
And it's going to make your marriage not as enjoyable.
In order to have an enjoyable marriage, you have to have the memory of an elephant.
And an elephant never forgets.
Actually, they always do, okay.
I don't know the phrase.
But essentially you basically have to just have a short-term memory when it comes to marriage
and you have to constantly forgive one another and let things go.
Otherwise, your marriage is going to be a train wreck, okay.
Now, I want to go to a lot of places but I'm just going to read a few verses.
Go if you would to Colossians 3, okay.
I'm just going to read for you.
Matthew 6, for if you give men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
But if you give not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Matthew 11, and when you stand praying, forgive if you have ought against any,
that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive your trespasses.
But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.
The Bible says in Ephesians 4 verse 32,
and be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another,
even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Now, here's the thing.
When you live with someone, you're going to rub them the wrong way.
They know all your dirty laundry.
They know all your leaves and ants and dirt, as it were.
And no one is perfect.
No one has arrived.
Everyone has issues.
And it's really easy to just let a few ants in and just be like, I don't want to deal with that.
But here's the problem.
Then more ants show up.
And then more ants show up.
And now all of a sudden you have a pyramid that's moving in your pool.
And you're like, what is that?
You don't want to do that.
You don't want to deal with that.
And this is called bitterness.
Bitterness is essentially you allow a little bit of dirt to come in and then you don't clean it up.
And then just more and more and more.
But eventually it compounds with something that's really gross.
Compounds into a big problem.
In marriage, you get mad at your spouse for one little thing.
You have two options.
Let it go or let it keep floating in the pool.
Get it out of the pool.
And this is what a lot of people do.
They just let it lay in the pool.
And then the next day another thing.
And they just keep adding and adding.
And then all of a sudden there's this giant pyramid of crap.
And then the littlest thing.
The littlest thing will get you mad.
You'll be like, one leaf will make you mad.
But it's not really the leaf that's making you mad.
It's the fact that there's 10,000 leaves in the pool.
So it's just you're frustrated by every single one you see because you see the swath of leaves.
But here's the thing.
If you were enjoying the pool and there was one leaf that just came and fell and you'd be like, oh, whatever, and you just throw it out.
So what you have to do in your marriage is you just have to constantly throw the one leaf out.
But then you never have 10,000.
Because when you have 10,000 leaves in your pool, every single little one makes you mad.
It irritates the fire out of you.
But it's not one leaf.
It's all of them.
This is bitterness in your relationship.
This is bitterness in your marriage.
And this is how I, you know, and again, I'm not perfect.
So don't think like I'm up here doing all these things perfectly, okay?
My wife knows better.
But I'm just telling you what you should do, okay?
But here's the thing.
When you're upset about something, you have to do one of two things.
You have to deal with it or let it go.
Bitterness should never be an option.
And this goes for all relationships.
But look at Colossians chapter 3, verse number 19.
Husbands, love your wives and be not bitter against them.
Notice that this is not a suggestion.
This is a commandment.
It is a commandment not to be bitter.
That's why I'm telling you that if you have a problem, you either address it or you let it go.
You just forgive it.
But bitterness should never, ever, ever be an option.
You don't just let leaves stay in your pool.
You don't let dirt and ants get in your pool.
You get them out.
You are commanding.
You know, be angry and sin not.
Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.
So if it's something worthy of saying, you say it.
You deal with it.
You address the problem, okay?
But if it's not worth addressing, you should let it go.
Now, I think some people get confused, though, about what I mean by addressing.
Because this is what you hear in your mind.
Well, yeah, I tell them they're wrong and they didn't just fix it immediately.
That's not what I'm saying.
And you have to understand this in a relationship, okay?
From a male's perspective, from the husband's perspective,
if your wife does something that needs to be addressed, then you tell her.
And here's the question.
Okay, well, what happens when she doesn't do it?
Nothing.
You move on.
Well, I can't believe it.
Well, I'm kind of mad about it.
No, no, no.
You tell her and then you let it go.
And she's like, well, with that kind of enforcement, won't they just walk all over you and never obey?
They could.
But here's the thing.
It's not like Islam here.
It's not like forsake them in bed and then strike them, okay?
We're not Muslims here.
We don't believe in that.
And you know what?
David, when he got home, my cow was all in a huff and having a bad day and rained on his parade.
He rebuked her.
But here's the thing.
Did my cow ever get it right?
No.
What did David do to her?
Nothing.
David rebuked her.
If she's not going to fix the problem, it's her problem.
And here's the thing.
In a marriage, as a husband, I'll tell my wife what to do.
You know what?
It's between her and God if she doesn't get that right.
It's not for me to treat her differently.
It's not for me to be mean to her.
It's not for me to do any—I can correct her.
But you know, as soon as I'm done correcting her, I need to go back to the pool with no leaves, dirt, and ants in it.
Now, of course, you might have a consistent theme like, hey, there's a problem and we address it every once in a while, right?
But over time, if you're consistent, you'll probably fix that problem.
If you notice ants coming in the same door and leaves coming in the same spot, you might try to figure out, well, where are these ants actually coming from?
Where is this leaf actually coming from?
Let's chop that branch down.
But what I'm telling you, in a marriage, as a man, you're not allowed to have bitterness in your relationship.
You just love your wife and say, you know what?
She's not perfect.
I'm going to let it go.
And I'm so glad that God does that for me on a regular basis.
Just think about that.
How many times do you screw up?
And the exact same problem, the exact same issue.
You say something dumb.
You say something foolish.
You're lazy.
You didn't do your job right.
And here's the thing.
How do we want God to treat us with that?
You know, we should extend a lot of mercy to our wives too.
And I think sometimes in our circles, even though we get a lot of things right, we sometimes miss some things too.
And what I mean by this is like, okay, the husband's the head of the house.
The husband's the leader.
The wife's supposed to submit to their husband.
The wife submits to the husband.
But this is what men think.
They think like, okay, everything that I don't like about my wife, I'm going to tell her.
Or I have to force her to just do everything that I want at every single second.
That's not what that means.
Okay?
Leadership is not enslaving someone.
That's a master.
You're not a master of your wife.
You're a leader of your wife.
Okay?
You are her boss and she is responsible for obeying you.
But here's the thing.
You don't want to treat her like a slave girl.
And I think some guys think they want a slave girl for a wife.
And you know what?
That's not going to be a good marriage.
You will not have a good marriage by treating your wife like a slave girl.
You'll have a good marriage by treating her with respect and loving her and being merciful to her often.
Now what is mercy?
Mercy is inherently undeserved.
Mercy doesn't mean you deserve it.
It means you screwed up and then you got favor anyways.
Here's the thing you have to think about.
When my wife screws up, do I always tell her about it?
Or do sometimes I just give her grace?
Do I give her mercy about it?
Do I just let things go?
This is going to help your relationship when you let things go.
Now of course, to actually give grace or mercy, it means you didn't store it in your bitterness bucket either though.
It means that you actually just, you know what?
She screwed up.
She did this wrong.
I don't care.
And you know, I'm not perfect but that one is sometimes pretty easy for me.
And I hope that you can just learn out of this attitude because that's how God wants us to be.
He's just really just letting so many things go.
And you get really wound up tight as a person when you don't.
Everything starts bothering you because there's just so many problems.
There's just so many sins.
There's just so much issue to get mad.
I mean there's so many things to be mad about.
You need to just have this philosophy like it doesn't matter.
Just let it go.
Who cares?
Is this a big deal?
You know, it's like my wife, you know, burnt the pancakes.
It's like let that one go.
Okay?
No.
My wife is wearing, you know, some kind of a trans-vite outfit and trying to go to that church across the street.
Okay, we're going to have a talk.
Right?
But, you know, when she's within the boundaries of like trying to fulfill God's commandments, like you should give her some breaks, right?
You should give her some love.
And I'm just saying, hey, my marriage isn't going very well.
Okay, well do you look at your wife as an employee or do you look at it as a spouse?
And of course there's parallels and I use those parallels a lot to teach you, but what I'm saying is there's got to be a lot of forgiveness.
And you know what?
On the women's side, you need this too.
And I don't know how hard or easy it is for women to forgive.
I would say that it's hard because they can't forget anything.
So, and true forgiveness is forgetting.
You know, if you bring it up again later, it does not feel like you forgave at all.
Anyone.
Just like it wouldn't to us.
You know, when I get up to heaven, if God started being like, hey, remember when you were 15, Pastor Shelley?
And it's like, am I in trouble for that?
You know?
I'm so glad that God's not going to go through my record.
My record's bad.
Okay?
And, you know, I'm not, I would never, I would be so embarrassed and so in shame for God to read any of my symptoms.
From any week of my life.
Why do we have to sit here and rag on the other person?
You know, as a wife, you need to try your best to really forgive things.
If you've forgiven your husband on something, you need to just never bring it up again ever.
Not even joking.
There's the rebuke of humor.
You know, just don't even bring it up.
You should learn this, how to be a cheerleader for your husband.
And I say that joking and true in the sense that literally, your husband, you know, I'll just tell you what your husband wants.
He wants you to be his cheerleader.
And I tell you, I use that analogy because, again, cheerleaders are always for their team.
I mean, everything about a cheerleader is like everything that a guy wants.
Like, especially privately at home.
Okay, you know, I'm just saying.
Like, they got it all.
You know, right?
They're just a constant, just support.
You know, they're usually the biggest whores in school or whatever.
And here's the thing.
You want your relationship to be, you know, just this constant, just we're excited for each other.
We love each other.
This is our relationship.
And you say, that's not what my relationship looks like.
Okay, well, is it because you have a lot of ants in the pool?
Because you have a lot of dirt in the pool?
Is it because you have a lot of leaves in the pool?
And you got to just work on it.
You got to clean it up a little bit.
And, you know, if you have something that you're mad about your spouse with, you need to just let it go and tell them, like,
I'm sorry, I've been kind of mad at you about this and I'm just, I'm not going to be mad about it anymore.
I'm done being mad about it.
Or if it's too big, just say, like, look, you know, there's a laundry basket right here.
Here's the floor.
Here's where your clothes are going.
And I want to kill you because you just always put your clothes here.
It's like, just tell him that so that when he gets home, you're like, yay, woo, he's home.
Instead of just being so, like, just mad the whole day, like, there's his clothes.
I'm not even going to wash them.
I'm going to wash them with a dog towel.
You know, it's like, you know, or whatever, you know, whatever mad thing, you know, don't be mad.
Get glad.
Eat a Snickers.
Whatever it is, you know, when husband comes home, when he comes home, he wants 100% cheerleader.
He doesn't want Elizabeth Warren.
He doesn't want Nancy Pelosi.
He doesn't want an earful.
He doesn't want AOC to tell him about climate change, okay?
Like, he wants you to just be like, you've arrived, you know, my whole life is complete now, all right?
And I'm just trying to give you some tips here.
You know, and in fact, you know, if you're a wife, you should try that when your husband comes home
because he usually comes home around the same time, typically.
You know, you should try to make that like you're prepared for his arrival, too.
Not like literally every chicken's head's cut off and the kids are running amok and the kitchen's on fire.
He just walks in and he's like, get in here, we're all going to die.
He's like, ah, what do I do?
He's like, because if you come home, as the man comes home and it's just literally like some kind of a crazy 9-11 rescue attempt, okay,
he doesn't want to come home.
He's thinking like, you know, he turns off the car and he's just like, oh, okay, I'm going to just sit here, 120, but man, you know, hotter in the kitchen, you know.
It's like, you want, when he comes home, I mean, what if, and look, I've heard this literally from men that are really happily married.
They said when they come home, the entire family is standing at the door waiting for them.
And the kids all tell dad, like, I'm so glad you're going to give him a hug and a kiss and his wife gives him a hug and a kiss and dinner's ready.
And I'm thinking like, hey, you want your guy to be excited to come home?
And you say, ah, you think Stepford-wise in 1950 or whatever, I'm just telling you how to have a great marriage.
If he comes home to a thousand ants in the pool and leaves in the pool, he's not going to jump in.
When you come into the perfect pool and the cheerleaders in there waiting for you come on it, you're jumping in, you're running in, okay.
I'm just trying to tell you that these are ways to improve your marriage.
You want to, number one, get the chemicals right, okay, and number two, you want to have it clean.
Because when you get those two, man, it's just going to change your relationship.
Of course, you want them to be, you want to be equally yoked as well and, you know, that kind of goes with the chemicals and the cleaning a little bit.
But, you know, being equally yoked is not just before marriage. It's always in marriage.
And if you find yourselves, you know, ebbing and flowing a little bit, like you're getting a little bit out of sync in your yokeness, then you want to work on that.
As a man, you're supposed to lead your spouse. You should lead your wife into becoming equally yoked again.
You know, if you feel like you're drifting apart in a relationship, as a man, you need to figure out a plan to get you back on the same page.
If you don't have the same, hey, love and zeal for church, for the things of God, for steak, whatever it is, you need to just work on that, okay.
It's like, well, she doesn't like barbecue. Okay, well, take her to Heinz, you know.
But take her to Spring Creek. It like shut down, okay.
Take her to Heinz and, you know, she's like, you want to start working on these things and improving these things.
She's like, she doesn't like church. Well, quit taking her to Todd White's church, you know.
Take her to the right kind of church.
She's like, well, I don't like the sermons, you know.
You know, figure out a way to help her with the sermons, you know.
Maybe help with the disciplining of the kids more or help, you know, instruct your wife, help read the Bible with her.
Because I find that you get more out of sermons the more you know the Bible.
Like if you don't know any Bible, a lot of times the sermons are just like, you're like, I don't know what's going on and he said the F word.
That's all I can think about anymore.
Pastor Shelley, you know.
Sorry about that one, all right.
He's trying to quote somebody.
Either way.
But here's the thing.
If you sit your wife down, you're reading the Bible and you get excited about the things of God, you know, it'll improve your marriage.
When you don't have like no interest, you know, and even just outside of church, find things that you like to do with each other and do them with each other.
You know, Facebook is not the most fun activity to do together.
But a lot of people, that's their activity, you know.
It used to be TV, now it's social media, now it's YouTube.
And here's another thing, guys.
You could probably watch Pastor Anderson's sermons until Jesus comes.
But she may not want to.
And that's okay.
Because, you know, you could get to a point where you burn your wife out on church because you're watching so many sermons at home on top of it.
It's like, don't just force her to just, you know, drink from a fire hose of Christianity.
It's like if she's willing to come to church three times a week, I mean, that's great.
Why do you then have to have a fire hose of everything else?
You know, get some other hobbies and interests too.
You know, find some things that your wife likes and do those as well.
And, you know, and you lead your wife, find some new hobby and teach her that.
Because, you know what, women just like attention.
I personally believe that the women in this room care way less about the activity that they're doing with their husband and more about the focus and attention he's giving them.
She would rather have more attention and more focus doing some activities she's not that interested in than just doing something she likes and you're not that interested.
My case in point is my wife loves shopping and I hate it so hard that I think I ruin it for her sometimes.
And so when I feel like, you know, that's a hard one for me.
But I'm just thinking there's activities out there that when I at least engage with her and I'm giving her attention, it's like we have so much better of a time.
There's less animosity, less friction, even if we are doing the activity she loves, but I'm just not into it.
You need to find things that you're both into.
And again, that's kind of going with getting the chemical composition right.
Getting your cleanness right.
You need both of those.
And here's my last point and I really wanted to see but I couldn't get one.
But you've got to fill the pool.
You've got to get the chemicals, you've got to clean it, then you've got to fill it.
And again, you can love a pool but, you know, if you've got an eight foot pool, it's not as cool if you only fill it three feet.
You want to fill it all the way up, right?
And the same with the marriage that when you first get married, you're not great at marriage.
You need to mature.
You need to mature in marriage and you need to mature as a person.
As a man, go to 1 Corinthians, chapter number 13, you need to mature.
You need to grow up.
You know, the Bible even says in Ephesians 4,
But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ.
You know, as a Christian, you're supposed to grow.
It's an instruction to grow.
And the way you grow physically is by eating.
I mean, you can grow in all kinds of directions through eating.
And when you don't eat, you don't grow.
You get weak and emaciated and just kind of weak and sickly or whatever.
You know, that's not cool.
You know, the vegans are never going to look like, you know, brother Jason over here, okay?
Brother Jason, you know, in order for brother Jason or brother Samson to look like they do on a vegan diet,
they would have to just nonstop eat.
They probably couldn't even do it, okay?
So, look, if you want to be mature, if you want to be strong,
if you want to actually have some meat on the bone, you have to learn how to mature.
And not just physically, spiritually.
And when it comes to marriage, when you first got married, you were very immature, whether you like that or not.
You're very immature and you have to learn and you have to grow up and you have to get better at these things.
You didn't arrive as a spouse.
You need to constantly learn.
And as a man, you need to just grow up.
And again, why?
Because as a boy, as a kid, you just like to play.
I mean, what's the big difference between kids and adults?
Kids play more.
Now, there's nothing wrong with playing.
I play with my children.
I play golf sometimes.
I play certain things.
I play table tennis and have to humble people every once in a while.
Sometimes I get humbled too, okay?
But, you know, my life is not evolving around playing.
And the bachelor or the college kid, you know, he kind of is caught in between this window of like,
do I just play all the time or do I get like a man's job and actually work and actually grow up and become a man?
And here's the thing.
The Bible instructs you to become a man.
1 Corinthians chapter 13 and verse 11.
When I was a child, I spake as a child.
I understood as a child.
I thought as a child.
But when I became a man, I put away childish things.
You know, there's some things of our youth that we need to just put away.
Sometimes you just have to sell it.
Sometimes you have to just get rid of it because it's just childish.
It's not going to benefit your marriage.
Let me tell you something that will not benefit your marriage is video games.
And look, I'm not saying if you play video games, you're sinning or it's wicked.
I'm just telling you, if your marriage isn't going well and you feel like you're just playing all these games,
and, you know, maybe it's not video games.
Maybe it's computer games.
Maybe it's phone apps.
You know, I have an extremely addictive personality, okay?
And it doesn't matter what the game is.
I can become obsessed with it.
And I have.
And, you know, for a while, like, you know, and I regress every once in a while.
But there was a good while where I'm just thinking, like, I can't have any game on my phone.
I just waste so much time.
I waste so much effort and energy doing these stupid things.
I've played it all.
Candy Crush.
What's the one that was like Farm?
Farmville.
Oh, man.
Who played Farmville?
Okay.
All right.
I see that hand.
Okay.
You get into these things.
And look, the games are designed that you could play them forever.
Like, you could play them 24-7 and you would never make it to the biggest farm.
I mean, you would, you know, you never get enough coins.
You never know your crops or whatever.
I mean, you could play Candy Crush and they'll come up with a new pack of levels.
You could play chess until your heart, you know, bursts.
I mean, you could play all these.
But, you know, that's not going to help you as a husband, as a father.
You have to just start growing up and saying, you know what, I'm going to put more effort
and energy in making money and spending time with my family than all this playing and having
fun.
You have to grow up.
You have to learn.
And your wife is not going to think you're super cool because you play games.
Like, virtually, it doesn't exist.
Maybe there's an exception to that, but I'm just saying, like, you know, your wife's like,
my husband's really good at Farmville.
Have you ever seen how good he's at crushing candy?
And I'm not talking about just eating.
I mean, he crushes that candy.
It's like, these are things women never said.
Things women never said.
Have you seen my husband's Call of Duty rank?
You know, fighter solitaire, he's got it.
It's just like, they don't really, it doesn't really matter.
You know, it's just not, and again, you could substitute this anything.
Maybe it's a hobby.
And it could even be something good.
You know, it could be something, you know, you like working on cars.
You like doing whatever.
You know, you don't want to put so much effort and energy in something that's not your spouse
if your marriage isn't going well.
Because you're going to get joy out of whatever you put your affections in.
Why say I have a bigger personality?
Look, I can enjoy virtually any game.
Here's the thing, I can also enjoy my wife.
And you're going to reap what you sow.
And you're going to reap where you sow.
If I'm just putting all this effort and energy in games and stuff,
yeah, I'll get enjoyment out of that.
Yeah, that'll be fun.
But here's the thing, I'm going to neglect my spouse
and I'm not going to get the joy out of her that I could have gotten from her.
If I put a lot of effort and energy into her, I can reap a lot of joy out of her
and then I can maintain a healthy marriage.
So us as men, we need to mature up, grow up, and say, you know what?
Instead of getting a bunch of cheap thrills, I'm going to get the joys that come from my wife.
You know, just like kids love, I love candy still.
You know, as a man, you're not going to be a man on candy.
You've got to eat some strong meat.
You've got to eat some real food.
And here's the thing, let's get some real joy, which comes from your spouse.
Visit point one.
Now, I just kind of have like one more point that I want to make,
but go if you wouldn't name chapter number one, name chapter one.
Obviously, wives in this also should mature and, you know,
I think for women in the maturity, and again, this is just my thoughts,
but I think that women sometimes struggle with realizing that what God wants them to do is a job.
They don't look at their life as like a job and work so that it's real easy to be lazy about it.
Whereas if they actually had a career where they actually had to go and clock in and they have a boss,
they have employees, like they have coworkers, and they have forms they have to fill out,
and they have a uniform, they like take it real serious.
But because you don't wear the uniform, because you don't clock in necessarily,
because you don't have that, you know, boss that's not your husband or something,
you kind of just cope, you just kind of like living.
And that's really just kind of an immature attitude towards being a wife and a mother.
You know, or like even teaching.
You know, if you're going to homeschool your children, you should take that as serious or more
than you would if you taught at the school down the street.
You know, and the teachers down the street, they're having conference meetings,
they're planning, they're reviewing material, they're dressing for the position.
You know, I've always heard, you know, you should dress for the job that you want.
I've even heard when you work from home, and I've worked from home a lot,
that a lot of times your attitude is dependent upon how you dress.
And I'm saying as a woman it will help you in your marriage if you look at your job as a wife
and as a mother as a real job, because it is a real job.
But you have to build yourself, you have to mind yourself, because if you were on the job,
and you go to class to teach your students, and then you just stand there
and you just look at Facebook for two hours, you'll get fired.
Because you didn't attend to your children.
You know, at home, if you just sit on your phone for two hours and the kids just do whatever,
you don't get any trouble.
There's no parents to call and complain, like why aren't you teaching any lessons today?
Or why aren't you doing anything today?
You know, but it's easy to just kind of stay immature, stay a young girl,
stay helpless or something like that, as opposed to taking a really proactive approach to your life
and growing up and saying, you know what, I'm going to make a plan, I'm going to get dressed,
I'm going to teach my kids all this.
My kids are going to be the smartest kids on the planet.
I'm not just going to teach them the curriculum at school, I'm going to teach them above that.
We're going to have Bible classes.
We're going to have music classes that excel.
We're going to have foreign language classes where you actually learn something.
We're going to have finance classes.
We're going to have gardening classes.
We're going to learn about animals.
I'm going to take this up.
I mean, God has blessed you with children.
God has blessed you with a husband that's going to provide for you.
Why wouldn't you say, you know what, I'm going to take being a wife,
I'm going to take being a mother to the greatest extreme.
I'm going to be the best wife and the best mother you can imagine.
And here's another thing.
Being a wife is a job.
Don't think like, okay, I took care of the kids checklist.
It's like, okay, well what about your husband?
Again, I'm looking at other people's relationships and drawing in the good.
I've seen people that have really good marriages.
And let me tell you something that I observed is this guy did not know how to cook.
And that is a great marriage.
And you say, well, what do you mean?
Because he didn't have to.
And let me tell you something about men.
They don't learn things that they don't have to.
If it's just always, think about it.
If you had a professional chef at your house that's making you the greatest meals ever,
all the time, whenever you want, why would you ever learn how to cook?
Now look, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with guys cooking.
What I am saying is this guy had zero need to ever learn it.
He had a packed lunch for him every single day of everything he could ever want to imagine, all home cooked.
He had a tiny, like a slight gluten allergy.
So she had to make all of the bread that they ate as a family from scratch.
So she would make all the bread from scratch, all its like homemade meals.
He put a note in his lunch every single day about how much he loved him.
I'm just telling you, this is a real person.
I'm not talking about Proverbs 31.
I'm talking about this is a real person.
And you just think like, guys are thinking like, can I get one of those?
Of course you would, right?
Again, why do you preach these ideals?
It's because you say, well, my marriage isn't going well.
Well, here's the thing, have you tried that?
I mean, look, you could solve your marriage problems tomorrow.
And I say that because I mean it.
The problem is, here's the question, do you really want to work that hard?
It's like, hey, your pool's terrible.
We could fix it in a day.
We could start pouring chemicals, we could start filling it with water,
and let's get all the bugs and ants out, and we're going to have a party tomorrow.
Tomorrow is going to be great.
Think about it.
If your husband starts working super hard and making lots of money,
spending lots of time and focusing on you,
wanting to have an intimate relationship with you,
wanting to spend all kinds of quality time with you ladies,
and is going to forgive a lot of your problems,
tell me how your marriage isn't going to be great tomorrow.
And hey, ladies, if you say, hey, I'm going to make every meal
the best meal I've ever made for my husband,
and I'm going to make him a special note,
and I'm going to be a cheerleader when he gets home,
and we're both excited about the duty of marriage,
he's like, I'm great.
I mean, it's not hard to figure out what to do.
It's hard to do it because it's hard work.
Marriage is hard work.
But it takes two to tango.
And everybody in this room is thinking,
like, I really hope my spouse is listening.
Let me tell you something.
You can never affect your spouse.
You can never force them to do it.
I'm sorry, you can never force your spouse to do anything.
You can only influence them,
and you influence them by doing the right thing.
Hey, if you go 100%, maybe you'll encourage them to go 90%.
And even 90% of this sounds good.
No, no, no, 90% scale, you're like, that sounds great.
And I'm not telling you how to have a good marriage.
I'm telling you how to have a great marriage.
Now, here's the last one.
You've got to be jealous for your spouse.
And, you know, I always teach this,
but your jealousy can wane and it can ebb and flow.
But, you know, your jealousy ebbs and flows
when you're not working on your relationship.
Because when you're not working on your relationship,
you'll end up becoming jealous for other things
because jealousy is attached to what you're interested in.
God is interested in us, and I took you to Nahum, right?
Chapter one, look at verse two.
God is jealous.
This is a good attribute.
Here's the thing, God is so interested in us,
that's why he's jealous for us.
Here's the thing, I would never want it to be said
that God's not jealous for me
because that means he's interested in something else.
Just like as a husband and wife,
you wouldn't want your spouse to say,
I'm not jealous for you
because that means that there's something else they're jealous for.
Because you're never going to not be jealous.
There is something that you desire.
Like all of us, whether it's a nap, okay,
maybe some air conditioning,
is the sermon going to be over?
I don't know, you know.
Whatever it is, there's something you want.
Okay, as a man, maybe you have selfish carnal things,
you're like, I want to play more baseball.
I don't know who'd want to do that, but you know.
Or I want to go and play more ping pong.
Or you know, I want to go and ride my hot rod around town.
I want to go, you know,
you'll start getting really jealous for that
and then when something competes with that,
you end up getting mad at anything that competes with that time.
You get mad at anything that competes with that thing in your life.
So when you're not making your spouse a priority,
you're not giving her that time,
you're allowing other things to steal that jealousy factor.
And when you don't have that jealousy factor, it's hard.
You know, marriage becomes hard.
You know, marriage and pools are the same
in the sense that when you neglect them, you really don't want them.
You know, if I just, if I look at my pool,
and I don't have one, but I'm just saying,
if I look at my pool and it's just,
the chemicals are just gone awry
and there's all this junk in it and it's not even filled,
I just keep thinking like, I don't want to work on that.
I don't want to go swimming.
I don't want to have to do all this work, you know.
And people look at their marriage and they're like,
I haven't been talking to my wife.
I haven't been sweet to my wife.
I'm not doing anything good.
Then they don't even want to be around that person.
You end up causing where you don't want to be.
Whereas if you're cleaning the pool every day and it's all fresh,
you enjoy it every day.
And when you neglect it, you hate it every day.
And here's the thing.
When you neglect your spouse, you start getting resentment
and you're not that jealous for it and you don't want it anymore
and that's how people divorce.
They're not cleaning their pool.
They're not putting the chemicals in their pool
and they're not filling their pool.
And you know what?
You fill it by giving them time.
You fill it by maturing yourself
and you have to constantly grow and constantly get more
and constantly get closer.
And you know what?
Marriage is something that you always have to work at.
You will never ever arrive.
Just like a pool.
You can never ever have a pool and it's good forever.
A pool needs constant maintenance, constant work.
You know what?
A pool is a good thing.
And marriage is a good thing.
The reason why people have bad marriages
is because they don't work at it.
They won't work on it.
And you say, well, my spouse has given up.
But you just start working hard.
You work hard on your relationship.
You can only affect you.
And I guarantee every single marriage,
it can be boiled down to this.
You're just not working hard.
And it's not hard to know what to do.
It's hard to do it sometimes.
And I gave you a couple tips.
There's probably even better tips out there.
But at the end of the day,
if you're not going to put in the effort and energy,
you're never going to enjoy your relationship.
You say, well, if I married a different person.
It's not the person.
There's all kinds of shapes of pools out there
and they're all fun.
It's not the shape of the pool.
It's not if it's a saltwater or chlorine.
You just got to clean it up, get the water, get the chemicals.
You'll enjoy it, I guarantee it.
Let's go to prayer.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for the word of God.
Thank you for giving us the institution of marriage.
Thank you so much for my wife.
Thank you for all the couples in here that are married.
Thank you for those that want to get married.
I pray that you would help them to find a spouse
and they would desire the right attitude of marriage.
I pray that those that the marriages maybe need some work,
that you would inspire people's hearts to work hard on their marriage.
Realize that it's an important institution.
Realize it's not just important for them.
It's important for the children.
It's important for this church.
It's important for the gospel.
It's important for so many reasons.
And that when we do work on our marriages,
that you can bless them, that you can give us a lot of joy.
I pray that you would help all of the marriages in this room
just have joy, have happiness,
that they could get to new levels of joy that they've never had before.
And we just thank you for all that you give us.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
All right, for our last song, we will go to song 110,
All the Way My Savior Leads Me.
110, All the Way My Savior Leads Me.
Song 110, All the Way My Savior Leads Me.
All the way my Savior leads me,
what have I to ask beside?
Can I doubt His tender mercy
who through life has been my guide?
Heavenly peace, divinest comfort,
hereby faith in Him to dwell.
For I know what e'er befall me,
Jesus doeth all things well.
For I know what e'er befall me,
Jesus doeth all things well.
All the way my Savior leads me,
cheers each winding path I tread,
gives me grace for every trial,
feeds me with a living bread.
Though my weary steps may falter
and my soul athirst may be
gushing from the rock before me,
lo, a spring of joy I see
gushing from the rock before me.
All the way my Savior leads me,
O the fullness of His love,
perfect rest to me is promised
in my Father's house above.
When my spirit clothed immortal
wings its flight to realms of day,
this my song through endless ages,
Jesus led me all the way.
This my song through endless ages,
Jesus led me all the way.
Thank you all for coming.
God bless. You are dismissed.