Mens Conference 2016 - 02 - Enhancing Intimacy in Marriage — 1 Thessalonians 5

0:00 Now in this next session, we're going to be looking at enhancing intimacy in our marriage, and it's divided up, when Bob and I were talking about this, it's divided up into two sections. The first section, we're gonna all stay together. Second half of the session, about thirty minutes, the single guys are going be doing a breakout session. I have a little study for them. Jacob Ming is going to lead that, and that's out of chapter Proverbs.

0:33 Alright. So enhancing intimacy in your marriage. The way god created us, we have three main parts. We know that in the trinity, there's the father, son, and holy spirit. Paul tells us in first Thessalonians five twenty three that that we are spirit, soul, and body.

0:57 And fully bought under the blood were all the lords, but those are the three aspects of our makeup. The the body is world conscious. The soul is self conscious, and the spirit of man is god conscious. So I have I have a body here. It has five senses, and that is my connection into the world.

1:19 So I'm bringing all the sensory data from my body, the flesh, and that comes into the soul. Soul is where my emotions are at, where the will is at. It's where my personality is at. It's what makes you you and me me. Okay?

1:35 It's unique. It's eternal, but that is self conscious. That's where the heart is, the mind, the reasoning, and so forth. But then we have a spirit, god breathed into Adam. It is passed down from Adam.

1:51 We we come from him, and that is god conscious. And that is the the deepest part of who we are. It's called the inner man, and that's why in scripture, we read of spirit, soul, and body. God lists what's most important first. We often say body, soul, and spirit because often essential is what's more important to us.

2:13 So, when we're unregenerate, our spirit, cannot commune with god. But once that we trust Christ, receive the lord Jesus as savior, then the Holy Spirit regenerates us and we become, we have that communication and the fellowship and interaction with god again, right? So, in thinking about how to present this subject matter, I wanna start at the top, what's the most important, and then work down. We're thinking about how to, have greater intimacy with our wives, and I would suggest that there's these different levels in which that we can have intimacy. And if the spiritual level and at the soul level is all in good shape, the intimacy at the physical level is gonna be a lot better.

3:05 So we have to deal with these, other, other levels, of our being. So our fellowship with god and what we permit from the flesh level to influence us will determine the degree of marital intimacy we enjoy. So, if we talk about this in the first session, if I'm in fellowship with the lord and I'm feeding on spiritual food, as Paul says, I'm strengthening the inner man daily, then, I'm going to have the greater opportunity to have intimacy at that level with my wife at a higher level because we're both in communion with the lord, right? If if I have two brothers and one's in sin, my relationship with him goes up before it comes across, right? So, if this brother is out of fellowship with the lord and I'm in fellowship with the lord, we cannot have fellowship together, right?

4:00 We both have to be in fellowship with the lord and so there is a spiritual aspect that believers can enjoy in which non believers can't. The the satisfaction of Christ can flow down within into the marriage relationship. Two strangers can enjoy sex at a flesh level, but that's not what God intended. There's a much deeper interaction in the the physical relationship between a husband and wife. So as...

4:29 Again, love triangle we talked about in the last session is both spouses are drawing to the lord. That's going to bring deeper marital communion. If one or both spouses are in sin or proud, selfish, mishandling anger, we're going to talk about that in a minute, stirring up base desires that are outside the will of god, then that's going to be a hindrance. One of the warning signs as a believer, if if you feel yourself getting frustrated, edgy, moody, all those kind of things, there's probably something at the flesh level that's hindering your relationship with the lord. It's good to take inventory.

5:33 I'm sorry, wife, not wives. I... There's been times that I've said some doozies, especially when I was... I remember one time I was up in Seattle working on a project that had been gone a long week, working like fifty, sixty hours a week. And we flew back.

5:51 I got home. It was 10:30 at night. And I've been in a small hotel room the whole week. I was just beat. And I remember climbing into bed.

5:59 Brenda came over. We were just cuddling. I said, oh, it is so good to be in my own bed with my own wife. And I knew as soon as I said it, that wasn't quite what I meant. She punched me and she said, I know what you meant to say.

6:20 This isn't this didn't come out quite right. So, yeah. Regularly initiate prayer with your wife. I, this is right up there at at at of one of the most intimate things you can do with your wife. For us, it's after lunch.

6:36 We get down on our knees. After lunch, we try to do it every day except Sundays because we have people in our home and to pray out loud together, going to the throne of grace together is a wonderful thing. And I use this actually in marital counseling because I remember one couple I was working with, she says, well, I ever love my husband again. Woah. She was committed to him, but it was a dead marriage.

7:01 You know, they they didn't have the intimacy. And, I said, here's what I want you guys to do. Every night before you go to bed, I want you to get down on your knees and pray out loud, both of you, and and just pour your hearts up before the lord and you know what? Within a month, their marriage had totally revolutionized because what she was not telling her husband, she was pouring out before the throne of grace and after they got done praying, they always had things to talk about. They never had anything to talk about before and so it's a great great opportunity to build intimacy, praying together, your wife will share things with the lord.

7:40 She might not even tell you about. It gives you a little insight to what's going on and and just encourages that intimacy. I've had couples say we've we never pray out loud together or the wife will say, I'm uncomfortable. I said, do it anyway. Just do it.

7:53 You... You'll be glad you did. It'll come. And so I I really appreciate praying with my wife. I really enjoy that.

8:01 It's right up there that... One of the most intimate things you can do with your wife. Invest spiritual growth in your children. This is going back to Isaac executing good spiritual leadership. It just thrills the heart of a believing woman when dad takes time, invests time into the children.

8:21 It displeases them. It just, it's exuberant, to see see that. Her... She has a connection with the children that you don't. Right?

8:31 I was just talking with a brother a few minutes ago. When my wife, had that first baby, it was like, whoo. Man, there was things I never knew were in there. She's a different person. You know, motherhood unlocked things, and I remember feeling a little gypped and, like, I got sidelined and forgotten, and and that's part of that selfishness that you you learn that you have.

8:52 And so there's a... She birthed those babies. Right? And and she carried them for nine months, and she nurtured them, and she she... They're very important to her.

9:04 Well, they're important to us too, but in a different way for her. And so it's it speaks a lot to her when we invest in the children. Conduct regular family devotions. Now I'm in full time work, and now we have our devotions after breakfast. When I was in engineering, we usually had them in the evening.

9:45 We read a verse. We go around the room, and everyone contributes a thought and engages them. And, again, it keeps the word of god central. Share the word with your wife. We were talking about that that cleansing aspect of Ephesians five twenty six.

10:00 It may be sharing thoughts out of books you're reading with one another. In this trip that we had last weekend, my wife read a book to me the whole... Well, not the whole way up, but probably six six hours of the trip. It was great. We both enjoyed it, and, it was just thrilling.

10:17 So whatever you can to to focus in the word and be sharing it back and forth, that's really thrilling to a wife. I I can see my wife brighten up almost every time that I say, I got this out of my quiet time this morning. They just love that and so that's a good thing to do to show that you're in the word, that you're spiritually minded, you really love the lord. Attend I I put normal church meetings. I think some local churches get so many things going that it it becomes insane to try to do it all but Acts two forty two, they met for apostles doctrine, for fellowship, for prayer, for lord's supper.

10:59 Actually, it's lord's supper and prayer but they met for those four things. Hebrews ten twenty five, don't forsake the assembling of yourselves together. It should, your children should never have to question, are we going to prayer meeting tonight? It should just be if the doors are open to the building, I'm going to be there. Amen.

11:16 And that's the kind of commitment that we should give our children. They should never even have to wonder about it And, that's important. It gives us security. It shows, leadership, and children that are raised that way, then they tend to be that way with their families. So it's important to show that kind of a spiritual leadership about commitment to the meetings.

11:43 Let's go now to the soul level, And so this is more the emotional level. One of the things that, my wife and I start out very early, and I talk about this, I think, in both books, The Fruitful Vowel and The Fruitful Vine, is date nights with a variety. I don't know about you, but as a male, it's very easy to slip into routines and ruts. My wife is much more creative than I am in in coming up with ideas and so forth. But...

12:12 And the date nights have shifted. Sometimes they're Friday night. Presently, because we have bible studies on Friday and Wednesday night, prayer meeting Thursday night, our date night is Tuesday night. And that's pretty religious. We're...

12:24 We we don't plan anything on those nights. Now, that doesn't mean that that we go out and go to dinner. If we go out to dinner twice a year, that's about it. But it means that we are going to go do something. We're going to go to a park and walk.

12:37 We're going to go enjoy nature doing something together. We're going to go biking together. We're going to take a walk. Maybe go back in the bedroom and shut the door and tell the kids, good night, guys. See you in the morning and watch an old movie, whatever.

12:53 But just keep it vibrant so it doesn't get old. It means a lot to your wife to say, you're important to me. I want to commit one night a week just to you, to start a relationship. Set a time, quality time for interaction. This is another thing that...

13:11 This thrills my wife, and I did this this last week. I said, you know, you've been going all day long. I've been going all day long. What about just just fix some hot tea and sit down and talk for a little bit? Boy, she just loves that.

13:27 You know? To be quite honest, I could probably go on and do another project. Check the box. Right? At conquer, you know, the male mentality.

13:35 But she really enjoys just the invitation to sit down and just talk. My wife told me, I think it was the first year we were married, she goes, you want to turn me on? Talk to me. That didn't make any sense to me. That's not the way I'm wired.

13:57 But she said, you talk to me. You talk to me for thirty minutes. And she said, I I will be much more I just... It it helps me be more romantic. So we are...

14:12 We're different, and I find that that's very helpful. So learn your wife's needs, fears, expectations. That's part of that first Peter three seven verse, spending time with them, learning. Affirm significance and security. Another thing that's good is just writing little notes, constantly affirming with word that you love your wife, that she's significant to you, that she's important.

14:40 Leave little sticky notes. If I go on long trips, sometimes I'll mail her letters that she'll get while I'm gone, or I'll hide things so she'll find them when she's working through the the week. Serve your wife. Serve your wife. And little things mean a lot.

14:57 It doesn't have to be big things, but things like doing the dishes. Whatever... About about two months ago, we have we have church meeting in our home on Sundays. And so Saturday is a big day of cleaning, getting ready for that. And I noticed she had to go into town for the groceries and something else, and I knew she was running behind.

15:25 So I don't often do this. Okay? I don't wanna give you that impression. But I went ahead and cleaned the bathroom. And so she comes home.

15:35 Kelsey comes in. They're carrying groceries, and I'm down scrubbing the toilet and so forth. And, Brenda comes in and she goes, you're cleaning the toilet. I said, yeah. I knew you were running behind.

15:50 And she walks in the kitchen. Kelsey, guess what dad's doing? He's cleaning the toilet for me. And my my analytical daughter, who's 18, says this, did he throw up or something? That doesn't compute.

16:04 Dad's cleaning the toilet. Little things like that mean a lot. Yeah. Man was ever stabbed to death while washing dishes. That's right.

16:19 Can I quote you on that? Alright. Remove behaviors that hinder intimacy, sin, selflessness, pride, lack of discipline, that's a big one, spending money frivolously, not planning, not being a good leader, Pride. You know, another way that you can really excite your your wife is to say, I was wrong, and I'm sorry. Those are hard words sometimes, aren't they?

16:55 But, you know, our children need to see that too. Our children need to see not perfect men, but men that are learning. Men that recognize their mistakes can say, I was wrong, I'm sorry. Please forgive me. That's important.

17:11 What I'd like to do, now is is just talk about removing behaviors that that interrupt intimacy at the soul level. And, I don't know, Bob. This could be some more meddling, but I'm gonna give you 12 behaviors just to think through and see if these could possibly be hindering intimacy with your wife at this emotional level of two souls interacting. Because if there's hindrances at this level, you maybe have a physical relationship with your wife, but she's not going be all there. Right?

17:47 And what we want to do is draw into this the most deepest level of interaction that two people can have together, not just a physical thing, not just an emotional thing, but really kind of a a spiritual thing that just says, god is blessing us. We're in god's presence. We're in fellowship with the lord. This is just as good as it gets. Okay?

18:06 So affixing guilt, number one. That's either being a judge or a martyr. It fixes guilt rather than actual accountability. So you could come down on your wife and say, you're guilty of this and this and this, what you did and this, and you're just beating her down instead of recognizing, okay, there was a mistake made, acknowledging accountability. Or you could say, play the martyr.

18:30 Oh, you've done this to me again and again. You did it then and then. In other words, it's not a behavior that builds intimacy. It's just acknowledging that a wrong had been done and forgiving it, you know, asking forgiveness and then forgetting it versus beating it into the ground and causing a lot of guilt. Guilt is not a good thing in a marriage.

19:28 It shows that I heard, I listened, and, if I repeat it back, if I don't have something right, she can correct it. But it shows that I'm I'm interacting with her. I'm actually listening. Put down anything else. The male mentality is a single focus at a time.

19:48 And so it's hard for us to multitask. And if we're having a conversation with our wife that we want meaningful, we don't want to be multitasking doing something else. Whatever you're doing, if you're reading a book, if you're watching something, if you're texting, whatever, if you put that aside and then talk... That shows that she's significant. She's important.

20:10 Whatever else doesn't matter, this is important. If you're trying to multitask, it's not going to be a positive thing. Analyzing. Men tend to do this. I think engineers tend to do it, sadly, but it's true, where we kind of just make it a cold thing, and we just say fact one, fact two, fact three, fact four.

20:33 And we kind of make it something that without feeling, acknowledging that there's hurt, we just kind of make it mechanical. And for women who are more emotional, that's not a positive thing. It is hurtful for them. And so to not acknowledge one's feelings and make it a cold mechanical conversation is not helpful. Gunny sacking.

20:59 This would be resentment. When there's offenses, internalizing those offenses instead of working them. Now I have a book on anger. What's the name of it? Be angry and sin not.

21:17 Thank you. I really did write it, honestly. Be angry and sin not. I worked with ECS, and we made a study guide out of it called Man... Managing Anger God's Way.

21:29 And so this... Either of these two next things are a problem. You might find that book helpful. Gunny sacking, internalizing grievances instead of, dealing with them. And so what happens is there's an offense.

21:42 There's an offense, and and you just internalize it, and what you get is this kind of smoldering fire. Orge is the word in the Greek. It's a smoldering fire kind of like under a blanket. It's burning. It's there, it just this is where the sarcasm and the jabs and all the little comments come from.

22:04 And in time, it can lead to a root of bitterness, and so it's inappropriate. You want to deal with grievances. Either deal with it or release it and forget it, but don't keep a list of grievances. Love keeps no list of wrongs, we read in one Corinthians 13. Rage.

22:21 This is blowing up. This is clamming up. This is blowing up. It's also a way of mishandling anger. We just spew, just an explosion.

22:32 Then ten, fifteen minutes later, we come back and we might apologize. Well, you can do a lot of damage in those first few seconds with uncontrolled anger, unclean anger. Blaming. This is finding fault, causing anxiety without taking responsibility. It's creating a no caring atmosphere to promote growth.

22:53 In other words, with two people, there's rarely a situation where there isn't some fault on either party. And so recognizing that we have a joint mutual problem, that's worked through rather than trying to say, Well, you're guilty. You're 95% guilty. We have a mutual problem. What's the solution?

23:32 And if there's lawyers here, didn't mean that in a derogatory way. It's just playing the lawyer and not sincerely listening, not really trying to pursue the problem, but more asserting pride by making sure that they know they're guilty. Not a good thing. And then triangulating. Bringing other people into the situation to give support.

23:58 Terrible thing for intimacy. Put downs. I want to say this quite clearly, that in marriage, there is absolutely no ground for sarcasm or put downs. Don't even have it in your house. Sarcasm is humor with a hook in it.

24:21 Right? In other words, you have a little joke and then you go, Oh. You hook. Yeah, you set the hook. It hurt.

24:30 And, oh, well, that was a little funny, not a lot funny, but mostly hurt. And that's usually an indication of resentment, undealt with situation. So I really want to emphasize this. If you're a husband that is using sarcasm to try to get your wife to do what you want her to, or you're still upset about something that she did, and then you throw it back in her face or dig, it's not going to build intimacy. It's going to destroy it.

25:00 No sarcasm or put downs. Mind raping. This is also another thing that we men tend to do. I had a couple in counseling quite quite a while, actually. And just last year, they did divorce.

25:13 They made it twenty years after this, but they did divorce. It was sad to hear. But I was working with them. And whenever the the wife started to express herself, the husband would cut in and finish the sentence for her, and and then she just stopped. And after a few times, I I looked at the man.

25:39 I said, why are you mind raping your wife all the time? He goes, what? I said, you won't let her... She she has to be able to audibly express what she's thinking to make sense of it and feel heard. And you're cutting her off.

25:54 You're asserting your pride like I know you better than you know yourself and telling her what she thinks. And you're doing it all the time. And the the wife just started wailing, just tears all over the table. And he looked at her. He says, I do that?

26:08 She goes, you do it all the time. He didn't even know he was doing it. And it was it was tearing their marriage apart. It was killing intimacy. I call it mind raping.

26:18 So you listen. You wait. You learn. And it's pride. Right?

26:23 The pride is the reason that we do that. Delay. There may be a reason to delay good, constructive dialogue to resolve a problem. But if you delay, make sure that you do it. Oftentimes, what happens is we'll say, well, I'm gonna...

26:42 Let's do that Saturday. We'll have a talk. Or, you know, we'll get to that when we have time. And and that destroys intimacy. You promised me we'd deal with this, and we're never dealing with it.

26:52 And it really causes hardship. Alright. So those are just 12 things. If you're taking notes, guilt, filibustering, generalizing, analyzing, gunny sacking raging, blaming, questioning, triangulating, put downs, mind raping, and delaying. 12 behaviors that hinder intimacy.

27:24 Again, we're talking at the soul level. So how many if we check, like, three or four of those off, is that okay? You need you need counseling. By the way, you know, I was telling you about this couple that I had in this this counseling situation. I was actually speaking at a church, and I went through this list.

27:48 And they both came up to me, and he says, she has eight. I have nine. Can we have counseling? Yes. They would...

27:55 Yeah. I said, that's fine. We'll we'll work. They would have probably been divorced by the end of the year. And so, you know, we met together and thank the lord they had another about twenty years and you know, it's sad where they're at today but at least the lord preserved them for a little while longer.

28:12 Yeah, I mean, who of us would not be guilty of any of those? I I just wanna add, that whole list can be... That destroys the fellowship. Exactly. Man to man.

28:21 I mean, that that list is great for Yeah. And that's why the young men are in here Yes, happy. That are single because this is exactly the same... And this is with the book, The Evil Nexus, where I talk about these... The interaction of believers in in destroying the body of Christ.

28:39 And we gotta quit we gotta quit doing that. And so that's the the idea of that book is let's not do these behaviors that are are destroying each other. Yeah. Good point. Alright.

29:14 And so did anybody else go that seminar? I'm just curious. Did you? I'll sit right by you. Yeah?

29:19 Okay. Sorry. I get older. I don't remember. But, anyway, I went to that conference.

29:25 Then after that, Rainey and I got into this two month discussion. You know, we're going back and forth, and I did a word study on anger. And what I found is in the in the gospels, the main word that's used for anger is aphiemi. It's used in Luke 23 when the lord was on the cross. Father, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

29:52 And what it literally means is is to let be. Let be. Suffer it. It does not mean that the lord gave forgiveness to the individuals who crucified him on the cross. That's not the meaning at all.

30:09 Actually, if you look at that whole text, you'll find that the verbs of blasphemy between the soldiers and the Pharisees and even the unrepentant thief on the cross, they're all in a imperfect tense, meaning that as the lord was hanging on the cross those six hours, the insults were continuing to come up until a a particular time. That's the imperfect tense. And the verb, the lord said, father, forgive them, is also in the imperfect tense. In the English, it looks like he just said it one time, but he's continued saying that for that period that he was on the cross. Well, that makes sense.

30:49 Blasphemy, insult, father, suffer. Father, let it be. Father, don't judge it now. That's what the lord was doing on the cross. He wasn't issuing forgiveness to the individuals who were mistreating him because they hadn't asked for it.

31:06 Okay? So in the in the gospels, the main word for forgive is aphiemi, and it means to suffer, let it be. So we get the mechanics of the gospels. Don't forgive the seven times, but 70 times 70. Luke seventeen three, if if your brother comes to you and and he repents and asks for your forgiveness, you shall forgive him.

31:31 You shall forgive him. That's what it says. So we get a lot of these mechanics governing forgiveness. When we get to the epistles, the main word then used in the epistles for forgive, like in Colossians three thirteen, Ephesians chapter four, I think it's actually in verse 32 of that chapter, is chariotzomahi. Yeah.

31:57 If you can make that work in Scrabble, that's 50 points. Right? Chariotzomahi. And that means to unconditionally release. Unconditionally release.

32:10 And Paul gives us the motive. When we see the savior and what he did for us and what I've been forgiven, what possibly would motivate me not to forgive others, right? I've been forgiven so much more than whatever's been done to me. To be honest, I've had some pretty mean things done to me and you've had some pretty mean things done to you. But the idea is as soon as the offenses come in, I release them to the lord because I've been forgiven, and then I...

32:40 That allows me to move things into a more logical situation to think through. Lord, how can I use this to better that person and bring you glory? Okay? In other words, I may... Like my wife, how many how many, things would husbands and wives be addressing if they decided to talk about every little thing that offended them?

33:05 We spent all of our time. Well, you you didn't put a fork on that side of my plate. You know? All these little things don't really matter. And so there are these rubs in marriage, but what we want to do is...

33:18 Part of this is two sinners living together. I shouldn't say sinners. Two people that have a flesh nature that sins living together. There's gonna be these rubs. So if it's just a rub, I love my wife, just release that, and that's the end of it.

33:32 And if you release it, don't think about it anymore. But if it's a habit, it's something that's hurting her, hurting the family, hurting others, then in love, go to them and say, you know, this has been offensive. It's hurt me before. It's hurt... And I just want you to consider this.

33:50 And if she says back to, oh, I'm sorry. I didn't even know I was doing it. Forgiven. Right? And so when people ask to be forgiven, then we're we're commanded to forgive.

34:00 We have no grounds not to declare forgiveness. But as soon as we're offended, have a releasing spirit, let the Lord have it, and then work in an objective way. And when that person confesses it, then declare forgiveness. And until they've confessed it, it goes in the background of your mind, but it's not going to control my stomach acids and keep me awake at night. The Lord has it.

34:22 And when that person says, I'm sorry, then then it's forgotten. Okay? So it's important. This is really crippling a lot of marriage. It's also crippling a lot of assemblies.

34:35 This... Because bitterness is what sets in. Anger is a very powerful emotion. It equips us, the body, to do things it would normally be able to do, and it's such a powerful emotion that we cannot control it very long without sinning. That's what Paul tells us in Ephesians four.

34:54 Be angry and sin not. Don't let the sun go down on your wrath. If you stay angry, you're going to sin. You can't control that emotion. It was given to you to accomplish a present righteous purpose.

35:06 And if anger can't accomplish a present righteous purpose, you need to distinguish it because it'll lead you into sin. So we need to think objectively. Anger is an emotion that God gave. God gets angry. It's not a sin to be angry.

35:19 But wrath... I shouldn't say wrath. Rage and resentment are two ways. Those are behaviors that anger anger leads us into those behaviors which cause sin. I'm trying to make my terminology very correct the way scripture halves it.

35:38 Anger is not a behavior. It's an emotion. And if wrongly used, it leads into wrong behaviors, rage, and resentment. Righteous indignation, which God shows us throughout the Bible, and a releasing spirit, that's... Those are proper ways of handling anger.

35:55 So that makes a little more sense then. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be bitter towards them. Okay? So how we handle anger and how we handle situations, if we have a releasing spirit and then we objectively work with our spouses in areas that they need growth in, then that's appropriate, and the rest let go. I was working with a couple about seven years ago.

36:24 They were dairy farmers. They've been married thirty five years, married longer than I have. These these... This couple was physical. I mean, she had actually grabbed her husband by the throat and threw him up against the wall.

36:38 I mean, they were violent. It was one of the hardest situations that I've ever gone to. The first night we started talking. You know how far back they went with their grievances? Their honeymoon.

36:54 I said, you've been carrying that around for thirty five years? Why are you ruining your life? And it was liberating to how... Get them to work through these offenses that they hadn't dealt with. And it was liberating.

37:11 You just... The... You could see the burdens rolling off. I remember the husband bringing something else up later that had already been addressed. I said, I don't know what you're talking about.

37:22 He looked at me. He said, yeah. We talked about it in our second set. I said, if I recall, your wife apologized for that, and you forgave her. You should never bring that up again.

37:31 Right? And that's the way we have to deal with these, and it's how we interact with each other too. Right? So it's liberating to have that kind of... To understand what biblical anger is to accomplish and what fleshly anger accomplishes, and we don't want the latter.