Aspects of Agape — Ephesians 5

0:00 Hi. Hello. You know, I was thinking Barbara and I were talking as we were driving down here. Actually, she was driving. I was riding.

0:13 And, we were talking about we had our twenty fifth wedding anniversary gala here at this chapel. And it's, it's really interesting because, Andy was emceeing that and, you don't remember, do you? No. It's called old, brother. You're getting old.

0:45 Yeah. You don't remember that. That was twenty six years ago. You can believe that? So Barb and I will be married October six, fifty one years.

0:59 This is like amazing to me. And I can't believe, you know, the changes are amazing. I mean, the changes are amazing. I I think I've shared this with you. Why are we so far back?

1:19 The changes are just totally amazing to me. I mean, that's the gap. Is that COVID code or something? I don't know. That's really weird.

1:29 Is that better? For me, it is. Okay. Feel like a chiropractor here. Okay.

1:39 Yeah. So far, we'll do this. Yeah. And I I was thinking to myself, you know, I I can't believe Barb. What a gift Barb has been to me.

1:52 I mean, what a gift. She is stuck. She's been miss steady our whole life, our whole married life. Just steady. You know, with the way Barb has treated me, well, one time she made me cry.

2:08 She got me in a headlock. And, we were wrestling. She got me in a headlock and got... My jaw got out of thing, and she then... She put the squeeze on.

2:20 That really hurt, man. I'm such a wimp. That is so true. Wimpy Chris. And...

2:28 But, Barb, is... We... And I could tell you... Regale you with stories of of funny stories, some really funny stories, and some heart wrenching, gut wrenching stories. She was there when my mom passed.

2:46 I was down in the bay... Down in the 1st Floor when my mom... She's in an oncology ward in a hospital. And Barb was just dutifully sitting there, and as my mom went to be with the Lord. And I missed my mom's home going by seconds.

3:06 I walked in and the zeros were across the the automatic cuff, you know, blood pressure cuff and all that. Barb has been unbelievable. Just really, really fantastic. But, you know, I I was thinking to myself, when we first got married, we said to each other we said to each other, it's not gonna be a fifty fifty situation. So if you're taking notes, Gabe, you you probably want to take notes on this.

3:42 Okay? So it's not a fifty fifty proposition. It's a 100100% without anything in return. So you give 100% and you don't expect anything. You do that in your marriage, it's going to be great.

4:01 It'll really be great. It'll really be fantastic. The divorce rate among... It said the Barna Group did that's a... It's like Gallup, Barna, you know, these these survey groups.

4:18 Barna said that the average is like... The average divorce rate is like twenty five to thirty three percent, something like that. And I was talking to a friend of mine. He is a marriage counselor. He is a he is a counselor, just not marriage con...

4:33 He said it's way higher than that. It's like sixty percent, in The United States. All couples that get married, sixty percent of those couples end in divorce. And the scary part is that that's the Christian couples divorce rate is almost matching it. It's almost matching it.

5:02 And that is something of great consternation. Not only to the couples but also to to the lord. That's a great consternation to the lord for sure because marriage is we're we're going to get into it. We're going to get into it. I'd like us to look at Ephesians chapter five.

5:36 Are we being filmed? Am I being filmed? What did he say? Audience recording. Oh, audio only.

5:43 Okay. Alright. The glare. Yeah, the glare. Thanks.

5:48 Thanks a lot. It... Your day's coming, bro. And you'll be going like this. Uh-oh.

5:54 Uh-oh. That's what I did. I looked like I had the mange, man. You know? I'm going blotch here, blotch here.

6:01 I'm not doing the comb over. I'm not doing minoxidil. I'm not doing any of that. So I took the clippers. JC was like 11.

6:09 And I took took the clippers on one. And I said, what do you think JC? He says, mom's gonna kill you. And so I went and got Norlkos. I said, if I'm gonna die, I might as well go smooth.

6:25 You know? That was 2005. Can you believe that? I actually had hair then. Yeah.

6:33 So a a guy... A a friend of mine, he works for the DOD, Department of Defense, and he was in the army for twenty three years, and he did special things. He's an he's an interrogator and knows Arabic and all the different different dialects of it. And so he... He's a good friend.

6:57 And I said I said to him, you wanna see our wedding pictures? And I showed him our wedding picture. He goes, that's not you. I go, it's us. It's me and Barb.

7:11 He goes, no way. I go, way. Way, that's us. He goes, that is not you. I couldn't convince him but it was us.

7:24 It really was. Things change. Things really do change. And they really... I mean, look at this.

7:39 Things change. You know? I mean, I'm just being honest. Everybody sees it. So, I mean, what's what's the deal from hiding it?

7:48 You know? And things things do change. And the the the question that we have to look at... And my thoughts are this, I have a dear friend who just left his family. Great communicator of the Bible and of the gospel.

8:13 He left it all. And in the wake of it is devastation I mean, abject devastation. I mean, you you would you would you would want to listen to him. You would want to hear what he had to say, etcetera and it just just unbelievable. You think that no way in a million and his wife, beautiful, he's handsome, all this kind of stuff, and he just walks away from it and goes after another person.

8:50 And it just doesn't... It's like, you know, you've seen that where it goes, got a nuclear cloud over your head. It just blows your mind. It just... You just can't believe that something like that would take place, and it did.

9:07 And there's no rectifying it except for god maybe stepping in but it doesn't look like the lord is stepping in on this and it is just so very very difficult. So very difficult. I wanna talk in Ephesians chapter five what the Bible has to say about us and our relationships especially in terms of marriage and if you're not married, take notes. Okay? But it it...

9:39 Just take notes anyway you look at it. But, you look at this, and we're gonna... This... I'm gonna title this aspects of agape. And agape, I put agape there and not just aspects of love, but agape because the agape love is selfless love.

10:02 Abject selfless love. You are not thinking of you. You're thinking of the other person. And this is how God has loved us. Agape love is God's love for us.

10:19 In fact, somebody somebody once said was a guy named Jim Russell. I don't know if anybody ever heard of him but long time ago, Jim Russell preached at Willow Bible Chapel in Willoughby, Ohio. Now, it's defunct and he preached and he said this, god knows the absolute worst about you and still loves you. That's agape love. That is agape love.

10:47 So, in this passage, we're going to look at Ephesians chapter five verses 22 through 33 and we only have Paul will show us two aspects of marriage that we must hear. We we must understand and obey if we're going to glorify god. If we're going to do this, if we're going to glorify god and glorify the lord Jesus Christ in our marriages. Okay. So, I'm going to and I'm going to speak to the singles for a for a moment.

11:21 Okay. So, alright. Alright. Responsibilities. I'm getting a little ahead of myself but responsibilities here.

11:31 Paul shows us the aspect of the responsibilities of marriage and we see that in this passage and then also the rationale for it. The rationale for it, for marriage. So when we talk about marriage, we see here the responsibilities of... And and the responsibilities of marriage, the responsibilities of wives, and the responsibilities of husbands. So, here's here's the deal.

12:21 Speaking to yourselves in Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing, and making melody in your heart to the lord. Giving thanks always for all things unto god and the father in the name of our lord Jesus Christ. Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of god. So, we are we are in the fear of god. That is just not a I'm scared to death of god.

12:50 No, it's a reverential awe. It really is. I respect god. There is no one else like god and so when there's nobody else like god. I don't care if somebody thinks that they're fantastic and all this kind of stuff or you know, we have different gods in our society.

13:11 No questions about it. You know, the god of the NFL, god of the Major League Baseball, god of education. We got gods all over the place but there's only one true god. And we have to do with him. You know, it's going to be really interesting.

13:31 It's really going to be interesting to see the shock of people realizing, first of all, after they die, that there is a god and now they are responsible to this god. The shock is gonna be overwhelming. It's gonna be... They're gonna be blown away literally and then find themselves in a place called hell because they have not trusted in Jesus as their savior. Jesus is the savior of the world.

14:06 He's my savior. Praise god for I praise god that when I was 18, I trusted Christ as my personal savior. I praise god that I did that and there's only there is only one god. There is only one god and I we have to do it. We have to deal with him.

14:26 You have to deal with him. You can't get away from it. You're not going to get away from it. There's no hiding from him. And what he has done for us is that he sent his son to die on the cross who is god in the flesh and paid the penalty we deserve to pay.

14:48 I deserve the wrath of god, Jesus stood in my place. Now, I say that because notice what it says, we're to submit ourselves. Did you know that Jesus submitted to the father? Philippians chapter two, he submitted himself even unto death. Death of the cross.

15:13 Let this mind be in you which is also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of god thought it not robbery to be equal with god but made himself of no reputation, took upon himself the form of a servant, was made in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. The god who created the universe humbled himself. And I've said this before here, I'm sure I have. Bruce Shelley's opening line of his church history. His opening line of his church history was this, Christianity is the only religion that has as its central event.

15:58 I get choked up with this. Central event, the humiliation of its god. Islam could never say that. Would never say that. The Vedas would never say that.

16:15 Buddhism, nothing would say that except Jesus Christ. It's true. Humble himself. Now, why do we talk about this? We talk about this because it is so important.

16:53 Okay. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as unto the lord. Look at verse 24. Therefore, as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wise be subject to their own husbands. In everything So this is the responsibility.

17:20 I mean, ladies, I really feel for you in the climate culture that we are in in this situation of I'm I'm going to assert my rights. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do that. This is my right. I am going to I am going to be this way.

17:38 Right? Wrong. No. You're submissive. You know, and then we're going to say to the husbands, I've gotta throw this in right away.

17:48 We're to say to the husbands, love your wives. That's what he's going to tell us. Husbands, love your wives. A loving husband will have a submissive wife. A husband that loves his wife not as his own body will have a submissive wife.

18:11 She will feel comfortable. I had a friend of mine. And, when he first met Mary Ann, Tony first met Mary Ann, Tony... Mary Ann was one of these like now women, National Organization of Women, you know, I'm gonna assert rights, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna be my own, you know, all that kind of stuff. And she she met Tony and they got together and they started dating and all this and then they felt like, well, let's get married.

18:42 You know, I saw such a change in Mary Anne. She was a businesswoman prior to to looking at Tony and then, you know, self assertive and all that kind of stuff. All of a sudden, she was not meek. I mean, meek, strength under control, but she was really one of those individuals that was submissive to her. I saw the the unbelievable change in her life.

19:09 Why? Because Tony didn't dote over her but he really loved her. He really cared for her. He watched as his as his own body. And so we look at this and husband, wives, submit yourselves as unto the lord as to your own husbands.

19:28 I, you know, it says it twice. You, ladies, do not, if you're married, do not submit yourself to somebody else's. You don't submit yourself to somebody else. You know, the the past, the the see, the pasture is greener and the other, oh, I don't know how that goes but you know, it's all greener in the other side. Look at him.

19:51 He's really fantastic. He's really great and all of a sudden, your affections start to shift from your husband who is really, he's not the great guy that you, you know, that you first thought he was and all of a sudden, all of a sudden, you're shifting and you're looking at another guy. Is that possible? You betcha it's possible. And so what happens is it says, submit yourselves to your own husbands.

20:18 In everything, not to somebody else's husband, your own husband. As in in in everything and as unto the lord. And then so you you know, look at verse 33 and it and it says it again, nevertheless, let everyone of you in particularly so loved his wife even as himself and the wife see that she reverence her husband. She respects her husband. This is this is amazing to me.

20:49 I I think and by the way, it's we are such, well, let me read this passage first. In the same manner, you wives, first Peter three, you wives be in subjection to your own husbands that if any obey not the word, the husband wouldn't obey the word that they also without the word be one by the behavior of the wife, of the wives. Wow. This this means that there's tension. This means that, you know, are they are they saved?

21:33 Is it, you know, course, you're not going to get into a relationship with a person who is not born again. I've seen it. I've seen where a a woman thinks that the, you know, the age of marriage is pastor and she's going to be an old maid and so therefore, I've gotta go after somebody that is I'm I'm getting desperate here. I've seen this and I talked to that that young lady after she married the unsaved guy and she said, man, that was the biggest mistake of my life. That was a big mistake because she had nothing but trouble And somebody once said, it was HA Ironside that said, if you married an unsaved guy, you're gonna have you're gonna have trouble with your father-in-law.

22:36 The devil You'll have problems. Oh, I'm gonna do this as evangelistic. You know, the old flirt to convert. You know, I'm going to I'm going to pick him up and lead him to Christ. So, I'll marry, I'll marry him.

22:57 I'll be in this relationship and I'll marry him. I'll pick him up. I'm going to tell you something. They're going to pull you down. They're going to pull you down like crazy and it's going to be very very difficult, very tough.

23:12 So, what you want to do, well, with this wives in first Peter thing, I I had an a situation and I don't recommend this. I don't recommend this. I just wanna wanna tell you before I tell you about the situation. I was asked to come and and talk to this guy who was dying. The family said, my my my dad's dying or my father, he's dying.

23:44 Can you talk to him? He's not safe. And I said, yeah, it'd be honored to. So, I went there and we talked and praise god on his deathbed. He he later succumbed.

23:59 He trusted Christ as a savior. Wow. Praise god. You know what he told me? His wife, I'm standing here.

24:08 The bed's here. He's laying there. His wife is standing right there. He looks at her and points to her and talks to me and said, I beat her. I beat the kids.

24:25 She stayed with me. Now I'm not talking about if you're in that kind of an abusive situation. It was verbal abuse. It was mental abuse, and it was physical abuse. If you're in that kind of situation, you need to get wisdom as to whether you should stay with that person or not.

24:44 That's an important issue. That's an important issue. I don't want you to get killed because... You know? But she decided to follow that passage and she decided that I'm going to stay with him and love that man and it was it was I don't know she got got married first and then got saved and then he wasn't etcetera.

25:10 I don't know the whole story on that but he says, the reason I trusted Christ today is because of her. She testified to me. He didn't use that word. She showed me the love of Jesus. And I wanna trust him as my savior and she he did.

25:36 Wow. Wow. That is so hard. That is very difficult. That is a difficult situation because, I mean, you know, if I...

25:47 If she were asking me what what should I do, I probably would have said to her, you need to think about maybe separating from that. And, I knew of a couple that did that very thing. The guy comes home. He was in abusive situation. The guy came home after work and she's gone and the kid's gone without him knowing where she was.

26:10 The services, the the government took her took her away and hit her. It was really interesting. Really, really tough and he was baffled by it. The responsibilities of wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as unto the Lord. We have this in Colossians three eighteen as well.

26:53 You know, it's in the lord. That's the thing. The responsibilities of husbands. Look at verse 22. Actually, as unto the lord, look at look at verse 23.

27:07 A, for husbands is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, and he is the savior of the body. What is god saying to us right now? What is god saying to us? What he is saying to us is that the marriage relationship is an example of my love for you. And my submission, my son's submission to the father That's what he is doing.

27:42 It is a type. It is a a illustration to the world of how god loves us and when he talks about, you know, the two shall be one flesh, you know, Remember that? It says that? Two shall be one. Let no man separate and all that.

28:01 You know what he's saying? He's saying, my salvation that I have given to you can never be separated. So, don't you separate because this marriage is typifying or illustrating to the world of my incredible love for you. That's what he is saying and that's why he's instituted marriage. He is, it is, it is a, if you please, a incredible gospel tract illustration to the world of what it is.

28:42 Of his love for us. What a testimony. What a testimony. And notice him. Notice this too.

28:50 He he's talking about the husbands. How how are we to love him? Look at verse look at verse 20. So men ought to love. So men ought to love their wives as their own bodies and he that loveth his wife loveth himself.

29:10 For no man yet hates his own flesh but nourishes it and cherishes it. Even as the lord, the church, even as the lord, the church. It is selfless. It is selfless. Hey, guys.

29:25 Understand something here. That woman that you just married or are thinking of marrying or of, you know, years on. That woman changed her whole identity for you. Everything changed. Barb, do you know, you know Barb's maiden name?

29:48 Gruber. In fact, that's how we first met. I thought... I said, hey, Judy. And, she never turned around.

29:57 I I said, hey, Judy. She was turned around. And I said, hey, Judy. And she never turned around. I said, Judy, Simchick.

30:03 And she turned around. She goes, I'm Barb Gruber. And smooth as silk. I said, Gruber? I did that.

30:13 I actually said that. I said, Gruber? Gruber. I did I did say this. Oh, alright.

30:23 If I if I was Barb, I'd come up and right upside the head, you know, potential husband beating, you know, boom. You know, Goober, you know. And, oh, she took on the Schroeder name. She took on a whole new identity to becoming one. And that's just not the physicality of it.

30:49 This is the whole identity is tied up. Respect that, would you? You guys who are so stinking selfish and thinking about yourself. Love your wives. Love your wife.

31:12 She gave up to be with you. And then, if you have kids everything changes and that is true. They're not the same looking person after having three or four kids. Things stretch out. They gain weight.

31:38 Everything like things change and they become different in terms of the physicality. And us guys, man, we go we go, there's... This this lady doesn't look that bad as this. I mean, come on. Love your wives.

32:25 You know, I said that to my son one time. I said, man, and we were standing at Turkey Hill Ranch Bible Camp and I'm standing there and and it's a 114100% humidity, no rain. It was hot and we're just standing there dripping and I said, JC is right next to me. I said, man, am I hot? And he looks at me and says, that's a matter of opinion, dad.

32:51 Oh, why I ought to? But a lot of us think that we're really hot. We're really hot stuff, us guys. Love your wives. It is a matter of commitment.

33:11 My uncle who is not a Christian, he was an eye specialist, ophthalmologist, a MDI ophthalmologist. My aunt and they're both in eternity now. And I don't know where. My aunt was an alcoholic. In fact, that's how she died.

33:32 She died of cirrhosis of the liver. My mother, that's her brother, uncle Jim, he says, my mother says to Jim, her brother, she says, Jim, why do you stay with Phyllis? Why do you stay with Phyllis? What is the deal? I mean, she's causing nothing but problems.

33:56 And in his Bostonian accent, he says, Francis, my mother's name, I took vows. And I meant those vows, and I'm keeping those vows no matter what. You understand me, Francis? And that guy wasn't even saved. And I thought to myself, wow.

34:24 Wow. It is a commitment When you say you stand at the altar and you say, I do and then the other person's, I do, that is boom. It is an covenant. It is an oath. It is not to be violated and so, we make that commitment.

34:52 We say, I'm going to do this. We're often tempted. The husbands are often tempted. Women are very visual. I mean, excuse me, men are very visual.

35:10 Girls, ladies are very security minded. This is why sometimes and I said this one time at a a I said that it was really funny. I'm saying, yeah, that's why you'll see a beautiful woman with a short, dumpy, bald headed guy. You know, you know, not dumpy in the sense that he smells bad or anything, but he's short, fat, bald headed guy, and the woman is very stately and beautiful and all this kind of stuff. And as I'm speaking, as I'm saying this, this is really funny.

35:45 I'm saying this kind of stuff and I'm I'm I'm talking and then I move over there and I look at a guy and his beautiful wife. He's short and dumpy, bald headed. He said, right in the middle, he goes, you talking about me? Right in the middle of everything. You talking about me?

36:05 And the the the place went, it was at Lakeside. It it... And they they went berserk because... And I looked at him and I'm going, no. No.

36:14 But you're a good illustration. You know? Why why would she be... You know, you go like, oh, why was, why is she with him? I mean, you can, you know why?

36:25 Because she feels secure. He's gone va va voom. Look at this babe. She's gone. I feel secure with him.

36:42 It is a commitment. Husbands, love your wives. Make them feel secure. Help them. Love them.

36:52 What if they go through the the windshield and have to have re re you know surgery. What if they have breast cancer? And they have to have a medical a mastectomy. What if they what if they go through all those things and everything changes? You're still committed.

37:14 And it's an act of your will You say, I will. I do. What's the rationale for all this? The rationale is, you know, we have Christ's headship over the church. Look at verse twenty twenty three again.

37:40 For the husbands is head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church. He is the savior of the body. So, this is why head coverings are so important. It is telling angels. In first Corinthians chapter 11, we see the headship.

38:00 We see the headship. The lord Jesus is the head that the father is the headship over the lord Jesus. The lord Jesus is the head over the man. The man is head over the woman and the and the symbol of that for the woman is the head covering. Oh well, I'm not going to go into an exegesis on first first Corinthians 11.

38:24 Not going to do that. We don't have time. That's for sure but it is a symbol of that submission of the wife being submissive to the man. Well, what if I'm not saved? What if I'm, I mean, not saved.

38:39 Then, all bets are off but what if I'm not married? It says, be submissive to the menfolk. You're doing this and by the way, the angels are looking. On this They're watching. They're those they're watching to see submission or rebellion.

39:54 At the outset of this, it's not a fifty fifty. It's not fifty fifty. It's 100%, 100. I give to my wife, period. I don't expect anything back.

40:06 If I get it back, praise god. That's cool. She'll want to give it back though. She'll want to And notice verse 26 that he may sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of the water by the word. He's talking about the church.

40:31 That's for sure. But he's also talking about the marriage relationship. The sanctification of your marriage, the set apart of your marriage, and then also the glorification. Notice verse 27. That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing.

40:57 But that it should be holy and without blemish. Is marriage tough? Yeah. It's tough. It really is.

41:17 It's tough sometimes because you got two independent people committing themselves to each other. And by God's grace. And sometimes your breath is your breath is bad. Your feet stink, guys. And they still love you.

41:41 They still minister to you. They still care. By the way, if you're single, I want you to just a little tidbit. When you're looking at a potential spouse, see how that person that you're looking at and saying, woah, this is you know, if somebody I, this would be great, right? This would be, well, those guys, you guys are thinking this.

42:07 I know you are. You're going, woah, that's that's fantastic. See how they treat their mother. See how they treat their father. If they don't respect their mother or their father, let that be a flag.

42:27 Ping. Let that be as as something that would really, how do they, how do they treat their mom and dad? Do they treat them with respect? Do they treat them or just, you know, flip it. This is serious.

42:48 What we're talking about here is just not an illustration of the family of a marriage relationship and then a family to of of Christ loving the church. The damage of divorce is stunning. It's awful and it's stunning. I saw the sun. I saw the son of this fellow I was telling you about.

43:30 And they're they're filing for divorce. And I looked at I looked at the son. He's 14, big kid. And I I stood him up, put my hands on his shoulder, and I said, I gotta tell you something. You're not at fault.

43:50 They are not divorcing because of you. You're not at fault. Because most children think, if there's children involved in that kind of a situation, most children think they're the reason why mom and dad are quitting on each other. We're at. We're the problem.

44:14 If I just do better, if I do better in school, if I'm not such a pain on all that kind of stuff, you will, you know, the marriage will be better. You'll you'll be back together. Not at fault. I don't like this message. So maybe you're joining me in that and saying, I don't like it either.

45:10 And if you're in the prospect perspective, you know, you're looking and thinking about who to marry and all that kind of stuff and you're, you know, you look at that person Am I committed? Would I be committed to that person? Because marriage is not infatuation. Marriage is not she brings to the table a great intellect or she's beautiful or she's rich or that's not the issue. The issue is if God led you together, let no man, even you, put it asunder.

45:55 Tear it apart. It's commitment. And the question I'm asking you gentlemen is, are you committed? To her? I can't answer that.

46:14 I can only answer for myself. I can only answer for myself. And I, fifty, almost fifty one years of marriage, has it been easy? No. Because you're constantly making that commitment.

46:34 You're constantly making the statement to her and to you, to yourself, and to the lord. I am committed. I love my wife. You can do that. You can love.

46:52 You can make yourself love. Because what is love? Selflessness. Agape love, selfless. I'm thinking about not me, not how I feel about it, but do I love her, And I will love her because I will not think of me.

47:25 I will think of her. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. Right? No. You have to yield to the Lord all the time.

48:00 About the beans? I remember all the beans I ate. Oh, yeah. It was... This is stuff love is made out of.

48:08 I ate a big can of beans. I was feeling a little blocked. And I thought, I chased it... This is true. I chased it with 15 prunes.

48:25 Yeah. It was bad. It was just like that movie Dumb and Dumber where... Just like that. Barb and I were in a rip roaring argument.

48:36 I mean, we were yelling. I I talked to her. I don't I don't all of a sudden, I heard. And I go... I I could feel it.

48:47 I'm going, this is not good. This is not good. And I said, this is true. I said, honey, come here. And she looks at me.

49:00 I mean, she's like, madder than a hornet. So am I. I'm going, and I said, honey, come here. And she comes over, and I said, hug me. She hugged me.

49:13 I said, squeeze me. And it all broke loose. And we had to open the windows and everything. But you know what happened? It ended the argument.

49:30 It ended the argument. We were laughing so hard. It was unbelievable. We were laughing. I mean, we were dying.

49:37 It was, I couldn't hardly breathe well for a lot of reasons. But, I mean, was just unbelievable. Did the young man be writing that down? Yeah. You're you're...

49:49 You wanna take that can... It's it's, Campbell's. Okay. And you wanna get the California prunes. They work faster.

49:57 Okay. So, I mean, yeah, write that down. So, I mean, it's it's this is the stuff marriage is made out of. Kind of. Well, it happens.

50:09 You who have been married a long time, no. You know that this stuff is true. We're transparent about it, and I'm transparent with that story because we made a decision 100%, 100%. Praise God, my wife has stayed with that. And me too.

50:41 We said we're gonna love each other. Now, we're not the model couple. We're not gonna write any books on this or anything like that. It's a commitment. Agape love.

51:00 Father, help us, we pray. As we prepare to marry, as we are thinking of marrying, or in a marriage of fifty years, twenty years, thirty years, we ask you, Lord, that you would just really help. Please bless, we pray. And bless our marriages that we can be a testimony to this world of your son's great love for us. In Jesus's name, amen.