Love for a Lifetime
Fireproof Your Relationships: Sermon Three
Matthew 19:3-6
Good morning friends!
Two little guys were sitting in a wedding, watching what was going on, when one asked the other, "So, how many marriages can you have?"
His friend whispered, "16, I think."
16?"
"I think so."
"How do you know?"
"I added it up one time. Every time I come to a wedding the pastor says ‘Four better, four worse, four richer, four poorer.’"
Of course, we’re all hoping for the better and richer ones…
We’re learning these days about how to Fireproof our relationships, and I want to talk to you this morning about how to fireproof your most important relationship of all: your marriage. If you’re not married, I hope you’ll take careful notes in this message, because what you’re going to learn will make a huge difference in any future marriage, should you decide to enter into one and it will empower you to help your children and friends in their marriages..
Sometimes when I do a wedding, looking at the rings, I mention three things about them. (1) They’re round, which means they have no end. That’s the nature of marriage. (2) Because they’re round, they are made to be equally strong at all points. And (3) they’re costly; all marriages start with a sacrifice and are sustained by sacrifices. Then I ask them to say their vows, which always end with, "As long as we both shall live."
In the movie, Fireproof, Caleb and Catherine are starting down the road to divorce. Caleb explains to his friend, Michael that the marriage is probably through. To which Michael responds, "I’ve seen you run into a burning building to save people you don’t even know, but you’re going to let your own marriage burn to the ground."
Watch this clip with me. Clip ‘Session Three’ from your Fireproof CD
Find a Bible and Turn to Matthew 19:3-6.
One time Jesus was asked about marriage. Here’s how that went down.
Matthew 19:3-6 - Read - Pray
"Therefore what God has joined together, let no man separate." That’s the warning we hear pastors give at the conclusion of every wedding. By this point, the couple is beaming. They’re about to turn and face their parents and friends, as husband and wife, for the very first time. The music will swell, the people will stand and clap, and the ‘endorphin induced euphoria dressed up as mature love and relational bliss’ couple will start to exit down the aisle and walk off clasping hands silhouetted against the divine backdrop of the setting sun into the surrealistic aura of utopia and live… happily ever after.
It’s at that moment I’m almost tempted to say, "Wait, wait! Let me tell you what’s most likely to happen from here! Because reality is, while you married for better and worse, richer and poorer, in sickness and in health, there’s going to be a lot more worse, poorer, and sickness than you really want. And yes, you’ll have better and richer and health, but not nearly as often or as early as you would like."
What I want to say to every married couple is that All Marriages Go Through Seasons. Nobody gets a cakewalk. That’s just not how life works. Like the rotation of the earth, they move through stages that are predictable. Many experts agree that there are six of them, one following the next.
Here’s how it works: the Seasons of a Marriage
Two young people meet and fall in love. Unlike the rest of the world, they have a picture-perfect relationship. While in this first season, they know that they have something special between them. Theirs is a rare love, not like the common stuff their parents’ experienced. More like Anthony and Cleopatra or Romeo and Juliet .
She calls it, "A match made in heaven."
He says "We love each other."
It’s magic every time they’re together, and misery every moment they’re apart. There’s such a strong chemistry that passes between them that you’d almost be tempted to call it a chemical addiction. And some people do.
Experts have astutely labeled this early stage Romance.
1. Romance Ever heard of it? It’s the first season of a marriage: The Romance Stage. It starts when the couple fall in love - and can go on for years if it is nurtured - but will last no longer that 18-36 months after the marriage.
During romance, all is right with the world. Women lose weight and men lose money. She’d rather spend time thinking about him than eating; he’d rather spend money on her than pay the rent.
Romance is the season that most love songs are written about. [Start to play quietly in the background "When a Man Loves a Woman" - Percy Sledge]
Years ago, Lewis Wright wrote a song about this stage, and Michael Bolton updated it in the 1990’s. You heard it sung by Percy Sledge as you came in this morning - and you can hear it playing softly in the background now.
"When a man loves a woman."
"When a man loves a woman, he can’t keep his mind on nothin’ else." (Apparently including grammar.)
"He’d trade the world for the good thing he has found." Now that’s romantic, isn’t it?
"When a man loves a woman, he’d give up all his comforts and sleep out in the rain if she said that’s the way it ought to be." Can we talk a minute? I ask you: wouldn’t most men want to discuss plan B if their wife said, "I want you to sleep out in the rain because that’s the way it ought to be?" Only in the season of romance could she hope to get away with such a thing.
Continuing,
"Trying to hold onto your precious love baby, don’t treat me bad." Personally, I think she treated him bad when she told him to sleep in the rain. But somehow, when we’re in this phase, nothing else matters. We don’t think straight, we don’t act smart.
M. Scott Peck says that this phase of romance is a prank played on us by our otherwise rational minds to trick us into doing things that we would normally never consider.
Romance: the first season of a relationship.
For those of you interested in facts, psychologists tell us that romantic feelings of infatuation wear off, on average, about 2 ½ years into any relationship.
And then you know what you’re left with?
2. Reality. That’s the second season of a marriage.
Reality is what sets in when romance wears off.
Suddenly, one or both parties realizes that the object of their pursuit, the person of their dreams, the individual they feared they could never attract . . . is now someone they can never get rid of. They begin to think, "Now that I have this relationship, what do I do with it?" It’s like the dog that’s been chasing cars for years and one day he catches one. "Now what do I do?" he says.
Some say marriage is a romance in which the hero and heroine die in the first chapter.
"Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away."
Being in love is what romance is all about.
So after the first 2 ½ years the two, who were once in love, now have to discover how to choose to love for a lifetime.
Author Wayne Oates writes about this stage:
"All couples have friction during the first two years of marriage over several adjustments. They have to work out a mutually satisfying routine of work, sleep, social activities, and frequency and form of sexual relations. They need to agree about how to be involved in the rituals of each other’s parental families at major holidays and family rituals. They must learn the subtleties of each other’s non-verbal behaviors and ways of communicating feelings. They have to come to terms with their desires to change each other. And they must make explicit the unspoken and previous unconscious assumptions about marriage that they brought to their union." – Wayne Oates: Husbands and Wives, Victor Books, 1988, p. 328.
That’s what the first round of reality looks like.
In the midst of all this struggle, as the Novocain of romance wears off, both parties begin to feel a growing pain from the flip-side of character traits they once thought were so appealing.
He says, "When we first started dating, I saw her as such a neat person - never a hair out of place, never a wrinkle in her blouse. Now I’m seeing that she’s compulsive. We can never go anywhere on a whim, because she’s got to get ready first. She’s so meticulous, she even irons her pajamas!
She says, "While we were dating, he was always the life of the party. He would do outrageous things and light up the room. I was so proud to be with him. Now I’m seeing how impulsive he is. He never thinks before acting. Sometimes he does things that are so outrageous they make me embarrassed to be with him."
Reality clarifies what romance conceals, and all the while we start to see more clearly who it is we are married to.
From then on it is not long before the relationship reaches the next stage:
3. Resentment. Resentment is the third season of every marriage. Every marriage goes through each of these seasons, friends and this one comes close on the heals of Reality - and lasts for a few weeks.
She says, "Something happened to me when I wasn’t looking. Who switched husbands on me? I went to bed with George Clooney and woke up with Frankenstein. I thought I was marrying the man of my dreams, but somehow I wound up with Osama bin Laden’s nephew.
He says, "I thought I was marrying Julia Roberts, now I wish she really was the runaway bride."
During the resentment phase, the one who was once the object of our affection now becomes the target of our frustration.
From Resentment the next stage does not seem that far away - and it is inevitable:
4. Rejection - During this phase we come to the rather sad conclusion that we have made a huge mistake and ended up marring the wrong person.
And we start the ‘Blame Game’ - we start to blame the spouse for all the evils in the world, even if they are only remotely connected to the problem. I was speaking with a husband recently whose wife had told him, "You are the reason for everything that has gone wrong in my life over the last 30 years." During this phase - if there are financial stresses, it’s her fault because she spends too much. Or his fault, because he makes too little. If there is friction, he started it, or she was too sensitive. If there’s blame to be cast, well, go look in the mirror pal, because it’s certainly not my fault. Or, as Caleb said in the movie, "I am not a perfect person, but better than most. And if my marriage is failing, it is not all my fault."
It’s during this Resentment and Rejection phase when character is tested, the need for love comes into play, really for the first time. It’s because of this kind of feeling that the Apostle Paul wrote,
"Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive each other whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity." Colossians 3:12-14.
Now watch this - if you will embrace that verse, if you will hang on to that commitment, you have the opportunity to get into the fifth stage that any relationship that survives gets into.
5. Repositioning - let me tell you want happens during this phase. You make a choice, a choice to not walk out of the door but rather you make a principle choice to see the relationship through and your outlook changes.
Instead of playing the Blame Game - you play the Claim Game - you claim responsibility to make it work.
Instead of waiting to defend, you are willing to bend - and do what you need to redeem the relationship. This is where you make the principle choice to love - to love no matter what with the hope and belief that the relationship will come right.
And when you choose that kind of love, the kind of love we learned about last weekend, God’s kind of love, that focuses on you and your needs, not me and mine, then the relationship can enter the sixth season of marriage. It’s called the season of 6. Rebuilding
If that kind of love doesn’t get practiced, then the marriage never makes it through all the seasons. It either gets stuck in a perpetual wintertime of Rejection, or it dies and is buried in a ceremony we call, "Divorce."
This is the glasses-off truth about marriage. All marriages have Romance and Reality and Resentment and Rejection on their calendars. Some get to experience the thrill and joy of Repositioning and Rebuilding.
To succeed during the season of Rebuilding, there are three great skills we need, that have been called:
The Three Great Skills of Life-Time Lovers:
These are must-have skills if you want to rebuild.
Remembering
Asking
Deciding
The first of these critical skills in rebuilding a marriage, is . . .
1. Remember - That We’re Different, and Adapting Accordingly.
We spent a lot of time on this two weeks ago. If you missed it, I encourage you to listen online, or order the CD at the Sound Desk.
Ask a man how he feels about something and he’ll tell you what he thinks about it. Ask a woman what she thinks about someone, and she’ll tell you how she feels about them.
These differences are heightened in the Reality and Rebuilding stages. So, if you’re going to successfully rebuild your marriage, you’re going to have to remember that you and your spouse are different and compensate accordingly.
Another critical skill in rebuilding a marriage or even a long-term friendship Is
2. Ask - and Grant Forgiveness.
Note that this action isn’t really a skill. It doesn’t take any skill to say the words, "I’m sorry, or please forgive me." What it takes is character. It takes being humble enough to admit you’re not perfect.
I’m going to read you a story that we’ll come back to two weeks from now. It’s written by J.D. Holt.
One of the first lessons I learned in our marriage was the necessity of saying, "I’m sorry." My wife, Christy, is much better at it than me. In fact, it seems that whenever we had a disagreement, she would be the first to apologize. Due to my delicate male ego, I would let her.
After one of our "discussions," Christy decided that it was my turn to say "I’m sorry." Since I wasn’t used to apologizing, I thought nothing of the stony silence that existed between us for the next hour. However, I caught her non-verbal message after awhile: "Either you apologize, or face the consequences." As a newlywed, it didn’t take me long to figure out what those consequences might be!
But I was feeling stubborn that evening and thought maybe I could outwait her. I was wrong. There was no way she was going to apologize first. She had made up her mind, the next move was up to me.
I knew I should do my part; Christy was a very forgiving person. And after all, wasn’t I the head of the home? Wasn’t I the one who was supposed to be showing the way? Wasn’t I to love Christy as Christ loved His church?
Finally, I dropped to my knees. Not to pray, although I probably should have. I dropped to my knees so I could crawl across the living room and beg Christy’s forgiveness. It was a well-calculated move, and it brought the desired result: laughter. For all her determination, she couldn’t stay mad when she saw her penitent husband crawling on the floor.
When I finally reached her, we collapsed in each other’s arms, almost simultaneously saying, "I’m sorry!" The ice had been broken, and we could return to the joys of our relationship.
Since that time, I’ve said, "I’m sorry" many times. Sometimes I’ve added flowers or a gift. I doubt I’ll ever be as quick to forgive as Christy, but I’ll never forget the lesson I learned that night. Love means you always have to say, "I’m sorry."
My Bible says: "Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ, God forgave you." Ephesians 4:32
A third skill, and maybe the most important one for lifetime love, is
3. Decide - to Love and Keep on Loving.
One of the biggest misunderstandings about marriage in our day is that people think marriage is based on love, and that love is a feeling. Love isn’t a feeling, it’s an action. It’s a way of acting, a thing you do. The Bible’s most famous passage on love, 1 Corinthians 13, says that love is patient, kind, not envious, not boastful, not proud, not rude, not self-seeking, not easily-angered. It says that it doesn’t keep score, doesn’t secretly like it when someone has something bad happen to them, protects, trusts, hopes, and hangs in there. That’s God’s description of love. What part of that is based on emotions?
None of it. It’s all based on decision. To love is a decision. To hang in, even when happily ever after isn’t happening, that’s love.
Kenny Chesney sings a song called "Don’t Blink," that goes like this:
Don’t Blink
I turned on the evening news
Saw an old man being interviewed
Turning a hundred and two today
Asked him what’s the secret to life
He looked up from his old pipe
Laughed and said "All I can say is."
Don’t blink
Just like that you’re six years old
and you take a nap and you
Wake up and you’re twenty-five
and your high school sweetheart
becomes your wife
Don’t blink
You just might miss your babies
growing like mine did
Turning into moms and dads
next thing you know your better half
Of fifty years is there in bed
And you’re praying God takes you instead
Trust me friend a hundred years goes faster than you think
So don’t blink
The older I get, the more conscious I am that I only have one life. So my choice is, instead of trading in difficult relationships for new relationships and starting the whole process over again, I want to keep and deepen my marriage, my friendships and my memories of those I’m in relationship with.
In ancient times, when a city was destroyed by an earthquake or a fire or a flood, the survivors would rebuild on top of the ruins of the old city. But I don’t want to build on top of ruin or collapse. I want to live one life, one time, for 60 or 80 or 100 years. I don’t want to repeat the same life and the same mistakes with a different person every 5 or 10 or 15 years. When I’m old, I want to be able to say to my wife, "Remember our first Christmas together? Remember when we brought our children home from the hospital? Remember those vacations…, that tragedy we weathered…, the discoveries we made during that period of our lives…?
I don’t want short bursts of life repeated over and over again. I want one life, where I learn in successively deeper levels how to love and build up my wife for the rest of my life.
Friends, all marriages go through seasons. For most people, Rebuilding is a normal state. After the first round of Romance and Reality and Resentment and Rejection and Repositioning, most marriages come back to Rebuilding in one area or another of their relationship, because there is always something we’d like to change about another person and always something that needs improving about ourselves.
Now here is the good news - if we work the Rebuilding stage sincerely, we can come back around to Romance. It might not be as sizzling hot the second time around or the third time around or the fourth time around, but it will be far better than that - far deeper - more meaningful. Just like spring follows winter and summer follows spring, marriage passes from one season to another to another, over and over again.
And if we do…? At the end of it all, we will say, "We lived mostly happily ever after." And our children and others will say, "Those two had a really good marriage."
Love Dare Challenge:
Couples:
Sometime this Week, Renew Your Vows to Each Other.
If you don’t have a copy of them, or remember what they are, we’ve supplied a sample you can use in your Message Notes:
I, _________, take you __________ to be my wife/husband.
To have and to hold from this day forward,
For better, for worse,
For richer, for poorer,
In sickness and in health.
To love and cherish as long as we both shall live.
After renewing your vows together, spend a few minutes praying together about your marriage.
Singles:
Pick out a Skill to Work On:
1. Affirming Differences in Members of the Opposite Sex
2. Forgiving (We’ll have a chance to go deeper with this in two weeks.)
3. Deciding to Love and Keep on Loving a Close Friend.
Will you take this challenge?
Let’s pray. (Pray for marriages in each of the seasons, for courage to rebuild, character to keep loving, courage to forgive, and creativity in honoring the differences between men and women.)
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