Digging Ditches P3 - Marriage

Pastor Zach Whitehead

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

She's entered the house. Love you. It's okay. I j I just rolled in too. I I just beat you here. It's no big deal. Man, I'm excited about this week. Um because that means next week I move and no more driving. So I'm super excited. But no, man, I really wish like we could do this youth group style and have just a bunch of futons and couches rather than the lights and you know, staring down the barrel of this. Because I think the Tuesday night stuff's a lot more conversational in tone and you know, practicality. Because sometimes asking questions in this, people don't feel as comfortable answering because you're like, I gotta shout from the back of the room, and I don't want people to know what I'm saying, you know, because what if I get it wrong? So, you know, go back to the Sunday school days. The answer to everything is Jesus, at least, or at least if Jesus is in the answer, you're probably more than you know 75% right. Um, but remember, so Sundays we're talking about things uh and we're going back to it in terms of lens of the lamb, that we want to we want to read, we want to read scripture through the light of Jesus. Um, because even Old Testament all points to Christ. And then as you read what Jesus speaks, he referenced the Old Testament prophets, he references the Torah, he references the law, and then even go and read the apostles, they don't just refer to the words of Jesus, they also refer to those same things. They refer to the they refer to the prophets, they refer to uh the Old Testament prophets, they refer to the law. Um, because Christ didn't come to do away with the law, he came to fulfill the law, remember? So we want we want to take the fullness of the word. It's not what it can't we can't just be, well, I just want the words of Jesus. Well, if you go read the words in red, there's a lot of quotations from prophets. And so um, and if you want that too, again, the apostles quoted the words in red. So we've got to keep that all within mind as we're doing this. And so that first week we talked about uh the house the lamb was building, and on Tuesday night we talked about um that that first Tuesday night we talked about just establishing that what what what those ditches are that are those those channels that those in that inflow is going to be that we have to start thinking about. And then since last week we talked uh the sorry the previous week we talked about the heart um the heart the lamb is building, we talked about the individual, right? And so we talked about that and we talked about covenant and holiness and practicality last Tuesday. And so this week, since we talked about marriage, um, again, in the different context of hey, this is five easy ways to save your marriage. If you want that, go find it on Instagram, because this ain't it. We're gonna talk about that from that context of that covenant relationship. Because remember, marriage is a covenant that's meant to emulate perfectly the bride, the church, and the bridegroom. And so the things that we do, we have to emulate that. So again, we talked about that Sunday. Uh we saw that marriage isn't merely a social institution or a legal contract, um, it's a covenant designed to reveal Christ and his church. So I'm not gonna preach you a marriage sermon. I told you that Sunday, I'm not tonight's not gonna be the practical things to fix your marriage. God's gonna reveal those things. Tonight we're gonna ask a different question. And so we've been talking about digging the ditches. How do we prepare that channel for that kind of marriage to exist? How do we prepare the channel for that kind of marriage to exist? Again, let's go back to 2 Kings 3. I told you you guys are gonna be able to like quote this like Bible quizzers before we're done with this. And so this is the prophet, uh this is this is one of the prophets speaking. He said, and thus saith the Lord. So he's giving he's giving command to the people. Uh this is Elisha, by the way. I will make this uh I'll make this dry stream bed full of pools. So it's not just a place that there's no water, it's a place water once existed. It's a stream bed, it's a it's a it's a dried riverbed. Imagine if the Mississippi River went, didn't just go to like low stage, like the silt at the bottom dried up. That's what we're talking about. That's why this miracle is so huge. And so um Elisha's saying, look, this dry stream bed that you can walk on that once gave you water, watered your animals, watered your crops, it's gonna the water's gonna come again. So this is what he says. Um he says, for thus saith the Lord, you shall not see the wind, the rain, or the stream, and but that stream bed will be filled with water, so that you shall drink you, your livestock, um, and your your animals. So not just for you, not just for your family, but for the things that sustain your family. And this is a light, he said, this is a light thing in the sight of the Lord. 2020, 2026, saying, you know, interpretation of this, if you were looking at that version of the Bible, that's child's play for God. That's child's play for the Lord. That's that's just that's God, that's God sneezed, and that happened. You should listen to him if he speaks. He will also give them Moabites into your hands. So he continues this, and he says, and you shall attack every one of their fortified cities and every choice city, and fell every good tree, and stop all the springs of water, and ruined every good uh piece of land with stones. And the next morning, about the time the offering, uh, the sacrifice, behold, water came from the direction of Edom, and the country was filled with water. And so God didn't just use the prophet to speak a word and say, Hey, there's gonna be water. He poured out extended blessing on it, and then the next day when the sacrifice was given, water started flowing. But what did the people have to do? They had to be practical and start digging out ditches. And again, that's what we're talking about. If we're talking about re-rewiring our brains and looking at the word in the way God intended us to, Tuesday nights are gonna be talking about, well, how do we practically do that? Remember, the whole idea behind this, um, just again, on my heart, is this is what the Lord keeps telling, prepare a healthy house because I intend to fill it. And so if he intends to fill it, where are these people gonna go? If they've got needs, where do they go? If they got needs in their marriage or with their children or recovery or any, you know, whatever, whatever it may be when they come in, how are we gonna facilitate that? And that's what these dishes do. So the miracle came because someone was willing to dig. Not just the fact the water came, but if someone was willing to dig. Because if no one actually stopped and actually dug those channels out, that water would just hit that dry, that dry stream bed and just kept going. From Edom, down past the people. They might have got a good couple buckets out of it. It'd been a great day, like a water park, and then done. It was the people responding to the word of God, to the prophecy of God, from uh and and and and actually digging those things. Sometimes miracles don't look the way they want we want them to look. Miracles require something on our part. God does the supernatural part. You and I have to do the natural stuff. So if God said told, you know, told uh told Naaman to go dip in the Jordan River seven times in Hewood Hill, well, got to go do the dirty work and go to the Jordan River. And so if he's telling us, dig these ditches so I can send the water, so I can send the rain, so I can send that inflow, we got to do the natural part of it and dig these things out. The water's God's responsibility, the ditch was Israel's, and so likewise, we can't manufacture God's blessing. We can't manufacture God's presence. We can't do that, but we can prepare the channels that are able to receive it. Again, the big idea covenants are sustained by practices. Everybody say this. Hey, covenants are sustained by practices. So God establishes the covenant, but we practice living inside of it. Practice doesn't earn the covenant. Remember that. You cannot earn grace. You can't earn God's mercy, you can't earn God's love, you can't earn any of that. It's freely given. Practice preserves our awareness of that, is that God made that covenant available to us, but that constant practice keeps it at the forefront of our mind. I never graduate from the gospel. I never graduate beyond that, that I'm still a sinner yet saved by grace, that I don't belong in this, but God loves me enough to bring me into it. And so we have to stay in that. And so, what do we do to dig the ditch? Establish holy rhythms. A ditch isn't dug once. And if you've dug a ditch before, especially in South Louisiana, you know that. It's formed through repeated work. You may have, you may, you may dig it out initially, right? But you're gonna have to go six months and clean it out. You're gonna have to go in a year and go dig it out a little bit more. You're gonna have to go the following year if you didn't do any of that that year because you just didn't feel like it in hurricane season and summer was just too hot. You gotta go dig it out. Why? Because something's gonna keep flowing into that ditch and either filling it back up or polluting the stream that's coming through it. It's formed through repeated work. So, likewise, we have to think about marriages in the same way. Healthy marriages are formed through repeated covenant practices. And so remember, Sunday, if you're not married in the house, that's okay. Because what? God's not looking for two halves to make a hole. God's looking for us as whole first, the individual whole in the covenant with him first. It's two holes come together to make something new. Okay? That's that's what God's referring to in his word when he talks about marriage. And so you can establish these, the anything that I say with the word marriage, you can establish, whether you're 12 years old or you know, you're 20 years old and you're looking to get married. You can establish these things. You can establish healthy and holy rhythms before you get married. You probably should. Um, that should probably be something you look for in your future spouse. What's their prayer life look like? What's their Bible reading look like? What's any of that look like? Okay. So those digs, those ditches aren't dug once, and healthy marriages are formed through repeated covenant practices, not because they earn God's favor, but again, they continually orient the marriage. Or again, if you're not, if you're not in that place, they continually orient our heart toward God. I don't want to read my Bible every day, guys. And if you're honest, you're probably saying the same thing. There's some days that we do the things that we don't want to know, we don't do we don't want to do because we know it produces something good in our lives. It is sometimes hard to stop and pray during the day or read the Bible when you've had your kid, you know, when you've been working from home all day and the kids have been climbing on top of you, and finally, while all them little boogers are asleep, you're just like, I just want to unwind for a minute. Either let me doom scroll, or I'm gonna go play on the PlayStation, or I'm just gonna go shoot some basketball, or I'm just gonna go sit in my my lazy boy and put that up and just put the TV on. I'm not even gonna watch what's on TV because I just want the white noise right there. And if that's the only alone time that I got that day, it's worth giving up that time because I get to spend it with God. Does it make sense? We there's and and and those of you who've been married any length of time, you know there's things that you do in your marriage that you don't necessarily like doing, but you know who it's for, and you know that over time that eventually you can pick up your socks and put them in the hamper if it really bothers your spouse that much. Is it a big deal to you? No, but if it's a big deal to them, at some point it's gonna have to become a big deal to you. So, practice number one, remember, everybody say remember. So, this is a very scriptural principle. I think oftentimes we don't we don't live this out enough, is that throughout scripture, God constantly tells his people to remember. Again, everybody say remember. So, what were some things that they had to remember? The feast of Passover, that was a remembrance of what God did. What what what was the feast of Passover about? Anybody? What were they remembering? Being yeah, being delivered. That the angel of death passed over. What it was like to to put the blood of the lamb on the door. Communion. What was communion? Jesus said, Do this in remembrance of me. That was communion. Memorial stones. He would tell oftentimes when people had an encounter with God, they would stop let's say Jacob, for example, after he wrestled with the angel all night. He built a memorial there. And so when people would go there, or either he would go back, he would see it, or when people trespassed, they knew what those stones meant. There were feasts beyond Passover. Passover was just one feast. There was a cycle of feast throughout the year that they would either celebrate in their hometowns, and I if I'm again, somebody correct me if I'm wrong, at least three times a year that they would travel to Jerusalem to go celebrate the feast together, like Passover and uh Pentecost. Um, the Sabbath, he tells them all the time to remember the Sabbath. Why? He says, Remember the Sabbath, keep it holy. Because I'm God, I didn't need to rest, and I chose to rest on the seventh day to example to you that you're human, you need rest. Because forgetting is the first step towards drifting. Forgetting is the first step towards drifting. The same is true in marriage. When a couple stops remembering, they begin to rewrite their history. We used to fill in the blank. You've always filled in the blank. We've never filled in the blank. I know oftentimes our wives accuse us husbands of having selective memory, but can I tell you the enemy loves selective memory on both sides of the fence? Because using words like absol the using absolute words like never and always, there was probably a time when it did happen in the marriage. There was probably a time when things were good. There were probably times when we were, you know, we were communicating great and having that. And so what's the practical application? What do we do? Um so we we we had the idea we're supposed to remember. So how do how do we apply that scriptural principle over our marriages or over our lives personally before we get married? Tell your story often. Tell your story often how you've got there. Um tell your story how you got the Holy Ghost, how you met God, that first moment that you knew you just had that aha light bulb that that, oh my gosh, he loves me. I'm an absolute turd and he loves me. I mean, however, however you say it, I mean I'd tell Angela that. Um that's how I told her my story. Um, you know, what was it like when you felt like when you got baptized? When you spoke in tongues for the first time, maybe when you served for the first time, maybe you you played the piano for the first time, um, or you let a song for the first time, or you taught Sunday school for the first time. You remember um those things matter because what happens is as you keep remembering those things, it will keep that at the forefront of your your not just your marriage, but that covenant relationship with God. Because remember, the two individuals living in covenant first with God. Remember, we talked about we can't fix the problem downstream. We have to go to the source. You don't try to fix all the pollution on the Mississippi River in New Orleans, you start up the river and work your way down. At which point does it get more polluted? You identify it there. And so the source of all of all the source of everything is Christ, okay? Christ is pure. So we keep going down, and the first thing that God wants to do is have communion and covenant and priesthood with us, what relationship with us. So if the source isn't bad, there's got to be something in that covenant relationship with me and him that's polluting that. And before I can ever be the person that I'm supposed to be, just speak for myself, before I can ever be the man that I'm supposed to be and the husband that I'm supposed to be in marriage, I have to be the man that God's called me to be first. Out of that covenant flows healthy husbandry. And out of that holy covenant, good covenant between me and Angela, flows healthy, a healthy dad. And so you have, if you remember, you got to take it back to where it started. How did God bring you two together? Um, what prayers has he answered? Be practical. What valleys has he brought you through? Again, this is all scripture. They overcame by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their what? Their testimony. Sometimes you got to testify to each other. David, the Bible says that David encouraged himself in the Lord. Sometimes you got to encourage each other in marriage in the Lord. And and when you're going through hard times, you have to remember the things that God has done. And if you have trouble remembering, guys, make a voice memo on your phone. Um write it down. Remember those things. Celebrate your anniversaries as covenant renewal, not just milestones. Oh, we made it to our 10th anniversary. No, no, no, no, no. Even if it's not like in a church in the church or anything, or shoot, if you want to use the church to do it, I'll be glad to open it up for you. At your 10 year, your 15-year, your 20, your 25. Um, that you you you want to you want to renew that covenant. Not big ceremony grand and tons of people, but like it means something to you to look each other in the eyes and repeat those covenant vows? Absolutely, why? Because those vows in sickness and in health for richer, for four, that all come from that all came from God in the first place. And so sometimes, again, we have to remember, everybody say remember. Second thing, practical thing, we gotta worship together. Everybody say worship together. Notice is not worship, it's worship together. And so this is one of those things that you have to learn to worship as an individual first before you can learn to worship together. You gotta learn to work or worship as individuals first before you can learn to worship together. Because prayer isn't simply asking God for help, it's recentering the marriage around the true king. And many couples only pray during emergencies, and I'll even scratch couples out there. Many, many not even people, many believers only pray during emergencies. Imagine in your marriage, the only time you talked was during an emergency. It wouldn't even be fun talking to the emergency because you're probably screaming heads off at each other, not knowing how to talk to each other. That's what prayer is with God. Prayer isn't just, and yes, you can bring your emergencies to God. That's not what, that's not what we're saying. Prayer is a constant conversation. How did uh TF Tinney? Um, I'm gonna butcher it, but TF Tinney said he, he, he, he prayed, he would, uh, he would, he would, he would pray all day. Uh oh man, I'm totally gonna butcher. I've got to look it up afterwards. That's a killer. But anyway, the the premise of what he's saying, he doesn't pray. Every word that he does, every word, every word throughout the day is not a word of prayer, but he prays all day because that he know he doesn't pray for 30 minutes a time, but he never goes 30 minutes without prayer. I think that's what it is. And so he doesn't sit there and pray 30 30 minutes just right there. Sometimes it's good too, but every throughout the day, every 30 minutes or so. Yeah, he check he checked. Um it oh man, I'm I'm gonna look up the quote. I'm I'll I'll I'll I'll put I'll I'll send the video out or something. It's it's so good when he says it. But for the premise of it, he doesn't go 30 minutes a day without praying. At some point, checking in with God. At some point, just talking to him, even if it's just for a couple minutes. And that for me, when I heard that as a young man, it changed my perspective on it. Because again, there are times to just ward out in the spirit and you pray for 30 minutes an hour is necessary. And then there, but there's also the daily routine of just going throughout the day. I wake up in the morning, but I should have I should be talking to God throughout the day. I shouldn't just wake up in the morning, talk to him, and then maybe before I go to sleep, talk to him again. Constant conversation. Keep it alive with them. It's recentering the marriage around true king. And again, anywhere we use the word marriage, use the word covenant. Even you're again single teenagers, uh, you're dating your your your your your fiancés, this the covenant that matters first, it recenters it around there. So many couples only pray again, pray during emergencies, many believers only do that. So now imagine if Israel only remembered God during famine. And there's sometimes that they did. They only remembered God, they were in trouble. And then, hey God, you did a lot of cool stuff and you brought us out of Egypt and everything, but we want to have a king like everybody else around us has a king. Fine, have Saul, and we see what happened with that. But what did he do with David? There's a reason why he chose he let Saul go first so that people could see that with their choice. But what did he say with David? He said, I'm looking for a man after my own heart. And there's there's a difference. Why? What did David do? As an individual in the field, he built the covenant relationship with God before he ever got to the crown and before he was ever married. Again, because you build regular rhythms. So what are some practical things that you can do? Guys, read scripture together. That doesn't mean even if, you know, um, I'm gonna pick on Sarah and Stephen right now. Stephen is working in Abilene, right? He's working all the way in Abilene, Texas. Can they could they get on FaceTime and read scripture together? Yeah. Does schedule always permit it? No. However, there is practical ways. You have a bajillion Bible reading plans. And they heck they and I don't I don't know if you guys are doing it. I'm not, I'm not, I'm just, I know, I know you guys, I know you guys read, that's why I'm picking on you. They can still have the same Bible reading plan. And at some point during the day, even if his time where he could read was in the morning and her time is sometime in the afternoon, they can still talk at some point or even the next day. Hey, what did you read the day before? If you just because you can't do it at the same time, don't make the excuse that you can't do it at all. Read scripture together, pray together. Now, this one you should do together. Pray together, carve out that time to do it. If it's after the kids go to bed or it's before you got to wake up before they get up, pray together. Why? Because you should be, you should have that established first as a believer, as an individual, and that should naturally come together. You should pray with your spouses and not just, Lord, thank you for this food. Bless my hot wife who prepared this and bless her hands, that she can she can prepare another meal for me. No, no, no. The kind of prayer that that that when it does get to the emergency times, and maybe your marriage is on fire, that's not that's not the first time that you've got prayed together in years. Sing together occasionally, even if you can't carry a tune to the bucket uh in the bucket. Good thing, um, good thing that the the Lord says that the Bible says to sing a joyful noise unto the Lord. It doesn't say uh an in an in tune or on pitch or in the right key. It doesn't make a joyful noise. So if you two can't sing, crank that radio up all the way. Let Brandon Leg drown both you out, and it looks like you're lip syncing in the car, you know. Uh worship together. Worship keeps Christ at the center of the marriage, and uh instead of the marriage becoming centered on itself. You can be a threefold cord, but what's the chord in the Center that you're bound to. Is it the idea of the marriage itself? Or as healthy individuals are saying, no, we've interwoven ourselves so much around God that there's no difference between all of it. So practice three, everybody say bless. Bless. God blesses. Parents bless. Priests bless. Jesus blesses. But many marriages hear correction far more than a hair blessing. Guys, speak life intentionally. And again, anywhere a time you hear that word marriage and you're like writing it off, enter the word covenant. Speak blessing over your own covenant with God. Speak life intentionally. Look at your spouse. I see Christ working in you. I'm thankful for you. I appreciate your sacrifice. Blessings form the atmosphere of covenant. Because remember, again, pattern in scripture. What did God do so many times for the children of Israel? He forgave them and he reminded them of his covenant with them, his promise of blessing. That every step they would take, that would be theirs. The land would be theirs, the inheritance thereof, that he would be the God of what Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, he would be the God of they would be their God, their children's God, their grandchildren's God, generational God. He reminded them of their blessings often. And so we should practice that in our own lives, our own covenant, our own walk with God, but also in our marriages. Speak those things. And even if, even if it's not the biggest sacrifice, or it's not the most, you know, romantic gesture, or even if it's not the most chivalrous thing in the world, you want to see, like wives, you want to see, you want to see your man be chivalrous, you want to see your man be sacrificial, start speaking it into existence, as it were. Start speaking into existence. And husbands, same thing. If you see something in your wife, even though you are the head of the home and you are the priest of the home, sometimes it's better to let God things work out as you speak life over it. There are times that we get that we gotta sit down and you gotta figure out what's where's where's the lane of the finances and where where where's our lines with the kids and where's this kind of stuff? But there's some things that God's working out in individuals, and that's the thing. If you come into this thing or at some point in your marriage, when you start following Christ, you decide that you've got to work on that personal covenant first. A lot of times, what happens in that covenant separate, you know, uh between the the the the the coven the as individual bricks first before they come together is that God will speak conviction there because it is awkward to try to correct your spouse on something. Can I get an amen from anybody who's been married for more than one moment? There are some times I know Angela wants to kick me under the table for stupid stuff that I've said. And you know what? She doesn't all the time. There's some times that she does things and it drives me absolutely bonkers. I'm like, why in the world would you do that? But we have to remember, each of us came from a different walk in life. And God is still working out some things in us. And I can either choose, I can either die on every hill and lose the war, or I can say, okay, this hill's not worth dying on. I'm gonna speak it into existence. I'm gonna speak blessing over their life. Because I want them to speak blessing over me, and I'm gonna let God work some things out. Again, I'm not a marriage counselor. I don't know if I've been married, you know, going on 10 years, but I'm just I'm telling you, there's there's there's so much biblical principle for that kind of stuff. So, number two, we gotta clean the ditch. We gotta practice continual repentance. Say continual repentance. Repentance is a hard word. It's even harder when you put continue in front of it. Here's the principle from last week's lesson that we talked about. Clean channels carry clean water. Marriage is the same way, your covenant's the same way. You don't wait until contamination spreads. You remove it early. You don't try to fix it downstream, you fix it upstream. So pollutants, what are what would be the pollutants that that that mess up that gets mess up our covenant, mess up, that mess up that? Our pride, our bitterness, hidden sin, unforgiveness, harsh speech, comparison. Ooh, keeping score. That's that's a that's that's a hard one. We naturally want to do that. Neglect, secret habits, spiritual apathy, these rarely destroy marriages overnight. It is very, very rare that you see a marriage that they decide to wake up one day and that I'm gonna go find me another, I'm gonna go find me another person and go have, you know, go go go go have uh go have an affair with. That doesn't happen overnight. It's small practices that were neglected that build up to those things. They accumulate. And so if we identify the pollutants in our marriage, is there pride? Is there bitterness? Is there unforgiveness towards each other? Is somebody keeping score? Um, are we speaking harshly to each other? Are any of those things happening? Are we spiritually apathetic because we just haven't been praying together enough? And as you begin to work on the little things, what's the Bible say? It's the small foxes that spoil the bind. It's the little things that come in and wreck over time. What do they say? Because you can take a frog, and don't go home and do this, please don't do this. But you can take a frog, and if you were to throw it in hot water, it'd immediately jump out. But if you were to put the same frog in water and slowly bring that temperature up, you can boil the frog without never jumping out. Why? It's because that slow accumulation over time, that slow buildup over time, the frog won't even realize it's in boiling water too late. Usually, if you jump into a situation in your marriage that's it is boiling water, you can say, Oh, I'm out because I know this is uh-uh, blind strong. But if we don't work on the little things as we go along, suddenly we're gonna wake up and realize, holy cow, I'm in hot water. I need help. Covenant practice number four. Everybody say, repent quickly. Repentance isn't vertical. It's not only vertical, it's horizontal. One question, every couple, every person, every individual, have I represented Jesus well to you this week? We need to ask that. Have I represented Jesus well to you this week? Not what did you do wrong? Instead, where have I failed to love you like Christ? These are hard questions. But I'm telling you, these are these are things that have that have changed that have changed my life. Because I've asked these, like I this is again, even going outside of the context of marriage, these are good practices to have as an individual. These are questions that I've asked mentors in my life, that I've asked other people that I trust in my life, that are my friends. The question changes everything because repentance becomes formation instead of blame. We can blame all day and every shade and every color and every word that we want to. But what does the Bible say? We oftentimes we want to call out the speck in someone's eye when we got a log in ours. You want to call out, and you say, Hey, you got a little twig there when you got a you got a full-blown pine tree sticking out of yours. But that's that again, biblical principle. How many times what when the scripture talks about is that the man was presented with a mirror, God showed him what was wrong, he turns away and immediately forgets. Oftentimes we're still like that in our marriage. But again, we repent quickly and continually and ask. So you can have uh you take a date night, ask some of these questions. I'm telling you, God will be, God will show, God, God will pull up that chair. You think it's a two-seater table, God pulls up that chair and be like, I'm so glad you finally enjoyed me to sit here with you guys. This is what do you remember? This was a threefold cord, but you've been wrong asking the wrong questions. Again, I don't have a perfect marriage, guys. I'm still working on it each and every day. I'm just, I'm just telling, this is where I feel in my spirit is that we start doing these kind of things and we teach people to do these kind of things. I'm telling you, we're gonna have such healthy marriages and families in our church, and people are gonna be like, what are those people doing? And they're gonna become here and we're gonna, hey, read your Bible and repent to each other. And they're gonna be like, Are you stupid? Stupid enough to try it, see it works. Covenant practice number five. Say forgive freely. Forgive freely. Forgiveness doesn't erase wisdom. It does not erase wisdom. Some people learn best through the school of hard knocks, and if you have the combination of XY chromosomes, you probably learn better through the school of hard knocks. However, it doesn't erase the wisdom that we learn from it. But here's what forgiving freely does it removes the poison. Unforgiveness is like leaving debris in the dish and expecting clean water to flow through it. If you make a mistake, repent. And at the other side of the party, you've got to forgive freely, no restrictions on it. Even if they've done it before, even if it's the same stupid mistake, even it's the same thing. Why? Because at some point, enough contact with God, it will change. Enough contact with God, it will change. And so what do we do next? We expand the ditch. So we've got to make sure that we're keeping it clean. And we actually dig it out first. So we've got to dig them, we've got to dig the ditch out, we've got to clean the ditch, and then we've got to expand it. And so here's what we want to do we want to increase our capacity. So don't simply just protect your marriage, don't just simply protect your personal covenant with God. Don't, don't, don't just protect that. Grow it. Grow it. That's how you make it in the long haul. So ask, what does God want to send through this covenant? And again, this is where practical application goes that this isn't just about marriage. Remember, marriage is just a reflection of Christ and his bride, you and I, the church. And so what you gotta ask, what does God want to send through this covenant? Is it children, hospitality, discipleship, leadership, mission, healing, generational faithfulness? Marriage isn't about surviving, it is a kingdom channel for his spirit to flow through. It is a kingdom channel for spirit to flow uh to flow through. And then here's a super practical thing. Everybody say serve. Together. Say serve together. Find somewhere your marriage ministers together. You two may not have the same gifts, and that's okay. Oftentimes what you'll find is that people's gifts will complement each other. But there will be things that overlap and you do have in common. So find it together and go do together. And if that's praying with another couple, go hold hands and pray over another couple. If that's hosting people at your house for coffee, for food, then do it. Serve the church. If that's coming up in cleaning, because that's at least what you guys know how to do good together. If one of you is better with Sunday school children, and somebody else is good in the media department, that's okay. But we all know how to do the practical things together. Disciple younger believers. It's who we're called to do. Jesus disciples us that we would become disciple makers. A marriage that only serves itself stays small. And again, replace that word marriage with covenant. A covenant that only serves itself stays small. And a marriage that serves the kingdom continually expands. And again, take it down to the individual brick. A covenant that serves the kingdom continually expands. If you feel like you're not growing in God, let me just ask you this today. Self-introspection, you don't have to look at anybody, don't even look at me. Are you serving? Are you giving? Are you giving it away? Just as much as God is giving to you, are you giving away? And so here's some things to think about. So what rhythms have helped your marriage most when life has become difficult? When's the last time you actually did that? Which practice is the easiest to neglect for you guys? Not every marriage is the same because not every people in the marriage are the same. Some people praying together is their jam, but reading together may not be. Some people may be really easy to repent and say, I'm sorry, but the actual release and the forgiveness may be hard for them because of the way they grew up. Again, this is this you got to figure out in your own house. And again, oftentimes you figure out those things because you figure out the individual covenant first. I've got to know who I am as a man before I can I can be the proper husband. I've got to know who I am because I've, and again, she's got to know who she is so that way we can try to communicate the differences. So if I know I'm I I have a bad habit of keeping score and being cynical, and she's really quick to forgive, if I'm not careful and cautious, so they're just being transparent. I I I can be a perfectionist and I can be cynical, and Ange wants to just just wants to just get along with everybody, she'll be really quick to say sorry. If I'm not careful and I'll keep in check in my spirit, I can be cynical all I don't say I'm sorry because I know she's gonna forgive me anyway. But what does it matter? It matters in the heart of the context of it. And so we've got to have practice, we've got to have practice, we have to, we have to, you know, analyze our own marriage and say, okay, God, you put this together. And if you're truly the cord that this thing is center around, this threefold cord, then would you show us so that way we could we can be better each and every day? And God's not gonna correct you out of a place of ha ha, you're horrible at this. No. It's like a parent who corrects their children. You do it, hey, don't play in the highway because you're dumb. No, don't play in the highway because I love you and I want you around. That's the way God is with us. Hey, be quicker to forgive and let go of that stuff because I want you to enjoy this marriage. This is a gift to you. I I've got I've got I've got more for you to do as an individual, but I've got even more for you to do as a married couple. And I want you to enjoy marriage. I want you to enjoy all the benefits of marriage. And so can then, you know, at a practice on a practical basis, once we get individual, the individual covenant uh believers uh good and the marriages together, so how can we teach these rhythms to our children before they ever marry? And that's that's one thing that I mentioned it the other Sunday. There's one thing Angela and I were very particular about. If I'm man enough to raise my voice at my wife, I better be man enough to apologize in front of my kids to her. And that, you know, the first time I did that, oh my gosh, I was so red in the face, I was sweating from my forehead, from my back, from my I was down, I was drenched by the time I was done apologizing. But it taught me something is that there are little people watching me. And so if if if if if by default, just because the you know, the way I've raised and not just like my immediate family, but in my like my whole family, they're just yellers, dude. Like, oh man, Thanksgiving with all these, always so much fun, usually into a huge family fight. And yeah, anyways, um, childhood trauma. Um but like you know that that's in me. And so a lot of times I have to be careful that that my response with her because why I got little people watching that, and if I want that to stop generationally, I decide where it dies. And that's if got if God's gotta if God's gotta embarrass me, which what is embarrassing? It's killing my pride and saying, I'm sorry. Guess what I do a lot less? I go to raising my voice and I stop. Because repentance happened, she forgave quickly and genuinely, and then the wisdom stuck. And so I don't know what that is for you guys. I'm just I'm just trying to be transparent because I'm I'm I'm telling you, like, you know, serving and working in a church, it's like people think everybody's perfect. Oh my gosh, it's not perfect. You guys see Maverick. Man, there's days that we want to, mmm, I love Jesus. And that that's hard on a marriage. Like, one kid's hard, three, however many you've got, four, that that's hard. Like, all that stuff weighs on you. And but at the same time, like you got these little believers that you're supposed to be raising right, and they make you want to pull your hair out, and you're trying to do a marriage right at the same time. It's a lot. But again, if we have healthy practices continually together, it makes that it makes that easier. And that rhythm and that pattern that we develop, that when those moments come, and then that child gets really difficult, or marriage gets difficult, the practices are in place. And so I want to what think about this. If someone watched your marriage for one week, what covenant practices would they actually see? Or what reality TV show would they start writing? That was a really bad dad joke. Sorry. So here's here's here's my challenge to you guys. Don't try to implement everything as soon as you go home. Please don't try to implement everything. Pray together. Ask God, what is one thing, one thing this week that we can try? And then, you know, at the end of the week, give each other an honest evaluation. One out of ten, I don't know what, one out of five, whatever you want to decide the scoring scale is. And if you didn't feel like you do it good, try it week two and then week three. When you finally feel like you make progress on it, ask God what the next practice is. Choose one covenant, practice it, practice it every day this week. Not because God is withholding blessing, but it's because we want to be intentional. If we're gonna, if we're gonna, if we're gonna dig, if we're gonna dig this out, this covenant relationship out where it flows downstream. We want this to be clean so our marriages will be clean and we can grow those because we can't marry we can't minister to people whose marriages are broken if our marriage if our marriages can't withstand the weight of what they're going through. And that's usually what will happen. I've just seen it time and pattern over the years of working in churches, is people want to expand in ministry. And this is we're gonna talk about this in every ministry. People want to expand ministries. Well, we need it, we need a marriage ministry with focused date nights, with uh focused discipleship, focused couple counseling, and that. But what happens is you get in over your head and you haven't been putting enough work into your own marriage that when other people's marriage problems come into your marriage, it contaminates your own marriage, and other and and marriages that are in the church get hurt because they want to do the right thing. It's the right heart and the right motive, but the only the intention was there, not the direction. I don't want to be a church of intention, I want to be a church of direction because why? I do believe what the Bible says, that that the that the latter that the latter rain is gonna be greater than any other rain, and that the the harvest is plentiful and the labors are few. I believe God is asking us to build a healthy church because he intends to fill it. I do not want to see people come in and see them fall out, not just fall out between our fingers, but I don't want to see people who have been established in this church hurt and and give up on God and give up on their marriages and give up on their covenant. Why? Because they we didn't put the intentionality in first. What does God do anytime that he develops somebody? He always puts them in front of the mirror. It's self-examination first. We pray for outward revival, and this is the this is again, this is what this is Western culture, this is American church. We pray for revival, and we define revival as we had a service, and you know, X amount of people got the Holy Ghost, X amount of people baptized. Really, revival would be okay, from that, how many people were there the next year of those people that they are disciple makers now? That's what Jesus built, that's what Jesus spoke, and that's what the apostles taught. And so, what does that work? It starts with personal revival first. I've got to have revival here so I can have revival in my marriage, and I can have revival with my kids and let it flow from there. Excuse me, sorry. So when engineers are digging an irrigation canal, they don't stand over it every morning demanding water. They trust that when the source is opened, they prepare the channel, the prepare channel will carry what it's designed to receive. And that's what covenant practices are. They don't produce living water. You apologizing doesn't produce living water, it just keeps the channel clean, it keeps the pollutants out. We prepare the channel, God supplies the water, and we keep digging. Church, this is why we're calling this this midweek digging the ditches. Sunday, we see what the Lamb is building, and Tuesday we could do we just we we're we learn how we can cooperate with his work. So tonight, it's not about fixing your marriage with a list of tips. I'm not coming to saying everybody's got bad marriages in the house. I'm saying I want to be intentional. I want to be intentional about everything. Why? Because he was intentional about everything. Because the Lamb isn't looking for a beautiful, he's not looking for beautiful promises. He's forming faithful people. What does he say? Give those pearly gates. He says, Well done, my good and faithful. Faithful servant. Faithfulness is hard work. Faithfulness is the little things compounding over time. And faithful people build faithful homes. We don't practice these things to earn God's water. Us working on our marriages isn't about earning God's water. Us working on our homes, us working our own covenant promise, us working on structure, leadership, church culture, any of those things. That does not earn God's water. We practice these things so that when it comes, every channel is ready. Let's stand across the house real quick. God, we thank you for your word. We thank you for everybody that's here tonight that they've sacrificed during their midweek. Uh, these are the people that help move church forward. And you see that and you know that. So God honor their honor their families, uh, honor their individual relationship with you, honors their marriage, honors their parenting, uh, honor and bless them in any way that you can. God bless them at work, bless them in their finances, um, bless them in their marriage, bless them in their families. And here's what we ask, God is that every week as we go through this, that as you speak to us, we would not shy away from your voice. You didn't get you you don't speak words of condemnation. That's the that's the words of enemy, that's the words of the enemy. But God, your words of conviction are words of love because you have better plans for us. God, you have better plans for our individual relationships with you, and therefore our marriage our marriages and our parenting and everything that flows out of that. So, God, help us to be the right people first before we can be the right husband or wife, and then therefore the right parent, and then who you are calling us to be. God, is it our faith first, then our marriage, and then our family, and then ministry flows out of that, God. If we want healthy ministries, if we want healthy channels for those people to flow into this church and for that revival to flow into this church, it's gotta be that way. We've got to establish healthy relationships with you as individuals first, and then our marriages, and then with our children, and then all ministry flows out of that. In your name we pray. In Jesus' name. Amen.