It's Time to Get Naked in Your Marriage - 219

In marriage, we naturally seek to share our true selves with our partner. However, for this to take place, there must be a prepared and protected atmosphere providing an environment where we can regularly “get naked.”

God intended for the vulnerability of marriage to encompass every aspect of our beings - physical, emotional, and spiritual. When we can be completely open and transparent with our spouses without feelings of shame or fear, we lay the foundation for a strong and intimate relationship to flourish. If there are parts of ourselves that we are keeping hidden from our partners, it signifies a barrier within the relationship that needs to be addressed. Intimacy is a fundamental human need, and it can only be achieved in an environment of honesty and openness. 

You may not have recognized the importance of exposing your true self to your spouse, but it is essential for a deep connection. This involves sharing all aspects of who you are, not just physically, but also emotionally and spiritually. You need to open up and reveal yourself, but you cannot do that in just any place or with just any person.

Healthy nakedness must happen in a special place with the right person. Although special friends and family can accommodate the need for exposure to some degree, marriage is the singular place God has created for us to fulfill the need for total exposure of our true selves.

Chapters

• 0:03 Addressing Challenges in God's Design for Marriage
• 0:10 Understanding God's Vision for Our Marriages
• 0:13 Adam and Eve: The Fall from Perfect Nakedness
• 0:21 The Impact of Transgression on Their Relationship
• 0:27 The Immediate Changes after Eating the Fruit
• 0:39 The Loss of Innocence and Its Consequences
• 0:47 Introducing the Law of Purity in Marriage
• 1:03 The Importance of Vulnerability and Openness
• 19:42 Guarding Against Sin: The Path to Purity

Transcript

Daniel Moore: 0:03

It's crucial to address some of the challenges that may arise in implementing God's design, and we've talked about God's design for marriage through this whole podcast. We know how God wants us to have our marriage. Understanding what led to Adam and Eve losing their initial state of perfect nakedness before sin entered the world is essential. Prior to their transgression, they were able to be completely open and unashamed before each other and before God. However, when Eve ate that fruit and then she gave it to Adam and he ate, something in their relationship changed immediately. As soon as they'd done that, something changed and it was not the same as it was before. According to the Bible, they lost their innocence instantly. Their unimpaired nakedness was lost to shame and fear. This week, on Marriage Life More, we're going to be starting the final law in the four laws of love, the law of purity. We'll be back with that. Right after this, my voice rang all at once. I told you I'm a PONDER, PONDER, PONDER, PONDER, PONDER. Welcome to Marriage Life More.

Daniel Moore: 1:33

This is a podcast about marriage, Bible and book studies. We also interview people every once in a while to have a story. I'm Daniel Moore, your host, and sitting here with me this week is Michelle Moore, my wife. She's helping me host this episode this week. Thank you, guys, for joining us. If you're not from here with our show, check out our website at wwwmarriagelifeandmorecom for our platforms, our YouTube and Rumble links. We're also on the Christian podcasting app, Edify and your smart devices such as the Alexa Dot and the Google Home Hub. You can also visit us on social at facebookcom, forward slash ctgaponline. If you're a fan of our show, please subscribe. Feel free to leave a comment on our platforms, Give us a thumbs up or a five-star review on Apple Podcasts and we'd be grateful to you for helping us out in that way to help our podcast to grow here at Marriage Life More Well.

Daniel Moore: 2:22

As you probably noticed, there's a few changes that's taken place here over the last few weeks. As most of you that's been with me for quite some time knows that the podcast has always been called Connecting the Gap and ever since we've been doing this marriage study that my wife Michelle here has been sitting in with me on the Four Laws of Love. It's going to grow into more of a marriage podcast at this point. So we had made the announcement here a couple of weeks ago and some of our episodes were already recorded when that happened, so we hadn't really had a chance to say anything about that. But we've come to realize that there's a lot of people that have marital issues and marital problems in their lives as they start the marriage journey, and Michelle and I were no exception to that rule. As you guys have been listening to us here for some time, you know the testimony that we have, and we've really not even shared all of the story there.

Michelle Moore: 3:19

We haven't.

Daniel Moore: 3:20

We'll get to all of that eventually, I'm sure, as we go through different episodes here. But sometimes life's rough and life's hard and when you're trying to make life happen with a spouse and you're just not quite on the same page, just not quite clicking, it's kind of difficult sometimes to get through things. And it's always good to have someone that can come alongside you, that's, as they say, been there and done that, sometimes wrote the book. You've heard that little saying before. It helps to have somebody like that that comes up next to you to help you through those times.

Daniel Moore: 3:55

And that's where Michelle and I come in at here we feel like that God has turned our testimony around for us. He wants us to use it for His glory. Turned our testimony around for us. He wants us to use it for His glory. We by no means are super-duper happy with the route that our marriages took. From the very beginning we made a lot of mistakes and a lot of bad choices. Satan was very thrilled at one point in time with where our marriage was headed, but through God's mercy and grace we turned that around.

Michelle Moore: 4:23

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 4:24

And I'm so thankful now that we have the opportunity to help other couples. So from this time forward, you're going to notice we're going to be doing a lot of marriage episodes. We're going to have couples come in and do interviews with us that have blended families, some that don't have blended families, that it's a first-time marriage, maybe they've had some struggles, just different things. We've got people that are willing to come in and share their stories and we just hope that through anything that we share here at the podcast, that it will in some way help you. And then we're going to be offering some other things here down the road as well. So keep an eye on our website at marriagelifeandmorecom for those changes.

Michelle Moore: 5:01

And I still believe that Dan is still going to do some series off and on, because we all know how in-depth his series can be and they're so good that he is still going to be able to pop in and do some of those series and speak his heart for what God has for him, at times as well.

Daniel Moore: 5:22

Yes, so you'll still see some Connecting the Gap material as well. We're still keeping that name, as that's what everybody knows the podcast by, and so we've just added on the marriage portion to this, and so it's kind of a two-edged sword. I guess you could say at this point we're going to take the Bible and cut both ways with it. We're going to do the marriage thing, we're also going to do some Bible studies and book studies and that kind of thing as well.

Michelle Moore: 5:48

So excited so you'll probably.

Daniel Moore: 5:49

In essence, you'll probably end up seeing a couple of episodes drop a week sometimes. So it just depends on how things are going. We just want to do what we can to do what God's called us to do.

Michelle Moore: 6:00

Yes, absolutely.

Daniel Moore: 6:01

So, as I stated here in the beginning, we have been going through the four laws of love and we have reached number four and that law is purity. So this week, on Connecting the Gap and Marriage Life and More podcast, we are going to go ahead and get started with that this week the law of purity of purity, and the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed Genesis 2.25.

Michelle Moore: 6:39

When God created Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, he did not provide them with clothing or intend to give them artificial coverings. It was God's perfect will for them to remain naked, as seen in Genesis 2.25. While I do not personally support nudism, the biblical truth can offer valuable insight for couples in marriage today. Adam and Eve experienced complete nakedness in all aspects. Complete nakedness in all aspects physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. They were completely open and vulnerable before each other and before God, sharing themselves fully in a relationship of intimacy and openness. This serves as a model for a perfect marriage according to God's design.

Michelle Moore: 7:24

While it is not typical to expose ourselves completely to everyone we encounter in life, our spouses are the exception to this rule. Besides our relationship with God, marriage is the only relationship that allows for such deep vulnerability and openness. In marriage, we naturally seek to share our true selves with our partner. However, for this to take place, there must be a prepared and protected atmosphere, providing an environment where we can regularly get naked.

Michelle Moore: 7:58

God intended for the vulnerability of marriage to encompass every aspect of our beings physical, emotional and spiritual when we can be completely open and transparent with our spouses, without feelings of shame or fear, we lay the foundation for a strong and intimate relationship to flourish. If there are parts of ourselves that we are keeping hidden from our partners, it signifies a barrier within the relationship that needs to be addressed. Intimacy is a fundamental human need and it can only be achieved in an environment of honesty and openness. You may not have recognized the importance of exposing your true self to your spouse, but is essential for a deep connection. This involves sharing all aspects of who you are, not just physically, but also emotionally and spiritually. You need to open up and reveal yourself, but you cannot do that in just any place or with just any person.

Daniel Moore: 9:04

So as we start here with purity, it brings into the focal point here of nakedness. And there is a podcast that's been out for a long time called Naked Marriage and Dave and Ashley Willis was the host of that podcast for many years. That's when they were with XO. Well, now they've left XO so that podcast is going to be no more. They've actually moved on to a different podcast at this point.

Daniel Moore: 9:32

But I always was intrigued by the title of that podcast Naked Marriage because it's very catching. When you read that or see the title it really does, it makes you wonder. You know what's that podcast about. You know, because we think of naked, you know what comes to all of our minds. You know we think of Adam and Eve in the garden, naked, you know. But in all reality the nakedness that that podcast actually pushed was not just sexual nakedness. That podcast actually pushed was not just sexual nakedness, it was actually just a transparent type of nakedness in the relationships.

Daniel Moore: 10:11

And as you were reading the opener here, a couple of the things really stuck out to me when we were going through here the opening on this about how if we're going to have a relationship with a spouse, it's got to be completely different type of a relationship than it does than just say, like your best friend.

Daniel Moore: 10:32

And what the difference is between the two is you literally have to have your heart open to be naked before your spouse. You should not be hiding anything from them. Before your spouse, you should not be hiding anything from them. There's a complete transparency there. Or I guess, as you could say, quote unquote, a complete nakedness before them that you hold nothing back. Because we know that from the sentimental side of things, the sexual side of the relationship that we have with our spouses, the most intimate thing that we can bear ourselves is to be fully naked before our spouses. That's you can't get any more transparent than that when it comes to speaking just in the, you know, to the body and that kind of thing. So that also relates back to our mind.

Michelle Moore: 11:19

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 11:20

And we have to be open. So this brings me back to our marriage and our story, and some of the very first mistakes that we made in our marriage was we had a problem with this. And I know other marriages that, as Michelle and I have talked to different couples, we know that other couples have struggled with this as well, that other couples have struggled with this as well. It's so hard, I think, to come from being single and not really having to be open to somebody like that. In that aspect of it where you know our friends up to the time that we get married, probably the person that is considered our best friend probably knows the most about us. That's a same-sex friend. You know, my guy friend, that I have the girlfriend that you have. They're going to probably know the most, but they're still not going to know everything about us and they have no reason to.

Daniel Moore: 12:10

That friendship that we have between them is just a mutual friendship that we've got each other's back you know, no matter what may come our way, you know difficulties or we get sideways with someone and they want to fight us. You know our friends are always going to be there, right there by our side, to help us through all of the thick and thin, and vice versa. But when it comes to a spouse and a guy marries a girl, such as I married you and when you married me, that takes that up to another level and at that point it becomes yes, we are best friends because you and I, we've always considered ourselves to be best friends. But there's also another step above that that we have to move ourselves to, and that is that we cannot hold anything back from each other.

Aria: 13:00

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 13:00

Especially when it comes to our relationship.

Daniel Moore: 13:01

Yeah, especially when it comes to our relationship.

Daniel Moore: 13:04

And you know, when the marriage first started with us, I had been single for a while and I had friends that were girls and I chose at that point I didn't want to drop those friendships, regardless of the fact that you and I were getting married.

Daniel Moore: 13:19

And so there were some friendships there that I did not expose to you and that caused an issue in our marriage. So, from your side of it, as we get started here this week, just give a little bit about when we went through all of that and I made that decision to not be completely quote unquote naked with you in the relationship. How did that make you feel as we went through that whole process of time to the fact where you felt like you thought something was going on but you weren't sure because I was kind of quiet and wouldn't talk, and then to the point where you actually found out that I was actually keeping something from you that was very important, that you should have known right up front, from the girl's aspect, the girl's side of that, of what you went through, you know talk a little bit about how you felt with that.

Michelle Moore: 14:19

Well, as I was reading this, I kind of like you.

Michelle Moore: 14:21

You want to go back to it and talk about how the environment of honesty and openness, you know, has to be there in order for that intimacy to take place.

Michelle Moore: 14:28

And you know, I want to say, you know, we got married before God but yet we left God out. So, technically, you know my feelings and everything that took place, of everything that was going on with you, probably wasn't the exact biblical feelings and I think part of it too, I was so busy with the children that I didn't think much into it until I started finally figuring out like, okay, you're talking, and it was hurt. And because I was hurt, I didn't want much to do with you. So I mean, which everybody already knows from the very beginning, the testimony, what we've talked about, how we each individually walk through those things, and so I just think that you know, if I go back and I really think about it, the biblically part was completely left out. So, and I don't know that I recognized it right off the bat. So it was a little bit later on that I kind of had that feeling of something's not right. I mean, we really honestly, the communication was always a problem.

Daniel Moore: 15:32

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 15:33

And openness. I mean, I thought we were talking about everything.

Daniel Moore: 15:38

But we weren't.

Michelle Moore: 15:39

No. So, it makes it kind of hard because now that I go back and we've experienced multiple years of you know I say it a great marriage of you know, communication and putting God first.

Michelle Moore: 15:51

I can sense that something's bothering you. Or if I don't and I'm too busy in life, the Holy Spirit will be like, okay, you need to check with them, you know. And it's like, okay, or pray for you. You know that I do daily, but still there's a sense of like hey, something's going on that you haven't spoke to me about just yet.

Daniel Moore: 16:13

And one of the things that we really felt that at the beginning was we did not prepare a safe space, repair a protected atmosphere where we could just be open with each other and have that open-necked relationship that this requires. I feel like that's something that probably needs to be brought up, especially for people that might be thinking about getting married here in the future. One thing that I feel both sides of the couple the man and the woman need to talk about before you get into being married is you need to be able to have a safe space where you guys can actually communicate without getting mad at each other. Yeah, you know, because we're going to do things to each other sometimes that's going to make the spouse mad. Yeah, absolutely, do things to each other. Sometimes it's going to make the spouse mad. Yeah, absolutely, and we know how hard it is, especially after you get married and you're living with each other for a while.

Daniel Moore: 17:11

you can't just turn around, leave and go back to your parents and it can get hard to talk about stuff because if one of the spouses has a tendency to pop off and get mad, you know their temper flares and they have a short trigger and there is an issue it can create a space where a spouse doesn't want to talk to their other spouse about it because they're afraid of how they're going to react and they think they're going to take it out on them. And you and I did not give ourselves a space. We never even thought of that.

Michelle Moore: 17:41

Well, I didn't. Anyway, if you go back and think about it, this is not something that we even remotely even looked at. I mean, there are so many things that I think in couples, before you get married as we've talked before, you know the marriage, pre-marriage counseling is very important, but why not go and just read a book together and talk about each chapter of you know what's important to you and what's not important, what you learned and how you guys can utilize it before getting married? And even this book that we're going over has helped us tremendously and we've been married and we've been through it all. I mean there's still things as we've been reading through here. It's like, oh my gosh, I didn't think of that, you know, and I mean even now, I feel like you know we do have a safe you know a safe space for us. I mean I feel like you know we can come to each other and be like okay, but I also think a safe space means you got to work on yourself. I got to work on myself before we come together.

Daniel Moore: 18:40

Right. So you know talking about this healthy nakedness. So you have your spouse, which is the right person, and you've got to have that special scenario, that special place that you can actually let these conversations take place to keep your relationship healthy, although special friends and family can accommodate that need for the exposure to some degree, like we talked a while ago, marriage is really the singular place that God has created for us to fulfill the need for total exposure of our true selves. You're going to know, you know more about me than anybody in this world knows.

Michelle Moore: 19:15

Right.

Daniel Moore: 19:16

I mean, you know me inside and out at this point and vice versa. Yeah, you know, I know you've told me a lot of things you never told anybody else. We now have our safe space, absolutely. Where we can talk to each other about these kinds of things, and those of you out there listening right now may be saying well, I'm married and I certainly can't expose every area of my being to my spouse.

Michelle Moore: 19:37

Well, you've got an issue there then. Yeah, because when you're married, you become one.

Daniel Moore: 19:42

Right.

Michelle Moore: 19:42

You know and you're one before God. So, you should be able to tell your spouse anything and everything.

Daniel Moore: 19:48

So you need to get to the root of that. Yep, why is it that you cannot speak to your spouse? Absolutely there's a reason for that, and until you both sit down and try to discuss this and figure out what the issues are and try to get those corrected, you're going to live a whole life of marriage constantly withholding things because you're going to be too scared and too worried to talk to your spouse about that, and that is not a healthy place to be with a relationship, especially with the way that God intended for that relationship to be. It's crucial to address some of the challenges that may arise in implementing God's design, and we've talked about God's design for marriage through this whole podcast. We know how God wants us to have our marriage.

Daniel Moore: 20:30

Understanding what led to Adam and Eve losing their initial state of perfect nakedness before sin entered the world is essential. Prior to their transgression, they were able to be completely open and unashamed before each other and before God. However, when Eve ate that fruit and then she gave it to Adam and he ate something in their relationship changed immediately. As soon as they'd done that, something changed, and it was not the same as it was before. According to the Bible, they lost their innocence instantly. Their unimpaired nakedness was lost to shame and fear. So at one point, what seemed perfect and what seemed just a divine connection between the two of them, because they could be completely open with each other about anything and everything, all of a sudden, at the snap of a finger, that switched and they all of a sudden started feeling the shame and the fear come down upon them. So, as the taste of the fresh fruit was still on their lips, adam and Eve searched for fig leaves to cover their genitals Before they ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Their genitals were shamelessly uncovered.

Daniel Moore: 21:39

So this signifies three things. Number one, it signifies their differences could be openly expressed Because in the same aspect, their genitals were their most obvious physical difference and they were exposed. Number two, they could have unhindered intimacy At that point, before this happened, before she ate this fruit, there was no clothing to remove for sex and no sense of fear or shame to inhibit complete honesty and vulnerability. And thirdly, their most sensitive areas could be exposed without fear Before they ate that fruit. You know, the genitals are the most sensitive areas of the body and until they ate that fruit they were completely exposed and there was no sense of shame or anything at that point, because they were in a perfect scenario in that relationship between each other and with God.

Daniel Moore: 22:30

Conversely, the fig leaves with which Adam and Eve clothed themselves after sin entered their relationship with God represented three truths. Number one it represented that our differences cannot be safely expressed where sin is present. Secondly, sin damages and often destroys the atmosphere necessary to breed intimacy. And thirdly, the sensitive areas of our life and delicate issues in our relationships cannot be safely exposed where sin is present. And that's what was happening with you and I. I brought sin into our relationship. There's no other way to describe that. I did wrong when I did what I did at the beginning of our relationship and God was not happy with that, and in essence, that caused a barrier, a type of barrier between me and you, where I knew that I couldn't talk to you about some of the stuff that I was not talking to you about, because I knew how you'd react and I was being wrong.

Aria: 23:24

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 23:24

You know I was letting Satan. He already had his little fingers inside the relationship that you and I had going on there with our marriage and so anytime that there's any type of a sin like this present within the marriage that's taking place, the little secrets that are in the closet and that kind of thing you're going to notice, it's going to really be difficult to be truly intimate with your partner and open and expressive with them and everything, every aspect of the marriage.

Michelle Moore: 23:52

And I can remember being the same way when I was going through my affair. I can remember specifically, you know, not being open with you at all.

Daniel Moore: 24:02

Right. And so that's exactly what happens when sin enters into the relationship is those doors start closing and that's what then causes that marriage to split and start veering off in different directions. You know, sin is the greatest obstacle to openness. Sin poses the primary obstacle to genuine and open communication in any relationship, emphasizing the importance of maintaining purity. Adam and Eve's account here in the Bible of their nakedness and the lack of shame is not merely a description of their physical state. It was actually a reflection of the purity inherent in humanity and marriage at their inception. It's crucial for us to comprehend God's blueprint for marriage and strive to align with His original intentions as closely as we can. So, to understand how to bring our marriages into compliance with God's requirement for purity, there are several issues that need to be discussed. The first thing is that sin is always deadly. So in Romans 6.23,. What does that scripture say?

Michelle Moore: 25:08

For the wages of sin is death.

Daniel Moore: 25:11

So that's pretty straightforward. I mean, there's no ifs ands buts around that whole little statement right there, and the penalty for sin remains constant. It never changes until we get that sin out of our life. When we allow sin into our lives or our relationships, we swallow a deadly poison, basically no matter how small the dose it hurts. Follow a deadly poison, basically no matter how small the dose it hurts. Also, without a healthy respect for the deadly effects of sin, we're open targets for Satan's lies and destructive schemes that he puts up against us.

Daniel Moore: 25:41

When we use the word sin, we're obviously referring to behavior that the Bible says is wrong, but we're also referring to things we say and do that violate our spouses and harm the relationship. Over decades you hear the reports of what husbands and wives have said and done to each other that were brutally painful to them and harmed the marriage, and in hundreds of cases the guilty spouse defended his or her bad behavior rather than taking responsibility. That devastates the sense of intimacy and goodwill in the marriage, and I think one place that marriages really fail here with this subject matter is when we get mad at each other and we pop off and say something hateful to each other, or when you start, if you do start having marital problems. We start getting a little brutal with each other in our language sometimes and you know I know with me and you whenever we got to the deepest, darkest points of the separation.

Michelle Moore: 26:39

I said some mean stuff.

Daniel Moore: 26:41

You did. You said some very mean things to me. I honestly didn't even know, and you meant some of them at that point.

Michelle Moore: 26:48

I remember specifically on some of those and I'm just like who is this person? And I'm sure you were thinking the same thing. You know like those words hurt and that's the reason why we should not speak when we're angry at anything. You know, take a step back and pray about it. But I'm going to tell you there was no prayer in any of that, because he'll tell you I lost my Jesus.

Daniel Moore: 27:14

Yep, you did, and.

Michelle Moore: 27:16

I'm not sure Jesus was even there right at the moment. Actually, I can say there was no Jesus. I mean, I'll just be flat out honest. There was no relationship at all.

Daniel Moore: 27:26

Jesus had left the building. For me it had. Yes.

Michelle Moore: 27:30

And it had been for months. So you know, even from the beginning there was no intimate relationship with Christ at all and I was more doing things in the flesh and things that I was being selfish on and saying that there was no nice about it. I mean, I was at the point I hated you, so I don't think any of the words that came out were loving by any means.

Daniel Moore: 27:58

And when you said those things, you always defended yourself Absolutely. You had a reason for it, absolutely, and you thought that you were in the right. Yeah, even though I was back then. Back then, you were no just kidding. No.

Michelle Moore: 28:14

I was not in the right. Those words you know, and I'm so thankful that Dan has forgiven me for those, because a lot of times when you say things, you can forgive a person, but you don't forget what they said.

Daniel Moore: 28:26

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 28:27

And you know and that's one of the things that Satan has used against me in the past is you know, you know what words you spoke to him. And I have to step back and think you know, get behind me, satan. You know God's already forgiven me. Dan has forgiven me. That that's not where I'm going to be standing anymore. That's my past.

Daniel Moore: 28:46

Yeah, and when it comes down to the point that we have to defend our bad behavior, there's a problem. Because, first of all, the bad behavior shouldn't be there. We should be able to have that safe space to work things out Right. But then when it does come along, because life happens and we allow it to happen and it starts down that bad path, when the excuses start coming out and the defensiveness and you know, for all the bad things, then you know you've really got an issue that needs taken care of Right. At that point you can't let that continue, no.

Daniel Moore: 29:22

Secondly, purity must be upheld by both partners in order for the relationship to provide a climate for total exposure. It's not one sided. Genesis 225 says both the man and woman were naked. It wasn't just Adam, wasn't just Eve, they were both in that same state of dress. Purity isn't just for women and children, it's for men as well.

Daniel Moore: 29:44

Both partners in a marriage must be careful about what is allowed into their lives. Marriage is such a close bond between a man and woman that everything each that's good. It would be absurd to say that you could roll in the mud, then hug your spouse and not transfer any of that mud to him or her. That's good. It is just as absurd to think you could harbor the mud of sin in your life and not have it affect your spouse so good. Because of this very practical spiritual truth, a spouse has a right to be concerned about every area of his or her partner's life. Anything the person does will affect the other. It's so true.

Daniel Moore: 30:34

Big one here is pornography. I think a lot of times you'll hear when people have a pornography issue in their marriage that they're hiding from the other spouse. One of the biggest things that they truly believe is well, this is just my problem. It's not affecting my spouse. But in all reality, when you start digging down deep into the roots of it, especially as that person allows that pornography to saturate their marriage more and more and more, you will start noticing that the intimacy starts dropping the times that the husband if the husband's the one that's doing the pornography, it's actually pretty highly used on both sides now. The women have as much of a problem these days, but whichever spouse is involved in that sin, they'll start not seeing their partners as attractive, so the sex will stop, they'll start getting irritable and the spouse will say something, and then that spouse that has the addiction will have a tendency to spout off of them, at them. They start getting irritable in their relationship. You can't say that none of that affects the marriage, because it does.

Michelle Moore: 31:42

Well, a lot of times people will lie about it.

Daniel Moore: 31:45

Yes.

Michelle Moore: 31:46

You're lying to your spouse that I don't do anything, or you don't even talk about it and communicate that you have that issue. You're keeping it within yourself and not telling anybody. You have that issue and right there, Satan's going to you know, he's going to keep you controlled. By doing that, because you're not communicating with your spouse, You're lying. Not only are you lying to your spouse, but you're lying to yourself that it's just something, that, oh, I'm just doing it for just a little bit. It is what do I want to say? It's an addiction.

Daniel Moore: 32:17

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 32:18

And it goes and then it just grows bigger and bigger and bigger into the part where it is involved in your marriage and the other person is getting the consequences because of what you're doing.

Daniel Moore: 32:28

Yeah, and how many times with your job at the bank has? Couples eventually came in where one spouse had a gambling problem and they've been gambling money and not been telling the other spouse and you know stuff just would come up and you know stuff like that affects people and it affects marriages and it tears marriages apart and you can't expect for one partner to sit there and have this rolling stuff going on in their life all the time and it not affect the marital bond and not affect the marriages.

Michelle Moore: 33:02

Or drinking. It could be numerous things. Some people can just lie like they, like no other, and they actually start believing their lives. But the spouse may know, hey, that's not the truth. All of those have consequences.

Daniel Moore: 33:18

Yeah, so purity has to be upheld by both sides. Yes, it can't be just a one-sided situation where one spouse has the halo above their head and the other one has the horns. It can't work that way at all. Third, purity is for every area of marriage. When a burglar wants to get into your home, he doesn't need you to leave every door and window open. He only needs one good entry point to give him a stronghold from which to bring destruction. We all have seen people devastated and marriages destroyed because someone allowed sin into just one area, whether it's your sex life or your finances, the things that you speak, your addictions, wrong priorities, selfishness, dominance, or if it's something else, the list can go on and on. You need to understand that sin from that one entry point will harm you and your marriage, and the longer it happens, the more damage will occur. And we've talked about this repetitively that if you give Satan one little spot, oh, absolutely He'll win.

Daniel Moore: 34:21

He's able to get inside there. He can totally destroy an awesome thing just by that one little issue, and so we have to be super careful that we always take care. That's why that scripture is so important about not letting the sun go down on your wrath, not wanting to get angry at each other, don't be, you know, lying and just keep something rolling, or all these sins that we've been talking about. You have to keep those out of your marriage. You need to be able to talk and have that safe space to have this conversation and communicate, and make sure that you don't give Satan that foothold, because you give him an inch, he'll take a mile, as they say.

Daniel Moore: 34:59

So if you consider this illustration of the destructive nature of sin, when you buy a new car, the owner's manual from the manufacturer is going to be in the glove box and that's going to inform you how that vehicle should be operated.

Daniel Moore: 35:11

We trust the manufacturer to provide this information because they, as the manufacturer, they understand every detail of that car or that vehicle that you're buying. If a warning is in the manual for the manufacturer not to do a certain thing or to take care of the car in a certain way, otherwise it's going to cause damage, then we must know that it's true. That's something that you don't do with your vehicle. We realize those instructions are not personal. The manufacturer isn't telling us do's and don'ts because they don't want us to have any fun. The manufacturer tells us these things in order for us to get the most out of our vehicle and to keep from damaging it. So this is an excellent illustration of God in marriage. In this case, god is the designer or the manufacturer of the marriage. I like that. His instruction manual is the Bible, in which he has told us to do and not to do certain things.

Michelle Moore: 36:02

If only we would listen to that and read it and take it to heart.

Daniel Moore: 36:06

And not take offense to it because it looks like a rule book.

Michelle Moore: 36:09

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 36:10

I love that Sometimes people don't want to become a Christian because you hear them say well, it is a bunch of do's and don'ts. You know that's not really true. God's trying to protect us, is what he's doing. There are individuals who believe that God's guidance is flawed or view him as a tyrant intent on restricting their enjoyment. However, the reality is that God is a compassionate Creator, communicates with us through His Word to guide us toward a fulfilling life that does not harm ourselves or others. Sin goes against God's intended design and, while it may offer fleeting pleasure initially, without immediate consequences, engaging in sin initiates a harmful process. To prevent the destructive outcomes of sin, it is crucial to address it when it starts. Just as Adam and Eve were deceived by the devil's false facade of innocence and harmlessness, sin often begins with a deceptive allure that disguises its true nature, and I think a lot of marriages fall victim to that because sometimes even like in my situation, you know, with me having the opposite sex friends I might, you know I looked at it as well. There's not really much harm in this, we're just a friend, but in all reality that dominoed and snowballed into almost getting a divorce. So something that may seem really innocent, you know, really small at the very beginning. You have to be careful of those things if they aren't really a good thing for your relationship, because even though it might seem minute to you, if you're not careful it can definitely snowball into something huge and destroy a good thing really quickly. And that's how sin operates. You know, every time we have, we always talk about little white lies or just the little sin. That's not that big a deal. But you know, some people have a problem with those little sins. The next time you see them they're in some state you know reform house trying to get over an addiction or whatever they had going on in their life, because it all started with something small and then they let it get out of control. And so we have to be really careful with that because that's how Satan operates. So just like Satan deceived Eve in the garden, he continues to deceive us today, that original deception tactic that he uses. He still uses it thousands of years down the road. Just as he misled Eve by promising that sin would improve her life, he uses that same tactic on us.

Daniel Moore: 38:41

It's important to recall that before Adam and Eve fell into sin, they had a flawless marriage, adam and Eve, they were united as one. They were bare and unashamed, basking in the intimate and loving wonder of their union. However, after they succumbed to sin, they became two isolated individuals, hiding from both each other and God. This scenario is reflective of the current state of the world that we live in.

Daniel Moore: 39:08

You may consider yourself a good person and you may really believe some sins are not as bad as others and could even enhance your marriage. You may have an image of a marriage where you go to church and are socially respectable, but one in which you can also quote-unquote, have a little fun. But it won't be long before you find out that the fun of sin has a severe backlash. In fact, many problems you have early in your marriage can be traced to the roots of sin and bad behavior you allow in your life. Rather than giving pleasure, sin can seriously damage and soon will destroy your relationship and Michelle and I. I think we can look back and see where the mistakes were that we made Absolutely.

Daniel Moore: 39:50

We can see the sins as we let those come in and we didn't fix them, we just allowed those to continue and we did we, I guess, in essence kind of started hiding from each other. Yeah, just like Adam and Eve, they went with these fig leaves on because, all of a sudden they're embarrassed.

Daniel Moore: 40:08

Yeah, and you know they've got this mind thing going on that I'm naked and I need to do something about this because they're seeing me and all this. And that's the way it is with marriage is you become exposed whenever you allow sin to come in and we go into that reactive mode of trying to do damage control and trying to fix something that God never intended us to have to fix in the first place, right?

Michelle Moore: 40:32

right.

Daniel Moore: 40:33

And then we end up where we are. So, as we close here today, we're going to wrap up this beginning point here for the law of purity. Is there anything that you want to add to this that we've covered here?

Michelle Moore: 40:47

No, I'm just actually, as we're reading through this, I just think about Adam and Eve and their relationship with Christ and just how perfect and awesome it was. And you know to be deceived just by that little spot right there and how it changed everything. And you know, I was just, I guess I'm just amazed at how perfect it was. And then the fig leaves had to come in and you know, to be covered, and I just, I mean, I've thought about it, I've read about it, but I think it's really hitting me more today, as I'm sitting here reading this and I'm just like, oh, my goodness, you know, could you even imagine that? Like, I mean to be thinking you're in a garden, it's me and you and God and you're living this life that you don't even recognize. I mean, like I wouldn't say recognize, but I don't know that you need to be covered by a fig leaf or anything like that.

Michelle Moore: 41:48

We're just going about doing our business, loving everything in front of us, you know. And then, hey, you want a taste of this. No, god told me not to do that, but how often do we do things when sometimes we know it's like, oh, it's not that bad, or you just kind of somewhat, don't even think about it, and you just do it like speeding. Speeding is a really good thing, because I do it all the time. But it's like you know, all of a sudden it's like OK, I know I'm not supposed to, but yet here I am. And then, once you've done it, everything changes.

Daniel Moore: 42:25

Yeah, and really the big thing that sticks out to me about Adam and Eve's situation is don't we always talk about how awesome it would be to be in a room just talking to each other and then all of a sudden, we can just walk with God? We can just start talking to Him and he's right there talking back and he walks with us through the garden and in the evenings just all the things that it described there in Genesis. And then just by that one thing that Eve did, and then Adam allowed himself to be deceived by it, even changed that, because immediately they start trying to hide from God and it's like here we are trying to get close to God in our day and age. I mean I would love to just look across the room and see God sitting there and just carry on. I mean we can carry that conversation with him. But that intimate relationship that they had was, even in my opinion, so much more.

Michelle Moore: 43:20

Oh yeah, I mean, they had direct access. It just blows my mind. I think in my what Over. Over a fruit and you can't see me, but I'm actually like acting like I'm holding a fruit in my hand and it's like I keep trying to hand it to Dan, but it's just like I can't fathom. I mean, but Satan, I mean he's sneaky.

Daniel Moore: 43:44

Yep, very sneaky and conniving. He knows how to do it and it's up to us to come together as married couples and have that safe space where we can communicate and talk and keep these little sins out of our life, these little toeholds where Satan can get in and destroy. We've got to make sure that we keep that out. The only answer is to banish those sins from our life completely and make sure that they're not there, and when we do that we're going to find. The most fun and the most enjoyable lifestyle in the world is one of purity and being obedient to God. There's nothing that tops that.

Daniel Moore: 44:21

Purity is a blast, and the best sex and intimacy in marriage is experienced when you can take responsibility for your behavior. I like that. So it's always more fun when we're just. You know, having those intimate moments as a husband and wife, because that's the thing we love to do and it draws us closer together. It's not so much fun when you're doing it trying to make up for being mad at each other and trying to use it as a tool to tell your spouse that you're sorry when we've worked. You know we've talked about that, how you don't use sex as a makeup tool, and so that's when we get to that point. We've got some things need to take care of and need to fix.

Aria: 44:57

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 44:58

Because that's not what that's all about. The purity and intimacy needs to be kept clean and pure, just like it states, so that we can have that uninhibited access to each other, like God meant it to be.

Daniel Moore: 45:11

Yeah to each other, like God meant it to be. So next week, as we come back, there are seven steps to having purity in marriage and we're going to pick up the discussion there next week when we come back to the next episode of Marriage, life and More. And so I guess today we're going to go ahead and wrap this up and hopefully you guys have enjoyed today's and maybe, as Michelle and I were talking about here with Adam and Eve, just maybe it's caused you to think a little bit more into that story and completely understand exactly what Adam and Eve gave up whenever they did what they did there in that garden, and that's something that as couples good Christian couples we should never give up.

Michelle Moore: 45:53

No.

Daniel Moore: 45:53

That relationship between each other and especially that relationship with God in the middle of it as well. So well, we're going to go ahead and cut it off for here. So if you guys want to hear next week's episode, then please tune in. And, even better, if you've not subscribed yet, please do so that you don't miss any episodes. And I'm Daniel Moore. Michelle's been sitting here with me this week. Bye, guys, and we'll be back again next week. Thank you, guys, for listening. As we always say, this show really wouldn't be possible without you. If you're a fan of the show, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts or if you would like to help us out by just taking a few seconds to give us a five-star click, and please subscribe to us on your favorite platform. The links for those are in the show notes. Well, that's all for this week, and we pray that your marriage is stronger and your walk with God is closer after this episode. This is an extension of Connecting the Gap Ministries. We'll talk to you next week.

Aria: 46:47

You've been listening to Connecting the Gap podcast. In this world, there are many disconnects that cause chaos in our lives. This podcast is birthed from the desire to share hope and restoration of the power of the gospel by being transparent and open in our biblical walk with God. Each week, we take a few moments as we navigate God's word and peer into other people's testimonies and encourage each other to connect the gap. We upload a new audio podcast every Thursday and a video version of it on YouTube and Rumble. We are also on the Christian podcasting app Edify. You can subscribe to our podcast on many of the available podcasting platforms, including Apple Podcast, spotify, amazon Music, iheart Radio, tunein Radio and more. We are also available on your Alexa-enabled devices. If you would like to contact our ministry for any reason, visit our contact page and send us a message. We hope you are blessed by this ministry. This is a production of Connecting the Gap Ministries.