8 Steps to Disarming Anger and Conflict - 221

When anger strikes in marriage, the path we choose determines whether we'll grow closer or drift apart. This raw, honest exploration of conflict resolution dives deep into the spiritual battleground of marital disagreements, revealing how seemingly small decisions—like sleeping on the couch after an argument—can create dangerous openings for destructive thoughts and patterns.

Drawing from personal experience and biblical application, Daniel and Michelle Moore share vulnerable stories from their own marriage, including moments when unresolved anger nearly destroyed their relationship. They candidly discuss how letting the sun go down on their wrath literally gave the enemy a foothold in their marriage, creating a cycle of resentment that became increasingly difficult to break.

The transformative moment came when they realized that anger itself isn't the problem—our response to it determines whether it becomes destructive or constructive. Through practical application of Ephesians 4:26-27, they outline four powerful "don'ts" for handling anger: don't deny your anger, don't sin in your anger, don't go to bed angry, and don't give the devil a place in your marriage.

Perhaps most illuminating is their breakdown of the difference between complaining and criticizing. While complaining focuses on expressing your feelings about a situation, criticizing attacks your spouse's character—a distinction that can make or break your communication. They provide practical language templates that transform confrontational moments into opportunities for connection such as: "Honey, I'd like to talk about something that's bothering me. I want you to know before I begin that I love you and I'm glad we're married."

Whether you're dealing with minor irritations or major conflicts, this episode offers biblical strategies to disarm anger before it damages your relationship. Subscribe to continue this journey through the Four Laws of Love and discover how applying these principles can restore the harmony and intimacy God designed for your marriage.

Chapters

• 0:00 Dangers of Going to Bed Angry
• 4:30 Introduction to Law of Purity
• 9:40 Understanding Anger in Marriage
• 15:28 Four Don'ts of Dealing with Anger
• 30:08 Satan's Role in Marital Conflict
• 36:27 Resolving Conflict Constructively
• 45:14 Forgiveness and Letting Go

Transcript

Daniel Moore: 0:05

times that I went to bed at anger in the early years of our marriage, michelle and I had our fair share of sleeping on the couch, while the other one stayed in the bed because we were mad at each other.

Michelle Moore: 0:15

I'm not gonna say that we never did that, because we did and I can remember a lot of times you would come down there and was like, are you not coming to bed? And it was like, no, I'm not, and it would make you mad. And then it made you know I was already mad and and was like, are you not coming to bed? And it was like, no, I'm not, and it would make you mad. And then it made you know I was already mad and it was like it just it really wasn't healthy at all, not at all.

Daniel Moore: 0:34

This week on Marriage Life and More. We continue our study on the four laws of love, as we continue the law of purity. We'll be back with that right after this. Welcome to Marriage Life and More. This is a podcast about marriage, Bible and book studies. We also interview people with inspiring stories. I'm Daniel Moore, your host. I have Michelle Moore here with me this week once again, hey guys, as we're continuing this study. Thank you guys for joining us this week.

Daniel Moore: 1:37

If you're not familiar with our show, you can check out our website at wwwmarriagelifeandmorecom. All of our platforms are there YouTube and Rumble links. We're also in the Christian podcasting app, Edify. We're also on your Alexa and Google smart devices. You can also visit us on social on Facebook, Instagram and X at CT gap online. 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 podcast, and we would be grateful to you for doing that, as that helps our podcast to grow and helps us reach the masses out there that may need to hear messages like this or maybe need some restoration in their marriage, and we hope that maybe one of these episodes we release will do that. Well, this week, as I said, we're going to be continuing our study that we've been in for a couple of months now and we are now in the law of purity, and this week we're going to be talking about disarming anger and resolving conflicts.

Michelle Moore: 2:42

The objective of marriage is to cultivate a relationship that is both intimate and harmonious. However, this does not imply the absence of negative feelings or occasional conflict. A successful marriage does not entail never experiencing anger. Rather, it involves effectively managing and resolving anger. This episode aims to provide insight into handling anger appropriately and navigating conflicts with your spouse to achieve resolution. Adherence to the principles of purity involves conscious and accountable conduct, including owning up to our errors. However, despite our best efforts, we may still inadvertently hurt and provoke each other. During such moments, it is essential for our relationship to provide a safe space where we can engage in open and caring communication with our spouses. To help do this, we're going to begin by using a text of scripture from the fourth chapter of Ephesians, where the Apostle Paul gives us four directives concerning anger and conflict resolution Be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your wrath, nor give a place to the devil, and that comes from Ephesians 4, 26, 27.

Daniel Moore: 4:07

So this week's episode is going to be almost a little bit of a rehash of some of the previous episodes that we have put together already, and I think one reason that this is repeated is this is probably an issue in marriage that's very difficult to navigate, but it's also an issue in marriage that happens a lot. I mean, it's real easy to get mad at your spouse and it's real easy to have conflicts, and especially if you get into the blended family scenario, or even if you're not in a blended family. But when the kids start coming around, we always start finding out what our differences are when the kids show up, especially how we think we should handle things, and it seems like that every time something new is introduced into a marriage, it's a whole new set of rules that we have to apply for that scenario, and when you're married, you have to be on the same page with that, or you have to figure out some way to come to an agreement to be on the same page with that. So as we start off this week, we're going to first of all talk about disarming anger, and there are four don'ts of dealing with anger. The first one is to not deny your anger.

Daniel Moore: 5:24

The Apostle Paul begins in verse 26 by telling us to be angry. You know, in all reality there's nothing wrong with anger, because even God gets angry, if you remember the Bible, the story there where he came into the temple and all of the people were there selling the chickens and had the tables, you know, changing coin and all that kind of thing and Jesus got extremely angry over that and he flipped all of those tables over and dumped them and told them to get out of the house of God. That's not what the house of God was for. So we do know that there is a place to have, I guess, what you would call godly anger.

Daniel Moore: 6:00

I guess is the way to put that. But there are many families, you know, just like the one that I grew up in, that doesn't allow anger, and the reason in most cases is because they fear it. They don't know how to deal with it and they just deny it and hope it will go away. And as we look at that, would you say that when you're around someone that has a blow up, would you say that when you're around someone that has a blow up or, you know, has really angry things to say to you or confront you on, is that probably a way that you handle that is, to work around and try to ignore it and get past it without having confrontation, or do you confront that?

Michelle Moore: 6:40

Well, I don't mind confrontation. So I would definitely be, I would take it and just like, okay, let's talk about this, let's see what the problem is and let's talk. And you know, but first in my mind I'm going to be praying for the right words to say, because obviously the other person, if they're angry, probably what you're going to say they're not going to listen to, Right? So, but I don't mind addressing things if I need to. Yeah, only if God wants me to.

Daniel Moore: 7:12

Right, do it in a godly manner, absolutely yes.

Michelle Moore: 7:17

So I know when— If you did that to me, I'd punch you.

Daniel Moore: 7:22

So we need some anger resolution here.

Michelle Moore: 7:24

That's one of my favorite lines. I'm going to punch you and I don't punch anybody, I just I'm going to punch you.

Daniel Moore: 7:30

As I've said many times, she's very violent, but I noticed we let our kids grow up. I do recall a lot of times when we probably we suppress the anger more than we let them vent and probably in some cases we should have let them vent and probably in some cases we should have let them.

Michelle Moore: 7:49

Yeah, I would agree with that.

Daniel Moore: 7:50

Like a controlled venting is probably a good way to put that, because definitely when you're angry, you don't want it to be out of control anger.

Daniel Moore: 8:00

You need to have some kind of a process there that you can vent that anger, work through the anger and come to a resolution at the end and try to resolve that anger and fix the issue to the best of your ability. That doesn't always mean you're probably going to still in the same conversation on the same page, Right? I mean you may still have your differences and disagreements and all of that, but to do it in a godly way, we have to find that level, equal ground somewhere so that that anger can stop, because you can't let that continue. On the flip side of this, if you're the person that doesn't like confrontation and you just want to hold that inside of you which would be my personality, because I'm the type of person that I don't mind confrontation but you got to push me to my limit before. I'm the type of person that I don't mind confrontation, but you got to push me to my limit before I confront, and that's dangerous because when I get pushed that far, I'm so mad at that point that it is not.

Daniel Moore: 8:56

I could literally just deck somebody. I'm way beyond my limit of where I should be, and so I've had to kind of reprogram myself a little bit to start earlier in the issues to try to get the anger out quicker so that it can be resolved before I get to that bomb stage.

Michelle Moore: 9:12

And I think you've done really well because you recognize it.

Daniel Moore: 9:15

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 9:15

You recognize it and so you start addressing it immediately. You say a little bit later, but you really do, you address it kind of right. Then it's like you can tell it's starting to bother you and you address it.

Daniel Moore: 9:26

And that's because I've come to realize that if I internalize my anger and I keep it inside of me, it actually causes health problems, mental problems, depression, emotional problems, problems in your relationship. Yeah, because when you deny anger, it doesn't go away. It just sits there and hovers over you like a dark cloud.

Michelle Moore: 9:44

Yeah, when you deny anger.

Daniel Moore: 9:45

it doesn't go away. It just sits there and hovers over you like a dark cloud, waiting to just unleash and just soak you and all that it has inside of it and it accumulates. And this is where dangerous anger comes from, because people with anger issues almost always have years of unprocessed conflict that they don't know how to resolve. They've got it all pent up inside of them and they don't know how to approach it. They don't know how they need to unpack all of that in a safe environment with somebody and try to get past all of it and resolve all of those issues.

Daniel Moore: 10:13

And we've even seen that even in our kids, sometimes when they were growing up, especially being in a blended family, I don't feel like a lot of times our kids felt like they had the liberty to speak out, like they probably should have had the opportunity as a child, because as a child in your home, they do have a voice and you need to allow them to have that voice. That's how they learn and that's how they grow. But more often than not, as we just stated, michelle and both of us, we would probably suppress that a lot more than we should have as our kids grew up. But that's a whole other episode. But the first step to resolving anger is that we've got to admit it and allow everyone else to admit theirs. It reminds me of the story of the dad that had a son that had a really bad short trigger and he would get mad at the drop of a button, and they were having problems getting the child to overcome that and resolve that issue and they were constantly having to try to correct him. So finally the dad came up with the idea one day that every time the son got mad, he had him go out there and get a nail, and he had him hammer that nail into the fence. And so from that time forward this would happen multiple times a day. I mean, the fence was just getting filled up with nails, but the longer that it went, they started noticing that there was less and less nails that were being hammered, until it came to the point where the boy really didn't have much, very many nails to hammer anymore. He was starting to understand the issue and so the dad came back to the boy finally and talked to him about that, said you know, see, you've started out really bad here, but as we've worked through this over time, you see that your nails have become less and less. So we're making some progress here.

Daniel Moore: 12:00

And the boy's like so that must mean that I'm good. Then the dad says no. He said now you got to go back and take all those nails back out. So the boy's like okay, so he goes back and he starts pulling all the nails back out. Well, when he got done, they were standing there looking at the fence and the dad looked at the boy and he said so what do you see? And he said well, he said I see a fence full of a whole bunch of holes. He said it doesn't look good at all because there's holes everywhere. And the dad told the boy. He said yeah, he said, and that's what anger does? He said whenever you lash out at people, you say hurtful, hateful things to people. He said that has a lasting result.

Michelle Moore: 12:37

That's so good, he said you can't pull that back.

Daniel Moore: 12:40

Once you've unleashed that, you can't take that stuff back it. You've left a spot there that that person then has to deal with and everywhere you go you leave a track or a trace of things you said and things that you've done, and it ends up looking like that holy fence. And I think that if we look at it that way, to understand that we can bottle ourselves up in a bottle and keep this anger inside of us all we want to, or we can just fly off the handle and just tear people a new one whenever they tick us off and make us mad. We've just got to be careful because those things can be a permanent, eternal wound to someone if we're not careful.

Daniel Moore: 13:26

And so we have to learn how to resolve those conflicts when that happens and to get that anger out when that happens.

Daniel Moore: 13:30

And to get that anger out. So you know, in marriage we must make anger legal in our relationships. So we need to say something to our spouses, like if there is anything I'm doing that is bothering you or making you angry, please tell me. I won't reject you or make you pay a price. I really do want to know and I want to do whatever I can to make it right. Be sincere about it. Yeah, to know, and I want to do whatever I can to make it right, Be sincere about it. You know, and that changes the whole atmosphere and the whole attitude of the whole thing. Because if I come to you and I say you know, I know there's an issue here and I truly I want to know what it is, because we need to fix this, and doesn't that make you feel like that? I actually care.

Michelle Moore: 14:09

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 14:10

And you know that I want to fix that and I think that's how I would feel about you as well, and that creates a warm and like an open customer relations type counter that will ensure that negative issues and emotions can be resolved. You know we go to the store to do a return. We want to know that that customer service department is going to take care of our issue and they're going to fix all of that, and so that's the same with us. You know when we come to each other, we have to come up with the mindset that you know your customer relations and you want to make me happy. You know the customer is always right to an extent, yeah, and to know that by the time we're done going through the back and forth, that we'll have all that stuff fixed.

Aria: 14:52

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 14:53

So so we do have to allow anger to be expressed in our marriages, but just because we allow anger doesn't mean that our anger is valid. There's many reasons for it. You know, I might be angry because I'm ignorant. It may be something that I totally misunderstood that made me angry. But we're not going to know if I misunderstood something unless I ask.

Michelle Moore: 15:11

That's right.

Daniel Moore: 15:12

So we're going to have to be able to have that space there. And sometimes we're angry because we're immature or we're stressed or we're hormonal. Sometimes we get angry because someone legitimately violates us. But when we allow anger we are not saying it's always right, but we're saying that it's real and it needs to be dealt with. So good.

Daniel Moore: 15:31

So we have to make sure that we acknowledge that we do have some anger there. Secondly, don't sin or justify bad behavior, and that pretty much speaks for itself. Yep, whenever we, when Paul told us that we could be angry, he also told us not to sin.

Michelle Moore: 15:45

Right.

Daniel Moore: 15:46

So there's obviously definitely a difference there between the two. You know, so many husbands and wives justify their bad behavior because of the bad behavior of their spouses, and I think we talked about this last week a little bit how just because one spouse does something bad to you does not open that door for you to come back and do the same. So the third thing is don't go to bed on your anger. And this one. You get different responses from the worldly view versus the Christian view, and I was talking to Michelle here the other day.

Daniel Moore: 16:21

I read this article that we're going to probably go through it sometime here on the podcast, but it was the 12 myths of marriage, and one of the myths that they spoke about was not to let yourself go to bed angry.

Daniel Moore: 16:33

That they spoke about was not to let yourself go to bed angry. Well, according to this article, they were saying that it's okay to do that occasionally, because sometimes you just have to have some time to cool off and think about things before you say stuff or whatever, and so you have to allow yourself that space to be able to do that, and I know a lot of people would probably agree with that article, but in all reality. That's not biblical, to just put it out there bluntly. The Bible tells us that we are not to let the sun go down on our anger. That is not how God wants us to resolve that, and he doesn't want it to go down on our wrath. And the reason for that is because any time that there's an issue going on between Michelle and I and the pot's been stirred, guess who's trying to jump right in the middle of that.

Michelle Moore: 17:19

Yeah, Satan.

Daniel Moore: 17:20

It's Satan. He's in there already with his little spoon trying to whip up the batter. And if we do not fix those issues and we go to sleep on that, we all know that our mind is Satan's playground. He loves to get inside there and just put thoughts upon us. And it doesn't mean that tomorrow we wake up, that we can't fix it. It does not mean that at all, but it's just a fact towards of having a healthy marriage and doing it the biblical way. God does not again, does not want us to have an anger within each other that we can't resolve when it happens. He wants us to take care of that. And so you know, there's times that I went to bed in anger. In the early years of our marriage, michelle and I had our fair share of sleeping on the couch, while the other one stayed in the bed because we were mad at each other.

Michelle Moore: 18:14

I'm not going to say that we never did that, because we did and I can remember a lot of times you would come down there and like, are you not coming to bed? And it was like no, I'm not. And it would make you mad. And then it made you know I was already mad and it was like it just I mean, it wasn't, it really wasn't healthy at all, not at all.

Daniel Moore: 18:35

And what's funny is, even though we was mad at each other, I didn't like the fact you were sleeping on the couch downstairs. I wanted you up there where I was at, which is kind of odd, because usually when you get mad at somebody, you want to be as far away from them as you possibly can be.

Michelle Moore: 18:50

And just to tell you guys, I never slept all night on the couch. I would always go upstairs.

Daniel Moore: 18:55

Yeah, and both of us did.

Michelle Moore: 18:57

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 18:57

We both had our times. We'd get mad and storm off downstairs and I'm just sleeping downstairs tonight or whatever but that wasn't healthy. No, that was not something that we should have done and you know the deep love and passion that I had for you was destroyed, one drop of resolved anger at a time, and on multiple occasions. You know I went to bed angry and stood over issues that I had with you and in the end, because we both did that, it almost cost us our marriage because we didn't fix it the way that we should have Right.

Daniel Moore: 19:28

So the fourth thing is don't give the devil a place in your marriage. Yep, and this reminds me, I've got a book here that is in my bookshelf. It's called Don't Give the Enemy a Seat at your Table.

Daniel Moore: 19:38

And this was written by Louis Giglio and if you go online, he actually has a sermon that he does with this, where he sits down at a table and has food and it just blows your mind as you visually go through that sermon and watch that scripture play out in real time. It really helps you get an understanding of how the table that we have whether if it's our spiritual life or if it's our marriage, whatever it is all of those tables have been put out there and have been set up by God.

Daniel Moore: 20:11

He is inviting us to His table to commune with him in our relationships, in our life, in the different things that we do. And here on the back of his book it says you don't have to let negative thoughts control your life. You don't have to allow the enemy to influence your thinking. You have power through Jesus Christ to take control of your thoughts and emotions. Jesus invites you to a table that he has prepared for you, a table where the enemy is not invited. And I think that if we flip this around to our marriages, you know Jesus has invited us to that table, just as I have invited you to the table of our marriage and you have invited me to your table of marriage. And again, that marriage table between me and you has two chairs Yep, it's for me and you.

Daniel Moore: 21:00

Yeah, and never was Satan, never supposed to be invited into that. I guess you could say three chairs, because God's there with us as well, but there is no chair for Satan, there is no chair for him to be a part of that. And if you look at the Garden of Eden, whenever Eve, when she was tempted to take that fruit and to eat of that fruit the word for devil that's used there in Genesis, in the Greek language is the word diabolos, which means slanderer, and what happens is is whenever we allow Satan to come in and we have those moments of anger and we storm off in fury and sleep on the couch at night or whatever, that opens the door for the devil to slander our spouses to us. What are you thinking? The whole time that you're laying on the couch downstairs mad at me? What are you thinking about me?

Michelle Moore: 21:56

Well, not so great stuff. No, I'm thinking about all the things you did and that weren't right I never once gave myself a thought of what. I did. It's all about you and what you did and how you need to change and you need to accept responsibility, and just how angry I was with you.

Daniel Moore: 22:17

So, basically, you're slandering me as your husband and when I'm the one on the couch, I'm sitting there thinking all the ways that you're a horrible wife. You know why you don't understand me and all this, it's all. Everything's focused towards you, just like you said, I'm not even thinking about myself in that equation, and what's crazy about that is the whole time we're laying there, we're thinking that, we're thinking those thoughts, but it's really Satan in there in stealth mode. He's the one that keeps feeding all this stuff and we're taking it hook, line and sinker. You know, we're just sitting there allowing it to go on, and whenever that happens, then we can literally sit there and think ourselves into divorce right on the couch, because we're so mad, you know, and that's not a healthy place to be at all. And the reason that this is going on is because the devil and all his little demons that run around, they want our marriages to fall apart. They want our marriages to fail. And ever since the Garden of Eden, whenever he was able to get in to that relationship that Adam and Eve had and destroy what they had between them and God, where it just changed the whole process of the future for everybody, they've been in an all-out campaign and an all-out war ever since then to try to destroy every other marriage. That they can do and this is one way that they can do that is to try to get that anger in there, because if they can cause division between me and you, then they can, in essence, eventually break up the family unit. Yeah, so in our marriage, when we finally came to the point that we asked the Holy Spirit to come in and to change both of us and to change us and to help us understand each other better through the lens of Christ and to fix the marriage that we had, that booted Satan out. At that point, yeah, and we started working on making sure that we didn't let him back in Absolutely.

Daniel Moore: 24:13

In their book, the Unexpected Legacy of Divorce, authors Judith Wallerstein and Sandra Blakeslee document their sobering findings concerning children of divorce, and here's an excerpt of their book. It says because children of divorce don't know how to negotiate conflict, well, many reach out for the worst solutions when trouble strikes. For example, some will sit on their feelings, not mentioning complaints or differences, until their suppressed anger blows sky high. Others burst into tears and are immobilized to retreat into themselves or the next room and close the door. But the most common tendency is to run away at the first serious disagreement and wrestle with unconscious demons. This is because, from the perspective of a child of divorce, any argument can be the first step in an inevitable chain of conflict that will destroy the marriage.

Daniel Moore: 25:01

So remember that not only are we messing around with our relationship between me and you, but if there's kids involved, they've already seen one marriage dissolve because anger, because the spouses the dad and the mom got so mad at each other and couldn't fix it that they ended up getting a divorce and split that whole family up. And now the kids are being drug into a new whole family scenario to get to know a whole new parent. And kids don't completely understand everything in the marital relationship. So the first time they see mom and mom and stepdad or dad and stepmom fighting there, they start trying to process this. And now they're thinking, ok, well, this is what broke up the first marriage, a part of it is this where this one's headed. Am I going to be stuck now again having to move, being uprooted and whatever? So remember that as parents we have a lot more responsibility than just ourselves when there's kids involved as well. So we need to figure out how to keep Satan out the mix of all of that and remember that we're not a prisoner of our past and we don't have to repeat those mistakes that took place in our families even. And we can break that and we need to.

Daniel Moore: 26:24

So now we're going to talk about resolving conflict in marriage, and we all know that when we're married to someone we've already talked about how we're different. Women have different things that they need, guys have different things that they need, and so that's a perfect recipe to have some conflict if we're not careful. But the first thing that we need to do when we have conflict is to confront it in a loving and positive manner, and in Proverbs 15.1, it says a soft answer turns away wrath, but harsh words stir up anger. So what will happen? Many couples make the mistake of stuffing their anger for weeks and months at a time, and during that time, the devil is accessing their unresolved anger and injecting it with slanderous thoughts about each other. Finally, something comes along that will trigger an argument and the vicious words and threats begin to fly, and this is a very dangerous scenario that ends many marriages. So here again we see that the anger if we don't fix it, it can create these conflicts and guess who's right in the middle of that still.

Michelle Moore: 27:28

Satan.

Daniel Moore: 27:28

Satan. He's still in there causing that slander. You know, you and I just talked about a while ago about how we slander each other and I don't even feel like we have to have an extensive vocabulary. I think Satan gives us the words sometimes to throw at each other, just like you said I think it was last week's episode how you don't feel like you were you sometimes.

Michelle Moore: 27:56

Oh, I know.

Daniel Moore: 27:56

I wasn't Because of the things that you said, and so you feel like Satan was the instigator behind a lot of what you said, even oh yeah, did he plant those seeds? Oh, I think so.

Michelle Moore: 28:09

I have no doubt. I mean, I think the enemy knows exactly what he's doing. And when it comes to those when you don't really realize what you're saying and spouting, I think the enemy has a hold on that and that's exactly where he was at with me.

Daniel Moore: 28:29

And sometimes those are the harshest words that are so hard to fix, it's so hard to take those back and that can cause a lot of damage for some people that they sometimes can't get over. And then that's when your relationships deteriorate and fall apart. So just remember that soft affirming words begin successful conflict resolution. Harsh threatening words start fights that go absolutely nowhere. If your emotions are out of control, then we need to take a break. We need to go somewhere and calm down for a minute, and this is good parenting advice as well, Something that I didn't really follow very well when we were raising our kids.

Daniel Moore: 29:10

It's real easy, it seems like, no matter what scenario you're in, if you become extremely angry. If you automatically try to fix that problem when you're that mad, that a lot of times you're going to cause more problems than good. Yeah, you do need to get away from that. Sometimes you have a moment to just calm down, pray a little bit and ask God for peace in the situation, and then come back to it once you feel like you're both in a spot where you can actually talk about it.

Michelle Moore: 29:38

I like this and I'm just going to read this right quick. It's talking about when. I'll just read it. The opposite of what is described is a marriage where anger is legal and both spouses are free to share. When sharing begins, it doesn't start with screaming, threats and cursing. It starts with words like this Honey, I'd like to talk to you about something that is bothering me. I want you to know before I begin that I love you and I'm so glad we're married. I know we will work through this and we are on the same team, but I have something to share with you. When you start with that, how would that make you feel if I would have actually started with some of that? Instead of just coming screaming and saying some of the things? It actually it takes down one you know we're on the same team and we both want to work together but it kind of takes that anger away, you know of hey, let's work this out, you know.

Daniel Moore: 30:37

Yeah, it definitely redirects the thought process. Yes, because when we're so angry at each other, we're really looking at each other as an adversary at that point You're somebody that I'm fighting with. We forget that. Yes, at that point You're somebody that I'm fighting with. We forget that. Yes, you are my love. You are my soulmate. Now that stuff's in my mind. When I'm red and the veins are popping out of my head, smoke coming out of my ears, that's the last thing I'm thinking is how much I truly love you.

Daniel Moore: 31:06

I'm just furious at what you did to me, and I think that when you do start that way, that's perfect, because it automatically starts a defusing at that point and you come at that conversation a completely different way.

Michelle Moore: 31:21

And it says soft and affirming words begin a successful conflict resolution. And so I mean, I feel like that is very, very important that if you are having some kind of argument that, hey, let's start this out positive and let's work through this.

Daniel Moore: 31:37

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 31:38

So it's going to end badly if you don't approach it the correct way, right, and so we need to make sure that we do that Absolutely. The second thing to resolving conflict is complain and don't criticize, and we've talked about this a little bit before. Yes, we have. There's a huge difference between the two that most people don't understand. Complaining is helpful and constructive, but criticism is negative and destructive. The difference between complaining and criticizing is the focus. Complaining focuses on me and criticizing focuses on the spouse.

Daniel Moore: 32:10

So when I am complaining, I say something like this Michelle, you said something this morning that bothered me and I would like to talk about it. I'm sure you didn't mean anything by it, but I would just like to tell you how I'm feeling and talk it through. So that's a complaint. It doesn't attack you or judge you. It just basically tells you how I'm feeling, and it's going to give us the opportunity to clear that air and try to get that stuff out of the way. Now, if I'm going to criticize you instead, I'm going to say Michelle, this morning you said something to me and it really hurt me, and I know why you said it. You said it to pay me back for what I said to you yesterday because that's just how you are. You are so spiteful and mean to me all the time. I resent how you treat me and I am not going to take it anymore. Well, the focus of those comments aren't on me or how I'm feeling. That focus there is criticizing you. We also have to notice that in criticism, how it doesn't want input, it wants confession and repentance. So when I criticize you, my next thing is I'm just waiting for you to say okay, I'm sorry, I did it wrong, I'll never do it again. I'm taking full responsibility. That's, in all essence. That's really what I'm asking for when I criticize you. But when there's just a complaint, that's there. That takes that out of the equation, yeah, because then it's not necessarily that I'm waiting on you to apologize to me or whatever.

Daniel Moore: 33:40

I think when we complain, it starts off the process for both of us to maybe take some of the blame and to work out the differences between the two of us and come to a peaceful resolution, at the same time showing that we still love each other enough to try to fix the problem. Yeah, and resolve it. It's good, and so that's something that I feel like you and I have made major progress in. So don't come at them with your guns blazing and focusing on their faults. You need to come to them really in an attitude of, hey, what's going on here? Can we fix this and make sure it's better? So, number three listen to your spouse and believe them. It's better. So, number three listen to your spouse and believe them.

Daniel Moore: 34:21

So, again, when you have gone to bed on anger for a long period of time, you're under the influence of toxic thoughts regarding your spouse. This almost always results in mistrust and deeply held beliefs about your spouse that keep you from receiving their communication at face value. So, basically, what this is saying here is if Michelle, if she goes to the couch a lot because she's mad at me and she chooses to, we have these arguments and fights or whatever and she chooses to go to the couch and does that repetitively over a period of time, the more that that happens, the madder you're going to get at me. Yeah, right, yeah, it's not going to get any better, it's just going to make that get deeper and deeper down inside of you to where you know, like you said, you came to a point where you finally hated me.

Michelle Moore: 35:07

So much bitterness.

Daniel Moore: 35:08

Because you let that go for so long. So then what happened when I would try to come in and say constructive things to fix stuff? Did you believe a word I said?

Michelle Moore: 35:18

Absolutely not.

Daniel Moore: 35:20

So why do you think that was the case?

Michelle Moore: 35:23

Because of what you said previously and it never took. I mean, honestly, if you were to say something to me and I was angry about it and then you're coming back to criticize me or try to change it, I'm not going to believe anything you say because of what you previously said. Yeah, and my heart is shut off to anything you're going to say anyways.

Daniel Moore: 35:45

Yeah, it kind of comes back to that saying that we talked about many episodes ago, that trust is lost in buckets and regained in drops Yep, regained in drops. And I think we have to remember that when that damage has been done and those scars are there and they're so deep, you stab that knife in so deep and cause so much issue that it's going to take some time. It's not going to be just an overnight flip of the switch if this has been something that's been festering for a while and so we have to understand that. And that's not going to say that sometimes the spouse is still just going to lie to your face.

Daniel Moore: 36:20

I know it says to listen to your spouse and believe them for what they're telling you, but I think in most cases most spouses have been around each other long enough. They can usually tell when one's lying to the other one and I think that there's some discernment there that can be seen. But if you're both actually trying to fix the issue and your spouse is truly repentant and they're truly trying to fix the issues they caused or whatever, then you have to put some trust into them and try to work through that, still probably having some guards in place. You don't want to open yourself up for a bad situation to take place within your own self, but you still. You're going to have to have some trust in each other as you're rebuilding this.

Aria: 37:02

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 37:03

And just similar to what you and I finally did In 1 Corinthians 13, 4-7,. It says the spirit of our marriages should reflect the words of that passage. In some cases, it might be a good idea to write that scripture text down and tape it to your mirror or your refrigerator as a reminder, because true love acts with a Christlike ethic that treats others with dignity. So we need to make sure that you know, as we're talking these things out, you're going to have to have a little bit of a moment there where you're going to have to put some belief into what the other spouse is saying and work off of that. Number four is forgive and let go. And you know, just like Michelle and I, you and your spouses are both imperfect and will be making mistakes for the rest of your lives. You know you don't want to live carelessly and do bad things on purpose, but we are all humans and we all make mistakes, and Jesus is good with it. That's the way that we were created. But he wants us to get better. He doesn't force us to stop having problems, or else he patiently washes us in the water of his word. And, husbands, we're directed to emulate that sacrificial love we have to be patient with our spouse and forgive them over and over and over, just like Jesus does for us.

Daniel Moore: 38:38

There are many times in marriage when you're going to need to forgive your spouse, even when there hasn't been a big fight or confrontation. But especially in those times when you've had a spat, you must put it in the past and go forward. We all have issues. We all need lots of mercy. Our sin put Jesus on the cross and no one loves us more than Him, and I think when it comes to this issue in marriages, we really need to look at it like Jesus did there. We're going to have to nail all that stuff to a cross and we're going to have to put it behind us and offer that full forgiveness for the other spouse that they deserve if they're asking for that forgiveness.

Daniel Moore: 39:21

And, of course, as we talked about last week, you know both of us, we both shared, you know some pretty bad things we did to each other. But, yeah, we chose to forgive. Have I forgotten it? No, you haven't forgotten what happened either, and obviously we're here using it as a testimony now to what God's done in our life. But the fact that we can use this as a testimony, what does that speak about? Where we're at with those problems that we had?

Michelle Moore: 39:49

Yeah, definitely. I mean we're past that, that is our past and God's using it as a testimony. I mean it may have taken—I mean God's healed our hearts completely.

Daniel Moore: 40:00

Yeah, you know, we've got to remember that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. We must remember that if what we are saying to our spouses is true, the Holy Spirit will enforce it and we don't have to. But if what we are saying isn't true, the Holy Spirit's not going to come in there and help with that. We need to be open to the possibility that we could be wrong, and this is another reason that we must forgive and keep our hearts tender toward each other. In marriage, both are equals and can say anything to each other, as long as it is done with love and respect.

Daniel Moore: 40:33

The fact that you know, you and I we had some harsh moments between the two of us, because I wasn't patient like Jesus wanted me to be, and also because I didn't trust the Lord to change you. The entire spirit of our relationship changed when I began to lovingly share how I felt and trusted God in those results. And so, when it comes down to, I think, probably with marriage problems, probably and you might tell me if you agree with me on this or not but I feel like probably the most powerful thing that we ever did that actually caused our marriage to work was that we forgave and we forgot about things. Because if you can't forgive for stuff that you've done to each other, how do you move forward? You know, we can sit there and run all that stuff, rehash it all we want to and keep it over each other's heads and, you know, use that to beat each other up.

Michelle Moore: 41:33

Right, right. And I think the most important thing for me was I mean it was that, but I really I mean it was god like coming to god and accepting the fact that I had made a lot of mistakes and letting him be my first love was probably my biggest thing for me because of what I had did, was probably my biggest thing for me because of what I had did and what I had done. I think it had to be that because we hadn't put God in our marriage at all. It was an afterthought. So that was the first and foremost thing, because I feel like you have to have that in order to be able to forgive.

Daniel Moore: 42:18

Yes, I totally agree with that.

Michelle Moore: 42:26

So I mean it was really because I had to accept responsibility of what I had done.

Michelle Moore: 42:31

And you know and you have to understand, when you do something like that and you have an affair or something, there's a lot that comes with that and you know, god had to really work on me and I mean it's been up until last year, I think I mean on some other things that came along with that, but for our marriage it definitely to me it was God. And then the forgiveness, because you know I have forgave you but I had to also forgive myself. I mean, if I didn't forgive myself, I would have never been able to work past it.

Daniel Moore: 43:02

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 43:03

And same as you, I mean.

Daniel Moore: 43:05

If you're constantly beating your own self up, it's still hard to work on the marriage and the relationship that you have with your spouse? Yeah, because you're going to constantly feel like you're not good enough. Right, you're going to feel like you deserve this or you deserve that. Yeah, going to constantly feel like you're not good enough. You're going to feel like you deserve this or you deserve that, yeah, and you're going to constantly go through that whole cycle over and over and over.

Michelle Moore: 43:23

And still you're not going to find that true happiness Because even if you forgave me, it wouldn't have been. I mean, and I think that's the reason why it was so important to bring God back in, you know to it, because I had to forgive myself.

Daniel Moore: 43:33

Yeah, that's some good stuff. So anybody out there, if you guys are having issues with the anger, the conflicts, you might bookmark this episode Because there's a lot of truth here, just biblically, on how you can resolve all of that and get past those anger moments. Because, like we said at the beginning of this episode, this is probably one of the biggest things that will tear a marriage apart Is the anger and the conflict that you're going to have and not being able to forgive and forget that.

Michelle Moore: 44:02

And I think with anger too, it comes with that pride.

Daniel Moore: 44:05

Yep.

Michelle Moore: 44:05

And so if you cannot get rid of that, that pride is going to be there and you cannot allow pride in the marriage.

Daniel Moore: 44:11

Right, yeah, pride comes before a fall, as the Bible says, and that's very true in marriage as well, because it's not just you by yourself in the relationship, it's you and a spouse, and so you have to be able to open up to that spouse, as the law of purity says here, and allow God to work through both of you.

Daniel Moore: 44:38

The law of purity is the universal law of love and marriage. You know we must be careful and responsible in our behavior, but even with our best efforts, there's going to be problems that we need to deal with. So as we close today, wherever you are in your journey, we encourage you to get current and stay current with your issues. Don't keep pushing that stuff off until a year later. You're so stinking mad you can't stand it because you've not brought nothing up in that whole year. Keep that stuff current as it happens. Take care of it Right then and there. Don't wait. It'll keep your heart and marriage pure and, best and foremost, you're going to be blessed by God. God's going to bless your marriage if you make sure to keep that stuff taken care of. Well, I think that's going to do it for this week's episode. Did you have anything else to add to it? I think we're good.

Daniel Moore: 45:27

Next week we're going to be continuing with the law of purity and we're going to be talking about everyday intimacy and we're going to be talking about the four lives of intimacy. It's going to be another great episode here in our series on the four laws of love. But if you're not subscribed you may miss it. So please subscribe to be sure you don't miss that episode. And that's going to end this week's episode. I'm Daniel Moore and my wife, michelle has been sitting here with me this week.

Michelle Moore: 45:52

Bye guys.

Daniel Moore: 45:53

I want to thank you guys for listening this. Bye guys. I want to thank you guys for listening. This show really wouldn't be possible without you. If you're a fan of the show, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. If you'd like to help us out, just take a few seconds and 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 pray that you have a blessed week.

Aria: 46:21

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. Thank you.