EP 22. Having a passion to meet your spouse's needs. PT 4 of the Lover's Dozen Series

Welcome to the Married and Love it podcast.

We are Greg and Linda Smith, your host from Raleigh, North Carolina.

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Thanks for joining us today.

Today's episode we're going to be continuing with the Lover's dozen, which is 13 principles that we have applied since we restored our marriage after a near separation back in 1986.

And we've been married for over 47 years and we're still together.

And you know, actually this coming up, May, coming up May or June.

That's going to be 50 years since we met.

Wow.

And you look just as good as you did back then.

Thank you, dear.

And I'll put my glasses on now, but no.

Can you believe 50 years?

Wow.

That went by dating and marriage experience?

Well, they say that time passes when you're having fun.

That's right.

Is that.

And what is.

How does they say that time go?

You're having fun.

Time goes by fast.

All right, so something like that.

Oh, well, y'all write in us and tell us how to say that correctly.

How about that?

Okay, well, this series starts with episode 19, so if you haven't listened to them, we would encourage you to go back to them and then you can start at the very beginning of the episode.

Yeah, they're all really good and they all build up and build on each other.

Before we actually get into today's topic part, I want to share a real life experience that just happened about two days ago.

You know, we've been married 47 and a half years, and the longer you're married doesn't mean you're perfect.

You learn and you try to improve all the time.

But I just, I'm going to a confessional right now.

The other night, I think it was on Friday night.

The other night, whenever it was, we were home, it's Friday Night didn't have anything going on, and Easter weekend coming up.

And Linda said, you know what?

I would like to have a piece of carrot cake tonight.

Just a special treat going into the weekend.

A small piece.

And then.

Then she goes, some Popeyes chicken would.

No, no, Bojangles.

I'm sorry?

Bojangles.

Excuse me?

Bojangles.

Bojangles chicken strips, which she knows I can't e.

And I'm not gonna mooch them because I don't like the spicy.

But you do anyway.

And it's like I'm already home, you know, we're there.

And so she gets.

Drops these hints.

And so I said, would you like for me to get.

No, I straight told you out I wasn't gonna hit around on that one.

She did, really.

So I said, all right, I'll go up to the store and get that and then I'll drive down the Bojangles.

It's bow time and they're not a sponsor.

But I said, I'll do it.

So I went.

I said.

I went and got picked up the.

The carrot cake at the Harris Teeter.

And while I was in the store there, I happened to see a couple people that go to our church and they're alumni from one of our courses that we did at the church one time.

So I went over and started talking to them.

We talked about the weekend, what they're going to be doing for Easter and all that, and chit chat it.

So then we said our goodbyes because they don't.

They're not even learning live in our area.

They just happen to be over and stopped in that store.

And so I went over and got the cake and a couple other items.

And then I said, all right, I'm gonna head on down and get the chicken.

Well, on the way to get the chicken, there's a car wash and my car was really dirty.

And I said, I'm just gonna run in there real quick.

It won't take long.

Linda knows I'm running around and I'd already forgot.

I had probably spent a few minutes talking.

So time's gone by and she happens to be hungry.

But I said, I'll just run in and run the car through the car wash and not dry it or vacuum it.

So I ran it through the car wash and I said, oh, it'll just take me a few minutes to the vacuuming out and wipe out the.

Wipe the outside down a little bit, dry it off.

So I did all that and it was nice out.

And so I drive on to the Bojangles down the street a little ways and the phone rings and I actually during that time I said, maybe I need to let London know I'm stopping.

I said, no, she knows I'm on the road and, and it just took me a few minutes to do everything.

So while I'm in there, my phone rang right after I put the order in and Linda.

And she goes, where are you at?

No, I wanted to see if you were okay.

Well, we all were saying, yeah, yeah, she wanted to know if I was okay.

And I said, no, I'm here at Bojangle.

She says, well, I haven't heard anything and it's been a long time.

But she wasn't just asking.

She was, I could tell she was upset.

Well, there's a reason.

Well, go ahead.

Well, back in 1999, Greg had a.

I'd say a near death.

Yeah.

Fatal kind of type accident.

And so I get this call and he was.

What happened?

She got one of Those calls about 10:00 at night because when he should.

Have already been out of town and.

I should have been coming home.

Right.

Yeah.

So every time now it's like scar tissue.

Yeah.

On me.

If he's gone any length of time, you know, and it starts to cause me concern that there's possibility.

I.

I guess I hope and pray I don't get a phone call that something happened, you know.

So it kind of makes me concerned when I know he said I'll be right back within just a few minutes really.

And he'd been gone for a long time.

And so besides that, I guess I was pretty hungry.

But mostly that sentimental that, that thinking, oh my gosh, I hope something didn't happen.

And a lot of times when I'm out, if I'm running errands and stuff, I'll say, hey, I'm on the way home.

Here's kind of a progress reports, especially if I'm out because I do most of the errands lately and, and because of what her healing that's going on.

And so I tried to keep her updated and I didn't even do that.

So.

Right.

That, that was something.

So she, she, you know, was really upset, I could tell.

So I was trying to say I'm.

Sorry and I wasn't mad, I was just concerned.

Concerned.

And I understood that.

So my, my whole point in this little story here is I did get home with the cake and she actually had me happy, let me have a couple of bites and got there.

She got to eat.

And you?

Oh yeah.

I put it took it out of the box, put on a nice plate, put the cake on a nice plate, so she had a nice meal.

But the point being is I should have called her.

See, a lot of times we, we, we're not putting the other person first or we're not thinking of what we needed to do.

And I was aware that I was probably taking longer, but I kind of justified it and said, oh, it's not going to matter.

Not a big deal.

Not a big deal.

But it was the other person that.

Could have been a big deal.

So I, I didn't do what I knew I needed to do and what I normally did.

And therefore, it put stress and concern on Linda that she did not need to have.

And so really, that's going to tie into what we're talking about in a few minutes.

But I want to let you know, you can have all this stuff down and you're going to have those times when you say the wrong thing or you don't do the right thing, but then you, you, you make up and you move on.

Linda didn't come home and say, no, you're not touching that cake and you're not going to have the chicken and clam up for the rest of the night.

I apologize, I repent it, and went on with it.

And we had a great night.

So just a little thing that happens in the Smith household sometimes.

And so let's get into the.

What we're going to be doing.

But before I do that, if you're a newlywed or you've been married just for a few years, this series that we're doing, the Lovers Dozen, is an excellent way to help build a firm foundation in your marriage, because we're talking about things that help us reestablish our marriage after we almost broke up.

So see the little 13 different principles we're going to be talking about as a foundation for your marriage.

Now, if you're like us and you've been married for a long time, the Lovers Dozen can be like a checklist to help you to evaluate where you're at in your marriage.

Are we doing everything we need to be doing a little regrouping?

Or it could be an audit.

You just kind of going through and doing audit.

Hey, how are we doing in these areas that Greg and Lynn talked about?

And some of them may apply to you and some maybe not.

These are what helped us.

They may not be something that helps somebody else, but they helped us.

But we're like most people, so it probably would help you.

So it's a checklist.

And remember this.

And that's even for me and Linda, especially after this weekend or Friday.

It's never too late to learn.

You've never arrived.

We can always learn.

Because then what happens?

We can learn so much.

After 50 years, almost 50 years of marriage, we forget some of it.

So we got to go back and remember.

Yeah, there's a lot of times we'll mention to people around us that we're doing a podcast and what it's about, and they just, all of a sudden, it's almost like a defensive wall that comes up, and they're like, no, we're good.

We're good.

We aren't even implying that they ought listening to the podcast.

But people are like that.

They're.

They're like, we're good.

No, we're all good.

Everything's okay.

Yeah, we're good.

Yeah.

You know, I remember I was at.

At the.

A conference, podcasting conference, back at the first of the year to learn how to podcast.

You believe me, there's a lot more to it than what you all just hear.

But I was giving a couple.

It was a father and a son.

I was giving them my business card because you kind of pass out business cards.

And they kind of looked at it, and I said what we did and what our goal is and that both of them go, oh, we're really, really good.

We're good.

We're good.

And, like, not showing any interest in it at all.

So, anyway, it's time to learn now.

The challenge is, for the ones of us that have been married more than a few years, it can be harder to change and make adjustments that we developed habits in, in our routines, especially if those aren't benefiting our marriage.

Sometimes it's good to learn new habits in these areas.

So let's think about what we're talking about.

Say, hey, do I need to adjust some habits?

Is there something in here I need to change my routine, Even though maybe you've been doing it for a long time to improve your marriage.

So just see these principles as something maybe you can adjust or add to what's going on in your marriage.

Yeah.

Ask God to search your heart for any changes that might be needed, whether it's something that you shouldn't be doing or maybe, like Greg said, something that you should be doing.

And also remember this, that God can heal hardened hearts.

Yeah.

Because as we grow older, it's like scar tissue from a surgery.

Yes.

You know, sometimes you get a hard heart, and it's like, you know, What?

I really don't care.

Yeah.

And then that's when we start hearing we're good.

Yeah.

Yeah, we're good.

We're good.

So God can heal and help you make changes if you need to, or heal where you've got wounds and stuff going on.

Correct.

And before we get into the ones, the.

The principles we're going to talk about tonight, I just want to do a little commercial here, if you want to call it that.

We want to remind you that we are working on a newsletter that we're going to be starting.

And if you would like to get on our newsletter list, we're going to be doing it through emails, plus giving you updates of what's going on with Married and love it.

You can go to www.marriedandlovet.com, which is our website.

That'll take you right there.

We'll have a link in the show notes, and it has a place there where you can sign up for our email list and give us your information and tell your friends about it.

Also, some.

A lot of y'all are married, and we know that.

And you have kids that are marriage, age or married.

Tell them about our podcast.

Yeah.

Spread the news.

Yeah.

Maybe there's some things you'd like to tell them and you can't, but we can.

Yeah, we.

And even your grandchildren, if they're married.

That's true.

And then another last thing is follow or subscribe, depending on what platform you're on, to our podcast.

So whenever a new podcast comes up, you'll get a little flag, come up and say, hey, new episode there.

There you go.

All right, well, just a little summary of the first part.

Episodes 20 and 21.

We learn to understand each other.

Those are really good.

Yes, very good.

You know, I learned stuff and I was the one teaching it.

Yeah.

So moving on.

What's number two there, dear?

All right, tonight we're on this podcast.

We're going to cover two areas.

First one is we have.

Number two of those 13 is we have a passion to meet each other's need.

Man, this is a big one.

We have a passion to meet.

To meet each other's needs and desires.

Now, here's an attitude to have with this.

It sounds real easy.

Oh, yeah, I'm going to do all that.

But sometimes we don't feel like meeting our spouse's desires.

So when we're going to be talking about this, it's you want to do it, and you may feel like doing it, but sometimes you're not going to feel like doing it.

So this is an attitude to have.

Now here.

Here's part one of it.

It's.

It's not a chore, but I get to.

As soon as I said I do to Linden, she said I do to me, that meant I get to meet her needs, and I'm the only one technically that has the right to be meeting her needs.

That same same goes for the wives.

It's reciprocal, back and forth.

It's not.

But it's not.

I have to, but I get to.

It's not a chore.

It's my pleasure to meet her needs, even if I'm not feeling like it.

And most time, we all do.

But there's times when you don't.

You're tired, you're selfish, you're lazy, or you're just don't do it.

Another one, it says, I see a need, and I have the privilege and pleasure to meet that need or desire.

It can be from refilling a drink to providing extended health care.

See, a lot of times I can come into our.

Our living room and we're going to sit down and watch a program or do something, and I look over and see Linda's water bottles half, half full, and I'm ready to sit down.

I got a cup of coffee, and I don't want it to get cold.

It's easy to say, think, hey, I need to see if Linda wants her water refilled or freshened up.

But my coffee's getting cold, so I'll put my coffee down.

Say, Linda, would you like to have your water refilled?

Or is there anything else I can get from the kitchen?

And she'll say yes or no.

See, that's meet in the need.

However, take that to the other side, the coin.

Lynn, over the last several years, she's had health needs.

What's what, what's been going on, and we've talked about in the past.

So I'm meeting more of her needs on a regular basis.

Does that mean every time she has a need, I'm going, oh, yippee.

Do I get to go meet Linda's need?

No, it's a responsibility.

It's a pleasure, and I like doing it, but sometimes it's inconvenient, but I still do it, even if I'm not feeling like it.

And it's continual that I need to do those things.

But she'll come back in my.

My needs in a lot of different ways, and we're going to talk about how to do that more practically.

You know, in First Corinthians chapter 7, verses 32 through 34.

It talks about how when a husband and wife get married, it says it's if they do get married, they can't serve the Lord as much as somebody that's single.

That's what it's talking about.

And some of these scriptures, people use this in the area of sex, but really it's saying a husband's desire is to take care of the needs of his wife.

The wife's desire is to take care of the needs of her husband.

So when we get married, God's placed us in our spouse's life to help meet their needs.

And so that's where we're at with that.

Well, I got a little article.

Now, this is really going to age us because it's a Dear Ann Landers article.

So if any of y'all remember her, hats off to you.

Yeah.

And I'm going to read it to you.

This is an open letter.

Oh, Dear Ann Landers, this is an open letter to all the couch potatoes who feel unloved because their wives are no longer interested in sex.

If your wife's life is anything like mine, it goes like this.

I'm up at 6am get myself ready for work, see that the kids, eat a good breakfast and get them off to school.

My couch potato gets up whenever he feels like it and goes to work.

He's home around 5:30 or 6, picks up the remote control and heads for the recliner.

I head for the kitchen to fix dinner, serve it, then clean up.

I then straighten up the house, spend time with the kids, start a load of laundry, bathe the children and put them in bed.

Finally, I'm able to sit down while I'm folding the laundry.

I try to engage my husband in conversation and all I get back is a grunt.

He doesn't even take his eyes off the TV when I speak to him.

After a while, I give up, go to bed disgusted.

With a life like this, sex becomes nothing more than one of those chores that is tolerated because I was brought up to believe it was my duty.

I'm not a demanding woman.

All I want is a kind word, a little conversation, some small sign of recognition that I am human, and maybe a little help around the house in the evening.

I hope all you couch potatoes out there will take this letter personally.

You might just rediscover the girl that you used to date.

Wow, that's.

That's powerful.

Oh, and she signs it worked to death.

Yeah, that's powerful.

Yeah.

That doesn't mean you're couch Potato.

Now that this.

This story can go male, female, either way.

Yeah.

Could be things where the w.

Life isn't doing things, but the point is we're there to serve and to help one another.

So that's what we're going to talk about as we get into the.

The needs and desires.

All right, let's go ahead and look more at needs and desires.

Now.

Needs and desires, they can be emotional, physical, social, spiritual, or practical.

And when I say practical, I mean more like honeydews or filling up a drink or something.

There could be something fun and spontaneous to do that you say, hey, I'm going to do this over here and bless my spouse by doing this.

Something they really like or, you know, it's something they really enjoy.

I could take it.

A spontaneous meat in the need would be.

I know Linda likes carrot cake or she likes fresh vegetables from.

From the grocery store.

So I just say, you know what?

On the way home tonight, I'm going to stop and get her a fresh bag of Brussels sprouts or something.

So because she loves to roast those, and I stop and do that.

That would kind of be like a spontaneous need.

Now she says, hey, Greg, I need some more.

Like the other night, she.

Well, that wasn't a need, that was a desire.

But I took care of that.

So those are carrot cake.

The carrot cake, yes.

Oh, the Bojangles.

The Bojangles, yes.

Yeah.

But some other things could be like laundry.

Maybe your.

Your wife's in there folding clothes, and it's got a big load, and you walk by, you look at her, you say, hey, and you move on.

Then you turn around and say, you know what?

Let me go in there and help her, because I know she's tired.

She worked hard today.

She had to work overtime.

The boss gave her a hard time.

So you go in there and you say, you know what?

Let me take over or let me hang up.

The ones that go on hangers.

Yeah.

Like the other day, that's what you did for me.

Yeah, it was time.

I needed to get clothes out of the washer and I mean out of the dryer.

And some of them needed to be hung up.

And so you got right in there, and when the dryer went off, you started hanging them up and getting them all together.

And then we kind of picked up together and worked us, you know, together on it.

Done.

Now, if I would have known that when she wanted me to hang up the clothes on the hanger, we got these new hangers.

I got them for her.

They're these yeah, they're supposed to be better to hang close, but they're, they're hard.

And trying to hang something on there is very aggravating for me.

So I still did it anyway.

So helping somebody, just hopping in and doing it.

Oh, another example is Grego go out and he, every time he'll go out and pull the pine needles off my windshield because I'm right under a pine tree and the pine needles just, I mean, tons of pine needles.

And he does that every time with my car, whether I ask him or not stuff or.

Yeah, he always, but always doing something to get my car ready to where I can manage and take it for a drive.

But in another I thing is, I love to butter Greg's toothpaste.

Like a spontaneous, spontaneous thing.

And some of you might say, what, what does that mean?

Butter your husband's toothpaste?

No, I'm not weird.

No.

But what that means is to just put the toothpaste on your spouse's toothbrush for them.

Say it's nighttime and they're going to be getting ready for bed soon.

Well, do it.

And that's a good time to write a little note and say thank you for everything that you helped me with today.

And you put your tooth, their toothbrush right there on the note.

It's just a random acts of service.

Yeah.

Really.

Yeah.

And that's what we're looking at.

Now this, I'm going to give one more example here that I know nobody can relate to, but I'm going to use it anyway.

And it's in the area of sex.

There can be times when one spouse is.

It's probably more of the male, but can be ready and wanting to have sex.

Make love.

I like saying that.

And the wife can come in and she's tired or maybe it's the husband coming in.

Either way, that lady where the couch potato just sat on the couch.

Yeah.

And she worked herself to death.

She said.

Yeah.

But anyway, the, the, that one spouse that's not, that's tired, can say, think to themselves or even express it.

You know what?

I see you, you're in the mood to make love.

I would really like to make love tonight, but I am, I'm really tired.

And maybe this is just going through her head or his head.

I'm really tired tonight.

But you know what?

I see your need and I want to take care of it tonight.

Maybe it's not going to be full blown, but tonight I want to take care of that need for you.

But on the flip side, same scenario Spouse.

One spouse is ready to have sex, the other one's tired.

Maybe that spouse knows about it, but the spouse is tired and.

And they express, you know what?

I'm kind of tired tonight.

I mean, I can come in and we can still make love or do whatever, but I'm really kind of tired and worn out.

Then that spouse this time says, you know what?

I see that you're tired.

You had a rough day.

You know what?

Let's just take a rain check, and maybe tomorrow night we can pick up.

You see, one night, one spouse gives in to the need or desire to the spouse, but on the next night, it's reciprocal, and that's why God wants it.

Every time you can't do something, but you say, I'll meet your needs, and you meet my needs.

And it balances out where everybody's needs are getting taken care of.

Now, what we're talking about is like, acts of kindness, acts of service.

And a few years ago, I worked.

Had opportunity to work at Chick Fil A for a little while.

And being behind the lines, you know, they.

They do really good business.

Really good.

And they're even closed on Sundays.

Well, one of the reasons why is their service.

You walk in there, and I'm not sponsored by Chick Fil A, but you go in there and they're going to treat you good, or they should be treating you good.

And they train us that way, from the managers all the way down to everybody and everything.

Because you know what they say all the time?

They say, you say, thank you for something.

They go, my pleasure, my pleasure.

But it really is their pleasure.

You know, when the.

When you walk in the door there and you.

Somebody says, welcome to Chick Fil A.

And got tired of hearing that.

But.

But it's almost like everybody is trained to be aware of the needs of the customer.

So you don't walk in.

As a rule, you shouldn't be walking in and standing there.

Two or three people behind the counter talking, looking in the back.

It's like you almost get trained to know somebody is standing there, and you turn around and you take their order anytime there's a need.

They bend over backwards to make sure your food is proper.

If something's not cooked right, they're gonna.

They don't argue with you.

They just go get you another sandwich or they refill your drink.

They'll give you free refills.

They have people that walk around the store.

Do you need a refill?

Let me go get the refill.

Is everything okay?

To keep the area Neat.

But their whole focus is meeting those needs.

If somebody comes at the counter wanting a refill, they'll stop, they'll walk over and get that.

So they make customer service a priority.

That is the way we should be in our marriages.

Yeah.

That moves right into what are some action steps.

I mean, how can we be aware of what our spouse's needs and desires are?

And so that would be number one, to listen, be aware of, pay attention.

And that's an example of what you're saying that Chick fil a always does.

Be aware of.

Pay attention and ask they at Chick Fil A, what you said they.

They would stop and ask, is everything okay?

Is there anything I can get you?

And then they take action, right?

They take action.

Takes action.

They.

They got their antenna up.

Yes.

Yeah.

Their radars on.

They pick up on hints and clues, which is what you did the other night with carrot cake and Bo Bow time.

Yeah, you know, I mean, I didn't hint around and I said it straightforward, but you know what I'm saying?

That's it, you know, and.

But I can tell you that on the laundry because I was saying, oh, the dryer just buzzed and I'm going to need to get in there and get the clothes out of the dryer where you were up on it, because you were right there where you could do that.

Right.

And help me get the clothes taken care of.

But what about.

Remember in the Bible, I think is second Samuel, what.

What was it that David's his, I guess, or armor bearers or something.

Yeah, they went to get him water.

Tell me about that story, dear.

David was hiding in a cave and the enemy, Saul, who was trying to get him, was across the enemy's lines.

And they were in Bethlehem, and the well of Bethlehem was there.

And David was just sitting in there and he goes, man, I'd like to have some water from the well of Bethlehem.

He just made a comment.

Just made a comment.

I was thirsty.

Well, there's three men in there and they happen to hear David say he was thirsty.

So they picked up, went across the enemy lines, into enemy territory, went to the.

Somehow got to the well of Bethlehem, scooped out some water and brought it back to him.

And it's just an example of us listening to our spouse water their needs, laying down what might be inconvenient to us.

I mean, they risk their life.

They risk their life.

I mean, that's drastic.

But that, that was.

I don't know, maybe you rest your life going to Bojangles.

Yeah, I risked it by not calling you back.

But the point is they listened and then they took action, and then it wasn't convenient for them, but they wanted to please and meet their leader's needs.

And that's kind of the attitude we need to have with our spouse.

Not every time is it going to be a major inconvenience, but they did it.

So anyway, that's just a good example.

Yeah.

So back to the action steps on how to do this.

I mean, listen, be aware, pay attention, even ask, and then take action.

Yeah.

Well, here's some more.

Here's a few more thoughts on meeting your spouse's needs.

Now, you and your spouse can have some of the same needs or you might have different needs.

And a lot of this is tied into the love languages, our personality types, and plus the male and female differences.

And we did cover a lot of these areas in the previous episodes.

So check that out.

Yeah.

Your needs and desires can change over time.

Right.

So you got to be aware, ask, listen.

And the longer we're married and the older we get, our needs can change.

Yeah.

Like life's going to hit, you know, and that can change a married couple's needs and desires.

Like when my back issues hit me.

Yeah.

You know, that caused a drastic change in our needs.

Yeah.

My needs, me meeting Linda's needs May came to keeping her comfortable and helping her heal and do all the things she can't do and belong with the things I need to do.

Right.

And so life hits and you got to be ready for it.

That's what your battles are for.

That's why your vows come in for better or for worse.

Doesn't mean your spouse worse and sickness.

But your life can take a turn.

And that's when you're.

You need to be there for each other.

Right.

And sometimes meeting the needs.

We've already said this.

But sometimes meeting the needs can be fun.

Like Linda likes going in there and buttering my toothbrush or likes doing little fun things for me.

Yeah.

I.

I get a kick out of stuff in a love note in Greg's sock.

So when he goes to put his socks and shoes on, he's like, what the heck is that in my sock?

And she's meeting my need of having.

Because he is words of affirmation, surprise, romantic and stuff.

And sometimes we just need to meet a need.

Right.

And.

And then thinking ahead about that, because Greg is really good about.

Before I even ask, he realizes that, like if my car needs gas and he'll.

Or it needs to be washed, so he'll take it up, get it gassed up, and he'll wash it up really nice.

And you know, that to me is.

That's making me know that he is thinking of me and he wants to meet my needs like that.

And I know some of y'all could be saying, especially maybe some of your women, I don't need my husband to put gas in my car.

I know how to do that.

I can pull up and.

And pop the lid and put the gas in it.

I don't need my husband doing that.

But you know what?

No, you.

You're.

You can do it, but some of y'all need to let your husbands treat you like a lady.

Yeah, you're treated like.

For me, the way I was raised, the chivalry, women, wives were not lower.

They weren't helpless.

But I treat her.

Treat Linda with honor and respect.

And to me, I just don't like the idea of having to get her.

Having to get out of the car.

It could be raining, it could be hot, it could be cold.

Having to mess with gas and smelling like gas and having to do that or take her time.

So I tried to do that and serve her that way.

And I honor and respect her by doing that.

So some of y'all maybe need to get off a little high horse there and allow your Prince Jarming to get on his horse and take care of your needs.

Good word, dear.

Now, if he's a lazy couch potato, tell him to listen to this, or we'll put him in the roaster and he'll be a baked potato.

Yeah.

Okay.

So when we're doing this, we've been talking a little bit about the attitude you might have in meeting your spouse's needs.

So, number one, if some reason your spouse asks you, can you get me a cup of water before you actually sit down and get all comfy in your chair?

And you watch your body language, you might say, yeah, so what is your tone?

What.

What is your body language?

What is your face saying?

What are the words that you come back with if you really go, what's your problem?

Can't you get up?

No.

So, yeah, so those.

Those are just.

Yeah.

If your body langu.

Tone is there, all your brownie points just went away.

No, they left.

Treat your spouse the way you would like to be treated.

And even better, when you put in the effort to meet your spouse's needs and desires.

This is key.

It sends the message that you're thinking about them and you care about them.

That's right.

Well, I've got Another.

Dear Inlanders, this.

This is pretty good.

It says, dear Ann Landers in response to the letter about the wife waiting on her husband because she got him a soft drink.

Just listen to this.

A young couple in Missouri got married in 1937.

Mike worked the third shift for the railroad.

He would come home at 7am do odd jobs around the house, fix the old car, do everything but go to bed.

Finally, about 4pm in the afternoon, he would crawl into the sack, and then it would take an atomic bomb to wake him up so he could go to work.

Rosie would plead.

She'd say, honey, give me your feet.

I'll put your socks on for you.

By now it was 1947.

That's 10 years later and four children later.

Rosie never told anybody about how she would put Mike's socks on because they would think she was some kind of a nut.

But this went on for 46 years.

In 1983, Mike died.

Rosie tried to figure out how many times she had put Mike's socks on.

The number came to about 15,000.

Wow.

And that wife was me.

I'll soon be 75.

Mike has been dead 10 years.

I'll get well.

I hate saying the word dead, but he's passed.

It's been 10 years since he passed on.

I would give anything if I could put his socks on just one more time.

Signed, Rosie.

And here is what an under says back to her.

Dear Rosie, what a beautiful love story.

People who care about each other enjoy doing things for one another.

They don't consider it servitude.

Your letter spoke volumes to me.

That's pretty good, isn't it?

Yeah, that's powerful.

Well, we're going to close this session.

I have a scripture that I wanted to read.

And this goes back to having acts of kindness and service.

And it's in Philippians 2, verses 3 and 4.

I'm going to do part B of.

Of number 3.

It says, Let each of you regard one another as more important than himself.

Do not merely look out for your own personal interest, but also for the interest of others.

See, it's not all about us.

It's not all about me.

It's not all about Linda.

It's about us meeting each other's need.

Well, we do have some honeydews.

Wait a minute.

Okay, one more thing you got.

Do you want to be irresistible?

Then make meeting your spouse's needs a top priority.

Treat them like they're more important than yourself.

Now you can get into the.

All right.

Honeydews.

Well, we talked about to meet the needs and desires of your spouse.

But what are some ways, think about it.

What are something you could do that maybe you're not already doing, you know, or maybe you are doing it and want to just kind of excel still more.

Right, right.

Bring him a cup of coffee or tea.

Like Greg is really good too about I'd like to sit down in the morning before we get into our day and have a cup of coffee and have some quiet time with the Lord.

We call it prime time.

And a lot of times he'll say, let me get you a cup of coffee.

Go get cozy in your chair.

And he also is super good about helping with the dishes.

Well, you do a lot of cooking even too, so.

Yeah, yeah, you picked up a lot of that.

But think about it for you and your marriage, what is it something you can do, Think about a couple things and then.

And then you know what?

Do it.

You know, I'm going to interrupt on this homework for a minute.

I do because Linda's situation with her back and just everything she's beginning through.

But I do a lot of the kitchen stuffs.

But there's a lot of times I know she's in the chronic pain and it's acting up more.

But she'll come over or start on the dishes sometimes to help me out if I've been really busy and I know she is hurting, I mean hurting.

But she'll come over and start helping me.

Well, Greg hates to put the silverware away.

Yeah.

And I don't mind doing that.

That's in the morning.

In the mornings.

Yep.

And so I clean after about cleaning out the dishwasher in the mornings.

And so I'll try to get in there and I mean I can do at least that much.

Yeah, right.

Thank you, dear.

What were you saying?

Keep on going.

The bottom line is there's times she'll.

When I know she's not feeling good, she'll come in and help and then I'll tell you, sit down or I'll let her help.

Yeah, there you go.

And another thing is, remember this week to apply the action steps we talked about.

Like to listen.

Make yourself a few little notes as you're listening so that later you can meet that need, be aware, pay attention, ask, and then take action.

And you know what if there's an attitude adjustment that you need to make?

Well, you know what?

Make it.

Make that adjustment.

And the last part of the homework, as you guessed it, the ten second kiss.

Now this is a part of meeting your spouse's needs.

They need physical affection.

They need a kiss from you.

So find them before you go to work.

You can do it more than once a day.

If you can more you do this, remember, it's going to get better and better and better.

But just say, hey Siri, set my timer or whatever timer you use for 10 seconds and maybe you got 10 seconds down, pull them to you even if it's an inconvenient time, and get that 10 second kiss and enjoy.

All right, well, that's it.

Now we had mentioned there's going to be two topics today, but we're going to pick up on the topic number three on our next episode.

So we look forward to meeting with you again in a week.

And remember, you can be married and love it on purpose.

On purpose.

That's right.

God Bless.

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