EP6. MAKING YOUR MARRIAGE GREAT: Part 3-6 Action Steps to Gods Plan for Marriage

Welcome to the Married and Lovett Podcast.

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

It is great that you are taking time to invest into your marriage by listening to our weekly podcast.

The goal of our podcast is to provide you with a weekly dose of marriage teaching to help you keep focused on your marriage.

See it as a freshening up of your marriage, preventive maintenance, a marriage tune up, or fanning the flames of romance, love and passion.

You could even call it continuing education.

We will be covering everything that has to do with your marriage, including hot topics like sex, communication, love and much, much more.

Our teachings are based on Christian principles plus over 47 years of marriage to each other and ministry experience.

We want to help you make your marriage great by teaching you how to be married and loving.

It is an honor and privilege to have you join us.

Today's topic on our podcast is part three of our Making Marriage Great series, which is six action steps to God's plan for your marriage.

See, God has got a plan for you and it's good.

And I think you're going to enjoy this part of our series because it's got some good stuff in it.

But there's some things that God puts in His Word through the scripture that we're going to be sharing in a few minutes that help us have the marriage that he wants us to have.

And you know what?

Life doesn't want you to have that marriage.

Life, the enemy, Satan life, whatever you want to call it, whatever your enemy is, is saying, I don't want you to enjoy your marriage.

He wants it to be boring, dull, distracted.

He wants your kids to get messed up because you're not, you're not having a good marri marriage.

And he just out to kill still and destroy.

But you know what?

Jesus came that you might have life and have it more abundantly.

Everybody say that abundantly.

So we want to set.

We want you to be able, when you get done with this podcast today, to be able to set your high bar, your expectation for your marriage to be a step higher because we don't want you settling for.

We don't want your family settling for.

We want to have God's best for our marriage, but for your marriage also.

So we're going to be talking about making marriage great.

Six action steps to God's plan for your marriage.

But you know what?

Before we get into that, I want to give you a little marriage quickie.

You know, a lot of people do research on marriage topics and usually sex and communication are the top two Most requested topics.

Now, we haven't got into those directly in the first five or six episodes of what we're talking about because we feel like a foundation that needs to be laid before we even get to that, you know, because some of y'all are maybe, well, I want to hear about sex, I want to hear about communication, I want to hear about boundaries.

What type of boundaries can I put on my husband or my spouse or all these type of things?

But you know what, if there's certain principles you don't apply, you're going to have a bad or poor foundation.

So, you know, we do a seven week marriage class.

It's got 14 hours of teaching in it.

And we have sex fizzle or sizzle right at the very end before we renew vows and talking about being a family of destiny.

Why?

Because everything from day one, the first 13 hours or so, or 12 laid a foundation to have a successful sex life.

And I know you've heard this, sex begins in the kitchen.

Well, it really does because it's a lifestyle.

So we don't want you just having sex in your marriage.

We want you to be making love.

So what I want to talk about in this marriage quickie, I'm going to combine both communication and sex right here.

There's a saying that I heard it's called communication is lubrication.

Now we all know what lubrication is.

It makes things slide together easily.

You put it in your car motor, you put it on screws when they're.

You put oil on things to make a screw work better.

You use it in sex to allow for no friction and pain free sex and things just work better.

That's another topic again.

But you got to have that lubrication communication though in your sex life.

So vital because if you're not communicating in your sex life, chances are there could be pain.

One or both spouses is not getting pleasure because you need to be able to talk about your sex life.

How do you like it, where do you want it, do this, don't do that, and the list goes on and on.

So communication is lubrication.

However, you need to have communication in your marriage so that if you're communicating then your relationship outside the bedroom has lubrication and it's going to go a lot smoother.

So just remember this, a little nugget.

Communication is a lubrication whether it's in your sex life or it's in your overall marriage life.

Yeah.

So part of the introduction to our six action steps, Ecclesiastes 9.

And it's verse 9, and it says, relish and enjoy life with the spouse that you love each day of your life.

So every day.

Every day.

Yeah.

And throughout the day, even that time of the month.

Yeah, that.

Yeah, that time of the month.

Or when your baby throws up in the backseat when you're on your work, like Jason did one day.

Yes.

And so here's our version of that scripture.

We feel like our marriages should be, wow, exciting, fresh, sizzling, a marriage affair, rewarding and strong.

We should be best friends, lovers, and partners in life together.

Amen.

We should, you know, we should be pursuing our dreams and goals together, talking about them.

And then when the busyness of life happens all around us, it doesn't matter.

We're still unified as a couple.

We're.

We're united as one as a couple.

And, you know, we are going to pass through the seasons of marriage, and there is.

Pass through.

Yeah, we're going to get through.

And.

And within our marriage, there's so many different seasons.

And here we are, almost 47 years we've been married to each other, and we have had several different seasons of life.

Several different things going on in our life.

Right.

Well, we're so.

Action step number one, decide to enjoy.

You know, the word that I just read to you, it says to enjoy.

But you know what?

We are responsible to decide.

We got to make that decision.

You know what?

I'm going to decide to enjoy.

I'm going to.

Even though with everything going on all around me, all the busyness of life.

Enjoying marriage just doesn't happen.

It does not.

It's kind of like Nike.

Just do it.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, it doesn't just happen.

We have to make that decision to make it happen.

So we're going to be talking.

Yeah.

It is a mindset.

And so, you know, we're going to be setting the high bar from.

Well, we can look at our marriage and say, am I really enjoying it?

Is.

Is this going on?

What can I do to not settle for yes.

What can I do to enjoy our marriage together?

And it may just be little things.

You know, what can I do?

What's enjoy mean?

Yeah.

Okay, so the.

Here's a definition of enjoy.

It talks about to experience with joy, take pleasure in, and that you appreciate.

And it goes on.

Be rewarding.

Yeah.

Special.

Yeah.

Exciting, romantic, happy.

Happy with.

I like these words.

Fun.

Yes.

Hot.

Gusto and zest.

I mean, we go through life and we see these things in other people's lives or maybe on TV or movies.

Yeah.

And we Say, I want that.

But God wouldn't put this in his word if we couldn't have it, if.

We couldn't do it, and if we couldn't make it happen.

Right, right.

So base your expectations on God's word.

And I like the Scripture, Ephesians 3:20.

That is one of my favorite scriptures.

And it talks about that God will do exceedingly, abundantly, above and beyond all that we can think or ask.

Well, you might be thinking in your head, you know, I would really enjoy getting to do this with my husband or my wife, but we're just thinking about it.

Yeah.

Well, God said, take that thought.

And, and he promises us that he is going to do exceedingly, abundantly, above and beyond all of that, because we might say to ourselves, you know what?

I might want to do that, but that ain't ever going to happen.

You know, God's not up there saying, I'm going to do exceedingly, abundantly, above all.

You.

You could ask or think, and we come back and say, we.

But I got to go to softball practice for my kids, and I got to work late, and.

And the lawn needs to be mowed, and my husband's cranky today, and.

And this.

And we got doctor's appointments.

Oh, we got to pay the bills tonight, and, oh, there's church we got to go to this weekend, and I got to make a covered dish dinner.

God doesn't say, oh, oh, I didn't know you had all that stuff going on.

Right.

He goes, no.

He says, you got to solve this side.

Enjoy your marriage.

Yeah.

And figure it out.

And we're going to be talking about that.

I'm sorry, how do you interrupt?

Quite all right.

So.

So we should.

Okay, here's a good question.

How would you rate your marriage as far as enjoying it and feeling satisfied with it?

You have something about that, Greg?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

Just take a moment and say, taking these definitions that Linda gave, how would you rate it on a scale of 1 to 10?

Yeah.

And let me ask you this question that kind of get a mindset.

Are you doing marriage or are you enjoying it in the rewards it offers?

Yeah.

Are you just doing it?

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm married.

You go to go to work, you send your husband off, your wife off, put the kids in school, if they're still there, walk the dog, come home, mow the lawn, clean the house, hang out on the weekends, maybe go out with another couple, watch a football game, whatever people do on the weekends.

We go to church, come home, do all that, and are you just doing marriage or enjoying what God has for you?

You see, if you said anything between 1 and 9 and 9's probably doing pretty good.

And 7, 8, 9.

But you know what?

In God's eyes, you're settling for anything.

Less than a 10 would be settling for.

Right?

Yeah.

And I know what you're thinking, but you don't understand.

I do understand.

Linda and I have been there, and we don't hit a 10 all the time, but that's where our goals and there are.

We got our aim set.

But if because you're only aiming for a six or seven, you're probably only going to get a four or five.

And you know what?

The marriage busters will come in and try to get you a notch lower.

There'll be more practices to go to.

The boss is going to be more demanding.

There's going to be more things to volunteer for.

You're going to have an argument with your spouse.

Your.

The lawn mower is going to break.

Somebody's going to get sick.

You got to go take care of a parent or somebody else.

There's always going to be things coming in.

But that's why we're learning through married and love it.

In our podcast, we're going to learn how to handle these marriage busters.

We're going to do the communication as lubrication in your whole marriage so you can experience what God has for you.

And that's one of the big reasons why our podcast is weekly.

Yes.

I'm doing a little commercial here because every week the marriage busters are coming in and knocking on your door.

We want in.

We want in.

But you know what?

You get a little dose about marriage.

It's like faith comes by hearing and hearing the word.

You're hearing something on marriage.

You're renewing your mind.

We have to keep it before.

So when those marriage busters come in, you can go, God wants me to enjoy my marriage.

Yes.

What can I do in this situation?

How can we get through this little struggle?

What can we change?

And I'm jumping ahead of myself.

But you got to realize the enemy is coming in.

He's sitting there by the.

By the door looking for someone to devour.

And it's not going to be you and your marriage because you're married and love it and you're enjoying what God has for you.

Yeah.

And you're deciding that you want God's best and you're not settling for.

Yeah.

And there's different seasons in your marriage and maybe you're not able to do everything you want to do, but how do you get through it?

And we've talked about that, and we will be.

God's grace comes in.

But this past last 11 years, for me and Linda, since she's had all these surgeries and health issues and we've had some financial struggles, and we've put things on the back burner and dealt with other issues, we haven't done everything we like to do, but we found little ways to work it where we'll make the best of the situation so we can still be enjoying ourselves.

Not.

Not our perfect part.

But you find a way to do things right.

And also, we need to take the initiative in our relationships.

You know, don't wait on your spouse.

You know, you.

You might be listening to this podcast, and you're like, well, I'll wait for my husband or my wife to, you know, do something to make it enjoyable.

Well, don't do that.

You take the initiative and you decide that you're gonna.

You're gonna find things to do that would make it more.

Realize it starts with you.

It all starts with you.

Like Linda's saying, it starts with you.

Because some.

If, you know, you're married and y'all are caught in a rut and you're just not where you want to be at, you have to decide you want God's best.

And if your husband or wife is not there, they're just.

They just haven't come around of where they wanted.

They haven't listened to this podcast.

You make the decision, and you get inside and you say, you know what?

God said it.

I want it.

And then, as we talked about in a previous podcast, you run the win.

So that way, just like Linda said, if your spouse isn't doing anything, you start the ball rolling.

You be the first one to do something.

Don't wait on your spouse.

You know, a lot of people, they feel like roommates.

Oh, yeah.

You know, just to identify it.

What.

What do you think about that, dear?

Yeah.

Do you hear that a lot when you're coaching people?

Yeah, when we're talking to people here, other programs and stuff, people, we're just roommates.

Ships passing in the dark.

Oh, my marriage is so boring.

Or they're just not.

I mean, another big word is we're not connecting.

We're not connecting.

All we do is argue.

You know, that's.

That's problems people are having.

But you know what my answer to that is?

If you feel like a roommate or you're bored, let's just hit with the roommate.

You know what?

It's real easy.

You already.

Yeah, hold on.

You might want to pull over if you're driving, because Stop acting like a roommate.

So you might ask yourself, how am I?

Well, yeah, but the next part is act like you're married.

Hey, revelation.

So if you say, well, we're just roommates, your spouse sitting on board, well, stop acting like a roommate.

What can you do?

You need to act like you're married.

You know what?

And look at it this way.

I like this.

A marriage is really a business.

You've got money coming in, you're coordinating.

You're coordinating the bills, you're taking care of the building, you're doing building maintenance.

You're creating an atmosphere in your home.

Just like a business that wants.

No, they want unity.

They got a goal.

You're doing all that.

But you know what?

If you got a.

Your house is a business, your marriage.

You know what?

You can have an affair with your wife or your husband.

And it's legal.

And it's legal.

All right, so add some suspense.

Say, you know what?

We're doing this thing called marriage.

Well, have a marriage affair.

We used to do a seminar called A marriage Affair.

Well, an affair.

People have affairs, so they want to have good sex and do all these different things, but they don't ever develop a relationship.

But you've got a relationship, so change your mentality.

We've got it all when we're married.

See your spouse together and be co conspirators to life.

That your conspiracy.

Conspiring together.

You know what?

In this little thing called marriage is not a little thing.

We're going to have fun together.

We're going to have pleasure together.

Having a sneak.

We're not going to just do it.

Your kids are around.

We'll sneak off somewhere and have.

Make love.

Yeah, like when you were dating.

Well, I hope they didn't do that when they were dating.

Yeah, right.

That's true.

But what.

What are some of the things, okay, that when you were dating, when you were boyfriend and girlfriend, so to speak, that was making it fun.

That was making that relationship fun.

What are some of those things that you can pull back and think about now?

Also, all work and no play.

And a lot of times that happens in our marriage relationship, everything becomes all work and we don't have the play time that we need.

Well, like, we change our focus and we think about, like Greg was talking about our be a marriage is really a business.

Well, we don't want it to always be a business when it's a marriage.

We want to have some fun together.

So change your focus, like I said earlier, to take the initiative, get the cards out and say instead of just asking or wait around for someone else to initiate it, get the cards out and say, let's play a game of cards tonight.

You know, and a lot of setting up fun time that's going to play into the relationship, the personality styles.

Yeah, that's true.

Cuz.

Yeah, cuz a sanguine like when we first got married, Linda's that sanguine personality.

I want to have fun, she's having fun.

Well, I'm a more of a phlegmatic.

That means more laid back so I don't have to be.

Well, that's the way I used to be.

We're going to get into the personality styles later.

But you got somebody that's like that and the other person.

Oh, I don't.

I can just sit on the couch and watch TV or hang out with just the two of us.

Well, that causes problems if you don't deal with it right.

Do you say your marriage is boring?

Oh, well, well, you're part of that equation.

As Linda said a minute ago, if it's boring, like she said, go grab a deck of cards or a board game or something crazy to do or something.

And you bring it out and say, let's do this.

So don't wait for the other person not to be boring.

You quit being boring.

Oh yeah.

Oh, ouch.

The heart.

Did I say that?

Yeah, you did that heart, in other words, right, because we.

It takes two to tango.

What can.

Yes.

Right.

It takes two to tango.

Yeah, get tangled up.

So start with one thing.

It can be simple, right?

Yeah, Start with one thing, you know, Light a candle.

I like this.

Just light a candle.

Like when you sit down to have dinner.

Ladies.

Or the husband, if you're the one cooking, get a candle and just create a little atmosphere.

Break the routine, you know, we win some.

One of our marriage classes we'll teach sometimes about getting a red light bulb to put it in your bedroom.

It creates atmosphere.

If you say, oh, it's always.

Since you're talking about the bedroom, I want to talk, I want to say mention this.

Oh, we can talk about the bedroom.

Everybody wants a candle.

Light a candle in your bedroom.

Okay, so ladies, well, maybe men too.

You gotta create the atmosphere in your bedroom.

And our bedroom is not a laundry room because so many times we'll bring all the laundry that needs to be done, dump it on the bed or dump it in a chair and it becomes a laundry room.

That would be a roommate mentality, wouldn't you think, dear?

Yeah, yeah.

Roommates.

There you go.

Okay.

Just.

That's another little marriage quickie.

A nugget for you.

You get that one free today.

Yeah.

Greet your spouse when they walk in the door.

You know, or if you have dogs, they usually come running to the door when they see that you're coming home.

Greet your as a spouse.

Greet your spouse when you walk in the door.

Or if you walk in the door and you're not being greeted.

Well, go looking for your spouse.

Yeah.

Go find out where they are.

And, and yeah, greet your spouse.

I mean, we're just going to give little tips here.

It's little and it's simple.

But if you're feel like your roommates, you're not connecting.

You're on different pages in life.

Get on the same page.

Yeah.

Don't, don't come back three months later.

Well, we just don't connect.

Well.

What are you doing to connect?

What do you, what are you doing to add the spice and the fun and the change in your marriage, not your spouse like we talked about when we were talking on Be the better you, better marriage.

What are you going to do?

Are you going to get out of the chair and get off the phone when your husband or your wife comes home from work?

That's right.

Grab their briefcase, grab the device or grab the groceries and say, hey, can I help with dinner?

I'll help with the kids.

Or do you want a bath tonight?

Let's just go out to dinner, man.

I know that's a major, that's a major thing.

Hey, that's a good one.

Just to go to Burger King.

McDonald's cost you $20 for two people or $30.

But what are you going to do?

You God says, enjoy life with the wife of your relish.

Relish it.

So he didn't say he wants excuses.

He says do it.

Obey the word, Make a decision to decide.

And we're right now we're talking about the fun stuff.

We're not talking about overall communication and all the different how to's to have a good marriage.

We're just saying do things to have to spice it up somewhat or to have fun having a card game.

Whatever you, whatever you two like to do.

And maybe different than what me and Linda like to do.

Oh, seduce.

I'm coming to that.

I'm coming to that.

Go on.

But one of our homework, we say do the 10 second kiss.

Now, I want to add a little to that Today, the kiss, there's a reason for that.

Number one, it gets you kissing.

But I don't want to read a scripture.

This is in Song of Solomon.

It's 5, 16.

And here's the bride or the wife attitude about a kiss.

It says his mouth is full of sweetness.

And I know you, you're going to go, yeah, his breast smells like a dead fish.

So men, we do got to work on that.

Or his mouth spews out crap.

Well, we got to work on that.

So we're assuming this stuff is being taken care of.

His mouth is full of sweetness and he is wholly desirable.

Ladies, what is your attitude about your husband?

How do you see him?

And even if he's not quite the way you want him, start seeing them that way.

Help them to get to be that way by your.

By speaking to him.

And in a different way to encourage him.

But it says he is wholly desirable.

This is my beloved and this is my friend.

That 10 second kiss.

His mouth is full of sweetness.

Start looking at that 10 second kiss.

Man, I get the layout one on him before he goes to work.

Before I go to work.

And you know what?

That is a decision that has to be.

That is because we're always usually running out the door.

We're in a hurry.

But you have to make the decision.

Wait, pause, stop for a minute, find your spouse and set your timer.

Or just maybe you're just doing it in your head.

Doesn't really matter.

Yeah.

And do that 10 second kiss.

Yeah.

I mean, it makes you be so surprised at how it makes such a difference in your day, in your relationship, who you're going to be thinking about during the day.

Because you'll be remembering.

Oh, that was pretty sweet.

Just like the scripture says.

You know, sometimes Linda and I'll do the 10 second kiss.

And it is kind of a quick 10 second kiss.

It's not anything, but still we're connecting.

And then all of a sudden, Linda lay one on me.

The next day it's like, I ain't going nowhere.

Forget work.

Yeah.

Or whatever we're.

You can't forget work.

Well, the next scripture is.

This is song of Solomon 1, verses 2 and 4.

May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth.

For your love is better than wine.

Then it says, oh, listen to verse four.

Draw me after you and let us run together.

The king has brought me into his chambers.

Well, you know, just doing that kiss, maybe in the morning can energize you two as a couple.

It can get your blood going.

I mean, just throughout your body, not your one area.

But.

But you know what it does?

It.

It.

It can set the pace for the rest of the day.

That's right.

And then you anticipate getting home.

Yes.

And.

And getting with your spouse.

Because you're doing it.

You're out of a rush to enjoy your day.

And what do you got?

You know, you walk out the door and you argued and all the way to work, you're dealing with that and you get the work.

You're in a cranky mood or you're thinking, oh, man, we shouldn't have done that.

But when you walk out with that passionate kiss, a kiss, and maybe you throw a prayer in there or something, then you're.

You leave energized and you got.

The man is a better worker, the wife is a better mom at home or she's working, you're better.

And then.

Then maybe you're looking forward to getting home and getting another kiss, enjoying your life together.

Then it says, the king has brought me into his chambers.

Well, that can lead to other things.

But kissing that man, it's.

You're just coming into his world.

And you're coming into his world.

Now let's move on because our time's starting to.

To go.

Now look at the next one's.

The husband talking.

See, the husband and the wives talk.

This is song of Solomon.

4, 9, 11.

It says, you have made my heart beat faster, my sister, my bride.

You have made my heart beat faster with a single glance of your eyes.

With a single strand of your necklace.

Let me ask you this.

Some y'all that have been married for a while, when's the last time.

Maybe you were at church, Maybe you're at a meeting somewhere and you looked over and you saw your wife.

You looked over and you saw your wife or husband, and there was a gleam in yalls eyes.

You just had a connection.

And it's like maybe you were thinking, we need to leave this joint or go find a room, whatever.

But there's something there.

You have a connection.

Even in the evenings when you're out shopping, maybe, or when, like I say, maybe you.

I remember one time at church talking about having fun.

We were sitting down and I opened up my Bible.

Linda had put a pair of panties in my Bible and it fell out.

Sexy pair.

One granny panties.

And I'm like, whoa.

And the guy behind us saw us, I think.

And Linda said he looked like he was.

Whoa.

This guy, he was not thinking about the message, but what.

I mean, preach.

Maybe she should have done that.

Maybe not, I don't know, but just.

Having fun like that.

But get creative in your, in your, in your relationship.

But you should have that click.

See, if you're an old roommate, you don't look across the room and you probably think your roommate needs to clean up the mess.

So when you get on your husband or wife about cleaning up, you're treating them like a roommate as if you're doing that all the time.

Treat them like a lover that you're having an affair, that you, that your lovers.

And it goes on.

How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride.

How much better is your love than wine and the fragrance of your oils, than all kinds of spices.

Verse 11.

Your lips, my bride.

Drip, drip, honey.

Honey and milk are under your tongue.

That sounds like a little more detailed kissing.

I think some kids call that French kissing or if they still even have.

A term anymore, I don't know.

But look at that attitude about a kiss.

Look at the power of that kiss.

In the morning or whenever you do your 10 second kiss, remember the word says to enjoy life.

Little things like this enjoy.

Because you don't enjoy mowing the lawn or doing a budget, but you can definitely enjoy a kiss or holding hands or cuddling and such.

Do the 10 second kiss.

All right, let me move on.

Oh, okay, one more part here.

Change your dull routine and do something fun and exciting.

You know, yesterday after church, Linda and I did a little bit of running around and we said let's go get a Whopper.

That is not our normal routine.

In the scale.

Definitely relates related to that.

But you know what?

We decided to go get a waffer.

Well, for one thing, we went to the Burger King where I used.

We used to go with my mom and dad when they had visit town and Whoppers and Burger Kings and double cheeseburgers with mustard were my mom's favorite.

So we have memories at this restaurant and what we would get there.

But you know, we just went in there and ordered our Whoppers and some french fries and we just had a really good time.

We did something different than we normally did in getting a grilled chicken sandwich or something like that.

But do that break out of your routine.

Do some things fun and exciting and such.

Now I want to read one more thing out of Psalm and we're getting ready to close up.

We'll just have a couple of nuggets and then we're going to close up.

This is in Song of Solomon, verses 7 through 10.

I am my beloveds and his desire is for me.

Ladies, your husband desires you.

He loves you.

And in the.

They say, come, my beloved, and let us go into the country.

That's the wife talking to the husband.

You know what?

And it says, let us spend the night in the villages.

Get creative in your life, in your marriage.

Do something different.

It says, let us go into the country.

Leave the bedroom and go into the kitchen.

I mean, that's assuming the kids are gone.

Yeah, right to the living room.

If you got a private backyard, go in the backyard.

If you got a car and you can find a good place to park where there's not a bunch of cameras.

All over the place nowadays, go parking.

Kiss at a red light.

Do something.

Be fun.

I know some of you older ones are going, I ain't gonna do that stuff.

That ain't godly.

Or.

Or what?

Somebody might see us.

Yeah, they might see you.

Well, we don't want to see an example.

If your windows are fogged up, maybe you don't want them, but you know what I mean.

Let us rise early and go to the vineyards.

Let us see whether the vine is butted and whether prom against have bloomed there.

I will give you my love.

Think of creative ways to.

To be lovers, to enjoy your marriage.

Not when I says.

I'm not going to say that.

Just talking about sex.

But roommates don't give each other love.

If you're a married couple, you're having an affair, your love your lovers together in the midst of all the work.

Then find out how you can give your love and demonstrate it to your spouse.

So we're going to take a couple more minutes.

We're going a couple minutes longer.

But you're going to get your money's worth today because this is free.

All right, so let's move on.

So be consistent and intentional.

And intentional with everything you're doing.

Right.

On purpose.

So let's couple more nuggets here real quick and we'll close up, dear.

Okay.

How about starting the conversations, starting the conversations.

Make sure that it's not about kids, it's not about your bills.

The conversation should be centered around you and your marriage and fun things that you can do together.

Yeah, that's a.

Hey, yeah, that's a change.

Roommates talk about junk all the time.

Yeah, they just talk about work and.

And, you know, frustrations with life and everything.

Well, how about we change our conversation with each other and then seduce your spouse?

Whether it's sexual seduction or, you know, what a piece of chocolate cake brought into the home can be a seduction.

Yeah.

It works every time on Linda.

Take a walk together.

How about.

And you know, Greg and I used to enjoy walking outside together.

And like right now all the leaves are changing colors and just enjoy the leaves and just reconnect by walking.

Walking outside together, if you can do that.

And then we would go walking in the mall.

We would just load up the car and go walking together in the mall.

And see, Linda hasn't had it where she can walk a lot in the last 11 years, like we used to do every day.

So we had to get creative.

We'd go, yeah, think about it.

She had a walker and we could walk in there and it's air conditioned or heated.

Yeah.

And that made it nice.

Or when you're in the grocery store, hold hands in the grocery store.

Now, like me, I would be having to get in the scooter, but Greg would come right up alongside of me and he'd grab my hand and we'd be walk, I'd be scooting and he'd be walking while she's driving, holding my hand while I'm trying to drive.

And Greg's like, you're horrible in that scooter.

I was knocking things down, but that was because he was holding my hand.

I'm like, well, I can't drive.

The little scooter had problems before.

I would hold your hand.

Matter of fact, I was holding your hand so you wouldn't run into the people.

That's probably right.

But so little things like that.

How about cooking together?

These are just some ideas that you can do to turn off your devices, video games devices, and pay attention to each other for a change.

You know, find out what their love language is, your spouse and, and fill their love tank.

Fill it.

Find out what?

And we're going to be teaching on that pretty soon.

Yeah.

And then talk to your spouse about it.

Like when you're reconnecting, saying, what are some things that would be fun for you?

Yes.

What is it that you'd like to do?

And y'all talk about these things.

So you can, you know, here are just some little ideas that were thrown out for you.

Yeah.

And like I said, start a conversation with them.

Say, you know, do you ever feel like we're roommates?

And then.

Yeah, that's a big question.

That's real good.

And then you can ask them, well, what can we do about it?

Or ask them to listen to this podcast.

Yeah.

Listen to the podcast together.

Talk about it and do the 10 second kids homework and just decide and be creative.

Yeah.

And then act on it and act on it.

That's a big thing.

You might think about it, but what good does thinking do about it?

So we're gonna go ahead and stop here.

The next next podcast we'll get to action step number two and maybe number three.

But I want to leave two things with you.

You can experience what God has for your marriage, that you can enjoy it, or you can make excuses why you can't, but you can't do both.

So make a decision to enjoy your marriage.

A few years ago, I had an opportunity.

I was working at a Chick Fil A for a short period of time.

And you know, they strive on customer service.

That's their whole thing.

And sometimes a customer's hamburger or, excuse me, not a hamburger, sometimes their.

Their chicken sandwich or nuggets, maybe they were cold or something wasn't right, or maybe they didn't like their drink.

And there was one manager you would go up to in there and you say, hey, we got a problem here.

And a lot of times you had to get a manager's approval.

But this one guy, he always said, whatever the problem was, fix it and make it happen.

And so what I'm saying today, if you're a roommate, you got issues going on in your marriage, things that can be adjusted.

And probably very simply, you're having to make decisions on how you spend your time, but you're having to make decisions, fix it, just make it happen.

And then you can enjoy the marriage that God has for you all the days of your life.

Will it be easy?

No.

Be intentional.

You got to be intentional.

You'll have to make decisions, but it's going to be a lot better because roommates are not good.

No, don't be a room.

Don't be a married roommate.

Don't.

Yeah.

Act like you're married.

Act like lovers.

Have a marriage affair with your.

Be a girlfriend boyfriend.

Be a girlfriend boyfriend.

Make your marriage fun.

Yeah, I've had phone calls come in.

They're like, who, who's calling you?

And I'll say, oh, that's my boyfriend.

And they look at me like, what?

It's my hubby, you know, it's my husband.

And I always.

And I always get a big chuckle out of that with these people.

All right, so we need to close.

So you got homework.

Number one is to do your ten second kiss.

We got homework.

And you're to do ten second kiss.

Do your ten second kiss.

And then also here's another.

And then a second thing to do for your honeydew.

I like to call them.

What is one thing that you can change this week from now until our next week dose of Married and Lovett comes to you.

What is one thing you can change to bring more enjoyment into your marriage?

Sounds like a plan, yeah.

Thank you for investing into your marriage by listening to the Married and Love it podcast.

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This.