Together Through the Storms - Jeff and Sarah Walton

They said I do and meant it, but they had no idea of what was ahead. All of a sudden it was like this eruption. The Lord finally was like, okay, now it's time to deal with really what's going on under the surface. I am not being the model that I want to be to my kids and to my wife.

Something drastic had to happen. Welcome to Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . Today, Sarah and Jeff Walton share their story of going through the storms of life they've experienced in their last 16 years of marriage. Don't miss the encouragement straight ahead. If you go to fivelovelanguages.com, you'll see our featured resource, their book, titled Together Through the Storms, Biblical Encouragements for Your Marriage When Life Hurts.

Again, go to fivelovelanguages.com. Gary, there's not a married couple listening right now who can't identify with this idea of the storm. But as we're going to hear, Jeff and Sarah have been through an awful lot in 16 years.

Well, you're right, Chris. I think most couples do go through storms. But I think Jeff and Sarah have been through some tornadoes and hurricanes and pretty big storms. So I'm really excited to talk with them today. I read the book, and man, it's a powerful story of how God walked with them through a lot of difficulties in their marriage and their family. So I think any couple who's listening today who's struggling now or you have struggled today should bring a lot of encouragement to you.

I sure hope so. And let's meet them. The Waltons. Sarah is the author of Hope. She and Jeff now live in Colorado Springs with their four young children. She, Sarah blogs at setapart.net. Jeff is now a real estate broker. We'll find out more about that and what they've been doing. They have written this devotional, Together Through the Storms, Biblical Encouragements for Your Marriage.

You can find out more at FiveLoveLanguages.com. Well, Sarah and Jeff, welcome to Building Relationships. Thank you so much for having us on.

Thank you. We're so excited to talk to you both. Well, before we get to the storms in your life, let's talk about how the two of you met and what attracted you to each other.

Yeah, well, it's kind of actually a funny story. I was a senior in high school and Jeff was a junior in college. And I was going to be going to Taylor University the following year. So I went to Taylor for just a weekend to visit my brother who was already there. And we were standing outside of a building and he saw Jeff and Jeff and he were friends.

They had played lacrosse together. And he called Jeff over and he said, Hey, Jeff, come here. I want you to meet my sister. He said, I'm going overseas next semester and I want you to look out for her and be kind of her big brother next semester. So, of course, Jeff did just that and he made sure to take care of me by dating me and marrying me. That's the short end of it, but we both did not think anything of it. It was just kind of two ships passing, a quick meeting, and then we were off on our own way. But we did meet each other then Sarah's freshman year and I was a senior. She was there for orientation.

Then I was also there for football pre-camp. And so that's when we actually first met right before school. And I think just the things that, you know, attracted me to Sarah, where there's just a lot of similarities in things that we like. We both like sports. We both like doing things out outside together.

Both raised from Christian families and just seeing that, getting to know her. You know, there was just a quick natural spark from there. Yeah. Well, what I want to know is, did he give you time to finish college before he married you?

Oh, no. Did he just snatch you out of college? He swept me up.

Yeah. Well, he graduated. He actually stayed for a fifth season of football, but I think it was by the December of my freshman year, we were already talking about marriage.

And so we didn't end up, I think we got married after my sophomore year. So yeah, it was kind of quick. Well, you know, God brings us together in strange ways, but I'm glad you took care of the guy's, you know, sister. You know, that's really good. He's a good guy like that.

It's the best I could do. Now, did you expect to encounter troubles? Were there any warning signs before you got married that you all might have an awful lot of struggles in a marriage? No, I think from the moment that we started dating and then certainly when we got married, there weren't any kind of red flags that were on notice. And certainly you go into a marriage thinking that everything is going to be kind of smooth.

And as you plan it out, you know, you'll have X amount of kids and you'll be able to work up in your career and then move into a certain home or neighborhood. And you expect life to kind of go as you plan, like probably most newlyweds that are on cloud nine. So I don't think we really, there's no way we could have ever thought in our wildest imagination that we'd be walking through the years that we have up to this point of trials and struggles. And there wasn't anything looking back on it that could have probably been an indicator of that. Which is probably a good thing, or we may have walked away from the aisle. That is true. Yeah, had we known.

Yeah. Well, you know, when couples say I do and they take one another for better or for worse, they don't know when or how storms are going to come in their life. And as you're saying, most of the time we don't anticipate the storms.

You know, we just think it's really going to be better. What was the first real storm that your marriage encountered? Yeah, that's really easy because it was it was a sudden extreme storm. We had been married for three years and I was about to have, well, I had just had our firstborn and he was about seven weeks. Wasn't he about seven weeks old? And you know, you're a new parent. You don't know what to expect, but it's all new.

It's all exciting. We really hadn't left the home much yet. And all of a sudden he spiked a really high fever. And anybody who knows infants who spike a fever, that's that's a pretty scary sign. So we were rushed to the hospital. They did a spinal tap on him.

They did every kind of test that would need to be done. And it was terrifying. It was one bad diagnosis after another. They couldn't figure out exactly what was going on, but they knew that he had a severe infection of some kind.

But they couldn't figure out what. So we were in the hospital for about five days. It was actually our third anniversary we spent in there. And I think we were in shock. You know, you're kind of you're enjoying the new parenthood excitement. And then suddenly we were faced with we could lose this child that we just brought into the world seven weeks ago.

Yeah, yeah. During all of that, how did you respond to God? I mean, did you feel like, God, why, why, why, why, why?

Yeah. And that's the I think looking back on that, you know, it wasn't necessarily something that we directed or at least I directed directly at God and got angry over just, you know, this was a start of kind of our lifelong challenge that we've had with our oldest son. So he has neurological challenges and a lot of other trials that we've been through with him. And so when we look back on that date, there's not anything that I would say that we feel like God had let us down or there was something that just led us to be angry with him. I think it was we were in shock, as Sarah had said, and just trying to survive day to day of seeing what is this going to look like.

You know, those five days felt certainly much longer than five days in the hospital. But the interesting thing is, you know, we had dedicated our oldest son about two months before to the verses in 1 Samuel where it says, For this child I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition that I made to him. Therefore, I have lent him to the Lord.

As long as he lives, he is lent to the Lord. And so this is the first test, I would say, of being a parent that do we truly hold loosely our children before the Lord and allow whatever God brings into this little boy's life? And so that was a wrestling that we had to go through. And we still go through today because as parents we naturally want to hold on and we want to protect them and we want to give them a comfortable life, just like we want in our own marriage. And so when trials come and when we are up against that, we really have to come back to Scripture and remind ourselves, Is this something that we are truly gripping and trying to figure out in our own knowledge and wisdom?

Are we leaning on God and coming back to him and saying, This is a gift that God has given us for X amount of years, and we will do whatever we can to honor him with the years or the days that we have with this child and our other children. So I think those are some of the things that we were starting to go through of we are needing to back up what we just said we were going to commit this little boy. We really mean that. It was a real test of did we mean that.

It's easy to say those things until you're up against a wall. Yeah. So what was the next storm that came your way? Well, it really was kind of storms that came one after another. It was, as Jeff had said, our oldest, after the hospital, we kind of thought things were okay. We went home with an undiagnosed severe illness. He gradually seemed to get better, but then he kept getting sick and little things started happening. But nothing that you would have been like something's wrong until he was a toddler and we started having dealing with really extreme tantrums beyond the normal toddler tantrum. Things that just weren't reasonable at all.

A lot of aggression and outbursts that would go for hours or two hours that we would have to just either restrain him for his protection or our protection. And that increased over the years. And that's kind of a whole story in itself. But that was going on. And Jeff was actually a trauma consultant at the time, so he was gone 24-7. He was in and out of the house constantly, so I couldn't rely on him. So here I was, a mom, a young mom, dealing with something I had no idea how to deal with and nobody really knew what was going on. So it consumed my days. I was either restraining or recovering from a situation. And Jeff would be in and out of the house sometimes at really scary moments.

And I would be having to try to pull back my feelings of resentment or hurt that he was leaving during these hard times. And then my health increasingly got worse over those years. And so it was about nine years. We had four children. Through those years, we had layers of challenges with our son, doctor after doctor. My health got worse and worse. And then our younger children actually all started showing symptoms of sickness.

Very different between each of them, but none of them really connected dots or made sense. But our family was struggling on a lot of levels. And then on top of that, we threw in nine surgeries between the two of us, didn't we? So I had a degenerative ankle.

And so I had one surgery that I didn't walk for almost six months. So you add those stressors on, and it was about ready to break us. And that kind of led to some hard decisions. I'm assuming this put a whole lot of stress on the actual marriage relationship.

Oh, yeah. There was a season where I think we were in such pure survival, though, that I don't think we even had the energy to think about it. I think we were functioning together kind of like we were in a battle together and we were doing OK on the surface. But there was so much going on underneath the surface that we really couldn't address because we were so exhausted all the time mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally on all levels. And with Jeff and out of the house, I had a lot building up in me. But again, I don't think I had the time or energy or space to really even let myself feel it. And so that went on for many years.

And so I think when we did reach a point where we had a moment of reprieve, slightly reprieve, where Jeff ended up changing jobs, which we'll probably get into later. I do remember all of a sudden it was like this eruption, like a volcano was going off in me and I was floored. I was like, where is all this emotion coming from? And I had anger and I had resentment and I had hurt. And I had all sorts of feelings going on that it was like the Lord finally was like, OK, now it's time to deal with really what's going on under the surface. Yeah.

And I think that's the one thing. There was certainly stress after stress in our in our life. And so while we had the natural tensions and things that were going on between Sarah and I, maybe lack of communication and just things that were being kind of stripped down and then trust was maybe being broken.

Those things were just kind of at the wayside because all of those were being trumped by just the situation we had with our son and just being parents as well and how difficult that was. And as Sarah had mentioned, so being on call and working in the hospitals as a trauma consultant 24-7, nights, weekends, holidays, it doesn't matter. There were surgeries going on and that's when I was going into the O.R.

and consulting. So there were many situations where we had a very difficult and extreme situation that Sarah was in at home. And so I got a page or a call from the hospital or from a doctor and I had to leave. And so try to picture what that put Sarah in, you know, and what that was for me of being able to walk out on her, seeing her in tears and not being able to be there and help her through that because I was trying to do my job. And so I think those things really took a toll on our marriage for the nine years. And that continued, as Sarah said, really once we got out of that season, that's when kind of the floodgate opened and we had to deal with this head on.

Yeah. So you were in and out any time, day or night that you got a call no matter what her situation was at home. So I could see how they could build resentment inside of you, Sarah. And I could also see the pain that you would feel, Jeff, as you know, you're going out, you're supporting the family, you've got to go to work. And yet you realize this doesn't feel good. Yeah, it was a no win situation.

Wow. And that's the one thing that we were up against is, you know, I was trying to do what I felt was providing for my family. And so I thought that was kind of the honorable thing of being loyal to the doctors, going whenever they needed me. Fear probably certainly came in, fear of man, that if I did not show up when they had called when Sarah needed me the most, then I would lose their business.

And so that's what I was wrestling up against. And there over those nine years was probably, you know, one, two, maybe three times that I, looking back, should have stayed no matter what that cost was to help Sarah. And by choosing to walk away and go do my job, which at that time certainly thought that was the right thing to do.

But given our circumstances and things we can't get into to paint that picture well, that created a lot of chaos and turmoil within our relationship. Yeah, because, you know, in general, I knew my job was to support him and I wanted to. And every time he'd walk out the door, I'd say, I know he wants to be home if he could.

He's doing what he needs to do. But there did become a point where I wondered, would I ever come first? And that's where I think push came to shove that I started to think, no, I would never come first. And I knew he really wanted to be home. But there were times where I said, I'm waving the white flag today.

This is an unusual situation that I need to have you here. And so it was it was a no win situation. And but it did have an impact. And those are the things we had to work through eventually. Yeah. Jeff, Sarah alluded to this earlier, but eventually you decided to just quit that job. What really brought you to that point?

Yeah. So as you can imagine, just kind of the stress and the type of lifestyle that that was, you know, I enjoyed the job a lot. It was always something different and very rewarding being in those settings and trying to help in that, you know, the patient care and with the doctors. But the toll that that took on our family and seeing that I was missing important things in our kids' lives and being able to support Sarah, no matter where we had to go, we had to drive two cars because I could get called at any point. So going to church, going out to dinner, going over to a party that that created a lot of stress. And so there were increasing times where I was not able to lead my family to church because I worked on Sundays or I stepped foot into church and then I got a page and I had to leave. And so I ultimately, you know, it became too much where I looked and said, I am not being the model that I want to be to my kids and to my wife and leading them spiritually.

Just looking at that alone and knew that something drastic had to happen. And I walked away from a good paying job. And that that allowed me to get into something that created a big sacrifice where we had to take a pay cut. That was very significant. We had to move out of our home, which we thought was our dream home, and we'd be in for many decades. And then we had to move into a rental home. And that created a lot of sacrifice where people would look at us and say, why from the outside?

What are you doing? You know, that makes no sense. They even brought, when he was applying or interviewing for this job, they brought in like a third party because they were suspicious of him because he was taking such a huge pay cut. They're like, what's up? Something's different. This isn't normal.

What's going on with this guy? So it was a huge cost. We lost a lot of our comforts and we knew that was possible.

But I don't think you really realize how much the cost is going to hurt until it happens. And it really wasn't until we left, we moved, we were in a smaller home, and we started feeling that pressure that that's really the point where our marital struggles started to come up. Yeah, but we knew we were being faithful to where God was leading both of us. And so we knew that was the right decision, but yet it doesn't make it an easy decision. And so we had to walk by faith through those next couple of years and what that change meant in our lifestyle and in our marriage. So you took the other job, which was less pay, but less hours.

At least they were predictable hours. And so were things going well for a while there? Or was that, as you said, maybe Sarah, that was the time you began to really talk about your relationship? Yeah, I probably remember that as being the turning point, I'd say, in our relationship. I think because he was home more and I had a little space to breathe, I started, like I said before, to deal with a lot of emotion that I just didn't know what to deal with.

And so I first started doing it as probably most people do, which isn't the best way. I started having long conversations with Jeff, trying to explain to him what I felt and trying to change how I said it so he'd understand it because he wasn't getting it. And so what that was doing was actually building more anger at me because I had felt so hurt and I wanted him to see how I felt hurt. And I wanted him to see the ways that I felt like I'd lost trust in him. But we weren't on the same playing field at that point. He was not grasping that and I wanted him to so badly. And I felt like, how can we move forward? How can we heal if you can't grasp at all the pain that I have walked through? So I actually remember sitting on the couch one day and we had pretty much not had a conversation without tears involved. It was a really, really tense time for us. And I remember sitting there and I had tried so many ways to help Jeff understand and I was like, the Lord impressed on me.

Sarah, stop trying to change Jeff's heart and bring me yours. And that is what I did. I started, it was like I reached a breaking point and I started to pour out the hurt I was feeling to the Lord. I started to just, I journaled, I prayed, I kept bringing my pain and my struggle and my resentment and everything I had been feeling to Christ first. And I had to realize, really and ultimately, the Lord is the only one that knows everything I've walked through. Jeff was sometimes not in a room with me when I went through a really, really scary situation, but the Lord was.

So I can try to get Jeff to understand it as much as I want and he might be able to enter in somewhat. But Christ is the only one that knows truly the pain and the fear that I walked through. And so I realized I have to bring all that to him first and Jeff is never going to be able to give me what the Lord can. And so I started praying that God would give me the comfort that only he could give. But I also prayed that he would open Jeff's eyes to see what he saw fit. And it was really miraculous.

Little did I know Jeff was somewhat doing the same thing. And God just began to do an absolute miraculous work in us. We stopped turning towards each other and we turned to the Lord, but all of a sudden our conversations became more fruitful. And we started to be able to hear each other a little more. Forgiveness started happening.

It was a really, I'd say, probably the most incredible time in our marriage to see God work in such a profound way that really was all his doing. So things were turning in a better way because you were taking a different approach. But then something else happened with your job.

Jeff, when did that happen in this process? Yeah, so I was with that company that I had transitioned to for about a year and a half. And then they had started struggling and financially needed to make a decision.

So they laid off all their sales force and kind of flipped their model on outside sales to an inside sales model. So that left me unemployed. And so that was the first season of unemployment.

That's happened twice as it happened about four or five years after that, that one as well. And so when we look back on that, we thought we were obeying God to what he was calling us, to leave a job, to improve kind of the quality of our life. And whatever sacrifice that took, we were willing to do. And so now when we are in the midst of this, that we're unemployed, no income at all because Sarah was not working and stuck with, God, you led us here and now you just pulled the rug out from underneath us. Yeah, it was hard. It was really hard. This makes no sense. And so very confused, very frustrated and a lot of emotion going through us.

Well, can I jump in? Yeah. Just to make a point too, at the same time, I had just been diagnosed with Lyme disease and all four of our kids had as well.

And so anybody who knows the realm of Lyme disease most is not covered by insurance. So we were bleeding money and all of a sudden Jeff lost his job. So it felt really confusing. Like the Lord, like Jeff said, had pulled the rug out and we were like, Lord, we thought we were following you. And in your mind, you know, you naturally think blessing will follow obedience.

I mean, isn't that the natural way we think as Christians? Yeah, right. So it was a really difficult time.

Yes, that was six months of unemployment. And again, just really struggling with where God was leading me in my career and wanting to again, just press into him and see what was next. But that was again, that searching and just that dependency coming back that, as Job says, the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the Lord. And so again, just that test of everything, whether it's a child that we need to hold loosely because he's lent from the Lord or even a job or even our health, our finances, the list goes on and on. Are we willing to hold loosely the comforts of this world and the blessings that God gives us, even if they're just for a season and press into trusting Christ at the core, no matter what that is?

And is Christ enough or do we need Christ plus something else? And so I think that's what we were up against. Yeah. Was that the lowest point of all of this or does it get even worse? You know, to be honest, it's been more of a roller coaster.

I think there's been a lot of low points. I see really a pattern in our life where the Lord allowed one thing after another and then suddenly you just feel like something breaks in you. Like, I just can't do this anymore.

This is too much. But he somehow sustains us and he holds you and he carries you through that. And then time and time again, we see his spirit just renews strength in us and a perseverance. And then we're walking through that perseverance and then layer upon layer comes and then you feel broken again. You know, the Christian life is not this uphill, you know, you're growing and everything gets easier.

In fact, it seems to be the opposite where life gets hard and the challenges grow deeper because we start to wrestle with deeper truths. Do I really believe God is good if he allows things that are so painful in my life or I'm praying so specifically for this specific thing? And not only does he not give that, he gives the opposite. You know, those questions start to come up and I think that's what led us to Job, honestly, was that is the book of the Bible that makes you think, okay, Job went, here's this righteous man, and yet God allowed Satan to attack him on almost every single level. So you start to question with the why. You watch him walk through layer upon layer of suffering and not understand how can a good God allow this.

I believe he's sovereign, so if he's sovereign, how in the world can he be good? So those were the questions we were really wrestling with and I had many low points where I just felt like I can't go on. But I look back at those low points and I marvel at God's faithfulness because those are the times I see that he is truly the one that's carrying me through this. It is not my strength, it is not my wisdom, I am not some super spiritual human.

It is purely the Lord's grace that he has carried us through times that there's no other reason we would have survived. Your experience is certainly parallel, the book of Job. As a matter of fact, when I was reading your book, I thought, I think this is the first marriage book I've ever read that has a strong focus on Job. Many marriages have probably had similar things, but were there people during this time when you were going through all of this, were there people like Job's friends who told him essentially, you know, Job, it's your fault. If you hadn't sinned, this wouldn't be happening to you. Did you have friends who meant well but said those kind of things?

Yeah, we certainly have and I think, you know, I'll admit I've done that myself. You know, where you try to comfort someone and you give them maybe a spiritual answer, a pat answer that you think is going to help, but yet it can do more harm than good. And so we see that through the story of Job where his friends come around him and they're grieving and they're trying to comfort him, but yet in trying to understand and put a reason to Job's suffering, they bring so much more pain upon Job.

By trying to accuse Job that there must be some kind of sin that he has done and trying to bring in something that is in his control, but yet they were not privy to any of the conversations between God and Satan as Job had no idea of those things as well. And so I think the friends that have come in and just people in general or maybe it's been a doctor that has said something when we've been in an appointment and they just say, you know, nothing really seems wrong with your little boy here, but maybe you just need to give him more stuff to do or, you know, it's something that comes back to our parenting or our marriage that, you know, we've read so many books on parenting before we got into it and classes and same thing with marriage as well, and you just can't prepare fully for some of these things, but yet when things go wrong, it's in our flesh to think, okay, what did I do wrong or what can I do to fix that? And you eat yourself up of just tearing yourself apart of thinking that did I do this wrong or should I have done that? And I think that's where we can fall into the trap that if we are not going to the word of God and seeing what truth really is, then we can start tearing down those lies that the enemy is trying to feed our minds. And so you can just see that even in the story of Job that apart from going to what we know is true, God's character, his faithfulness, his goodness, his love, and seeing Jesus Christ and the strength that we have through his Holy Spirit, that if we are not being fed daily on his word, then we are going to spiral down and we are going to be, you know, suffering greater than if we are trying to do things, you know, certainly apart from him. So I think that's something that we can relate to as well. And we've learned tremendously through our own suffering of how to walk alongside those that are struggling with something to show compassion and praying fervently for wisdom to know when to speak and when to close your mouth, because that is such a hard thing to do in such a balance of when you think you can be a help and also when you just need to be there and your presence is enough. And also just from the standpoint of I think we had to learn to lower expectations or get them in a proper place of other people. It's easy to also want to expect too much from people that they can fully enter in when in reality most of us can't. And people are scared of suffering.

That is the reality of most of us. We kind of are afraid we're going to catch it. So we can have a tendency to be afraid of entering into someone's suffering. And so learning to just have grace for people, too, that most people intend. They want to be offering help.

They intend good. But if they say something that's not helpful, growing in the confidence and knowing, like Jeff said, what is true allows us to extend that grace a little bit more to have some compassion to that, too. Yeah, and that one verse that we see in Job is that it references the words of the wind. And so if you think of that relationship between Job and his friends and their rebuke on him, if we can have that mindset of knowing that they are trying to be helpful, but yet it's also from Job's perspective. So as Job is lamenting and sharing his heart with his friends, that on the other side of that, you're not going to take that at face value because you know that their hearts have just been through a lot of hurt and pain. And so the words of the wind, if you know that friend has good theology, that might not be the time where you need to speak that specific verse into their life. But let them share with you the wrestling back and forth with God, and know that it's just the words of the wind. It's going to come, and it's going to go, and then let's use that time later on.

Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I think we're told that about 40% of Americans are suffering from chronic illness, which is what you've been through, Sarah, and then some of the children, and what you're saying now is, and I know we have listeners out there, some of whom are going through things like we're discussing here, and others who have friends who are going through these experiences. So I think what you just said in terms of how do we as friends respond to those people is a good word, because we don't have all the answers either. We act like we do, and we make them feel worse.

Right, right. I remember a missionary friend that had come home from the mission field, he wanted to do some counseling in our office and get some experience, and after every counseling session, he would come over to my office with tears in his eyes, and he said, I don't know how you do this all day. He said, this is just tearing me up just hearing all these people's problems. That is hard. It is hard, especially if you're trying to truly empathize with someone. You are kind of putting yourself in the pit with them, and that's hard to carry that weight.

It's really a rare gift to find a friend that will do that with you. Yeah. Now, of course, with Job, there was also distance between him and his wife in terms of how she approached this and how he ultimately was approaching this. Did you have any of that going through this? Or one of you was more in tune to, okay, God, and the other one was feeling, I don't know about this. Yeah, we definitely did. Or were you pretty much together?

No, we definitely had lots of things, which is why I think my favorite verse that we have up at the top of one of our chapters is Job 19-17. My breath is strange to my wife, and I am a stench to the children of my own mother. But isn't that really sometimes what we deal with? I mean, I think about times that I was dealing with a lot of chronic pain. I didn't want Jeff to touch me. I didn't actually really want him near me.

I just wanted to be by myself. Or times that we were both feeling the tension and the stress of our son. It just changes. It makes you wrestle with emotions that can sometimes make you turn against each other rather than realize we're on the same team here. So there have definitely been times where we have struggled with distance between the two of us.

And yet, I also see God's grace in how much he has upheld us through those seasons. We've definitely seen how easy it is for couples to start thinking, I can't do this anymore. I'm not relating with my spouse. They don't understand me. This is too much stress.

I can't do this. And really, it was God's kindness towards us that he held us both together. But then the fruit of that has been as he's grown us both spiritually and individually. It's also drawn us together more and allowed us to communicate, I think, a little better about those times. Like, look, I'm just not feeling good right now.

This is not a personal thing. But I just need some space right now. And that helps him to understand where I'm at to help prevent the distance from growing. It enables us to have a little more compassion and grace for one another. And I think through all that, even though that there's distance between us and the ebbs and flows of that, we were still individually going to the Word of God. And I think that's the only thing that kept us moving forward. Because if we had just kind of clammed up and shut down our relationship with God and said, I'll pick back up reading God's Word when we're through the season, you can't go through life. You lose your foundation.

Yeah, with that type of mentality. Because we're always going to be facing another challenging day or another season of life. And so it's just the importance of being grounded in truth and fighting those feelings and emotions that, I don't want to talk to God or I don't even want to open His Word right now. But we can't let that go on too long before we continue to just openly come to Him and have those conversations.

Because He longs to hear from us. As Job, I think, spelled that out so clearly throughout those 30-some chapters that it is just a marvelous gift to be able to lament that we don't have to come before God and have everything figured out. And God actually rewards Job for his honesty. And there was no sin in all of Job's lamenting. And if you read through that, along with the Psalms and Lamentations, it's pretty eye-opening when you hear some of the things that they claim back to God. And yet, we don't talk like that in church today.

We don't lament the way that we see in Scripture. And I think that's a key point that we need to bring back into our discipline before God. And also, just relationally, for spouses, I think that's something we've learned that has been so crucial for our relationship is to give each other the space to grieve. And I've so appreciated Jeff allowing me at times to come to him. I've also battled seasons of depression that are connected to my illness. And he has grown to learn how to listen in those times, to let me have the space to lament out to him. Sometimes I need to process it out loud. And he has been able to listen to that, not need to fix what I'm saying or tell me that I'm wrong.

That's not the way to think. But giving me that space and being an encouragement to me has been such a gift. And I think we give that gift to our spouse when we're able to have that space for each other to grieve in our different ways, to process through our pain differently. But we connect always on the truth of God's Word and to help each other slowly bring each other back to that central point.

But also giving each other that space, I think, has been really helpful. Let's talk for a moment about forgiveness, which is another topic that you cover in the book. And you say that forgiveness is the glue that keeps you together. Talk about that just a moment and the importance of forgiveness.

Yeah, sure. Well, forgiveness is such a central key of Scripture. You know, it's a central key of the gospel that we need forgiveness for restoration in our relationship to the Lord. And so with husbands and wives and that being a picture of Christ in the church, there needs to be that forgiveness in that relationship. We're inevitably going to hurt each other. That is just human relationship. We are sinners, two sinners married.

We're going to row up against each other. We're going to hurt each other. And so if there's not a consistent practice of repentance and forgiveness, that just allows for those hurts to continue to boil over. And we haven't always done that well. Sometimes, you know, I will hold on to a hurt and I won't really want to give forgiveness.

I wrestled through what does that mean? What does that look like in a relationship, especially that season when Jeff really was not able to see how he had hurt me? I was trying to figure out how do I practice forgiveness?

How do we restore here if he can't see the choices he's made in the way that's hurt me? So that's really what the chapter addresses is the helpful differential of horizontal versus vertical forgiveness. Dr. Timothy Lane has this really helpful picture that the vertical is between us and the Lord. And so that is what scripture talks about. We are to offer and entrust the pain that we have experienced to the Lord.

He is the ultimate judge. And that allows us then the space for the horizontal forgiveness may look different. If our spouse is not repentant, that may not happen immediately. It may be over a time where the Lord starts to work on their hearts and then that restoration can happen.

The other thing is the horizontal. We often have to practice that forgiveness over and over. You know, we don't forget things. And I have to remember when something happens in our relationship and it starts to bring up old hurts. In my mind, I have to say I have forgiven Jeff of that and I need to ask the Lord for the strength again to forgive him for the things that I have felt hurt by.

And to practice that consistently has been really, really important. I think that's something for our own marriage. You know, we even had some of those that you bring baggage into your marriage.

And so those are things that Sarah's been forgiven for, I've been forgiven for. And so choosing also to not bring those back up time and time again. And there's going to be many listeners that are going through, you know, seasons right now where their marriage, the one spouse might be walking with the Lord and the other is not. And then there's a lot of grief and pain and hurt and distrust and things that need to be forgiven, but they're not. And so for that one person, that spouse that is in that situation, they need to be in a place with their heart of humility coming before that they are ready to forgive if their spouse ever comes to that point of asking for that forgiveness. And I think that's the freedom that we have that we have to remember. We have to be ready to forgive and that might not come as hard as it may be in this lifetime.

And I know there's many marriages that are in that situation and that's the struggle that they're dealing with day in and day out. But yet going back to seeing the picture of Christ and his model of forgiveness and what we're called to here on earth. I really like that emphasis you have on that because we can release our hurt and our anger to God, even if the other person has not repented and turned around and we're free then to love them as God loves us, you know.

And that's why the scripture of course says, you know, return good for evil. You can't do that until you, first of all, you and God get this thing worked out and you put all that anger and hurt into his hands. As we come to the end of our time together on the program here, we know there are a lot of couples and individuals who are out there listening who are going through storms and feel that they're, you know, struggling.

And I know this is speaking to them. Is there a final word you'd like to say to that person who's listening today? Yeah, I think from a standpoint of trying to encourage them, acknowledging that there is real pain, not isolating from the body of Christ. That's one of the beautiful things that we have learned through all of our struggles and our hard, hard days is to press into the body of Christ and seeing them, the community of believers, that they can be just to help, whether it's praying or whether it's just for practical needs and pressing into that, not letting the enemy trying to divide you from his church and not being afraid to ask for help and support and maybe even counsel.

There's several times throughout our marriage that we've needed to go get counsel from a professional. And without that, we might be still stuck in our ruts to lift our eyes kind of above our circumstances. And certainly coming back to the word of God, being consistent and faithful to doing that and letting that be what is driving and fueling our marriage and not not allowing the root of bitterness and all those other things that can take hold of us and allow the enemy to control us. And I just I'd love to end with a scripture. These verses have been just such a gift to both of us, but to me, especially in these last several years.

In Second Corinthians 4 16. So we do not lose heart, though our outer self is wasting away. Our inner self is being renewed day by day for this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. As we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen for the things that are seen are transient. But the things that are unseen are eternal.

And that has been such a helpful reminder time and time again. We are wasting away. We are live in a broken world. We deal with broken marriages. We deal with broken bodies. And so recognizing and looking at our situation and acknowledging this is a wasting away of this world.

This is hard. I have freedom to grieve it. It hurts. But at the same time, to then lift our eyes and to remember the hope that we have beyond this world, the hope we have right now through the strength of Christ, but also that we are waiting for this weight of glory beyond all comparison, that we are storing up treasures for ourselves for all eternity as we press on in endurance and perseverance. And God is working in us now. He is redeeming us to himself through these difficult times. And so to not look at them as the enemy, but to look at them as they are hard, but I am going to trust the Lord is going to carry me through it. And I'm going to lean into him to see what he will do through these things in me, because I have this hope that this will all end one day and it will end in glory.

And we have to keep our eyes fixed on that. Amen. Wonderful verse, 2 Corinthians 4, verse 16. Jeff and Sarah, this has been a wonderful time of discussing hard things, but to see how God has walked with you, is walking with you. And thanks for being with us today, and thanks for spending time and energy to write this book, because I do think it's going to help a lot of other people who are struggling with similar things. So God bless you as you continue to walk with him. Thank you for having us on. What an encouraging conversation about the way God is at work in the middle of the storms.

Maybe you're right there. It's the storm in your marriage, or maybe you're listening and you're single. I think you'll be encouraged by the featured resource, Jeff and Sarah Walton's book, Together Through the Storms, Biblical Encouragements for Your Marriage When Life Hurts. Go to FiveLoveLanguages.com, you'll find out more.

Again, FiveLoveLanguages.com. And next week, we open the phone lines for your questions and comments about marriage, parenting, single issues, and more. Don't miss the October 31st edition of Dear Gary in One Week. Our thanks to our production team, Steve Wick and Janice Todd, and from Focus on the Family, Sam Truffin and Laura Kennedy. Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman is a production of Moody Radio, in association with Moody Publishers, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute. Thanks for listening.