Friday, February 14th | 10 Rules for a Better Marriage (ft. Nicole Shah) (pt. 2)

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I'm John Galantis. You can find us online at Clearview Today show dot com. If you have any questions for Dr. Shah or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-582-5028 or you can email us at contact at Clearview Today show dot com.

That's right. You guys can help us keep the conversation moving forward by supporting the show. You can share it online with your friends and your family. Leave us a good five star review on iTunes or Spotify anywhere you get your podcasting content from. Link is in the description below and we are here in the Clearview Today studio with Dr. Abbadon Shah, who's a PhD in New Testament textual criticism alongside permagest Nicole Shaw.

Always got to give up the air horns, always got to give up the respect. Welcome. Welcome back. She was here yesterday. That's right. You were here yesterday for our first part of our two part Valentine's Day special. That's right.

Our verse of the day today has come to us from Habakkuk chapter two verse 14 Habakkuk. Well, a weird one. Not a weird one, but an uncommon one.

Yeah, an uncommon one. No, no hate to Habakkuk. Right. For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Oh, that is our, that is our prayer. The earth, the whole earth is filled with knowledge. You know, Dr. Shah, as a scholar, you, you, you pursue knowledge. You want to know God deeper. But I think what I've always respected about you and what I've respected about Clearview is there is a desire to know God, but it's, it's not just a desire to know about him, but to know him, the more knowledge that we gain about God is in a sense, trying to get us to God.

Does that make sense? Well, that's what the Bible says. You know, the Bible, there's a verse there about how, you know, when we desire to know him, that we desire to seek him, that's virtuous. That's a good thing to do. Let him who desires something. I can't, I can't remember that.

I used to quote that all the time and it's been a while since I have done that. But anyways, the more you want to know him is a good thing. Right.

Right. That's not something, you know, that's that's something praise worth. Like I imagine, I imagine like you've got a spouse, right? We're celebrating Valentine's day and it's like, you know, I think I've pretty much know everything I need to know about my wife. I don't have any desire to know her.

It's like, you don't want to get to know her any better at all. No, I think I'm good. I think we've more or less arrived. Right. So it's virtuous. It's good that you want to know more about God and want to spread that knowledge.

And this radio show, this podcast is one way, a big way of knowing that. So here's the scripture. Our resident researcher has put it out for us. Yup.

Here it is. Jeremiah 9 24. But let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice and righteousness in the earth. When these things I delight declares the Lord.

So if you want to boast, boast in the fact that you understand and know God. That's right. Amen. Love that. Well, happy Valentine's day, Nicole. Thank you. Happy Valentine's Day. Happy Valentine's Day to you guys and to our two bachelors back there. Two bachelors hanging out, having fun. Are you married? Oh, he's not a bachelor bachelor.

You're not, you're not married yet, but, but you're getting close. You got a heart. David said, he's got love for everybody. Happy Valentine's day.

Probably just like, no, if you wanted to catch a movie or like go with you, just do it, just whatever, hang out. If you want to play like some halo or something, you got plans. And Dr. Sean, Nicole, y'all got Valentine's day plans. Yes. Yeah.

Well, it includes our youngest son. He has an interview. He may be getting a full scholarship. There are several universities that he's applied to. And so, you know, he may be getting a full scholarship, but he has an interview process.

So you have to be there. Of course, our second one here is also in college. I think I'm going to a bigger university. Very cool. Yes. Exciting.

College life coming up. Well, yesterday we talked about, we had this, they had this list, these, um, well, do you want to, do you want to kind of kick it off to what we talked about yesterday? Sure. Yeah. So yesterday we began this conversation, you know, that Dr. Sean and Nicole, obviously you guys have celebrated 30 years of marriage. That's very exciting. Very cool. Very, uh, give a little respect.

30 years. That's worth a round of applause. Yeah, absolutely. 30 rounds of applause, one per year. There you go.

Here we go. Uh, but we started talking, uh, based on, you know, a message that you two have recently shared with our church family on 10 lessons that you learned over the past 30 years, 30 years to a better marriage. Um, and it's, it's so insightful. It's so real.

Uh, and it's so genuine hearing your heart and how God has walked you through these seasons of life, some ups, some downs, some in-betweens, um, but leading you to each one of these 10 different ways. When we sat down to come up with these 10, uh, as we mentioned yesterday, uh, we told each other, we're going to imagine that we're talking to our four children and they're not children like little kids anymore. I mean, you know, they're, one is what, 29 and 25 and then 21 and 17, 18, 18. They grow every year.

It changes every year. And two of them have spouses, other two have girlfriends. So, um, we wanted to talk to them. We wanted them to hear us. And if, if these are, so this was not just like, Hey, this rhymes or these, these are great principles.

We heard somewhere and man, that's going to sound cool here. No, this is like, does, do these work? Have they worked for us?

Are there still things that we can be working on? And so these 10 were very, very, very prayerfully chosen. Did you agree with that? I agree with that. I really do. We had a bunch of people texted in saying, please, please, please continue.

I'm wanting more of that. I think a lot of husbands, if you can believe that. Oh, and I believe it.

I believe it 100%. It's not a surprise. All right.

So what's number five, number five. By the way, can I say this? Um, I was in a meeting today and this lady with tears in her eyes said, by the way, I heard, I watched, uh, you and your wife, uh, you know, talking to the church and I saw the mistakes I made. Wow. I wish, I wish I'd heard that 30 years ago. That's a fantastic. Yeah.

And we heard that Sunday morning as well. And different people texted us and young couples and, you know, talked about how much it was helpful because this was not just again, prayerfully chosen and this was done, uh, with, uh, with a heart to see people do well. It's helpful when you get responses like that.

Cause like I think about like someone like me, I've, I've been at this church since I was 21. And so now I'm not saying this to brag, but with, with Godly wisdom and watching people who have gone through this before, you know, my wife and I have made, you know, I would say wise decisions because we're under wise teaching. And so it's good, I think, to see people who are on the outside of that saying, Hey, listen, I made those mistakes.

And I can tell you right now what these people are saying is not only credible, but it's very, very, very helpful. I think that that's an encouragement even to me. Well, in sitting and listening from a marital standpoint, I was, I was taking it in, you know, what are these lessons that I can apply as a husband, but also, I mean, like you shared Dr. Shaw, how can I teach my kids this too? They're headed, you know, God willing for marriage one day.

Uh, how can I impart this to them? And it was, it was such a, Elizabeth and I talked about this afterward. Uh, it was such a blessing to look over and see my 12 year old daughter taking notes as the two of you were talking. That was so sweet. We saw a lot of, uh, uh, you know, teens taking notes. I thought that was beautiful. It is because I think a lot of people forget that you don't have to make those mistakes in order to learn. That's right.

You don't have to be the one to make them. Well, years ago, uh, we were in Indiana and we went to the Amish country Mennonite, uh, country and we saw a sign because this kind of leads us into the fifth point. And the sign was good fences make great neighbors. And that's just kind of stayed with us. In fact, at the Super Bowl party, a young girl came up to us and said, I just want to tell you, that was the best statement.

I was my favorite. It's really great. And what it means is that there need to be boundaries in your marriage, externally, internally, internally between you and your spouse, certain boundaries, certain things that you want to do, certain places you won't go. Now I know we will cross those boundaries, but not having them is not good. Have those boundaries and by God's grace, do your best to maintain them. I mean, honestly, think about this with your boundaries with your spouse, you teach them how to treat you. And if you allow them to constantly run over your boundaries and you just stay angry, what's going to happen? You're going to get resentful.

You're going to get bitter. And then how's that going to help your marriage? I mean, imagine living in a house with no walls, you know, imagine living in like a country with no laws or no boundaries, not only are good, but they're very helpful for our marriages. And boundaries go externally in the sense of with your extended family.

There are certain places they should not cross over and then certain places you shouldn't let them cross over. So in the early years of marriage, people make the mistake of running to their parents and telling them exactly every detail of their fight. And what happens is, you know, your family remembers that. So you may get over it, you may kiss and make up, but your family says, I remember what you did.

Yeah. I think there's, there's such a desperation to have someone on your side, like in the immediate fight and you know, mom and dad are always going to have my side. And that's not, that's not helpful. And then of course, boundaries with the world, good fences with the world, which means you don't have to go with certain friends. No, you don't need to go with them on vacation. No, you don't need to go to that party. No, you don't need that little girl's night out or the boy's night out. You don't need that because you know what's going to happen. So boundaries means, no, I'm not going to cross that. That's a great point because I think a lot of people would listen to that and will say, well, when it comes to my friends and my fun, like that seems very restrictive. And it's like, that's what a boundary is for.

It's to restrict you from making unwise decisions, protect you from the dangers that you may see in front of you. That's right. Exactly.

There's a passage in the Bible that I wanted to quickly read, which is Psalm 1. It says blessed is a man who walks not in the council of the ungodly. There's a boundary. It means that not everybody should have a microphone in my life. I'm not going to listen to your counsel. Hey, let me tell you something. Let me tell you what you need. No, no, I don't need to.

I mean, maybe I listened because you're forcing yourself on me, but I know I don't need to follow that. That's right. Have y'all had to deal with that in y'all's marriage? With? With just anybody.

Just people trying to speak into your marriage that you knew in that moment. A lot. I mean a lot. And it's not, some people, not necessarily ungodly. They might've been godly people, but they are with their wisdom. If you want to say that or there was not good.

Was not good. And you know, sometimes we learned, we, we knew it from the get go and other times we learned the hard way. And then it says, nor stands in the path of sinners nor sits in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord means this is my boundary. I'm going to stay in the law of the Lord.

And in his law, he meditates day and night. He should be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings forth his fruit in his season. Whose leaves also, whose leaves also shall not wither and whatever it does shall prosper. How about the wicked? The ungodly are not so, but are like the shaft which the wind, wind drives away.

Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment nor stand sinners in the congregation of the righteous. So have boundaries and it's good to have them. And then the next one is my spouse is not my enemy. This man right here, he is not my enemy. So you have to remember that, that no matter how you feel in the moment when you are having a spat or an argument or a disagreement, whatever you want to call it, that person that's standing in front of you, that you, you can feel your blood starting to boil or your temper starting to rise.

You need to remember, wait a minute. They're not my, they're not my. But every marriage has one. You have an enemy. Your spouse is not it, but there is an enemy with a capital E and he is the enemy. And this is even a leadership quality that you've brought out Dr. Shah is that just because you have conflict, you have conflict in your marriage, but someone who brings conflict is not your enemy.

You know what I mean? Like even on a team, if you just think about like a team conflict, refines us, conflict helps us to trust each other. So also in marriage, like that conflict doesn't mean, well, that's my enemy. I need to win against that person. There is an enemy and you have to be sober and vigilant against him as first Peter chapter five.

That's right. In verse eight tells us. And I feel like John, what you were talking about is almost like what I like to say that, you know, our spouses are like holy sandpaper because they, they refine us. They rub off the rough edges, you know, and it's not always fun.

It's, it's not pleasant. There were, there were times like early in my marriage where like, I would think that Ellie was always trying to like correct me or she was always trying, she was like trying to change me. But at the time, you know, like you're 21, 22, you start to finally be cool with who you are. And so you start thinking, this is, this is me. And that means I must be good.

So why are you trying to change me? And then you realize you grow up and you get into your thirties and you realize like, I think all along she was trying to help me be better, but I missed it. That's what I mean.

Or I was, I was in danger of missing it. And I think that's something that a lot of people now miss. Something also important is to remember that children are a blessing. Okay. But if you think children are a blessing in the sense of joy and laughter all the time, that's not true.

I've got two under, I've got two. I'm just going to go ahead and give that some respect. Cause that's a blessing from the Lord, right? That's what the Bible says. And the fruit of the womb is a reward.

Psalm 127 verse three. But the blessing is different. The blessing is that you're leaving a godly seat in this world. Of course, there's a blessing in to see your little newborn and the smile and the cooing or the toddlers and running around acting crazy and funny. And you're laughing at them trying to do things or when they get into the teenage years and you know, all that. But if you think, oh yes, yes, man, they brought so much joy. No, they're going to also bring so much pain. Yeah, that's true.

When they're very young, the stress is probably more physical. Yeah. Yes. Lack of sleep.

Lack of sleep. And just, if you have one like we did, it's just a constant, you know, constant trying to keep up with them and making sure that they're not destroying them. Yeah. They're destructive. They're destructive in those early years. Right. And then, then we get into the middle school years, the teenage years, it's emotional draining, draining along with physical. True. Yeah. And, but then when they get into the young adult age and you think, okay, parenting is done.

No, no, no. No, it's a different kind of parenting where you parent without parenting. You know, it's funny cause I watch you guys parent your, your four kids, even your kids who are married, you're still parents to them and your parenting has to change. And so like, whereas like I'm in the, hey, no, stop, come here. Like watching you guys, you have to parent, like I think that's really where you, I don't want to call that the quote unquote real parenting, but that's where you have to say, all right, all the wisdom that I've gained over the years, I have to really put it in right now. That's, that's a difference. And you can't put it in unless they ask for it.

It's permission based. And unfortunately, you know, some people would agree with me that parenting in that stage where you have young adult kids becomes emotionally stressful because, you know, kids may say things to you or they will keep things from you, or they may, you know, talk about their growing up years as being the worst thing that ever happened to them. And you go, really? Okay. Wait till you have your kids. Let's talk again. Let's bring this back up in 20 years from now. No, no, no, no, no, no.

Not in the toddler years, not even in the teenage years. Let's talk a little bit after that. And tell me again, how, how, how did we do? And what you'll find is your respect for your parents begins to grow up. Oh yes.

100%. I remember, and this was when my first one was a toddler and I looked at my mom one day and I said, how is it? The older I get, the smarter you get.

And it's the truth. I mean, we, we began to see, oh, mom and dad, they were right. Oh yeah. Yeah. Those teenage years, you know, you think my parents don't even, they are clueless.

They're another galaxy, much less zip code. And then as, as my kids have grown, I'm like, mom and dad, mom and dad knew more than I gave them credit for. Well, I would say as, as your parenting, and if you want joy in your marriage, make sure as moms and dads, you are united in your parenting. Don't turn on each other. Don't make the children the deciding factor of your happiness, because that's not going to help them.

That's not going to help them. Don't bad mouth your spouse, right? I know your dad is, you know, he's going to, or she is, you know, your mom, don't do that. Don't do that. And I know we all done that at times. Try not to. It doesn't help.

They remember that. It's superfluous. No, I'm not, I'm not buzzing him. He's using my trick. There's a, there's a large amount of superfluity to it.

You know what I mean? It's superfluous. It's unnecessary.

The one thing you do remember, and I love, you should have took it when you had the chance, Ryan. Which one was it? Superfluity. Superfluous. I was like, no, you're just, we need to change the rules of this game. Superfluity.

I was like, that one might be it. The rules need to be like, it's not just one time. You have to use it a couple of times.

I'll bring superfluity back up later. What were you saying? Well, what I was saying was there was a quote that I had found years ago and it goes along the lines of what I was saying about leaving a godly seed. And it's by a man named Neil Postman. And he said that children are living messages we send to a time we will not see.

And isn't that true? Because we, we're not going to see 20 and 30 years, you know, after they're going to be adults and maybe even senior adults and living in a world that we're not going to ever live to see, but yet they are messages from us to our world. That's beautiful. Absolutely.

What's the next one, Nicole? Oh, okay. Crises are sometimes can be, or they seem to us random, but to God they aren't. We have to remember that. And the biggest thing when it comes to crises in our lives that I have had to remember and that I encourage, especially people that I counsel to remember, is that God is always good. No matter what, God is always good. Man, he's working. Even if it feels like it's not for your good at the moment, he's working everything out for your good. That's a word that I think perfectly describes how crises feel, even though we never use it because anytime something happens, like the car breaks down or some medical, it's like, why now?

It's always the worst time. James says in James one, two, my brethren counted all joy when you fall. Nobody plans on falling. Right. Other than jumping out of a plane or a bungee jumping. That may fall more in the jump category. Yeah. But even then you have a parachute.

Yeah, that's right. Even then you have a bungee cord, but when you fall into a pit, like a real fall, like in your driveway or down the step or something like that, or a pit, you know, walking in the grass, not knowing there's a big giant hole there or on the beach and somebody has, you know, we're making a sandcastle. There's no bungee cord or no parachute. You fall. You just hit the ground. Yeah.

That's it. So crises are unpredictable. Crises come in all forms, sometimes physical problems, emotional struggles, relationship breakdowns, financial problems.

I mean, all kinds of things that you never expected. They're part of these crises. Yeah. And I use the example and I still absolutely love the example of the silver Smith, you know, turning the heat up, melting the silver and looking over into that molten silver to see his reflection, not marred by the, by those impurities that are in the silver. Cause he keeps taking, he keeps turning up the heat and taking off the impurities until it's pure. And that's what God is doing in our lives.

I mean, he wants to look at, he wants to look at our lives and see himself. Yeah, that's right. That's right. And I think it changes those times of peace too. You know, I think that's one of the things that you guys mentioned when you, when you gave this message from the stage is that those times of peace, that's not just like, Hey, rest up because the next trial is coming. Those times of peace are actually times for you to be learning and like all these principles of God you're saving up for that next trial.

That's right. These thorns in the flesh are there for a reason. They'll stay there. God's not going to remove them. He's using these crises to keep you humble. What we're saying is God, if you just take this out, my life would be so much better. I could serve you if you just heal this problem. If you just give me a resolution in this sickness or help us financially or help us achieve this, but you're keeping it away. And we feel like if only God says, I'm doing it for you.

But how many times that you prayed that and maybe God did take it away from you and how long did it take you to forget? Every time. And it's always what you say to is like, God, I could serve you so much better. I'm telling you, this is for your benefit. And God is saying the whole time, no, the thorn qualifies you to receive my grace and you need my favor on you. You need my love. You need me to prop you up and not make you arrogant. Now, keep in mind crises come kind of randomly, but seasons are different.

Okay. And they may feel like a crisis, but they are really just a season of the season. Marriage will go through seasons.

There'll be changes. Dress accordingly. Don't be wearing a swimsuit or a speedo in the dead of winter.

Maybe just don't be wearing a speedo. Don't wear a woolen jacket in the middle of the summer heat in church. Right. Right.

I mean, make sure you have the right attire. Now, this is very biblical. Ecclesiastes 3 says, to everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven, a time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck what is planted. There comes a season where you need to be more into the harvesting mindset, which is like, I'm not going to go interfere with the crop.

Yeah. I see the bugs and it has been sprayed, but I need to leave it alone. I see the rain. We put the water out there. You know, the sprinkler system is working, but I'm not seeing much come to the ground. I see the sun. We may put a little shade on the crops, but I need to wait.

Sometimes people are trying to plant when it's a harvest. Right. Right.

That's near. They're not letting the season do its work. Right. A time to kill, a time to heal, a time to break down, a time to build up, a time to weep, and a time to laugh, a time to mourn, and a time to dance, a time to cast away stones, a time to gather stones, a time to embrace.

Guess what? And a time to refrain from embracing. Sometimes, you know, you'll have silly people.

The church has silly people. Yeah. Biblically, they don't know what they're doing, but they'll come to you like, you know, you need to make up and you all need to come together.

Don't you know first John talks about that? It's like, yes, I agree with the love and the embracing and all that, but there's a time for that. And there's a time to refrain.

Right now may not be the time to do that. That's a great point. Right. And so it goes on, a time to gain, a time to lose, a time to keep, and a time to throw away, a time to tear, a time to sow. I mean, there's a time you have to tear, a time you have to sow, a time to keep silence and a time to speak. I think we got that backwards many, many times.

A time to love, a time to hate, a time of war, a time of peace. So recognize the seasons in a marriage. That's right. You know, oh man, I'll tell you what, I remember when we first met. What do you mean by that? What do you mean by that? You're not the same person. You're romanticizing something that doesn't exist anymore.

Like that version of you is in the past. And it's not supposed to exist anymore. Exactly.

So don't, stop trying to chase this thing. Yeah. That's how people do dumb things in church.

And then finally, there are no perfect marriages. What? No.

For real? Two sinners. They're just two sinners. I was a little late. Sorry. Two sinners saved by grace.

And I love Ruth Graham's, her saying that she said a good marriage is just two sinners, two good, I'm sorry, it's made up of two good forgivers. Yes. Right. Two good forgivers. Right.

And I'm like, yeah, you're right. If you look at biblical couples like Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebecca, even Christ in church relationship, I mean, they're all broken. Christ is perfect. The church is not. So don't ever envy anybody's marriage. Don't envy anybody's family, their children, their wealth.

I mean, the more I see that and having pastored for 27 years, first church, only church, I can go and tell you, you don't want anybody else's life. That's right. No. What may seem like great on the outside is not always. No, it is not. I have learned over the 20 something years we've been here that what appears on the outside. And people are good at it too. I think that's something you forget is that people are so good at masking their lives or masking that I don't even want to say dysfunction because it's I mean, it's a functional marriage, you know what I'm saying?

But they're so good at masking that unpleasant reality that you start to really get yourself fooled even on social media and in real life, you start to really fool yourself into thinking, man, every single marriage has it made except for mine. Yeah. I would say if people follow these 10, they will they will really benefit from that. And the most important thing of all, we need Christ in your life. That's exactly right.

And in your marriage. That's right. So good. Dr. Shah, Nicole, thank you so much. I hope you guys were listening, paying attention, taking notes at home, such good information for us. Make sure you guys join us next week, same time, same station. We're going to be diving into another great topic here on the Clear Read Today show. Thanks again to our sponsors for making today's episode possible. And don't forget that you can support us by subscribing to the show on iTunes if you want to re-listen. And you can always support us financially at ClearReadTodayShow.com. Enjoy your weekend, find somewhere to worship, and we will see you bright and early on Monday on the Clear Read Today show. We love you guys. We'll see you Monday on Clear Read Today.