The Power of Feeling Seen: David & Meg Robbins

Hi, you don't know me, but I've just about run myself out of gas and I'm embarrassed that I've let the car go this long without gas.

Is there any way, I said I have $25, is there any way that you could go to the gas station a mile away and get a gas can and come back? And the first thing she said, which was so glorious is, oh girl, we've all been there before. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott and your hosts are Dave and Anne Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com.

This is Family Life Today. We are here in the studio with four very special people, starting with Anne Wilson and Meg Robbins, the most important, equal, most important. And then those other guys, Dave Wilson and David Robbins, president of Family Life. We fully agree with that introduction. Well, this is special because it's our final episode of 2023.

Can you believe it? We all just need to do a collective, what a year for everyone. So we've been over the last few weeks, having some best of shows. And today is going to be some of our best of from the past year in 2023, under the banner of ICU.

So in this final episode, it's going to be good. We're going to highlight some of our best moments and basically communicate. God says it to you that I see you. And you could say it to those around you as well. So I want to kick it off with some fascinating research from Ted Lowe, showing the importance of this ICU concept for a healthy marriage.

Let's listen. The research is so clear about this. And this study is actually 10 to 12 years old, where there was a group of psychologists that said, hey, it feels like we do a lot of research on couples that are struggling. And then we basically say, don't do that or do the opposite of that.

And they said, well, wait a minute. What if a great marriage is not the opposite of one that's struggling? What if it's different like everything else? You know, a great church is not the opposite of one that's struggling is different. A great football coach is not the opposite of one that's struggling.

They're different. So they did an enormous study in the United States and United Kingdom. And they came back and they said, it turns out our hunch was correct because the ones that were struggling, the commonality was I don't feel understood. So everybody went, oh, well, communication, communication, communication. You've got to have a firm grasp of reality of strengths and weaknesses, which would make sense.

And they went, that's logical, but that's wrong. The only common denominator with couples that reported the highest level of marital satisfaction, they were basically given a spousal report card and said, rank your spouse in categories like generosity, kindness, loyalty. And the ones that were happiest were the ones who ranked their spouse highest in every category than their spouse had ranked themselves.

So I think it's made up of, you know, if you could only see you like I see you. So Anne, you do this, I think really well in terms of encouraging your, encouraging your husband. I want you to talk a little bit about how you view Dave with this. I think Dave is incredible.

He could do it. I think he's one of the most gifted people on the entire planet. Like he's athletic. He's a skilled communicator. He's passionate.

He's a great leader. But here's one of the things I love about you too. You see me way better than I am. You'll say things to me like, oh, you're so good at this. Like, no, I'm not.

You look like this. No, I don't. You can do this. No, I can't.

This is every day at our house. You have given me so much more confidence because I'd probably be under the table most days because I don't think I can do things. But you've instilled in me this confidence that with Jesus, I can do all things.

I think that's biblical too. But you are gifted at that. And I don't think anybody believes in me or cheers for me more than you do. Well, it's honest. I mean, I'm sitting in a seat right here because of you.

I know that. You're an amazing, amazing woman. So I mean, we could do this all day. I just love how real you guys are with one another and take the time on the air to encourage one another. There's so many moments where I'm sure where guests just stop talking and get captivated by your playful conversation with one another, your honest conversation. Everyone listening could see how you guys treat one another as spouses and see the example of the ICU.

You do a great job and I love that about you too. And I would just add this thought for our listeners. That's a choice that you have to make as a married husband and wife.

Make that choice today. Okay, I'm done. So obviously this ICU theme doesn't just apply in marriage. It works for parents too.

So we wanted to listen to this clip from Dane Ortlund showing us the power of ICU to our children, even though so young, they're still looking up at us from the crib. I guess one other thought that comes to mind is and here I'm really thinking of the really young ones. You know, the ones who are looking back at you out of their crib or that you're feeding them and they're flinging the mac and cheese on the floor. Understand that you as a mom, as a dad are actually telling them what God is like. You are creating pathways in their mind and heart to be able to receive what God is like so that as you rejoice in them and enjoy them.

My dad puts it this way. Our kids receive enjoyment as love. If you enjoy them, they receive that as love.

If you just say, I love you, but then you enjoy other things or other people, they don't actually believe that you love them. If you enjoy them, if you smile at them, if you rejoice over them, they will grow up to believe that the love and grace of God is a believable reality because they got it in microcosm from an actual flesh and blood individual. It must be very hard for orphans or others who grow up, anyone who grows up in a cold home to really believe that there is a God, a heavenly father who's not like my father.

So let's beat dads and moms who make the real God believable by the way we love them and the tone and culture we set in the home. Yeah. Dave, when you said that, all I could see was a smile. Yes. And then I thought, grace is a smile. Bingo.

Love that. You know, if they're walking in mad and you're frustrated and if you can just muster up a smile, that's what he's doing when he sees us. I know we don't believe that.

No. Especially in the middle of our sin, he's like, I'm still smiling. I still love you. I still praise you.

I know what you've done and it doesn't change anything. It's like, how is that possible? If we could communicate that.

It's the beauty of the gospel. You do that. You do that. Oh, you do that. You both do that. You know, even as that clip was going and you leaned over to David, patted him on the hand like, oh, you do that. And he was like, you do that. You were like double time in doing that. You do that.

It was amazing. It's like you do that inception that was happening. But isn't that a great thought that we are telling our kids or a scary thought. We're telling our kids what God is like by the way we treat them and look at them. That's a big responsibility.

Yeah. I mean, I think in some ways it's kind of freeing too, because we know that we don't do that perfectly and God is bigger than our times. We don't smile at our kids when they need us to smile at them. But when we remember that God is smiling at us, Dave, you said that.

I thought it was so on point. You know, grace is a smile. And when we are messing up, my tendency is to think that God is so disappointed with me and he's probably frowning and has his arms crossed, but he doesn't.

He still has his arms wide open and he's still smiling and embracing me. And can I turn around and reflect that to my kids even when they're choosing the disappointing thing or whatever it may be? And even if we have failed in the way we've responded to their mess up, we can still go back and apologize. And that's God smiling again by offering grace.

It's never too late to go back with that smile and open arms. The way you guys just talked about that helps me think how I'm relating to my own shame. I feel with the Lord and running to him, he's smiling on me and his grace is limitless as I run to him with repentance. And do I process that enough where I'm able to pass that down in such free flowing form because I'm able to look at my kid and I go, Oh buddy, I know that I'm disciplining right now, but you need to know my grace is unlimited because I have a God. Because man, I disobey too often and I have a God that gives so much grace to me. Let me tell you how he gave me grace this week. We're able to pass that on so powerfully if we're processing our own shame of our own sin well with the Lord. We don't need to keep punishing ourselves.

He's already been punished for us. That's really beautifully said. It's the gospel. It is the gospel. And Dave, you know that we care about those relationships with one another in marriages, with kids, with our friends, and we want to invite people to be a part of that.

Yeah. You know, and I'm honestly hoping that a listener is seeing the smile of God right now. I did a message years ago with signs in my sermon about what we think God thinks of us.

And of course, you know me, I had to sing an old sign, signs everywhere there's signs. But anyway, here's often what we think. God thinks this, I'm disappointed in you.

I'm going to get you for that. Dane reminded us that grace is God's smile. And I think that's basically what we do at Family Life Today every day.

We sort of want to bring the smile of God to warm up your soul and warm up your home. And if you're grateful for that, you can donate to Family Life Online. And I don't know if you understand this or not, but we can't do what we do unless you jump in and become our partners. And it brings a smile back to us to say, I want to be a part of the team at Family Life that makes this possible. You can become a financial partner and this month, your donation is doubled. So why not smile about that and say, I'm in, I want to be a part of this.

Give today and Shelby will tell you how, but let me tell you, you're going to change not only your life, somebody else's life as well. Yeah, the beautiful part is every dollar you give will be matched dollar for dollar. So if you give $25, it turns into $50. If you give $250, it turns into $500.

It's just an incredible blessing from Jesus. So you can go online to familylifetoday.com with your donation or give us a call at 800-358-6329. Again, that's 800 F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. Well, today's theme is I see you and we've been talking about the power of this within our homes. It's important with our spouse, as we talked about, it's important with our kids. But the reality is it's also important outside our four walls with our friends and our neighbors. You know, I think we're all aware there's anxiety and isolation and discouragement all around us. No doubt witnessed that. When someone in your corner of the world feels discouraged or a little worthless, they may just need a kind voice like yours to say, Hey, I see you and I get you.

Here's an example of that with Don Evertz. We need other people to help us see gifts that we have. There's something about relationship that giftedness thrives in relationship and in community. I think of my mom anywhere I go with my mom, waiter, waitress, doesn't matter where we are. She stops and she says, you're really good at what you do.

Thank you for doing it. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like that too, right? Yeah. And when I was a kid, that embarrassed me because I'm like, mom, we're at the store.

Like don't get into those conversations. And I look at it differently now and you know what? I'm trying to do it more myself. Like I'm having my mom rub off on me and to say to people, you're really good at what you do.

Thank you for doing that. A lot of people don't understand their gifts because the things they're gifted at come easily to them. Oh, that's a good point.

And in the same way that we all assume everyone thinks the way we do, which leads to a lot of communication problems, we all assume people feel like we do. So it must be easy for everyone to do this. That's not a gift.

That's easy. And it's when we interact with other people and they go, man, you like the way you encourage people when you're, you know, you hear that enough times, you're like, maybe not everyone comes that easily to be encouraging. Maybe that's a gift of mine. Maybe I need to take that more seriously. Am I being a full steward of that? But that comes from having people point things out.

Yes, I love this. We need to be in community. Isolation is our enemy. And Don went on to say later on in that clip that 3% of the entire population feel they have zero gifts. And the only common thread among those people who thought that was being isolated from others. So if you're isolated, you'll start to believe that you don't have anything to contribute to the world. David, how do you respond to that?

When I heard that statistic, I started thinking about all the statistics now that we most of us know are pretty familiar with around the loneliness epidemic we're in and the surgeon general warning. And there's a reality that, okay, we are wired to give and take and to interact together and to bring out the best of each other because we need one another. And especially in the body of Christ, it is declared in first Corinthians that we are a part of a body and the foot needs the hand needs the arm. We all are meant to work together. And if we are buying into the lie that we can live this on our own, if we are tempted to believe, well, I'll get reconnected to community down the line, it's too busy right now. If we are drawn to just put our head down and crank it and not pause and be willing to engage with other people, even though the to-do list might not get done for now, we're really setting ourselves up, not only for loneliness and isolation, but then that double whammy of our gifts not being called out and affirmed and seen. We will not see ourselves perfectly. We need other people to be able to call out the gifts God's given us in one another. And that combo could get really lethal, especially in this season right now where loneliness is kind of spiraling out of control.

Yeah. Meg, how have you seen that played out in your life? Well, I think even just the reality of social media and how, you know, you can forget even truths about yourself.

I loved when he said, the things that you're gifted at are so natural to you that you think they're easy and they're probably easy for everyone. So you don't see that as a gift. And I think things like social media that can draw our attention towards other people and we start to look at others and can become jealous of what they're doing or see really a non-realistic picture of what we think their life is like. And you can start to look at yourself and think, oh, I don't have that.

I wish I could do that or whatever it may be. It's just a good reminder that we need to call out in others the gifts that we see in them because we need to be reminded of that. I mean, it's unfortunate that we don't see ourselves the way that God sees us most of the time. I mean, it's a choice that we can choose to believe who he says that we are and walk in that. But I think sometimes we do.

We need people to come alongside us and say, hey, I see this in you and this is something to celebrate and be reminded and centered on just the sweet gift of who God is and that he gives us gifts that reflect him to others. And I don't know about you, Meg. I can be really bad at this or really good at this. And it's determined by where my eyes are. When my eyes are on myself and my busy schedule and comparing myself, I don't see anybody in front of me. And I'm not going to speak words of life because I'm speaking words of death to myself. But when my eyes are on Jesus and my prayers, Lord, let me see people the way you do and say the things you would say, he answers that prayer. And it's amazing how you can see like the greatness in people.

And then we get to be Jesus on earth, speaking life and hope to one another. I found that to be easy to do when situations are easy. But I've asked the Lord recently to do that for me at the airport. It's really hard for me to see people the way Jesus sees them at the airport. When I'm like, get off the plane!

Or when you're going through TSA or anything like that. But like I did it on my on my trip down here to Orlando and he really did. He was gracious to me. Look at all these wonderful people that Jesus loves. It's a prayer from scripture. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear what you see and hear Jesus in people's lives.

And we can be a vessel out to the world. It's having eyes to see. But also, I mean, sometimes I have to take my headphones out and engage with the people around me.

Because sometimes when I'm by myself or grocery shopping or on a plane or whatever, it's easy for that to be me time. And sometimes we need that. But I feel like there are times when I know the Lord is kind of nudging me.

Hey, disengage from your own self and look around you. You know, essentially, we've said this here before, but, you know, sit and listen one time to our youngest son preach. And he said this statement I've never forgotten.

We turned to each other like he didn't get that from us. But he just said, when you see and he was talking about marriage, but this could be a friend or a neighbor. When you see your spouse the way God sees them, you will speak to them the words God speaks to them. Think about that for a second. Because when we see our neighbor as a precious man or woman, boy or girl made in the image of God, you speak life. You don't speak death, even though they may be, their dog may be pooping in your front yard. You know, it's like you see them as an image bearer.

That's the gift we just got today from Don. And you mentioned social media as well. There's a person behind those people who post online.

And so if you think behind every, you know, avatar picture, that that's a real human being, you will speak to them differently, even if it's with your thumbs. Now, before our final clip, let me just say on behalf of our listeners to Dave and Ann, I want to thank you guys so much for this past year. What an amazing 2023 it's been here on Family Life today. You guys crush it every single episode. And it's a privilege to get to do this, isn't it? Isn't it just a fun job for you guys? It's so fun for you too, Shelby. We love and appreciate you and all you do. Thank you.

So we're going to stick the landing here with maybe the funniest person on our program this entire year. Amberley Neese, who described a time when she was feeling unseen. And the kindness of a total stranger made all the difference in the world.

Listen to this. I just took a cross country tour to visit my daughter and it was fantastic. But on the way back, I was on the 40.

It was beautiful. And I am in a car that I've not owned a whole year. And I've never gone below like 50 miles to empty. So I am looking at the map and it says that I'm 15 miles away from a gas station and I have 20 miles left.

And it's the dog and me. And we're going, we're going, we're going. It goes 19 miles to empty, 18 miles to empty, four miles to empty. And the gas station is five miles away. So I pulled over before the car actually ran out of gas because I thought I'd rather be at a place that's safe. There was a little like gift shop in the middle of nowhere.

Tumbleweeds, the whole nine yards. It was literally like, this is a CSI episode waiting to happen. And here I am and I pull over, but we're going to be in an air conditioned place and it's going to be fine. And the lady says, I can't help you.

I'm here by myself. And so I walk outside and there are some patrons that had just gotten soda pop or whatever they got at the store. And I said, hi, you don't know me, but I've just about run myself out of gas and I'm embarrassed that I've, I've let the car go this long without gas.

Is there any way, I said, I have $25. Is there any way that you could go to the gas station a mile away and get a gas can and come back? And the first thing she said, which was so glorious is, oh girl, we've all been there before.

And I've never wanted to hug a stranger so much in my whole life. And 12 minutes later, I have a new gas can if you need one, I got you. But what I told my husband was once I got over the initial shock that it was, she was so glorious is that that's my job as a believer is to say to more people, I see you stranded. I see your struggle and let's be honest, it took her 12 minutes out of her busy day. She probably was busy, but she was willing to take the time.

And the question is for you and me as believers, are we willing to leave the comfort of our schedules and our agendas long enough to see people who are on the roadside asking for help? And she could have said, you're an idiot. And I would have deserved it, but she didn't. She started with, oh girl, oh girl, we've all been there.

So just practicing more of that. I feel like the New Testament church, the churches, we wouldn't have enough pews if more of us were willing to say, oh girl, I see you. We've all done it. We've all been there.

And then leading them to hope. And how much does your heart leap when you hear Amberley say that phrase, oh girl, we've all been there? I mean, every single woman resonates with that. If another woman says, oh girl, I've been there. Oh girl, I've done that. Oh girl, I get where you are.

Yes. I've talked to so many women of all ages that will come up to me and go, oh girl, I've been right where you are. I've been right where you've been. And that it's like, thank you that you're hearing us. And a lot of them will say, I work out with you and Dave and Shelby every single day. I'm like, what?

That sounds weird. I know. But that resonates with me because I want people around me that aren't perfect, but man, we're pursuing Jesus and we're not doing it in a way that's not really glorious because we are falling along the way and skipping and falling again and getting up, but we help each other up.

And that is glorious. We ran into a girl not too long ago and she said to Anne, she said, I listened to this one program you did. It was a program Anne did about speaking life to your husband. She said, I listened to it once a week the entire year. Oh wow. I said, are you kidding?

She goes, no. Every Friday I'd put it in because I'm going to need it for the weekend. 52 times. Every week. And yeah, she's saying, oh girl, I've been where you've been and I needed to be reminded every week for 52 weeks. That's how crucial some of the things that we talked about, this thing that we just talked about today with Amberlee, that is so us, that's all of us.

I see you. I just love hearing Amberlee tell that story because it's like the woman who said, oh girl, we've all been there was the Lord saying to her, I see you Amberlee. Reminds me of Hagar when she's in the wilderness and the Lord, he sees her and she calls him the God who sees me. And she actually says, you are a God of seeing for she said, truly here I have seen him who looks after me.

And it's just makes me think, do I have margin in my life? If God wants me to be someone who he might want to see them through me, you know, do I keep enough space in my life to stop and say, yes, I can go get you some gas or whatever it might be. I think that's, it's a good question, but it's so true that a lot of times someone else who says, I see you, I've been there. It's like, that's the Lord's way of saying, I'm here for you. I'm going to provide, I know what you need and I'm going to tend to you in this moment.

I think in this time of year two, it's crazy how we can feel lonely and we're comparing our lives with other Instagram lives that feel so full and full of family. And let me remind you that God does see you. There's not a time that he hasn't and he hasn't forgotten you. He's with you. He's with you.

That's why he was born. And Meg, it's so fun. The guys have been talking about giving and let's you and I talk to the ladies in the house. Let's do it. Because I feel like so often there are women and moms and wives that are listening and you're resonating with what we're saying. Jesus loves you. And I'm just going to appeal to your hearts. We need you. We need you to partner with us.

And I really hope you'll consider giving this year. Be a partner with us. Yeah, I'm actually one of those people that when I work out, I listen to y'all. I really do.

It's like you're working out with me. But honestly, I mean, I think we can both sit here and say we've been deeply impacted by guests who've been on here today and things that we've heard and processed. And we just want to remind you that family life today is a listener supported ministry and everything that happens, everything that you hear is brought to you by people who say, I want to be a part of this.

I want to be a part of bringing this hope of Jesus to others. And as December closes out, this will be the last opportunity to give and have your gift doubled. We have had very generous donors who have offered to give a matching gift, which means if you give $50 today, that turns into $100.

Or if you give $300 today, it turns into $600 right away. So we just want to invite you to be a part of this with us by joining us financially. And we love you. We thank you for listening. Like it's an honor that you're partnering with us, that you're listening, and that Jesus is transforming all of us.

Thanks for all you're doing. If you have already given, if you've donated, we want to say thank you so much for making family life today possible. You're bringing real help to hurting families. And we want to ask you to please continue to bring programming like this to so many families around the world. Now is not the time to give up. Families need the hope of Jesus.

And God wants to use this program to make that happen. You can go online to familylifetoday.com with your donation. Make a donation there or you can give us a call at 800-358-6329. That's 800 F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. Or feel free to drop us something in the mail if you like. Our address is Family Life, 100 Lakehart Drive, Orlando, Florida 32832. On behalf of David and Wilson, I'm Shelby Abbott. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a donor supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.