This is the Truth Network. What is the most important love language?
Well, we have one of our all-time favorite guests. On Truth Talk and Truth Talk Live, Dr. Gary Chapman in the house. And that's the title of his new book that he wrote with Les and Leslie Parrott. I'm so excited.
I just want to know the answer to that question, Dr. Chapman, but I also want to be able to be one of the first to invite our listeners to come hear you in person at a wonderful relationship conference in Utah, in Layton, just outside of Salt Lake.
So we want to talk about that event. We want to talk about this new book of yours. And Dr. Chapman. You're, you know, you have, you have roared past the age of 80, and you're still out there encouraging families, marriages, relationships, writing books.
Sir, I thought, I mean, why aren't you chasing a little white ball? Why aren't you just in a senior retirement home, you know, just playing cards? What's wrong with you, sir? What's going on here? What drives your engine?
Well um What I do, and I know that God has called me to seek to enrich marriages. We struggled in our own marriage, my wife and I, early on. I have a deep empathy for people that are struggling. And that involves almost every couple at some juncture. We all struggle.
And so. As long as I have energy and as long as God opens doors, I'm going to keep walking through them and keep doing my thing. Called me to do?
Well, I have benefited my marriage, even raising our children, and now our grandchildren, we've benefited from. Dr. Gary Chapman's books, The Five Love Languages, all the great, the love language of healing, of forgiveness, all the different books and the different ways that it has segued. And you've turned these into conferences. It's just been amazing.
I love listening to your radio program, which we carry on a lot of our stations. A lot of the other stations that carry this program carry. Dr. Chapman's radio program, well produced by Moody. And Dr.
Chapman, you've written this recent book, and I know you're gonna be sharing some of these principles.
So let me just ask you out of the gate. What is the most important love language?
I got to know the answer to this, man. You've got us all on the edge of our seats here.
Well, that was our purpose for using that title. We knew everybody was going to say, Which one is it? Which one is it? And in the first paragraph of the book, we say, the most important love language. Is the love language of your partner, the other person, not you.
And we're making that point. Making that point, because so many people have read the original book and they take the quiz, they learn their love language and the spouse learns their love language. And so they're speaking their they're trying to speak the spouse's love language, but the spouse is not speaking their language. And they're saying, Listen, we read that book.
Now you ought to be speaking my love language. If you love me, you would do. Da da da da da da. And that doesn't help. That basically drives them away.
So what we're saying is, let's start where Jesus said start. Let's deal first of all with ourselves. and let's love as he loved. Remember, he loved us when we were unlovely. and sent Christ to die for us.
So we can love our spouse even if they're not loving us. And we think that just that concept is going to help. But in that book, we do two things that were not in the original book. And it's questions people have asked me through the years. They said, you know, Gary, in the original Five Love Language book, you mentioned that each of these love languages have dialects.
That is, different ways to express them. But you didn't tell us what they are. And you also mentioned That personality interfaces with when and where and how you speak a person's love language. But you didn't really go into that.
So in this book, we're going into both of those.
So if you've read the original Five Love Language book, this one's going to really help you dig deeper and learn not only the primary love language, but to learn the particular dialect or dialects that are most meaningful to your spouse.
So yeah, I'm excited about this book. I think it's going to help a lot of people be even more effective in communicating love to each other. Wow, and Dr. Chapman, you know, your books, your ministry, you've really struck a nerve because, you know, last time I checked, there's not a whole lot of college courses on how to love your spouse, how to find your love language, how to be a better husband. You know, we go to school for a few years, but we're married, you know, hopefully for 30, 40, 50 years, you know, in some cases longer.
My mom and dad spent 60 years married. But Dr. Chapman, this is so important because this is. Marriage is the greatest picture of the gospel. You know, manifested out in the world.
But we've adopted worldly. Worldly axioms and worldly philosophies for marriage, like you know, 50-50, like you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
Well, you do this for you, this is your day out, this is my day out. But really, that's not biblical. Tell us what Christ's plan is. And I know it shows up in your writings, but. How we need to take We need to bring the gospel back into this area of marriage, and how you have for decades written and spoken on this prolifically.
Well, I think no question about it. God is our model, as in everything. And he loved us, the scriptures say, when we were still sinners. and sent Christ to die for us.
So I believe that one person Even if the other person's not willing to go to counseling, they're not willing to read a book, they don't even talk about us. I believe one person can have a tremendous impact Positive impact on the other person by speaking their primary love language on a regular basis over an extended period of time. Because the Bible says love stimulates love. The Bible says we love God because He first loved us. We didn't start the relationship, He started it.
So in a marriage, even one person With the help of God, it's not natural to love your spouse if you don't feel any love coming from them. What's natural is to complain about it. But if you love them the way God loved us, and God will Romans chapter 5 and verse 5 says, The love of God is poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.
So we can actually say, Lord, you know how I feel. I don't have really many love feelings for them, but I know that you love them, and so I'm opening my heart and let you pour your love into me, and I'll be your agent for loving them. You do that over a period of time. I don't mean three weeks. I mean three months, four months, six months.
I can guarantee you, you're having the most positive influence you can have on the other person. We can't change the other person. We've always agreed to that. You can't change your spouse, but you can influence them, and we do every single day. We either have a negative influence or a positive influence every day.
And speaking their love language in a way that's meaningful to them is the most powerful influence you can have on touching them in a way that they may well begin to respond to you. That's the voice of Dr. Gary Chapman, who actually is my pastor. He's an associate pastor at Calvary Baptist Church. He has been.
I think since Noah started building the ark, Dr. Chapman, it's been going back to the days of courts and Pastor Hip and all those guys have great times. And Pastor Will now is there. But we're so grateful for you being a pastor and being just willing to let the Lord use your gift to encourage, bless, and heal a lot of marriages. And you're doing that.
I mean, you're getting on a plane to Utah. A lot of our listeners in the Utah, Salt Lake area, specifically this church, I believe, is in Layton, Utah, that's hosting this relationship conference. Tell us a little bit about that. And for folks that can get there, it's at the end of this month. We're in the month of May 2026 recording this.
Of course, we'll make this a podcast so that. Folks can be blessed, encouraged by this interview, even beyond this event. But tell us a little bit about this event, Dr. Chapman. Yeah, it's Friday night, May the 29th, and Saturday morning, May the 30th.
It's at the Christian Life Center in Layton, Utah. And I'll be dealing with such things as How do you solve conflicts without arguing? Everybody has conflicts. Most people have no idea how to solve them. They just try to win the argument.
And if they win the argument and the spouse says, okay, have it your way. They lost. You're the winner, they're the loser. It's hard to live with a loser. Why would you want to create a loser?
We're on the same team. That lecture alone could save a lot of marriages. I'm going to also deal with. How do you share the things that irritate you? Little things, sometimes bigger things that irritate you.
How do you share them in a positive way? Most couples have no plan. They just let all these little things bug them to death and then they explode one day. Da-da-da-da, and da-da-da-da.
Well, that didn't help anything, you know.
So I'm going to share that. And I also will talk about the five love language, obviously. I never speak without talking about the love languages because I believe they're Exceedingly important. In fact, every time I'll do a marriage conference, I'll have people come up and say, Dr. Shairman, we just want to share with you.
that book, The Five Love Languages, saved our marriage fifteen years ago or twenty years ago. This book's been out over thirty years now. Wow. And so that concept will help people. And then I'm going to also share another thing that I think's an essential And that is dealing effectively with our failures.
None of us are perfect. You don't have to be perfect to have a good marriage, but you do have to deal with your failures, and that means that we apologize. and we choose to forgive when our spouse is apologizing to us. But part of the problem is We have different ideas on what a sincere apology looks like. And so I'm going to be sharing some of those ideas because you may be saying, I'm sorry, and your spouse is thinking, you certainly are.
Is there anything else you want to say? You think you're apologizing. They think you're giving a character report.
So we'll have a lot of fun. It is a lot of humor, but it's a lot of real life stuff.
So I would really encourage listeners to join us on that Friday night and Saturday at the Christian Life Center in Layton, Utah.
Okay, fantastic. May 29th and 30th, 2026. You gotta check it out, friends. You'll love it. You'll be blessed.
Maybe you can't go, but you got some some newlyweds in your family you want to sponsor to get their marriage off on the right foot. And here, Dr. Chapman. And also check out his brand new book, The Most Important Love Language. I can't wait to read that thing, Doc.
I read it a little. I'm a little hesitant in saying that because I know I'm going to get convicted because I'm that husband that says, well, if my wife would only get her act together, our marriage would be so much better. And then I see you in the lobby of church and you say, little Stew, we got to get you right here. But just the biblical model, what's your challenge out there real quick? Folks that may be in a struggle, maybe they're about to hang it up and they're about to walk out the door, walk away from their spouse, and they're at wit's end.
Dr. Chapman, can you just offer some quick hope and maybe even offer the gospel to listeners right now that God ain't done with them yet, real quick, as we get out of here?
Well, I can und understand how couples can get to the place where they feel like giving up. I certainly understand that because I know I had some thoughts like that in my early years. But I would just say this, God's a miracle working God. And he first starts with you. Ben, as your heart gets changed.
he begins to touch the other person.
So Instead of focusing on they need to change, they need to change, I know they do need to change, but if you want to influence them, it's the way God influences us. God loved us and sent Christ to die for us so he could forgive us. And so you do the same thing, and you have that attitude, Lord, I want to be your instrument for speaking out and loving my spouse. I'm not talking about feeling love. I'm talking about actions that really touch their heart.
And when we do, we are an instrument in the hand of God to touch the heart of our spouse. True top line Hey, a couple of friends to say thank you to for sponsoring this podcast, Vintastic.com. promo code truth. A brand new drink from LeBlue Ultra Fear Bottled Water that has no sugar, no calories, no carbs, and no artificial sweeteners. And it's loaded with polyphenols, antioxidants.
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Mm-hmm.
