 Well, welcome church family to another week of our moments with Pastor David and Marie. It's good to see everybody. And again, I say this every week. We're looking forward to the time that we can get back together with the church family and fellowship and see one another and be together. But welcome. And it's good to see everybody. And as, of course, we have Pastor David and Marie with us this afternoon, welcome and thank you for joining us. Of course. I always ask this question, how are you guys doing? We're getting a divorce. We're doing great. I've had it. I've had it with his woman. Anything changed? I know, as we were speaking before, you're sharing with us that nothing's really changed at home because you spend time with each other anyways. We have a naturally boring life, John. It doesn't matter where we're at. We just kind of sit. It doesn't matter. Put me like a cushion. Just put me somewhere and I'll just sit there and it doesn't matter to me at all. It doesn't matter. So we're not interesting. No, not in the least. One of the things that I'm talking to Marie a lot about lately though is, you know, my hair is growing. I haven't had a haircut in almost two months now, so I might as well just keep letting it grow. I think I'll let it grow for a while. Yeah. You know, it's one of those. Remember they had that, what was it, no grow November or no shave November? You can do like a no quarantine haircut until the quarantine's over. I'm going to just let my hair grow. Marie loves it really long. No, I don't like it very long. I mean, I think it looks good right now. I tried cutting my, I tried letting mine grow and that doesn't work out well. It looked like a patch of a, you know, you know, pastures, pastor. You know, we're just speaking before this started. It seems like your, your teachings have been different. I mean, this last teaching in second Corinthians was just, I posted on Facebook, straight heat. I mean, it was really good. What's changed for you? Well, you're starting to listen. Finally. There we go. It's always been the same. You're just starting to hear it, John. I think that part of the dynamic of speaking to a live congregation is the interplay between the communicator and those that are being spoken to. And so we have a tendency, as you know, you teach have a tendency of responding to the people. They, they are actually responding though they may not be speaking. They are responding through body language very often through a nod of the head or some kind of visible response. And so for me, when I'm speaking to a live group, I incorporate other stories. Sometimes I'll, I'll say a quip maybe to make them laugh or something, but what we're getting right now online, and I actually think it's an improvement is more straight teaching. And I actually am preferring that in terms of what I'm giving to the congregation. I prefer that. And I think that that's one of the good things that is taking place through this, through this quarantine that we're going through. It's helping to improve my communication skills. So there is a difference. And as mentioned, you know, I'm giving more definitions for words than, than in the past, I'm spending more time developing thoughts. And I'm not distracted by those who are in front of me because there's just a few people in the congregation, staff members who are there with me. And I think that that's part of what we're seeing take place, John. And I also think it's part of the, the moment, the hour that we're living in. There's more of an intensity that I feel in terms of communicating these things to the church. I want my people to be well-fed. I don't want them to turn on our program and, you know, get anything other than as solid a Bible study as I can give to them. And so that has also been refined. Things like that. Yeah. It's been really, it's noticeable. And just these, even in John, your teachings have been just really on fire. It's been, it's been a good thing. And Marie, you know, you've been doing other, you've been doing more interviews I see with Charis that you're doing with Charis ministry. Yes. How's that been for you? Well, it's out of my element, but it's been good, yeah. It's been, it's been good. I've enjoyed, you know, enjoyed doing that, but I think it is- I'm sure the women enjoy it. Yes. I hope so. What can I say, but yeah, it's a matter of just trying to reach out to our ladies and then bring people on to share the things that they're doing and, you know, what are they doing to pass the time, you know, it's interesting, you know. Can you find that you've done, you're doing more now with the women in terms of more speaking with them and the more interaction with them than typically when we weren't on quarantine? Right now, yes, yes, you know, right now, yes. Do you enjoy that? I do. I do. I am a people person, so I do enjoy that, but it's different when you're communicating in a different way like we are now, you know, it puts me, I'm not at ease. But, but I'm here, you know, and so, so it's, it's, you know, we all need to, what's the word, get out of our comfort zones, you know, so. It's been, even for myself, it's difficult for me to just speak in front of a camera and I get mindful of that, and so it really allows me my flow, and so I was talking to the pastor about that and just learning how to be comfortable. So it's a transition, we're all learning, but you know, even the churches, if we see the people that are watching this interview and hearing from, from you both, it looks like the church is really enjoying it, getting good feedback on that. Well I do miss being together with our body, you know, and, you know, seeing us face to face. And I look forward to, I can't wait till this quarantine's over so we can get back to just being with our body and just, I want to know how they're doing. Right. You know, it's interesting, Marie, you bring that up and that's kind of where I want to go with our, our, our interview today or our moments with you too, is, you know, when, one of the things that pastor you discussed earlier was not getting back to a normal when we get back, not getting back into the routine of things, as we're now spending more time with family members and family and marriages, husbands and wives are spending more time together, children are spending more time together, parents with their children. What's the danger of returning back to the relationship that was, that what it was before? You know, we looked at that on a bigger picture with the church, not allowing the church to get back to the place where everything's just normal again, attendance starts to drop. It's just the normal thing, the soccer practices, the football practices. We want to guard against that. How would we now not fall back into the place of just going on with our marriages as nothing happened? Because now we're spending time with wives and with husbands and things are being worked through. How would you both would could answer this safeguard against going back to the normalcy of what marriage can look like? You know, sometimes people think things are changing permanently simply because they change temporarily. You know, we have a tendency, I'd say, of adjusting ourselves to an environment. And so within the environment, there are certain things that are demanded, expected, necessary, we'll say. So we, to survive, we'll adjust. I mean, we do that in all of life, whether it's when you're first going to school and you have to adjust being in the classroom with the teacher without your mom and learn how to be friendly with other children and things. We start from a very early age, adapting to environment. And we do that throughout the rest of our life and you get married and you have to adapt, you know, if you're going to survive. And so that's just pretty normal in events like this, though, in the church where this has really been a critical thing. This is so unusual for the church to be mandated, to not be able to gather, especially for a church that's trying to be biblical like we are, where we see community, you know, being the heart of the Christian church. I mean, Jesus calls us the church. We are the ecclesia. We are the called out ones. We're called out, but we're supposed to be called out together. So there's a community of believers, a community of faith. And when you take those things seriously, when you know that the first thing that God ever declares in his word to be not good is for the man to be alone, which gives us an insight into the reality of the unity within the Godhead, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, there's a community, if you will, using that term in the loose way, but he intended us to have community. And so in marriage, the man and the woman become the one flesh. And that's a, what has been called a composite unity, you know, the two became the one. And so my wife is to fill up the gaps in my life and I'm to do the same for her. And so that's in marriage. Well, in church, we have a body and the body has the hands and the feet, the eyes, the ears, you know, that's what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12 and describes it in such a way. And so because the body is made up of many members, the members need to be together or else the body is not going to function properly. And so we've always, as long as I can remember, at least in this church, emphasized that, you know, that God has given some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers in order to equip the saints for the work of ministry, meaning that the church has to work together to perform the acts God would intend to perform through the church, right? And so we need to get together. So what's the temptation? Well, the temptation I would say is for the, for us to temporarily adapt in the home, we'll say we're temporarily adapting and the husband is finally starting to pray with the wife and the children doing devotions, doing those kinds of things. That becomes a temporary new normal because he realizes, you know, and the wife realizes these things are necessary and he sees it. And sometimes we can step in and we can do that, but because our comfort level is challenged because we're not really feeling we're good at that, or perhaps we really just don't want to do that, whatever. Once we have the freedom to no longer do that, well, that gives to us the opportunity to see whether something that occurred was actually a genuine change or whether it was a temporary adaptation. And so I would say what we need to do is be very careful that we don't go back to the normal, but that what we're learning to do right now, all those things just mentioned that that should be the new normal, that the husband should wash the wife with the water of the word, that the wife should learn to reverence, respect her husband, that together they should raise their children in the knowledge and nurturing of the Lord. And that should have been what they were doing all along anyway, because when they gather here with us in church and I'm teaching or Marie's women's groups are taking place or women's functions, those are supplemental. Those are not supposed to be their complete diet. That's supposed to supplement and guide and direct and give insight and all of those things. That's what we're here for. But they should be doing these things on their own. And so it's interesting how Paul speaks to the wives in 1 Corinthians and he says to them that if a wife has any questions, she should ask her husband at home. That means that the husband is to be equipped to be giving answers for the spiritual questions that the wife has. And instead of saying, well, we'll go to church, you can ask the pastor. That should be provoking the husband to get into the word. Or if he can't find the answer and he does the best that he can, if he is looking and just doesn't know how, well, that's where we come in. Where we can say, oh, this is the answer to that. And this is how you can find it for yourself next time. See, that's what a teaching ministry is intended to do. And so when we get back together again, and it won't be too long, and I pray that it's soon, I hope that things that they began to put into practice become their routine for the future. Yes. Anything you'd like to add to that, Marie? Well, and I think, well, the woman should be as a wife encouraging their husband. I know that in some homes, people are having difficulty because they haven't spent time together. And part of the time is that we need to spend time with our husbands, just him and I, and we do that. Of course, our children are gone. We don't have children at home, but I would caution it when they can do things with their wives. That should have been taking care of all along, is spending some time with your wife. Not only your children, of course, but making that time together. We had to learn to do that, Marie, and I did. Because as a husband, I think wives are better equipped for, and maybe this is wrong. Maybe it's just my opinion, my experience, but I suspect that there may be truth to this, that wives have more of a propensity towards nurturing their children and all. I'm gonna assume that to be true, because most of them that I know feel more comfortable with the wife doing the nurturing, and the wife very naturally does so. She does, you know. And so because of that, sometimes a husband may tell the wife, honey, I need more of you. I need more time with you. I need to talk to you. But because the wife is so busy with the children, we'll say when they're small and so active and she's getting so tired, she may not hear what he's saying. And so in some ways, Marie and I, as a matter of fact, Marie and I had to learn to take that time together. We had to. I actually had to learn just to desire time with children. I had to learn that. It's not that you don't have a natural love for them. There is a natural love. But I had to learn how to sit down with the three-year-old to talk to one, to learn how to communicate to children, to hear what they're saying. And that's all a learned thing. It isn't something that I was born able to do. I had to realize that children go through stages of growth and things that Marie was learning because she was with the kids. I was in an office, I was coming home and the baby would make some jabbering sound and she'd say, oh, she's hungry or she wants this. It's because she had learned those sounds and what they meant where I hadn't. And I began to learn very early that if I'm gonna be successful at raising children and being a father or a good husband, I'm gonna need to learn their language. I'm gonna need to learn things like that. And the only way I can do that is by spending time with Marie. And so I would say that to Marie. In the early days, I'd say, we need to take some time together. It isn't that she didn't want to, is that she only had a certain amount of time and a certain amount of energy. And she began to have to make adjustments to the needs that her husband had too. And she did. And over time, I learned to not expect that much. I was told, and maybe you or any father, maybe would know this, that you're gonna potentially become jealous of your wife because your wife is gonna give the attention you used to get to somebody else. And I originally, I thought, oh, that's, no, my wife loves me. No, no, she never didn't love me, but she loves somebody else. And then when I saw that she was quicker to hear their voice or meet their need, I had to grow up. I had to realize some things. As a matter of fact, your wife called to tell me about you, John. You know what I'm saying? I was like, did she call? It's about time, John. I was like, you're looking right at me. I was like, Marie's going, but that's what you're looking at. And on the flip side of that, if you guys can both answer this, if that time isn't taken out to spend time with one another and to be able to get over that initial jealousy or almost like second fiddle, what will happen potentially if that time isn't carved out for one another? Well, a lot of things can happen. I mean, the husband can feel, well, I'm done. She doesn't love me. I mean, and other women may be giving him attention. He goes to the office, somebody gives him attention and he may be liking it. I think that we have to be careful as wise to make sure that we do give our husband undivided attention. Together and to be together, we need to have dates together. Granted, I don't think you can do it. Well, you could probably walk around the, right now, just walk around the block a couple of times. That's together, that's good. We've done that, but you have to nourish your marriage, both of us, both of us worked on our marriage. I was, being I had four children and they were pretty close and close, like had them pretty close. And I was a very nurturing mama. I was always afraid of, they're gonna get hurt or, and I had to, sometimes they fall, but they get back up. And so I had to, I really had to adjust to that. And Marie did. I remember when the boys were little, she didn't want them playing in dirt or mud, she didn't like them wrestling. She was just, you know, she was making them into little girls and I can still remember, we learned together about this. I can still remember us having those conversations because she is very nurturing because she wants to care for them because that's one of the wonderful qualities that she has. She nurtures, she loves it, she cares for the babies. And for me, I had to learn similar things from a male perspective, how a man invests in the lives of a daughter, how a man invests in the life of a son. You know, what does that mean? How does that work? And so again, it takes teamwork. We have to work together and we need to see that we compliment each other. You can either compliment by adding to one another, learning from one another and they're combining and producing or you can compete. If you compete, then it's gonna be a lot of argument, it's gonna be a lot of difficulty, it's gonna be maybe angry times, you know? Don't do that, don't say that, don't be that. And so again, that's part of the iron sharpening iron that takes place. That's part of saying together we wanna do something that has value for others and the others happen to be our children. And it all goes back, I think, to nurturing our own relationship. You know, if I know that Marie has made time and sacrifices for me, her time, it makes me appreciate her more. And if I realize that she's taking care of children and she's so tired right now and why am I demanding attention? And I grow up enough to stop being, you know, her fifth child rather than the fourth that she's already crazy. And maybe she'll be more of open to talk to me and share with me and be with me. And that just works that way, John. And over the years, that's kind of what it became for us. You know, going on that, just exactly what you're saying, the danger of potentially taking one another for granted can be something that can easily sneak in, especially when there can be those feelings of, wow, she's giving all her time to the children or he's not helping me, you know? And it kind of goes into my next question is the importance of love in a marriage. We think of love, of course, there's love in a marriage. But what is that love really connected to? Is it the self-sacrificing love that Christ instructs the husbands to have? Or is it a love that we can have in a marriage that we'll actually use to wanna be loved? And Pastor, can you speak, and Marie, can you speak a little bit about how that can be dangerous if you're in a relationship, especially in a marriage, where the only reason why that you're loving is to receive love back? You wanna answer first, honey? You've got much to say, cause I'm so lovable. You are. You know what, when I made my valest to my husband, I mean, that was, you know, to cherish him, you know, to obey, you know, to love him. Do that again, say that one more time. No, I'm not. Tell him more. No, I will not. No, but, you know, I promise to love him unconditionally. You know, we've got two sinners sitting here, you know, and we have to learn each other's ways. You know, I came from a different family, he came from a different family, you know, I did things differently than he did, you know, and we had to adjust to those things, you know, we did, you know, and it wasn't easy, you know, cause sometimes I wouldn't understand, you know, that my husband needed attention, you know, cause I was so busy with the kids, you know, you can get so busy with the kids, and he can fill just left, completely left out of the relationship, and then you're tired after you put them to bed, and so, you know, you just want to veg out, you know, as a woman, I was tired, I just want to veg out, oh, you know, and I think that no, we need to, you need to spend time with your husband every daily, you need to have that time where it's just you and him when the children go to bed, you know, and you can talk, you can ask him how he's done, because, you know, every man who is working, they go to some place and there's usually women that work there, and like I said, somebody will give you attention, you know, and especially even, you know, they may see a pastor and they may say, oh, wow, you know, I want to ask him questions, and, well, you know, it's true, I mean, and I'm, you know, and, you know, then looking to, wanting to look to him, and start, you know, start looking, trying to be almost dependent upon him with some of their questions, some of the women can be, and it can be, you know, and, so we have guarded our marriage. That's something that we have really worked on, you know, we spent a lot of time together, you know, not that we didn't when we were younger, it was, you know, it was harder because of, you know, all the things we did at home and with the children, and as they were growing, and like I said, they were close in age, so we were real busy, but, you know, I, you know, the promise to love and, you know, love and obey, we kept, you know, we love each other, you know, were there times when we disagreed? Yes, you know, but we worked through those things, you know, you know, we've had a, I think we've had a very good marriage. I do too, thank you. It's because I'm pinching him, he's saying that. No, you know, and I thank God for it because, you know, you know, the whole thing is John is that as believers, we are to put others first, you know, my husband has to be put first, you know, my mom, my dad, my, you know, and I saw David's mom put his dad first, he'd serve him first, you know, and you know, as believers, you know, the children need to know that he's the head of the house, you know, that they are to honor their father. And that's a lot of it's my responsibility to the children, to, you know, telling the children that your dad is, you know, is coming home and, you know, you, you know, you need to honor your father, you know, you know, you don't mess around with your father, you know, and so, you know, that was something that I was taught respect. We respect one another and a lot of households don't respect one another, they speak, they don't talk, you know, I know of husbands and wives who speak to one another, you know, terribly, terribly. And, you know, they don't have a good relationship. They take each other for granted and I don't think we can, we shouldn't ever take each other for granted, you know, cherish the moments that we have together because I might not be here tomorrow or he might not be here tomorrow. Is that a hope? No, it's not a hope, it's not a hope, but I'm just saying, you know, you don't wanna regret, you don't wanna live with regret that, oh, I didn't do this or oh, I didn't do that or I should have done this, you know, I could have been kind or I could have, you know, done certain things for my husband that he liked and I didn't and rather, you know, I, you know, I think you could, I don't wanna go home or I don't want him to leave me and I don't wanna regret, you know, I want memories that, God, I was blessed, we were blessed, he was blessed. He's the most important person to me, you know, our children come afterwards, you know, sometimes. Depends on how they react, no, we love our babies, but, you know, and I love my family and he loves, you know, his, but, you know, we've always felt comfortable, just David and Marie. You know, when I first got saved, John, I started reading the Bible and, you know, it spoke concerning how we love him because he first loved us and it's blessed, it's more blessed to give than to receive and I began to see scriptures about greater love has no man than this than to lay down his life for his friends. So I'm reading the Bible and I'm starting to see that that it's not about me, that it's about him and so that naturally begins to express itself in relationships. Now, it wasn't immediate. I wouldn't pretend that it was. I had, it took a long time to learn what I just said in relationships because I mean, most men want to be loved, you know, rather than to love because when you love, you sacrifice, when you love, you're yielding, when you love, when you biblically love in the agape form, you are actually yielding of yourself in a sacrificial way, you're dying to yourself and so that isn't the most appealing thing. I have been at the bedside of those who are about to depart to go to heaven and there's not always an anxiousness, you know, oh, I'm gonna die. It's more a matter of, oh my, I'm gonna die. You know, it's that grasping for one more day, it's that desire, hold on for one more moment. That's natural for us. Well, that's part of our nature is to want to survive and to want to be victorious, right? And so in matters of love and relationship, we can bring that worldly mentality into our relationship and so you learn at a very early age that the one who loves less has most power, you do. You know, you can control somebody by their emotions. It's not hard to do. And so as a kid, going into dating, learning to date, I didn't have lots of dates. I never really did. I wasn't that guy who had girlfriends, lots. I never did. But the few that I began to experiment with to kind of learn to be a man with, you know, how do you treat a woman kind of thing? I discovered that if the girl started saying, I really like you more than, you know, quicker than I ever did, I discovered that I could manipulate her. I discovered that I could say, oh, I'll give you a call in a couple hours, you know, when I get home from school and then go hang around with my friends and maybe see her at school the next day. Oh, I was waiting for you to call me, she could say, and I'd say, yeah, I got busy, you know, because she cared more for me than I cared for her. I was in control. And I started liking that. I think that there is a, I think one of the primary original aspects of sin is power. It's the desire to control others. You know, God speaks to Eve and says, the one who eats of this is going to, well, Satan said it really is going to have knowledge, good, evil, you know, I'm going to have power. I'm going to have, because knowledge is power, I'm going to be able to control, I'm going to be like God. I think that that is probably part of, at least part of what took place originally in the fall is this desire to be like God, this desire to control others, this desire to be loved by others. I think that that's part of human nature that's fallen. And so you take that into relationships. And so you control people by their emotions. That's not love. That's manipulation. And so I know that in a practical way. I think that theoretically what I said is probably sustainable in argument. The fact is, is I had to learn to stop controlling women by their love for me. And I had to learn to simply love them. And so that's something that I've been learning for a long time, John, is to love people simply because I love them. And in ministry, and using it in a ministry way, I love our fellowship, not to be loved by them, but just because they do. You can't imagine over the history of this church, 39 years, within the next month or two, you can't imagine, John, how many people I've known who have left, sometimes people that I loved so much, it broke my heart when they left. Many of them never even saying goodbye. I can still remember we're sitting in a room with a couple of double doors that you enter into the double doors and right to your left, there's a right to your left, there's an office. And I can still remember being in that office when someone knocked on those double doors and the person in the office with me went to the doors to open them up to see who was standing there and then coming back and he has in his hand the key to the church. You don't hand church keys to just anybody. You hand a church key to somebody you trust because they have access to everything. And so you don't just hand a church key to anybody and he comes walking and he's got the key in his hand and somebody whom we trusted deeply, deeply enough to give that key to and stood at that door and said, I'm leaving the church, I'm out of here, here. And gave the key. You can't imagine how many times we've had similar instances where we've been some place where somebody's walked by us at the mall and they, a woman I'm thinking of and she drops her hair over her face to try and hide from me as she walks by, you know. And I turned to Maria and I said, well, that's so-and-so. We're looking right at her and they just do that. John, I choose not to remember all the stories I could start telling you. But you know, we have multiple thousands of people. We've been a mega church since 1989, you know. We've had over 2,000 members plus for a long time. I cannot tell you how many people over the years have left with just not even a goodbye, not even a, we love you, not even a note. So you can't love people. So you can't love people, expecting them to love you in return. You just love them, you know. And you don't expect them to call you. You don't expect them to write you. You don't expect them to do anything because Maria and I could say this in our marriage just this way too, but in life in general, I love you, John, just because I do. Not because of what you can do for me, but because God put love in my heart for you. It's that way. And if I loved somebody to get something from him, that's not love at all, you know, because the essence of real love is a sacrificial kind of attitude. Well, when you have that in marriage, when you grow to that in Christ, when you seek God and say, God, teach me to love the way you love, that's what happened with me and Marie. Took a long time. I'm not saying she was much better at it than me. And that's just because I'm much more lovable. Let's face it. You know, she was much better at it than me. I mean, she really has always had that spirit about her, that she just loved me. It was me. I had to die. I had to learn to want to love her more than she could possibly love me. And then what I discovered was the more that I released of myself and the more I cared for her and the more I tried to tenderly cherish and nourish her, the more she gave back. And so like, if you give your wife 100% and she'll give you 150% and that's how it's worked. And it really has. I mean, she's right. I mean, obviously she would know that there are women in the church who look to the pastor and look to the wife in a different way. They want sometimes to be the first, they used to call them the first lady in the church. They want to be the pastor's wife. And Marie knows that. And we've had incidents in the past where somebody has set their sights on me, you know? And Marie cherishes and guards me, you know? She guards our relationship and she's aware of those things. And so, you know, my heart safely trusts in her and her heart safely trusts in me. There's nobody out there that I would ever want more than my wife, none. But I've never given her reason to think there might be. Never have. Because when these guys use jealousy to control and manipulate and that's just, you're just signing the death warrant for your own marriage because an insecure marriage partner who is insecure doesn't know what you're going to do or whether they can trust you, you might as well. You might as well just sign that certificate. You've got to have trust and how does that work? That works by, in our case, biblically, we love because he first loved us. God, I want your heart. I want to learn to love my wife. I want to learn to put her first. I used to say this long ago, John, that, and Marie knows this, you know, one day God may remove me from full-time ministry and I'm going to be in the house rattling around with this woman and I want to know her. I don't want to be, I don't want her discovering things about me she didn't really, really know. And I don't want to be saying, who is this person I'm with? So we made plans long ago to know each other, to really study and know each other, to hear each other. And we've, I think we've succeeded in that. I think so. I do. That's good, good stuff you guys are sharing because that's so important to understand that. And, you know, I meet with couples here at the church quite a bit and I see that a lot, that it's a tick for tack kind of love and it's not, it's unconditional, you know, and so. Well, you know, as we're wrapping up, Pastor and Marie, is there anything you guys like to share with the church to encourage them? Well, another thing let me just share, like you mentioned with tick for tack, I think, as women sometimes, you know, I mean, not as sometimes, never mind about that, but I think be careful, guard your tongue. I think for speaking to women, I think sometimes women can just rattle their little tongue a little bit too much and put on expectations on their husbands. And I would say, you know, get off their backs, pray for them, love them, show them that you care, you know, do the things that women need to do for their husbands and be an encourager to them. They don't, sometimes they don't need to know what they don't do, you know. They need to know that you love them and you're doing something for them and you want, and through kindness and love and cherishing them and putting them first in your marriage, they will respond. They will respond to that. What man doesn't want to be loved by their wife, unless you're crazy, you know. I'm looking at John and saying that, that must have hurt his feelings. No, like a hooch. How come you saw that? My God, and I have to ask God, give me love, you know. Give me love, you know, always. I mean, I need to, I mean, I love my husband. You know, it's easy, you know. Anyway. Oh, that worked. Oh, I love my husband. Give me love for that, man. Is that what you're saying? No, no, what I'm saying. And then you hit me on camera? You know, but for people, Lord, even, you know what? Even the ones that are unlovely, give me your agape love for those, because we're all dealing with people that we come into contact that are difficult to love. And yet, as a believer, I am to love them like a believer. And I'm to love them like Christ loved the church as well. So it's important. Well, there must have been something about that guy or that woman when you got married that you felt you loved and something changed. Now, what would that be? And so many times people say, well, it was them. No, it's not always just them. Maybe they're responding to you, you know, something changed in a relationship. What was it? And how can we return to the things that we had that made me desire to spend the rest of my life for this person? Because when we got married, it was forever. I knew that. I knew that marriage, because God's word said, you know, whatever God has joined together, let not man put us under. I don't believe in trial marriages. I don't believe in, well, if it didn't work, there's always, I'd learn lessons. No, because you'll be a repeat divorce, you know, because you don't learn your lessons. What you do is you end up, generally marrying person was very similar to the one that you just divorced. When you haven't changed anything, you've stayed the same, and you still have unreasonable expectations and demands and things like that. You got to die to yourself. And so I knew that. And so when, when Marie and I got married and I was standing there and that pastor was speaking to us and he was saying to me, will you honor and cherish and love her till death? Do you part? I have to tell you, man, I still remember, I was just, God, I don't know if I have it in me to be able to do that. I don't know. I believe I do. And with you, I can do whatever I need to do. I know that, but I need help. I need help to be a good man. I need help to be a good husband to this woman, a provider for all of man. I was just sweating bullets out there. But it wasn't because she wasn't a wonderful girl. I mean, it was because I didn't know if I could do it. And so on our wedding day, I knew that until she either hands me to Jesus or I hand her to Jesus, it's us. It's us. It's us. He brought her into my life and he may take her away. He brought me into her life and he may take me away, not from her in divorce, but one day she's going to place me in his arms in some church service and she's going to walk up and she's going to say this is the man that I was married to. Or vice versa. And I want it to be something that she can say without lying. I want her to say this was a good man. John, that's the deepest part of my heart. That's a fact. I want her to not regret being with me. I don't want that. So I think I would be determined to be the best man I could be for her. And that's what God created me for. Sometimes men don't know their purpose. My purpose is to be a good husband, to teach her the ways of the Lord, to be her protector, her provider, her support, to be the man I was created to be. And in her, I made whole. I made whole. And that's just the truth. I mean, that's just my heart to yours. That's just the truth. Marie's the same way. Yes. She's the same way. Yes, I will. Yeah. That's it. It's just, it's us. That's our secret. We love one another, and we're committed totally. That was special. Thank you guys for sharing that. And church, isn't this amazing that we're able to spend time with our pastor and Marie to hear their hearts and to hear the secrets that aren't really secrets, but how they're able to approach marriage and love and give us some really practical things that we can learn as men and as women. And so thank you guys so much for joining us again for this week and look forward to next week's interview. And so church family, we look forward to having you. And I know you guys enjoyed this. Please comment below. There's a prayer request you'd like to have Pastor David and Marie or the staff to pray for. Put your comment below. Share this with your friends that you may be able to see to see that could be helpful for not only our marriages, but for their marriages out there. And one last thing, John, if I may, one last thing. I just want the people to know how much we love them. Yes, absolutely. And we miss them terribly. Yes, we cannot wait. And we're looking forward to being back with our church. And it's going to be a happy day. But we'll continue doing these kinds of things because I think that people are appreciating it. And we'll continue doing online ministries and things because we've seen great fruit and not grapefruit, great fruit. And so I just want the church. We want the church to know how much we love you guys. We do. God bless you guys. God bless you. Thank you, guys.