2023 Marriage Conference – Session One

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0:04Well, it is a joy to be with you this morning, as Steve and Liz mentioned. My name is Brian Lichty, and I serve as one of the pastors here and on the screen. So this gorgeous woman is my wife Casey, and God has graced us and blessed us. We've been married for 23 years, and we have three wonderful boys. And one of the things that I really, really admire about my wife is how incredibly supportive she is. Many of you know that we've moved a lot during our marriage. We've actually moved five different times. We've lived in five different states, and so that's a lot of packing and moving and transition.

0:44And through it all, she has been by my side not only supporting me, but following Jesus every step of the way. And so I'm just a very, very blessed man, and I want you to know that. And so I praise God for Casey. And babe, I love you. Well, I wanna start out this morning by asking you a question. Have you ever had a time where you experienced some really weird physical symptoms, a time where you knew something was wrong with your body, but you didn't know exactly what it was? Maybe your knee started popping. Maybe there was a humming in your ear. Maybe there was something kind of weird going on in your stomach, but you didn't know what was causing it. Well, typically, when we experience weird physical symptoms, the first thing we do is go to the internet, right? We, we type in what we're feeling, what those symptoms are, and we see what it says.

1:42But what if that doesn't help? Well, most of us, at least those of us who aren't stubborn, will call the doctor if those symptoms persist and go and see what they have to say. But what if we go to the doctor and they don't know what's going on? They don't know what the cause of those symptoms are. Well, inevitably, they will probably send us to go get some tests, maybe a blood draw, maybe an x-ray, maybe something else. And you know how this goes. It can take weeks, sometimes months, sometimes even longer before we get an answer to those problems, before we get a diagnosis to those symptoms. Well, here's the reality.

2:24Most of us will do whatever it takes to get an answer. We'll do whatever it takes to get a diagnosis, because we know until we get that diagnosis, if things aren't gonna get better, right? Until we get that diagnosis, we're not going to be able to treat those underlying problems. Well, brothers and sisters, in many ways, the same thing is true for marriage problems. For instance, until we figure out what's behind our irritability toward our spouse, we're probably gonna keep getting irritable toward them, right? Until we can find out what the, the source and the root of our conflict is, that conflict is probably going to go unresolved.

3:08Until we get to the cause of the relational distance that exists between us, we're probably going to keep distancing ourselves. So again, until we get to the diagnosis, you could say, of our marriage problems, we're not gonna be able to treat them. Now, as you and I both know, there are a lot of different marriage, you could say diagnoses these days, right? And just as many treatments for instance, go Barnes and Nobles bookstore, and you will see books and books with all kinds of suggestions for how to be a better communicator or how to make your marriage last or bring back the romance. And some of those books can offer some help to a degree.

3:56But there's only one book, only one book that really gets to the core diagnosis for our marriage problems and only one book that really shows us the best way to address them. And so that's what we're gonna look at this morning. We're gonna explore what God says is behind our marriage problems, and what God says is the best way to address them. And so, if you're taking notes this morning, first God's word shows us that behind our marriage problems are worship problems. Behind our marriage problems are worship problems. And there's honestly a lot of places where we see this in scripture. But what I want us to do is focus in on James chapter four.

4:44So if you have your Bible, if you have a Bible app, go ahead and pull that out and turn to James chapter four, James chapter four, and I will begin in verse one. James Wrights, what causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you, you desire and do not have? So you murder, you covet and cannot not obtain. So you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people. Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

5:44Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God? Or do you suppose it's to no purpose that the scripture says he earns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us? Well, in verse one, James starts out by asking a really important question, doesn't he? He asks, what causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Now, when James mentions quarrels and fights here, he's not talking about just kind of mere disagreements or maybe differences of opinion. He's talking about sinful disagreements. He's talking about sinful conflict. He's talking about sinful arguments where there's some kind of anger or hostility, some, some kind of sin that has saturated it. And, and we all know what that's like, right? There are times where all of us, myself included in our marriages, we have conflict at times. Maybe we get really loud and animated at times.

6:53Maybe we turn a cold shoulder and just walk away. We all know what it's like to have sinful conflict with our spouse. So what causes that? What causes those quarrels and what causes those fights among us? That's James's question. Well, in verses two to three, he answers his question. He explains what causes those fights and quarrels, and it's honestly not what we would expect. It has nothing to do with having maybe different personalities, has nothing to do with busy schedules not even our upbringing. Instead, James says that the reason we quarrel and the reason we fight lies within our hearts, right?

7:37It has something to do with our desires and the passions within us that lead us into that sinful conflict. Now, it's really important to understand that not all of our desires are bad in and of themselves, right? So you may have desires in your marriage for peace or for respect or companionship in and of themselves. Those are good things. But take note, if those good desires start to consume you, right? If they kind of climb and take priority in your heart, if they start to rule over you, that's a problem. And at that place, they're no longer good desires. They're really bad masters. In fact, you could say they're idolatrous at that point.

8:28And I think, I think this is what James has in view here. Again, notice the language that he uses. He talks about how we desire and do not have, so we murder, right? He talks about how we covet and cannot obtain, so we fight and quarrel. In other words, these desires, these idolatrous desires are ruling our heart so much that they're leading to sinful responses. So again, James is really clear here, what causes quarrels? What causes fights among you? It's our idolatrous desires that's at the root, that's at the source of our conflict. All right? So we have established that idolatrous desires are at the root of our sinful conflict. But what does that mean for us? What does that mean for all of you today? We're all here, we're all married.

9:20What does that mean for our marriages? Well, in many ways, I think it shows us there's a connection between the horizontal and the vertical. In other words, how we treat our spouse, what goes on in our relationship with them horizontally. It actually says something about what's going on in our relationship with the Lord. In fact, I would say it this way. It shows us that ultimately behind our marriage problems, our worship problems, look again at what James says in verses four to five. I think you'll see it here immediately after making this connection between their conflict and their desires. He says this, he says, you adulterous people.

10:04Do you not know that friendship with the world is enemity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose, that the scripture says he yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us? Imagine for a second that a thief came into your home and stole your TVs, your jewelry, your most prized possessions. When they did that, they broke the law, right? They, they committed an act against you. But now imagine that that thief is your adult son, right? He not only broke the law, he broke your heart, right?

10:54When he stole those things, he wasn't just offending you morally. He was offending you relationally. You could say his act of stealing was ultimately a betrayal of your love. Well, in many ways, that's what James is getting at here. When we have idolatrous desires, it's because there's been a breakdown in our relationship with God, right? When we have idol desires, it's because we've forgotten our first love. So instead of finding satisfaction in him, instead of seeing him as our, all in all, we've looked to something else, again, we've idolized something else. And, and so it's really no surprise that James uses this language of adultery here.

11:44It's no surprise that he says God yearns jealously over the spirit that he's made to dwell in us. To put it this way, brothers and sisters, God doesn't want us to give our hearts to other lovers. He's jealous for us, right? He wants us to worship him and worship him alone. And so this is, this is really something that we need to be on the lookout for in our marriages. This is something that we need to be examining and see. And, and again, it's normal for us to want things like peace or respect or companionship in our marriages, but when our hearts are ruled by those d desires, when those things start to consume us, when they rule us, that's a problem. In fact, here's a, here's a helpful test for you.

12:36Are there desires you have that you want so much that you're willing to sin to get them or sin? If you don't? That's a really helpful test. Let me say it again. Are there desires you have that you want so much that you're willing to sin to get them? Or sin if you don't? For example, do you want peace so much in your marriage that you avoid having the hard conversations? Or do you want companionship so much in your marriage that you feel completely crushed, completely dejected when your spouse doesn't compliment you or affirm you in the way you were hoping? Or do you want respect so much in your marriage that when your spouse maybe asks you a question, you just immediately get defensive and angry?

13:30You know, I remember a time when I had a really, really stressful week. It was a long week, and I was just ready at the end of that week to just relax, just pull away, do nothing, not face any kind of difficulties, any challenges. And as I was in process of actually doing that, trying to kind of pull away and relax, I remember, you know, I need to ask Casey a question about tomorrow's schedule. So I went to her thinking this would be a really short, brief interaction, and it wasn't. It ended up being a really long, drawn out conversation. And I remember in the middle of that thinking things like, what's her problem?

14:11I mean, doesn't, doesn't she know I've had a really long week? Why, why can't she just, you know, give a yes or no response? This is a simple question. Well, here's the reality. She didn't do a single thing wrong, and yet I was accusing her in my mind, right? Why was I doing that? I was doing that because I wanted that rest and that comfort, that peace too much. I was idolizing those things, brothers and sisters, if you're like me and you want something so much that you're willing to sin to get it or sin, if you don't, you're wanting it too much. You've taken a good desire and you've made it into an idolatrous desire.

14:53You've allowed it to rule your heart and become your functional God. So as you think about that reality, and this is sobering reality, let me encourage you in a couple ways. First, don't just focus on behaviors. When you see problems and challenges in your marriage, don't just focus on the behaviors. In other words, get to the heart. Look below the surface, see what's beneath those sinful behaviors. So for instance, maybe you realize you're being impatient or unkind, look underneath. And one way to do that is to ask yourself and ask God, what am I wanting right now that I'm wanting so much I'm willing to sin to get or sin if I don't?

15:44That's the question. That's the test. So again, don't just stop at the behaviors. Don't just do behavior management in your marriage. Get to the heart of things. Get underneath the surface, and that question is a really helpful way to do that. And then second, as you discern those idolatrous desires turn to the Lord in repentance. Now, we don't have time to unpack it fully, but look at the rest of the passage that's there in James four. Look at what he says, especially in verses six to 10. James says, but he, that's God gives more grace. Therefore, it says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

16:27Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you, draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts. You double minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourn and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you. In these verses, James is calling us to respond to our idolatrous desires and our sinful conflict through repentance. And he actually uses a lot of different language to convey that. So he talks about resisting the devil, drawing near to God, cleansing your hands. He's basically saying, turn from your sin, right?

17:11Resist temptation, pursue holiness. But notice what else he says. Notice what he says prior to this call to repentance. In verse six, James says, he gives more grace. And he says, God gives grace when we humble ourselves. In other words, because of Jesus, there is grace available for forgiveness, for those idolatrous desires, right? Not only that, because of Jesus, there is grace available to put to death those idolatrous desires. There's, there's grace available to grow and to, to change and to produce new fruit in your marriage. So there's good news here, right? If we examine ourselves, if we go to the Lord in repentance, if we receive his grace, we can change, right? We can grow. There can be new life, new fruit in our marriages.

18:15But what does that look like? How do we, how do we do that? That's a big question, right? How do we actually change and grow in such a way that will please God in our marriages? Well, that leads us to our second point this morning. So second, God's word shows us that the best thing we can do for our marriages is to worship God and put him first. The best thing, there's a lot of good things we can do, but the best thing we can do for our marriages is to worship God and put him first. And again, there are a lot of places where we see this in scripture, right? The first commandment, the great commandment, a lot of places but I I want us to look at is a couple verses from Luke chapter 14.

19:08So again, if you have your bible, your Bible app, flip over to Luke chapter 14, and I'll be reading verses 25 and 26. Luke chapter 14, and I'll begin in verse 25. Luke writes, now, great crowds accompanied him. That's Jesus. And he turned and said to them, if anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, and wife, and children, and brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Now, at this point in Luke's gospel, Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem, and in verse 25, we're told that great crowds were accompanying him. But as you and I know, Jesus wasn't just interested in simply gathering crowds, was he? No, he wanted followers, right?

20:13He wanted people who would be devoted to him, people who would give their allegiance to him. And so when he turned to this crowd, he said, if anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, and wife, and children, and brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. And when Jesus said that, it wasn't a suggestion, right? He wasn't presenting an option for the crowd to consider. He was saying, this is the cost of discipleship. He was making a very clear statement about that. But what did he mean? What did he mean when he said hate, mother, father, wife, children, brothers, sisters? Yes. Even your own life, are we to literally hate all of those people in our lives?

21:00Should you literally hate your spouse? Is that what Jesus is getting at? I don't think so. My understanding is that Jesus is using hyperbole here. And there's a couple reasons we know this, right? Jesus already said earlier in this gospel that we're to love our neighbor, right? That would include our spouse. We're also to love our enemies. And we also know from other places in loose gospel that hyperbole was often used. What's hyperbole? Hyperbole is basically an exaggerated statement to make a point. And that's what I think Jesus was doing here. In other words, Jesus was making the point that we should love him above anyone else. So Jesus was saying essentially, our relationship with him should be primary as the son of God.

21:53We should worship him and put him first. We should love him so much that by comparison, everything else looks like hate. So that's the way to think about it. In fact, I'm gonna put a, a, a slide on the screen here. This is a really helpful illustration from Francis Chan from his book, you and Me Forever. Just look at that and I'm gonna read to you what he says about this. He says, it's not hard that we should love God a little more than we love our families. Our love for him should be in a different category. He's far beyond us. So our love for him should be far beyond our love for others.

22:33The gap between our love for God and our love for our spouses should be massive. The two are not even worthy of being compared. Now, we normally order our affections, like the list on the left, when the list on the right is the biblical mandates. Too many are content with the lift as list as it is arranged on the left. But that list doesn't come from the Bible. In fact, it stands in opposition to what the Bible actually teaches. God demands that we treat him as holy, which means set apart. If we love God the way we ought, there would be no such thing as a close second. So brothers and sisters, it's not wrong for you to love your friends or your kids or your spouse.

23:19Those are good things. But our love for God should be much, much, much greater. Our devotion to him, our delight in Him should far exceed any other devotion and delight, right? The the closeness that we have in our relationship with him should be much closer than any other relationship, right? The, the influence that he has over us should be much more profound than any other influence that any other relationship has. That's what Jesus is calling us to. That's the cost of being his disciple. He must be first with nothing else as a close second. So hopefully it's clear to you from Luke chapter 14 that we are called to worship God and put him first.

24:11But why are we to do that? I think that's important for us to grasp. We know that we are to do that. But why, why should we put God first in our marriages? Why should we worship him and no other? Well, let me share a few key reasons to begin with. We should worship God and put him first in our marriages, because that's what God deserves, right? Think about it. That's what God deserves. After all, he's God. He's God, he, he, he's the only one who's, who's trustworthy enough and praiseworthy enough to take center stage in our marriages, right? He, he's the only one who's, who's full of glory and splendor and majesty in our marriages, right? He's the only one who's, who's perfectly loving, perfectly faithful, perfectly good in our marriages, him not us.

25:05Not only that marriage is ultimately about God, right? He created marriage, right? He sanctioned it. He established it for His purposes. So yes, we may be participants in our marriages, but he's the main character. Marriage is first and foremost about God. So that's reason number one. Why should we worship God and put him first in our marriages? Because that's what he deserves. Another reason we should worship God and put him first in our marriages is because that's what's best for our spouse. So what's best for our spouse? Think about it this way. If you deliberately worship God as your king and understand that he's sovereign over your marriage, you're gonna be much less likely to kind of nitpick, right?

25:56And micromanage your spouse because you're submitted to, and you're surrendering to his sovereignty, his kingship in your marriage. If you worship God as your creator, and you, and you understand and embraced the reality that he formed and fashioned your spouse in the way he wanted them, you're not gonna spend so much time trying to make them into your own image, right? You're gonna submit to him, you're gonna be surrendered to him. That's going to change how you treat your spouse, right? If you worship God as the satisfier of your soul, you're gonna be much less focused on what you can get from your spouse and much more focused on what you can give you. See how that works.

26:40The more we worship God and put him first, the better we treat our spouse, the more we worship God and put him first, the more gracious and loving and patient we become. Consider another helpful quote from Francis Chan. He says, Christ came so that we may have life and have it abundantly. When we are filled with his abundant life, we overflow. This is how marriage is supposed to work. So one, we find our identity and fulfillment in Christ. Two, we fill with overflowing with the fruit of the spirit. And three, we pour out that love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and gentleness into our spouses. That's how it works.

27:30So again, the best thing you can do for your spouse is to worship God and put 'em first, and then the third reason, a final reason why we should worship God and put him first in our marriages, because that's what brings us the most joy. That's honestly what brings us the most joy. You know, ever since the Garden of Eden, there's been a a lie going around that if we rebel against God, if we kind of go our own way, that's what will lead to satisfaction. That if we just kind of blaze our own trail and do what we want and follow our selfish desires, then we'll finally have joy. But that's just not true.

28:10That's just not the way God designed the world to work. The reality is we experience the most joy when we're doing what God has called us to do, and being who he's called us to be. So we actually experience the most joy when we worship him, and then when we love others above ourselves. And again, that's how God made us. That's how he designed us. So even though that's counterintuitive, which it is, even though that's hard and difficult, which it is, it requires dying to self, you will not regret it. You won't regret worshiping God. You won't regret worshiping him and Him alone and putting him first, because that's what will lead to joy in your life.

28:59Well, before we wrap up, I just wanna take a couple minutes to get, to get super practical. All right? We know that we are to worship God and put 'em first. We understand some reasons why we're to do that. But what does this look like? How do we do this? What exactly does this look like? Well, there are lots and lots of ways we can worship God and put 'em first. And so I just wanna share with you four in particular that I've found helpful. Number one, help each other to carve out protected time to spend with God, help each other to carve out protected time to spend with God. In other words, figure out a time, ideally every day, when each of you can meet with the Lord, spend time in his words, spend time in prayer, and then do whatever it takes so that the other person isn't interrupted, right?

29:55So that, that time is protected, it's carved out, nothing's gonna get in the way of it. So maybe those of you with young kids, this means, you know, at 6:00 AM mom spends time with God. Well, dad watches the kids, right? And then at 7:00 AM you switch, and dad gets to spend time with God. Well, mom watches the kids. That's one way to do it. There's lots of ways, whatever it looks like, find a way so that each of you have protected time, uninterrupted time to spend with God routinely throughout the week. Number two, make treasuring Christ and loving God the primary goal. When you study scripture, make treasuring Christ and loving God the primary goal when you study scripture. So growing in knowledge, right? Getting through a, a Bible reading plan understanding how that passage applies to you.

30:58Those are good goals to have for studying God's word. But our primary goal, our primary goal should be to treasure Christ, love God more. After all, the, the greatest commandment applies to everything in our lives, including our time and His word. So when you open up your Bible, take deliberate time, slow down and fix your eyes on Jesus, right? Behold his glory. Not only that, look at what the passage says and see and savor what it says about God. Right? Use that time primarily to cultivate your heart, your affections, your desire, your love for God. In fact, if you're routinely studying God's word and that's not happening, try something different. It's okay to set aside that Bible reading plan.

31:53It's okay to go to a different place in scripture. It's okay to try a different method of study. Do whatever it takes. Make whatever changes you need to, to help you to treasure Christ and love him more. Number three, when facing challenges in your marriage, ask yourself this question, what will please God in this situation? What will please God in this situation? So maybe your spouse is running late or they forgot something again, or they did something irritating, and, and my wife never does any of those things, by the way, but maybe that happens in your marriage. In those situations, ask yourself, what will please God in this situation?

32:47Or, or maybe when you're struggling to communicate or there's unresolved conflict. Really, anytime there's challenges that you face, ask yourself that question. What will please God in this situation? Simply asking that question is inviting God into your struggles, right? It's, it's giving you an opportunity to engage with him in Word and in prayer. It's giving you an opportunity to walk in the spirit and respond in ways. And then finally, number four, invite other believers into your life to help you worship God and put 'em first in your marriage. In other words, you don't have to do this alone, right? The church is here for you. So I would encourage you, find somebody from your small group, or your Sunday school class, or men's and women's ministry, or, or maybe even at your table today, who can help you with this, right?

33:45Who can pray for you and ask you good questions, and maybe even provide some accountability to help you do the most important thing, the best thing you can do for your marriage, which is to worship God and put him first. Well, brothers and sisters, there's again, a lot of ways to do this, but I just wanna encourage you to be really intentional. See if you can determine some ongoing ways to worship God and put him first in your marriage. And by God's grace, when you do, he will be praised. Your spouse will feel very loved, and you will experience his joy. Amen. Amen. Amen. Let me pray Not to us, oh Lord, not to us, but to your name.

34:38Give glory, oh Lord, that's what we want most in our marriages. We want to worship you and put you first. So help us to do that. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.

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Christ Has Come, He Will Come Again

The End Is Not Yet

Woe To Hypocrites!

2023 Marriage Conference – Session One

Surpassing Worth Of Christ

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Christ Has Come, He Will Come Again

The End Is Not Yet

Woe To Hypocrites!

2023 Marriage Conference – Session One

Surpassing Worth Of Christ

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