Transcript
Ego Brand Representative (0:01)
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Jimmy Evans (0:31)
Hi, this is Jimmy Evans with Marriage Today. This podcast is dedicated to equipping families with the teaching and tools they need to succeed. We hope you enjoy this episode and subscribe for more marriage building content. Matthew 6 Jesus said, do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. So Jesus is saying to his disciples, don't lay up all your money on earth. You know, lay up treasures in heaven. In other words, you know, give to the Lord and have a mind toward eternity and things like that. And then Jesus says this line here, this is where it's a very, very powerful sentence. Wherever your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Okay, well, the word treasure is the word thesaurus, if y'all know what a thesaurus is. And the word treasure means treasure, but it means a repository of treasures. It's a treasure chest. It's a place that you put your treasures. Jesus said, wherever your treasure chest is, there will your kardea. That's the Greek word for heart. There will your kardia be also. The word kardea means the seed of your passions. Here's what Jesus is saying. Wherever you're putting the best of your life, your passion will always be there. You can't separate your passion from your treasure. In fact, your passion tells on you. You say, well, are you passionate about your marriage? No, not really. You know? You passionate about God? No, not really. You passionate about nascar? Oh, I love nascar. You passionate about football? Oh, I just can't. I. I'm a fantasy footballer. See, your passion is telling you where you're putting your treasures. And so Jesus said this. If you lay up your treasures on earth, your passion is going to be on the earth somewhere. But if you lay up your treasures toward God in heaven, that's where your passion is going to be. Now listen to me, givers don't backslide a person who gives to the Lord they don't backslide because their heart's with God. When you give the best of your time, talents and treasures to God, your passion's there. It tells on you. Okay? When you don't give the best of your time, talents and treasures to God, you'll always struggle with God. You'll always struggle with the desire. And I'm saying I've been there, done that. That's how I lived the first years of our marriage is I was not a good husband. I was not a godly man, I was not a giver. I didn't serve the Lord. And I always struggled with the world. I always struggled with temptation and all of those things until my treasure came back to God. And so the way we fall in love is we give each other our best. It is. You fell in love because you got interested in each other. You started going out and you knocked yourself out the first times you went out. I mean, you invested the best of your time in talents and treasure. You said no to other things so you could say yes to each other. And guess what? You fell in love. But that's also how you fall out of love. There was a woman who did a study, Jane Albus, and it was a sociological study that she did, very large study, and she was finding out how marriages operate and the most happy time in marriage. And what she found was that, and this doesn't surprise anyone, the best years of marriage are the early years of marriage. Typically they're the first three or four years, especially the years before children. So a couple gets married, they're in love, and they have great years until the kids come around. But when the kids come around, the marriage satisfaction typically drops. Okay? And the marriage satisfaction gets the absolute worst when kids are in junior high and high school, in secondary school. And if you survive that and one day they leave when they're 17, 18, 37, 38, somewhere in there. If someday they leave and you survive it, your marriage gets better. This is what she found. Marriage is best at the very beginning. It dips when the kids come. It goes worse when they're in secondary school. Then when they leave, the marriage gets a little bit better. Not as good as it was at first. Let me say something to you. God makes marriage to get better every year. What a crazy thing that some rookie is better than someone who's been married 30 years. Well, also, what a crazy thing that you got two or three good years and then goodbye, the honeymoon's over. What a horrible concept of marriage that is. And so here's the problem. When you're not sowing into your marriage, here's the problem that it creates. You're giving what belongs to your spouse to somebody else, and it creates jealousy in your spouse. See, we know Genesis 2:24 says, for this cause a man will leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife. We know we belong to each other first. We know that. We instinctively know that when we get married. I know that Karen belongs to me before she belongs to the kids. I know that she belongs to me before she belongs to her family, her parents, that Karen. I belong to Karen before I belong to marriage today or anybody else. We belong to each other first. And when my spouse takes what belongs to me and gives it to her friends or gives it to the kids, or my husband takes it and gives it to work or whatever, I get jealous. It's a legitimate jealousy. And by the way, Exodus 34 God says, My name is Jealous. Capital J. One of God's names is Capital J. Jealous. God created us for him first, and he is jealous of anything that takes us away from Him. Let me tell you something. The reason that God is a jealous God is because he's madly in love with us and he's not willing for us to go lightly when we begin to drift away from Him. He fights for us. And we need to be thankful that we have a God that fights for our hearts. He loves us so much. But we're the same way with each other. If we begin, we get married, we're investing in each other. We say no to other things. Our treasure is each other. We're putting the best of our life in each other. And guess what? We fall in love and we get married. And so why does the marriage satisfaction drop when the kids are born? It shouldn't. It should not drop whatsoever. Why does it drop? Because when kids come around, typically men turn their hearts to their work and women turn their hearts to the kids.