Most of the time our marriage relationship starts off with warm, tingly feelings, but those initial feelings eventually wear off. What do you do when the tingly feeling of love is not felt towards your spouse anymore? Love is more than a feeling, it is a choice. In this Dive Deep Interview, Dr. Gary Chapman offers a practical conversation on how we can choose to love our spouse (even when it’s hard) through serving with a Christ-like attitude.
1.What is a gesture of love that would be meaningful to you, specific to your primary language?
2. Tell me about a time in your life when someone served you in love even though it may have been hard for them? How did that make you feel? Did that experience influence you to love?
Think About It:
1. In what area can I stop focusing on the differences and instead just allow my spouse to be who they are?
2. Have I had a heart of servanthood toward my spouse lately?
3. What interruptions in my life could actually be an opportunity to show love?
Notes and Quotes:
“If we choose the attitude of love, God will give us the ability to speak love, even to a spouse that’s not loving us.” -Gary Chapman
3 Question’s that changed Dr. Chapmans marriage:
1. What can I do to help you?
2. How can I make your life easier?
3. How can I be a better spouse?
Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Romans 5:5
Her betrayal and resulting pregnancy caused so much pain in their marriage. But God shows up and moves this couple into a brand new direction. It was unexpected with huge twists and turns. Join Jill and Mark in this robust conversation with Brent and Stacey Locey as we hear how God worked to redeem a total mess to glorify Himself and His purposes. So often we want to run from pain, but when we run toward it, we can experience tremendous growth and transformation.
Talk about it:
What parts of this conversation impacted you most?
How would we describe our marriage story?
Think about it:
Brent and Stacey talked about how they had to start focusing on their marriage. How are you focusing on your marriage? Where do you need to readjust your priorities?
Is God my first priority?
Brent and Stacey emphasized their decision to hit the reset button on every aspect of their relationship. Do you need to hit the reset button and what would that look like for you and what you bring to your marriage?
Notes and Quotes
“How long have you been married? Our true marriage is different from our first wedding ceremony. We had a big party on June 12, 2004 that was called a wedding. We didn’t become married until 2010. That was when we allowed God to be the 3rd person in our marriage, and we started following Him.”
“We are a hockey family. Once we accepted and operated that we are a team, we began to move forward and focus on life together.”
“The day that I married Brent I loved him the least. I love him now more than ever.”
If there’s any book that’s changed our marriage, it’s How We Love by Milan and Kay Yerkovich. We read it in the early days of Mark and Jill 2.0 and it’s now a resource we use in our marriage coaching.
The home we grew up in helped set our Love Styles in place (these are very different from Love Languages). Love Styles are the relational relating patterns we learned in our childhood that we unknowingly carry into marriage. Understanding how your Love Style does a dance with your spouse’s Love Style can give great insight into recurring challenges in your marriage.
Talk About It
Take the Love Style Quiz if you haven’t already. You can find it here.
What’s our Core Pattern? (You can find it here after you know your Love Styles)
Do you remember being comforted in your home of origin?
Our past, our upbringing, and our experiences in life don’t stay in the past. They are carried into our marriages and affect how we operate in our relationships. This is a topic that we cover a lot in our book No More Perfect Marriages and in our coaching with other couples. The good news is that you are not powerless to stay stuck in the past! You can move beyond it and experience true intimacy in your marriage and relationships.
In this Dive Deep Interview we are joined by our friends, Joe & Tara Buchanan. Joe is the station manager at our Central Illinois radio station, WCIC. Together Joe and Tara are the hosts of the Behind Our Smiles podcast, in which they talk openly about their marriage journey and how their past has affected their marriage.
Talk About It
Tell me about a time in your childhood when you were hurting, disappointed, or grieving and share how your pain was handled.
Trauma in childhood can include parental divorce, neglect, abuse, death of a sibling, having an angry parent you couldn’t please, having an alcoholic parent or a parent who has so many of their own issues they are unavailable to nurture and lead their child. Understanding that, is there any trauma in your childhood?
Think About It
Trauma in childhood can include parental divorce, neglect, abuse, death of a sibling, having an angry parent you couldn’t please, having an alcoholic parent or a parent who has so many of their own issues they are unavailable to nurture and lead their child. Understanding that, is there any trauma in my childhood?
Is there anything in your past that might still be affecting your thinking, your fears, or your responses? Is there still work to be done? Should I consider working through any of those with a coach or a counselor?
Notes and Quotes
“I was pushing my anxiety and my fear on my wife.” Joe Buchanan
“There’s layer after layer after layer in the healing process.” Joe Buchanan
“I had to come to a place where I realized I wasn’t strong enough on my own. I needed God.” Joe Buchanan
A strong marriage and family doesn’t “just happen. It is created. In this Dive Deep Interview, Jill has a conversation about intentionality with Instagram influencers Dino and Ashley Petrone. Their book Designed to Last equates designing a marriage relationship the same way you would design a room in your home. This conversation is about strengthening your faith AND your marriage.
What is one takeaway or personal challenge you have from this teaching?
Is there some area of life you’d like for us to be more disciplined in as a couple? What’s a next step we could take to start that rolling?
How do we do finding joy in the “in between?”
Talk about what activity you personally enjoy doing together.
Think about it:
Dino and Ashley talked about a disciplined life determining your success in growing your relationship with the Lord. Where do I need to be more disciplined?
Is God my first priority?
Dino and Ashley emphasized creating healthy habits in your marriage. What personal habits would be good for me to establish within my marriage?
How do I do at finding joy in the “in-between?”
Notes and Quotes
Zig Zigler says this. “If you aim for nothing, you will hit it every time.”
Instagram: @arrowsandbow
Designed to Last: Our Journey of Building an Intentional Home, Growing in Faith, and Finding Joy in the In-Between book
