What You Don't Want to Do

Tell your spouse what you don't want to do to him or her.

I got this idea from a man who was telling a story about how he had said a really mean thing to his wife a couple days prior. It really hurt her. At some point after the incident, he had to leave to go to work or run and errand. The silence was awkward and hurtful. It isn't that he wanted to continue to hurt her with silence, but shame had crept in and so he withdrew.

At some point during his drive, something changed in his heart and he knew what he needed - even wanted - to do. He called her up on his cell phone and said, "Wife, I don't want to do that. That's not want I want to do to you."

I'm pretty certain that he drove home later to a woman who was willing to enter and engage with him because he had provided her with the safety of a repentant heart that had a real desire to do good to her and willing to admit when he hadn't.

I have kept this story and this statement of his in my mind. I tell my wife often about the things I don't want to do to her - sometimes after the fact but sometimes even before they happen, as a way to actually prevent them from happening when I am tempted to do so. This is one way to create a sense of safety in a relationship.

Tell them what you don't want to do.

Eye Contact

Make eye-contact with your husband or wife.  Period.

Eye contact is so difficult because eye-contact requires grace.  It requires grace on the part of the receiver and the giver.  See, eye-contact is one of the most vulnerable things we could ever embark upon with our spouse because in the eyes we feel either accepance or rejection.  Shame tells us we can't look into our spouse's eyes because of what we've done, what they've accused us of doing, or what they would leave us for if they really knew what was going on inside our heads.  Judgment tells us the person making eye-contact with us doesn't deserve our returned eyes, our willing hearts, or open ears.

But this is what I want to say to you. 

Make eye-contact with your husband or wife.  Period.

Eye-contact is a place where we get to truly extend the gospel to another human being.  In eye-contact, I refuse to hold my sin or another person's sin between us.  I refuse to hold their imperfections or my imperfections and inabilities between us.  With our spouse, eye-contact is one feature of the relationship that promotes deeper emotional intimacy.

This is where we have to make a separation between the difficulties in the relationship and the value or worth of the other person.  When I make eye-contact, when I place my hand on her cheek, arm, or shoulder, I tell her or him, "You have value.  Independent of all the misunderstandings, contradictory desires, selfish actions, or feelings hurt, I will make eye-contact with you and make physical contact with you because I know you are good, that God has made you in his own image, and that you have much to offer  the world.  I may not feel that way right now, but I'm going to separate the two.  I'm looking into your eyes because you deserve it based upon your God given value.  I'm looking through all sin and shame to see the inner-core of who you are." 

And it is with a heart that contains these types of sentiments that we reveal God to the other person.  They begin to have a connection to Him through how we view them.  What occurs in these instances are so powerful because as our spouse sees God through us, it is directly through us that this happens.  It is sort of like we're a power line and the current has just run through us.  This current or surge of energy we feel is a deep type of joy or gratitude and our own connection with God and the other person.  Now I'm not saying its always as epic as what I've just portrayed - but sometimes it is.

There are times that I have a hard time looking into my wife's eyes.  Just this morning, in fact, I felt insecure about something I had done and thought she might be angry with me.  But, I went to her.  I refused to hide.  I went to her, made eye-contact, and I shared it with her.  She, in turn, was able to enter into the issue with me, clarify, endorse, and we were able to walk into the morning together.

Eye-contact is scary at first, but in time, if you offer your eyes to your spouse, you begin to offer your very being to them, and you begin to slowly walk out of the hiddenness of your heart - the deep fears you are afraid to share with your partner. 

Over time, eye-contact becomes addictive.  I love to make eye-contact with my wife.  You know how you can look at a baby for hours and hours at a time?  How can we do that with a baby and not with an adult?  It's because shame has been introduced into all of our relationships and it takes looking straight through that shame into the person's God given soul in order to make eye-contact.  With a baby, there is no shame.  Eye-contact can last for prolonged periods of time.  But, in a grace-based marriage relationship, just like with an innocent baby, we can begin to practice looking at each other without shame, forgiving all sin, and treating the other person as Christ would treat them.  Without shame.  Without judgment.  Even if we feel shame about ourselves or have contempt towards the other person (in the dark side of our soul) we choose to take a chance and treat them with the part of our selves that wants to treat them with purity and hope.

We make eye-contact.

More Than Encouragement

If your husband or wife loves to play sports then find every way you can to get them out there playing their favorite sport. Writing - same thing. Serving the poor - same thing. Painting, acting, alone time for walks in the morning, cooking creatively, training dogs competitively. Whatever it is - deliberately get them out there to do what they love. Create space in your schedule, watch the kids, set aside money - do these things directly in open conversation. Don't just show a general sense of interest. Get active. Do it simply to do good to them. The stories to be told in such relationships are powerful and beautiful.

Community Based Weddings

My wife and I married each other four days ago, surrounded by family and friends, taking in every bit of it, on a peaceful, cool, late summer evening in Prescott Valley.  The honeymoon has taken place in Oak Creek Canyon and Flagstaff, and we are now rounding up the last, playful, financially carefree evening before rolling back down the hill to our Phoenix home.

There is something I want to tell you about our wedding.  Primarily, the wedding was born through a mixture of creativity, initiated among the dreams of my wife and God himself, culminating in a crisp, peaceful, early evening wedding.  Secondly, the wedding and honeymoon were produced through a collective outpouring of family, friends, church community, and even friends of friends.  

Our community delivered a cornucopia of talents, abilities, service, financial contributions, and guidance that culminated in a wedding we could not have construed on our own.  The financial aspect alone expresses our fortune due to services rendered by family, friends, and even friends of friends, the value of the wedding likely ten to twenty-thousand dollars higher than our budget.  Here are some of the flat-out pro bono services:  The venue was free.  The photography was free.  The sound equipment was free.  The musicians and singers were free.  The food was free.  The set-up was free.  These are just to mention a few.  In addition, people sacrificed their entire day to help set everything up, some experiencing dehydration and exhaustion.  Oh, and the wind kept busting lights and luminaries until the Lord told the winds to be still just prior to the wedding.

I simultaneously experience gratitude and sorrow as I reflect upon the fact that the cost of the average wedding puts so many engaged couples into debt even prior to being married.  Our silent culture of isolation, lacking clusters of networks of grace-giving communities, forces engaged couples to go-it-alone in their preparations.  Yet, the love of God is expressed in this - when we risk entering community and all of the hurt and pain that may ensue, we create a situation in which it is God's desire for us to experience their hearts as they help us.

The story of our wedding is a story about a divine interplay of the creator, community, and gratitude.  Our story prior to marriage already contains difficulties, and our marriage will contain even more difficulties and pain, yet the value and magnificence of the story is about faith, hope, and love which trump everything.  The story we write with God, the connection we feel to God in the midst of it, this kind of joy we experienced in the midst of the community that surrounded us.