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Food and Drug Administration. This product is

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not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or

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prevent any disease. Welcome

0:34

to the Marriage Day Podcast. I'm Jimmy Evans and I'm excited

0:36

to have you join me today. In

0:39

this episode, we'll explore the importance of having a

0:41

vision for your marriage and life. We'll

0:43

discuss how vision impacts unity,

0:46

provision, and victory, and

0:48

delve into the significance of glorifying God

0:50

in your relationship. I'll share

0:52

insights on conducting a vision retreat and the

0:54

value of seeking godly counsel. We'll also touch

0:56

on the power of tithes and offerings and

0:58

the purpose of our marriage. Let's

1:01

embark on this journey to strengthen and enrich our

1:03

marriages together. This

1:06

is one of the most important messages

1:08

that I bring related to marriage

1:11

because a lot of people, if you

1:13

ask couples, did God put you together, most

1:15

couples would say, yes, God put us together.

1:18

And then if you ask them why, they can't answer that

1:20

question. And Karen and I

1:23

could not answer that question early in

1:25

our marriage for many years. So I want to talk to

1:27

you just about how we got to the point of

1:29

having a vision retreat for our marriage and

1:32

what a difference that made. Let me

1:34

go through a couple of facts here. Thank you so

1:36

much. I appreciate it. This

1:39

is our vision retreat guidebook I'm going to talk about here in just

1:41

a minute. But in

1:43

five years, these are just some

1:45

facts about your marriage. In

1:48

five years, you will not be the same. You'll

1:50

be better or worse, but you won't be the same.

1:54

And the question is, what will you be like in five

1:56

years? What will your

1:58

marriage be like? in five years is

2:00

an important question. Another

2:03

fact, success never happens by accident.

2:06

It always happens on purpose as we decide

2:08

to have a positive purpose and we commit

2:10

to it. So if we're gonna succeed and

2:13

be better in five years, it's not gonna happen by

2:15

accident. You're not gonna say, you know, we never talk,

2:17

we never work on our marriage, you know, we really

2:19

never spend any time together, but we had a fantastic

2:22

marriage. That's not gonna happen. Is if

2:24

you're gonna have a good marriage, it's because you

2:26

purpose to have good marriage. Here's

2:28

another fact. In marriage, success only happens if

2:30

we're both in agreement and committed

2:32

to the same purpose. And so here's a question

2:34

from Amos 3-3, and

2:36

the question is, can two walk together unless

2:39

they're agreed, okay? And that question

2:42

demands a no answer. You

2:44

can't walk together if you're not in agreement

2:46

because you're constantly pulling in different directions like

2:49

this, and marriage is the longest journey in life.

2:51

And it's the closest journey in life. You'll

2:54

never have a closer relationship with another human

2:56

than you have in marriage, and

2:58

you're on a journey together, and can two

3:00

walk together unless they're agreed? No,

3:02

you're just gonna be fighting constantly. And

3:04

here's the fourth fact. To find the purpose for your

3:06

life and marriage, you have to

3:08

start with the big questions. Once

3:11

you answer the big questions, the little questions answer

3:13

themselves. And the biggest question, I'll come back to

3:15

this later in the message, is why did God

3:17

put us together? So again,

3:19

you ask people, you ask couples,

3:22

did God put you together? And almost every couple

3:24

would say, yes, God put us together, then you ask why,

3:27

and they have a hard time answering that question.

3:29

Before I get to that issue, I

3:31

wanna ask you another question, and that is why are we here? There

3:35

was a secular poll done, nationwide secular

3:37

poll, and they asked people,

3:40

if you could ask God any question, what

3:42

question would you ask God? And

3:45

the number one response across the nation

3:47

was, why am I here? People wanna

3:49

know the purpose of their life. You know, why am I

3:51

here? So I wanna answer that question. This

3:54

is life's universal purpose, Matthew 22. When

3:58

the Pharisees heard that Jesus, has

4:00

silenced the Sadducees, they gather together,

4:03

then one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question,

4:05

testing him and saying, teacher, which is the great commandment

4:08

in the law? Jesus said to him, you shall love

4:10

the Lord your God with all your heart, with

4:12

all your soul, and with all your mind. This

4:15

is the first and great commandment. And

4:17

the second is like it, you shall love your

4:19

neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments, hang

4:22

all the law and the prophet. So

4:24

Jesus took the entire Bible, and

4:26

they were asking him and saying, what's the most important commandment?

4:29

He said, let me give you two. Love

4:31

the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength,

4:33

and love your neighbor as you love yourself. On

4:35

these two commandments, hang all

4:38

the law and the prophets. Well, that was their entire Bible. The

4:41

only Bible they had was the law and the prophets. And

4:43

so the law is summarized by the 10

4:45

commandments as an example. The 10

4:48

commandments, the first four commandments tell us how to love God.

4:51

So he says, no other God's before me, no graven

4:53

images, don't take my name in vain, and remember the

4:55

Sabbath day to keep it holy. So God says, here's

4:57

how I want you to love me. The

5:00

next six commandments are how we love each other,

5:03

honor your father and mother, don't murder, don't

5:05

commit adultery, don't steal, don't bear false witness,

5:08

and don't covet. So according to Jesus, all

5:11

the law was for the purpose

5:14

of helping us love God and love each

5:16

other. Then the prophets, Jesus said, all the

5:18

law and the prophets hang on

5:20

these two right here. The prophets were all men calling

5:23

Israel back into a relationship with God. Every

5:27

prophet, you read any prophetic book in the Old Testament,

5:30

all the prophets were sent by a

5:32

jealous, heartbroken God trying

5:34

to get Israel to turn back to him. It was

5:36

all about relationship. And so Jesus

5:39

says, if you take all the

5:41

law and the prophets, if you take the entire

5:43

Bible, the interpretive key to

5:45

the entire Bible is loving God

5:47

and loving each other. The purpose of the entire Bible is just to

5:50

get us to love God and love each other. So

5:52

my question is, why are we here? We're

5:55

here for relationship. We're

5:58

here to love God. This

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