Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:10 Hello and welcome to episode four of the Strengthening Your Marriage Podcast with Jeremy and Hailey. Today's episode is titled Restorative Love. But before we get into the details, wanted to do a quick recap of last episode's content. Episode three was titled, enabled to Live a New Reality. And we picked up from episode two that idea that God has for our marriages of something better actually looks like something concrete in practice. And we looked at Galatians five and these characteristics that God enables us to produce in our life, patience, kindness, gentleness, and self-control, uh, those kind of things. And others in that passage are what make the marriage of our dreams. And a key idea last week captured by that word enabled, is that God doesn't call us to live this new reality without also giving us what we need to live it out. We're equipped with the enabling power of his spirit.
Speaker 1 00:01:10 And that's huge. It's huge for me. And I think it's huge for anyone who feels stuck somewhere in their life because there's hope for change. Even when you feel stuck, hope for change that takes you beyond your past record, your track record, what you've known from yourself in the past, your failures. There's hope for real change. So I said before that the title for today's episode is Restorative Love. Now, Hailey, you were thinking about love and maybe typically what we think about that the options for us when we think what love might mean in a marriage.
Speaker 2 00:01:43 Yeah. So I think we can often think that loving someone means giving them what they want or making them feel good. And we think that the alternative to that is getting someone to give me what I want. So manipulating them towards your own end. But I think we don't see that there's a third option, which is loving the other person selflessly. So there is actually a place for speaking in ways that might be uncomfortable for the other person, and that don't make them feel good or don't make them feel happy, but is seeking what's best for them. And he's willing to, I guess, take their risk because you care about their wellbeing.
Speaker 1 00:02:21 Hmm. So what is restorative love then? I guess what you've said, Hailey is applied to marriage. It's it's love that does what is best for your spouse, and that's not, you know, tainted by what you want to get from them by self-interest, but it's this desire to see them flourish, to see them made fully as they were made to live. Yeah, I was thinking, we were chatting about this earlier in the week of an image that a friend, uh, gave me a, a mate called Pete Sunder Girl talks about the fact that experiences of shame, they trim us, they cripple us, and they limit our capacity to, to grow and flourish. And his picture was that they shrink us down to being like a bonsai, when actually what we were made to be was this grand flourishing tree. And I guess that's the kind of love we're talking about, this love that seeks the restoration of the other, of our spouse, of our husband or wife, wanting them to be fully human, to become like Jesus in their character, is to produce all those character fruits that we talked about last week, to be patient, to be kind, to be good, joyful for bearing.
Speaker 1 00:03:31 It's producing all of those kind of fruits, and it's not doing it because that will just make my life as their spouse easier. But it's because that's the absolute best that you could want for someone else. And you were saying, Haley, that it's a really loving, like God loves. Did you want to talk about that a bit more? Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:03:50 I, I feel like the more you get to know what God's like, the more it shapes your definition of love. Like what you think he's actually loving to another person. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I think, yeah, we can have kind of a default idea of what love is, but it becomes a wiser and more nuanced thing as we look at Jesus and see what he's like and start to imitate what he does and what feels like it's a loving thing. As you get to know God better, looking back, you might think maybe that actually wasn't that helpful. Or you see the results of what you're doing, you think, oh, that's actually not working out very well. <laugh>, why is that?
Speaker 1 00:04:30 So one maybe concrete example of that that is expressed in our culture and that we've wrestled with firsthand is the idea of loving someone means giving them a lot of choice. Yeah. And so we've wrestled with that both in our marriage, but also our parenting our children. And probably our default, which we've kind of imbibed from our culture, is that understanding of love giving choice, but actually giving lots of choice can actually paralyze and cause indecision. And God's actually got a much more robust kind of definition of love, of the way he loves us, is not always giving us free reign and the ability to do whatever we want. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:05:10 And I think making other people feel emotionally good and not wanting to people to feel bad is one that I've fallen into. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, that's what I want for myself and that's what I want for other people as well. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but realizing that that's actually not always helpful and that can actually be harmful at times because you avoid difficult conversations that need to be had with the good of another.
Speaker 1 00:05:32 And just in terms of where we maybe go wrong with our understanding of love, I think of that suggestion that's been put forward that our culture in the West operates with a pain pleasure paradigm. We wanna maximize the amount of pleasure and enjoyment we feel, and minimize the amount of pain that that's very much shapes our worldview. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And yet what God wants for us is actually quite different. It's doesn't fit within that broader narrative, that broader cultural understanding. Mm-hmm. I thought that I'd read Paul trips quote, this is in his notes from session four of his live streaming series. And just before I read, it uses this word cruciform, if that's not a word you understand, it really just means cross shaped. I e like Jesus going to the cross. It's self-sacrificial. It's giving something up for the good of someone else. And he says this, cruciform love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation, or that the person being loved is deserving.
Speaker 1 00:06:35 I'll read it one more time. If you watch the session online, you'll, you'll hear that he, he says it over and over again and then he, he unpacks it. But there's a lot in it. So I'll read it a second time. See if you can take this in. Cruciform love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation. Are you getting something back? Or that the person being loved is deserving, that the other person doesn't have to be worthy of my love. Now Heather, you were saying that you found that quite profound. There was some of that that resonated with you. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:07:07 I think it's quite unnatural to continue to love someone when it doesn't feel like it's being reciprocated or when you don't like someone <laugh>. So I think that does not require reciprocation or the person being loved is deserving. That's quite a hard thing to do if someone is Yeah. Obviously not wanting to receive your love or is hurting you or it's not responding, I guess, to your love, it's very difficult to keep going.
Speaker 1 00:07:36 Mm. It's another worldly kind of love one that doesn't, it's not tit for tap, it's not give in order to receive back. It's happy to go in one direction if that's all that happens. Yeah. So that's, it's quite costly. Yeah. I guess for me the word willing, willing self-sacrifice is an important one because it speaks of not being kind of dutiful and empty, but being emotionally engaged. There's a gladness in sacrificing and being selfless for your spouse. It kind of involves enjoying doing your spouse good. Mm-hmm. And there's something rich about that because that involves me as a whole person doing what's good for you. It's not just right actions, but it's my whole self participating in mm-hmm. Doing good for you. A pier likes to say, God, our church likes to say having emotions that are congruent with reality. It's, yeah. Having emotions that fit loving actions, not just having the actions devoid and and empty of emotion in the heart behind the action <laugh>. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:08:42 Yeah. The two things going together. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I guess that relates to about thankfulness and joy. That that willingness comes when we have that thankfulness and joy in what God's doing in us, what he's done for us and what he is doing in us. Yeah. That, that kind of joy in doing that, even when it's not reciprocated. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 00:09:02 So we're probably jumping into the application questions a bit later in the episode than last time, but I wanted to put these out here so you can start making this personal for you and your spouse. If you're listening together, or just for you if you're listening on your own. First question is, what's been your functional definition of love? So that's kinda getting at this idea that we can hold a definition that we have in our heads, but it's actually something different to what we live by. So I, I want you not to think about the right definition, what you think it should be in your head, but how do you actually love your spouse and those in your life? If someone was to watch a videotape of your interaction with your spouse at home, what would they observe? What would they think your definition of love is from the way you relate?
Speaker 1 00:09:51 Second question is, what's one area of focus where you can grow in showing restorative love to your spouse? What's one area? Just narrow it down to one. That's a growth area that you can really invest some energy in, in thinking through what it would look like for you to have this restorative love that you show to your spouse. Now the rest of the episode, we're really going tease out these questions for us. We've kind of touched on the, the first one a bit, but we'll unpack that a bit more. So, hey, for us, what, what do you think has been our functional definition of love? The, the way that we've related to one another? What assumptions have we had about what love is?
Speaker 2 00:10:31 Yeah, I think that idea of reciprocation, I think there's been an expectation that we'd want that reciprocated. And I think for me there's been a subtle demand of that at times, which has come out in the form of a lot of emotion and like raising the fact that I feel like I'm not getting the love back that I'd like <laugh>. I think in that period that we've talked about where we were really struggling, that was kind of a characteristic thing for me. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but I was wanting to get something back <laugh>. And so there was a lot of conversations about that. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 00:11:05 Yeah. I guess related to that is this idea that Ry uses it, it's a law based understanding of love or an understanding of of how we relate that's based on Yeah. An expectation. Particular rules as if there's a, a rule book that we're living by that says, if I do X, you should do Y in return. And I guess perhaps one of the places where we might see it most clearly in our own marriage is around sleep. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So for example, if I get up Monday to Friday early morning with the kids, I have some expectation that you are grateful response to that ought to be asleep in on Saturday or something like that. But it's these unwritten rules that is not just gladly doing something that is for your benefit regardless of how you respond or what you'll give me in return. But it's almost, I'll do that if you do this. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:12:03 Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:12:04 So that kind of functional idea, which is not love, it's not this restorative love, it's not like God's love, God's love, it's not like that.
Speaker 2 00:12:11 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. It's really given mm-hmm. <affirmative>,
Speaker 1 00:12:14 I guess the other way, partly because we read a bit of psychology and it's influenced our culture a lot. Things like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, there's a certain understanding that says that to love someone is to meet a need in them. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, there is something that's true to that. It's not that that is false, but it can be a bit skewed. So doing what's good for someone doesn't always equal meeting a need or meeting something that they perceive to be a need in themselves. It could be meeting a desire or want something they would like. And as parents, we know that it's not always good to give into our child's desires. Actually, that can be disastrous. And if you say yes to everything your child demands, they'll turn into a bit of a, a monster who expects everything to be done their way all the time. A bit of a tyrant. And I guess we've had an idea that maybe that's part of where the tit fort thinking comes, that that love is needs meeting, but that can be a little bit off track, do you think?
Speaker 2 00:13:19 Yeah, yeah. Um, or
Speaker 1 00:13:21 Do you put it, yeah.
Speaker 2 00:13:22 So meeting each other's emotional need. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, yeah. I guess can lead to that. I guess it comes back to that demand and feeling that you have a right to receive this from this person. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, which again is a violation of love. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.
Speaker 1 00:13:39 Yeah. I guess for us too, we got stuck a bit in that kind of thinking, which was, what does it mean to be fully human? My understanding was, well, you need to be loved and you need to be important. You need to have the sense that you're making a meaningful contribution. And it was almost like you had two tanks and they had to be filled up to be fully human. But it's kind of like if, if you operate on that definition, you become controlled by your perception of whether you feel loved or whether you feel important. And they're like fixed needs, fixed understandings of who you are as a person. But this idea of restorative love is actually that God's got a different plan and a different design for us. Yeah. And he's in the business of changing our desires. So yes, we may desire to feel loved what whatever experiences in life or whatever patterns are relating make us feel loved or whatever contributions we have, interactions with others, make us feel valued and important, meaningful.
Speaker 1 00:14:41 We may have those desires, but actually God's not about topping up our desires and keeping them full. He's, he's actually in the business of rearranging our desires. 'cause sometimes we want the the wrong things. And even those desires for love and importance can skew us in an unhelpful way. And this idea of us being a full flourishing person is actually being someone who's able to love God, who's free to love God and free to love others who's not constrained by their desires and controlled by their desires. But they're able to become like God in their character, become like Jesus in their character, not concerned about filling themselves up. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but concerned about doing what pleases God and what would be good for those in front of them. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:15:29 Yeah. I think the difficult thing about that though is that the idea of our needs being met before we can function well actually resonates because of our experience. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I think we can often feel like we can't function without those things. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I think that's why it resonates so strongly and why we feel like it is a need, not a want. And so, yeah, I think it is quite a huge paradigm shift and it takes time for God to chip away that and to see that there's a different way of coming at things.
Speaker 1 00:16:01 And I guess one of the ways we've talked about this before is the difference between having a self-focus. Yeah. Yeah. Like when you're thinking needs and what I need. Yes. You're coming at it from the paradigm of, of self. Yes. Rather than paradigm of selflessness and God and his enabling power. Mm-hmm. Being with me. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> helping me to give what would be good for another right now. Yeah. It's, it's this different paradigm Yeah. Than a big paradigm difference there.
Speaker 2 00:16:29 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it takes a while for your affections to change so that that drive which energizes you and allows you to function well and flourish, it takes a while for that to change, which can be part of why it can feel difficult for a while, I guess
Speaker 1 00:16:45 <laugh>. Yeah. I guess speaking personally for me, this might sound strange if you've not thought about it before, but because I'd read psychology that told me that those what my essential needs were to be loved and to be, to have meaning, to have importance. And that resonated with my experience. I'd become convinced that that's what it meant for me to be human. And I went through life trying to feel those two things. But actually coming to the Bible and realizing they're not God's primary concerns, for me, it was just so freeing. It was liberating because I felt like the chains were free, had been set free from living for those things. And I could see things much bigger than myself <laugh>. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And that's part of being able to have a better picture of marriage. Yeah. Is a marriage that's not controlled by that self focus and that you fill me up and I'll fill you up Yeah. Kind of thing. But it's based on something different entirely that is being part of God's process of being made like him. Mm. I'm an instrument to help you become like him. You're an instrument to help me become like him. Yeah. It's something much more beautiful and rich. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:17:54 And then as we both start to flourish and help one another with that, there's this really rich connection that starts to happen. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:18:02 So in terms of one area of focus where we can both grow in showing restorative love, we thought it might be helpful to talk about a couple of conflicts that we've had recently wanting to be very concrete and zoom in on a couple of scenes of life that we can share with you. So a few weeks ago, one Sunday morning, we were participating in church online from home. That was before we had any meeting in person happening. So it's just our family at home on our own. I'd got up early with the kids and it just felt like a rough morning. I'd given Haley the opportunity to sleep in a bit longer. And when she did come out of the room and came into the dining room, I just felt this relief. It was like, oh, the pressure's off. Like I'm not on my own managing the kids anymore.
Speaker 1 00:18:46 Possibly I could go back to bed, or at least Haley will relieve me of the responsibility of caring for the kids. But what actually happened was Haley thought, oh, things are fairly under control to enable us to get ready for church on time. She would go and shower, that would be the best use of her time. But she didn't communicate that. And so I was there thinking, oh, there was this promise of relief that I was anticipating that didn't come. It's been extended. Does Haley not see what I've experienced? <laugh> Amy had good intentions, but I didn't know why she disappeared. I felt like she was just off doing her own thing functionally a bit independent from the family, maybe a bit unaware of the load I'd carried in the morning and the fact that it felt hard <laugh>. And that then blew up in a little bit of a conflict before we participated in video conference calls with people from church. And we kind of had started to address the conflict, but not really worked through it more fully until after all that had happened. And for me there was this dilemma of do I raise my reaction <laugh>. So I think sometimes I know that I can respond in a self-centered way and my perspective isn't a good perspective. And so I'm better actually holding my tongue that time. I didn't hold my tongue. I told you what I thought. <laugh> and you actually were glad. Yeah. Though it brought tension <laugh>. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:20:07 Yeah. It gave opportunity. Opportunity to clarify, I guess.
Speaker 1 00:20:10 Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Perfect. I guess the area of growth is constructive conflict. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> that God's been working on us to help us have conflict that moves in a constructive direction. And not avoid conflict, but but actually move through it to establish more trust, more understanding, more unity in our marriage. Did you wanna talk a bit more about that experience? Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:20:32 So I guess, I mean that has been a bit of a pattern that both of us, I think are aware of the potential to come to something with a selfish motive. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so not wanting to cause unnecessary hurt by raising something. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Like we tend to think, oh, is this something that I just need to deal with myself, deal with my own heart and move on, or should I raise it? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But I guess the advantage of raising things is that it gives both people an opportunity to potentially grow mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And like it does obviously give opportunity for clarification too, because you can perceive the same situation very differently. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But yeah, I guess we perhaps like to have things clear in our head and resolved before we'd raise it with the other person, which has some value. There's definitely time to hold back and think something through, not jumping straight away, but oftentimes we can't actually reach that clarity without conversation together. Mm. And often there'll be something on both sides, <laugh>. Mm. Like it's not usually a one sided thing. It might be more to own on one side than the other at different times, but mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. Usually there's unhelpful things contributed on both sides, which can come to light and be worked on <laugh> mm-hmm. <affirmative> through that kind of conversation. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 00:21:47 <affirmative>. So my honest reaction, even though it might've been not an accurate perspective on what had happened, because I didn't know that there was good intention or what you were thinking behind going off to shower, but my honest reaction became the opportunity for us to work through what my reaction was. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:22:05 Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:22:06 And you had no idea that I had taken your actions that way and that would've just let things fester and allowed on golf potentially to develop. But the actual robust conversation about it and even feeling some distance while we're participating in Zoom online and then clearing things up a bit further afterwards and and moving toward one another enable us to resolve the misunderstanding and to see the good in your intentions with going to shower, even though that wasn't what I was hoping you would do or looking for. Yeah. So there was one other conflict that we had just this Monday gone and it was actually related to the podcast. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So the thing is, I tend to be a bit more confident in a public speaking role because I've had a bit of public speaking today, the nature of my role with church and it's harder for you.
Speaker 1 00:22:56 Okay. And so you might fumble over your words or say a few ums and say the editing process after we record can be quite lengthy. And I was editing Monday afternoon, August episode three, and the time just really blew out. I think it would've taken between four and five hours to edit and then publish and promote that, that whole package I guess. But I worked into the evening and about 10 o'clock I probably could have gone to bed. I had the episode ready to publish the next morning, but I was a bit frustrated at my own limitations and the fact that there are a number of things that I couldn't get to that relate to my work, promoting the opportunity to meet face-to-face, hoping that that might eventuate. Putting some things on the church website that give people some more information about who I am and what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 00:23:44 And so I stayed up till 11:30 PM Now some of you may do that and, and that's fine and you cope fine staying up that to that time and maybe you have the ability to sleep a bit longer. But for us, we know that's not a sensible decision for us to stay up at 1130 when Amber's still waking during the night. And I'm normally up from six o'clock and neither of us are the kind of people who cope well with less sleep. I'm prone to stress anyway. So I confessed to Hailey in the morning that I had stayed up later than I should have that it had been a late night. I Hailey. How did you react at that point?
Speaker 2 00:24:22 <laugh>. I, I already knew you'd been up. Yeah. Yeah. I guess I felt frustrated was my first reaction. I had been up in during the night to Amber an extra time where you would normally get up to her because you're out to it <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:24:35 So asleep. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:24:37 And I guess I know the impact of you staying up on the whole family. Mm-hmm. And so my immediate reaction, I guess was a self-focused one of, oh, this is gonna impact on me, it's gonna mean I'm going to need to lose sleep in order to help you catch up on sleep. Mm-hmm. And you're probably going to be more prone to be stressed or irritable or whatever. So that was my immediate reaction. And I guess I wanted to help you with that kind of decision making and things. And I guess we've had conversations before about working within your limitations and all of that. So I've been wanting to help you with that, but at the same time, aware of my own self interest in the situations. So in raising it with you or responding to you that morning, I guess my vision was a bit clouded. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and I wasn't sure what was helpful to say and what was not helpful to say because, 'cause I had drive to <laugh> serve myself, which was coming out mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 00:25:34 <affirmative>, so we had this conversation on Tuesday morning. Morning routines are fairly pressured. So it wasn't like we could have a long in depth discussion, but there's a bit of time over breakfast to chat. But in reflection we're thinking how do we have constructive conflict when we're aware of that self-interest being part of the mix that could be clouding our vision. You were thinking maybe just that awareness that you are self interested in your response and being able to declare that. Yeah. I guess I was a bit tentative. I was hoping that you had that interest, that restorative love interest that might help me to clarify what was going wrong in my own heart. To have a foolishly stayed up later that I know is healthy for me <laugh>. But you had become aware that actually you had some self-interest at play motivating your response. That wasn't just a good concern for my restoration, for my growth and maturity in addressing the underlying things. Yeah. And pointing out actually maybe that wasn't a good idea for this reason or this reason or,
Speaker 2 00:26:33 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I guess part of helping each other is letting each other know the impact of our actions too. Like back to your example. Yeah. That was actually helpful for me to reflect on how I'd handled, like there were good intentions in there to be ready on time, but that actually helped me think about how I could love you better <laugh> and the impact of my lack of communication at that point.
Speaker 1 00:26:58 So I guess we're learning that in this constructive conflict to choose your timing wisely, but also you've been thinking about humility and gentleness and one of the ways we've been thinking that we are learning to have constructive conflict with one another with this restorative love, this love that wants to help the other person flourish and grow and mature. It's involves often asking questions, doesn't it <laugh> mm-hmm. That are maybe open-ended questions, but they're questions that prompt the other to make connections to see maybe a consequence of what they're doing or to ask, or do you think this is what's behind it? I guess often one that comes up for us is perfectionism. Mm-hmm. Because that's both been a pattern in us and it's quite easy sometimes for, for me to see when you are feeling overwhelmed, I start to see that idealism coming out and the fact that you're holding yourself to a standard that is just completely unrealistic, that means you're being particularly self-critical. And so just asking a question like, could it be that your own standards are coming out here or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. Then becomes maybe a moment of insight for you. Mm-hmm. Oh yeah. It's just that thread in that bigger theme of my life, <laugh>. Yeah. And expressing itself here again, <laugh>. Yeah. And that becomes an opportunity for you to open up about that or to talk about what's happening <laugh>.
Speaker 2 00:28:18 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think having that humility is really important in terms of not assuming motivations or assuming that your interpretation is correct. Yeah. But coming to it with an openness Mm. Yeah. And clarifying things. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And then also being open to the fact that your interpretation might be wrong or there might be issues that you are bringing. Yeah. I guess it's a two-way thing.
Speaker 1 00:28:44 You mentioned the idea of looking at yourself first.
Speaker 2 00:28:46 Yeah. I mean, Jesus talks about before you take the spec out someone else's eye to get the log out of your own eyes. And I think that's incredibly helpful way to approach any conflict because there's often, or maybe always in your own life that need to be dealt with first, which then gives you the humility to and gentleness to help someone else in a right way. Mm-hmm. So if you know your own struggles and failures better than you know other people, then you're not going to approach them with judgment or heavy handedness. You're going to approach very gently and, and humbly mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so it gives you the right posture to help.
Speaker 1 00:29:29 Actually, I read Ed Welsh's comments in that recently in a little book he's got on anger. And it just helped me to understand that passage even more clearly. Mm-hmm. What I had before, because he's saying that we ought to have a more critical look at ourselves than we do at someone else. And he wasn't saying that in a harsh, beat yourself up worries me kind of way. But it was actually just that balance of, of about looking at yourself quite closely and looking at yourself more closely than you would look at someone else. So that when you see things that are ugly <laugh>, I guess you're just aware of your weakness and your vulnerability and that gives a compassion for others. Yeah. And of course it doesn't destroy us when we see that ugliness, because we know that God gives us grace and offers us forgiveness.
Speaker 1 00:30:15 He allows us to see those things without being destroyed by them <laugh>, which is a wonderful freedom. We don't have to pretend that we've got it all together mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but we can see the things that are ugly in our own responses, but then also be compassionate and understanding towards our spouse <laugh>. Yeah. When we see their weakness expressed. Yeah. So for us, it's the area of how we engage in constructive conflict where I think God's growing us in learning to show restorative love to one another. It's going about it in the way we've just described. And I guess at the heart of it, this restorative love, it's all about who God is. And the way he relates to us, you know, the heart of God for us is that he takes the initiative to move towards us to come close even when we are far away.
Speaker 1 00:31:06 And we don't want anything to do with him. We don't want to know him. He moves to toward us with this willing, costly, generous love he gives himself. He gives Jesus so that we could be rescued from our self focus, from our antisocial patterns of relating, be it in our marriage or with whomever else. And he takes this first step towards us, and it's because he wants us to draw close to him to have unity and oneness with him. And that's what this restorative love we've been speaking about is like, it's shaped by the way God loves us. And when that's a reality in a marriage that's just so rich, you wouldn't want to have it any other way. So just to leave you with those application questions again, the first question was, what's been your functional definition of love? That's what have you actually lived out in your relationship with your spouse? And the second question, what's one area of focus where you can grow in showing restorative love to your spouse? Thanks again for tuning in.
