When Challenges Lead to Growth

Because there was this feeling of like, why should we keep trying to do these things when we fail? Like that was like, we failed. We might as well not do anything ever again. And my thought was like, okay, that’s actually how I felt during the time. But after that, when you start getting some spiritual clarity and you start praying through it, you’re like, well, this is not right. You just remember, you’re like, well, we don’t continue on because

You know, we’re victorious always. We move toward victory. Like Christ is our victory. He won it for us. It’s not the other way around. not like, when we’re victorious, then we can serve Christ. Then we can work. No, no, he was the victor. Yeah.

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Marriage After God podcast. We’re your hosts, Erin and Jennifer Smith. Hello. In this episode, we are going to be talking about how to handle things when they go all wrong before and during a camping trip. What it looks like to move forward after failure and things for you to look forward to on a future episode. I should say future episodes.

So before we get into that, make sure you hit that like button and subscribe wherever you like to listen or watch. And also please take a moment to leave us a comment or review. Those are so powerful in helping us to grow this show. So please don’t forget to do that. If you already know, thank you so much. You rock. So before we get started, I would just like to say hello again. She’s back again. back again. I just feel so proud to be here because consistency. we, Erin and I,

Talked about it recently how like what’s coming to the podcast if you guys stay tuned like you said we’re gonna be sharing What’s coming for you guys? So today’s just gonna be another update Just thank you for having me and this is your show. I know everyone Everyone emails me and says hey, love your interviews, but where’s your wife at? I just hope people like these little updates that we that we like to give them So something that I wanted to start off sharing was the last time I was on last month

a weeks ago, shared a little update and just shared how God’s still working on me. know, we shared a little bit about that. You can go listen to it. But… should go listen to it in fact. Well, guess what? He’s still working on us. Nothing’s done. Yeah. Nothing’s done. I’ll say that. But during this… Did we already mention that we did a road trip or… I don’t know if we’ve mentioned it yet. So I don’t know if I think we mentioned that we were going Going to. Okay.

So we did the last two weeks in August, we did a road trip with family and our kids and we went to Yellowstone and we went to Glacier and Coeur d’Alene and then back and the whole trip was two weeks and it was just slow and awesome and amazing. And we’ll probably give you more just tidbits as we go along. But.

What really hit me in a really good way was the music that we got to share in the car as we drove with the kids. Our kids love music. I don’t know if you guys know this, but they’re all falling in love with music. My boys always want to listen to dubstep. And then our girls have been falling in love with all kinds of genres. All of his little DJ. But this specific trip, I will say, is probably sponsored by Crowder.

Forrest Frank and Josiah Queen. That’s all we listen to the entire trip. And the kids, know, they’re old enough to give us their preferences and tell us like, what, you know, turn on this song, turn on that song. And then a lot of repeats. ⁓ But Josiah Queen actually launched his newest album while we were out on the road. Zion. Yeah, it was, it’s so good. ⁓ And one of his songs, ⁓ it’s called Slow Down, Please.

The lyrics just really spoke to my heart and I was sitting there listening to it and it just reminded me of again how God’s still working on me. So I just wanted to start with that and share some of the lyrics. It says, but he walks right in with kindness in his eyes and grace in every step. What will he say when he takes a look around and sees that I couldn’t clean this mess I’ve made? And then he says, all the things you do for me are good and sweet, but slow down, please. All those things will always be, but sit right here. Come and see.

There’s not a better place to go to rest your heart and weary soul than at my feet. was just, we were listening to this cause I really love this song. I turned it on yesterday when I was praying, just listened to it while I was praying. And, but we were listening yesterday in the car and Elliot’s like, what is this song about? I was like, well, it’s actually about like the singers saying how hard he’s working, thinking that he’s got to clean up everything in his life. Later on, he talks about his character and all the things that are going wrong in his character. And he’s trying really hard to clean it up.

Can’t and then he’s just like what wonder what Jesus is gonna say when he walks in and just sees all my mess And then he says, know, Jesus walks in and says hey, this is all great I love what you’re trying to do for me, but why don’t you slow down and just come sit with me? It reminds me of that picture of Mary and Martha and how Martha’s, know doing the good thing of serving and trying to prepare everything but really Jesus is like what Mary’s doing at my feet is is The better you’re missing out comes it down. Yeah, and so that just really spoke to my heart. thought it was really cool

And then there was another song that we played a lot by Crowder called Still. And he just says, he’s working on me still, changing me piece by piece still, making me better, gonna do his thing, don’t care how long it takes. So all good things. You guys should go listen, go listen to Crowder, go listen to Josiah Queen’s new album. He has a lot of good songs on there. He does actually. Yeah. I’ve been really inspired lately. This is just like a side note.

I’ve been really inspired lately by all of the creativity I’ve seen on social media coming out with, ⁓ you know, Christian music and artists and just the creativity and people and how God’s moving in them to put their hands and minds and hearts to work for His glory. It’s been really inspiring to me. And it’s also what’s awesome about it is it’s a whole new genre. I remember growing up, like I listened to David Cratter when I was a kid.

And now he’s like, my kids are being influenced by him and just the consistency that he has in just preaching the gospel in his music. But it’s really cool seeing all these young Christians, these young adults that love the Lord using their gifts and talents in such beautiful creative ways, powerful ways. And it’s actually making waves in the world. I think Forrest Frank is like one of the number one hit songs in the world. So praise God for that because

The more we can get the word of God out, the more we can get the name of Jesus out, I think the better. good. So cool. And the creativity is not just music. What I’m seeing out there, it’s like design work and just artistry and craftsmanship like all over the place. And what’s really cool is we were reading in Acts today during family Bible time and the small section of scripture that you read talked about this woman named Dorcas.

or Tabitha and it said that when she – so she dies and then all the widows and people who are mourning were – They’re coming up to Peter who they asked to come to see her, the dead woman and all the widows are like – yeah, widows, right? Yeah. They brought all the garments and dresses and things that she had made them. This woman who passed away, she had made all of these things and they brought them and were like waving them as they’re weeping.

And I was just caught off guard by that because I don’t remember reading it before, but I thought, ⁓ how cool that they are bringing a significant piece of art that she created, something that she crafted. her own hands and heart. To honor her presence that is not there anymore, although then it comes back. So it’s just really cool. Well, and what’s just an encouragement for all of this and this idea of creativity and this song Josiah Queen wrote of like,

Jesus isn’t looking for all of the things that we can do for Him so that He’ll accept us and receive us. He already does. And He wants us to just be with Him. But what’s awesome is when we love the Lord, when you have His Holy Spirit in you, we will create. And that’s going look different in very different ways for every person. But God’s given each one in the church, we’ve talked about this so many times, gifts. And when you love the Lord, those gifts, it’s nearly impossible for us to not want to use those gifts for Him.

And what’s cool about it is they often will outlast us. Like something that we produce. Like our children are going to outlast us, hopefully. That’s the idea. Things that we create, these books that we’ve written, podcasts, audio, music, that people… We still sing hymns from hundreds and hundreds of years ago, believers who wrote down, you know, something that was in their heart and they did it because they wanted to please God, they wanted to bless God and others. And so there’s something really cool and powerful about creating.

Not that we have to do that to earn anything from God, but it comes out of that love for Him. And it’s just such a cool expression or reflection of our own selves, our personality, but just the talent that God’s given us. So if you have a hobby or you’re passionately pursuing a career in artistry, we just want to encourage you to do that. But also as parents, you guys, if you are parents and you’re raising kids,

look for those things that your kids are interested in, whether it’s drawing or music or writing or gosh, you name it. Maybe it’s metalwork or wood shop. can’t even list all of them, but look, keep your eyes open and look for those things in your kids that they have just a interest in and then give them resources to keep pursuing those things because who knows what it will develop later on in life. I was actually thinking as we were listening to these

younger guys, you know, producing this music. And I was thinking about how my kids are in piano right now. And I’m like, I wonder if God will use anything of that, you know, 20 years from now, will my kids be on Spotify or not? That’s fine. I don’t, I’m not pushing for that, but I’m just saying I want to keep my eyes open to- We’re typical parents and we get excited about that stuff. But my daughter, she’s an amazing drawer and she’s only 10 and she’ll like, she’ll, she does these things where she practices noses and eyes and ears and things that are actually really difficult for

people to draw and she does an amazing job on it. So I just like to keep my eyes open for things that they’re crafting and interested in and say, ⁓ you know, let’s pursue those things because that’s pretty cool. Well, and even if they’re not like, it might sound like we’re saying, you know, only people that have creative talents can do these things. It’s not true. Like I think about some of our kids that are more analytical or more type A where they want to, they can organize stuff. And like, those are beautiful things. Someone who can, ⁓

take something that’s unorganized and make it organized, that’s a gift. And so I just want to say like just using the skills and the gifts and the talents and the resources as we talk about in our book, Marriage of a God, using what God’s given us for His kingdom, for His glory. And those things will definitely develop and be used in whatever career or whatever they pursue as adults. Those things will naturally benefit and add to whatever it is that they choose to do.

Mainly and especially if we cultivate not just in our children, but in each other. The fact that we are to use what God’s given us, whether you’re a bank teller, whether you look mow lawns, whether you’re a mechanic, whatever it is, the Bible tells us to do all for the glory of God, all unto him. We’re doing it for him. So that we had a lot of good conversations on this trip, by the way. Yeah, lots of random because we spent so much time in the car that it was like lots of driving.

Mainly me doing the driving because I have a big old truck and a 30 foot trailer and so I got just I get a little tense But it was was good to talk because it got my mind off of the driving, which is great I will say leading up to the trip was a little bit interesting because there’s a lot of work involved to get ready for a two-week trip if you guys have done this before, know to go camping you need a pack you need a meal prep making sure that our house is decent when we leave too, so it was just a lot of ⁓

a lot of lists and checking those prepping all the things. But that same week that I was doing all of that, we were doing all that. We had a cancel Truett’s birthday party because he and another one of our kids got a really nasty stomach bug. And then a few days later, Edith broke her collarbone. And then the next day I threw my back out. And that was probably just this all within a few days leading up to we’re going we’re getting in the truck and going.

Me throwing my back out was probably the hardest just because I couldn’t really care for anybody. And that as a mom of six, that was really hard for me. But tell him when I went and got you at the local thrift store. got her a really nice walker. But actually helped me getting up and down. You only had to use it actually for like half a day, feel like, or one whole day. It was a little bit more than that. It was probably two days.

That was crazy. of the things that happened. I didn’t hurt myself so bad that yeah, it started getting better. Like once we were on the trip, I felt like so much better. ⁓ so it must’ve just been like a pulled muscle or something, but something that was really encouraging is because I was, I told you guys, I was being inspired on social media through music. I had seen forest Frank’s video of him breaking his back, which I don’t know if you guys saw that video. ⁓ but as

I would imagine everyone listening is some way experienced the Forrest Frank saga. he was – so I was watching this video of him kind of replaying what happened and there was this video of him trying to lay down on the bed and he’s like crying and then in the background you could see his wife’s hands wrapping a towel around his back to try and give him support and right as he starts crying and weeping because of the pain, you can hear his wife weeping.

got me like so emotional because I just thought, well, she must be so crushed for him. But here she is trying to stand next to him to hold him up. And part in part of his video, he was just explaining how in those moments of pain, when he’s trying to like find relief or transition from laying down to sitting up, ⁓ he would just focus on Jesus during those transitions of tension and pain. He would just focus on Jesus and him and his wife. ⁓

later said that it was only during those moments that he didn’t experience pain or like there was this relief. He had relief from it. So that was really, really encouraging just to see a husband and wife respond to pain in that way. So when I pulled the muscle in my back, was like, we can do it this. That’s fine. I didn’t break my back. I did not break my back. Yeah. You know, you actually recovered.

fairly quick from hurting your back. I was so concerned. was like, well, we’re literally sitting in the car for hours. I sent a text message out to all my girlfriends. was like, you guys need to pray because we’re supposed to go on this trip. And now don’t even know if I could sit in the car. This is terrible. It makes me think, though, we’re going to talk about something a little bit that was really difficult for us while we were on the trip. But it makes me think about that scenario of like these hard things that came up, the stomach bugs, the

Edith breaking her collarbone so randomly. like literally was just barely fell a little bit onto like a frisbee and Green stick broke her collarbone. ⁓ and then while we were on the trip, I woke up with a really bad sinus infection So I was just in a lot of pain on my face And then I went to go nurse the baby and when she got up she scratched my eye really bad so bad that it my eye didn’t open for like six hours and you had to take me to urgent care. Yeah, luckily there was one in the middle of Yellowstone. They’re so random.

So that was crazy. Sorry, what were you saying? There’s a lot of stuff going on. All of these really hard things that happen and all I can think is like, we shouldn’t do this. Like, why am I literally about to get in the car? This doesn’t sound fun. This doesn’t sound valuable, profitable. Like it’s like you’re hurt. I’m just thinking you’re not going to sit in the car for six hours, 12 hours, whatever it’s going to take. And then help you set up camp. And then help me set up camp. I was like, should just not do this.

Her parents are literally in town. We’re literally rented. They rented an RV. We’re about to go. It had been planned for like nine months. But it kind of correlates what we’re going to talk about in a little bit of these hard things and feeling like you want to quit and feeling like you don’t want to move forward. Where should our perspective be? Yeah. Yeah. But we get we did go. my gosh. It was so amazing. I think that overall the trip was so perfect in light of like weather and you know when you take kids of different ages ⁓

into national parks and Yellowstone Glacier, there’s so much awe and wonder. And so just driving in, it’s like, there’s a bear. there’s a baby bear. It’s so cute. We saw elk, we saw bison. I mean, people know when you go to Yellowstone, you’re going to see a lot of animals. ⁓ But and then in Glacier, it was a lot of just the massive rocks and waterfalls. Yeah, things. But what was cool about it is like there’s all these

beautiful things that we’re anticipating. There’s always like weird concerns like I’m driving my truck that we’ve never towed with before. It’s old. It’s from 2001 and it did perfect. So there was these things that I was afraid of and they worked out just fine. was really nervous about Edith’s collarbone because you got the x-ray like two days before we left. And so was just really nervous, but she also just was a champ. She held it together. doesn’t know how to stop.

She won’t stop moving. she would like, she does these things and she’ll like bump it and she’s like starts crying and like, you gotta stop moving. You gotta rest. Just sit down, just stop. She’s like, she’s like, okay. Yeah. Then she runs off and does it again. Yeah. She’s finally at a point where it’s not really hurting her anymore. Yeah. But. So she was healed up pretty quickly too. that was crazy. ⁓ What’s cool about these trips, we’re going to talk about recovery in a little bit. ⁓ It’ll make sense, but having these moments, lots of spiritual

growth took place on this trip. getting away and getting out, getting away from the normal day to day actually helps you to see those things. And so all the driving we got to do, it’s actually one of our favorite things. We love driving. We’ve done it ever since we were, first got married. We drove to we drove to Washington, we to Canada, we drove back and forth. I think it’s my favorite time to dream with you and to consider.

Like you take those honest evaluations, you look at your life because you’re staring at the window at this beautiful scenery, but then inside you just start internalizing everything. And I think it’s just a perfect time to ask yourself hard questions, ask your spouse good questions, dream about the future, dream about the future, figure out goals that we have. ⁓ Because when you don’t get out of your day to day and it doesn’t have to be a two-week trip. ⁓

Yellowstone and Glacier. It could be a Friday, Saturday. You could just drive to the coast. If you’re not near the coast like us, maybe drive to a lake. ⁓ But just getting in the car and being able to have that ⁓ focus time because there’s nothing else going on. You’re next to each other. You have nowhere to go. to be quiet and you listen to music or you can talk. And we did all three various times. we did a lot of talking and

It was actually really encouraging. I got to share with Jennifer some business books that I’m listening to. One business book specifically. But I’ve been sharing her concepts that I’ve been learning these but applying them not just to business but to us spiritually and our ways of thinking. And that was a lot of fun to talk about that. One of them was this idea of gap in the gains. I don’t know if you guys have ever read the book. There’s a book called Gap in the Gains and ⁓ we were talking about that. How did that?

⁓ concept kind of trigger some thoughts in you. Well, it was really encouraging because even though you’re sharing from a standpoint of business and you know how these principles can apply to you in ministry and business, I was looking at it through the lens of my role. So motherhood and home management. And so I just felt really encouraged by my own perspectives of what I see from day to day and

I actually was convicted because I realized that I perceive life a lot through that gap mentality of, I’m not there yet. I’m kind of like how I started this in the beginning and talked last episode of how God’s still working on me. ⁓ Being appreciative of living in a space where I know I’m still growing versus I hate that I’m always failing. So there’s just a different… ⁓

shift in when you view life a certain way and how you express yourself from those mentalities. Let me share just for a minute what this idea of gap and gains means. So we all have an ideal of what we want to be, what we want our business to be, what we want our family to look like. We have an ideal. Everyone does. And gap and the gains essentially is just how you measure yourself against it. Either you’re in the gap, which means the distance between you where you’re at now and your

Actualizing the ideal. ideal. And that’s where often you would live is like, I see this ideal of myself and I’m, look, it doesn’t matter how far I’ve come. I’m not there yet. And so that gap is always a, it’s a negative measurement. Yeah. Cause you can never attain it. It’s very frustrating to see life that way. Gains is. Look how much closer I You measure yourself not from your ideal, but from your past. So where you were compared to where you are today. Yeah. Cause.

If I’m moving towards, let’s just take it a small thing, if I’m on a diet and I want to lose 10 pounds, I could look at it be like, oh, I have nine pounds to go. Or I can look at it be like, wow, I was eating so much worse yesterday and today I’m eating really good today. And so it’s purely a way of measuring ourselves. And this is something we got to talk about a lot because we do it in various ways. Something that the author of this book that we were listening to had mentioned was that the ideal

is not ever reached because the ideal changes. so in my mind, that was the first time I think I have heard that because I’ve had, I’ve said it in various ways in the past, but he said it, he said it just the right way. Okay. Well, I’ve heard that some people say the same thing, you know, and, people only hear it from certain people. So I that’s true. don’t know. That’s good. It’s okay. I don’t mind. For whatever reason, when I heard it, I was like, ⁓ goodness, I’ve been

⁓ Seeing my daily life, myself, and even my children in our relationship, everything through this lens of, it’s not the ideal when I measure it to our past and the growth that we’ve experienced, we’re on the moon. We’re doing awesome. changes your whole perspective because if you live in this gap mentality, you’re never ever… There is no success ever.

You’re always a failure only. Like that song from Josiah Queen. Like, I have all this mess and Jesus is like, hey, come here. Come here. Like, rest with me. And this is actually a way that we can change our mindset as believers is either we can constantly be looking at ourselves and judging ourselves against the ideal, which is Christ. He’s the ideal. He’s perfect. Or we can be judging ourselves against the cross, which we’re told to take up our cross and follow him. Follow him.

So we look back and be like, man, look what God’s done in my life. Look where God has brought me. God told the Israelites over and over again, remember where I’ve brought you from, that you were once slaves and now you’re free. And then they would look at me like, well, we’re free, but now we’re starving to death. And God’s like, no, no. look how I’ve taken care of you up until this point. Do you think I’m not gonna take care of you again? So it’s a constant battle that we have of not measuring our current state against this impossible future state.

It’s measuring where we’re at against where we were in Christ and that Christ is actually working in us. That what he has begun in us, he is faithful to complete in us. That what he has accomplished in the cross is accomplished in us. That we have been given all things that pertain to life and godliness. not only were we thinking about this in concept of motherhood, parenting, spiritually as well, looking at our lives and being like, how are we measuring ourselves? Are we measuring ourselves against an ideal that is going to be constantly changing? Or are we measuring

our current state against our past state. Like, look, you know, wow, we’ve come a long way. Like, we used to be much worse in this area. used to be much, you know, more disorganized over here. And now we’re moving forward. It’s literally what sanctification is. It’s a constant being, you know, moving in the victory. Like, we’re already in victory in Christ. That’s what the Bible says. And then we’re moving toward victory also.

These are the kinds of conversations we were having in the car. It was funny because we’d be listening to this audio book and every like two minutes we’d stop it and go, okay, so what does this mean to you? And then he’d say, what does it mean to me? And we just got to share through our own lens of whatever he was talking about, whatever principle or point he was trying to make, how that was encouraging us in that moment. And so it was really cool to do that with I think the Holy Spirit was for sure using it because he kept bringing to our thoughts like ways of being actions.

situations that have happened, ⁓ dreams that we have and kind of attaching them to these ideas. It was really good. We came back really excited about the future. practical, so we can hand off a practical to ⁓ help encourage you guys to do what we’re doing, ⁓ to help retrain our mind or just train our minds to focus on the positive and to live in that gain ⁓ mentality.

is we’re writing down three goals every day to try and hit three things that matter to us that are important. And at the end of the day, taking time to actually acknowledge, did I meet those three goals? What am I grateful for? And that to me, we’ve been doing it this last week has been so encouraging because it’s helped me truly see, like you were talking about measuring yourself, like it’s helped me not get distracted or bombarded by.

all the other things that I have going on in my life that are not accomplished yet, but to say, I did a good job in these areas. And writing down the wins is that, is that training, retraining our brains to be like, let’s look at that. We actually have moved forward today. And even if it doesn’t, we didn’t reach an ideal, whatever that is, we’ve moved forward. We’ve made, and you know what? It actually, we actually got really convicted also because we realized that we

would look at our children and the way we talk to them the same way and we’re so we’re trying to adjust that also. Even though we have an ideal for them, trying to remind them like, where you look, how far you’ve come. You’re doing so good. Lots of affirmation. Here and here and here. Not not false affirmation, but true. Like actually recognizing where they’ve grown and how they’ve matured and things that they’ve taken responsibility for. And instead of I mean, I feel like we sometimes

Since we do it for ourselves, we often see like, they just haven’t met this expectation. They didn’t clean their good room good enough, but they cleaned it and they did well. And so I don’t know, I’m rambling a bit, but it was really cool that these conversations were able to be had and got us talking about a lot of things. One point that you wanted to kind of share was this idea of the importance of recovery.

And I know that that inspired us a little bit to think, oh, do we do this? And what does it look like? And again, this was coming from like a business point of view, but then we were quickly encouraged to view it in light of marriage. So can you share that? Yeah. One of the books I’m reading, it uses this idea of recovery days. Like it’s talking about schedules. Like you have your, you know, focus days and you have your, you know, practice days and you have your recovery days. And the idea of the recovery days is

Instead of just every day melting into another day, which that feels like life. Like we just were going and every day is melted into the next day. The very thing that happened when we were on this two week trip, that downtime, that quiet time. was recovery. We have the space to be able to recover and be able to even look at our life and to evaluate the things and enjoy time and have good conversations. so that recovery time.

is so important for having vision for the future and energy for the future and ⁓ the strength to do the next right thing. so some of the things that were listed ⁓ to kind of define or put parameters on what recovery days look like was ⁓ therapy, restorative quality. sorry. Restorative therapy. Doing things that restore your energy and your mind and heart. Quality, fun.

connection and having healthy close relationships. Yeah. So a good example, something that was huge when we look back in our past, because when we read these things, we’re always trying to identify like, have we done that before? What does that look like? When we were going through a hard season in our marriage early on? One of the best times that I can remember, we’re staying up late with close friends of ours and just laughing. Playing games. So even though once we were done with that, we still had to wrestle with

the hard things and the questions and all the things. We look back in fondness during one of hardest seasons of our marriage early on. And it’s all those moments. It’s those long hours, quiet times, not doing the hard things and enjoying the company of good friends who are encouraging us, loving on us, ⁓ laughing with us, playing with us. And that is recovery. I’ll add.

From my point of view, marriage recovery, when I think back to one of the hardest parenting times for us, would say was ⁓ when we had our third and fourth baby, because everyone was still so little and reliant upon us, and it felt kind of overwhelming. ⁓ I remember we made date night consistent, and that was the first time we really made date night consistent, where we left the kids with the babysitter and we got out and went to dinner or did something, and to me, that was recovery, because I went…

You know, as a mom too, you’re at home all day with the kids and you’re kind of just burnt out. So being able to step away and ⁓ now our kids are older and we actually haven’t made date night as consistent this last two years, but we still get out. ⁓ And I just feel so close to you and just encouraged when we get to get out and just talk. I will say we should figure out how to get date night back. you talk about this form of recovery, ⁓

It’s something that Jesus needed. there’s several times in the gospels that says Jesus went away to desolate places to pray. He did. He needed, there was times that he’s literally healing hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people from morning till night and he’s just going, he’s feeding people, he’s doing all of these amazing things that he’s supposed to do. And then he tells his disciples, get in the boat and go across, I’ll meet you over there. And he goes off by himself.

And if the Messiah, if the Savior of the world, if the God band, Jesus Christ, these recovery moments where we’re going, we’re getting out of the normal, we’re getting out of the day to day, we’re getting out of the rush, we’re getting out of the hard, and we’re going to be alone and in prayer and in the Word and in contemplation and especially doing that with your spouse, like it’s so necessary. So necessary.

Yeah, and you talked about how we went away to pray. And I think that prayer is another form of recovery for spouses. Absolutely. the times that we’ve, you know, just at night before we go to bed, we spend a few minutes praying together. That’s recovery. That makes my heart feel so close to you and so close to God. And it doesn’t matter whether I had a great day or a hard day or we’re in the middle of, you know, not an argument, but like we’re talking about something pretty heavy. ⁓ I just feel so much peace and trust that

it’s going to be taken care of or we’re going to get through it together. And so if you and your spouse are in a mode of going, going, going, and you guys need a form of recovery and you’re not praying together, I would start there. I would start by either every morning or every night, middle of the kitchen, bedroom, wherever you are, just stop and take a few minutes to pray for each other. Amen. Yeah, that’s a good one. So something that we came up with, this was a

plan of ours. on the trip. We’re talking about all these things, having these big visions and goals that we’re making, talking about how God wants to work in us, things that he wants to change in us. we’re like, man, what’s the next step? need like a reset. We need a reset. That’s what it felt like. And so we challenged ourselves for the month of September to do a 30 day challenge. There’s 30 days in September and we’re like, let’s just take September. back on August 29th or 30th. So it’s perfect to

look forward to starting something on the first. And so, ⁓ of course, you know, you’re on a camping trip, you’re not eating that great. So we’re like, you know, it’d be good to have some diet goals, not that we have a super strict diet, but I’ve been having inflammation in my shoulder and like dealing with stuff. like, I need to I just need to take it serious, these certain things. So part of the challenge that we did for each other is food related. That’s part of it. Spiritual, ⁓ mental.

And so on the food side of things, something that I’m taking, you guys don’t have to this. We’re going to encourage you all to do this challenge with us, but it doesn’t have to be exactly You should do whatever works for you guys and whatever goals you have. Yeah, that’s good for you and your marriage. Mine was I needed to cut out dairy because I’m kind of slowly eliminating things to see what might be causing inflammation in my shoulder. So that’s a hard thing because I love dairy. So I’m not lactose intolerant at all.

It’s one thing I’m like, maybe that, maybe I have some sort of, anyways, we’re cutting out dairy, but- And gluten, for me. Well, because you can’t even have Yeah, I get inflamed with gluten, so. Yeah, because of the I’ve never cut it out for the kids too, and so this last week I’ve given them whatever was left over in the house, but we’re doing gluten-free as a family. Cut it out slowly, yeah. But more importantly than the diet part is on the spiritual side of things, we’ve challenged ourselves to be in the Word of God every day.

So whether in the morning or night or whenever. And then on top of that, journaling every day. So you mentioned journaling earlier about writing down some goals, writing down some wins. And faithfully, I’ve done that. You’ve done that for the last four days when we’re recording this. And that’s a really big thing. I used to journal a lot. You used to journal a lot. And it’s like one of the things that with life and six kids and everything, of, I was just saying, I kind of like lost my…

my consistency in that. And so trying to like reactivate that because it’s good for my mind, it’s good for my heart. Journaling. And then what was? We’re going to we write down three focus goals for the next day. And then later on that night, we just kind of reflect and say, OK, how did that go? We write down wins. Like what did we not necessarily did we accomplish the goals, but what were some wins for the day?

Like, I did well at this. I had a better attitude here. So writing those down, I’ve been trying to write down my prayers in there and writing down scriptures that – that God’s pointing out to me. So getting into journaling every day, reading every day – again, we didn’t put like really strong like we need to read five chapters a day. We need to journal for – it’s just being in the Word.

and journaling every day. I will say this, it’s been such a significant and it always impacts me this way the times that we’ve done it and I forget and then when I do it again, I’m like, when I write down, I am going to do this. I do it. And it was such, it’s such a funny example, but I wrote down my three goals the other day and then I was like a little asterisk, like an extra. I said, if I have time,

I have some lupine in the garden and its leaves have powdery mildew. Cause when we got back from the trip, our garden was exploded. It was so big and beautiful and luscious, but all the leaves on the lupine ⁓ had this- Only the lupine. It was so weird. Yeah. I got the- what is it called? Powdery mildew on the leaves. And I just didn’t want it to spread. And so I knew in the back of my mind, I needed to get out there and get it. And so this particular day I had wrote it down and-

I don’t know how, but I carved out time to do it amidst all the other things that were going the other things. Yeah. So ⁓ it just reminded me, it was a good, healthy reminder that when we write stuff down, we are more intentional to pursue those things versus you have this list in the back of your mind of like all these things I got to get to, but then the day happens and you see all the things you have to get to and you’re distracted. And by the end of the day, you haven’t reached those few things that you probably should have focused on. So writing it down has really encouraged me.

So we have a few other things that we have on our own personal challenge for this month, but essentially our whole heart with it was we want to reset with our relationship with God, not that we’re trying to earn anything or work towards a match. And on the contrary, I feel like what we’ve been encouraged with is that He’s already pleased with us, that He loves us so much, that we are His. And so our hearts are like, well, we need more. want more of that. want more of what God has for me.

Something that’s really convicted me in the last four days is I just feel like for a long time I’ve been operating in my own strength and not like going to Christ for his strength, not needing God’s power in me. And it’s not, it doesn’t work. It’s exhausting actually. And so it’s been really encouraging, like resting in his strength and trying that. So we want to go ahead. Oh, I you going say something. I was going to transition, but. Let’s transition. Go.

Now it feels choppy, but that’s okay. I was just going to say, as inspiring as it was to have this road trip with you and really we were given a lot of time to feel inspired and encouraged and kind of look ahead at the future and go, okay, we know what we’re going to do. Which with such clarity. Well, it felt so exciting. I was like, yeah, we got this. We’re going to do this.

Like we’re on the same team. This is great. We love each other. We really do though. That’s the thing. Cause we’re sitting here right now telling you guys and like you can see it, right? we had a day of transition from one national park to the other and somewhere along the end of the day, ⁓ well, actually think that that day was like one of the most inspiring conversations we had on the way to camp. So we pull up to camp and honestly, like after reading my notes, I was trying to, asked you, said, well,

we even fighting about because we got, know, of our flesh is gotten away. But it must’ve been one of those things where he said something to me and then I got offended. But then when I responded to him, he got offended or hurt. don’t know. I can not remember what happened, but I know this. ⁓ it took up that night and a portion portion of the next day, ⁓ just because we were kind of avoiding it. We were like still trying to make it fun for the kids. And when we got,

to talking, ⁓ we flushed it out, but it was emotional and it was like hard. And both of us during that period of time felt bombarded by all of these thoughts of we can never move forward. All these things that we just talked about aren’t gonna happen. ⁓ And we didn’t even realize this in the midst of our argument, but ⁓ later on as we talked about it, it was like, man, that was such a bummer that we felt so inspired, so encouraged and had such a great day. And then

Completely fell apart by the end of the day. Yeah, be completely derailed by lies. The enemy our flesh and just and let it happen and in the midst of it actually Start believing the lies like this is like what why move forward? This isn’t even worth it one of the things that we identified as a lie was both of us in the midst of feeling feelings towards each other thought man this one day has ruined our whole trip and We thought it was gonna affect the rest of the trip and we were just really up into that

Point the trip was amazing like we were with not just our family but like in-laws and It literally couldn’t have gotten any better and we have this one and a half day or what one maybe 24 hours Not even maybe 12. I don’t know doesn’t matter that we’re not great and it may it can make you those little Moments those hard moments can if you allow the lies to come in you will make you feel like this is Might as well not pursue any of those

those dreams we have because this isn’t going to work. Just because we had this moment of failure. We were talking about the people recording and I was like, that’s literally like the life of a Christian. I was thinking about every story of every human being that’s written about in the Bible. That is their story is like, ⁓ look how great, you know, my I’m walking with God and then boom, something happens and you go like we were sinners. We were reminded recently that

the enemy does not like what we do and does not approve of, well, first our marriage and then us probably raising kids to know God and then ministry. Encouraging other Christians like you listeners and watchers to grow closer to God and to each other. I’m giving him the credit for us failing, but I think that there is a temptation that comes with, you know, wanting us to fail. he wants Well, the Bible even tells us that our flesh is opposed to the things of the spirit. Like our

our natural state is opposed to godly things. Does not want peace, does not want patience, does not want kindness, because those things are hard to do. so, yeah. So as we were driving the next day, I remember you saying something to me and I wanted to write it down exactly how you said it. And then- like, remember everything you just said? like, I went to you, I was like, what? And then as I got my notes out, he was like, kind of fumbling. So I want you to try and share what I was-

Because there was this feeling of like, why should we keep trying to do these things when we fail? Like that was like, we failed. We might as well not do anything ever again. And my thought was like, okay, that’s actually how I felt during the time. But after that, when you start getting some spiritual clarity and you start praying through it, you’re like, well, this is not right. You just remember, you’re like, well, we don’t continue on because

You know, we’re victorious always. We move toward victory. Like Christ is our victory. He won it for us. It’s not the other way around. not like, when we’re victorious, then we can serve Christ. Then we can work. No, no, he was the victor. Yeah. And you said that ⁓ it’s not contingent on us winning. Yeah. Our salvation, our relationship with Christ is not contingent on us winning. No, we need the winner. Yeah.

And we get to glory with his win. And then you said when we do fail or when we do fall, it reminds us that we still need a savior. Yeah, there’s a there’s a proverb. I believe it’s Proverbs that says, you know, ⁓ feed me so I don’t, you know, just enough so I don’t have to steal, you know, and don’t give me too much that I forget your name. And this idea is like. Any way it goes, if I get too much, I’m going to forget you, if I get too little, I’m going to forget you. And it’s like, no, we need.

him and all of that. And so like, we need a savior. Like, you listening right now, you’re probably thinking like, yeah, we fought. Like, we fight. We have issues. He is the reason why we keep going. He is the reason why we can get up the next morning and still love each other. Well, I remember sitting there when we were frustrated with each other and it was quiet because I literally had no idea what to say. And I didn’t know how to get out of how I felt. And I’m like in my head and I have all this cortisol and all the things.

And I kept, I feel like God was just talking to me, He’s like, there’s nowhere for you to go. He’s like, that’s your wife. I’m like, okay. But the point was, the only reason I was able to like snap out of that is because I made a promise to you. And I have a savior who made a promise to me that he’s going to keep. He doesn’t, he’s not going to fail on that. And that’s what we do as believers is

It’s not that we are perfect. It’s that we have a perfect Savior. And ⁓ that’s what’s good. I just want to read some scriptures. Proverbs 24, 16 says, the righteous fall seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble in times of calamity. See, I read that. like, cool, I can fall seven times, but what’s up with this like extra seven hundred times? That number seven is the number of completion.

though we continue to fall, we will continue to stand up again because of Christ. There’s another ⁓ scripture in 2 Corinthians chapter 1, and this is Paul sharing about the struggles that him and the other apostles have gone through. And he says, For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired even of life itself.

Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death, but that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. even if we die, which is like the worst thing that can happen, He raises the dead. So as you’re reading that, I just got this phrase in my head of like, the God who raises marriages. Like, yeah, he like, we can rely on. We’ve seen it. Yeah.

He goes on, says, he delivered us from such a deadly peril and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. Again. So it’s not like he has delivered us and too bad. it. ⁓ No, we need the again every single day. Do you need it listeners? Do you need the again from God? ⁓

To reiterate, says, but that was to make us rely not on ourselves. And I think, like you said earlier, I was doing it in my own strength. ⁓ You said that earlier, earlier. But I was too. We’ve been trying to do… When we do it in our own strength, that’s when we fall on our face. Yeah. So we need to be reminded to rely on God and remember that he does raise from the dead. And there have been plenty of times he’s raised our marriage from the depths of despair and what feels like hopelessness.

And it will continue to do that. Yeah. Yeah. So, Aaron, you were a huge encouragement to me when we were going through that hard time. And you also did remind me that so much of life is spiritual and what we’re experiencing was spiritual, like us wanting to make all these changes and come home strong. Yeah, of course. we were going to have an opportunity to be tested in all of what we were thinking and experiencing together. And so I just appreciate that you were willing to

Pick it up with me and keep going and encourage me. Well, and I appreciate that you did the exact same thing, that you because there’s been times in the past that you would hold on longer to not to the fight, but to the effects of it. Yeah. And you surrendered that to the Lord. You said, OK, yeah, we were able to get up and still go and still have a really fun time. We reconciled. Yeah. And then we were able to get up and go. I want to highlight that we did reconcile. And so that’s that’s the key to all of this. So.

Yeah, we did. It was an awesome trip. Yep. Even though there was that one day right in middle, it was literally right in middle. It was so crazy. So perfect. Right after that. ⁓ I don’t know why I feel the need to share this, but it was on my mind because we just went to this homeschool prayer night to kick off the school year. And a friend of mine asked me, so what was your highlight from the trip? And I was talking about just all the different places we went and how beautiful it was. But when I really thought about it,

Um, in glacier, said, you know, I overcome a really big fear that I’ve had for a long time, um, at least specifically to that national park. Um, but I have a fear of heights and, we tried like five years ago to go on the road to the sun and I had Aaron turn around because if you don’t know what the road to the sun is, it’s this 50, it’s 50 miles, um, through glacier national park, but like really a pie, like 12 miles of it.

is a barely a two lane highway with a teeny wall next to it going down a sheer cliff. So last time we tried it, we got like a quarter mile in and it was like, nope. I had to turn our huge van around on this teeny tiny highway. I had like a 50 point turn while everyone’s waiting for us. But we went this time and you Well, still cry, but I survived it. What’s funny is when I think about it now,

Just that beginning portion was probably the scariest. was the only part that was scary. Halfway through it, the rest of it wasn’t so bad. Yeah, I would imagine it’s like five miles of scary road. There were still parts of it that I felt like I kind of lost my breath and had to close my eyes, but it was really beautiful and it was worth the excursion. And we were in my excursion. My kids think I’m really brave, so that’s cool. And then the next day we did it again and you had no problem. Yeah, I had no problem You’re like, why was I so afraid of that?

I just think it’s Face your fears, my friends. think that it’s cool when we can face hard things, not just like what we were talking about with our marriage. Like when we encounter things that, you know, can scare us or cause lies to get up in our heads and frustrate us ⁓ just to trust in what God’s doing and to pray your way through it. And I did pray my way through that road, like getting to the top of that. And it was super fun. So.

Yeah, I guess I don’t know why I wanted to share that, I just thought it would be fun to end with. Well, what we’re going to with though is what’s coming up, what you guys, what you listeners and viewers, if you’re like watching on YouTube, what’s coming up on the podcast? Because we got some things coming up. Before you share that, I just wanted to quickly share that, ⁓ you know, I love writing. It’s always been where my heart’s at. ⁓ I do the podcast for Erin. ⁓

I love to write and a friend of mine gave me an opportunity to write recently a brief article. ⁓ If you want to go to now that we’re a family.com, I think you can pre-order ⁓ the fall. It’s a fall magazine and it’s so encouraging. saw their last two and it’s just really great encouragement for families, for moms, moms who homeschool or don’t. You can get the links to that in our show notes to check it out because she’ll have an article in the fall.

And also lastly, we want to encourage you to make sure you’re subscribed to this podcast because Jennifer is going to be on more regularly. I’ve heard the requests. You guys want her back. I’m trying. I’m going to bring her back. I want to be proud every time I make it. So we actually are going to be going through our marriage after God, devotionals, husband after God and wife after God. And we’re going to be taking the content from them and expanding on

in content and episodes for you. make sure you’re subscribed. Make sure, guys, the only way this podcast is going to grow, I said, not say the only way, the best way is by you telling someone about it. You telling your friends, hey, listen to this podcast. So please do that. Get your friends subscribed. You make sure you’re subscribed. And we’re going to be going through our husband after God and wife after God devotionals.

You do not need to have a copy of the devotional to go through it with us and listen to the podcast. But if you wanted that, if you wanted to use it as a way, you know, as a resource to go with your spouse, to go through it with your spouse, you should tell them where they should get that. But as someone who runs a business, I’m going to heavily encourage you to get a copy of our devotional. You’re going to love them anyway. But get them in your hands. And that way, each week when we launch a new episode, you’ll be able to have your own copy.

Yes, you won’t need it for listening to our podcast, but it would be fun. You should get a copy. But you need to tell them where to get the copy. Yeah, there’s going to be links in the description or you can go to shop.marriageaftergod.com and just look up the husband after God and wife after God devotionals. There’s a bundle right on there. You can check it out. So guys, thank you so much for listening to this episode. I hope it encouraged you. Jennifer and I are still growing as you talked in the beginning. God’s still working on us always. We are not perfect, but we love God.

And he loves us. I’m so thankful that he does because otherwise we’d be so lost. So we just want to encourage you to do that third day challenge with us. Subscribe to our podcast and we look forward to sharing the next episode with you.