Hardships in Marriage and Parenting

one of the things just to transition to you as the man the man that's not just the author but the man has husband the man is dad one of the things that I've really appreciated about you and your teaching over the years is you've been an open book in as much as you can and you've talked about how marriage is hard got to fight for our marriage being a dad is hard what my question to you is in the midst of the busyness of life and being a husband and a dad and the call to those those are to you what has sustained you in the midst of the hardships what are the things that you and your wife Noelle have given yourselves to that would encourage those that are in hardships themselves in those roles yeah God is sovereign and God is good all the time no matter what bottom line theological convictions that he's in control he didn't drop the ball in any crisis in any heartache God rules and he rules for our good Romans 8:28 is not a platitude for me it is preached a sermon one time I've eaten four sermons in 1986-87 on um those whom he foreknew he called and those whom he called he justified and those whom he justified he glorified as the foundation that's that's verses 29 to 30 of Romans 8 as the foundation for Romans 28 so you got calling and predestination and and justification and glorification as the foundation for this precious promise all things work together for good for those who love God so those foundations have to be sunk really deep so Noel and I have believed those things from the beginning we grew together into this robust reformed vision of a sovereign God who I read yesterday during our seminar Habakkuk 3:1 17 to the end it was in our wedding ceremony there's no fruit on the trees there's no crop coming in from the fields there's no cattle in the stall we're starving right nevertheless I will rejoice in the Lord I will joy in the God of my salvation that's been our life so God has dealt us some pretty hard blows along the way and marriage itself and parenting have had their incredible challenges so my bottom line answer is God is the kind of God who governs all of life even the hard things he's good and through Jesus Christ who loved us and gave himself for us sustains us and is going to bring it out for his good in the end and for our good in it for his glory and for our good so my first answer is theological if you want more I would back into patterns of life Noel and I have prayed together every day of our lives that's that's an overstatement we're not praying together right now I'm here and I'm not buying an international phone plan all right so we're email so we didn't we haven't talked for three days but we're emailing but when we're together at home we're praying now when you can't talk to each other how do you do that yeah I mean Peter said live together with your wife according to knowledge lest your prayers be hindered right prayer is a barometer of Kenya all right how's it going hmm so how many times do we come to the end of the day and our pattern would be to kneel down beside the bed ask God's blessing on our children give him our lives for the night asked for help for tomorrow apologize to each other in to him for our sin and we kneel there and there is total silence now here's a word to husband's I knelt and because I knelt she knelt she didn't kneel and then I knelt we didn't want to kneel we didn't want to deal with this we didn't even talk to each other right that was so angry so frustrated don't know where to turn because things are so bad in the marriage I I am my job as the husband is to kneel first hmm okay she's a submissive wife she me and we just can't even talk so again my job I'm not saying you you messed it up pray apologize God or so there's a curse yeah yeah I'm saying and I don't know how many times this happened but I just said God we can't even do this help us amen get in bed back-to-back so point there is don't stop doing that don't give that up don't say it it's impossible to be yet to have devotions as family it's impossible to pray in this family it's not impossible it's not impossible it is possible and that's the only hope so my picture is marriage as a garden and the garden must be plowed and the fruit doesn't always come right away in other words you want wonderful vegetables and fruit to grow up in this garden spontaneous vegetables and fruit spontaneous kissing and spontaneous hugging and spontaneous affirmation and spontaneous blessing of one another and outward ministry to the community you want that to growing all the time and sometimes this diesel plants are just nor old and dry and the stones all all rocky well what does a husband do there he puts his plow of Bible reading and prayer in the grass and he asks his wife to come over and sit on the couch and read their text together and ask God to do a miracle so those two things us a theology of God's sovereign grace to work all things for our good and then patterns of devotion that you don't give up even when times are impossibly hard I can't tell you how much I appreciate your authenticity in that because I think well there's just too little of that and I think there's a fear for the pastor to share that because of the criticism that comes I would assume that you have you received criticism with criticism when you were that open to places that you've taught to your own church I didn't know I really no no I don't think we live in a day where people criticize openness that's good well maybe they do maybe there's some groups to do I don't remember being criticized I got here - two words - pastors don't don't you talk like this without your wife's permission hmm - I made that mistake one time I made that mistake I'm a very kid I mean it's easy for me to be candid I am so stupid and sinful in so many ways there's just no hiding it you got an you got kids to take into account when you start talking publicly you get a wife to take into account and you better not just blab away about the issues in your family without her knowing what that blab is gonna sound like one time I mentioned a argument or a conflict we were having I got home she was furious her she was furious at me she I should believe you shared that with us I will never ever ever do that again and so that's true for your kids as well I've heard pastors you think you'd have five-year-old kids and you're free to say what you want about how funny things they say you're not right you're not five-year-olds can be talked about can can you can talk to a five-year-old about ministering with their experience to your people and they'd be okay with that don't don't drop that on your people without their permission without dealing with your kids and your and your wife and and the other thing I'd say is I don't think you should sneak around as a pastor and have counseling without your elders and even your people knowing huh so when Noel and I back what late 80s I think it was 33 months with a Christian counselor I'm I'm just right there with my elders things are hard boy they want to know what you know what's gonna happen here you we don't want we don't want to anything to break down here you know so they're right there with me and following the whole thing and and I'm right there with them and and I told the church I said look we believe in Christian counseling in this church right we believe in biblical counseling why do we believe in that because real Christians need it God has gifted the church with biblically saturated people with unusual wisdom that's called counseling there's an Old Testament model there are a wise men in the Old Testament wise women and they give counsel to need that is to be normal right so what you want to do is normalize counsel so all your people I'm looking at your sanctuary here yeah I'm looking at you know five six seven eight thousand people out there there they also be counselors some more gifted than others and they do it for a living maybe but everybody speaking words of exhortation and guidance into people's lives

Channel: Desiring God

Views: 61,433

Rating: 4.9419489 out of 5

Keywords: Desiring God, John Piper, God, Jesus Christ, Christianity, Christian Hedonism, Marriage (Quotation Subject)

Id: KxlicNIdTpE

Length: 10min 14sec (614 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 21 2015