Thank you, ladies. We want to welcome our live stream congregation. And just last week, our sight and sound men were able to get the lip sync in. And we've got the higher quality cameras now. And so we have gotten feedback from our live streamers that it's coming through clearly. And when we say something, they see the same words in our mouth now. Now, we've been running it the other way for a couple of years, but we're really excited to make that improvement, and we welcome them today to the service. We're also excited to have our guest speaker for the day, Dr. Terry Coomer, with us. He's the pastor of Hope Baptist Church on the north side of Little Rock, Arkansas. He flew up here to be with us, he and his wife, for this day, and we're excited about that. He's an author. And they have written some books and booklets. And they are down in the resource room. You can see them tonight at 6, or before the service, or after the service, and see them and purchase those. One other thing, he's Dan Tesson's. He was Dan Tesson's sending pastor. How many of you know Dan Tesson? Oh, yeah. We love Dan Tesson around here. And this. This was his sending pastor when he was in Indiana. We're excited to have Dr. Coomer come and preach the word of God. Now take your Bibles out and let's listen intently and on purpose. So glad to be here with you. And my wife said, for all of you in Sunday school, that I probably needed to explain that in Arkansas, they're crazy about the University of Arkansas football. And the team is called the Arkansas Razorbacks. So that's the reason why I was making the hog scenario. I've always thought that hog was best on the plate. they really into that. So, the life where you take your Bibles and turn to Ephesians chapter 4. I'm going to speak to you this morning about... I'm going to give you a little bit about why our passion for what we're talking about. We're going to speak about communication and marriage this morning. In Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 29, if you stand together with me out of respect to God and His Word. Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 29. Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 29, the Bible says this, Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed into the day of redemption. I want you to notice this, I call these the slimy six here. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor. The word clamor means public quarreling. and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice." And notice it says, be put away from you. And, be ye kind one to another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. Let's begin by having prayer. Father, we thank you this morning again for the opportunity that we have to present your word. We ask that the Holy Spirit will be our teacher in this hour. I submit myself to you. I ask God that my mind and my heart will be yours. I pray Heavenly Father, I'll say the words that you once said here today. I pray that you'll minister hearts. I need your help today, Lord. And I pray God you will help me. and I ask God that you just give me your strength and wisdom. Pray for anybody here who's unsaved, Lord, that they may see their need of salvation. Pray, Heavenly Father, for that Christian who needs help today, the pro-receiver. Pray for the marriage that may need help today, Lord, the pro-receiver. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you. You may be seated. Just to give you some of the passion that we have for this and why that we are spending so much time and effort on the home, children, and marriage. It was December 7, 1976. I got saved on November 4, 1974. I grew up in a dysfunctional home with parents that were ungodly people. My desire as a young person was to get out of the house as much as I possibly could. There was a ballpark across the street from my house. I had a passion for baseball and I began to play. And I played against the older kids, and I got better. And in 1973, I graduated from high school as a high school All-American and was drafted as the 71st player taken in the three-agent draft in Major League Baseball by the San Francisco Giants. At that time, I threw a baseball 95 miles an hour. I know it doesn't look like it today, but I did back then. And so my desire was to do two things, was to make money and play ball. And so by playing professional baseball, I got married and my wife Kim was my high school sweetheart. We got married in October of 1973, bought a house on the lake, boat, a motorcycle, and all kinds of toys. and had the life that you would think that any young couple would want to have. I came home in the off-season after the first year, and the United Parcel Service driver, Rick Bratcher, witnessed to me. And when he first witnessed to me, I told him to get out of my face and leave me alone. And if he wanted to talk about anything other than talk about baseball or whatever else he wanted to talk to me, he wasn't going to talk to me about God. And Rick was not deterred. And even though I treated him mean and I treated him with bad behavior, he continued to talk with me and he took his lunch hour every day for seven months as United Parcel Service driver to talk to me and the Holy Spirit brought me under conviction. And on November 4th, 1974, in Rick Bratcher's family room, I asked Jesus Christ to come into my heart and be my savior. It changed my life. And I immediately wrote to the San Francisco Giants and said, I will not be back to play baseball because I'm saved. And you say, well, why? Because they play on the Lord's Day. And I knew I needed to be in church on Sunday. And so I no longer played baseball. And I haven't. I probably played only a handful of softball games in my life since then. because it was an idol of the heart. And then, a year later, God called me to preach and I went to Tennessee Temple in Chattanooga, Tennessee in 1975. I don't recommend that, but I had a passion for God, albeit zeal without knowledge, but God had spoke to my heart and we went to Tennessee Temple. And my wife was pregnant when we went. And so we got there, time for our baby to be born. And we had an older doctor. And this was the last baby. He was a Christian. It's the last baby. He was in the delivery in Chattanooga. He was retiring. And so through the course of the time, Kim was in labor for A lot of hours, had severe complications. Four o'clock in the morning, Dr. Clemmons came out and he said, and you know you're in trouble when the doctor comes out and calls you son, and then puts his arm around you. And he put his arm around me and he said, son, we've got major problems here. And he said, and this is in the mid-70s, and he said, He said, we've got a problem. And he said, we continue with where we're at right now. He said, I don't give a baby a chance in the world, and I give your wife less than 50%. And I'd been up for three days. And I looked at him and I said, what did you say? I mean, I need to hear that one more time. I don't understand what you said. And he explained to me, he began to cry. And, you know, at that moment my whole world just crashed. And so, at 4 o'clock in the morning in the Baroness Erlanger Hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Dr. Clemmons said to me, he said, Son, if you know how to pray, I think you can get in touch with God. So I went, and I got in a room, got down on my knees, and told God that I don't understand any of this. We're down here. We've given up everything we ever had to serve you. I don't understand this. And of course, as a young man who knew nothing, I didn't understand this. And so, but I'm, that night, and really long hours there in prayer, I made a promise to God that he would allow that child to live. You know, and my thought process at that point was is that Lord, I don't know if I can handle this. I don't know if I can handle losing Kim and this child. I need your help. But I will make you a promise. If you allow that child to live, allow my wife to live, I will do everything within my power to raise that child to life. As an ignorant young man, He knew nothing. He came from a dysfunctional family. Wasn't raised in a Christian home. Knew very little about anything. I begged God to teach me. And there were nights that I would go in and kneel down beside the bassinet and ask God, I don't know anything about being a father, and I need your help. And I want to be the father you want me to be. As the young man and young lady came this morning to dedicate their child to God and introduce their child, a few weeks later when Kim was actually able to come, and I told her the promise that I made to God, she agreed. So a few weeks later, she was actually able to come to church, which we came forward in the Highland Park Baptist Church in Chattanooga. Dr. Robertson knew the situation. Thousands of people there. He came down off the platform, which he rarely did. He came down off the platform. He put his hands on my shoulders. He said, son, I like them. They're calling you son. He says, son, I'm going to pray for you today. that you will be the father that God wants you to be because what is going to happen in this child is going to be determined by what happens in your life. In front of thousands of people, He put His hands on my shoulders and prayed for me to be that man. And I am so ever grateful and thankful for the man of God's prayer. Now, study comes to the issue and the passion that Ken and I have for helping people to rear children that will actually grow up and walk with God. And in a society that has a lot of issues with that, and independent Baptists who have a tremendous amount of issues with that, marriages that break up, children that are in trouble, And that number is huge. And so here we are trying to make a difference. So God has brought us to Grove, Pennsylvania today to try to be helpful. That's all we want to do is try to be helpful and try to encourage people in their walk with God. So I want to talk to you this morning about communication in marriage. That gives you a little bit of the background on the reason we have the passion that we have for these subjects. And we have studied those passages. And in many years of pastoral ministry, I've been in ministry 33 years now, I've observed and counseled many people about their marriage. Through For the Love of the Family, we get all these contacts each month from Christians about the needs of their marriages. I received contacts from pastors and their wives who are struggling with the needs of their marriage. I think the Bible teaches, as I've studied it, there are six points that the Bible brings out concerning marriage, which I believe are very important to have a Christ-honoring marriage. I'm going to give you these six keys. I'm only covering one today, but I'm going to give you six. All of them are on our website so you can read about it, but the keys are, first of all, number one, maturity. Secondly, submission. Thirdly, love. Fourth, communication, which I'm going to talk about today. Fifthly, prayer. And number six is Christ. There are also some marriage killers that I'm going to talk about this morning. And many of the marital problems today deal in the area of spiritual problems. And we have many people today who profess to be saved, never really been born again. But we also have many people who are saved but not living a spirit-controlled life. They don't have a real intimate and personal and passionate relationship with God. There are always those that hear me that say, we know, immediately say, Pastor Coomer doesn't understand my situation. Or my situation is different. Folks, the problem is that I understand it all too well. Many folks get, when you talk to them about these areas, their first reaction is, it won't work, or he just doesn't understand. And the real problem that I have found is the willingness to apply spiritual principles to the life. Let me ask you a serious question this morning. Do you want your will to go your own way, or do you want to be conformed to His will and have a joyful, Christ-honoring marriage? Many folks today are accepting second or third rate principles in their marriage. They're unhappy, but they either do not understand what to do or they hear what to do and they rebel against it. In essence, they make excuses for not having a good marriage. Communication is the main problem, and I can tell you this from counseling hundreds of people, communication is the main problem or the starter of a problem in about 99% of marriages. In essence, Christians don't talk to one another, and they certainly don't talk about spiritual things in their lives, and they rarely talk about anything. And young lovers, they rarely have a communication problem. But they seem to be able to talk about anything, and somehow that ability often vanishes after they're married. Lack of communication is almost always a problem for couples who come for marriage counseling. If it's not lack of communication, it is the wrong communication. Look at verse 29. I want you to notice when he says, Ephesians 4, 29, let, and by the way, you need to look at the words when it says let, because that means you've got to make a decision. Anytime you see the word let, it means you've got to make a decision. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. In verse 31, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. Now, let's think about this for a minute. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. If you notice that, I want you to notice there in verse 31 where it says, what's the next word? All. Now what part of all do you have a problem with? All. Let all bitterness and wrath, the word wrath is anger with a strong desire to avenge. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger..." You know, most evil speaking comes from other things in this verse. This is a powerful portion of Scripture. Did you notice evil speaking? It says, put away all evil speaking. Most evil speaking comes from the other things in this verse. Things like bitterness and wrath and anger. By the way, it says put all these away, too. Communication under pressure of anger and shouting is not the approach. By the way, I grew up in a home where that was the approach. However, I want to say this to you. Anger is the hidden sin of independent values. It doesn't take too long. You're not around the church, you know, it doesn't take too long when somebody's getting mad all the time to realize that's not right. But we go home, and we go away from church, and I can tell you this, that most of the young people that I counsel will talk to me about the anger of their parents. You, as a parent, are to get the heart of the child and keep it. But I'm going to guarantee you this. If you are a person that is angry, you're not going to get their heart. You're going to drive them away from you. And there are people that believe that they can be angry in the home, and then everything is going to turn out all right. Let's turn back to Ephesians chapter 4. I want you to Look with me at verse 15, and I want to contrast two verses here. But speaking the truth in what? Love. May grow up into him in all things, which is the head even Christ. speaking the truth in anger. Is that what it said? It said in love, didn't it? Now look at verse 26. I've heard all kinds of people talk about this verse in different ways, but I'm gonna share a thought with you. It says, be ye angry and sin not. I heard someone say, when was the last time you did what God told you to do and be angry? That's not what it's saying. Be ye angry and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Now, I'm going to use this because I'm a former baseball player, and so I like to illustrate it this way. This is a present passive imperative here. You know what present means right now, doesn't it? Imperative means command. But let me see if I can illustrate present passive to you. If I am standing at the plate with a ball bat, and I swing to hit the ball, that's active, right? OK? I'm standing at the plate. The guy throws the ball and hits me. I didn't do anything. That's passive. So when someone does something to you to make you angry, what the passage is saying is, deal with it! Be ye angry, but what? Sin not. So when someone does something to you to make you angry, you're going to have to deal with that. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Now, angry people. By the way, you can have an angry spirit. I had a guy in my office one time, a marital issue. I said, he's standing there and he's beating on my desk and he says, I'm not angry. I said, do you think you have an angry spirit? I'm not angry. One of the ways you can test an angry spirit is Watch what the person does when something doesn't go the way they want it to. By the way, I told my daughters growing up that you do not want to marry a man with an angry spirit. You're going to have to watch him under pressure. How does he respond under pressure? And by the way, God works from the inside out, Satan works from the outside in. Satan wants to control your emotions, so he'll put pressure on you from the outside. Now, what I call this is the point of spiritual impact. Now, a lot of folks go around our church right now and say, hey, pastor, you know what? I had some points of spiritual impact this week. Now I'm going to talk about tonight, extremely important tonight, how you control your mind at the point of impact. Because people, people when they are in communication, whenever something doesn't go right, that is the moment that they really and truly need to make Christ real in their life rather than, it's kind of like whoever the janitor is here. See if I can illustrate it to you this way. You know, the janitor is in here with the vacuum cleaner sweeping the auditorium. And Pastor Starr walks in and the janitor says, you know, Pastor, I have been running this vacuum around this auditorium for two hours and it's not picking up anything. And Pastor Starr looks over there and he says, well, you know, you can run that if you plug it in. It's the same way in the Christian life. At the point of impact, you're going to have to make Jesus Christ real, and that's going to come back to your communication. How do you respond at the point of impact? By the way, let me give you a rule of thumb, and I know it's easier said than done. But the rule of thumb here is this, the Bible says in James 4, 7, submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and he'll what? Okay, so at that moment, I'm going to say, Lord, I want to turn this over to you. You know what that's called? Submission. And you know what I've just done? I've plugged in at the point of impact. And Lord, I want to be controlled by you at this moment. Otherwise, you're going to say something or do something that is... And by the way, it only takes one instance for you to lose the heart of your child. It only takes one instance of anger for you to lose the heart of your child. It only takes one instance of anger for you to lose the heart of your wife. I had a president of a Bible college come and his son had called me. He was 21 years old. And he said, he's going to get married. And his father disagreed with that choice. And he said, I need your help because I don't trust my father. And I hesitated with that. So I said, well, let me call your dad. Talk to your dad. So I called his dad and mentioned to him what was going to go on and what was going to happen. And I said, I think it'd be a good thing if you came down and met with me and your son and see if we can sort this out. And the dad comes in, president of Bible College, dad comes in. with this. I don't even know why I'm here. Are you nuts, man? I mean, are you just nuts? You're about to lose your son. You've already lost your son, but your son's about to make a really wrong choice here, and you're giving that kind of an attitude? And he started to tell me, like on the phone, he told me, oh, he's rebellious. He said, he's just, you don't need to listen to him. He's just a rebellious kid. He doesn't, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I said, I understand that, but do you want to help your son or not? I understand what you're saying. Do you want to help your son or not? He said, yeah, I do. I said, all right. Come on in. So he comes in, gives me this attitude. And finally, we got sat down. And I said to the son, I said, all right, I want to ask you a question. And he said, fine. And I said, tell me where your dad lost your heart. And the son goes back to when he was eight years old. And he gave me the instance verbatim. And all of a sudden, this haughty attitude over there on the couch, he starts to cry. And I said, look at him. I said, is that true? And he said, yes, it is. And so we were able to work on that and help that situation. But I want you to understand this. Anger does a severe amount of damage in the communication issue. And so, years ago, a couple in our church, and I want to say this to you, a good marriage is worked at, it just doesn't happen. As long as two people can keep the lines of communication open, freely express their feelings, differences can be resolved. A leading newspaper columnist who gives advice to people says, the most single ingredient in a marriage is the ability to communicate. Years ago, a couple in our church, Keith and Darlene, that's not their real names, came for marriage counseling. He worked all kinds of shifts. She worked during the day. Each of them had several extracurricular activities. They only saw each other in passing. They never talked. When they did talk, they argued. And as they sat across from me in the office, the first thing she said was, and they always say this, I don't love him anymore. And it didn't take me too long to realize they didn't really know each other. And so I said, OK, Darlene, tell me the things that bother you about Keith. And she went on for 20 minutes without coming up for air. And it went clear back to six months after they were married. And since there are two sides to every argument, I said, Keith, tell me what bothers you about Darlene. He took off for 20 minutes. They had been married 10 years. He asked her why she didn't tell him these things, and she stated she's afraid he'd get mad. His answer was, when she asked him the same question, he said, because you'll go into the silent treatment. By learning to communicate, that couple soon learned to exchange their honest feelings without fear. For anyone that we have to read the material that we put out, I find that many pastors who are having difficulty in their marriage are consumed with their ministry and rarely communicating with their wife. Here's a couple who is to encourage others spiritually and they're fighting and yelling and not being controlled by the Spirit. Folks, that means you're not filled with the Spirit. You're not controlled by the Spirit, not in fellowship with God. The Holy Spirit is grieved when you do that. Look at verse 30. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed into the day of redemption. Do you know what grieving the Spirit means? It means not letting or allowing God to lead you. When you don't allow God to lead you, remember I was talking about this Sunday school hour, Lord, show me if there's any sin that stands between you and me. And if that sin comes up more than three times, it's a demand lust, and we're gonna deal with that. But when a person is unwilling to let God lead them, then they're grieving the Spirit. And so if I'm using corrupt communication, and I'm angry, and I am handling myself in that way, it says, and I want you to notice it says, in verse 20, or verse 31, Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking, notice what the next phrase is, be put away from him. Now, it said what? All. All. So if I want to raise my child to grow up and walk with God, I better understand that I can't be that kind of a person. You're living in a dream world if you think that you can do all the Slimey Six here and your child is going to grow up and walk with God. It's a dream world. It's a fantasy world. We can sit here and be disobedient to God all day and say, well, you know, I, I, I, you know, I raised my children in this church and my children went to this Christian school where we homeschooled them and Pastor Coomer, I don't have any understanding as to why that my child did not grow up and walk with God. What about this verse? Be real. You've heard of the mother who was old yeller? She yells until somebody gets it right. Get over here. You do this. You do that. Now look. And yet, what does the Bible say? So I have to be controlled by the Holy Spirit at the point of impact. Now don't go out of here thinking I'm a wimp. Not at all. When I wanted my children to do something, I made sure that they understood by getting into their eyes and letting them know that I'm serious about what I'm talking to you about. But I am not screaming and yelling and hulking and raving and going on. I recently read where someone said that the family is only mentioned a few times in the Bible and there's a lot more ground to cover. The guy's nuts. How foolish of a statement that is. You lose your family as a pastor, you don't have a minister. Or you shouldn't have. Because the Bible says, in fact, if a man doesn't know how to rule his own house, he shouldn't be ruling in the house of God. But the real weakness of the church today is lack of spiritual families and leaders. A person who's out of fellowship with God. Now listen to me carefully. A person who's out of fellowship with God and trying to do the work of God in their own power is heading for a real disaster. And by the way, somebody says, you know, that pastor committed immorality. I'm telling you this, anybody who's out of fellowship with God is capable of all the sins of Galatians 5, 19-21. And their children, we land in that direction as well. And Galatians 5.25 says, if we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. When is that? Every day, where we're walking. And at the point of what? Point of what? Get it? Spiritual impact. The point of spiritual impact. And you're going to have multiple times in a day that you're going to have to turn it to God. Stop! You know, we had a young, we had a lady get saved here not too long ago, and we wanted to, you know, in one of our things that we were doing in services, we had her give a testimony, and she came up, and she had this, and she said, you know, I went through the counseling program here at the church, and she says, I got something to tell you, and she had it written down, it says, TIO, turn it over! Turn it over to God! And the reason why we don't do that, turn back to James chapter 4 with me. James chapter 4, look at verse 6. Well, let's start with verse 1. James chapter 4 and verse 1, notice with me it says, and by the way, talking to Christians here, it says, from whence come wars and fighting among you? Question. Come they not hence, even of your what?" So a person who refuses at the point of impact to turn it to God and plug in and have fellowship with God is choosing to live for their lusts. They're making a choice. Remember it says, So they're making a choice here to live for the lust. So, whence comes wars and fighting among you? Come they, not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members. Now watch what it says in verse 2. You lust and have not. And you kill and desire to have and cannot obtain. You fight and war, yet you have not because you ask not. So in essence, now let me tell you this about prayer here real quickly in respect to this. I see this in the Bible where the Bible says that God knows what I have need of even before I ask, right? So one of the things I've made a real part of my prayer life is this, in my relationship with God. God, what do you want me to pray about today? That's submission. What do you want me to pray about today? How do you want me to pray about it? Instead of turning a yard list off a prayer list, I want to know what the God of the universe wants me to pray about today. Got it? So what do you want me to pray about today? and the Lord lays somebody upon my heart or a specific situation or that kind of thing. So I want to connect with God in my prayer life and have a real and intimate and a personal and passionate relationship with God. Most people in Independent Baptist Church, if you said, tell me when the last time you had a real answer to prayer and knew it was God. But put it down like this. If I say, Lord, show me what you want me to pray about today. And God says, I want to pray about this specific individual here, that he'd be saved. And by the way, I do this, Lord, who do you want me to witness to today? Now, I know I'm going to witness to people, but you know, I was in a McDonald's in Mancelona, Michigan. And I walked back to the back and I had Kyle with me, one of the young men from our church. Kim didn't go to that meeting. And so Kyle was getting the drinks and I walked back to see for a place to sit. And I said, Lord, I don't know anybody in Mancelona, but I know that I can be helpful. And so I want you to show me who to witness to today. And the Lord said, somebody's coming. So I walked back up front. Guy walks in, young man, 21 years old. He says, are you a preacher? And I said, yes, like sticking to a bulldog, right? I said, yes. And he said, I need help. And God said, here's your man. So we walked back to where we were sitting, sit down, and ended up leading that young man to the Lord. Now, talking about intimate, personal, and what? Passionate. And our communication, let me put it to you this way. I want to give you these. There are three communication killers in marriage, and how does the wall of resistance to communication gradually build up between two people that love each other? There are three weapons that people use to defend themselves. First of all, it's explosion. Secondly, it's tears. And thirdly, it's silence. As I give you those three weapons, you'll find that by using them, married people gradually build a wall of resistance so they're no longer able to communicate. Explosion. Whenever a person is told his or her shortcomings, rather than face them honestly, their natural reaction is to explode. Anger. This explosion is the result of inner anger or hostility that causes them to attempt self-protection. Ephesians 4 31 what does it say turn back there with me by the way in James chapter 4 when it was talking about this if you go up to verse 6 it's talking about pride and that's the issue by the way of not wanting to not wanting to plug in but in Ephesians chapter 4 look at verse 31 again let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you so when a person explodes What does this, you know, when someone in particular, our partner, points out our weaknesses, we tend to grasp for something to cover us. What this does is teach our partner, you cannot come that close to my intimate weaknesses if you do or I'll explode. Secondly is tears. This tool is used basically by women. And like other weapons, it's a way of saying to your partner, don't tell me my shortcomings or I'll cry. So another brick is laid in the wall, and pretty soon that brick just, that wall just gets bigger and bigger, and pretty soon it's too big to get over. And so, you know, men, you need to learn, we need to learn to distinguish between our wife's tears of emotion, stress, joy, and self-pity. Women are far more intricate creatures. Often show their emotions through tears. Don't despise your wife's tears. Be patient and kind for the emotional creature that you married is just being a woman. Look at verse 32. and be ye what? One too many. You know that the Bible says that love is kind? When was the last time you went out of the way to be kind to your wife or to your husband? You know I have people come in, I had one guy come in and I had a love seat in my office. I had it there for a purpose. Love seat, get it? Guy walks in and he says, do I have to sit in that by her? He says, you got no clue, preacher, what it's like to live with her. And I said, well, it's the only seat in here. So you're going to have to. And he sat down. And she's just crying. Don't despise your wife's tears. But, you know, in verse 32, "...and be ye kind one to another." What's the next word? Tenderhearted. Forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. You know, kindness. Spirit-controlled people are kind. And by the way, spirit-controlled people are word-controlled people. And you look at your wife or your husband today and you say, I really, you know, we don't communicate. I don't know if I love him anymore or that kind of thing. Or, you know, when you're talking about love, I'm not really sure about all that. Listen, love is what? Come on, help me. Love is what? Kind. So you need to make an effort to be kind. Work at it. One of the things that I do is I have husbands and wives, you know, when they come in and they're really struggling, I say, all right, we're going to have, we're going to start you on a date. And I don't, I don't necessarily, I don't want you to get into the mind that I'm all dating, but just I said, I'm going to have you go on a date. And they look at me like, are you crazy? You know, I can't even hardly stand her, let alone, OK, now you're going to go on a date, and here's what we're going to do. You're going to, the husband, you're going to pick the date, and the wife, you're not going to complain about where he wants to go. Unless it's an ungodly place we're going to go. But I want you to, and you're not going to complain about where he's going. And so, don't be complaining. And so they go, and they come back, and I say, well, how'd it go? Tell me, I want you to write down five things about how it went. And you know, the first time, it's, ah, it went OK, you know. And so, all right, this week she's picking. And so they go, and after about the third or fourth week, I'm getting, you know, you're seeing people come in and they're like, hey, you know, that was pretty good, you know, we sat and we talked, we actually talked, we talked to kids, and we actually talked about this, and we actually talked about that, and you know, I'm really glad that we were able to do that. Now I want to tell you one thing that Kim and I practice in communication just for the sake of this message, is we, a long time ago, We determined that we were extremely busy. I'm extremely busy. And so I determined that I was going to communicate with my wife, and I was gonna set aside a special time to do that. And so every night, every Sunday night after church, and we do this more than that, but every Sunday night after church, we drive around, we get something like a Coke to drink, and we talk about the day, how it went, And if, in the preaching, if it was me that was preaching, I asked her the question, what did God speak to you about in the message today? And by the way, getting hearts of your wife and getting hearts of your children is when you as a husband learn to ask questions, heart questions, who, what, when, where, how, why. So what did you learn today from the message? Not did you just think it went okay, what did you learn? And she'll tell me what she learned. And by the way, when our children were at home, when they got to be 16, I took them every Sunday afternoon, each girl, and I would take them on a ride. We would get a coat and we would talk about their life and what they were doing and how that God was working in their life. And I asked them to come back and we talked about their devotions and different things like that and what God was teaching them. And you know what? I learned a whole lot about their life that I did not know. And I asked questions to draw out their heart. And it was time for our youngest daughter to go. She was so excited. She came running out to the car with her Bible. And, you know, she was 16. It was time for her to go. She came running out to the car with her Bible. And so I said, Jennifer, do you have any questions for me? Yeah, Dad, I got lots of them. You know, it's important for us to understand that communication and the right kind of communication is extremely important. It's not only explosion in tears, but silence. Silence is the weapon many older Christians learn to use. It doesn't take long to realize that it's not Christian to get mad and explode all over the place when our partner crosses us or points out our weakness, so we resort to silence. However, that's dangerous too. Silence is caused by anger, and when it goes on for long periods of time, it causes real communication problems. In this passage, we find that all anger. It's at all. Bitterness, wrath, anger, grieve the Holy Spirit. And likewise, Galatians 5.16, This I say then, walk in the Spirit, ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. So what is the answer? Right here, very simply in this verse, the Christian is not walking in the Spirit, is not fulfilling, and is fulfilling the lust of the flesh, and it's leading to disaster in their marriage and in their children. And what kind of children does a lust of the flesh Christian produce? A lust of the flesh child. When in reality, we have to teach them how to control their mind so that they won't live for their lusts, and I find that that's not even a clue for most independent families. And that, dear friend, is the reason most children who grow up in a Christian home do not end up serving God. You can't be angry at your wife or husband and walk in the Spirit. It's not possible. You cannot be angry at your wife or your husband and walk in the Spirit. So how do we communicate? Ephesians 4.15, but speaking the truth in love. May grow up into Him in all things which is the head, even Christ. The Bible teaches that we should speak the truth in love, and one thing to bear in mind is that the more truth you speak, the more love you should use in conveying that truth. The truth is a sharp two-edged sword, so we use it carefully. And when you have an area in your marriage that needs communication, I'm going to give you six things and done. Okay? Number one, pray for the wisdom of God and the filling of the Holy Spirit. When you seek God's wisdom, you may find your objection to your partner is not really valid. In essence, I tell our folks this, ask God the question, is this my problem or hers? Or my problem or his? And if it's not my problem, or, you know, in essence, many times I find out it's my problem and not his or her problem. But I've got to ask God first. So is this my problem or not? And so, in essence, you need to ask, is this my problem or theirs? God may show it's your problem, or God may lead you to go ahead. Number two, plan a time that's good for your partner. Not after 10 p.m. Things tend to look darker at night, and you're tired. Pick a time when both of you are in the best possible mood to look objectively at yourselves. Number three. By the way, just for the sake of this, I had a... My husband, I said, why? So we get in, we get in the room, and she says, I cannot stand it. I have told him and told him and told him and told him not to do this. And it's just driving me up the wall. I said, what is it? A toothpaste tube. I have told him to do it at the end, and he always does it in the middle. And I'm like, are you guys serious? I'm about ready to die laughing here, you know? And so I said, let me see. I said, have you ever thought about having two toothpaste tubes? And she looked at me and she says, wow, Pastor, that was good. I mean, I'm like a fell out of the chair, you know? And she goes out and she's in church telling, oh, you know, pastor has all kinds of wisdom and all this kind of stuff. And I'm like, are you crazy? Here we go. All kinds of wisdom. But you know what? People get angry over that kind of stuff. Over little stuff, stuff that doesn't mean anything. Number three, speak the truth in love. In kind words, say what's on your heart. Make sure your love is equal to your truth. Proverbs 15 says, a soft answer turneth away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger. Number four, don't lose your temper. In fact, every Christian needs to learn that anger is never the answer and they must put it away in their life. Otherwise, your marriage and your children are in serious trouble. It needs to be said that many Christians do not think they have an anger problem since they only get angry every now and then. You know, once or twice a month. Now, folks, I'd like to illustrate it to you like this. How would you like to be lived by a volcano that only exploded once or twice a month? I think you see the point. Wise couples determine early in their marriage that they'll not raise their voices at each other. Under anger, we often say more than we intend, and usually this excess is cutting, cruel, and unnecessary, and angry on one person's part Anger on one person's heart usually precipitates an angry response by the other. Kindly state your objection in love and your objective. but let your partner think about what you've said. He or she may never admit that you're right, but usually you'll find that it'll create a change in behavior. And after all, you're more interested in that than verbal agreement. However, mature couples learn to communicate and do so without getting angry. And God will work in your lives and they'll be happier if you learn to do as he commanded in finding number six. Commit the problem to God. Once you've told your partner, you've done all you can do about it humanly, and from that point on, you must trust God either to help your partner or to supply the grace you need to live with. You know, there's two golden experiences that Kim and I have talked about, and that every married couple should communicate repeatedly throughout their marriage. I love you, and I'm sorry. Not in that order, mate. I had one guy who said, I told you that I loved you 25 years ago, and if I change my mind, I'll let you know. I'm sorry. I love you. Learn to be able to say this, and you'll go a long way toward having a good marriage. Say to your partner, I love you. And say it meaningfully and often. And men sometimes have a problem with that. And guys, if you're having a problem with it, you're going to have to force yourself to do it. You don't have to force yourself to do that. And once you force yourself to do it, it's going to be very helpful to you. Now, a good marriage is something that's worked at. It just doesn't happen. Now, I want to ask you this morning, if you're here this morning and you don't know Christ as Savior, that's the place to start. But I'm here to tell you this morning that I guarantee in a room this size, there are people that are having an anger issue. But I'm telling you this, if you don't get it under control, it's going to literally slay you. Let's stand together. Our heads are bowed and our eyes are closed.