With The Perrys - Best of WTP – How to Fight For Your Marriage

Episode Date: July 27, 2026

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Before you got married to me, when you were engaged, all the things, what did you think marriage would look like? Like when you imagined it? Huh. That's a good question. You want to be honest? That's the...

That's usually the goal. I was very ignorant. I thought it looked like you cooking for me every day, you know? Us having a whole bunch of babies. A bunch. And, you know, I don't know. Sex.

I didn't want to take it there. I mean, I had you take it there, you know. So speaking of... I was being in the sheets a lot. Speaking of marriage. A whole lot. Speaking of marriage. I was being in the sheets like a whole whole lot.

How about under the comforter, not the sheets? Huh? Because when you do it, you're naked. So you're kind of cold a little bit. Sometimes. Sometimes. Sometimes. Anyway, because it's about to go far.

Joining us today is Mr. C.D. I was going to call your whole name, Fabian. And one of my mentors since 2012, Melody Fabian. Clap it up. Yay, the Fabian! So Melody, Melody is the person who has kept, helped keep me in my right mind, who has helped me to love this man and love my children and to love y'all, quite frankly. Thank you, Melody. Thank you, Melody.

For all of your wisdom that you bestowed on me since I was 22 sitting in your living room. And not only that, you know. Bustello, that poisonous cafe. She gave me some boostello from all. the stove one time and I went to work I said I my belly is possessed I have never had to boo-boo I've never had to boo-bo that bad a ride in my belly I said I'm done I don't want no Puerto Rican coffee ever give me the white people coffee not only that we need to talk to I've been talking about a lot of discipleship and mentorship and you know we have me and Jackie both have this

you know disciples and mentors you know that disciple us individually but we have married couples who walk with us and I look at you guys as a a couple who we gleaned to, we look to, you guys have helped us, you guys have prayed with us and pray for us. And so I'm so grateful. The other day, you know, somebody was asking me, how are your kids so respectful? And I was like, why you say that? And he was like, every time you talk, talking to a grownup, one of them comes behind you and they touch you on your arm and they don't even interrupt you. They just wait until you respond to them. And I say, yeah, they put their hand on my arm

and they know that's how to get my attention but they are not supposed to interrupt me. And I remember, you know, when I had my first child, I mean, I was talking to you, my daughter was like, two, three. And she was like, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy. And you pulled me to the side and you said, this is what we do to our children.

You know, she has to put our hand on my arm and she does not interrupt until, you know, and I took that from you, sir. And so all my kids do it now. Come on. Praise a Lord. All my kids do it now, you know. And so you guys have just,

just taught us so much through the years. And so I'm just so grateful for you guys. We love you guys so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you for having us. So we'll jump straight into it. You both have kind of counseled couples in relationships and dating and marriage for a minute. A hot minute.

Recently, probably the last two years, y'all work with family life at their marriage. What's it called? Weekend to remember. Okay. So we speak at their conferences. And usually, how many people are there? 700 to like a thousand.

It arranged to about 500 to a thousand. Maybe 2000. 2000 sometimes. Yeah, they have a good show. Yeah, it depends on the venue. So in y'all experience, what would you say when you think about just the amount of couples you met with, the questions that are asked, the things that you have to speak to, what would you say are some of the pressing needs that you see in people's marriages

that we could talk through today? Well, I think we hear a lot about just communication, problems in general. Yeah. Couples are having a difficulty understanding what conflict is and how to overcome those conflicts. The major conflicts we see has a lot to do with sex, parenting, finances, also like old relationships. And distractions. I think that's been the biggest thing in this age too, is this is a lot of distractions. It's Facebook, social media, feeling like they're bidding for attention. Right.

They're constantly bidding for attention. And would you say that that's unique? It's increased more. Yeah, now. I think it's increased a lot, you know, technology in general. And so it's packaged in the context of lack of connection and recognizing. So we have a joke even between us that we share openly, which kind of helps open for them as well.

I used to get upset with Melody. how often she'd be on her phone. And so one day I told her I was jealous. And she was like, what you jealous about? And I said, I'm jealous about Jerome. And I'm like, who's Jerome? He named my phone. I said, Jerome the phone.

And she was just like, I know you just didn't name my phone. Like you can't name my phone. And I'm telling you like, late at night, she's on Jerome. And we go out to dinner and she's on Jerome. And we're driving around. She's on Jerome. And I'm like, you need to get off Jerome. Can you not see it that way?

Don't say it that way. Why is that the name? I don't know. Why not Apple? No, you do be on your phone. He is a little convicting because Jackie, she don't even like verbalized, but Jackie fussed with her eyes. Okay. And her body posture.

So it's just like, no, I'll just stop talking. Yeah. I'm not going to talk to your ear. Like, I want to talk to your face. Yes. That's good. I'm sorry, babe. It's okay.

I really like your face. I tell my, I don't want to talk to your face. I tell my wife, I don't want to talk to your forehead. I don't want to say, and we teach this, you got to listen with your face. Come on. You got to listen with your face. And so we had to come in agreement. Like, I want to take a picture of the event we're at, we're on a date.

I want to take a picture of the food or whatever. He lets me have that moment. And I put it away. That's right. And that's the agreement we have. And at the home, we don't have the phones at the dinner table. Right. If we want to play a little dining music because we do that sometimes.

my house and we put it over to the side. Yeah, you know, it's funny. It's like we like FaceTime on phones and stuff like that because there's something special about having FaceTime. And unfortunately, we can have FaceTime with the phone more than with each other. So we've got to learn how to do that. What is the threat to unhealthy communication in a marriage? Why is that a problem if people are distracted and not communicating well?

Because then you really don't know what your spouse is feeling. And so then there's assumptions. And then there's the enemy brings in his assumptions, you know. And so communication is so important. Like you have to build safety in your marriage to be able to share with one another. Yeah. I talk to marriages. They're seven years in and they feel like, yeah, I just can't, I can't go there.

I can't go. And I'm like, what? Why can't you go there? Like, this is your best friend. This is your partner in life. this is your spouse, why do you feel that there are areas you just can't talk about? And so building that safety is so important. And there were times where we were trying to get to hard places.

There was something that my husband said, I have to learn to bear the weight of what you're sharing. Yeah, so, well, real quick, before I say that, I just want to communicate that in a way. The issue is oneness, distraudeness, distra. Extraction is an issue because the way that we find oneness in our marriage relationships is through communication. Communication is the device that God has given us to find oneness.

The sharing of words reveals our hearts. So when we cannot reveal our hearts because we don't know how to communicate and we don't know how to communicate well, then seven years into a marriage, you still feel like you can't go to greater depth of communication because you haven't been practicing it. So you don't feel that level of oneness.

And there are various levels of communication that correspond to levels of oneness. So there was a time where Melody and I were at one of these Weekend to Remembers. We were just watching and listening. And they went through those levels of communication. And the ultimate one is transparency, where you're revealing who you are, not just what you

not just what you feel, who you are, like how you actually bringing yourself fully to a topic or a situation or even to the marriage. And I had said to her, I don't feel like you're very transparent with me. And she thought about it for a couple days and came back to me. She goes, you know, I think sometimes I too am hesitant to reveal that level of transparency with you because I'm slower to process than you are. And I think that sometimes you jump in and want to fix something I'm trying to communicate to you. So then I stopped talking. And that was real convicting because I had to learn how to just shut up and listen.

That's good. That's actually one of my, you know, I'm a fixer. And when I first got married, it was very hard for me to be with somebody who was an internal processor. Because the way I resolve conflict or the way I resolved conflict or the way I come to a conclusion is I have to verbalize it. So when somebody offend me, I'm not going to sit on for a day. I got to talk about it right now to even process it. She's different, you know, in that way.

And so God had to convict me in the same way. So that's crazy. I want to ask, though, is there a limit, though? Like, should there ever be a limit in which what we share, when we share, is it too much to share at times in a marriage? because for sometimes, I could assume that for some people, fear might be a factor of offense. Right. You know, and so like, what is the balance in that?

It's good. Yeah. I'll share something. I feel like there's what you're sharing and then how often you're sharing. If you're like, every day like, I got another lie, I want to tell you what I'll leave. I got another thought I'm fighting, you know. There's some things you just talk with your girlfriend or, you know, Your sister in Christ, like the females, female to female, male.

Yeah, I don't have no girlfriends. I like how you clarify. I want to make that clear. The same sex, your friend, godly friend. Because you don't want to men out there. I'll see. She said, I can talk to my girlfriend, baby. Exactly, no.

You're going to talk to your godly friend who is going to encourage you where you're like, man, I'm just processing this. You could process with somebody. Yeah. But bigger things, I feel like you've got to be able to bring stuff up, struggles even. I feel like there's couples are like, no, you're never sure what you're struggling with, with your spouse. And it's like, what? Yeah.

Like, how are they supposed to pray for you? How are they supposed to, they're anointed to be your spouse. So they have to pray for you. They have to fight for you. Yeah. So we were ministering to a couple of their older and they just stopped dating. They weren't even dating while they had children. The children are older and they still don't date.

And I said, why? Yeah. And they said, because it feels weird. Like we just got used to working side by side, but we don't talk, you know? Really? And so. How does that work? Exactly.

So it's just like, you're like. I can see it though. You're like each other. You're used to existing. Right. You know, paying the bills together, raising the children together, even going to church together, doing all the things together, but not actually being together. Oh, wow. And being intimate.

Yes. Well, becoming one. I mean, speaking of coming one, I mean, you probably know, I don't know. I don't know. I don't want to talk about that. Do they become one? Because this is like, it's kind of like, what do they do? Schedule sex? Wednesday, we're going to have sex.

Is that fine with you, honey? And that's not necessarily bad. That's not necessarily bad to schedule sex if you're, because another way of looking at is that you're saying, I'm reserving this time as special and nothing else can break it. But on a side note, though, but we all know that you can have sex but not be intimately close. Yeah. Right.

So that can happen in marriage too. Yeah. So again, like I said, I believe that God has given. Right? Jesus is the word. Why are words so important? Why does the enemy bring us lies? But the Lord says that the truth will set us free. And that gets communicated by words or communication.

That's good. Yeah. So your thought there with regard to how that couple wasn't really building, they stopped going deeper because there are greater levels, as I mentioned. And we just tend to kind of stop and we don't realize we can go deeper. That's good. How does someone even discern with, how do I say this? I think you can get in a rhythm sometimes with your spouse

where you don't even realize that the rhythm is actually dysfunctional. Sure. Right? And so you don't even realize that I'm not being transparent. Like you're not even discerning where with, so are there some, like, are there some rhythms you actually set in place to give you clarity on where y'all are in your relationship? so that you can address these kinds of issues.

I hope that makes sense. Yes, I feel like, and I know this is not for everybody, but you have to be around a healthy couple to know what's healthy sometimes, because it's like you don't even know you grew up with dysfunction, so that's how you know. And then your friends are all dysfunctional, and so we're all dysfunctional, you know what I'm saying?

But sometimes when you're around a healthy couple, you're like, when the last time we went on a date? You know, like, we don't even have a date night, right? Like we have a date night. We have a family night. You know, there's just things of ways to connect together. Even we had a conversation recently where I can go into work mode. I know how to work.

And he loves leisure and time and fun where he's like, I feel like. And we know Jackie, right? I can work. Yeah, yeah. And he can play, right? And you would think, why would God partner us together, right? Because we can really frustrate each other. Or we're better together.

Balance one another. And balance one another. I would be a workaholic without him. And he would just be playing all the time without me, right? And so he recently was like, babe, we got to keep building our friendship. Right. So you have to have checks and balances with each other. We do a thing like, how's your love tink?

You know, just checking in. How's your love tink? It's all e. Explain that. do you feel loved by me in this season? Well, in that very conversation, so we had learned that early on in our marriage. And so along with Gary Chapman's idea of the five love languages,

there's this concept of the love tank. How do you feel your heart is in your connection, your deep sense of oneness with one another? And for practical purposes, you can use the love languages or whatever. And we would say to one of them, another like, how's your love tank? And she would say like, oh, it's about midway or I'm spilling over right now or I'm pretty low. And that was, you know, like that would let me know, I need to

show my wife love in a way that makes sense to her. So even the way we receive and give love have languages. That's why he used that phrase. Yeah. So my wife, she feels filled when I serve her. And when I bless her with gifts, that just communicates. I don't typically communicate love in that manner. I will often shower with words and hold and touch. So now we're learning how to fill her tank with the things that make sense to her and vice versa to me. So when we had that conversation, I told her my love tank is low. And she was like, why?

because we were, you know, doing ministry and we were, you know, getting things ready for the next season and making these plans and she was pulling up the calendar and let's do this and let's do that. She was in her happy zone. And I'm like, yo, we need to go and just go for a walk and hold hands and talk.

We need to shoot. I'm like the more romantic one, like, or we can do something fun, like go shoot some hoops and have some fun. I saw that y'all was out there playing basketball at like 10 p.m. or something. Yeah. Yes.

And that, and that feels like that feeling. my tank and then it and she doesn't even realize oh she needs to slow down a little bit she needs to like have fun a little bit because i because i think you know what what i think couples have to understand that you know when you feel somebody else tank it gives them the energy to kind of feel yours exactly you know because i love one another and to love one another because i think a lot of for me you know i know with me like i don't like doing ministry i don't like doing work i don't like doing things when when when at times I don't. I'm going to be honest when I don't feel fed in other places. Because I had to,

I had to just come to the terms that God has wired me. I'm a relational person. And so that kind of fuels me, you know what I'm saying? And kind of feeds me in a way. You know what I mean? And so like I think I feed off relationships. This is kind of how God has wired me. And so not that I hate doing ministry, I just do it better when I feel like all the relationships. Collaborative. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm similar. I think the, I think the, I think the hard part about what everyone is saying is really the hard part, which is like the difficulty of marriage oftentimes is the fact that a healthy marriage

like requires self-sacrifice. Yes. It requires it. And so let me read something. In Ephesians five, Paul says to the churches, therefore be imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up. for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

It's from that place that he ends up getting to the fact that wives are to submit to their husbands and husbands are to love their wives. But he hasn't deviated from his original point, which is to give yourself up as a wife and as a husband. I guess speak to the power of the spirit and how we need him in our ability to love our spouse as well. Because sometimes, this is why I'm saying it. Sometimes I don't want to do that stuff because I don't want to do it.

Yeah. Right? So it's like, I need a power outside of myself to give me some grace to love you as best of that. Yes. Oh, yeah. Well, you're doing good, baby. Check this out later on in that verse.

He talks about that to love your spouse as you love your own body. And there's a reciprocal aspect of doing the thing that you don't like, knowing that the end result or the long-term blessing is a return in your investment, so to speak. And I typically like to start.

start with men. Women can do the same. But I like to say, gentlemen, let's initiate the work into our wives as our own bodies, whatever makes sense to them. And as my wife pointed out, it gives you the fuel, right, to then return that. When I meet my wife where she's at, it gives her the fuel to pour back on me. And then we got this beautiful cycle going on. The enemy wants to interrupt that. The Lord wants to fuel that. So Lord gives us the Holy Spirit to fuel that. It says in Ephesians 517, right, that we are to be filled with the spirit singing psalms and hymns

and spiritual psalms to one another. It says later on in chapter five that husbands... Walk through the Bible. Come on, walk us through it. Come on, call on, Daniel. Amen. It says to water your spouse with the Word of God, right? So when I wake up, as my wife tells me this,

When she sees me up in the morning doing my devotion, sitting at the table, and she comes in and she can tell, I've been there for a hot minute. Like, for all intents and purposes, it turns her on. Look at my man. You're reading a word. And I often have a word for her. So I've sought the Lord. The Lord has spoken to me by his spirit through the word. I translate that word and speak it over her.

She gets filled. I also am filled to do the other things. Like I get more channeled energy for work through the Holy Spirit in our ministry. Let me say it this way. Man, this is so powerful. When my wife tries to energize me and encourage me to get the work done and you might experience this, it doesn't come energizing for me. It feels more like a nag.

And she's not trying to nag me. She's like, hey, what are we doing next? But it feels like a nag because God didn't intend for us to get the fueling for our work from our wives. We get the fueling from our work from our master. It's our master who delegates responsibilities to us. That's good. If I have face time with the master, work is related to worship. Romans 5, right?

Offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, which is your reasonable act of. of service or your spiritual worship. When I spend face time with the Lord, he fills me with the energy and the desire and to get motivated. So then I say, hey babe, so now she's the administrator. She's got like you, Jackie, she's ready to always keep moving. She gets turned on again when I say,

and I'm using these terms, but it's like that's, it's true, like she gets excited when I put, I say, babe, pull out the calendar, what are we doing this week? What's going? Oh, and then she gets into it. She goes to see how old? What are we doing?

What are we doing, Fah? Huh? Let's go. Let's go. What we do? We're working now. We need the Holy Spirit who energizes us. We get directions from heaven.

And then we turn that into times of devotions, worship, and singing, planning, and preparing. Are there specific ways that husbands and wives can quench the spirit in their relationship? Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Well, I think bitterness is a big thing. You have to keep short accounts in your marriage. Because if you start last month and a year ago and you're like building cases that, oh my goodness,

like you have to keep short accounts. So we try to, babe, why are you saying it? Like right in the moment, he'll be like, duh, I'm like, what's that energy? Can you say that again, honey? You know? And he'll be like, can I? You know, but we built to that place, okay? I'll say something.

He's like, I don't like that you're telling me what to do. You know, but he learned to say it with a very low tone, because he's Haitian and he's, I don't like you talking like that. You know, and I'm like, why are you yelling? You know, and now we're arguing about that, all right? And so I'm like, can you say it a little lower, please? You know? So he's like, I feel like you're telling me what to do.

And I'm like, how can I say it in a way that you feel respected? Yeah. And he will literally teach me what he wants. And I think that we sometimes romanticize marriage so much that we think you're just supposed to know what to say. You're supposed to know what I want. You should know me by now. And we have, that's something you got to eliminate from your marriage. We should, we shouldn't even be past this by now.

We shouldn't be arguing about. this anymore we shouldn't yeah conversations are gonna come back up again so what i hear you guys saying is you know like you had to work but that work takes a lot of humility yes for me i mean i did not like the i didn't like the jacky you tried to correct me and i didn't like the way that she and i didn't like the way she did but then you know when she started to kind of fix her tone at times i still didn't like it i was like stop correcting me yeah you know that's a hard issue at that right it's a hard issue Which is cool, though, because when, I think when one spouse kind of does a behavior but in the power of the spirit, then it actually then reveals your own lack, right?

So with me approaching you about the correction and a tone that was still respectful, then you were able to see that one of the bigger issues wasn't necessarily my tone with your own heart. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's true. So it eliminates excuses when you love weight. Because she did it this morning. I kind of responded to the kids in a way. one of our children in a way that I probably could have been a little softer. And I came upstairs and she just said,

Preston, you can't do it like that, sweetie. You got to do it like this. And I said, do it like what? Do it like what? I said this. No, you paused. You looked in the sky. No, that's what I did?

And I said, what is that face? I said, I looked at the sky. She said, what is that face? And I said, I'm sure I don't remember what I said. And I'm checking my, I'm checking my own heart. But the way she came to me. me was so respectful. It was so gentle. And I had to reexamine myself. Yep. And I said, you know what? You're right. I'm going to be better. And you know, and it took us a while to get to that, to that place.

Yeah. Year two, three. And so like I like what you just said. You should never stop working. Like if our sanctification is a, is a process. So is our marriage. It's a continual process. We're 14 years in. And we're still having like, hey, hey, hey. You know, we, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, Oh, you can check me and I can check you and I love you. But we're going to say it in a way that we can receive it. Yeah, we want to say what we mean. But don't see it. And mean what we say, but not say it mean. I like that.

That's a good t-shirt. A rapper. Put that on the coffee. I would imagine, though, that because of the worldly influence that we've all kind of ingested, it influences the way we even understand marriage. And so I would imagine that to some degree, when people feel like they're working too hard, they think that that's evidence of divorce.

Yes. Right? Like it shouldn't be this difficult. I don't feel in love with you. Like sex shouldn't be this hard. Like how do you speak to people who feel like because it's not easy, then that means that they're actually not compatible. Right.

Well, you have a saying, babe, that conflict brings intimacy. Yeah, I say that conflict is, an invitation and an opportunity for greater intimacy. We also say that having conflict in your marriage doesn't mean something's wrong. It just means that you're married. But you've got to think about this. Say that again. Conflict in your marriage doesn't mean that anything is wrong.

It just means that you're married. And you have to understand it in this way. You're bringing two people, two different people, right, from opposite sexes, from different backgrounds with different traditions, with different love languages and things that bother them and upbringings and styles. And you're asking them to come and live under the same roof. I mean, and like do life together.

Their views on parenting could be different. Their views with finances could be different. Their communication styles could be different. got to learn all this. So what is conflict? Then conflict is a point of misconnection, right? And so because of the misconnection or the wrong connection, we're frustrated and we're angry, you offended me or you didn't meet my expectation. That's conflict. If you view conflict from that viewpoint, oh, this is an opportunity now for us to find the right way to connect. And finding that convergence creates space

for deeper connection. So now conflict is an invitation for greater intimacy. The problem is we don't have the right communication skills for healthy confrontation. If communication is the vehicle that God has given us for greater oneness, then we need to learn how to communicate well. That's good. And if we can learn to communicate well, then we can have healthy confrontation.

And if we can have healthy confrontation, then we can resolve conflict and walk away from that conflict with greater oneness than ever before. Some of the most amazing marital stories I know are from people who have come from the worst seasons of their life. Right. Like even as bad as infidelity, but because they did the work to learn how to communicate well, Yeah. Face that conflict and have healthy confrontation.

Years later, they literally say that they love each other more. Their sex life is increased. Their stability is high. It has impacted their children in beautiful ways. Wow. And on and on it goes, because God is the God of restoration and redemption. Make up sex on flea. Hey, they be teaching us stuff.

A particular couple that we know. Yeah. So. Really? Yes. But it comes by way of that deeper restoration and work. Huh? I mean, come on.

It's real. And you know, like I like to be, what does this look like on Monday? Right? Because these are lofty thoughts and it's like, okay, how does that look though? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like there was a, this season where we're in Florida, he's in school, it's hard. Like we're in a hard, we're in the messy middle towards our goals. And he was being critical, you know?

He was being very critical in, and he didn't. didn't even realize how critical he had been. And there's the things that kill marriages, being critical, self-defense, contempt. What's the last one? Stonewalling. And stonewalling. OK.

That's John Gottman. But he was being so critical. And I was like, I'm going to be critical back. You know, that I was like, but that's not godly. Right? You know, and so I had to go to God. God, I need the right perspective. And the Lord said, call.

Call him up to who he is in me. Woof. Come on. Call him up to who he is in me. And I'm like, how do I do that, Lord? You know? And he kept saying, could we talk? Can we talk?

He's going to fix it. I know you're upset. What did I do? What did I? I'm not ready yet. And that is even good for the spouse to give your spouse time. Because we know spouses are blocking doors. No, you know, you know, I'll deal with this.

And it's like, that is not the way to deal with him. So he gave me space and I got into the work. I had to get into the word, bear with one another, love one another. And I said, I'm not gonna get out of this passage till I feel it. Ooh. And it took a whole day because I was angry. Wow. And I was like, bear with love, no, no, holy spirit, you gotta do it in me, Lord.

And so, you know, that's while I'm doing the dishes, while I'm taking care of my toddler, I got a toddler and a teenager, right? It's not like you're just away in two hours in your room, you know? And then I said, God, create a space where I could share this with my spouse. And so one evening, he took a shower, I took a shower, and bed. I was like, I'm ready to talk, you know, and he's like, and this is like two days later. Yeah. Okay. Had to wait two days.

Yes. And we recommend you solve things within the week. Okay. Not no months. Yeah. Within the week. And you know, the scripture does say to not go to bed. angry, right?

Don't let the sun go down on your anger. She had stopped being angry, but she wasn't yet ready to resolve. Yeah. And I love what she said that she repeated, right? She meditated, she chewed, masticated on that word, because sometimes you get, your heart gets so hard. Yes.

You can't just put the seed on top of it. Jesus' parable, it alludes to this idea that the enemy can just come take it away or it's not going to grow good. So what you got to do? You got to break up the ground. And that's what she was doing. She was breaking up that ground,

putting that word, putting that word until it got to the place to where she saw that it was going to get the room. I think it's a difference between you, you know, going away and you're not allowing the Lord to work on your heart and you're just sitting with your own thoughts. That's religiosity.

Yeah, just sitting with your own. It's a form of meditation still. Yeah. Because you're meditating on how you feel what they did. And so it's actually solidifying the hardness versus if you're meditating on his law day and night, then that kind of massages your heart. And I had to realize that, you know,

the Lord kind of revealed to me early on in my marriage that I had become more like a Pharisee to Jackie than Jesus. And I remember, you know, calling out her stuff and wanted to talk immediately. And the Lord had to show me, it was like even when you truly believe that your wife knows. me that she's coming to me, you still kind of feel like your words are sufficient.

That if she comes to you, you can fix it, but you're not her God. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right? And so, like, I had to learn that. I was like, man, even if, like, the best thing for our marriage at times is for me to let her go off with her king and then for us to come, to come back or whatever. And so, yeah, I just had to learn it in my marriage. Healthy boundaries. So we talked about, I want you to finish the story, but. Like we talk about communication skills. We mentioned communication styles, right?

I had already talked about communication levels, right? Or stages like the depth, the end of transparency. But then there's also communication boundaries. You need to create space for people to meet with the king, to process rightly, you know? And when we don't give people that space, it can, it can, blow it up. Yeah, it can cause that just to get things worse.

Yeah. And it's selfish when we don't want to give people space. Because what we really want is to feel better ourselves. Yeah. We want to alleviate the pressure. What my wife mentioned earlier that I said that like I've had to learn. Stand up under it. To stand up under the weight, right?

Because in 1 Peter chapter 3, verse 7, it talks about husbands live with your wives in an understanding manner. It's like, oh snap, we can understand women. Yes, we can, but it's a process. Yeah. And the Lord showed me to flip over that word, understand, and learn how to stand up under the weight of the convictions or the needs or the space.

And what emotions that does to me or that patience, I have to exercise them and yield to and listen to the Holy Spirit to during her time of space, and then find Honestly, we got a chance to talk. Real quick, before you finish your story, I heard you say something about a week. Look, what is the boundary? Like, what is the limit? Should there be a limit?

Yeah. Like, because we possibly giving somebody too much space. Yes. That's possible, too. We, we, for us, we don't go past a week. But it depends on what the issue is. Yeah. I had deeply, I remember what happened.

And I had offended her. I said something pretty, there was a barrage of things that I had said in the car. And it struck her bad. And I knew it. And I wanted to quickly resolve it, but I was like, I need to give her this space. That's that particular issue. We usually would just fix something within the day. Within the day.

Yeah, we try within the day. But it's a heavy thing. You may need a couple of days. But you got to let them know, hey, I didn't talk to you about something. It's about communicating. It's communicating. Yeah. And she communicated, I need some time.

And the next day I need some more time. But she communicated. There's been times where I've been upset and I said to her, I love you, but I need some space. I'm going to go for a walk. I'll be back in a couple of hours or a 20 minutes or whatever might be. Now let's say it's a harder offense, like infidelity. That could take years to overcome. Yeah.

So as you're dealing with other issues, you know, you're still kind of working on that main issue and the boundary needs to be extended. That's good. That's good. So Melody, how did you call them up? So that evening I said, and actually I texted you that week and you had given me kind of a prophetic word. Like I feel like you guys need to discover each other again.

So I held on to that and then I said, listen, I don't think you've realized this, but you've been very critical with me. And what you said in the car, da da da da da da, we said we would never do that, right? And you are a kind man. And you are usually kind with me, but you have been harsh with me lately. And he was like, I saw, you know, like, because that's who he is, right?

In Christ, that's who he is. And so he was like, I'm sorry, babe. I'm sorry, honey. And my apology language, because that's another thing, is a plan of action. I don't wanna just hear you're sorry. I need to know what you gonna work on. Y'all so, yeah.

We are hearing like, it's like, I get it, you're sorry, but. My sorry, my sorry ain't, and I appreciate it, but what we're going to do. Sorry is often good enough for me. Yes, just let me know. He wants sincere, sincere apology, you know. So he said sorry, he took it in and then he was like, I will not do this, I will not do that. And when I find myself being critical, I'm a pause, I'm going to, you know, like his plan of action.

And then I said, you know, I was talking with Jackie, and she said that we probably need to discover each other more. And it was cool because it unlocked something. And he was like, I think I'm angry. And I'm like, about what? Right. So criticisms up here, but there's an underlying anger in his belly, right? And I said, about what?

And he's like, I just feel like, what you want is this? And if I'm going to do ministry, we can't do this. And it was all these assumptions and thoughts. I'm like, I don't even feel that way. And he was like, you don't. You know, so it was like a discovery again of what I think you're thinking, what I think you're doing. I'm assuming what you really feel, you know, all these things. That has communication, communication, even simple things.

Like we had an anniversary and again, my love language is gifts. And there was a series of like, I felt like he was missing it. And I'm like, just call my best friends. I know what I like. And he's like, no, I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna get it right one year, you know? So this was that year, he's gonna do it. And he booked us a place for anniversary.

And Lake Geneva, I'm like, it's Lake Geneva. Okay. It'd be great back in Chicago. And he didn't read the reviews. Okay. He didn't go to Yelp. He didn't go to Yelp. I didn't know nothing about that back then.

So we get there. And he was like a place you take your kids, like a little vacation. You know what I'm saying? Had that feel. The kitty poppoles. They were an old country buffet. Yeah, you know, that feel, you know?

And I was like, oh, Lord. And you know, they had crackers and cheese on the thing. And I'm like, there ain't got no strawberries here, you know. And immediately now the enemy comes. You see, he don't plan for you. He ain't even read the reviews for you. The enemy knows how to attack you directly in the areas that mean something to you. Because the thing, yes, he is.

He probably put his heart and his heart really hard. All of his being in that. Watch what happened. She's getting attacked with the enemy with these words. As soon as I walk into the door. Right. He don't plan for you. I feel I'm sinking.

My heart is hurting. You should see her face from the outside. He's like. Oh, you saw it. Oh, I saw it. She goes so far as to remove herself and excuse herself to the bathroom. It was almost as if the enemy was like right on her shoulder.

She went to the bathroom and he kind of just slither his way over to me. And immediately I just heard, look, she don't appreciate, nothing you do. Wow. Nothing you do is ever good enough. You will never get it right. She is so demanding and high class

and you go out of your way to do this and high maintenance and didda, and like for real, I heard this going hard. And then... I text one of my first. my besties pray for us. We just got here and I feel already defeated. We just got here.

She's like, that's the devil. I'm going to pray right now. Be gracious. You know, he's learning. I'm like, okay. I don't want to mean this kitty pool. So I come out and I see him sinking. And I'm like, oh, this is both of us now.

And I sat next to him. He's kind of quiet. And I said, the enemy is at work right now. Like right away, I said it. He's like, yeah, I feel that. And I said, I want to expose a lie. I know it's not true.

But I want to expose a lie. He's like, okay, I feel like you don't plan for me. He's like, but I did. I said, I know she didn't read the reviews. And that's just a learning lesson. Yeah, yeah. But it doesn't mean you don't love me. And I feel like the enemy's saying,

he doesn't love you. That's good. Because you're not worth it, right? He's like, I want to expose a lie too. I feel like nothing I do is good enough for you. And I'm like, that's a lie too, you know? And so we, he said, let's pray. And so we prayed.

Like, God, we expose these lies. We will have a good anniversary. And he's kitty pool. We didn't even go to the pool. We didn't even go to the pool. I was like, I was like, we want to see the site. I was like, we will have a good time. Yeah.

We will, you know, and like, we will make the best of this. and we, you know, the enemy won't come against us. We will, you know, we will get better. We will love each other. He's like, I will listen to your best friends, you know. And we just like, and then I will say seventh year, it was so beautiful. He had a beautiful hotel. Well, so let me say that right.

So what happened is I'm learning melodies, love languages and a polylology languages as well. So we, and the scheme of the enemy was to not get us to confess those lies. Yeah. The intention of the enemy. was to get us in our minds and in our heads filled with his lying words and not the words of truth. That's good. The words of truth either from God or one another both set you free. Yes, yes.

Right? Because God is all about the truth. So the truth originates in him. The principle of talking to one another is oneness. The principle of confessing to one another is oneness. That's God's principle. Enemy didn't want that. We faced spiritual warfare by. confessing the truth, even though it may have heard

or we missed each other's expectations. And then we prayed because prayer then invites Christ back into the center and we had his power and his strength and his spirit to lead us to go and have a good time. But now I had to learn. The funny thing is later on, I went to open up the shades and stuff and we found someone's underwear.

Oh, God. It was quite nasty. And then I started laughing like, That was underwear. I surely, it was, that place that we were at, like they didn't clean it up properly. So I really should have listened to the reviews because it would have shown me that it was not that very well maintained

and take care. But it was like a little something for me to laugh at, but also to see the magnitude of my lack of review and stuff. It was like God was saying, look, see this, she right. You see, exactly. Look at these wrongs. Humble yourself. So the following year, I was like, you know what?

I ain't going to try to save a book. I'm going to make sure I do the reviews. I'm going to talk to her friends. I'm going to go all out. So I went and found this nice spot. I went in advance. I checked it out. I looked behind the blinds.

Someone's sock was there. I was like, oh, I was about to say something, but I had already decorated the bed with flowers and everything. I just took care of it. It was a very nice place still. And then when I brought her in, she cried. And I was like, this is the next year. That's the following year.

Oh, that's good. That's been the following. That's good. That's so encouraging because I think it just shows you the beauty of what a marriage can be when there's two spiritually mature people who are willing to do the work. Right? Because what that is, because, you know, like. I would say spiritually maturing.

Yeah, mature. You don't have to be mature. Just have to listen to where God has you. That's good. That's good. Yeah. Because I think it's so encouraging that you. you guys dealt with it immediately.

Immediately, yeah. You know, that you took it to the Lord immediately, you know? Because, you know, when you're new in Christ, or even when you're, you're not working, it's like, you can go to your emotions and just sit with that for so long, but you took it to Jesus and me. And that's why the Lord was able to deal with it, because you bought it to him.

And so that's good. That's really good. I'm wondering what y'all would think about this statement, this statement, does the devil love marriage? He hates marriage. He hates marriage. Explain. Because it comes against the image of God.

The bride and his church, it's his image. It's his relationship. And so he hates it. He hates what it represents. And he hates what it looks like to others. It's a witness to others. Even unbelievers love love. Why are love stories still so like, ah, right?

Why Hallmark is so famous? You know what I'm saying? because he created that. It's an image of his love. And you have a great example of why the enemy comes so hard against marriage. Yeah, I was pondering the idea of sex and marriage and why it gets attacked so much. Check this out.

God, the enemy hates God. We are the imagers of God on the earth. The idea of imaging is that not only do we represent him in form, but we also represent him in authority. Our mandate in Genesis is to, spread the glory of God through reproduction across the face of the earth. The enemy does not want to see his enemy represented in authority over the face of the earth. What's the avenue for that?

Sex. What protects that marriage? Marriage is the institution that God created for man and woman to find companionship, and love and intimacy and connection with one another, which reveals his love for us. God calls Israel his bride. He kept referring to Jerusalem as his wife, his people, his body.

The church is also represented as the bride of Christ. He's coming back for his bride. Adam, you know, when he saw Eve, this is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh, right? She shall be called woman because she came forth from the man. When Jesus, the bridegroom, hung on the cross,

he was stabbed on the right side and the blood and the water flow. What does John say? This is the witness, the spirit, the blood and the water. The witness of who, the Christ, by whom, the church, his bride. When Eve came forth from Adam, It was a prophecy that the church was going to come forth from Christ.

We literally represent the most precious thing to God. So he hates the image of God. He hates the reproduction of the image of God. He hates the institution that comes from that. And so that's what he wants to pervert. He wants to pervert and destroy. Be your own person out there in the world sleeping around and everything. It's all good.

It's all good. Get married. Now it's a ball and shame. What's represented in TV? they don't have no sex no more. They're broken. They make fun of the men. The woman is always upset and frustrated.

All these images, the enemy, hates marriage. And he hates marriage for all those reasons. And that's why it's worth protecting. I accept because I think we have a conception of just spiritual warfare as it relates to ministry, as it relates to our mind, as it relates to our heart.

but a lot of times we don't see that some of the tension in the marriage is actually some kind of spiritual opposition, right? And so just not being like, because I remember when we came to that conclusion, probably recently, it was like, I think the devil would be throwing a lot of arrows at us. So I'm over here thinking I'm fighting you when I'm actually not fighting against flesh and blood. No. You know what I'm saying? You ain't actually my wrestle. My wrestle with somebody else. I had the, I had a series of dreams a couple of years ago that just started like, like coming out of nowhere of Jackie cheating on me.

Oh, that was for a year. Yeah, yeah. It was like, that was a nightmare, pun intended. Oh, my goodness. And I'm like, this is crazy. And I remember waking up feeling angry at her. And like I would literally feel angry at her throughout the day. No, you had, you had, because it was a really long,

it was a long season of him planting these seeds in your mind through dreams. Through dreams. That I would step out on you. And I remember, I think it got on my nerves in general, but it really got on my nerves because when I had Sage, I was in the room with Sage, and I had just delivered her, you went to sleep because I've been in labor all day, and he gave you one of those dreams.

Wow. And you woke up questioning me about if I, while I have a brand new baby in my arms, right? And I'm like, Preston, like, I guess at my, I was getting frustrated because it's like, you should know me enough now to know that I love Jesus. I love you, I love our family. And I want to be faithful, like.

And it wasn't until, yeah, yeah, it was. My whole vagina that had been ripped into because I got a baby. And I just remember feeling when she told, when I saw the frustration on her face, I just remember feeling so convicted. And I remember feeling so just like, oh, man, like, God, like, how did I get here? Yeah. I was like, I'm not even like an insecure dude.

And when Jackie don't even like people like that. And so it's like for her to eat on me, it's just so out. Like it's just, you know what I'm saying? I don't have to go out of my way. And it wasn't until I had an event in Chicago. I was like, Lord, help me. And it wasn't until I had an event in Chicago. I'm pretty sure he won't mind me talking about this.

And the event in Chicago and the rapper K.B was there, Christian rapper K. We were saying, I opened up to him, and I was like, bro, I'm going through a lot. And he said, I had an attack like that for two years. Wow. And I was like, really? And he, like, walked me through it. And we just talked in the car, just driving one, me and KB.

And he just prayed, pray with me. And I remember feeling like something kind of broke there. But it didn't go away. It didn't go away completely away. But it was just like the lawyer had to really help me out of that season. And that's when I walked away, like, feeling like, wow. the devil hates my marriage. Yes.

Like we, because we had been working at that point. And it was like, you know, I'm not struggling with this no more. You're not doing, you know, you're respecting me more, yada, yada, yada. So now I got to plant dreams. Right. So it's affect how you how you think. How you think. Yes.

And it's just like, wow, like you didn't do none of this with my girlfriends. Right. Right. Right. You were like, just be. Yes. You know. Keep going.

Yeah. That's good. So I hear you talking about how you overcame that by sharing it with the brother, getting prayer. Yeah. But we know that it's spiritual warfare. See, earlier we were talking about like, you know, Jerome the phone and things like that. We're talking about the distraction. See, Satan has strategies to divide marriages, to divide people.

Yeah. Because, you know, a house divided cannot stand. A kingdom divided cannot stand, right? So the enemy attacks the very thing he hates by implanting concepts and ideas in our minds to draw division. That's another strategy. One is distraction, another is division.

The same way that we face it is fighting for the oneness. With the distractions, you gotta put the phone away. With the divisions, and then when you put the phone away, and you look at one another, you speak to one another, you go into those deeper levels of oneness. The same thing with divisions. We have to call out. those divisions.

So Melody and I, we had something similar happen. For a season of time, I was having dreams where someone was trying to seduce me. One of the times, Melody was with you, Jackie, at one of the glory events. That same night that you guys were out there serving and working, I woke up in the middle of the night from an enticing dream and can feel the spirit herself. standing over me in the bed or by my bed. And I had to get up and rebuke it in the name of Jesus and then begin to pray.

And then I told Melody right away that next day or whatever. And these are happening because you guys are a power couple doing ministry together. Let me tell you something. I believe in this generation, I'm going to submit this as a prophetic insight. I believe in this generation and that to come. God is raising up prophetic ministry couples because it reveals the heart of God,

the bride and the bridegroom by his spirit working together. What does it say in Revelation? The spirit and the bride say come, come on somebody. It says the spirit of who, Jesus Christ, the spirit of our father, the spirit of our husband. And the bride say come, come into the, the body of Christ, come and avoid the judgment that Jesus Christ is coming to set everything straight.

And in that same way, the two of you are saying, come, Melody and I are saying, come. And when we choose to operate together, what did Jesus say? He will build his church and the gates of hell will not resist it. Gates are stationary. The church is going out against.

When you go and you visit these different cities, And when she's gone and you're covering her, when you're gone, you're covering him. And we go through the same thing. He's like, oh, where's all this coming from? Let's get to the source. Let's attack their marriage. And there's things that you can do to strengthen that,

expose it, confess it, and pray, but also look for any open doors that that might be lingering. But I'll just pause from now. That's good. Yeah. I'm wondering, my question went away. But I am wondering,

How do couples who have dealt with infidelity work through that? We have a very close, one of my best friends, worked through infidelity and it's, it's, first it was do you forgive? That's the first one. Do you forgive? And she said, I do forgive. Second question is, do you want to work it out?

Because you can forgive and be like, peace. I can't live with you anymore. And she was like, I don't know, I want to, but he was sort of in a like, I don't know sense. And God had to get him. And it's a cool, beautiful story. They're writing a book. But he basically was playing softball at a game and God broke his leg.

Like his leg got broke. And he's in the hospital. And he knew God broke his leg. Like he fumbled over a kid. And the doctor's like, it looked like somebody hit you with a bat. Like that. And he's in the doctor's, you know, a hospital.

He's just hearing, beep, beep. And the Lord said, stop running for me. Wow. Stop running for me. And he knew he was in sin. And he said, I repent, you know, and he repented. And so he said, I want to work this off. Forgive me.

But now she had to take care of him. Ooh, wait. You got to take care of the Negro, unless he's not a NIGO. No, he's not, but you know. You know. Yeah. Sounds like a Talapearian movie. The ninja.

That does just cheated on you. But here was the funny thing. She said, Lord, in prayer, God break his leg like a lamb and put him over your shoulders. Oh, she said that. She had prayed that prayer. She didn't know the Lord was going to answer specifically. Yeah, specifically. So now.

He's like, which one, daughter? Okay. Left of the right. So now, she calls me, I got to take care of him when I want to kick him. I want to kick him in the leg. I want to kick him in the bad leg, Melanie. And I don't care of him.

come, let's pray. You know, like we were literally, literally like that, you know. She'd be in the car with him. She'd be fine. And all of a sudden, she's like, no, she was driving. She's like, get out the car. Get out of the car. And he's like, what? And he's like limping with the crunches. She put him out the car. She's driving and she's like, God's like, go get your man. And she comes back. I'm sorry. Get back in the car. Wow. He's like, babe, what is going on? She's like, this might get me crazy. Now, I want to pause there. Adultery does make you crazy. Yes, it does.

We were never meant to break covenant. God says he's a jealous God. It makes you irrational. It will make you want to kill somebody. You're like, I can't think, right? So it was constant warfare that they had to keep praying, keep pressing, have accountability. And keep forgiving. Because forgiveness comes in waves.

And it's a process. And so when it would come again, she'd be like, but why did you? You know, and he'd be like, baby, I'm so sorry. He didn't go, I already said I'm sorry five times. Right. I say it as long as much as you need me to say it. See, Melody earlier said that for, you know, the first question was, will you be willing to forgive?

And then she's describing the process of restoration there, do you want to be restored from the offending spouse? I think the first question is, will you repent? Will you repent? So will you forgive, will you repent? Then the question together is, are you working to restore? Both have to walk in humility the entire time. Our friend walked in humility, ready to serve her in the capacity that he could,

because he's physically needing her service, which further humbled him. Yes, it did. God is so amazing in how he does things. She is being broken by having to serve the one who deeply offended her. which worked her forgiveness deep. See, why would God do that? God did that so that he could work the forgiveness in her heart deep by expressing it in work.

Then for him, it made him realize the beauty he has in this woman. The love she has for God, that she's willing to work out her forgiveness by serving him. What did I step out? What did I do? That helped him stay humble. It kept him low. These are God principles.

He resists the proud, but he lifts up the humble. He's like, I got to teach you both humility. That's good. And I know how to do it in the way that will affect you the most. He's someone who had prided himself and being able to do things for himself and take care of himself and I'm gonna go out there and I'm gonna do it. She had prided herself as someone who can be taken care of and I'm a prince. I'm not saying that necessarily was always going through their mind,

but I can imagine as conversation I've had with them, these are dispositions. So now he's being humbled by having to be taken care of and she's being humbled by having to take care of. And this is what I meant by boundaries before. These were conversations that they had to endure for years. Yeah. This was not going to just get fixed. Yeah. It would take time.

That's good. That's good. And I think what's coming to my heart to share is they have kids who are married now. Mm-hmm. And they have such a beautiful legacy. Mm-hmm. And she took a picture recently and sent it to me. And I just see all her kids behind.

There's only one that's two that are not married yet. But they love the Lord in their singleness. And I want to say that too. Like, I know they're singles watching like, so am I nothing without marriage? No, God has a plan and a purpose for you. And it may not be marriage. And it may not be married. Like, he's got.

the singles, the married, and the grandkids, and I see this picture. And I said, Limari, like, look at your legacy. If you and Tony said no in that moment, where would your kids be right now? Wow. Would they even be serving the Lord right now? Yeah. And they're all serving the Lord right now. And they're all building their family.

And they all know what happened. And that's what the enemy was after. Legacy. Legacy. That's what the enemy is up. We cannot see what we will leave behind. Do you know most people don't ever get to see the wealth of impact until they die? Or they never see it.

Maybe in glory, but they don't get to see it. Most of the people who have had the most profound impact in this world will never see that. They have to do it by faith. It's by faith. That's so good. I think sometimes when we're thinking of our warfare, I have to think of my legacy. I have to know there's an enemy. It's not my spouse.

He hates my marriage. We got a fight. And this is for my kids. You know, like you have to, and it's for the world. Yeah. Right? So this year or this season, we were in Florida, I had got, we got hit crazy with new attacks

that we had never had before. Yeah. In one moment, I remember feeling the enemy literally say, you should leave. Leave CD. Yeah. I've never had that. And what I was upset about wasn't even that big.

I was like, that would stop. You know, like, I reject that thought, right? Hold every thought captive. Yeah, yeah. But it was like, but like, don't you wish you could just do you? And it was like, but it was like strong. And it was like, I feel like there's a demonic presence in my room right now while I'm praying. It was, it was leave, not just me, but and the kids.

It was like, let her go. Which isn't even your character. No. No. But I felt it. Yeah. Like, I was like, oh, get in the car. I've had those moments.

Yeah. Get in the car. Well, not that. I'm exposing the lie that you're not coming for me by saying that you had those moments. Thank you. Very good. Go ahead. Go ahead.

I've had random moments of just, like, like, irrational, like thoughts. Yes, yes. Intruding irrational thoughts. But it was like, what? But just imagine it. Just like, just imagine what it would be like. Like you could just do you. You didn't got to cook, you can't get to clean,

you gotta take care of nobody. It's just all about you, you travel. And I'm like, what is this? But that's the trap right there. Just imagine. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you allow that door to the devil, and now you're like, man, I'll go to, I'll go on vacation,

I'll do this. And the thing, yes, we probably be miserable. Yes. And who knows what it happened. But the trap was to get her to imagine. Yeah. Because then it's a seed. Yeah.

But you don't got to find print what the devil has for you. And what SCD you're gonna get if you sleep around. Come on. And what disease you're gonna get? And what the devil's gonna do to your kids? Because you just open a door to your house, right? And so I was like, what is this? And I felt the Lord said, you need to resist this evil spirit.

And I said, I resist these thoughts right now. And I resist the devil right now. now you will not have my house. And you will not take me out of my post. Come on. Because that's what it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get out your post.

Talk heavy, Melody. Leave your position. Leave your position. Why? Why? Because once I leave and I'm in sin and doing my thing, I lose a wonderful husband. My kids don't want to be around me.

And now I feel so far from God. You should leave God too. See, you see how that goes? And now I'll expose some lies too. I've had similar thoughts. Not so much just to up and go, but wishing, not wishing, wondering if life looked different. And having to resist going down that lane as well. Because there is something about daydreaming away from what God has given.

The reality. The reality of things that can ensnare us. Because what happens is, and I think this is what happens with a lot of marriages too. but it gets fleshed out by imagining what could have been, what would have been with the old Facebook boyfriend or girlfriend. And then what happens is that little open door gets swung wide open over periods of time until we actually go.

And I've seen this happen in marriages where they have left. And then the next step is walk away from your spouse, walk away from your heavenly spouse. And apostasy is interesting. interestingly linked to adultery, because idolatry is spiritual adultery. If you want to remain happy in adultery or walking away from your spouse,

you have to let go of God. That's good, wow. You cannot live in peace if you walk away from your spouse. So all of the marriages that I've seen fall apart, and then sometime later I get this Facebook feed or this Instagram post, I ain't following Jesus no more. Well, you have to walk away from God,

or you have to hold on to a false God. A false God. You cannot worship him in spirit and in truth. Right. You have to worship, you have to worship this idea that you made up about God to live comfortable. And you're not really comfortable. You're just coping.

You know you're lying to yourself. You're lying to the people around you. And that's deep. I think what I'm enjoying about this conversation is that even a couple minutes ago, I was thinking about the imagination and how we can sometimes ruin it, but practically. So you have men who use their imagination

while watching pornography as in a way to skate. You have people who are addicted to video games as in a way to escape. But then you also have women who read erotic books as a way to escape. And so like we have these devices or this literature or these means by which we can, like we can put ourselves in another world,

which actually makes us discontent in the position that God has actually placed a sin. That's good. You know? Sure. That's good. Another interesting thing about those, that they are sometimes coping mechanisms.

So the way that we sometimes view pornography or drug addiction or alcoholism, notice I package those things together because for some people, there are wounds, they've never tended, tended to. Yeah. Those wounds creep up at the present.

The marriages hits a hard place. It's hard for them to process or to alleviate the pain of the memory, the wound, the present circumstances, and they go to their coping mechanism. So they go to smoke a blunt or they drink some alcohol or they get high or they play the video game or they watch the pornography. Or they eat a bunch of food. a bunch of food. They go shopping. All of these things are coping mechanisms.

So it's interesting because I'm now just thinking about how you brought that up in the context of imaginations and the enemy trying to like get a foothold into through spiritual warfare. But sometimes it could be remnants of old spiritual warfare that just never got dealt with. Yeah, because I said it in one of the podcasts, the difference between your wife,

or your spouse wounding you and you, or your spouse triggering old wounds in you that you've never dealt with. And so I think it's a difference, but also too, for me, I just have to be completely honest when I fell into my pornography addiction in my marriage, it was all of those things. It was me not not coping with a lot,

not dealing with a lot of past trauma, but also like God had to tear down a lot of what I thought about, about what I thought marriage should be. And he had to address my pride because I think what, one thing that led me to pornography was when my wife rejected me. And I vicariously lived through me and not getting rejected through porn.

Like I can watch a man not being rejected. And I vicariously live through that. That experience, you know, but it was, it was, it was perversion at its finest, right? It was not true. intimacy. It was not true oneness, right? But it appealed to my pride, my ego. And God was like, this is not just merely a lust thing. This is a deep pride issue. Right. You are with the, with the image bearer that happens to be my daughter and you can't deal with her saying no to you.

And low key, the kindness of God in all of this is that he creates these scenarios where there's some level of tension or conflict as a way to expose what we need to deal with. Yeah. And so I've started to see that triggers are actually opportunities. Like, I need you to see that you're still hurt. I need you to see that you're still bitter. I need you to see that what happened to you when you was nine and they talked about you is showing up and how you deal with your spouse, right?

And so it's like sometimes instead of ignoring the trigger, pay attention to the trigger and bring them to the Lord and say, you know what? I didn't know this was still here, so heal me. Right? Like there are opportunities for healing. What you're bringing out is those coping mechanisms are getting in the way with how God wants to really heal you. And Matthew 1128 says, come to me all you who are weary and heavy burdened, right? I'll give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and I will give you rest for my yoke is easy and my burden is like. And it's interesting, he's just asking for an exchange of yoke. The burden you're carrying, the way that you're carrying. the way that you're living your life, trudging the ground through this yoke, it's bearing you down. Yeah. This coping mechanism is actually destroying you. Right? And I can confess as well.

I've talked to my wife about this because I have a certain level of, like, angst with pornography, because I used to wrestle with pornography as well. I could feel the enemy trying to lure me back into pornography. It's funny. You said you had these dreams coming out of nowhere, and I saw the, I. I felt like the Lord was showing me. The enemy will like create new ways to see if he can get you to stumble.

So it seems like I've never struggled with this before. And it was like, here's a thought. Leave your family. But why? Because it's just these random, at 10. I gotta try something new. But he'll also go back to old tactics. And this is our ministry.

And we talked about purity and walking in holiness for the love of God and all these kind of things. I've put that away from me. For years and years and years and years. And we've talked a lot about it. And all of a sudden, it was like, lure me back in, but he knows he wouldn't going to just jump me back in. So it was like through social media and thirst traps.

And then I couldn't do this. And so then it was like, you mentioned how girls read the erotica. Right. Well, I started reading. How can you please your spouse better? Yeah. Now you're like going into articles. It went into articles to like stories to erotica.

And then the Holy Spirit whispered to me one day and he's like, bro, this is still pornography. It's literary. This is literature. this is porn, like written porn. Like that's what pornography actually means. We can see things on video too. And so I had to confess it. And she's the one who stayed up straight,

straight up said, this is pornography. The Lord whispering and convicted me about it. I told her. And she said, babe, that's pornography. Wow. And it hit. He was like, I was reading an article.

Like I was about to argue. You know, I'm reading an article, right? About us. And I said, but it went from there to actual erotica. And she was like, that's pornography. you know. Melody, can you speak to that when it comes to women?

Just the things that they read or watch that entertain this kind of marital ideal that they would prefer? I literally won't watch shows about adultery where they're like liking it, getting away with it. Like, I'll read, what is this show about, right? I will not watch, I feel like a old movie. Stella got her groove back. and she's like messing with a little young man, you know. Because adultery runs in my family and I'm breaking it in my bloodline, right? I'm not even going to watch that kind of stuff, but there's an appeal there.

It's like a little tickle. Like, don't you want to watch this, right? So we have to be aware, like, I'm not watching this. This doesn't glorify the Lord. And it may appeal to a struggle in your family and your bloodline. You have to guard what you're reading, what you're watching. Little things like we have Vid Angel where you literally could delete all the swear words and parts in a movie. You know, like you got to do what you got to do.

Because this culture is getting darker and darker. People are like, it's like, it's not they do. We just don't watch some shows either. Whether it's Vid Angel or not. We're like, we just can't watch this, you know. Because it's appealing to your flesh. You know? And so if you feed that, it will grow.

It will grow. And the enemy has plans to fulfill it. I remember one year, there was a, I don't remember what year it was, but I was like, hey babe, my husband text me, the internet guy's coming to fix the internet. I'm like, oh, okay, cool. I'm praying, I'm with the Lord, I'm by myself at the house. I open the, he comes, I opened the door. I'm like, man, I know this guy.

Like I'm like, I know this guy, you know? And he's like, hey, I'm here to fix your internet. I'm like, okay, cool. And he's like, Melody? And I'm like, what's your name again? He's like, oh, he says his name. And I'm like, oh, my, like, I used to like him when I was 16. And he tried to come for me when I was 20-something.

But I was like, no. And I'm like, he's my internet guy. Like, what the devil? I'm not like, that's so random. They ain't nothing random about this at all. But that's because you got to have a battlefield mindset. That's good. But you're like, la-la-la, la, this is so interesting.

Or, you bet you're. been fantasizing on cheating on your man. And now you're like, ooh, wouldn't this be spicy? This is how the enemy works. I'm already like, this is a trap from the jungle. Like I already like, bro. He walking up the stairs and I'm already like, I gotta text my husband.

I gotta take my accountability. Like I'm already strategizing, okay? But even the way he walked in had a little swag to it. He like closed the door real soft. He's like looking to see who's in the house. And I was like, what he's thinking about to happen? You know what I'm saying? And I was like, there's the internet box.

Like I'm trying to be real, you know. He's like, how you been? I'm like, I'm great. I'm married right away, right? Right away, you know, I'm like, yeah, we made the news, you know, we didn't kids to our wedding day. I'm trying to like just talk about our story. He's like, oh wow, yeah, I'm married too.

I'm like, oh, that's great. That is great, right? Right? So he's doing his thing. I go to the kitchen. I'm texting my two accountability because I've shared this story about this guy to singles and we call him The Lust of the Eyes. And so I said, the lust of the eyes is in my house.

And they're like, what the devil? You know, and they're like, we pray and you know. And then I go to text CD, but I know he was teaching. And I was like, I don't want to this with him right now. He's teaching. And I felt the enemy go, tell him later. And I was like, no, because there's room to change your mind. I was like, hey, babe, you know that story, loves to the eyes.

He's our AT&T guy. That's crazy. I'm just letting you know, I'm good. I'm just putting it out there. That's good. That's how you fight the enemy right away with. Yes, put it out there. Nothing, nothing to grow.

And then I opened the back door. Because I said, if this mug tries something, I'm running out the house. I'm going to run. Quick confession. Let our finish, though. Because it's given. You got to run. It's given Joseph.

Yeah, Joseph, run. Okay. So I got the door open. He will always provide a way out. Yes. And so people will go. it don't take all that. Yes, it does, though.

Yes, it does. How these big men of God falling? How are these women like, how did, like this, this little moment? And so he's taking care of everything. He's about to go. I'm like, okay, good, everything's good. He's like, so are you happy? No.

Yeah. I'm acting like I heard the story, but I, come on. Are you happy? He needs somebody to put pause on him. And right there is where people get crap. Yes. Why are you having a conversation?

Eve had a conversation with the devil. Yeah. You don't have conversations with names. He needed a two piece and a biscuit. And so I was like, I'm very happy. And I opened the door. I was not about to go, are you happy? It's none of my business whether you're happy or not.

I'm not having a conversation with you. Open the door. He always, even when I was 16 and 20, he always said, can I get a hug? You know, he goes, can I get a hug? I said, no. And I would like tap this shoulder. And I went like, tapped his shoulder like, get out the house.

Get out of the house. So your family, I'll say hi. Say, okay, bye. You know, because he knows my family. He left. And I was like, the devil was at my door. Wow. I locked the door.

I called my besties. They're like, that's crazy. See what gets home? He's like, wait, what happened? Well, I called after I saw the message after I finished my class. And then I came home. And that was interesting because she told me the situation. and it had stemmed from,

so this is what's this strategy, right? It had stemmed from melody wrestling with happiness in that season. So the question came, are you happy? And I wanted to ask the question, are you happy? You know, let's talk about this because there's a seed of lie in the question. Yep. And she affirmed, no, I'm happy. I'm listening to any other.

She affirmed it. And the funny thing is, we were having trouble with AT&T. That's the AT&T, like, internet that I had. So I went ahead and I canceled AT&T, and then... Which I got Exfinity now? We got exfinity.

That's hilarious. He ain't never coming back. He just got rid of that. He ain't never coming back. He ain't ever coming back. He got, hang on. I work in Florida. No, you don't.

Not in this house. If you come back, get a fire stick. But I love Melody's story because she used discernment and she faced it. She didn't listen to it. There were multiple demonic prompts throughout there. Should I text them or not? And then she reached out their accountability partners

and all this and the other. Look at the past. This has been a person of temptation multiple times in the past. We have talked about this in our talks with young people and singles before. The enemy would love to cause her to stumble and fall. And she said that this was an issue in her own bloodline. Yeah.

There's so many different aspects to that story there that we can highlight. But she discerned this is spiritual warfare. That's real good. Man, thank you guys, man. This has been such a fruitful conversation. It's always good to catch up with you guys. I'm looking forward to our time later on over dinner, man. But thank you guys, man.

Let the people know how they can find y'all, how they can. and all the platforms y'all got, YouTube. Yeah, so we are starting a podcast called Hanging With the Fabians. So look for us on YouTube and then just go to cd and melody.com. CD and melody.com. I am the melody to his CD.

That's right. And CD like like cassette disc. Because some of y'all don't know what that is. Yeah, the little round-disc. That's actually the way I got my name. What you mean? So my name is Claude Daniel, CD. But it's spelled in one word, Claude Daniel.

I'm Haitian. And I was beatboxing in junior high and they thought that it sounded real fresh. So they were like, hey, yo, this sounds like a radio. He's like a cassette. And they're like, no, no, no, what's that new thing? Because I'm old. What's that new thing? It's a CD.

He sounds like a CD. The CD. And it was like a week and a half later or so. They were like, hey, CD, Claude Daniel, C.D. so I actually got it from being I've never heard that CD. So yeah, CDMelity.com. Yeah.

And whether you want coaching with us or you want us to speak at an event for marriage. Yeah, we provide pre and post-marital coaching. Yeah. With the Perrys is produced by the Perrys with support from Amanda Reed and Channing McBride. Video recording and audio production by Matthew Baxter and Xavier Fairley.

Edited by the team at Tread Libely. Artwork by Hop. Thank you for listening. Now go with God.