Hey Saints and Apes, how are you? That should be a new one. What's up, y'all? It was given Mr. Rogers.
How are you? Like a ringtone. And this little, this way you sit now is kind of funny because it's kind of like Indian style and you sitting like our four-year-old, five-year-old Autumn on the couch. Does that trouble you?
No, you don't want to trouble me. Okay. I'm glad your feet done, though.
Speaking of Indian style, I will never forget a time when we went to Trinidad and I was on a radio show and I told my testimony and I made reference to being in kindergarten and sitting Indian style. And he was like, Indian style. And he looked offended. And I was like, yeah, when you sit down and you cross your legs, da, da, da, da, da. And I... I came to realize that in Trinidad, it's a lot of people who are ethnically Indian.
And so even making reference to something being Indian style. Anyway, I have a question. Before you got married to me, when you were engaged, all the things, what did you think marriage would look like when you imagined it?
Huh. That's a good question. I'm going to be honest. That's very ignorant. 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.
Bunch. And, you know, I don't know. Sex. I didn't want to take it there. I mean, I didn't take it there, you know.
So speaking of marriage. Us being in the sheets a lot. Speaking of marriage. A whole lot. Speaking of marriage.
Us 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 this is 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 Fabians!
So Melody is the person who has 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.
Just 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. Bustelo. That poisonous caffeine. She gave me some Bustelo from off the stove one time.
And I went to work. I said, my belly is possessed. I have never had the boo-boo.
I've never had the boo-boo that bad. A ride in my belly. She said, I'm done. I don't want no Puerto Rican coffee ever.
Give me the white people coffee. Not only that, I don't know who 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 couple who we glean to, we look to, you guys have helped us, you guys have prayed with us and prayed 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. 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 they get my attention, but they are not supposed to interrupt me. And I remember, you know, when I had my first child and me, 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. And, you know, we, she has to put her 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. All my kids do it now, you know? And so you guys have just taught us so much through the years.
And so I'm just so grateful for you guys. We love you guys. That's awesome.
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...
for a minute. A hot minute. Recently, probably the last two years, y'all work with like Family Life at their, what's it called?
Weekend to Remember. So we speak at their conferences. And usually how many people are there? 700 to like a thousand.
It'll range to about 500 to maybe 2,000. Yeah, over a thousand sometimes. 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... The biggest thing in this age, too, is this is a lot of distractions.
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. 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. I was 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, yo, you need to get off Jerome. Can you not say 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. Yeah, it's a little convicting because Jackie, she don't even like verbalize, 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. I want to talk to your face.
Yes. That's good. Say it.
Sorry, babe. It's okay. I really like your face.
I tell my wife, I don't want to talk to your forehead. I don't want to. And so I'll say, and we teach this, you got to listen with your face.
Come on. You got to listen with your face. And so.
We've 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.
And that's the agreement we have. And at 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 in 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 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, openly. 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. Distraction 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 depths 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, 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 think, not just what you feel, who you are, like how you, how you actually.
bringing yourself fully to a topic or a situation or even to the marriage and I had said to her I I don't feel like you're very transparent with me. And she thought about it for a couple of 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 come to a conclusion is I have to verbalize it.
So when somebody offend me, I'm not going to sit on it for a day. I got to talk about it right now to even process it if 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, 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 believe. I got another thought I'm fighting. You know there's some things you just talk with your girlfriend or your sister in Christ like the females. Female to female, male to 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. There's no one on man out there. 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 got to be able to bring stuff up. Struggles even. I feel like there's couples who are like, no, you're never sure. what you're struggling with, with your spouse. And it's like, what?
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. So we were ministering to a couple that are 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?
And they said, because it feels weird. Oh, wow. We just got used to working side by side, but we don't talk, you know?
Really? How does that work? Exactly. So it's just like, you're like, I can see it though.
You just became, you're ministry partners. You're used to existing. Yeah. 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. And being intimate.
Yes. Or becoming one. I mean, speaking of becoming one, I mean, you probably don't, I don't know.
I don't want to talk about that. Like, 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. Because another way of looking at it 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.
Right. So that can happen in marriage, too. 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. 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, so are there some, like, are there some rhythms you actually set in place to give you clarity on where y'all are in y'all 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 all 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's 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.
My man. Come on. Come on.
And we know, Jackie, right? I can work. 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 yeah balance one another and balance one another I would be a workaholic without him and he'd just be playing all the time without me right and so we have to so he like recently was like babe we gotta 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 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. 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're 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 and 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 could 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 filled my tank.
And then 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 think, you know, I think couples have to understand that. you know, when you feel somebody else's tank, it gives them the energy to kind of feel yours.
Exactly. And to 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. You don't like doing ministry. At times, I don't.
I'm going to be honest. When I don't feel fed in other places, because 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? It 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, I'm similar. I think the hard part about what everyone is saying is really the hard part, which is like the difficulty of marriage oftentimes is that...
the fact that a healthy marriage requires self-sacrifice. Yes. It requires it.
And so let me read something. In Ephesians 5, 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 as I can. Oh, yeah. You been 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 is 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 on your investment, so to speak. And I typically like to 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.
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 5, 17, 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, God, Daniel.
Amen. And it says to water- your spouse with the word of God. Come on. Right? So when I wake up, 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. Come on, 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. 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 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, it's true. Like she gets excited when I say, babe, pull out the calendar. What are we doing this week?
What's going on? She goes, oh, and then she gets into it. She gets excited.
What are we doing? What are we doing, Paul? Huh? Let's go.
Let's go. What are we doing? 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. How? 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, I'm like, 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. But he learned to say it with a very low tone because he's Haitian.
And he's like, 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. 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? 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 shouldn't even be past it. We should be past this by now.
We shouldn't be arguing about this anymore. We shouldn't. Conversations are going to come back up again. What I hear you guys saying is, you know, like you had to work, but that work takes a lot of humility. because for me, I mean, I did not like I didn't like that Jackie tried to correct me and I didn't like the way that she, 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, you know that's a hard issue at that point, 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 in a tone that was still respectful, then you were able to see that one of the bigger issues wasn't necessarily my tone, but your own heart. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's true.
So it eliminates excuses when you love a way. 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? You were 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? No, I said, I looked at the sky.
She said, what is that face? And I said, I'm trying to remember what I said. And I'm checking my own heart. But the way she came to me was so respectful. It was so gentle.
And I had to re-examine myself. And I said, you know what? You're right.
I'm going to get better. And it took us a while to get to that. to that place. Year two, year three. And so like, I like what you just said.
You should never stop working. Like if our sanctification 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, you can check me and I can check you and I love you. Yeah. 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 say 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 a 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? Yes. Like...
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 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. And you got to learn all this. So what is conflict?
But 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. Right. 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. 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.
And on and on it goes, because God is the God of restoration and redemption. Make up sex on fleek. Amen. Hey, they be teaching us stuff.
A particular couple that we know. Yeah, so. Really? Yes. yes some call me 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 so like there was a this this season 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 And he 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.
Okay. That's John Gottman. But he was being so critical. And I was like, I'm going to be critical back. You know, then 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 him up to who he is in me. 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, can we talk? Can we talk?
He's going to fix it. I know you're upset. What did I do? What did I? And I was like, 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're not leaving until we deal with this. And it's like. That is not the way to deal with them.
So he gave me space and I got into the work. I had to get into the work, bear with one another, love one another. And I said, I'm not going to get out of this passage till I feel it. And it took a whole day because I was angry. And I was like, bear with one another.
No, no, Holy Spirit, you got to 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.
We're in bed. I was like, I'm ready to talk, you know? And he's, and this is like two days later. And he's like, 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. You can't plant this. 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 do 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 into, until it got to the place to where she saw that it was going to. Because I think it's a difference between you, you know, going away and you not. allowing the Lord to work on your heart and you 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, Tajeet. It's a jacket in 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... to let her go off with her king and then for us 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… 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 um that i said that like i've had to learn stand up to stand up under the weight right because in first peter chapter three verse seven 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 finally 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 what is the the boundary like what is the limit that should there be a limit yeah like Because we possibly give somebody too much space. You know? That's possible too.
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 when 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. Right? 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 20 minutes or whatever it 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.
So Melody, how did you call him 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, 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 want to just hear you're sorry. I need to know what you're going to work on. Y'all sorry. We are very alike.
It's like, I get it. You're sorry, but... My sorry ain't enough. I appreciate it, but what we going to do?
Sorry is often good enough for me. Yes. He wants 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 going to pause. I'm going to, you know, like his plan of action. And then I said, you know, I was talking to Jackie and she said that we probably need to discover each other more. And it was cool because it unlocks something.
And he was like, I think I'm angry. And I'm like, about what? Right. So criticism is 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.
And 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. They know what I like. And he's like, no, I'm going to get it.
I'm going to get it right one year, you know. So this was that year. He's going to do it.
And he booked us a place for anniversary. And we get there. 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.
It's all right. So we get there. And it was like a place you take your kids. Like a little vacation. You know what I'm saying?
It had that feel. Like kiddie balls. It was 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, they ain't got no strawberries here. You know?
And immediately now, the enemy comes. You see, he don't plan for you. He didn'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 is, he probably put his heart and his soul, all of his being in that. Now watch what happened. She's getting attacked with the enemy with these words.
As soon as I walk in through 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 her. 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 slid 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. You go out of your way to do this. And high maintenance.
And like, for real, I heard this going hard. And then. I text one of 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. But I'm like. I don't want to be in this kiddie 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's 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 but it doesn't mean you don't love me and I feel like the enemy saying he doesn't love you that's good because you're not worth it yeah 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 you He said, let's pray.
And so we prayed. Like, God, we expose these lies. We will have a good anniversary. And his kiddie pool. How about this?
We didn't even go to the pool. We went to see the sights. I was like, we will have a good time.
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, we just like.
And then I will say... Seventh year, it was so beautiful. He had a beautiful hotel. Let me say that right. So what happened is I'm learning Melody's love languages and apology 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. 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 hurt 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. Where was underwear at? I surely, it was. At that place we were at.
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 taken care of. 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, he right. Exactly. Look at each wrong. 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, yes. This is the next year.
That's the following year. Oh, that's good. That's been the following, yeah.
That's good. That's so encouraging because I think it just shows you the beauty of a man. what a marriage can be when there's two spiritually mature people who are willing to do the work. Yes.
Right. Cause what, cause what that is, cause 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. That's good.
That's good. Yeah. Because I think it's so encouraging that you guys dealt with it immediately. You know, that, that you took it to the Lord immediately, you know, cause you know, When you're new in Christ, or even when 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 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. Does the devil love 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, 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 like 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's 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 chain. 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 ask that 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 opportunity. opposition right and so just not being like because i remember when we came to that conclusion probably recently yeah it was like i would be throwing a lot of arrows at us so i 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 like you ain't actually my wrestle yeah my wrestle with someone somebody else i had the i had the i had a series of dreams a couple of years ago that just started like coming out of nowhere of Jackie cheating on me. Oh, that was for a year.
Yeah, yeah. 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 I would literally feel angry at her throughout the day.
No, 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.
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 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. I want to be faithful.
And it wasn't until, yeah, yeah. My whole vagina done been ripped in two 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. Ugh. 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 one, Jackie don't even like people like that. So it's like, for her to even cheat on me, it's just so out, like, it's just, you know what I'm saying? I had to really 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.
I had an event in Chicago, and the rapper KB was there, the Christian rapper KB was there. 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.
And I was like, really? And he walked me through it and we just talked in the car, just driving one, me and KB. And he just prayed, prayed 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 Lord had to really help me out of that season.
And that's when I walked away feeling like, wow. the devil hates my marriage. Yes.
Like we, because we have 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 to affect how you, how you think.
Yes. It's just like, wow, like you didn't do none of this with my girlfriends. Right. Right.
It was just like, just be. Yes. Keep going. 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. Yeah. The same way that we face it is fighting for the oneness.
With the distractions, you got to 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 could 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 yeah and the bride say come come into 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 that he will build his church and the gates of hell will not resist it gates are stationary uh 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'd 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 might be lingering. But I'll just pause for 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, 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 broken. 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 looks like somebody hit you with a bat.
Like that. And he's in the doctor's, you know, hospital. He's just hearing beep, beep.
And the Lord said, stop running from me. Wow. Stopped running from 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 out. Forgive me. But now she had to take care of him. Ooh.
She would call me. You got to take care of the Negro. Unless he's not a Negro. No, he's not. But you know.
You know. Sounds like a Tyler Perry movie. The ninja.
The ninja. That just cheated on you. But here's the funny thing. She said, Lord, in prayer, God break his leg like a lamb.
and put them 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 or 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 bad leg, Melody.
And I don't kick him. 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 crutches. She put him out the car.
She put him out the car. She's driving. And she's like, God's like, go get your man. She come back. I'm sorry.
Get back in the car. He's like, babe, what is going on? She's like, this is making me crazy. Now, I want to pause there. Adultery does make you crazy.
It was, 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? And he'd be like, babe, I'm so sorry.
He didn't go, I already said I'm sorry five times. Right. I'll say it as much as you need me to say it.
See, Melody earlier said that, 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 gotta 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 on 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 It 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. This was not going to just get fixed.
It would take time. And I think what's coming to my heart to share is they have kids who are married now. 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 there's 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.
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.
Wow. 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 was after.
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 glory.
They never see it. Maybe in glory. 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 to fight. And this is for my kids.
You know, like you have to, and it's for the world. Yeah. Right.
Yeah. So this year. or this season we were in Florida, I had got, we got hit crazy with new attacks that we ain't never had before.
In one moment, I remember feeling the enemy literally say, you should leave. Leave CD. Yeah. I never had that thought. And what I was upset about wasn't even that big.
I was like, stop. You know, like I reject that thought, right? Hold every thought captive. But it was like, but like, don't you wish you could just do you?
And he was like, but he was like strong. And he 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, 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.
Look at you doing a work. Go ahead. Go ahead.
I've had random moments of just like irrational like thoughts. Yes. Yes. But intruding irrational thoughts. But it was like, well, just imagine it.
Just like, just imagine what it would be like. Like you could just do you. You ain't got to cook.
You ain't got to clean. You ain't got to 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. Come on.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you allow that door to the devil, and now you're like, man, I'll go on vacation. I'll do this.
And the thing is, we'd probably be miserable. Yes. And who knows what attack.
But the trap was to get her to imagine. Because then it's a seed. Yeah. But you don't got the fine print of what the devil has for you.
And what STD you gonna get if you sleep around. Come on. What disease you going to get? And what the devil's going to do to your kids? Because you just opened a door to your house, right?
And so I was like, what is this? And I felt the Lord say, you need to resist this evil spirit. And I said, I resist these thoughts right now. And I resist the devil right now. You will not have my house.
And you will not take me out of my post. Because that's what it is. 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.
Yeah. Because what happens is, and I think this is what happens with a lot of marriages too. Yeah.
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 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. You cannot worship him in spirit and in truth.
Right. 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 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 a way to escape.
You have people who are addicted to video games as 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 put ourselves in another world, which actually makes us discontent in the position that God has actually placed us in. That's good. You know?
Sure. Another interesting thing about those that they are sometimes coping mechanisms. Mm-hmm. 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 to. Those wounds creep up at their present. The marriage 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. 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 and 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 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 coping with a lot, not dealing with a lot of past trauma, but also God had to tear down a lot of what I thought marriage should be. And he had to address my pride because I think one thing that led me to pornography was when my wife rejected me. And I vicariously lived through me not getting rejected through porn.
Like I can watch a man not being rejected. And I vicariously lived through that. But it was perversion at its finest. It was not true intimacy. It was not true oneness.
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. You are 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.
And so I 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 in 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. What you're bringing out is those coping mechanisms are getting in the way with how God wants to really heal you. and Matthew 11 28 says come to me all you who are weary and heavy burdened right I'll take my yoke upon you and I will give you rest for my yoke is easy and my burden is light yeah and it's interesting he's just asking for an exchange of yoke the burden 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.
Cause 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 that I felt like the Lord was showing me the enemy look 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 attempts.
You got to try something. I got to try something new. But he'll also go back to old tactics.
And this is our ministry. 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. 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 wasn't going to just jump me back in.
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, right? 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 pornography, like written porn. Like that's what pornography actually means. Right. We can see things on video too.
And so I had to confess it. And she's the one who said, 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 just reading an article. Like I was about to argue. Yeah, you know, I'm reading an article, right?
About us. And I said, no. 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 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.
Yeah. 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, in your bloodline. You have to guard what you're reading, what you're watching. And little things like we have vidangel 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 not a big deal. We just don't watch some shows either.
Whether it's vidangel or not. Yeah, 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 texted 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 open 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. There ain't nothing random about this at all. But that's because you got to have a battlefield mindset.
That's good. But if you're like, la la la, this is so interesting. Or.
You've 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 devil.
Like, I already like, bro. He walking up the stairs, and I'm already like, I got to text my husband. I got to 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 do you think 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 did kids to our wedding day. I'm trying to like just talk about our story.
He's like, oh, wow. I'm married too. I'm like, oh, that's great. That is great, 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 heart.
And they're like, what the devil? You know, they're like, we praying, you know. And then I go to text CD, but I know he was teaching. And I was like, I don't want to mess 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, Lust of 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. Just put it out there. Yes, put it out there.
Nothing, nothing to grow. And then I opened the back door. And I said, if this mug tries something, I'm running out the house. I'm going to run.
Quick confession. Please. Let our finish though.
because it's giving you gotta run it's giving Joseph yeah Joseph run now okay so I like 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 you're 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 you're like No. Yeah. I'm acting like I heard the story, but I, come on.
Are you, are you happy? He needs somebody to put paws on him. And right there is where people get trapped. Yes. Why are you having a conversation?
Eve had a conversation with the devil. Yeah. You don't have conversations with names. He needed two pieces 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? Yeah, she didn't return the question. I'm not having a conversation with you. Open the door.
He always, even when I was 16 and 20, he always say, can I get a hug? You know, he goes, can I get a hug? I said, no. And I would like tap the shoulder, like, get out the house.
Get out the house. Tell your family I said hi. I said, okay, bye. You know, because he knows my family.
He left. I was like, devil was at my door. Wow. I locked the door.
I called my besties. They're like, that's crazy. CD gets home. He's like. wait what happened well i called yeah after i saw the message after i finished my class and then i came home and that was interesting because she told me the 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 let's talk about this because there's a seed in of lie in the question yep and we we and she affirmed no i'm happy i'm this and 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 we got xfinity that's hilarious yeah He ain't never come back.
He got him to change jobs to come back. Yeah, yeah. He's like, I work in Florida now. No, you don't.
Mm-mm, not in this house. If he 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 him or not? Yeah.
And then she reached out to her accountability partners and all this and any 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. There's so many different aspects to that story there that we can highlight.
But she discerned. That's good. 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, all the platforms y'all got. Yes. Yeah, so we are starting a podcast called Hanging With The Fabians. So look for us on YouTube and then just go to cdmelody.com. C-D- and melody.com.
I am the melody to his CD. That's right. And CD like, like cassette disc.
Cause some of y'all don't know what that is. Yeah. That's actually the way I got.
My name. What you mean? So my name is Claude Daniel. Uh-huh. C-E-D.
But it's spelled in one word. Claude Daniel. Claude Daniel.
He's Haitian. Uh-huh. 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.
Uh-huh. What's that new thing? It's a CD.
He sounds like a CD. A CD. And it was like a week and a half later or so.
they were like hey CD Claude Daniel CD so I actually got it from being I've never heard that CD so yeah cdandmelody.com 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 or speaking we can do that alright well thank y'all love y'all bye y'all peace peace