Bayside Baptist Church

Ted Cunningham: Good morning. Let me ask you a question. How many of you remember Olan Mills? Would you raise your hand if you remember Olan Mills? Young people, you've never heard of Olan Mills in your life. Would you raise your hand, young people? I need to see. Okay, you need to ask a senior adult about Olan Mills, but I'll describe it for you. Pretend your entire family just got arrested and they need a group mugshot. That's Olan Mills right there.

That was the 80s. We all marched into the basement of our church for that directory picture every year. Then we replaced them in the 90s with Glamour Shots. Raise your hand if you ever had a Glamour Shot. Raise your hand if you regret your Glamour Shot. You know why? Because one day you won't be around to defend yourself, and your grandkids are going to be going through your stuff. They're going to find those pictures and be like, "What was going on with Grandma? That was a weird time."

Now all the photographers are outdoors. They've got a lot of energy. They're very excited people. This October, my wife and I are going to celebrate 30 years of marriage. For our 25th wedding anniversary picture, we showed up to this park in Branson, Missouri. The photographer met us at the car with a lot of energy and said, "Amy, I want you to stand right here. Ted, you go back there 30 feet. I want you to sprint up, grab her, pick her up, spin her around, and set her back down." I said, "Should we stretch first? I didn't come prepared for this."

I'm not an athlete. I lack skill, balance, strength, and coordination. But you tell me to do something like that, I was all in. I sprinted up and grabbed my wife. At about the 180 mark, I lost my balance. For our 25th wedding anniversary picture, I body-slammed my wife to the ground with a force and a passion. I'm at that age where you don't get up right away after you fall down. You sit there for a second and make sure everything's okay. The photographer comes over and asks if we're okay. I said, "Tell me you got that!" She did not get that.

All of that was for nothing, but this was two minutes later. This is the story of our marriage. This isn't fake laughter or forced laughter. This is what I go for every single day in married life. It's what I call my wife's laugh: a silent patriotic laugh. When my wife finds something funny, she places her hand over her heart, leans forward, and nothing comes out. My goal is to get that laugh out of her every single day.

I'm married to a strong woman. Raise your hand if you're married to a strong woman. I love being married to a strong woman. Everything about my wife is intensity, and she's just very strong at all times. I absolutely love it. I'll come home from a bad day at church and say, "That was a rough day at church." She's like, "Fine, let's quit and move to Africa to be missionaries full-time." I'm like, "Wow, that escalated real fast. We should bring it down a notch."

My wife has a Fitbit and she loves getting her steps. She walks me and the dogs every night before sunset. I'll get home and say, "Can we just take it easy through the neighborhood tonight? Can we stroll, or do we have to be getting somewhere and getting exercise?" She's like, "No, we're getting our steps." She'll ask about halfway through the walk, "Are you squeezing your cheeks together?" I'm like, "Hey, listen. You know I grew up in an Independent Fundamental Pre-Millennial King James Version only Baptist church. I'm uptight pretty much all the time. You know that."

She loves this show on TV with Chip and Joanna Gaines called Fixer Upper. I've said if I ever meet Chip Gaines, I'm going to punch him right in the face. I hate that man and everything he stands for because he's ruining our marriage. Can I get an amen from some of the guys in here on that one? I come home from church and she's standing in the dining room like this. I ask, "What's going on?" She goes, "I think after dinner we should get rid of this wall. Can you get rid of that wall for me?" I had to go online and find a term to save our marriage. Do you know what the term is? Load-bearing. Every wall in our home is load-bearing. You can't touch one or the whole house comes down.

Then this lady came on Netflix. Her name's Marie Kondo and her thing is tidying up. Look at all the women going, "Mhm, declutter, declutter." My wife has two love languages: acts of service and quality time, which means I serve her for long periods of time. That's what those two love languages coming together means. In the middle of these love languages is one that she says Dr. Chapman missed, and that is decluttering. Whenever she gets in this mode, she always starts in the garage.

She gets the garbage can on wheels, flips the lid back, and like a grocery cart around the garage, she's just looking for stuff to throw away. She'll hold up one item at a time and ask, "Hey, are you still using this?" I'm like, "Babe, that's a hammer." She's like, "When's the last time you used it?" You better have an answer pretty quick or it gets tossed. Her algorithm on social media is so different than mine. Hers is all about health.

Here's how I learned she was getting real serious with this. I was in the garage a couple of years ago drinking out of a bottle of water. She walked up to me and knocked it right out of my hand. I asked, "What are you doing?" She said, "We're not drinking out of plastic bottles anymore." She asked if I knew why and I asked her to explain. She said, "You go buy these cases of water, you put them in your truck, it gets 120 degrees out, the plastic is melting from the bottle into the water, and you're going to get dementia."

I said, "Babe, let me explain something to you. When I was a kid, my dad would send me out to mow the lawn. That whole process started with me siphoning gas out of the car. I stuck a plastic tube down the Plymouth Volare, and I would drink between a quarter and a half a cup of gasoline to get that whole process started. I'm not worried about a little plastic in my body. Don't worry about it."

We've learned to say "no big deal" in our marriage on all the differences we have because every day I'm going after that silent patriotic laugh. For 30 years, my passion in life has been helping couples enjoy life together. I want couples to learn to lighten up and walk on the lighter side. I love the book of Ecclesiastes. If you haven't been there in a while, Chapter 1 says life is hard, and Chapter 12 says then you die. These are the bookends of Ecclesiastes.

In Chapter 1, Solomon begins to paint the picture of the earth as a grind. Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. In other words, the grind was going before you and I showed up, and when I die, the grind is going to keep going. When you get to Chapter 12, the first five verses explain how the body begins breaking down, and eventually, your body will find its way into the grind. In the middle of "life is hard" and "then you die," we get a little missing piece of theology in marriage ministry in the church today.

A lot of people hear this message when they come to church: "God gave you your spouse to beat you down and to suck the life out of you so you can be more like Jesus." I want to declare to you today that you can enjoy life together and your spouse is your companion through the grind of life. God didn't give you your spouse to be the grind of life. Ecclesiastes 9:9 reads, "Enjoy life with your wife all your miserable days." Sometimes I go to churches where they don't have screens and Bibles are closed, and in a preacher voice, I'll go, "Endure life with your wife all your miserable days!" and all throughout the congregation you'll hear, "Amen."

That's not what it says. It doesn't say "endure life with your wife." It says, "Enjoy life with your wife whom you love all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun." In this verse, we get two of the main themes from the entire book of Ecclesiastes. "Under the sun" is just speaking of life this side of heaven here upon this earth. Guess what? Life under the sun on earth is difficult and challenging. Providing for a family takes a lot of work. Solomon pursued building things, pleasure, money, and riches, and he found none of it ultimately satisfies. So you get "meaningless, meaningless, all is meaningless."

Then it says, "For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun." The word toilsome means grueling. Under the sun, our labor and the years we have and the time we put into work is challenging and grueling, but I want you to see what he's saying here. He is not saying that your spouse is the toilsome labor. He's saying in the midst of the toilsome labor, enjoy life with your wife. God didn't give you your spouse to be the toilsome labor; He gave you your spouse to go through it with.

This is how I start every counseling session as a pastor and have for years. I'll ask the couple what their goals are for our time. I want to make sure when you leave today or at the end of our sessions that we're hitting those goals, or I'll tell you the goal's not going to happen. When they're done sharing, I will share with them these three simple statements: Jesus is your source, Satan is your enemy, and your spouse is your companion. Don't mess this up.

Martin Luther said God could have taken a bone from Adam's head, implying that women would rule over men. He could have taken a bone from Adam's foot, implying men would rule over women. Instead, he took a bone from Adam's side, which implies mutual respect and equality. The word picture I love that I just showed you in that 25th wedding anniversary picture is this walking side by side through the toilsome labor together. Walking side by side through the grind of life together. Walking side by side through difficult seasons and stages of life.

If you want a great marriage, fire each other as the source of life. Plug into the true and only source of life. Spend your days giving each other the overflow. Walk side by side as you take your stand against the devil's evil schemes. That's how it works. When couples get caught up in the toilsome labor and the grind of life, it's very easy for them to start looking at one another as the enemy. I have to remind them to make no mistake: your marriage has an enemy. He hates you and he hates your marriage. It's just not your spouse. Satan is the enemy.

I want to be the companion. To experience high levels of marital satisfaction like we're talking about today from Ecclesiastes, never treat your spouse like the source or the enemy. Look to your spouse as that companion. Are you grateful for your companion through the toilsome labor today? For the widows and widowers in the room, I hope today as we go through the next few minutes that you look back on your marriage with joy and with gratefulness. I hear it all the time from widows in our church who say every time I talk on marriage, they think of their husbands.

Here's the key with marital satisfaction and enjoying life together: it's a decision. It's a choice. You're never going to discover it, you're never going to stumble into it, and you're never going to find it online. Raise your hand if you met online. It's a great way to meet. You're being judged by the senior adults right now, but that's okay. They're asking if that's legal. It's totally legal. I always love to look at an online couple because I usually get this: a good match is a good start, but it is not a guarantee of a thriving marriage.

It doesn't guarantee you enjoying life together because I'm not worried about how a couple meets; I'm concerned about what they do after they meet. Your marriage is only doing one of two things: you're either enjoying life together and choosing the path of decision, living in curiosity and fascination with one another, or you're not. That puts you on the path of drift. No one wakes up in the morning and says, "Today we will drift in this marriage." You just stop being intentional and you stop making the decision. I don't care which website you met on. Match.com, eHarmony.com, FarmersOnly.com, Ancestry.com. It doesn't matter where you met.

It's what you do after you meet that matters because it's a decision, and this enjoying life together is a daily choice that we make. Here's something else about marital satisfaction: it is based on factors and skills couples can do something about in any season or stage of life. I love meeting with couples because they always want me to help them out of the season or stage they're in. I hate to break it to you, but if you're here today with a three, a five, and a seven-year-old, you're going home with a three, a five, and a seven-year-old.

We can't get you out of that stage, but what we can talk about are factors and skills that work in any season or stage of life, whether you've been married five years or 50 years. From the newlyweds to the senior couples. One UK professor coined the term years ago: destination addiction. In America, we have fallen for destination addiction. The idea is I can't enjoy life right now, but it awaits me in the next season or stage that I'm in. I can't enjoy it with kids at home right now, but when the kids leave home, that's when we'll enjoy life together. I can't enjoy life now because of my job, but when I retire. If you're constantly pushing off joy, you will never experience it in this season or stage because this is a choice that you make.

So what we're going to look at today and into tonight are those factors and skills that lead to high levels of marital satisfaction. Do we have newlyweds in the room? You've been married less than five years. Let me see your hands. Less than five years. How long have you all been married? Don't look at her, look at me. You've only been married three years and you had to do the math with her to figure that part out? I always love asking guys how long they've been married. My favorite is how many kids you have. And then you ask for names and you lose it completely.

For newlywed couples, a lot of these factors and skills are like breathing early on. What was natural early on must become intentional later on. A lot of the skills I talk about, I know for newlyweds, I don't have to look at a newlywed couple and ask if you're touching enough. But after you've been married 30 years, guess what I need to be intentional with? Non-sexual touching. According to research, your wife needs 12 non-sexual touches a day. It's not one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve.

It's the hair over the ear. It's a hand on the small of the back. It's a hand on the thigh, a kiss on the cheek, a kiss on the forehead. I don't have to look at a newlywed couple and ask the question, "Are you guys spending enough time together?" That's all they're doing. They're spending plenty of time together. But after you've been married 30 years or 40 years or 50 years, you have to be intentional with it. I don't know if you remember when you were first dating, but do you remember before you introduced your boyfriend or girlfriend to your parents, you had already talked up that person?

You wanted your mom and dad to have a good picture of this person and good thoughts about this person, so you would brag about this person. You would speak words of high value about this person. It was natural early on. No one had to tell you to do that. But after you've been married a few years, are you still praising one another to family and friends? Are you still speaking words of high value over one another to family and friends? Even the way we think about each other. It's natural early on.

We read in the Song of Solomon, the Shulammite woman says her thoughts about Solomon are like a sachet of myrrh resting between her breasts. In that day, that's how they perfumed their body at night. She's basically saying, "I go to bed thinking about him, I wake up thinking about him, I dream about him." I always picture when you were first dating, fighting over who was going to hang up first. Does anybody remember that? When's the last time you fought with your spouse over who was going to hang up first because you wanted to stay on the phone with each other? But when you were first dating, it was like, "No, you hang up this phone. I'm not hanging up this phone." I'm looking at some couples been married a while and I know what you're thinking.

What was natural early on you need to be intentional with later on. If you'll be intentional with it, it can feel natural again. At 30 years of marriage, I don't wake up in the morning with the thought, "I've got to work on this marriage today. Got to really put my time in." No, I get up just being intentional. You're never going to hear me say marriage is hard work and takes so much out of you. No, I'm going to just remind people that marriage requires intentionality. We need to be intentional.

This was my mentor Dr. Smalley's passion in life: helping couples take everything irritating, frustrating, and annoying about the grind of life and the toilsome labor under the sun and finding a way to have fun with it. Gary started the church with us in Branson 24 years ago. He's a founding elder, and Amy and I met with Gary and Norma every week for lunch. Gary loved to give assignments. At one lunch at the Fish House in Branson, he said, "I want you guys to take one thing that's been bugging you lately, irritating you lately. I want you to find a way to have fun with it and then come back next week to lunch and report on it."

I've already told you I'm married to a strong woman. I get in the car and Amy looks at me and she goes, "Okay, marriage boy, we're going to do this. I want you to tell me something bugging you right now and I will let you know it will never bug us again. We are going to have fun with it." I had something fresh. I looked at her and said, "Babe, there's not a lot of adventure left for men in the world anymore, so would you please let me find my own parking space? Would you let me do that all by myself? I want to provide this for my family."

Amy said, "Game on." This was over 20 years ago, and we've never been bugged or irritated with one another in a parking lot since. This is the power of decision. We used to pull into a lot and we didn't even have to say anything. She'd point out three spaces from the door, I'd drive 20 spaces down. Her eyes would say, "You stubborn, stubborn man." My eyes would say, "We're getting our steps." It ended that day. It changed that day because Amy truly made the decision and I made the decision.

Now, 20 years later, we pull into a parking lot. The rule still applies. If she looks at a space, it's still automatically disqualified. But I drive down 20 spaces, and now she's not frustrated. She leans over and starts massaging my bicep and she'll say, "You did this all by yourself. So proud of you. Good job." You know what I caught her doing a couple of years ago? She knows those Andes candies at the end of an Olive Garden meal are like crack to me. I can't explain it. I love Andes candies. She bought a bag of them and she keeps them in her purse now for when I do something good. It was in a parking lot that she handed me my first one. I ripped that thing out of her hand, opened it up, and realized my wife just gave me a treat. She's rewarding my good behavior. I'm a dog! You've got to eat it and you've got to go with it.

You have to choose it. A good match is a good start, but it's not a guarantee of a thriving marriage. So what I want to do is really start to build out this morning and then have a lot more fun with it tonight, some of these factors and skills that we need to be intentional with. One of the first things I always like to address: raise your hand if you've got small kids at home still. The key for you right now in this season and stage of life is you must eradicate the child-centered home. Some of you just heard me say "eradicate kids from the home." I did not say that. I said prioritize your marriage in the home. Give your children the gift of a mom and dad enjoying life together.

Genesis 2:24. You've heard it over and over. Every wedding you go to is going to do Genesis 2:24 and quote this because Jesus quotes it in his teaching in Matthew 19 and Paul does this in Ephesians 5. But there are two parts to this verse, and don't overlook the first part with major parenting implications. We call this the "leave and cleave" text. For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother—that's the leave—to cleave, be united, to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

What we're learning here is that the bond between a husband and a wife is stronger than the bond between a parent and a child. I'm raising my children to leave home. My kids are now in their 20s. We're empty nesters. But it's not something that just takes place at a wedding. You have to prepare for this their entire childhood. You're preparing them to leave home so that they can start their own family. I've been teaching this verse to my children since they were five and seven years old.

You could go up to my son Carson when he was five. He graduates from Liberty University in May, so you can tell how long I've been teaching and sharing this. But when he was five, I would look at him and go, "We love you. You're a welcome addition to this home, but you're not the center of it. Your mom and I have big plans after you leave." He'd look at me and be like, "Well, what are you going to do?" I'm like, "Well, first of all, we're going to Disney World. That's how we're going to kick the whole thing off."

I want my kids to know they are a welcome addition to this home, but I'm giving them a gift of a mom and dad enjoying life together. To the grandparents in the room, I want to remind you of something. You are probably in the most influential season of your life. Why? Because now you don't just have children; you have grandchildren who are watching, listening, remembering, and repeating. That's how family discipleship works. How do your children learn and grow? It's messages that are written on the heart, and you're writing these messages every day because your children are watching, listening, remembering, and repeating.

Your children have a front-row seat to your marriage. When my son was five, his favorite clip on YouTube was the German Coast Guard. If you get time tonight or this afternoon, just type in youtube.com/GermanCoastGuard. A guy's being trained day one on the German Coast Guard when a Mayday comes in. 30-second commercial. It's real fast. "Mayday, Mayday, we are sinking! We are sinking!" "Hello, this is the German Coast Guard." "Mayday, Mayday, we are sinking! We are sinking!" "Uh, what are you thinking about?"

Carson got it. Fell over in laughter at five. I forgot about this clip. A few weeks later, I'm driving down the road singing a hymn from my childhood. I sing all the time. The hymn goes like this: "I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore..." and from the back seat, I heard, "And what were you thinking about?" I looked at my wife and I said, "They see everything. They hear everything. They forget nothing. And then they repeat." I want their front row of my marriage to just be a great reminder to them.

When my daughter, who's here with me, was five, she was taking over the home, wearing me out. I put her on the breakfast bar one day, I put my hand on her heart, and I said, "Corinne May, there's only one queen in this house and you ain't her." She looked at me with those eyes that said, "We'll see." She told my wife the next day there's room enough in this house for two queens. I put her back on the breakfast bar and said, "Corinne, you'll never be my queen, but you're my princess. One day I'm going to stand at the back of a church with you looking down the aisle, and I'm not walking you down the aisle until I know he loves you as much as me."

At that very moment, Genesis 2:24 is going to come to completion for me. I'm going to walk you down the aisle and give you away to become another man's queen. Don't overlook your marriage as part of your parenting. This is a very important factor. I said, "Corinne, between this day and that day, I want to show you every day how a queen should be treated." To the best of my ability, I'm not going to be perfect at this, but I want to give you that picture. On May 31st, 2022, my daughter walked down our backyard.

I walked down the backyard with her and my son asked the question, "Who gives this woman to be married to this man?" I said, "Her mother and I," and then I stepped around and officiated the ceremony. I led right off with Genesis 2:24 and I told her, "Our relationship today changes, Corinne. It changes. Not a bad relationship, it's just going to be different. Relationally, emotionally, I'm no longer your first phone call. Caden's your first phone call. When something breaks around the house, don't call me. You call Caden. I mean, he's not going to be able to fix it, but you've got to give him a shot."

This is so important. Who here has been married more than 50 years? I've been watching this couple right here. She raised her hand, he didn't. He doesn't want to do the math. How long have you all been married?

Guest (Female): 67 years.

Ted Cunningham: 67 years! Wow. I've enjoyed watching you, sir. We're glad you're here. Welcome. I really am. You've been a lot of fun to watch. If you don't know this couple married 67 years, they should never buy another meal again. Those of you who have small kids at home, how long have you all been married? 13 years. Do you know this couple married 67 years? Well, you are after this service. You're taking them to lunch.

And here's why. You've got antibacterial product hanging all over your purse. She let her kids pick up cigarette butts and chew on them. And her kids are fine! Are these some of your kids sitting next to you? How many kids you all have?

Guest (Female): Two children.

Ted Cunningham: Two children. You, sir, go talk to him because he used to let his kids sleep in the back window of the car on long trips. Now you strap them in like you're launching them to outer space. They used to put their kids in a playpen with only one toy, all of them together. That's where we got the idea for cage fighting. Their kids messed up, they took the kids outside of the playpen, they turned the playpen upside down and put it on top of them. And their kids are all fine!

Those are good days. My dad taught my brother and me that the bell on the ice cream truck meant they were out of ice cream. That's a good dad. That's a dad preparing his children for life in the real world. Here's why I encourage that. This is what we say in Branson, Missouri. We live in the live country music capital of the world, and so this works for us: every marriage is a duet in need of great backup singers. I want you young married folks in here to find yourself an older couple. Find a widow, find a widower. Take them out to lunch.

Where do we get the idea of duet backup singers? In the Song of Solomon, it's this duet between Solomon and the Shulammite woman. Chapters 1 and 2 they're dating, Chapter 3 they get married, Chapter 4 they're on the honeymoon, Chapters 5 through 8 they're building out faithfulness and commitment in the marriage. But the daughters of Jerusalem, they're the backup singers. They're the backup singers who come in and say this: "We rejoice and delight in you; we will praise your love more than sparkling cider."

My question for you in your marriage right now: who is rejoicing, delighting, and praising your love? I work with couples all the time who have horrible backup singers. Backup singers that help them doubt. I meet with couples who find the most jaded family members they can to help them. You know how Dave Ramsey says stop going to your broke friends for financial advice? Yeah, stop going to your jaded friends for marriage advice. You need healthy voices. One of the things I love about this church is Bayside desires to be a great backup singer to your duet. I hope this church becomes known in this community as great backup singers to the duets all around.

I hand couples in counseling a yellow pad and go, "Write down the names of every voice of influence into your marriage right now." Then I bring the list together and I walk through it. Who do we need to turn down? Who do we need to mute? And who do we need to turn way up? You know how many times we have to mute mom and dad, mother-in-law, father-in-law? I'm not telling you don't go home for family gatherings, but as a decision you have to make as a couple, mom and dad will no longer be an influence on your marriage. I'm a father-in-law now. You want to be a great backup singer to your child's duet? Be a backup singer to their duet, not just your child. Rejoice, delight, and praise the love of your child's marriage. We all need it.

I want to show you this precious couple I met. Lloyd and Jean. At the time I took this picture, they were married 69 years. I did a marriage conference at their church, and I was at the book table afterwards. Lloyd was making his way up to the book table, stuck his finger in my chest, and started to speak a blessing over me and my marriage. For a brief moment, he became a backup singer to Ted and Amy Cunningham's duet. I remember him saying, "I wish we would have had something like this when we were first married." Lloyd, you were in World War II. He was one that got married right before he was deployed. Jean shows up and falls on his arm, and they speak this blessing. I called back to the church every year and followed them to 73 years of marriage.

When they were done blessing us, Jean reached in her purse and grabbed two identical collapsible canes. Handed one of them to Lloyd. And both of them, like Indiana Jones, went click-clack like that. I watched them walk out to the parking lot and I called my wife and said, "We need two canes and two of those rockers from Cracker Barrel because we are in this." We used to say at our church "for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part." We got rid of the line "till death do us part" and we replaced it with "until the Lord returns or calls one of us home."

I hope that's true in the commitment you're making in your marriage today. I'll end with the words of theologian Kenny Chesney, who said, "Don't blink. Because just like that, you're six years old, you take a nap, you wake up and you're 25, and your high school sweetheart becomes your wife. Don't blink, because you might miss your babies growing like mine did, turning into moms and dads. Next thing you know, your better half of 50 years is there in bed, and you're praying God takes you instead. Trust me, friends, 100 years goes faster than you think." Would you pray with me?