Forever Love

Calvin Copeland: Pastor Cal Cop here. If you haven't subscribed yet, why don't you like, subscribe, and comment? We've got another episode for you, and our guest today is Gary Thomas, a renowned speaker and author in the area of marriage and relationships. He's actually authored over 20 books such as Sacred Love and The Sacred Search.

And don't forget, get ready because we've got Season 3 coming, and it's going to keep getting better and better. We've got some wonderful interviews of couples identifying how their hearts have been healed. Why don't you like, subscribe, and comment?

Thank you guys again for coming to another episode of how love can last forever after all. I have got a guest that I am so excited to see. Anyone who has had a heart or desire for marriage and relationship probably knows who this gentleman is. I had an opportunity to be at a marriage retreat with him not too long ago, and he said, "Sure, I'll be on your podcast," and here we are today. We've got Gary Thomas, profound writer, great speaker. I'm going to have him tell a little bit more of his story, but I'm so happy to have him on the podcast. Gary, why don't you just say hello and tell us a little bit about your origin story?

Gary Thomas: Calvin, it's surprising how closely our lives resemble each other. I know you saw your wife when she was 12 and you were 12. I was 15 and my future wife was 12 when we became boyfriend and girlfriend. For us, it only lasted two weeks, and Lisa broke up with me when she went to spring break, wanting to keep her options open. She thought we would get back together when she came back, but I'd moved on to another girl in the youth group at that point.

But another thing, when you said even before you were with Elise that you felt guilty of thinking of someone else. I still remember because we ended up remeeting in college, went to the same college, and I was walking across right in front of the library holding hands with my girlfriend at the time, and Lisa walked by and I felt guilty.

We weren't committed to each other or anything. There's no reason, but there was just this sense of doing this in front of her made me feel guilty. Lisa walked by and she called her sister, "Yeah, Gary's holding hands of another girl. She can enjoy him for a little bit, but I'm the one that's going to marry him." And we did. We ended up getting married right out of college. I was 22, Lisa was 19. She's only a year behind me but she skipped kindergarten and she was young for her grade. I was born in October so I was late.

So we really don't have much thought or memories apart from each other. I had more girlfriends than she did, but she didn't have any girlfriends. I had more girlfriends than she had boyfriends. It's kind of funny how we both—and I was a person of faith for as long as I can remember as was Lisa. So as I was hearing your story with Elise, it was just kind of amazing to see the parallels, how God brought us along similar paths.

Calvin Copeland: Did you feel like people have always looked at us like you guys were just made for each other? I do believe once again that what I felt at 12 years old was true, but I also know the work that I've been putting in too. So were we just a good fit? Were we just lucky? Part of what the podcast that I'm trying to do is try to help people understand how they really can play a part in finding their spouse and then the benefits of it too. I think the world does a terrible job of making folks feel like there's more negative to marriage than there is positive, when the data completely proves completely opposite.

Gary Thomas: Well, I do believe it's important to make a wise choice if you can. I wrote a book on it, The Sacred Search. But in Sacred Marriage, I say a good marriage isn't something you find, it's something you make and you have to keep on making it. So it's not a matter of you finding the quote-unquote right person and then everything is easy. It's like you say, and we both believe that. How do we have a love that lasts forever? We never stop working on it. The day we stop working on it, it doesn't feel like a love that we want to go on for ever. So I think we're sympatico as far as that goes.

Calvin Copeland: So here's where I get to get schooled, I get to get mentored, because I believe that the purpose for marriage is to heal your heart based on Ephesians 5:21 through 27. I guess we can start there and we'll probably pull more in. But I don't know, do you agree with that? Or what are your thoughts?

Gary Thomas: Well, it depends on how you define healing. If you mean by healing, meaning growth in righteousness using Ephesians 5:21 through 27, I'm right with you. But I think there are other purposes of marriage. I don't think I would answer with one. I think I would go to Genesis 2:18. One of the first purposes God says is it's not good for Adam to be alone. So I think companionship was an initial purpose.

I think secondly, 1:28, the purpose is procreation. Be fruitful and multiply. The purpose of marriage is to have children. And then third, I would put, using the same verse, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth, rule it and subdue it. I think it's a cooperating in mission.

Jesus said in Matthew 6:33, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness." And so I kind of look at those as the two purposes of marriage where Adam and Eve were told, "Okay, I've created this physical world. I want you to rule over it. I want you to spread it. I want you to build it." Jesus says in Matthew 6:33, "I'm launching a spiritual kingdom. I want my followers to seek first my kingdom, not your own, not your own happiness, not your own reputation, not your own pleasure, but my kingdom."

And so getting married helps me to seek first God's kingdom. It gives us a purpose. We don't bury ourselves with our expectations; we're focused on God's kingdom of our elves. And then His righteousness. And this is where, if that's what you mean by healing, where by mutually submitting to each other, by helping each other grow in righteousness, by seeing ourselves as brother and sister in Christ, I think that's a big purpose of marriage.

Calvin Copeland: Okay. So and I agree with everything you're saying. I just want to see if I can change a little shift of it. You're a sports guy. I am from Buffalo, New York.

Gary Thomas: I'm sorry.

Calvin Copeland: I know, so please pray for me. We are starting but you had four good years of being number two.

Calvin Copeland: Well listen, and I'm going to go to those years right near because I remember when Marv Levy, who was the coach back in those days, and he was asked, "Is your goal to win a Super Bowl?" And he said this—I can't remember how old I was but I just remember how for me it sounded so profound. He said, "No, winning a Super Bowl is not my goal." And time stopped. Everybody was like, "Okay, who is this guy in here?" And he says, "Because if we reach our actual goals, then the Super Bowl will be a result."

And then he began to talk about his goals for his offense and his goals for his defense. And it was the first time I'd ever heard a coach talk about the goals for a special team program. And he laid them all out and he had them all. He said, "If we do those things, we'll win a Super Bowl." So this is where I get to get schooled by the master. Because the things that you just said around marriage, I believe those things are a result of our hearts getting healed. And I agree with you, our hearts getting healed is really about our submission first to God because Ephesians 5:21 says submit you one to another as unto the Lord.

And so if I understand that my submission is to the Lord and I'm trying to wash her with the water of the word—I'll tell you another true story about me. We were early in the marriage and I was mad at Elise. And I ran to the Bible because I wanted to find the scripture on wives submit to your husbands. I was young. So but because I had been in ministry for a little bit, I wanted to stay as true to the scripture as possible so I read the scripture before and I read after and I read submit you one to another. I said, "No, that's not the one. That's not the one."

Then I found wives submit to your husbands. I said, "There it is, there it is." But I kept reading and then it says, "And husbands love your wives like Christ loved the church." And I remember thinking, "I can't do that." And I went in angry and ended up on my knees saying, "God, I can't do that. God, I can't love her like you love me." And then I remember God saying to me, "But you do know you're the bride and the groom." And I said, "What?" He said, "Yeah, you're the groom to your wife, but you're the bride of Christ. You are the church, aren't you? So the same washing that I'm demanding or asking you to do to her needs to be done to you. So if you're not washing yourself in this word, you'll never be able to wash her."

Whenever I do my coaching sessions, I always say, "Do you think you can be transformed to His image without getting healed? Do you think that you can look like Christ without getting healed?" And most people will say no. And it's interesting, you bring up some of the same anchor scriptures. The "it's not good for man to be alone," and you tell me if I'm wrong when I do this. I always say that that scripture does not say it's not good for man to be single. It says it's not good for man to be alone. And I say through my coaching sessions, you can be single, married, widowed or divorced, and I can't tell you how many times I have done coaching sessions with married couples and the first thing that both of them say is they feel all alone.

And so this whole issue that the enemy tries to make, that it's not good to be alone, like everybody has to be married. No. No. We need to learn how to be in covenant relationship with each other as Christian believers. Paul and Timothy weren't lonely and they weren't married. So for me—and once again, I really want you to challenge this—if we focus on washing each other with the water of the word so that we remove our wrinkles, our stains and our blemishes, then won't my—because this is what I always tell people from my personal relationship, that's what keeps our passion alive. That's what has people asking 30 years later, "Why do y'all still like y'all? It looks like y'all like each other. How are y'all doing that? Why does it look like it's still fits for you guys?"

And once again, I didn't realize I was doing this starting at 14 years old, but as I look back, I was really learning how to submit to God's word as it pertains to my caring for her. So what do you think? Do you think that those other things are results of walking in the purpose of marriage?

Gary Thomas: Well, I don't know that I can go there because for me, what I need to be healed of is selfishness and narcissism, self-centeredness. And seeking first God's kingdom is what lifts me from that. So I think marriage is secondary. I think when I seek first the kingdom of God, my marriage is lifted up.

Calvin Copeland: Yeah, so I think that's what Ephesians 5:21 was saying. Let's make first things first. Let's make sure God is first. Let's care for each other as unto the Lord first. And I think I told you this at the retreat, but our anchor scripture for our church is Matthew 6:33. I end every service with it and I agree with it so wholeheartedly.

And I guess we probably need to preface this by saying that when I talk about the purpose for marriage, I really am talking to our saved community. I'm not talking to non-believers because I always say that what Jesus did for the sinner is different from what He did for the saint. What He did for the sinner when we were sinners is He died on a cross for us. What He does for us as we're children of God is He washes us with the water of the word.

So that washing always speaks to the Holy Spirit being present. And so you can also—I can find scripture where if you try to do what the word says do without the Holy Spirit, the Bible tells us it'll bring death. So we've got to have that relationship with Christ. But one of the things that I am attempting to do is to help people who may be confused about marriage to help them understand no, there are some benefits. You're going to work at it.

When we think about deferred gratification, we understand that in almost every other area of our life. If you want a PhD and they say this is a matriculation process you have to go through, we understand that, we don't buck with that. If you want to be a billionaire and you talk to a banker and he says this is what you have to do to save money, we don't buck with that. But as soon as we start talking about deferring our gratification in relationships, oh, that's not God. Well, wait, do you see the same way?

Gary Thomas: I do, although I'm never going to save to be a billionaire. I think one of my favorite historical treatises on marriage that kind of deals with the purpose is actually Martin Luther's The Estate of Marriage. Now my relationship with Luther is spotty. Some things make me cringe. This is one that I was just so challenged by and I've never forgotten it.

What I like is he's very honest about the frustrations of marriage, the difficulties of marriage, how most people he knows at times when they're married thinking, "Man, should I have gotten married?" And then he says and then you add on child-rearing where you're up late and you're spending money you don't have and you're having to give time you don't have. But what he said is, and he makes exceptions for those who are called to singleness, but he said for the vast majority of us, it's God's will that we be married. And God knew the challenges of marriage.

God knew that it's difficult for a woman to be married to a man, it's difficult for a man to be married to a woman, but He wants marriage to be that, a man and a woman that we're different but that we come together, we're challenged in different ways. And I just need to surrender to that. And I need to surrender to the sacrifices and demands of parenting and not be selfish and not say, "Well, do I want to be a parent or not?" Instead ask the question, "If God's called me to marriage, I believe I should be open to children." And I know that might have some challenges. It's wonderful blessing, but there's also going to be some downsides. But that's what God made me to do, to be a husband and a father.

And I'm convinced for me personally, God created me to be a husband and to be a father. And so I surrender to that. I surrender to the challenges of marriage, surrender to the challenges, joys and disappointments of parenting, and just say, "Okay, God thought this is the best life for me to live," and accepting that as His will and His purpose for my marriage.

Calvin Copeland: Wholeheartedly. And I think that for you and I, based on our stories, we probably got that pretty early in life. My question to you is, for today's generation who can swipe right and whatever else they do out here, what would you say to help make it more appealing to them that with all of the challenges that marriage brings, what would you say to them that would make it more appealing to them to step into that commitment?

Gary Thomas: When you say the phrase—and I hear this all the time—"swipe right," I had a visceral reaction to that. Because those people that the singles are swiping left and right on, if they're Christians, they're God's sons and daughters. If they're not Christians, they're men and women that God wants to adopt into His family. And so this notion of I'm going to get married for me and look—I admit it, I probably said this at the conference we were at, Calvin—I admit I got married for 100% selfish reasons.

I liked the way Lisa looked. I liked the way she thought. I thought she would be a good mom. She was a Christian. We laughed together. I thought she was intelligent. And why else would I think to get married except that I think I will have the best life possible if I can convince this particular woman to marry me? I think God's purpose in me getting married was to take me away from that selfishness, to crucify that narcissism and call me to serve.

And that's where we get into your Ephesians 5:21, to learn how to mutually submit out of reverence for Christ. Because she's Christ's, because she's God's daughter, I submit to her in the sense of I put her needs above my own. And so that's the opposite of selfishness. So I got married for the opposite reason why God wanted me to get married. And until I got onto that plane of understanding, I was frustrated with some parts of marriage.

And then when I realized, well, God is using marriage to help me become holier, to become more like Christ, it's sort of like this spiritual gymnasium where you work out on machines that make you sweat, tired, sore, and breathe hard because you want to become stronger, you want to become faster, you want to become healthier, you want to live longer. Marriage is like that spiritual gymnasium where I learn to forgive and ask for forgiveness. I learn to serve. I learn to listen after a long day instead of just veg out on a show because that's what my wife needs. And that's how I become more like Christ. And so for me, it was really looking at it from an entirely new perspective to confront my selfishness.

Calvin Copeland: Absolutely. I agree. And I think I experience the same thing as I'm doing the coaching sessions because from your gym analogy relative to relationship, I wanted to go to the gym. I've got a buddy who's a bodybuilder and he can't wait to get to the gym. And I know people who are financially savvy and they won't spend a dime. And so like you said earlier, I am in agreement, don't come ask me how to be a millionaire because I can't help you do that. Don't come ask me how to get prepared for a bodybuilding show because I can't help you do that.

But I can help you with your relationship if that's what you're looking for. And so my biggest challenge is what happens for me is people have seen my podcast or they know me and Elise, and then they'll want to sit and spend some time with us because they like what we have. And then when I tell them, "Okay, well this is what I do to get what I have," and they go, "Oh, oh yeah. No. No. You've got to do all that?" Yeah, you've got to do all this.

And so the thing that I'm trying to do is I'm trying to help people to see why people want to go to the gym or why people save money, or why do people commit in relationship. And you're right, sin comes in one of three ways: lust of the eye, pride of the life, lust of the flesh. And those are the things that I believe that God is trying to cleanse us with His word and He can only do that in the confines of relationship. And so I try to encourage people to see their relationship with God like a marriage. And so you're single now, okay, and you've been used to swiping right. Do you really love the Lord? And then kind of have that conversation with them, so then it's not even going to be about the spouse that I eventually have, but it's about my development of my relationship with Christ. Have you found any other ways to get people to sign on for the development and for the healing and for the killing of their fleshly issues?

Gary Thomas: I just think marriage is a very economical way to do that. It's going to challenge you. It's going to confront your selfishness, your self-centeredness and whatnot. And this is hard, Calvin, but I'll just be honest. The most difficult people for me to work with are a generation that has no ambition. They just want to play video games, they lay around. They could be in their late 20s, early 30s, still at their mom's house with no plans to do anything.

Is that really what you want to be? You have this potential of a life where you could be husband to someone, you could be father to someone, you could be mother to someone. You could pass on, you could raise up the next generation and you really don't want to think beyond if it's going to be Jimmy John's for breakfast or Domino's Pizza for lunch. Seek first the kingdom of God, not your own.

And then that's where for me—and we're talking about a love that can last forever—one of the most important things for me, and this goes back to why I had this visceral reaction to sweeping left or right, I'm married to God's daughter. And that changed my marriage more than anything else when I realized nothing will make God angry that I do practically—I mean ultimate blasphemy perhaps—but then to abuse, neglect, or fail to cherish His daughter.

And so my marriage becomes an act of worship. And what I love about this, Paul says in 2 Corinthians 7:1, "Dear friends, let us purify ourselves," so if you're talking about healing as purifying ourselves, I'm right with you. It says from everything that contaminates body and spirit. So not just the worst things, not just lust or murder or drug addiction. He says everything that contaminates body and spirit, so anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language and lying, as listed in Colossians 3. Perfecting holiness—that's present tense—out of reverence for God.

So I'm not to focus on purifying my wife. I'm not to focus first on purifying others. I'm to focus on purifying myself from everything that isn't of Christ. But I love that last phrase "out of reverence for God" because sometimes in marriage, because I believe James 3:2 is true, that we all stumble in many ways, there will be times when your spouse doesn't feel very lovable. They're not paragons of mercy. We're all fallen. There is no one righteous, not one.

So if you love a person because they're godly or because they're holy or because they're nice or because they're kind, there will be days when you don't love them because they won't always exhibit that. But when I love someone out of reverence for God, God always deserves to be reverenced, God always deserves to be obeyed, God always deserves to be surrendered to.

So now I have a motivation that's greater than my sin. I love an imperfect person because I'm worshipping a perfect God who tells me the imperfect person I'm married to is His daughter. And I owe that God so much, everything, my existence, my being, my eternal hope, that loving this one person is such a small part of how I could never repay Him but it's one way at least to honor Him for what He's given me.

And here's what I love: if I love my wife out of reverence for God who always deserves to be reverenced, and I want a lifelong love, she can be an 85-year-old arthritic Alzheimer's patient who doesn't even know who I am, but she will be no less God's daughter then than she is now and I'll have the motivation to love her then because my primary motivation is worship. And so when somebody is swiping left or right, their primary motive is not worship.

Calvin Copeland: Absolutely. And it was about 12 years ago I was in a coaching session, and they were coming to the church and I thought this couple was married. They were always together. I'm telling this story because this has happened to me at least five times. So where this kind of thing has happened, they come to me and they say they want some counsel and because I'm talking to them about coming to the married couples, they say, "Oh, we're not married." And I'm going, "Oh," and then they say, "We actually want to talk to you because we're thinking about it."

Okay. And about 12 years ago, this couple of five, they were all in the same season that they had gotten connected together from swiping. Saved, loved the Lord, and so had to establish the difference between justification and sanctification. Heaven is yours because of what Christ did, but now there's some transformation that needs to happen, there's some healing that needs to happen. So we went through that journey.

But I'll tell you what happened with Elise and I when we did our interview and we were talking around this whole thought process of marriage, the purpose of marriage to heal your heart. And she said, "Calvin, I have always stated that I was going to stay committed to you because I love the Lord." She said, "But honestly, there were times that you did stuff that was probably not the smartest thing to do and I began to resent you." She said, "But now that we're talking about the purpose for marriage being a place of healing to remove a wrinkle, stains and blemish, now when you do stupid stuff"—and I still do stupid stuff—she says, "I start to ask the Lord, what's the heart issue? And I begin to see you differently which helps me to handle you differently."

So what I believe was we got a chance to expose one of the tactics of the enemy where people will quote-unquote out of their love for God continue to do it, but not develop an authenticity where we can be naked and unashamed. The very last thing that God said before the enemy showed up is that they were naked and had no shame. And then the very next thing in Genesis 3:1 was—and I say this all the time to new believers or people as they're struggling with this justification/sanctification process—is that the very first thing that the enemy ever did was, the very first thing out of his mouth was, "Did God say?"

And I believe every one of his schemes are wrapped right around that: is did God say? And like Eve, many of us, we don't repeat exactly what God said, we add stuff to it, we embellish it, and then we still give in to our desires because the Bible also says the heart is desperately wicked and nobody knows what it's capable of. So for Elise and I, thinking about marriage from the perspective of healing your heart, once again, she can't fix me, I can't fix her, she's not my savior, I'm not her savior, but if we learn how to wash each other with the water of the word, if we learn how to see each other through the word, then it enables us. And 1 Peter 3 talks about love is about what we do, the actions that we do.

So it's been amazing. We're getting ready to celebrate our 35th anniversary next year in October, but these last four years, there has been exponential transformation in our communication. And Gary, most people would have said they want what we had for the 30 years, but I'm telling you that arguments are so different, the way we see each other is so different, just working from that understanding, that premise, that in marriage God designed for us to get healed so that we look more like Him.

Gary Thomas: And that's where, Calvin, I think we're hearing you talk about what you mean by healing, I think we're a whole lot closer. Because when your wife Elise talked about she used to resent you but then she's learning how God is healing her through that and how to respond to you, I just think of the subtitle of Sacred Marriage, "What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?"

I think you're just using healing as sanctification, in which case I'm right with you. But then I remember, and people think that sounds so depressing, John Wesley, who said, "I don't know anybody who's truly happy that's not pursuing holy." Because if you're living with negativity, if you're living with pride, if you're living with anger, if you're living driven by lust, you are not happy. You have moments of pleasure, but that's a pretty miserable life.

But if I could go back just a second because I don't want to give the wrong impression on the swipe left and right. I know some couples who have met on those apps who have had great relationships. And I get that we should probably marry somebody we're going to be attracted to. Sex is a part of marriage and if that doesn't sound appealing to you, you probably shouldn't marry that person.

Although you and I both know as long as we've been married that sustained sexual fulfillment is based far more on character than it is initial sexual chemistry. Because after a while, you know this person, we get older, we change. It's the character, it's when we're kind and generous and loving that we still maintain that desire. So I'm not saying it's wrong in my view for Christians to use those and I get the initial appeal. What I'm saying is we have to go so dramatically past that initial motivation, "I'm kind of attracted to this person," to "I want to worship God by loving this person like she's never been loved and never will be loved because I owe so much to the God who views her as His daughter and I want to please Him."

My marriage changed when I ended the day instead of saying, "Am I being loved like I want to be loved? Am I being appreciated? Am I being noticed?" to when I would end the day and say, "God, have I pleased You by how well I've loved Your daughter today? Are You happy with me? Do I need to do something different tomorrow?" That was a dramatic change in my life that I wouldn't have even thought of the first 15 years of my marriage.

Calvin Copeland: Was there a particular event that made that shift or was it gradual over time?

Gary Thomas: It was a time of prayer where I think God took me to the woodshed. I was not being the best of husbands, and I felt God challenge me with this word, "Gary, Lisa isn't just your wife, she's my daughter and I expect you to treat her accordingly." You could apply that from 1 John 3:1, "Behold, how great a love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called the children of God." And I claim that, that I'm God's son, and God was telling me, "But that also means Lisa is My daughter."

And so I realized, I have two daughters and a son right now. The best way to please me? Be wonderful to one of my children. Best way to anger me? Be mean or cruel or neglect one of my children. Just look at them wrong and you're in trouble. And so when I realized that God looks at my wife just like I look at my kids with a holier and purer passion, that's when my marriage took such a dramatic turn. Because I do think we have to be honest: we were made for more than each other. Marriage is one of God's purposes for most of us, but no human can satisfy us. You can have the most intense infatuation, you can have the most beautiful couple, you can have the wealthiest couple, but eventually they're going to get bored with each other if they're not seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.

Calvin Copeland: I love the way you identified the different types of couple connections. Because I always talk about how no two marriages are alike; they're like snowflakes. And so it's important for you have first things first. Make sure your relationship is strong and you know how to develop a relationship with God. Then you can begin to identify what would be a good fit for me. And I also love the way you talk about how you've got to be brutally honest in that place. Whatever it is. And people look at me and they'll, "I want what you have." Well, I don't know if you want what I have. I've talked to some people who are corporate go-getters. You don't want what I have because I turned down corporate work because I wanted to be with my wife more often. I have friends who have great successful marriages and they're on the road three weeks out of the month, and the wife is fine with that. And so it's so critical that you have that down.

Now I want to backtrack a little bit too. I want to emphasize this. The first few times that them couples told me about their swiping, I had to stop the sessions right there. I said, "Listen, y'all just gave me a little bit more than I can take. I've got to go pray. Y'all are good. I'm not—God ain't judging you, I ain't judging you. I'm judging me right now. Let me go." Because it was such a shock to my system. And so I was right with you in terms of I don't want anybody to feel any kind of way, and I honestly believe that we as believers, if we would lean into the whole social media deal, that the Lord would show us how to be more effective at using it to reach folks with it as well.

And it's so funny, Gary, I really do believe that we're so much closer than it may initially have felt in the beginning. But I always ask—and it was so funny—one of the things that I talk about when I try to use this washing of the water of the word, I say, "Do you guys like taking showers?" And it was amazing to me how the first four or five times I said that, the person goes, "No. No, I don't like taking showers."

And I did like you did, right? And I thought, "Okay, well what am I doing?" And so then I said, "No, wait. Let me ask you this. You may not like taking showers, but do you like how it feels once you're fresh and clean?" And they go, "Oh, yeah. Yeah, that I like. That I like." And so I don't ask people do you like taking showers anymore; I ask them do you like how it feels when you're fresh and clean. And so I try to use that scenario to say, "Okay, I remember a season where I didn't like taking showers, and then I started smelling myself a little too much, and then I needed to take one."

And I think part of what's happening with this generation is they're not smelling themselves yet. They don't understand from the spirit how just nasty, you know? Like I think about me being a teenage kid, 12, 13 years old, and I'm going to play basketball, going to play basketball, and then somebody say, "You want to go to the movies?" and I go to the movies, and we're sitting in the movie theater and all of a sudden I go, "I don't think this generation has gotten there yet."

Gary Thomas: No, our selfishness. Yeah, I think we see that. But I also believe this: if we could ever get them fresh and clean a couple times, if we could ever get them to jump in a shower every now and then, then they'd develop an appetite for it.

Going back to John Wesley, that he doesn't know anybody who's truly happy who wasn't pursuing holy. If people could understand—this is where I kind of swim against the grain because a lot of people warned about legalism which is a real danger. If I'm trying to be saved by my works, that's heresy and I'll never get there. On the other hand, sin is what brings stress and regret into my life more than trying to pursue righteousness.

I want to pursue righteousness because I'm saved, not to be saved. But it's every time it's sin. If I sin against my wife, I'm going to have to repent, I'm going to have to say I'm sorry, I'm going to have to go through that. I don't want to be that way. And so I think when you start to realize, for instance, if a guy is really dealing with anger, how much his anger is making it difficult for his wife to be intimate with him or his girlfriend to want to marry him, he would realize, "What is this anger doing for me?" It might get me beat up if I finally find somebody who's bigger than me. It might make my wife just not want to be around me. It might make my kids afraid of me and hide from me. So why am I angry? What is it serving? And virtually every sin you see that. The addictions are so isolating. Whether it's gambling, alcoholism, whether it's drugs or porn, usually you're going off and you're kind of by yourself. Food, you don't want others to be a part of it. You take all of this sin and it isolates you and in the end, it makes you miserable. It gets you through a short moment and then it launches a season of regret and shame and isolation.

Calvin Copeland: And so whole time you're saying that, all I'm thinking about is the first thing that God said about man was it's not good to be alone, and then the enemy creates all of these things that isolate you. I don't think that's a coincidence. And so trying to help folks understand, "Listen, the best thing that can happen for you is to be in authentic, transparent relationships." The best thing that can happen to you. And so the temporary satisfaction is just that: it is temporary and the drop-off is so drastic. When are you going to get tired of that? Sometimes I just have to let folks just get tired of it. But I'm praying that somehow people can see the light that we saw at 12 and 15.

And once again, I didn't know you know the old saying, "If I only knew then what I know now." Well, I'm trying to get you to know now what I didn't know then. And so I'm just asking the Lord, how can I deliver the message and once again, not water it down because you're going to work. But like you say, there is a segment of the population that is playing video games and relaxing whole time. But I've got a daughter who's in physical therapy school right now, and she is getting ready to take on the world at 28 years old.

And so there's that population. And then I'm now coaching guys from 28 to 42 who are attorneys and business owners and all kinds of things. But this whole concept of living a life with someone that can last forever is so foreign to them. And once again, it might not be drugs, it might not be alcohol, might not be swiping right, but you're addicted to your work. And you don't understand the gift and the benefit that you get from relationships that come along with the stress. But like I'll talk to the attorneys, "Well, was it stressful when you went through law school? Yeah. Why'd you do that?" Because you could see the outcome. And so what is it about the relationship you don't see the outcome? And so just trying to break through there.

So we have been on for about an hour, and I don't want to take up too much of your time. I would love to talk to you for a few more hours, but I'm going to be respectful of your time. But I do want to ask you this: what would be the top marriage relationship conferences that you would recommend?

Gary Thomas: Well, I think it's a great thing to do every year, to work on your marriage. Romans 12:2 says be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We need to be reminded and think. So I've got five different marriage conferences I do, which I like because then if a church has had a good experience, I can come back and do it. So I've got Sacred Marriage that looks at that purpose of marriage and how God uses marriage to shape us.

FamilyLife Today has Weekends to Remember. That's almost the opposite of Sacred Marriage, but I think it really has a role. That's the nuts and bolts. How do you resolve conflict? How do you communicate? How do you deal with physical issues or whatnot? It is packed, from Friday through Saturday and Sunday. You're filling out the outlines and whatnot, but I think those are helpful.

I think if you're running into issues as a marriage, there are intensives. WinShape, if people look that up, it's located in Rome, Georgia. Focus on the Family has some, some other places do. Where if you start to go to once a week or once every other week, one hour marital counseling and you've got some real issues, you're never going to get there. Because in an hour you're just first 10 minutes you're getting started and then it ends right when you're making progress. So an intensive like for a Friday and a Saturday and maybe a Sunday morning, where a counselor can really dig in and you have time to explore those issues, I think that's really healthy to look at as well. There are an increasing number of date nights and sometimes it's just fun to go out and just to laugh. And a comedian now who does these—do you know Michael Jr.?

Calvin Copeland: I'm big on comedians. I'm going to look him up, Michael Jr.

Gary Thomas: He's one of the best Christian ones. He's great. And he and his wife have started doing ones on marriage where they make you laugh and then they really call out people in the audience and do marriage ones. So those are sort of like the little pick-me-up. I think a weekend conference like a Sacred Marriage is laying the spiritual foundation, the Weekend to Remember every few years where you're just really working on the tools, things like that.

Calvin Copeland: Good deal. And then top five books. You can include yours, so let's do your top five and then top five that you like.

Gary Thomas: Well, I mean the one that's done the most, Sacred Marriage, has sold over a million copies. What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy? A lot of what we've been talking about. I did do a follow-up, Devotions for a Sacred Marriage, which people like because they're two or three page chapters, 52 separate devotions. A lot of people like that more than Sacred Marriage because it's just so much more accessible and you can read them together, maybe take a year to go through it.

A Lifelong Love is how God uses spiritual purpose to give us passion. My book Cherish is the next bestseller to Sacred Marriage, when God raised the bar in my mind from not just loving my wife but loving and cherishing my wife. Then exploring what does that mean? What are the practices, what's the mindset so I can learn to cherish? That was really helpful.

Making Your Marriage a Fortress has stories of couples that have faced the most difficult life crises. It's just based on those stories. You mentioned a bodybuilder. I know a guy, bench pressed 400 pounds, and his wife loved being married to a really strong guy. Three years after they got married, he was diagnosed with MS. What that did to their marriage. Other couples, financial issues, overwhelmed by kids, overwhelmed by busyness, an affair from the wife, an affair from the husband, things like that.

And then finally, my book Married Sex. I wrote that with licensed counselor Deborah Fileta. And that was really to address the five roadblocks that keep people from sexual satisfaction within a lifelong committed marriage. Just being very practical from a biblical approach, how we can help couples, how you overcome boredom, shame, the thought that God might not be for sex, some of the physical challenges and whatnot. And I thought Deborah just did a fantastic job on her chapters and so I think focusing on your sexual intimacy can be very healthy for a while if your marriage is in a season to do that. So those are mine.

Some others that I've really enjoyed—I'm almost hesitant to give names and authors and titles because I know I'll be leaving a bunch out. But a couple that I've really enjoyed: Bob Lepine's Love Like You Mean It. I think it's just a fabulous look at going through 1 Corinthians 13 and applying that to marriage. I thought in just a fresh and powerful way. Julie Slattery, I believe, has become a prophet to this generation on physical intimacy within marriage. Her book God, Sex, and Your Marriage or her book Rethinking Sexuality are both very healing for couples that want to relook at that aspect of their marriage.

Les Parrott has two that I've found very helpful. Trading Places is about the importance of empathy in your marriage. And then a book I often recommend is Fighting Fair. If conflict is a real problem in your marriage and you want a very practical look at what it means to resolve that conflict, that's a good one. Ted Cunningham has written a couple of great ones. And I'm going to mess up the titles. If they look up Ted Cunningham, one of his first ones was on Fun Loving You. I'm pretty sure that's right. It's almost the antithesis of Sacred Marriage, in that let's not stress the difficulty of marriage, let's focus on having fun together.

And he just came out with a new devotional, I think it's Better Together, together spelled T-W-O-G-E-T-H-E-R. That's a series of devotions, so it's really fun if you're looking for a good devotion. Shaunti Feldhahn has also written a number of very helpful ones: For Men Only, For Women Only. She wants to help women understand men, and for Men Only, she wants to help men understand women. Harvard-based research, loves the Lord. And I'm apologizing. Deborah Fileta, my co-author, has written a number of books on her own on marriage. I'm going to leave out so many people so I hope they don't feel offended.

Calvin Copeland: Well Gary, man, I thank you so much. It's truly been an honor to have you here and it really means a lot and hopefully some of your words can touch somebody today.

Gary Thomas: Well thank you, Calvin. Keep on doing the work. God bless you, brother.

Calvin Copeland: You too. Thank you.