My Spouse Isn't Listening to God

Hey guys, welcome back to the Naked Marriage Podcast. We are Dave and Ashley Willis and on this podcast we undress the truth about sex, intimacy and lifelong love. And you know, we are so excited whenever we receive any kind of five star rating or really awesome review. We love how you guys get so specific in how this podcast is helping you. And so it just literally keeps us going. So I want to share one with you all today. It's from jrhawk81. It says, this podcast has helped me understand things about my marriage I know never knew. It's very motivating to keep working in your marriage. I would like to get information on what to do when your husband withdraws from you, how a wife is supposed to handle the pain and how to react to someone that is not all there. My husband says he is willing to work on our marriage, but his actions don't show that. What can I do to help my marriage and my situation? Thank you for these previous podcasts. Sincerely, wife that's not willing to give up. And I love how she signed that. And actually we're going to be talking about that a little bit today.

Yeah, we've talked about her question specifically in some past episodes. The one today. Today we're going to kind of take in a really specific angle as it relates to spouses being in two separate places as it relates to faith. Before we dive in though, quick shout out for the Naked Marriage book. Thank you guys. For those who've already read the book or listened to the new Naked Marriage audiobook, which is available now on itunes and audible your feedback on that has just meant the world to us. We've, you know, shared our story there and kind of the heart behind the whole naked marriage message and your feedback there has really, really been great. We're thrilled to know it's helping so many couples. If you haven't read it yet or listened yet, then check that out. But without further ad. Without further ado, let's dive into today's topic.

You know, I think this topic today is a hard one, but it's extremely important. And I think so many people kind of find themselves in this situation. We're going to be talking about, you know, what do you do when your spouse seems far from God? And maybe they're not listening to God, maybe they're not engaging in their relationship with the Lord. And you, you know, when you started out in your marriage, you both were strong Christians and all of a sudden it's like you, you're still walking the walk and you're reading your Bible, and you're going to church, but your spouse has no interest. That's a really hard place to be. So I wanna own that fact. And, you know, we get questions all the time from people about this because it's a huge concern, especially as Christians, you know, wanting to have a Christian marriage. I mean, and here, this very podcast is called the Naked Marriage, because the naked marriage is not something we came up with. It's a Christian marriage. It's how Adam and Eve were in the garden. And so we wanna talk about this. And so many times our first thing we're gonna tell you is to pray for your spouse. And we know that some of you listening are like, rolling your eyes and thinking, well, of course I'm praying for them. I mean, like, that's what my pastors told me. That's what my Christian friends tell me. But that is, you know, something that we actually really should be doing for each other. And that is important because one thing we have to understand when it comes to our spouse choosing to do things that we know aren't right or that we wouldn't do and choosing not to walk with the Lord is, is that we don't have the power to change them.

That's right.

And that is so hard to hear. But that doesn't mean that we can't do anything. It doesn't mean that we just kind of put our hands up in the air and say, oh, well, I guess we're just doomed. That's not what I'm saying here. But I'm saying we can't expect to be able to change our spouse.

It's true. It is true. And I know none of us wanna hear that because we're like, oh, but it's so frustrating, right?

I wish we had that power sometimes, but we don't. And it's probably for good reason, right?

Yeah. Then we would just, like, be manipulating each other and we'd be married to a robot instead of a human being, you know, a soul with free will. And so, yeah, it puts it in a really tough position. We just. We want to own that first right off the bat. And there's kind of a spectrum to this of a lopsided faith marriage. There's the spectrum from the fact that you're a Christian and your spouse just is absolutely not right. And maybe that happened because you disregarded, you know, what the Bible teaches about not to be married, not to marry someone who doesn't share your faith. But oftentimes it's two kind of non Christians or two people not serious about their faith, get married, and then one later on down the road becomes this sold out, passionate follower of Jesus. And the other one's just like, man, you got weird on me.

You're crazy.

You just got weird on me. And what do you do in that kind of situation? Well, I mean, first off, the Bible is really clear about that, that once you're married, you do everything you can to fight for that marriage. You do everything you can to live at peace with your spouse, to shine the light of your faith to your spouse without beating them overhead with a Bible. Because, man, that you're making them feel guilty.

Yeah, because I think sometimes we can find ourselves. Like, I went to church and said my prayers and I sought the Lord's forgiveness. What have you done today? And we turn into like church lady from Saturday Night Live, so we don't need that.

You were just home drinking Miller Lite all night and I was praying for your soul.

I'm so sorry that you're doomed and I'm not. You know, we want to be together in heaven, but I guess it's not going to happen. I mean, we can't be like those little derogatory jabs. They're not going to do any good.

They're probably not going to work. No. Now there's a great movie. You know, maybe just a movie you guys could watch together. Lee Strobel, who I've had the chance to meet, wonderful guy, great writer. He wrote a book called the Case for Christ many years ago. Powerful story about his wife becoming a Christian and him just thinking that she had lost her mind. And him just this very like professional driven, cynical atheist who was a journalist, said, I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to just disprove Christianity. Like I'm going to do the research as a journalist and I'm going to disprove it so she'll get over this phase and we can go back to like living our normal life. And he went on this journey to try to disprove Christianity as a journalist. And it ultimately led him straight to Jesus Christ. And he surrendered his life, life to the Lord, became a Christian, became a pastor, became a best selling author writing books like the Case for Christ, the Case for Faith.

So good.

And now that movie kind of chronicles their journey and they even have, they have a book that's kind of about how their marriage was when one was a Christian and one was not. I think it's called Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch. You know, another great book on this Topic is from Karen Evans, Jimmy Evans wife It's From Pain to Paradise. Because Jimmy, like the world's marriage teacher, he started out kind of as like a jerk husband. In his own words, he would say that he was far from God. He was living selfishly, sinfully, and he.

Thought Karen was crazy.

He thought Karen was crazy.

He'd be like, let's pray.

Let's go to church. And he was just like, you've lost your mind. And it's sharing kind of their journey and how he got to that point of really surrendering his life to the Lord. And so now, my gosh, look at what God's done in his life and their marriage.

Oh, my goodness.

So there's always hope. No one is beyond hope. But we do want to acknowledge the fact that it is incredibly lonely. I've talked to so many spouses that'll show up at church without their spouse. And just think, I would give anything to have my husband, my wife, here with me. And the most important thing in my life is not even on their radar. And so we're coming at life with two different worldviews. And I'm trying to follow God's plan, but at the same time, I'm trying to live with unity in my marriage. And how do I live when those two things can't coexist? How do I live when following God means there's no unity in my marriage? And so, yeah, we just first want to acknowledge that's super hard. And we don't want to throw out anything that sounds like a Hallmark card slogan that explains away a really complex situation. But at the same time, God's truth is God's truth, and it is always true, even in the most difficult situations. And so you keep trusting, you keep praying, you keep putting God's word in your mind, asking the Holy Spirit to really just create opportunities for God's truth to break through your spouse's potentially hardened heart. And again, it's going to come through love, through your love. Love is what points people to God. The Bible says it's the kindness of God that draws us to repentance. It's not just preaching at him. It's not the sarcasm. It's not any of those other things. You love them, you live the light of God in their life, be the light of God in their life. And that is something that really could make the difference. And be patient. I mean, I think we want things to happen right away, but these kinds of things very often take a lot of consistency, a lot of patience, and it's one little seed at a time you're planting in their life through your little words and actions and prayers.

That's right. I think it's important to remember that prayer is not a passive action. It is active. You know, prayer is not just taken like, you know, putting a band aid on it. I mean, it's really doing like God is at work when we pray. He answers our prayers, he listens to us. And he may not handle things in the way that we wanna handle them, but God always knows what's better. And he rarely, if ever, handles them as fast as we would like him to handle them. It's always just in the nick of time. Always. But what he's doing is he's building our faith. And he's also. He's building, you know, he's working in your spouse's life even when you can't see it. And I would just encourage you, you know, really actively look for it. Because I think sometimes we're like, well, something grand. They didn't decide they wanna get baptized today. Like, you know, we just get let down because these big things didn't happen. But look for the little things. Look for those little things. And I would encourage you, too. One of the best ways to just draw your spouse either to God or back to God, if they've kind of started kind of going astray, is to let them know in the most normal conversational way possible what God is doing in your life. Not like, let me sit down and tell you what God's doing in my life and make it real formal, but, like, in just normal conversation. Like, you know, sweetie, I had prayed that God would give me this opportunity to talk to this friend about this one issue. And do you know what? Like, she called me up for coffee the other day, and I was able to sit down with her and I was able to tell her all those things. And we had, like, the coolest conversation. And I think we had some breakthrough. Like, really go through the details of what he's doing just in normal conversation. And I would even venture to say, you know, what's going on with you and have that conversation. And if you see something where you're like, that's God working in your life. Don't you remember when we prayed for that? Or I've been praying that for you. You know, be authentic with it and be real and it's normal. It's not this crazy talk or Christianese that they can't understand. I think sometimes, too, the further we walk with the Lord, sometimes we can have this language that they don't understand if they've never read the Bible. And so we need to speak in normal terms, they can understand where it's real. You know, it's real to them. And they can see God through those just testimonies that you share with them in a very real conversational manner.

Yeah, just make it real, not weird. Faith isn't supposed to be like this weird thing. It's supposed to be just natural outflow of who we are. We're all spiritual beings. God made us that way, whether your spouse believes that or not. And so there's something on a soul level that's drawing us to God, even if our pride is standing in the way. So keep on that. But that's kind of the situation where it's an extreme scenario, like a strong Christian married to an atheist, which just creates a whole set of very specific issues. But I think maybe more often than not, the situation is more of a middle of the spectrum deal. They both would say they're Christians. They both would say, yeah, you know, I'm a Christian, I'll go to church on Easter and all those things, I'll go through the motions.

We call them CEOs. Christmas and Easter only.

Right? Right, CEOs.

Hey, at least they're going on Christmas and Easter.

They're going on Christmas and Easter. It's a start. But one spouse is just really like faith is the center of their life. It's kind of like if your life is a bicycle wheel, that thing in the middle of your life that everything else turns around, that thing in the middle should be Jesus. Every. Not just the spokes on the wheel. The spokes on the wheel are my career, my relationships, my hobbies, my money. All these other things are spokes on the wheel that connect to Christ in the center. And all of our life revolves around him. So that's the way it's supposed to look. But for so many people, their faith is just another spoke on their wheel. And the thing in the middle of that wheel is just themselves. Like, I'm in the middle. And all these things connect to me. My faith, my relationships, my job, my hobbies. And it's just another spoke. It's just another thing. It's just another box they check on a census bureau. I'm Christian. Sure. Because. Which just means to me, I'm not an atheist, I'm not a Muslim. I guess I'm a Christian in a cultural sense. So what do you do when, for one spouse, Christ is the center, Everything you're Doing is revolving around him. And your whole worldview is shaped by that. And for the other spouse, they're just kind of living, I mean, I guess maybe a more secular approach, you could say they're not anti faith. It's just another spoke on the wheel of their life. It's not the center. And because of that, if your lives are revolving around two different centers, your lives are always going to be out of sync. And I think that's where a lot of people are. And it's frustrating because you can't even verbalize it. It's like, well, no, my spouse, he says he's a Christian, but in practical terms of how we live and how we believe and how we pray and how we make decisions, we might as well be light years away. What do we do in these situations?

It's so hard. And again, I mean, I think the first step we have to take is to keep on praying and even ask our spouse to pray with us. You know, I think that especially because you know that they're not anti faith, this wouldn't be something that's completely foreign to them. You know, bring them into that and pray with them. And even if it means that they're not praying out loud with you yet, that's okay. I mean, at least they're there with you and praying. I think that's a good first step. But I also think, you know, we just keep on inviting them in to it, you know, and bringing them to church and saying, let's go to this thing together. And not just church on Sundays, but even different things with Christians, I think a lot of times too, it depends on who we're hanging around. Sometimes our spouse, who maybe is veering from the faith or it's not as important to them, maybe their friends, their primary friends, like their best friends, that's how they are. Like, maybe they're faith friendly, but it's not really the center of their life. And maybe you, as the spouse who is a strong believer, your friends are strong believers. And I would say let's get some couple friends who you can hang out with together that are also strong believers, because that's gonna bring that more into the center because it's who you're hanging around, it's what you're talking about. Your conversations are gonna be different, your priorities are gonna be different. And I think it's important to have those people in your life. So maybe you're not part of a small group at church yet. Invite your spouse to do that. And a lot of times these can Be pretty informal groups. They may not even meet at the church. You know, for a lot of years our small group met inside our home and we'd have cookouts and we'd, you know, sometimes the couples would go without kids to restaurants and we'd really get to know each other. And I will tell you all I know for sure. Probably three of those couples and we were in the same small group for like 10 years. Three of those couples started out with lopsided faith.

Absolutely.

For sure.

Yeah. There was one spouse that you could just tell. Like I would rather cut my face with broken glass and have these people are weird small group meeting and watch, you know, talk about things of faith. Right.

But we've seen their faith change and just vibrant, vibrant faith. And so I just wanna tell you there's hope. But it's taking those steps again, not beating them over the head, not making em feel guilty, but saying let's go hang with these people. You know, I really feel like we could learn a lot together. There's a lot we could bring to the group too and we would, you know, grow together and just again, don't make it seem like this formal thing, just like let's. These people are great. I think we're gonna do this study on parenting. You know, sometimes it's not even like a certain book of the Bible. There's certainly obviously biblical knowledge and verses involved. But you know, sometimes bring your spouse will come back to situations like that because they do wanna know more about parenting or more about marriage or more about, you know, living their best life or whatever the theme of the group study is. But I'm telling you, I mean I remember distinctly three of those couples and one we just saw recently and just sitting down with them, you know, knowing them for 10 years, watching their journey and seeing that husband's faith just drastically different and him talking about what God's doing in his life and then seeing his wife's eyes glimmer just like with hope and because she just kept on encouraging him and not expecting him. I think we have to watch our expectations too. Like you let me down again or you know, when are you going to lead this family? We get that a lot. We get a lot of emails about that.

Yeah. Wives saying like I just want my husband to be the spiritual leader.

And yeah.

And that's.

And we get that. It's a wonderful desire.

I think sometimes, sometimes what, what, what is at the root of that is, is I want, I want to squeeze my husband into this very specific mold of what I think a spiritual leader, a godly husband should look like.

Yes.

And what your husband. When you're saying those things to your husband, what he's hearing you say is you're not a leader. You're not leading us in the right direction.

You're failing measure up.

You're failing. And to a husband, that is the kiss of death. Because a husband, our primary need is to feel respected and admired by our wife.

And that we think you're able to.

Yeah, that we think we're able to do these things. If you're saying anything, even in your mind as a wife, you're thinking, I'm just trying to encourage him to make better choices. What he's hearing is, I don't measure up. And the thing that matters most to me as a husband is not being met by my wife because she's disrespecting me right now. Now, you're not trying to disrespect him. I'm just saying as a man, that's how that's perceived. And so a different approach, instead of just telling him he's not the spiritual leader over and over again, is you look for anything he's doing right. And you start praising it. Yes. And like, bringing it, like a spiritual component into it. Like, if he. If he ever, ever says, like, you know, let's. You know, are we. Are we gonna go to church? Or he comes to church with you or says, let's go to church, man, you just say, oh, man, I felt so connected to you when you did that. I felt so. Just drawn to you.

That means so much.

Yeah, that means so much to you. If he ever does anything that lines up with the truth of scripture, you know, like working hard or just being honest or any of these things, just say, man, I feel so safe and so cherished by you when you did that. And, you know, the Bible says this, and that's exactly what you did. And so until instead of telling him all the things in the Bible, he's not doing right, find something that he is doing right and be able to point it back to the Bible. Like, when you, you know, you work hard, it's. You know, the Bible says this. And, man, you're just such a great husband and you're leading us in the right direction in that way. And he's going to respond to that praise much more than he's going to respond to you nagging him and telling him he's a lousy.

Oh, my goodness, yes. And I would even say, like, point out how God has gifted him, you know, I love how God gifted you to do this. I love how he wired you this way. Like, it's so great, you know, and even point out, like, I love how God wired us a little differently. Like, it's so cool that you're good at this and I'm good at this thing. And we're different in that way, but we complete each other in those tasks. Just FYI. We don't complete each other because God is the only one who completes you, but we can kind of. We complement each other in the best way possible. And, you know, it's just. I love, you know, Dave talking about calling out those good things. Because I do think so many times, it's just what we're focusing on. Like, if you're focused on finding those good things, where you're seeing those God qualities, you know, that. That are in him, like that God specifically put in him that you love, and you call those out, you're much more focused on good things than you are on what he's not doing. It doesn't mean that you don't see what he's not doing or that you don't still desire him to be the spiritual leader. But. But that's gonna go a long way in nudging him in that direction. And it's just positive too. And it's encouraging each other. It's bringing out the best in one another. I think something we also need to talk about when it comes to having kind of lopsided faith is what if you feel like God is saying something to you, but your spouse doesn't feel like God's saying that to them? And it may be because they're just not even praying about it. Or maybe they're not. You know, their faith is not important in their life. And so you're not on the same page when it comes to certain things. Because you're praying about it and you're feeling a spiritual leading from the Lord, but your spouse is like, well, that's just crazy talk. I'm gonna do this thing because I feel like it's the most practical thing. You know, what do you do in those situations?

Well, I was really hoping you'd have the answer. Cause you were on a roll and I was just listening and I was like, here comes the answer. It's gonna be gold. And so you toss it over to me and I'm like, ah. Cause it is. It's a tough situation.

It is.

So we, again, wanna acknowledge that. That it's hard. So what we need to be reminded of first off is that, you know, like we've said, God's never going to lead you two in different directions. He wants there to be unity in your marriage. So if one of you is hearing one thing from God and one of you is hearing another thing from God that are in conflict with each other, then one of you, at least one of you, is not hearing correctly clearly from God. And so what to do in those situations is to. Is to really, really pray for unity. If both of you are at least one wanting to hear from God, that's a huge head start because you're both wanting to really hear from God. And so at least you're on the same page with that. And so look at this as an opportunity to pray together. Look at this as an opportunity to seek wise counsel outside the marriage together. Find some people who love, you know, love you, love God, love your marriage and ask them to be praying with you about this and ask them for their insight. You know, God might reveal an insight to them that will help you and your spouse get on the same page or look at the situation from a completely different perspective. But look for that unity. Pray for that unity and really just seek it. Just keep seeking it and don't give up.

And I would say too, if you're not on the same page, the answer would be wait. Because God wants you to be unified in your decision making and for nobody to just come kicking and screaming to whatever the decision is. I think most. There are certain circumstances, yes. Where it just might be that somebody has to say, we've gotta move on this. I feel strong. This is a strong feeling. And maybe the other spouse doesn't feel as strongly and it's not as important to them or something. It's not a huge game changer. But most of the time we need to be unified on the decisions. Like moving job changes things with our children. I will share with you too. And I think we shared with this in a whole episode, I believe so. Is about discipline. There have been times where we have not been on the same page when it comes to discipline with our children. We're just wired differently and how we approach that. And we actually brought in a mentor couple to talk to us because we were at a stalemate and we just, we can just be unified on almost anything. But this was one thing that just kept on coming back and it was starting to form some resentment inside of me and I think inside of Dave. And it was a bunch of misunderstanding. And if we ever had any arguments, it was always about that. And so Dave was the one who was so wise and said, let's find a mentor couple that we can talk to about this. And they were so happy to come over, have dinner with us. We talked to them about it, and they gave us totally a new perspective, you know, that we just really needed to hear. They're not related to us, so they weren't skewed at all. You know, it was kind of neutral territory where they could just look at the little stumbling blocks that we were having with disciplining our kids. And they helped us tremendously. And we actually went back to them several times after that. And I stayed. Even though they're in Georgia, I'd still call em up in a heartbeat. Cause they've been such a help to us. So that may be a way to kind of get you back on the same page. But I will tell you this. God wants you to be on the same page.

He does.

He wants you to be unified. Because that is where peace is. Cause we're always having to make different decisions. But we need to be unified in our decisions and do our best to work towards that unity and to pray about it and to talk about it in a healthy way, not pointing fingers.

And.

And so we need to kind of do whatever it takes to get to that place. And if it's not a mentor couple, maybe it's such a major issue that it is Christian counseling. I mean, sometimes that's the next step. And that's a wonderful next step. I know you guys have heard us on this podcast. If you've been listening for a while. We're huge proponents of this. So just do whatever it takes so that you can get on the same page and be unified in your decisions.

And I love that idea of connecting with a mentor couple or a pastor. And this can even work if you're just having, like, disagreements about interpreting what the Bible's actually saying.

Oh, yes.

Or interpreting kind of what. Where God's actually leading you. And you just have these kind of bigger disagreements where you both really do want to hear from God and you're even seeking God, but it's leading you in different places. So again, find a pastor that you both can trust and respect. Find a mentor couple that you both can trust and respect and just talk through it with them. Going in with this open heart and open mind of saying, like, we're not going to compromise on God's truth. But I'm totally open to the fact that I might be approaching this or hearing this or interpreting this in the wrong way and God will put people in your life that can help. The Bible says with a multitude of counselors or advisors, success is certain. So look to those advisors or counselors that are there, people you trust, people you respect, and ask them to, to speak into your marriage. And so, yeah, we could talk a lot about this, but we've talked a lot about the power of prayer. And so we're going to wrap up just by saying a prayer for you guys. And I'm going to ask Ashley to pray right before she does. A few resources to connect you to. We've got a free 31 day devotional that you can download@daveandashleywillis.com you can also find that on the marriage today website, marriagetoday.com and it's a short daily devotional with like one Bible verse, one little inspirational thought about that Bible verse, a quick prayer. You and your spouse take, you know, one or two minutes a day and talk about this, and it could just help you get in a habit of having these faith conversations. So that devotional is great. The YouVersion Bible app has some great marriage devotionals as well. We've actually written a couple of those that you can find there. The marriagetoday.com website is just tons of resources. So, yeah, check out Marriage Today. We're part of the Marriage Today family. In fact, I want to thank our podcast producer, Brittany Wilcox, our sound engineer and editor, Jordan Kennedy, and the whole team at Marriage Today that we get to be part of for making this possible. And so check out those resources. You don't have to do this alone. We even have coaches at Marriage Today. If you go to marriagetoday.com coaches, they are amazing. Yeah. That can help walk you through this and potentially even meet with you in person or via Skype to kind of help have these conversations. If you feel like you don't have somebody at your church that you could talk to directly, we want to help you have these conversations and get to that place in unity in your marriage. And so that's going to be our prayer as we wrap up. Sweetie, would you pray for us?

Let's pray. Lord, I thank you for all those who are listening. And I know none of us are listening by accident. I pray specifically for a spouse who has an unbelieving spouse. I know it breaks their heart and they want them to know you like they know you, Lord. They want to be on the same page when it comes to their faith, Lord. And I just pray that you draw that unbelieving spouse to you. I pray that you give patience to the spouse who keeps on praying and knows you're listening but is just feeling frustrated because he or she is not seeing the changes that they're hoping for. I pray that you encourage them, Lord, that you help them see, see little, little bits of change in their spouse and help this spouse, who is the believing spouse, to share all that you are doing in his or her life, Lord. And I just pray that the unbelieving spouse listens, Lord, and is drawn closer to you each and every day. I pray that you bring unity to the couples listening today, Lord. I pray that those who are getting ready to make a big decision, that they don't argue about it, but they keep on seeking you and they keep on talking through. And if they need a mentor couple to help them, I pray that you bring to mind right now who that mentor couple should be. I pray that if it's a pastor, bring that pastor to their mind, Lord. If it's a marriage today, coach, I pray they call today and set up an appointment. Lord, whatever it is, help us to just find the strength to do what it takes to work towards unity and to work towards a closer relationship with you. Lord, we love you. We thank you for all you're doing in our lives and in our marriages. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Amen.