When Marriage Disappoints | Kyle Idleman

Well, hello, everybody. Welcome to Southeast Christian Church. We are thrilled that we get to be a part of the Pando app each and every week with tons of content. And we wanna say welcome to church. This is a church of Southeast Christian Church located in Louisville, Kentucky. We got campuses in and around the Louisville area, even in Southern Indiana and also in Middle Tennessee as well. And so we're thrilled to be a part of your life today. As always, we love hearing from you. Check out the description. You'll see our address right in. We have a team of volunteers that might even write you back, but we certainly read and pray for each and one of you when you write in to us. It's one of the ways we can stay connected. And the way you can stay connected to us is hit the subscribe button. Join over 32,000 other folks inside this app that have clicked subscribe because you can stay connected to great content, including today's message and weekend service that's just for you. We are in the big series, stepping through the book of Genesis week by week these last few months. And today's series, it's called The Dysfunction Junction.

And I don't know if you feel like it, but I felt a little judged by Kyle's name of the series because I thought he was talking about me. Maybe he's talking about you, but also he's talking about all of us because we all have dysfunction in our lives. And the junction of our lives and God's plan for our life is often a dysfunctional one. And so today you're going to find some hope. You're going to find a way that no matter what your past has been, you're going to see how God can show up in the midst of it and point you to something new. There's a curve ball in today's story that's right out of God's word that I promise is one of those curve balls that none of us have probably experienced, but yet God still shows up in the middle of it. And so he's going to be talking specifically, he's going to talk about marriage and when marriage disappoints. Some of you might be married, many of you might not be, but for all of us, the greater story of going on is how God can show up when our life has a curve ball that we don't want to see, when there's situations that we find ourselves in that we don't like, where is God in the midst of it and how do we respond? So I hope you may pay careful attention. Stay tuned to the very end.

After service today, I'll be back up and I've got some specific things just for Pando of ways that you can stay engaged with Southeast throughout the week. So right now let's worship together. I'll see you after service. ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ God has been faithful to all generations we've all got a story to tell ♪ ♪ Stories of rescue, rebirth and redemption we've all got a story to tell ♪ ♪ Stories of rescue, rebirth and redemption we've all got a story to tell ♪ ♪ If he's been faithful, if he's been good, sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah ♪ ♪ And if he's been able when no one else could, sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah ♪ ♪ Sing hallelujah, we sing hallelujah, because he's good, I'll sing hallelujah ♪ ♪ The redeemed of the Lord lift their voices, remember the things he has done ♪ ♪ Remember the things he has done ♪ ♪ Good from our fathers, we'll tell our children, no one will make you die, yeah ♪ ♪ If he's been faithful, if he's been good, we sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah ♪ ♪ We sing hallelujah, if he's been able when no one else could, sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah ♪ ♪ Oh he's worthy, we sing hallelujah, oh he is good, his love endures ♪ ♪ Now and for eternity, oh he is good, his love endures ♪ ♪ Our history and our legacy, yes he is good, come on ♪ ♪ Forever, now and for eternity, oh he is good, his love endures ♪ ♪ Our history and our legacy, yes he is good, come on ♪ ♪ He has been faithful, He has been good ♪ ♪ Sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah, we believe ♪ ♪ He has been able, no one else could ♪ ♪ Sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah, we believe ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah, we believe ♪ ♪ I'll praise with a hallelujah ♪

♪ He's been able, no one else could ♪ ♪ Sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah, we believe ♪ ♪ Sing hallelujah, sing hallelujah, we believe ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah, we believe ♪ Come on church, let's continue to respond to sing and worship, to give Him our praise, our attention, our affection. Lift it up. ♪ When I favored the Father, sending us His Son ♪ ♪ So we could all inherit the riches of His love ♪ ♪ I give my thanks to Him ♪ ♪ And I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I ♪ ♪ When I favored the power, everything was His ♪ ♪ Impossible is not according to His plans ♪ ♪ And I give my thanks to Him ♪ ♪ All I can help, but it's on Him ♪ ♪ Now to Him is able to do so much more than me ♪ ♪ Could I still imagine glory to Him in the body of Jesus ♪ ♪ In the body of Jesus through all generations ♪ ♪ Forever and ever glory to Him ♪ ♪ All honor, all power, all glory to Him, oh ♪ ♪ Glory to Him, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ When the hand of God calls, I will stand astray ♪ ♪ From hell into heaven, for all eternity, I will stand ♪ ♪ And I can't help, but it's on Him ♪ ♪ It will be a holy moment when we walk through heaven's door ♪ ♪ The pain will be behind us, and death will be no more ♪ ♪ All I can help, but it's on Him ♪ ♪ And I'll lay my crowns down before Him, yeah, yeah, yeah ♪ ♪ Oh, now to Him, He's able to do so much more than we ♪

♪ Could ever imagine, glory to Him in the prime, in Jesus ♪ ♪ Through all generations, forever and ever, glory to Him ♪ ♪ Through all generations, forever and ever, glory to Him ♪ ♪ All honor, all power, all glory to Him, yeah ♪ ♪ Thank You, Father, for Your love, for Your love ♪ ♪ How deep, how high, the love I've come to see ♪ ♪ Oh, You sing, how strong ♪ ♪ You sing, how deep in all our worship, is it all in You? ♪ ♪ How deep, how high, the love of the Father, how strong ♪ ♪ We honor this faith, yeah ♪ ♪ For I stand in awe of worship forever ♪ ♪ I can't help but exalt Him ♪ ♪ Oh I can't help but exalt Him ♪ ♪ Now to Him is able to do so much more ♪ ♪ Do much more oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh ♪ ♪ Oh glory to Him with a pride in Jesus ♪ ♪ Through all generations forever and ever ♪ ♪ Glory to Him all honor all power all glory to Him ♪ ♪ Oh glory to Him all honor all power all glory to Him ♪ God we love you we honor you today. God worship is yours, our attention is yours. Thank you Jesus for your sacrifice on the cross. And everyone said Amen. You can take a seat. Each week we intentionally prepare space in our worship service to remember and take Communion together. The first Communion, the one that sets the example for what we're doing today, the one that set in motion Holy Communions

throughout history and around the world is captured in all four of the Gospels. All four. And this morning we're gonna read Luke's account of this night because he has a unique thing that I want us to pay attention to. So in Luke 22 beginning in verse 14, this is what is captured. When the hour came, Jesus and his apostles reclined at the table and he said to them, now y'all this part is read in my Bible and I love it so much because what it means is that Jesus spoke these words audibly. And in this situation his feet were literally on the earth and he was breathing in oxygen. So listen to what he says to his apostles. He says, I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God. After taking the cup, he gave thanks and said, take this and divide it among you. For I tell you, I will not drink again from the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes. And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it and gave it to them saying, this is my body given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, after the supper, he took the cup saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood which is poured out for you.

Y'all these words, I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you. On the night before Jesus died on the cross, he is saying to his apostles, I've looked forward to this. I have eagerly desired, I love how the message says, you've no idea how much I have looked forward to eating this Passover meal with you. This is joy and this is anticipation. And each week, those of us who call on the name of Jesus as our savior, we get to step into that same joy, that same anticipation, that same eagerly desire and you've no idea how I'm looking forward to remembering how Jesus saved us on the cross. Y'all what you hold in your hand, this bread, this body that for the joy set before him, Jesus endured the cross and this cup, this blood that he intentionally on purpose poured out for the forgiveness of sins. Y'all this body and this blood that covers, redeems, forgives the sins of those who know Jesus, this body and this blood, this life and this sacrifice and we get to eagerly desire to remember all that he has done. So while you take communion this morning, will you eat and will you drink and will you remember? You can take communion. Please subscribe, like and comment Cheers FFR! You are breaking new ground In the soil I now surrender You are breaking new ground So I yield to you and to your careful hand

I trust you, I don't need to understand Make me a vessel, make me an offering Make me whatever you want me to be I came here with nothing but all you have given me Jesus, bring new wine out of me In the crushing, in the pressing You are making new wine In the soil I now surrender You are breaking new ground Make me a vessel, make me an offering Make me whatever you want me to be I came here with nothing but all you have given me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Cause where there is new wine There is new power There is new freedom And a change on the sea I lay down my own claims To carry on through fire today Cause where there is new wine There is new power There is new freedom And a change on the sea I lay down my own claims To carry on through fire today So make me a vessel, make me an offering Make me whatever you want me to be I came here with nothing but all you have given me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Jesus, bring new wine out of me Walking around these walls, I thought by now they'd fall But you've never felt me yet Waiting for change to come Knowing the battle's won For you've never felt me yet All over the room but you let it rise up, you see Your promise still stands Great is your faithfulness, faithfulness

I'm still in your hands This is my confidence You've never felt me yet Never felt me yet I know the night won't last Your word will come to pass My heart will sing your praise again Oh, you're still enough Jesus, you're still enough Keep me within your love My heart will sing your praise again And again and again Your promise still stands Great is your faithfulness, faithfulness I'm still in your hands This is my confidence You've never felt me yet Your promise still stands Great is your faithfulness, faithfulness I'm still in your hands This is my confidence Oh, you've never felt me yet Still Come on, a church in faith this morning A belief that He is a mountain mover A healer, a restorer, a redeemer Would you sing to Him this morning? Come on! I see in your mouth You move the mountains

And I believe That I'll see you do it again You made a way That there was no way And I believe That I'll see you do it again I see in your mouth You move the mountains And I believe I'll see you do it again You made a way Where there was no way And I believe I'll see you do it again I see in your mouth You move the mountains And I believe I'll see you do it again You made a way Where there was no way And I believe I'll see you do it again I see you do it again I see you move again And again and again and again Let's take this call Lift it up. Lift it up. Lift it up. God, what an honor and a privilege it is today to worship the mountain mover, the healer,

the redeemer, the restorer, the reconciler, the bringer of hope, the giver of life. What a privilege it is just to be in your house and in your presence today. God, we stand here today in faith, expecting you to move because we've seen you do it again and again and again. God, I'm grateful that you see us in our need this morning, no matter what it is, what we've carried in, what we've gone through, the burden we're bearing. God, you see it and you long to take it from us. So we worship you today, we give you our attention, we lift our eyes to the heavens, to the only one who's worthy, the only one who's made a way, King Jesus, we thank you, we love you, we trust you, we honor you, and everyone said, amen, grapesee. I don't know if you saw the story. It went viral two years back. It was about a 71-year-old man named Lawrence Ripple who robbed a bank in Kansas City. That's not what made the story go viral. What made it go viral is what happened after he robbed the bank. So here's how it went down. He walks in, hands a note to the teller. The note says, I have a gun, give me money. The teller gave Lawrence just under $3,000. And then he goes into the lobby of the bank with the money. He sits down, waits for the police to arrive to arrest him. When the police come on the scene, they arrest him and they ask him, what are you doing? Like, why would you rob a bank and then just wait in the lobby to be arrested? He said, I'd rather go to jail than live at home with my wife. When he stood before the judge, he was facing 37 months in prison, and he wanted the maximum. But I love this. The judge sentenced him to six months house arrest. Like, you can look it up. That is a true story. The title of this message is, When Marriage Disappoints.

The title is not, If Marriage Disappoints, because disappointment in marriage is inevitable. So the question then becomes, what happens when your marriage doesn't turn out the way you thought it would? Like, what do you do when you wake up one day and realize, this is not what I signed up for? We're in a series called Dysfunction Junction. We're going through the book of Genesis, and what we're seeing is that God's purposes are constantly being fulfilled through broken and dysfunctional families. It's not that we fix our families, earn it, and then invite God in. It's that he meets us right where we are. He meets us in our mess. I heard a theologian once make the observation that in the whole of Scripture, like in the entire Bible, there's not one exemplary family. Not one. There's not one family that you can point to and say, well, that's how you do it. Like they figured it out. That's how we're done. That's the perfect family. There's not one family that's the model family. And I hope for some of you, there's something really freeing about that. Some pressure comes off here. You don't have to pretend because every family is a bit dysfunctional, and we've seen this in Genesis. Adam and Eve, like their boys, can't even be in the same field together. Noah saves humanity, but then he gets drunk, takes his clothes off. and his kids have to deal with it. Abraham lies about his wife two times. Isaac plays favorites with the kids. And Jacob, well, we're gonna look at his wedding pictures today,

and I'll just tell you, it's pretty messy. So turn to Genesis 29. We meet three people in this story who are all disappointed in their marriage. And I mean like genuinely, deeply disappointed. This isn't just the, I wish he would put the toilet seat down kind of marriage. It's real disappointment. And listen, I don't wanna get distracted on this, but can we talk just for a minute about why it actually makes more sense to leave the toilet seat up? Because I feel like the church has been silent on this for too long. So the prevailing cultural rule is the seat goes down. It's always down. The man puts it up and the man puts it down. What's the woman expected to do? Nothing. But I just wanna make the case, scientifically and mathematically, this is not only unfair, but it actually defies the laws of physics. If the seat's left up and the woman needs it down, she has one simple motion, one gravity-assisted motion. The seat comes down. It almost does it on its own. It is, scientifically speaking, the path of least resistance. However, if the seat is left down and the man needs it up,

he's gotta raise the seat, which requires effort. He's gotta lower it again, which requires effort. And so for the man, it's two physical actions plus executive function. And so the degree of effort required to raise and then re-lower the toilet seat is exponentially greater than the single gravity-assisted motion of just putting it down. So I've been working on this, because it's, well, you don't have to applaud. I mean, it is the more rational, spiritual position. I would say that I've never actually presented this to my wife, and in our house, the toilet seat stays down. But what I am saying is that this kind of disappointment is not that kind of, he always leads to the toilet seat, I'm kind of disappointment. I'm talking about the kind of disappointment when you're living in the same house and you are sleeping in the same bed and you're lonelier than you've ever been in your life. It's the kind of disappointment when your spouse has fallen asleep next to you and you stare at the ceiling and the thoughts that you have about your marriage are not anger or sadness, like apathy. It's indifference. Maybe you told your mom or a best friend, I think I married the wrong person, and as soon as you said it, you like walked it back, but you meant it when you said it.

You find yourself on Instagram looking up somebody from your past, and you're not gonna do anything about it, but you're just kind of wondering, like what would it be like? And you still go to the events and you still take the pictures and you still smile at the family photos and nobody would ever know it, but you are deeply disappointed. And in Genesis 29, we discover that God shows up in the disappointment. So Jacob is Abraham's grandson, and if you've been following along, you know this means he is the promise carrier. He's the one the whole covenant runs through, but we've already seen the dysfunction in his family of origin, so much so that he's had to flee from his family, and when we catch up to him here, he's at a well in a foreign land, and that's where he sees Rachel for the first time. Genesis 29, 17 describes Rachel and her older sister Leah. The Bible says, Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel had a lovely figure and was beautiful. The Bible rarely describes what someone looks like physically, so when it does, it's meant to stand out, and it says that she was lovely and form and beautiful,

and so it's not a casual description. It's like the ancient equivalent of the camera slowing down and the music fades and she walks onto the scene, and Jacob negotiates with her father Laban and he cuts a deal for Rachel. He's gonna work seven years for Rachel's hand in marriage. That's a long time, seven years, but there's this romantic verse, verse 20, so Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her. So Jacob worked seven years. The wedding day finally comes, the feast, the celebration, then it's the wedding night, and here's where the story takes a Jerry Springer-like turn. Verse 23 says, but when evening came, Laban took his daughter Leah, not Rachel, Leah, and brought her to Jacob, and Jacob made love to her, and when morning came, there was Leah. In other words, Jacob didn't realize he married Leah until the next morning. I've got some questions. Logistically speaking, like how? How does this happen? How does he not know? But think through this, like there's no electricity. It's what a deep darkness and wedding feast

has been going on for hours. Laban, I'm sure, made sure Jacob was plenty drunk before he pulled this widgeroo. And Leah was wearing a heavy veil. And so it kind of gives this a new meaning to the expression of the veil coming off. And the veil comes off and Jacob wakes up the next morning. He rolls over to see his wife that he's worked seven years for. And he experiences, I'm sure, a lot of things, but amongst them are deep disappointments. And imagine Leah, like the disappointment she must have felt when she sees the disappointment in her husband's eyes. Jacob's furious. He goes to Laban in verse 25 and says, "'What is this you've done to me? "'I've served you for Rachel, didn't I? "'Why have you deceived me?' Laban said, "'It's not our custom here "'to give the younger daughter in marriage "'before the older one. "'Finish this daughter's bridal week, "'then we will give you the younger one also "'in return for another seven years of work.' And Jacob did so. He finished the week with Leah. And then Laban gave him his daughter, Rachel, to be his wife. Laban gave his servant, Bilhah, to his daughter, Rachel,

as her attendant. Jacob made love to Rachel also. And his love for Rachel, the Bible says, was greater than his love for Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years. Well, you know, like, what could possibly go wrong here? Three people, one marriage, but each one of them is experiencing a different kind of disappointment. My guess is you'll find yourself in one of them. So let's first talk about Jacob's disappointment. Jacob was married, but he was haunted by his past. The most ironic thing about this situation is that Jacob gets deceived by a veil, by darkness, by someone pretending to be someone they're not. And that probably sounds familiar from last week. If you go back to Genesis 27, it's Jacob who's doing that. He put on a disguise. He covered himself in goat skin. He walks into his blind father's tent. He pretends to be Esau so that he can steal the blessing of his brother through deception. And so this moment should have been a really humbling moment for Jacob as he recognizes some things that he did before he got married. But instead of being humbled, instead of being honest, he gets angry.

It should have been a moment of conviction and contrition for him as he kind of connects the dots, but it doesn't happen that way. Instead, he has this disappointment, but he doesn't understand how it all is connected. I want to be careful here. God doesn't work like karma, but the Bible's really clear that the seeds you plant determine what you harvest. And I would just say that's especially true when it comes to marriage. Because I've just seen this, like in 30 years of marriage and 30 years of ministry, I've sat across from a lot of couples. And what I would tell you is that most of the disappointment in marriage doesn't start in marriage, starts before the marriage. Like you brought some things in with you. Maybe it's a pattern from your family of origin, the way your parents handled conflict or didn't. Maybe it's a wound from a previous relationship. Maybe it's decisions you made before you said I do that you've not really dealt with. Maybe it's the things that you have never told your spouse because you're terrified of what will happen if they find out. Or maybe it's just these unspoken and unexpected expectations you have on how your spouse is gonna meet your needs. But what happens is those things don't stay buried.

They have a way of surfacing when you get married. Dr. John Gottman, who has studied couples for more than 40 years, found that couples who struggle the most in marriage are not often fighting over surface issues. They're fighting about something underneath. In other words, they're not fighting about what they think they're fighting about. Instead, it's like an old wound or it's a story they've been telling themselves for decades. It's something that predates their marriage. And Jacob has a past, and his past is following him right into his wedding tent. So here's what I want you to take from Jacob's story. The disappointments in your marriage are often connected to the unresolved things you brought into it. Not always, but often. Like, here's what nobody tells you at the rehearsal dinner. You're not just marrying that person. You're marrying every wound they ever carried, every lie they've ever believed, every pattern they've learned before they even knew your name. And they're marrying all of that with you, too. So imagine. a husband and wife standing in front of the altar on their wedding day, they've each got like a suitcase of things they're taking into their marriage. But the thing is, it's luggage they haven't declared.

They don't even know what's in their own suitcase and they don't get to open that suitcase until after the wedding. And so the invitation for anybody who would identify with Jacob is, like stop trying to outrun it because you can't. Jacob spent years running from his family of origin, from his brother, running from his past, running toward Rachel. But it all catches up to him and where it catches up to him is where it catches up to a lot of us. It's in marriage. Tim Keller once put it this way. He said, marriage has a way of introducing you to yourself. And those of you who are married probably understand what that means. Like when I got married, I opened up my suitcase and I discovered that I am more prideful, more selfish, more irritable, more undependable than I ever dare believe. But when you get exposed to those things after you're married, like this natural approach is to say, well, it can't be me because I never noticed these things before I got married. So it must be her. It must be him. Instead of confronting those things in ourselves, we start to blame the other person. And that's what Jacob does.

So disappointment in marriage immediately wants to turn you into a victim. And the reason that's so dangerous is because victims don't have to change. If it's your fault, then it's your problem. If it's their fault, then it's their problem. And it's their job to fix it. And so you just get to watch and wait and resent and kind of keep score. One of the ways you know disappointment in marriage has turned you into a victim is you have become a scorekeeper. Gottman found in his research that one of the most destructive patterns in marriage is what he calls blame attribution. It's this tendency to explain your spouse's negative behavior as a character flaw, but your own negative behavior as a response to circumstances. In other words, you can't really help it. Like when there's disappointment, you blame your spouse and you let yourself off the hook. You're like, well, I'm just responding to things. I have a friend who does marriage counseling and he does this exercise. When a couple comes in and their marriage is in real trouble, they often wanna know, like, do we have a chance here? And he wants to give them some idea of what kind of hope they have for a happy marriage. And so he hands each of them a piece of paper and he puts them in different parts of the office

and he has them draw a circle on the piece of paper. And he says, think of this circle as a pie that represents all the problems in your marriage, all the struggles, all the challenges. And then I want you to draw what piece of the pie you think is your responsibility. Like what percent of the problems do you need to own? Draw that as a piece of the pie. And then he gets the papers together and he averages it. And he says, if your marriage problems are like 15% your responsibility, that's about the percent chance you have of having a happy marriage, about 15%. But if each of you think, like, it's 90% me, it's 90% things I need to own, you've got about a 90% chance of being happily married. But I've just noticed, I mean, almost any couple, our responsibility piece of the pie is usually pretty small. And so the real question is, are you willing to open up your own suitcase? What are you willing to own? A few years ago, I was talking to a man whose marriage was on the rocks. He made a comment to me in kind of a defensive moment. He said, I would take a bullet for my wife. I'd die for her. It was a bit ironic because at the time, he was refusing to go to counseling, but I believed him. I mean, I believed that he believed that that was true, that he would die for his wife.

And then since then, I'll ask guys that question, just point blank. If their marriage is in trouble, I'll say, hey, would you die for your wife? And I have been amazed at every single time I ask that question, the answer is yeah. And it's without hesitation, it's like immediate. I would die for my wife. Okay, but here's the disconnect, and let me personalize it. I would die for my wife. So why in the world won't I put up my phone when she walks in the room and speaks? Like, I'd die for my wife. So why won't I push pause on the game when she asks me to go for a walk in the evening? Like, I think it's awesome that you're noble enough that you would wanna die for your wife. But I'm just asking if you'll come to church with her on a weekend. Like, it's great that you have a willingness to die for your wife. But what about just praying with her out loud? Less than 8% of Christian couples pray out loud together regularly. Research shows that as few as one out of 10,000 marriages end in divorce when a husband and wife are praying together out loud consistently. So I'm glad you're willing to take a bullet for your wife, but I'm just asking if you'll pray for her. See, disappointment in marriage always brings you to a crossroads, and one path says they need to change.

Something's wrong with them, and that's a well-worn path, and it feels justified, because honestly, they do need to change. But there's another path, and it's a harder path, and that path asks, what's in my suitcase? What lies have I believed? What stories am I telling myself? What patterns have I slipped into? Well, Jacob's not the only person here who's disappointed. So is Leah, and here's Leah's disappointment. She is married but lonely. Leah is the oldest daughter. She's supposed to be married first, but it hasn't happened. The Bible tells us that Rachel was lovely and warm and beautiful, but that Leah has weak eyes. Some commentators say that's actually meant to be a compliment, a way of saying she has nice eyes. But let's be honest. If you're getting set up on a blind date, and you say, well, what does she look like? There's a big difference between lovely and warm and beautiful, and she's got nice eyes. But Leah had nice eyes, and she had lived in her sister's shadow. Her own father tricked a man into marrying her. Imagine being on the receiving end of that. And so she finds herself married, but my guess is that she's never felt more lonely. And so she decides to deal with that disappointment in her marriage by trying to control how her husband feels about her. She thinks, if I could just change him, if I could just control how he feels about me, then I would be happy. So here's what we read in chapter 29. Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben. First she said, it's because the Lord has seen my misery.

Surely my husband will love me now. She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son, she said, because the Lord heard that I am not loved, he gave me this one too. So she named him Simeon. Again, she conceived, and when she gave birth to a son, she said, now at last my husband will become attached to me because I've borne him three sons. So he was named Levi. Leah's disappointment in marriage is told through the names of her children. And if you track those names, you are watching a woman's soul be disappointed in real time. So you got Reuben, the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now. And so she's desperate and she's bargaining. She's trying to control how someone else feels. She's saying, the Lord has heard that I'm not loved. And there's this self-pity. Disappointment will always tell you to feel sorry for yourself. And so she's still hoping that this will be the thing that turns Jacob toward her. And then there's Levi. Now at last my husband will become attached to me. So she's working harder. She keeps thinking, if I just give a little more, maybe he'll finally change. And so she's connected her happiness to her husband's change. She thinks the solution to her unhappiness is her husband changing. So if I could just speak directly right now to the Leah's in this room. Some of you are in a marriage and you're lonely. And that might sound like a strange sentence to some people, but you know what I mean. Like you're sleeping next to someone who doesn't really see you and you've tried and you keep trying and you've done that thing and you've tried the other thing and you're hoping something will finally shift. Professor John Capaccio spent decades studying loneliness.

And he found that the loneliest people in his research were not the people without relationships, but rather they were people in relationships that felt unseen. He said this kind of loneliness where you're present with someone, but invisible is not just emotionally painful, but it actually gets registered in your body as a physical threat. In other words, what Leah's experiencing here is not neediness or weakness. It's not her being too sensitive. It's one of the most painful conditions a human being can be in. And so Leah gets caught in this cycle of dealing with her disappointment with transaction. With each child she thinks, if I just do this, if I just become this, if I just say this, if I just change this, then it'll change him and I'll be seen and I'll be loved. And so she just keeps performing, hoping to be good enough to win his heart. But that kind of transactional love always ends in disappointment because you know it's based on you being good enough or doing enough. I love... Verse 31, when the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, Jacob didn't see her, not really. Her dad didn't see her, but God did. The God of the universe looks at Leah, who has been treated like cattle, has been tolerated, and he sees her. Not because she was pretty enough, and not because she finally produced the right thing. And what I want you to catch from this is that God seeing Leah is not a consolation prize for not being seen by her husband. It's not like the spiritual participation trophy you get when the real thing doesn't work out. It is the real thing. It's the only thing that doesn't disappoint. It's the best thing. And so one of the most beautiful things that can come out of your inevitable disappointment in marriage is discovering God's love for you, that he sees you when you truly know that you are seen by God.

You stop needing your spouse to be your source of worth. You stop the transaction cycle, not because you've given up, but because you're finally operating from a place of fullness rather than desperation. You stop putting pressure on your spouse to do for you what only God can do for you, and the relationship finally has a chance to breathe and maybe find some life. You can finally stop auditioning for your spouse, and you can rest in God's love. Lastly, let's look at Rachel's disappointment. She has what Leah always wanted. She has Jacob. She has his love, his heart, and yet she's still disappointed. It tells me something about disappointment. It's not always about what's missing. Sometimes it shows up unexpectedly. Sometimes other people might see your situation like, well, they've got nothing to be disappointed about, but not long ago, my wife and I were on a date, and we were at a movie night, standing in line at the concession stand, and my wife was pulling up tickets on her phone to the movie, and she puts her phone away, and I sense that she's looking at me. Not just glancing, but like looking at me, like up and down, looking at me, and I'm like, okay. Thirty years in, she still can't take her eyes off me? I still got it? Man, if your wife's ever looking at you like that, don't ask her what she's thinking. Whatever you imagine, just go with that. Like just live in that space. That's not what I did. I leaned over, and I said with a smile, and what are you thinking about right now? And she smiled, and she kind of hesitated and looked down, and I took that hesitation as confirmation. She probably doesn't want to say out loud what she's thinking, because it's probably not appropriate to say out loud in a public setting.

So I lean in a little closer. What are you thinking? I put my ear close to her so she can whisper it to me. She leans in, quiet voice. She says, I was just thinking, if you stood up straight, you'd be two inches taller. Okay, that's not what I thought that you were thinking, but listen, that's just marriage. If you love the person, and you care about them, somewhere along the way, you also become the person who notices when they're slouching. You notice the person you chose needs some improvement, and so you still love them, but you just become more aware of the gap between what you imagined and what you got. And that's the gap that Rachel finds herself living in. So here's Rachel's disappointment. She seemingly has everything, but she's still longing. Rachel's fine, she's got Jacob, she's been chosen, but she has her own heartbreak. Someone once said, every heart knows its own disappointment. Look at verse one of chapter 30. When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister, and so she said to Jacob, give me children or I'll die. And Jacob became, here it is again, angry with her and said, am I in the place of God who has kept you from having children? So Rachel is living in a house where her sister keeps having children, and Rachel can't. And the disappointment is so loud she can barely think, and so she takes all that disappointment, and she turns it into a weapon, and she attacks Jacob. Give me children or I'll die. And Jacob, listen, doesn't recognize that her disappointment is sadness. He experiences her disappointment as accusation, and he does what a lot of husbands do. When a lot of husbands feel like they can't figure out how to win with their wives, they get angry. Because it's easier to be angry than to feel like you're failing. And so here's what you've got.

You've got Rachel drowning in longing, and Jacob drowning in feelings and failure, and they're both just kind of pulling each other under the water. So what we see. We see in the story happens over and over again in marriage that we take the deepest longings of our soul, the ones that only God can meet, and we hand them to our spouse, and then when our spouse can't fulfill them, we feel that disappointment, and that leads to what we see in the story, either anger with Jacob or despair in Rachel. But your spouse cannot be your savior. They were not designed for it. The most loving thing that you can do is recognize that God is the only one who can fill that disappointment gap, that Jesus is the only one that can hold up that kind of hope. Think about the woman at the well in John 4. She's married five times. Her soul is finally quenched by Jesus. He is the living water. Like all five of those marriages, we're just pointing her to the one man who wouldn't disappoint. Fast forward to verse 22. It says, then God remembered Rachel. He listened to her and enabled her to conceive. So God remembers Rachel. The word for remembered here

doesn't mean that God forgot her and he got a notification. It's like, oh, that's right, I forgot about Rachel. It's this idea that God turned his full attention toward her in that moment, and he showed up in that moment in the specific need. And so you got three people, different kinds of disappointment. Jacob is haunted by his past, married into a life that he didn't fully choose. Got Leah, unseen, unchosen, giving up everything for someone who barely notices her. And you've got Rachel, who's chosen and loved and beautiful, but still longing, still sad, still reaching for something more. But you need to know, it's the same God who saw Leah. It's the same God who was patient with Jacob. The same God who remembered Rachel is the same God who sees you and remembers you and is patient with you. I know there's some of you who hear this and you think, well, that's great, but it's not my situation. My situation is that I missed God's will when I married the person I married. Like when I married this person, I wasn't walking with God. If I would have been following his will, I wouldn't have married that person.

And so the only way for me to get back into God's will is to undo what I did so I can start walking in the will of God. This is not how God's will works. The beautiful thing about God's will in your life is that it's not static, it's dynamic, meaning that no matter what situation you're in, no matter where your marriage stands, no matter what you've done, God meets you right where you are. He can work with the broken pieces. Like he wants to meet you in your disappointment. He wants to meet you in the mess. And I just wanna ask you, before you give up, to surrender the pieces to him and see what God might do. I want you to take a few minutes and watch a story of Patrick and Ashley. It's a small part of their story. There's a lot more ups and downs that could be told. A lot of people who walked with them and prayed for them. But I'm proud of them for sharing this story. And I love that we, as a church, are a safe place for stories like this to be shared. Because it's not easy for them to share a story like this. They are sharing this story because they wanna give God glory, but also because they wanna give some of you hope. So take a look. So we met in the church that Patrick was a part of growing up.

It was my sophomore year of high school, and I had visited that church with a friend. Saw her across the, you know, across the pew. Thought she was cute. And after church, we stayed after and talked for a couple hours. I remember having this very vivid thought in my mind. It was like an audible voice. It said, that's gonna be your husband. About a year later, on leave, I decided to come home and put on my best dress uniform and ask her out. We went to the Olive Garden. We went to the Olive Garden, where I think a lot of great stories begin. And then the rest is history. We quickly realized that it was time to get married. Our wedding day was very simple and sweet, but little did anyone know, not one person. There were multiple affair situations where I was speaking to other men. I'm still hiding a struggle with pornography. I was just trying to figure it out on my own. I didn't really have anybody to help me through that. I thought that I had, you know, control over it. I don't know how else to characterize it except for it was getting far worse. It just increased in frequency and intensity and relationship. And then in 2015...

It was a Sunday morning. I had confessed to another affair situation. I didn't want to go to church. I had no desire to be there. I remember dropping our three boys off in the children's ministry and there was so much shame and guilt and it was so heavy that I didn't even wanna walk in the sanctuary. So we actually sat out at the coffee shop out in the lobby and watched the sermon from the coffee shop. Kyle was speaking and he had called for the usual call to come down for help. I kind of grabbed you and said, hey, we're going in, we're not doing this. We're gonna fight for this marriage and whatever it takes. So we went down front. And it was wild, like Kyle was standing at the bottom of the steps with no one around him. And it was like he was waiting for us. And immediately took us back and we began to share. We went to their house that night and I met with Desiree and Patrick met with Kyle. They both met like individually with us. I shared that I was struggling with pornography and that I needed help. And then they brought us together and we all talked as couples.

And not only did they pray for us, but they gave us resources and scripture, books, set us up with counseling therapy. I mean, just so much that we couldn't have done on our own. It's not like things got magically better. It was a work, but each year it got better. It truly got better. And again, I petitioned the Lord often and daily for him to take complete control of our lives and that I trust him to know what's best. And I began to witness truly a miracle in my life. And now what I have is the biggest gift that's ever been given to me. And then I feel like I know you wholly, like fully. When Christ is put at the center of your marriage and you are truly 100% your authentic self with one another, that's when transformation happens. Thank them for their courage. And... And she ends that video by pointing to Jesus. Keep him at the center. I've been pastoring a long time and the couples I've seen who figure it out, like they discover real, lasting, deep, intimate marriages, almost always share one thing in common. At some point, they stopped trying to make their spouse be God and they started bringing their deepest needs to God. Instead of putting their hope in their spouse, they start putting their hope in Jesus

because Romans says he's the only hope that doesn't disappoint. I think it is true. There's not one exemplary family in the entire Bible, not one. But again and again, we see God show up in the disappointment and he still accomplishes his work. And I believe he wants to do that today. My favorite part of our story from Genesis is Leah names her fourth son Judah. It's one of the lowest moments in her life. After having three sons, hoping that each one of them would win the heart of her husband and ease her disappointment, she has a fourth son, she names him Judah. His name means praise. And she says, this time I will praise the Lord. From Jacob and Leah. It's this marriage that nobody asked for. A couple that shouldn't have been. The fourth son is born and his name is Judah. And generations later from the tribe of Judah, a lion would come. From Judah comes a baby born in a manger in Bethlehem. And so what you see here is from this dysfunctional family and from this messy marriage comes the savior of the world. You don't know what God is building inside your disappointment. But you do know that the same God who saw Leah

and remembered Rachel and was patient with Jacob, he sees you, he remembers you, he's patient with you. And he's not finished yet. And who knows how Jesus might come from it. Let's pray. God, I thank you. I thank you for your grace. and for your forgiveness, thank you for your will that meets us right where we are. I pray, God, that you would give us the kind of humility and courage we just saw and were inspired by in Patrick and Ashley's story. Lord, would you allow us, even in this moment, to humbly put our trust in you, to look to you to be our source of hope? God, anybody else is gonna disappoint us and let us down. It would take so much pressure off of our marriages if we stopped looking to our spouse to be our source, to be our fulfillment, and we started to give you those deepest needs and that longing in our heart. God, I thank you that even today before we leave, that we can surrender that, that we can give that to you. Would you come into our mess, would you come into our disappointment, and would you accomplish your purpose? It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. We're gonna have a few minutes of worship, and as we worship, we'll have some folks down front here that are part of our prayer team that truly would be honored to pray for you.

And maybe that's praying for your marriage or a marriage of somebody that you care about that's going through a rough time, or maybe it's something different, completely unrelated. That's okay, too. We really would just love to have the privilege of praying for you. I know for some of you, you need this in your life, and yet you're reluctant to come down and be prayed for. Can I just tell you that God's blessing to you comes on the other side of you humbling yourself. The Bible says that those who humble themselves will be exalted, that God blesses the humble. And one of the humbling things you can do is to say, I need help. I could use some prayer. And by the way, that's true of everyone. There's not one person in here who couldn't use a little prayer. So can I just challenge you to humble yourself, to ask for prayer, to share your burdens. We have a team down here that really would be honored to pray for you. So as we worship, you can come forward for prayer, or if you're ready to be a part of this church, or to talk to someone about surrendering your life to Jesus, you can go to our next step room. It's to your left over here on the first floor. We'd love just to be able to visit with you about taking some of those next steps of faith in your life.

Let's stand together and let's worship. Amen. Amen. ♪ I love you Lord ♪ ♪ Oh your mercy never fails me ♪ ♪ All my days I've been held in your hands ♪ ♪ From the moment that I wake up until I lay my head ♪ ♪ Oh I am saved of the goodness you've done for me ♪ ♪ Oh I am saved of the goodness you've done for me ♪ ♪ All my life you have been faithful ♪ ♪ All my life you have been so, so good ♪ ♪ With every breath that I am able to breathe ♪ ♪ Oh I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ I love your voice, you have led me through the fire ♪ ♪ In darkest night you are close like no other ♪ ♪ I've known you as a father and I've known you as a friend ♪ ♪ And I have lived in the goodness of God ♪ ♪ All my life, all my life you have been faithful ♪ ♪ All my life you've been good, all my life you have been good ♪ ♪ All my life you have been so, so good Lord ♪ ♪ With every breath that I am able to breathe ♪ ♪ Oh I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ Come on we sing your goodness is running after me ♪ ♪ It's running after me over and over again ♪ ♪ Your goodness is running after, it's running after me ♪ ♪ Me, with my life laid down, I'm surrendered now ♪ ♪ I give you everything, Lord ♪ ♪ Your goodness is running after me, it's running after me ♪ ♪ When I'm forgotten, cause your goodness is running after me ♪ ♪ It's running after me, you see everything Lord ♪

♪ Your goodness is running after me, it's running after me ♪ ♪ With my life laid down, I'm surrendered now ♪ ♪ I give you everything, Lord ♪ ♪ Your goodness is running after me, it's running after me ♪ ♪ Amen ♪ ♪ All my life you have been faithful, even when I was weak ♪ ♪ All my life you have been so, so good ♪ ♪ With every breath that I am able, oh I will be faithful to you Lord ♪ ♪ I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ I'm gonna sing forever and ever Lord ♪ ♪ All my life you have been faithful, every second, every minute ♪ ♪ All my life you have been so, so good ♪ ♪ With every breath that I am able, oh I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ Oh I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ Oh I will sing forever and ever Lord ♪ ♪ All my life you have been so, so good ♪ ♪ With every breath that I am able, oh I will sing of the goodness of God ♪ ♪ Of exultation, I was born to lift your name above all names ♪ ♪ You hear the melody of all creation ♪ ♪ There's a song of praise that only I can bring ♪ ♪ Who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪ There is no one, only you Jesus, who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪ There is no one, only you Jesus, you are the infinite God of the angels ♪ ♪ Yet you chose to make my heart your dwelling place ♪ ♪ You heal my brokenness, show me your glory ♪ ♪ So I have songs of thanks, not even angels sing ♪ ♪ Who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪ There is no one, only you Jesus, you are the infinite God of the angels ♪ ♪ Yet you chose to make my heart your dwelling place ♪ ♪ You heal my brokenness, show me your glory ♪

♪ So I have songs of thanks, not even angels sing ♪ ♪ Who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪ There is no one, only you Jesus, who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪ There is no one, only you Jesus, you are the infinite God of the angels ♪ ♪ Who else is worthy, who else is worthy of this praise ♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ You also know what's possible to be redeemed. God, I pray that all of us will recognize that to the degree we're willing to confess our sin, to the degree we're willing to be honest with ourselves, to the degree we're willing to invite you in, to the degree we're willing to accept change and to accept you as part of us, that a new life is possible, that we don't get a new life by holding onto our old life. That's the nature of repentance. It's letting go of what's behind me and receiving what is ahead. So God, I pray that prayer for the marriages, for the families, for the situations, for the life, for the curve balls, for all the dysfunction that we all carry. I pray that prayer that we can look in the mirror and see ourselves and go, I begin right now to receive you, Lord, and allow you to change my life. So Lord, will you show up in the midst of our dysfunction and shine a bright light and show us plainly how we can step through in your step and in your ways. Lord, thank you for Jesus that makes all things possible, that makes new life possible,

not only right now, but certainly in the age to come. It's in his name that we pray, amen.