Relationship Reset | Week 1 | Daniel Goulding | Echoes Church

amen. I don't know if you've ever been on one of the receiving ends of the conversation where somebody you've been dating like sits down with you and they're kind of beating around the bush, but it's very clear that they're getting ready to break up with you and then they give you the famous line, but like, but don't worry,

it's not you, it's me. Right? It's I don't know if you've learned this or not yet, but they were lying to you when they told you that. Okay? It was you. They just didn't know how to tell you about the things they didn't like about you, so they tried to soften the blow by saying, it's not you,

it's me. And I think sometimes the reason that we don't know how to do relationships God's way is because we believe some of these cultural lies that have become pervasive

inside of our our world today. And we've become convinced that there's like this fairytale person that's out there for us, and one day we'll just meet them. And when we meet this person, that when we find the one, we're just going to ride off into the sunset together, we'll live the rest of our lives in paradise. But for anybody that's been married for more than five minutes, you realize that when you meet the person, you ride off into the sunset,

you wake up the next morning, you realize like a, they have bad breath in the morning, b, they don't know how to load a dishwasher properly,

and they leave toothpaste on the counter. Like, what is wrong with you? Right? You pee in the shower, like what's wrong? Who is this person that I married? I married an animal, not a person. And all of a sudden you're like, this fairy tale isn't necessarily what we were sold and maybe we've been sold a bill of goods. And so what we're going to try to do over these next five weeks is begin to really learn how do we how do we learn how to do relationships God's way. And my hope is is that if you're single, this series will apply to you. If you're dating, this series should apply to you. If you're engaged

and the guy won't put a date on the calendar, this series will definitely apply to you. But for all my married people in the room, this will apply to us. For all the people where it's complicated, we're trying to figure out. I'm hoping across that these next five weeks, we'll able to speak to all seasons and stages of of life and be able to address a lot of the issues that are there. But today,

I want to kind of lay a foundation. I want to kind of set the tone to what the scriptures say we're supposed to do, who we're supposed to be, that will kind of be a foundation that I'll build on over the next five weeks. And what I want to talk about today is this idea of what does it look like to become

the one. I want to talk about becoming the one. So much of our focus and our attention is finding the one, making our spouse into the one. But I I I just wonder what would happen if we said, no. No. No. I think that the the goal of this thing is to actually become the person. And that if I work on myself and if I grow more into the image of Jesus that I need to work on, then maybe God will do something in my spouse. And as we do that together, we can build a pretty healthy relationship. Now, not to just let everybody off of the hook, but part of the reason I think that we've gotten relationships so jacked up is because of some of the music we grew up listening to. I dropped my daughter off last night to winter formal, and it's one of the hardest things to do as a dad, knowing that I'm dropping my daughter off to a den of wolves that think like I think and were like me in high school, and I'm just like, it terrifies me that she's going to be in there and all these boys are going try to walk across the thing and do this slow dance. Oh, it's going to be terrible. But what I started to think about was, you remember those dances, some of the songs that were so foundational and shaped, like how we saw the world in relationships. Like, my whole framework for dating was shaped by like Seal and Brian McKnight. You know what I mean? Like, that's that's how I thought relationships were. Nobody told me that their their advice was actually terrible. Great songs, but terrible

advice. Now again, I want to prove my point to you. I'm about to play a song, and when you hear it, you're going go right back to that moment. It's going be nostalgic. Some of you are going have to control yourselves here for a second. But do you guys remember this song that they used to play?

Oh, come on. You you hear it. The moment is like you you're there. You're locked in. Listen to his great advice. Come on, sing it. You know it. Some of you are gonna get really into this. Three. There you go. Now now again, amazing song shaped so much of my high school experience.

But just for a second, can we actually look at what Brian McKnight is is posing to us for a relationship. K? Here's the lyrics that you just sang so beautifully. His first step is one,

just realize that you're a dream come true, and two, I just want to be with you, three, girl is playing to see that you're the only one for me. It's like, wait, what are you doing? You're standing in a corner stalking some poor girl convinced that you're in love with her and you're just and then if what if those if all those fail, what do you do? You go back and repeat steps one through three. Right? I don't know. If it doesn't work, you just you just try it again. And I know for all the older people in the room, you're like, well, this is why this generation is so jacked up. But let me just remind you that you were shaked by a man named Elvis Presley. K? His hips shaking threw this whole country into a tizzy for a long time. But again, listen to what his relational advice was. Every again, you're gonna know this song too. Listen to this one.

Come on, sing it if you know it. Only fools. Yeah, see you know it. Here it is.

I can't. Sing it with me. Falling in Oh, it's good. Come on. That's right. The next line gets even crazier. He says, I think it's sin, but I just can't help falling in love with you. Here's his dating advice to an entire generation.

All the wise people in my life say this is a terrible idea, but I can't help falling in love with you. Right? And that's what's framed and shaped so much of our our framework when it comes to dating, but thankfully, at least in the generation that's coming behind me, they have a prophetess that has risen up that is actually telling them correctly how to do relationships. K. If you don't know, her name is Taylor Swift, and she's at least framed.

I'm gonna get so many emails tomorrow because I talk about Taylor Swift in shirts but it's worth it. You remember her lyric? This is what Taylor Swift teaches about relationships. She says, it's me. Hi. I'm the problem.

It's me. You're like, well, good. At least somebody's being honest with us about how to fix a relationship for once. Right? And again, here's the the premise is at some point we've got to realize that you and I can't control anybody else, but there's a beautiful invitation that I think is baked into

the original creation story of Genesis two of how you and I can become the person that God can use to form a really, really healthy relationship to somebody else that is doing the same thing. But if we still operate under the the the false notion

whether we're single today or we're married, that one day I'm just going to find this magical person or I'm going to I'm going to make my spouse become this magical person, I'm telling you we're setting ourselves up for more danger and disappointment than we could ever possibly

imagine. I want us today to make a decision that we're not going to focus on finding the one, we're going to focus instead on becoming the one. What would it look like for us to be people who say, you know what, God? There's a lot of things that I wish were different about my spouse, that were different about this person, but I'm gonna focus not on what they're doing wrong.

I'm gonna focus on what it is that I can do better and how I can grow more into who God has made me to be. Genesis chapter two, here's how the story begins in verse 15.

It says, the Lord God took the man and he put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and to take care of it. K. Again, know we're just we're just one verse in. We're gonna kinda go verse by verse through, this passage,

but here's the very beginning of God's creation story. He takes a man, we'll later learn that his name is Adam, and he takes this man and he puts him in the Garden of Eden. We don't even hear about Eve for three more verses later.

Now, we don't know for sure how much time passes between this verse that we just read and the verse that we'll see Eve enter the picture, but we know that there's a decent period of time. It could be weeks, it could be months, heck, it could be years

where God has Adam and he's doing something with his life before Eve ever enters the picture. So tells us something

that if our purpose is foundational on finding somebody else to fulfill us, then what the heck was Adam doing in the Garden Of Eden? But if you read the story, you see that God put him in paradise and what was he doing? He was working. He had a job,

which tells me, ladies, the list that you have of the future spouse you were trying to find, if having a job is not pretty high up on that list, let me encourage you to just add it back to the list. Okay? They should learn how to work and have a job. It is part of our calling and assignment that God has given us. I can't tell you how many conversations I've had with guys who like, yeah, but working is only, you know, because of the the consequences of sin and the fall of man. It's like, no. There was work happening in the garden before

sin ever entered into the picture. But here's what I want us to see this morning. More more than a job, what Adam understood

was this thing called purpose. K? Adam knew who he was and why he was here. One of the things that you and I need to have a bedrock foundation of, we need to have a rock solid foundation of before we ever enter into the idea of a relationship with somebody else, is why am I here?

What is my purpose? Because so many of us, we think that our person is our purpose and it's not. And I'm telling you, I love my wife more than anything in this world. My wife is not my purpose. I love being a pastor. Being a pastor is not my purpose. They are assignments.

They are a part of the calling that God has given me, but they're not my purpose. And I want to remind every single one of you sitting here today that you have a purpose. The scriptures tell us in Ephesians chapter two verse 10 actually, before I get there, let me just tell you this. There's four resets we're gonna cover today. The first one is before I find my person, I need to find my purpose. K? We gotta figure out what our purpose is, who God has created us to be. Ephesians chapter two verse 10 says it this way, for we are God's masterpiece.

He's created us anew in Christ Jesus so that we can do the good things that he planned for us long ago. If nobody's told you this, let me tell you the scriptures are clear that every single one of you sitting here today, you were created on purpose, and you were created for a purpose.

There's something significant that God wants to do with your life. The question the question this morning is what is your purpose? You will be tempted to answer that question with an assignment. Your job is not your purpose, it's an assignment. Your relationship status is not your purpose,

it's a temporary assignment that will change throughout life. But here's the beautiful truth is that our purpose as followers of Jesus is one that is singular in nature. Our purpose, if you're taking notes, is this. Our ultimate purpose is to learn how to glorify

God. Now again, that's kind of a very churchy word to glorify God. All it means is that God created you and I with a singular purpose, which is to serve him and to bring God glory with our lives. Now again, if I could and I could write like a big thing called purpose over there on the wall, but what the picture is supposed to be is what you and I have to fight for, especially if we could wind back time and go back to like that that post end of high school, beginning of college time,

we should spend all of our time and attention trying to figure out and run headlong after the purpose of God on our life, and trying to figure out, okay, how does God uniquely want me to fulfill the purpose that he's put on me? What does it look like for me to run after the the purpose of God over my life? But instead, what so often happens is instead of running after our purpose,

we think that we're going to find purpose in a person, and we just go get married, we end up finding somebody we build a life with, mortgages come, kids come, and all of a sudden we wake up one day going, wait, this isn't this isn't at all what I thought it was going to be. I don't feel very satisfied. This person's not who I thought I was marrying. And what's amazing to think about, if you look at just the statistical data around marriages, especially with where we live in Maricopa County, you know that the divorce rate in Maricopa County is almost seventy two percent?

It's mind blowing. And what's amazing is most most marriages will fail within the first seven years because all of a sudden, a few years in, they're like warm butterflies and rainbows start to wear off, you begin to realize, wait, this isn't this isn't doing what I thought it was going to do. But what's incredible is if you make it past year seven,

statistically, you'll stay married for the rest of your life. But there's the next window where divorces happen at a really high rate. You know when it is? Years eighteen to twenty two. Because here's what happens. Oftentimes,

we enter into this relationship thinking that this is where my purpose is, not knowing who God has created us to be, not knowing the calling that is on our life, and instead just settling for a for a person, and then we start to have some kids together and we wake up and realize, hey, this isn't what I thought it was going to be, but we've got these kids that we've got to take care of. And so what happens inside of marriages is they make a business decision.

We would get divorced if we didn't have these kids, but we're going stay together as long as the kids are in the home. And then the moment the kids get out of the house, go, okay, the purpose of the marriage is no longer and now we can get out of this thing. And I'm here to just say whether you're single, whether you're dating, or whether you're married, you've got to answer the question, what is your purpose? Adam knew what it was before Eve ever entered into the picture.

He knew who he was in Christ. He knew the calling and the assignment that God has give had given him. That's why Paul says things like this in first Corinthians chapter 10. He says that whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

What he's saying is that you and I exist to bring God glory, and we can do that doing anything. Like your your vocations are gonna come and go. Jobs are gonna come and go. Seasons of life are gonna come and go. Houses are gonna come and go. States, cities, all of that's gonna change, but what will never change is the purpose of your life.

And if you run headlong into the purposes of God for you, what will happen is is eventually, you'll stumble into somebody that's doing the same thing. And then together you go, hey, you're heading in the same direction. You're moving the same place that I am. Let's link arms and let's do this thing together.

That's what can begin to build a really healthy marriage. But if you have one person that's going, hey, my life exists to bring God glory and I'm running after the purpose that he's given me, you've got one person that's like, well, I don't even believe in God. Why?

Why do you think that that's gonna have that's gonna end up anywhere other than disaster? That's why Paul will say later in second Corinthians chapter six, do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common or what fellowship can light have with darkness?

He says that if you know who you are and the most important thing to you is fulfilling the purpose of God in your life, why would you dare entertain the notion of dating somebody who's not who's not equally pursuing the same thing? You will trick yourself and I've watched it a 100 times and it's usually girls

that will say, yeah, I know he's not a believer, but like I think I can get him there and he did check the box that he's he's spiritual on christiandating.com

and I know he doesn't really go to church and everything in his life doesn't actually look like he's a Christian but like I think he'll get there. He wants to get there. He said he wants to go to church with me one day. I'm telling you, I can pull him up into the purposes of God that I'm running after. Let me just tell you, I've watched this scenario play out a 100 times.

99 out of a 100, it's not the person following God that pulls the non Christian up to the Christian thing. 99 out of a 100, it's the non christian that takes the person that's running after the purposes of God and then says, hey, why don't we just let's just do our own thing. Brunch is much funner on a Sunday than going to church. Why would we trust God with our money? Let's just do our own thing, and all of a sudden the person that was running after who God had made him to be, all of a sudden it's just kind of stumbling, and I'm telling you, you will wake up a decade later being resentful at the person you thought you were going to find purpose in.

We have to make a decision that I'm going to know my purpose. I'm going know who God's created me to be before I ever try to find a person. Okay. Story continues in verse verse 16.

It says, and the Lord God commanded the man, you are free to eat from any of the tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For when you eat from it, you will certainly die. This is amazing if you read the creation story from the standpoint of God's design for relationship.

He gives Adam purpose, and what's the second thing he gives him? Restrictions and boundaries. He says, Adam, if you want to thrive under my leadership, these are the boundaries you've got to learn to live within.

And so often, the tension that you and I feel when it comes to God is we get we get angry that he tells us we can't do certain things. And some of us would go so far to go, well, why would God even enter in the possibility? Why would he even put the tree there that says you're gonna if you eat from this one, you're gonna die? Because you gotta realize that without choice, without agency, it's not actually love. See, God God wasn't trying to create a bunch of robots that would have to follow him, so he allowed he allowed choice and agency to be a part of our human experience.

But you gotta realize that God from the very beginning, he said, these are the boundaries that if you live under, this will lead to flourishing.

If you want a life that scripture says is abundant and full, and you want to stay away from shame and embarrassment that the consequences of sin, if you want to stay away from those things, you've got to live under the correction of God. It is not lost on me that before Adam was qualified and ready to lead Eve and have a wife, God first had to teach him how to learn how to discipline himself and to make some wise choices.

And I think so often because we've been sold this lie that the season of singleness is something you just want to get out of as fast as you humanly can,

that we waste the season of preparation that God wants us to steward. And I'm telling you for all of you who are in this room who are single, do not waste the years that God has you single just praying and hoping to get out of them. Instead, go, God, would you teach me how to live under your correction?

God, would you show me how to make wise choices in this season? Here's the second relational reset that we've got to make today. Before I before I make a covenant, I need to learn how to make wise choices.

This is primarily my message to every young man in this room. I spent a lot of time as a young adult pastor. I can't tell you how many conversations I have had and how many conversations I continue to have with young people who are getting ready to get married. I have them taking assessment, expectations,

all the things that they're entering into marriage and so many of them, because of the world that we live in today, so many men today are dealing with massive addictions to pornography.

And the lie that has crept into culture is that that will only be a struggle until you get married. And now you're married and you'll have an outlet and it'll go away. And hear me when I tell you that fighting for purity and holiness is not something that you only do before you're married. The fight for holiness, fight for purity is something as somebody who's married for almost twenty years, it is a daily decision that you'll have to fight for the rest of your life. Your marriage will not fix the problems that you have as a single person. You have to learn to live under the correction of God, to live under the the the order that God has created this earth in before you begin to go through the process of bringing somebody else into this thing who's now going to have to bear the brunt of the consequences of your sin.

I'm telling you, use this season steward it to go, I've got to learn how to lead myself before I can lead somebody else. It's not lost that the first thing that Adam had to learn to do was to learn how to to lead himself, to learn how to make wise choices because here's here's the principle that we see all throughout the scriptures. These are Jesus's words in Luke chapter 16.

He says that if you're faithful in little things, you will be faithful with large ones. But if you're dishonest in little things, I'm telling you, you won't be honest with greater responsibility. What God was teaching Adam was how to lead himself so that he effectively one day could lead somebody else.

And there's sometimes I sit with couples that are getting ready to get married and I'm like, why do you think you're about to get this decision right? When the past all of your choices leading up to this point have proven that you don't really make the greatest decisions,

and you're about to just run into this thing with blinders on, making the most important decision you will make in your life of who you're going spend the rest of your life with. It's second only to whether you'll bend the knee to the lordship of Christ or not, and you think that you're just going to stumble in there. But Jesus says, you gotta learn how to be faithful in little things, and then you can learn how to be faithful with something as powerful and as as holy

as marriage because here's the principle, marriage doesn't change you. Marriage magnifies you. And so many of us, women and men alike, we enter into marriage thinking that once I get married, then I won't struggle with this any longer.

And let me just tell you that it is a lie from the pit of hell. It is not true. Marriage just makes you more of what you already are. It's a bit like money.

Money doesn't it's amoral. It doesn't make you good or bad. It will magnify who you are. Some of the most generous people that I know were generous when they didn't have a lot of money, and they learned how to be faithful with little, and when they got a lot, they continued to live a life of generosity.

But if you're greedy and you're greedy with a little bit of money, I'm telling you, when you get a lot of money, you're just going to become even more greedy. The same is true with our marriage. It's why if you look the very next verse, start to see verse 18 shows us that God's gonna create Eve

and she's going to be a helper for Adam. It's the same word in Hebrew that we see throughout the scriptures that is used for the Holy Spirit's relationship with us. It's this idea that Eve was supposed to come in and help make Adam more of what he already was. Help Here's

the principle that if you're healthy before you get married, your spouse will make you healthy

er. If you're strong before you get married, your marriage will make you strong er. But the inverse is true as well. If he's broke before you marry him, when you get married, he will just become broke er. K? If he's dishonest before you marry him, I'm telling you, you get married, he's going to become more dishonest.

They are showing you when you're dating them the best version of them.

Trust who they're showing you to be. I have conversations with couples who are like, hey, we're dating. How do we figure this out? Infidelity just happened. I'm like, you know how you figure out when you're dating? You break up and you find somebody else to date.

If you're married, sure, let's have the conversation. Let's work through something like that. But right now, you're dating. You're seeing the best version of them. You haven't even seen the real version of them yet. And you think that all of a sudden getting married is going to magically fix everything and it won't. It's just going to magnify what's already there. You and I have to make a decision.

Before we run after a relationship, before we run after a person, we're going to go, no, no, I got to learn how to make wise decisions. I've got to learn how to lead myself. I've got to learn how to discipline myself and be faithful with little things so that later God can make me faithful

with much. Okay. Verse 18 says, the Lord God said, it's not good for the man to be alone, so I'm gonna make a helper suitable

for him. Okay. Now this is where the idea of Eve comes in. She's not here yet, God's starting to realize, okay, Adam's doing this. He's living in his purpose. He's learning to disciple himself. He's learning to lead himself. So I think he's ready for marriage. Verse 19

says, now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky and he brought them to the man to see what he would name them. And whatever the man called each living creature,

that was its name. Again, Adam had to be a pretty creative guy because he came up with a lot of names for animals. Right? Some of them were like, that's a dog. Alright? Cat. Then he got bored, he was like, I don't know, black bird. Right? And he's like, I'm just going to mess with people. Good luck spelling hippopotamus for the rest of history. Know? It's a weird job, but here's the principle as much as I'm joking.

Adam knew the assignment that God had given him. He was living into the calling that was on his life. And as he's doing that, look at this very next verse, verse 20. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky, and all the wild animals. Now you got to say this with me. Okay? But for say it with me. But for

Adam, no helpful help don't say that with me. Obviously, I'm struggling. No suitable helper was found. Here's the part I wanted to show you. This is a kind of crazy thing if you look at it, kind of a bible trivia nerd moment. Genesis chapter two verse 20 is the first time we learn what Adam's name is.

Up until this point, he's only ever been referred to as the man. The man did this. The man did this. The man was here. The man did this. But in verse 20, for the first time, we learn his name. Here's the principle that I think God baked into the creation story in Genesis chapter two. As you and I learn to live into our purpose, as we learn to steward the small things that God has given us, as we begin to learn to walk faithfully with the calling that is on our life, as we walk towards the things of God, what you will unmistakably

be given from heaven is the most important thing you'll ever receive on this life which is identity. All of a sudden, as Adam is naming animals, God names him. And it's before Eve enters into the picture that God restores his identity.

Here's the principle. Here's kind of the relational reset that I think you and I have to wrestle through this morning. Before I seek intimacy, need to seek identity. I think it's no coincidence that the number one thing that the enemy has been running after and destroying in our world today is this thing called identity.

Because I think he knows that if he can get you to question your identity and who you are, man, everything else is on the table.

If there was one thing, as I go back and I look at who I was when I walked in the doors of church at 20 years old, I'm telling you the most broken part of who I was was my identity. I had no idea who I was. I was trying to answer the question of who I am with all the things that this world told me was going to solve this identity thing that I was struggling with. I tried the drugs, I tried the possessions.

For the longest time, I thought that my identity was proving to the world the value that I had by the girl that I would show up to the party with, and that was my identity.

And then I get saved, and I have this radical transformation with, the resurrected Jesus, and I start to go through the process of being made new and reading the scriptures and seeing God's heart for marriage and all these things. I just was like, God, I need you to rewire this stuff in me. Genuinely, I felt like the Holy Spirit said, Daniel, give me six months and let me just begin to rewire you from the inside out. And I was somebody that would have identified as like a serial womanizer. Like, I was usually dating a couple of them at the same time. It's why my twenty year high school reunion is this year, and I'm like, no, I'm not going to put my wife through that. Like, that's not fun for anybody. You know?

But all of a sudden, went through this process where God was literally just transforming me week after week. And six months into this journey, I'll never forget, I was literally sitting in my bed, reading the bible, praying, and I I had this the craziest feeling, thought sensation come over me.

It was like, man, if I if I never meet somebody, and I just stay single, I was serving in high school ministry, I was like, if I if I just stay in this place for the rest of my life, like, I'm I'm totally good.

All of a sudden, like, my my soul was satisfied in God and God alone. And it was the craziest concept in the world to me. And it is not lost on me that it was some three or four weeks after that moment, after God going through this process of restoring my identity,

that all of a sudden I bumped into this girl that was running after the purposes of God on her life, and I looked at her and I said, hey, let's try to do this thing together. But literally, our second date is I sat down and I said, look, I don't know how to do this. My past is pretty jacked up. Like, I don't think I'm that person anymore, but like, this whole thing is new to me. You and I need to make a decision that we've got to allow God to begin to restore the identity that's been broken in all of us. And I'm here to just kind of universally speak over all of the the men in our church. Men, I want to tell you, you don't need a woman to be a successful man.

You can be successful, satisfied, and whole with your relationship with God alone.

And I'd actually argue until you get to that place, you're not actually ready to start going through the process of considering a relationship. And women, I would say the exact same thing to you. You don't need a man to be a secure and confident woman.

You don't. There's a God in heaven that has made you, that loves you more than you could ever possibly know. The New Testament, Paul goes so far to say that it's actually it's actually better to be single for some people because you can do more things. And this idea that you have to find a person to be satisfied, you've got to find a partner

to find purpose, it's a lie that culture has permeated, that the enemy has come alongside of and furthered,

but you don't have to have any of that. Now again, over the next couple weeks, we'll talk about how do we do marriage God's way, what are the seven deadly sins that we commit inside of relationships that doom them from the start. We'll cover all that stuff. But we gotta start with a foundation that goes, no, I've gotta figure out how to be satisfied with my relationship with God and him alone

before I have any chance of entering into a marriage or beginning to restore the one that God has given me. Last couple verses here and I'll close. Genesis chapter two verse 21 says, so the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. And while he was sleeping,

he took one of the man's ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. And then the Lord God made a woman from the rib that he had taken out of the man and he brought her to the man. Here's just amazing. How does Adam

find the person he's supposed to spend the rest of his life with? Well, he signs up for 13 different Christian dating websites. He builds an algorithm to solve them all. He goes on he doesn't do any of that stuff. What does Adam do? He goes to sleep.

And while he's sleeping and resting in the provision and the protection of God, God does what he can't do. Friends, that's the promise of scripture. How do we how do we find the person we're supposed to spend the rest of our life with? Pursue the things of God and let God work on your behalf.

Learn to enter into the rest of heaven and watch what God can do as you begin to trust him with your life.

And you notice how Eve was created? See, I always thought the story. I thought the story was like, oh, God put Adam to sleep, takes a rib, he creates Eve, and then she wakes up and she sees him, and Adam looks at her and he says, woah, man. And that's how we get the term woman from. Right?

Some of is gonna take a couple minutes for you to get that joke. But that's not how the story happens. What is Eve's first encounter? Look at verse 22. Again, we read it. You got to read it slowly though. Verse 22 says, then the Lord God

made a woman from the rib that he had taken out of the man. And then what did he do? He, God, brought her to the man. What happened? Who did Eve see first when she was created? It wasn't Adam, it was God. And before she ever met him, she met him. And I'm telling you, if we have any shot of figuring out these relationships,

we have to get this relationship dialed in. Until you know who you are in Christ, you have no business trying to date somebody else. And if you're here today and you're married, I'm telling you, the greatest work that you will do on your marriage is in your relationship with Jesus.

And if you can just begin to rest and allow God to speak to you and to work on the parts of you, the the sharp edges that need to be refined, the things of your character that need to be worked on, if you can do that and you can trust God with the rest, I'm telling you, God can begin to build an incredible

marriage in us and through us. But as long as as long as we stay in the posture of going, no, no, gotta fix this person. I gotta get him to do this. We send him all the texts. You need to lead better. You're not leading enough. You're not doing this stuff. And we try to manufacture the relationship that we want.

I'm telling you, we're just gonna leave ourselves stressed and tired, but there is rest that is available for the weary human soul, available in God and God alone. Last point that I have, I'll close here. Before I pursue a relationship,

I pursue rest. What is the invitation of God for us today as we try to figure out how to do relationships his way? It's learning how to rest in his plan and his sufficiency despite all the things that are happening out here. King David said it this way, Psalm chapter 62 verse five, Yes, my soul, find rest in God.

My hope comes from him. I felt like God wanted me to come here this morning and give some of you permission to just just rest. Just enter into the rest of the Lord

and trust that all the things that you're trying to get figured out in your home, in your relationship, all the things that you wish were different in your marriage, I'm telling you, you can't fix your husband. You can't fix your wife. But if you can learn to rest in the sovereignty of God, the providence of his plan,

and you will give all of those things over to God and trust him, God will begin to do more than you could ever possibly imagine. Last point that I want every single one of us to hear today, until I'm satisfied in God, I will never find true satisfaction in anything else in this life. And that's true about everything,

not just relationships. But until your soul is satisfied deeply with who God is, until there's peace inside of your soul, I'm telling you, any any attempt to try to get a marriage worked out, it's all gonna be just feeling like we're constantly swimming upstream.

But there is rest available to the weary human soul, available to the person through the person of Jesus if you will if you will enter into it. And so here's what I wanna do this morning as we start to end our services. I want to ask everybody if you would just close your eyes and bow your heads. I I genuinely felt this week as I was praying for you, thinking about this message, that there were there were some of you walking in where like the phrase tired,

overwhelmed, exhausted, striving, at the end of yourself, it just really accurately describes where you sit this morning. And I think that there's some of you who are here, specifically married people here who have no idea what the future looks like in your marriage.

You're asking some really big questions of will we make it through this?

Maybe you've had conversations about potentially getting divorced if things don't get figured out, but I think God brought you here this morning just for me to have a chance to pray with you and for you and to remind you how much God loves you. If you're here today and that's you, again, all eyes closed, heads bowed in an atmosphere of faith,

not to be found out just so I can know who I'm praying with and so we can show God, man, we're we still want to do this thing. If you're here today and that's you and you're tired, you're overwhelmed,

uncertain of what the future looks like. If you're here, would you just right now just throw your hand up right with me so I can know who I'm praying with? Don't be ashamed. There's hands going up all over this room. I thank you for your trust. I thank you for your vulnerability.

I see your hands. I see your hearts responding. You can put your hands down. And father, I thank you. God, I thank you for every single person that you would bring here today, that maybe it feels like they randomly ended up here, but God, there's no coincidences in your kingdom.

That God, you orchestrated all types of things you get them in the room here, primarily so that they could hear how much you love them and how good your plans are for their life. And father, I pray that you would begin to show them and teach them what entering into your rest looks like.

Father, I pray that the spirit of God would move on their hearts powerfully this morning, and that God, we would feel your peace. We would feel your joy that surpasses all understanding. That God we would walk out of here with this thing bubbling up again that we haven't felt in a long time called hope.

God, would hope begin to return. And God we pray against what the enemy is trying to do. God we rebuke the lies that he's speaking over us. I rebuke the lies that he's been speaking over these relationships. And we say, Jesus, would you come and have your way? God, would you bring rest and restoration

to every single person that's here this morning? God, we trust you. We love you. It is in the mighty name of Jesus all God's people said. Amen and amen. Thank you guys so much for letting me yell at you for a couple minutes.