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All of us, on some level, desire transformation in our marriage. Whether that transformation is a small change, or a complete overhaul, we all want to experience more joy, peace, love and purpose. Ultimately, we are always going through some form of tran All of us, on some level, desire transformation in our marriage. Whether that transformation is a small change, or a complete overhaul, we all want to experience more joy, peace, love and purpose. Ultimately, we are always going through some form of transformation, because we don’t remain completely the same. All of us are being transformed into something; the question is, are we transforming into what God desires, or something else?The first step in changing, is realizing that we can. The lie we often tell ourselves is that we cannot change, or never will. We must believe that we can and will change, because of what God says. The journey to change can be really difficult, but to begin, start by doing the next right thing. Here are 7 ways to establish the change and transformation you want to see in your own marriage:Write it outWrite down your goals for your marriage and your walk with the Lord, together! Writing down your thoughts and goals makes them visible and real. Not only does this give you and your spouse something to work towards, it ensures you are on the same page. Whether they are smaller goals, such as “affirm one another more often,” or larger goals, such as “get out of debt,” it is important to know about and work together towards your objectives.The Golden RuleMatthew 7:12 12 So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. In other words, treat your spouse the way you would like to be treated. Be honest, treat them with gentleness and respect, encourage them, and forgive quickly. Pursue your spouse as you would want to be pursued.If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say it at allRegardless of how we are feeling at any given moment, it isn’t acceptable to be cruel or hurtful with our words and actions. We must practice holding our tongues and thinking before we speak. Silence, and the ability to listen more in an argument, is more important than being right. Think about what you are going to say. If it is not something you would love to hear from your spouse, then maybe it should not be said. If you do have a critique, bring it to your spouse constructively and from a place of love and respect.Stop being easily offendedOne of the attributes of love is that it is not easily offended. It is not irritable or resentful. We can become more easily offended when we love ourselves more than we love our spouse, or in the places where we allow insecurity to seep in. When we are not abiding in the word, it will be easy to react in our flesh. If we truly love, we will not be irritable or resentful. Remind your spouse that you are both working on not being offended with each other.More romance and more sexOur marriages need both the physical and emotional connection that romance and sex bring. Physical intimacy is a powerful gift God has given to our marriages. Emotionally, finding ways to relate and to bring excitement and mystery into your daily life is essential in connecting with your spouse’s heart and mind. Invest in your marriageInvesting in something means to spend your time, money, energy, and resources on that thing. Investing in your marriage will result in great returns for generations to come. Whether it is going on regular dates, attending a marriage retreat, reading books, or praying for one another, these investments will sow seeds that many (especially you and your spouse), will reap the benefits of.See your spouse and yourself through Christ’s eyesWhen you look at your spouse, choose to see them as Christ does. Have hope in seeing who your spouse can become in Christ and love them how Christ does, instead of constantly viewing them critically. See them through a lens of grace, not who they are in their sin, but who they are because of the blood of Christ; a new creation.Change can just happen, but that kind of change is usually the result of being passive in decisions and what you allow to influence your mind and heart. Powerful transformation comes from putting in the time and effort. It takes being selfless and sacrificial; it requires much, but the benefits of becoming more Christ-like are exceedingly worthwhile.--This episode is brought to you by our faithful patron team, who have chosen to help financially support this show monthly. Here is a shout-out to some of our most recent patrons. Nicole MitchellDawn GKimberly SKatharine CCandice GRegena JWe thank you so much for choosing to partner with us in blessing 10’s of thousands of couples with free daily prayer emails and this weekly podcast.If you have been blessed by the free marriage after god content, wed love to invite you to join our patron team. Please visit marriageaftergod.com/patronTRANSCRIPTAaron:Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith, your host of the Marriage After God Podcast. All of us on some level desire a transformation in our marriage. Whether the transformation is a small change or a complete overhaul, we want to experience more joy, more peace, more love, and more purpose.Jennifer:The truth is, we are always going through some form of transformation, for there is no such thing as staying the same. The question is, are we transforming into what God desires, or something else?Aaron:This episode is brought to you by our faithful patron team who have chosen to help financially support this show. Here's a shout to some of the most recent patrons: Nicole M, Don G, Kimberly S, Katherine C, Candace, G, and Regina J. We thank you so much for choosing to partner with us in blessing tens of thousands of couples, with free daily prayer emails, and this weekly podcast.If you've been blessed by this free Marriage After God content, we'd love to invite you to join our patron team. Please visit Marriageaftergod.com/patron.Jennifer:Well, this has been a whole month now of the podcast.Aaron:We're doing it.Jennifer:It's awesome.Aaron:We are doing it.Jennifer:Welcome to 2023. How's January been for you?Aaron:Well, it feels like we've been doing better because we're better as in, we've talked about, we're getting into routines. The routines look different than they used to, but we're getting some routines and I like it.Jennifer:Yeah, sometimes you just got to reset. Sometimes life forces you to reset.Aaron:Yeah, hence 2020, 2021, 2022.Jennifer:Every year there's been new reset. Yeah, so what's been happening lately since last week?Aaron:Well, just before ...Jennifer:Oh, yeah, I was going to say that.Aaron:Yeah. I walk in, and I wanted to Jennifer look at the notes and she's like, "What notes?" I'm like, "Oh my goodness. Was one of the kids in here?"Jennifer:There was just two sentences and a bunch of gibberish.Aaron:Garbly. Yeah.Jennifer:Did you say garbly?Aaron:Garbly goop. It was, all the notes were deleted, literally.Jennifer:Who was the culprit? That's what I want to know.Aaron:I'm wondering what else happened in our room. Luckily, I was able to restore the notes so we weren't out of luck, but something that is awesome that happened this week is I got to start Jiu-Jitsu.Jennifer:Nice. The kids have been doing it for a year. Did you know that?Aaron:It's been a whole year?Jennifer:I know. Crazy. Went by fast.Aaron:They're getting really good and I was getting jealous, and I'm like, "I got to get good at Jiu-Jitsu so that I can wrestle with them and them not win me every time." I started this week and I think you're a little jealous, because I think you want to start too.Jennifer:I've been wanting to start for seven months. I feel like out of everyone in the family, Mom gets to make those kind of choices last because everyone's got to be okay if I'm going to step out of the house.Aaron:It is true. We need you a lot.Jennifer:Timing was off, but who knows?Aaron:I think we might try it this week though together, on a date night or something.Jennifer:I think we're going to try it on a date night.Aaron:We should do it.Jennifer:It's just a fundamentals class, so there it'll be easy for me, I think. Not easy, but I'm not going to do what you're doing.Aaron:Straightforward. Yeah. To be honest, it was one of the most rewarding and intense workouts I've had in a very long time. I walk out drenched, soaking. It's disgusting. I'm so wet. I was getting in the van and I had to look for something to sit on so I wouldn't get the seat all wet.Jennifer:That's gross.Aaron:It was really gross, and I'm also really sore. To be honest, I felt really good after the first class. I was like, "Dang, I'm not that bad. I did awesome." Then the second class, I realized everyone was probably being really nice to me because I'm not good at all. That was awesome, actually.Jennifer:Does that make you want to go back?Aaron:Yeah. It was still a lot of fun. No one was mean about it. Everyone's so nice and they want, everyone wants to get good together. Yeah, it just made me excited.Jennifer:That's good for this episode. Get good together. That's what we should call it.Aaron:Get good together. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to growing in it.Jennifer:Cool. Well, something that's been interesting for me was a little bit unexpected, just because we've had conversations about it, but ...Aaron:Privately.Jennifer:The kids started praying for me crazy ...Aaron:Out of nowhere.Jennifer:... that I would have another baby, and it really warms my heart. Aaron and I have talked about this in the past. We're like, we look at Edith, she's two, almost three, and she's been our baby for so long that it's like ...Aaron:Is this the longest gap we've had so far? Yeah.Jennifer:WI think to myself, okay, well if this is all the kids that we have, I'm totally content and happy with where our family is at. Then there's this piece of my heart that I'm like, but if I did have another, that'd be awesome.Aaron:Our hands are always open in that sense. We want God's will. At the same time, we're praying and asking God to bring us along with them. Our kids started praying for it.Jennifer:Every day.Aaron:At Bible time, I'm like, "Who would anyone like to pray?" First prayer, God give mommy a baby. Then Elliot just came up randomly, me and you were talking this morning, just about the day, and I can't remember what we were talking about. He just comes over and puts his hands on both of us and looks at us and starts praying for a baby. We're like, okay, I guess you guys want a baby.Jennifer:That's just been going on a week.Aaron:We will see if you guys get an announcement at some point this year about a baby.Jennifer:Stick around if you want to hear it announced on the podcast.Aaron:You will hear about it if that happens.Jennifer:We shall see.Aaron:For this topic, transforming your marriage, it's hard to say that. Transforming.Jennifer:No, it's get better together, or what'd you say?Aaron:Yeah, let's do this together. Get better together. Transforming your marriage together. We wanted to bring up some ideas, and we actually have seven of them for you. What inspired this idea for you, Jennifer? You kind of wrote down some of these ideas that we've been building off of.Jennifer:Yeah. Well, the initial just idea of, hey, let's talk about transformation for a minute. Marriage came because of a conversation that we had back in December. I was having a hard time dealing with desiring change and wanting change, and being frustrated over things not changing,Aaron:Which also has been the theme for this whole month.Jennifer:Yeah, yeah. I remember calling you, and we were having a conversation about, well, I was letting my emotions out and you, you're being a good listener. Then you said, "Let's transform together. Let's be transformed together," or something like that.Aaron:Yeah. Well, because you felt like you couldn't. I don't know how to do this. I can't do this. That's why we've been talking about this in various aspects throughout this month, but we all feel that way. That's why I shared it. I feel like there's things in my life that I can't break out of either, that I can't change. Then I was just saying, "Well, we have to be transformed."That's the only way we have true change in our life is if there's a transformation. We can't be the same person but act differently. We can't be the same in the same place and yet be in a different place. We have to change. We have to move.Jennifer:I think the tension of the agony in all of our lives when it comes to transformation is we're on one side where we desire the change, because we're frustrated over the results and things happening because of where we're at ...Aaron:The consequences of where we're at.Jennifer:We also know that to get to the other side of change, it just requires a lot.Aaron:It's painful.Jennifer:It's painful, and it's hard to make those changes and those habits, and redefining rhythms and routines, and things that will help make all of that happen.Aaron:I think an encouragement also about transformation, because it's easy to say, we got to be transformed. It's like, well, yeah. How? I think the first step, and it's something that we've been trying to reiterate, is that first of all, we can change. If there's areas in our lives that we don't like, or that we know God wants change in us, we have the ability to, because God's putting his spirit. He's put his spirit in us. It's not impossible, and they feel that way, but the reality is we, are being transformed.Like we said in the beginning of this episode, all of us are being transformed into something. Either we're being lazy or we're being lax, and we're being transformed into something that we don't want because we're just letting it happen, or we're following God, we're putting our eyes on him. We're seeking first his kingdom. We're letting his spirit work in us. We're not fighting it, and we're being transformed into his likeness.Jennifer:The lie is that we're stuck.Aaron:The lie is that we can't change the lies is that there, that we are what we are.Jennifer:We're here in our heads. We'll never change. That's what I was getting stuck in, is like, no, I'm never going to change. You see yourself one way, and it gets really hard to see yourself in a new way.Aaron:Yeah. Believing that we can, like you said, but then also believing what God says and believing that he has something for us.Jennifer:The reason why we wanted to bring this up to you today for those listening is because we kind of had this conversation going on in our marriage, and we know that we're not the only ones who have struggled with desiring change in marriage, or in parenting, or in life, in so many different areas of life. We want to encourage you guys, if you're in that place of desiring change and transformation, we hope that today encourages you.Maybe what we share, not every single bit of it will stick with you or be something that you feel like you need to work on, but I'm sure there's at least one or two.Aaron:Well, and the point is, there's this saying that it says, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Well, if you think about the whole thing, you're like, it can. The goal is taking that next step, just…
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