Finding Joy and Spiritual Growth in Your Marriage – Love Like You Mean It 2025

Episode Transcript

FamilyLife Today® with Dave and Ann Wilson – Web Version Transcript

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Finding Joy and Spiritual Growth in Your Marriage

Guests:Cruise Panel

From the series:Love Like You Mean It 2025 (Day 1 of 1)

Air date:March 12, 2025

Juli Slattery:It’s not my job to change my husband. I tried for many years; it doesn’t work. It’s my job to love him well and let God change him. You may be in that season right now, where you’re like, “I have no answers.” Our whole encouragement to you is not to give you just marriage tips and techniques; but to really tell you: “God is the Life-changer, and the Healer, and the Wisdom.”

Ann:Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Ann Wilson.

Dave:And I’m Dave Wilson. You can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today!

Dave:We’ve got an exciting program for you today.

Ann:We do, because the talk that you’re going to listen to is from the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise.

Dave: We just got off the boat. I still got a little bit of a sunburn on my bald head.

Ann:We just want to invite you, personally, to come on this vacation; and it’s also a marriage cruise. It will ignite your marriage; it will heal your marriage; and you’ll become, not only closer to one another, but to Jesus.

Dave:And you’re thinking, “When is it?” I’ll tell you: Valentine’s Day next year, February 14 through the 21st. We’ll be in the Caribbean on an unbelievable boat; it’s even better than the boat we just got off of.

Ann:It’s brand-new.

Dave:Brand-new boat; it’s being built right now. You can be on that boat, and you hear talks like you’re going to hear today; as well as Christian bands, and comedians, and workshops, and devotionals, worship. It’s a powerful, powerful week. In fact, it’s a life-changing, legacy-changing, marriage-changing week; it’s a marriage retreat on a boat. We would love to have you join us next year in the Caribbean.

Here’s how you can sign up: just go right now—this is the deal: you want to capture it in this moment—go to FamilyLifeToday.com; you can sign up there. Or you can give us a call if you’d like at 800-358-6329. That’s 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and the word, TODAY.

And now, let’s set up what you’re going to hear. Ann and I hosted a panel on the cruise; basically, took questions from people on the cruise. They submitted them all-week long. We said, “Okay, you asked; we’re going to answer. Let’s talk about what you want to talk about.” So enjoy.

[Love Like You Mean It Panel]

Dave:Okay, I’ve got all these questions that came in. The best one: I want to see if anybody here can answer it. One of the first ones that came in was: “Are there any recommendations for hotels near Miami?”—that literally came in. Okay, we’re not going to really do that one: Google!

Obviously, we can’t answer all these; but they come in sort of categories. One of the categories that we got a lot of questions about was wives respecting or submitting to husbands, and husbands loving or dominating—sort of the roles of husband and wife. We’ve got some experts up here. How would you try to explain headship/submission, respect/disrespect, love/cherish?

Juli:So the best hotel in Miami is—

Dave:You found it! She’s good, isn’t she?

Mark Savage: I think that that has been a challenge for couples probably since the Word was written/imprinted. And what’s key is that we humble ourselves like Christ, and we serve one another. We take a posture of cooperation in the way that Christ calls us. Too often, we get into the mental battles of: “Who’s in control?” And if we would stop the control arguments, and move to surrender and to submission to one another, it would change the trajectory of our relationship.

Dave:Yeah, well-said. Any thoughts, Juli?

Juli:Yeah; over the years, I’ve kind of grown to dislike the word, “roles.” I don’t know if we see that word in the Scripture. I think what God is more calling us to is a posture. The way I’ve understood that as a wife, as I’ve grappled with that, is: “What do I do with my power? God is calling me to use my power wisely in a way that brings out the best in my husband—doesn’t compete with him—but really builds into him.” And to me, that’s a spirit; it’s an attitude, regardless of what role we might be doing at the time in terms of: “Who’s earning the money?” or “Who’s leading the devotions?”

I think, sometimes, when we think roles, we get stuck in that instead of saying, “God wants to give me a heart of loving my husband well and give him a heart of laying down his life for me.” That’s something that we grow into, over time. As you mentioned Mark, it’s that spirit of, first, submitting to Christ. But yeah, it’s a journey for sure.

Dave:Man, I hear that, as a guy, and I think, “Okay, ladies, we’ve got three of you up here. Talk to us, as husbands, how we can use our power to love and cherish our wife; because we have power, and wives have power too.” There are times I think she’s feeling loved by me—sort of asserting my power in more of a leadership way, strongly—and she’s not feeling loved at all. That’s just our marriage; I’m sure yours are never that bad. But I think for us, as men, sometimes we’re like, “Well, how do we use our power in a way that our wives flourish and feel loved?”

Jill Savage:I remember, in our 1.0 marriage, one of the things that we often talk about, and Mark will share about, is that love was transactional. What we mean by that is—particularly, from a him-loving-me perspective—where I would feel like he would be loving if he got what he wanted; but if he didn’t get what he wanted, then he wasn’t loving.

You [Mark] can expound upon that more, because you usually are the one who explains that.

Mark:Yeah, you’re doing great.

Dave:He’s giving up his power.

Jill:And I felt that—I didn’t know what it was that I felt—but I felt it. That changed as we hit a huge crisis in 2011. In 2012, we had a dark year; and then, as we began to rebuild our 2.0 marriage, suddenly—well, during that season—that’s where God taught me to love deeper. God instructed me to love Mark when Mark was in another relationship. That was a really difficult thing for me to do, but I realized that I only knew easy love. I only knew how to love when somebody was loving you back; I only knew how to love when it was reciprocal in some way. God really taught me how to love deeper; and then, it became Mark’s turn after that.

What I would say, in answer to your question, is to truly love sacrificially is a really powerful thing for us to experience. That makes us want to follow,

and it makes us want to link arms and do this life together.

Ann:I think I lived my first 15 years with what Dave should be doing.

Dave:I agree; I agree. Probably, 25 years.

Ann:Maybe; maybe.

Dave:And Dave wasn’t doing much of it.

Ann:Because if someone had asked a question like that: “What’s the man’s role?”—I’m like, “Oh, Jesus, please let him listen now! Let him hear it, Jesus!” I was so busy wanting Dave to show love, and do it the way I thought he should do it, that I don’t think I realized I had this huge log in my eye in pride, so much pride. I thought, “He’s so selfish”; but I was so prideful. I get a little leery when we say: “Hey, what should the men be doing?” “What does love look like?”—because I think, “Oh, here it goes.” I would fall into that trap every time, like: “Oh, yeah; he should be…and he’s not,” “He should be…and he’s not.”

I liked what you’re saying: “I just need to be about my business of: ‘God, what have You asked me to do?’ ‘How am I going to use my superpower, regardless if Dave does nothing to show his love?’” He’s showing me love all the time, but I was in such a mindset of looking for what I wanted I couldn’t even see the things he was doing well or right. I think it’s a whole mindset shift that Jesus has to change. He had to change me to see Dave in a different way and to see Dave the way Jesus saw Dave.

Dave:Yeah, Ann’s not going to tell you this, but she has a book coming out in May on that topic.

Julie:It’s great; that’s a great book.

Dave:Juli, when you said, “power”; “A woman has power,”—

Ann:Juli always uses that word too.

Dave:I know you endorsed her book, and so you’ve read it before anybody else.

Juli:It’s fantastic.

Dave:Talk about that a little bit, because we both have power. To live as Christ is both of us are laying down that power to really, not just love our spouse, but to love our God by living selflessly. It’s the hardest thing to do.

Jill:Mutual submission. We just don’t really understand what mutual submission looks like. It is, when we really love each other well, we are laying that down. That is so powerful.

Mark:I think submission is, for me, the word is “surrender.” Surrender is a word that sometimes men are afraid of, because they think they’re giving up. What I would encourage you is: “Yes, give up your flesh; give up your selfish desires.” That’s what I had to do. I tried staying silent for years; and then, I was ticked; and then, I tried to power up and actually lord it over Jill.

You can ask me: “How’d that work for you, Mark?” That didn’t—

Dave:“How did that work for you, Mark?”

Mark:It didn’t work—let me tell you—it did not work. So surrender myself, and do things Jesus’ way—man, it’s a mind-bender—it’s so hard to do that. It’s like getting the tar beat out of you in a pickleball tournament, and you’re losing. To do things the Lord’s way, just brings victory to the relationship.

Juli:And I guess I would just add—when we say things like laying down your power, it doesn’t mean weakness—I think women and men need to hear this. Sometimes, we think of that as passivity: “As a woman, maybe I’m just supposed to be quiet all the time, not share my thoughts,” or “As a man, just withdrawing, and saying, ‘I’ll just let her have her way.’”

God calls us, not to just get rid of, or ignore our power. And He also calls us not to be overbearing—but to use our power wisely—to be asking for His wisdom to be speaking life into one another, to know how to lovingly and courageously confront when it’s necessary. So it’s not just a passivity or weakness; it’s strength under the control of the Holy Spirit.

Ann:We know how to do that with our kids; we love unconditionally. There’s something about—sometimes, our kids drive us crazy—but there’s still this/most of us have this unconditional love for our child. Why don’t we have that for our spouse? Isn’t it weird? It’s kind of crazy!

Dave:Yeah. We’ve had several conversations in the last couple of years about grandkids. I love them.

Ann:Oh, no!

Dave:And we’ve said this on FamilyLife Today—but I don’t know if this is your story or not—it’d be a good show-of-hands moment; maybe, not. But I have said to Ann, “I feel like, with the grandkids, it’s ‘always’”—and I’m not exaggerating—”it isn’t like ‘mostly’; it’s always ‘Yes’; there’s never a ‘No.’”

Ann:Oh, look! Some people are raising.

Dave:And with Dave, it’s mostly “No.” I’m exaggerating.

Ann:What?!

Dave:I’m exaggerating, but I mean, I feel like, “Hey, can you come over right now, Nani?” “Yeah!” I’m like, “Hey.” And I felt that in this stage of our life—we’re empty nesters—it’s awesome in some ways.

Ann:Wait, wait, wait, wait.

Dave:Okay, it’s not about us; we need to talk about them.

Ann:Juli, can you help us now?

Dave:Anybody relate to that?!

But here’s what Ann said to me, sometime, this past year. She goes, “I felt that, for 30 years, with your job. It’s always, ‘Yes’; I was the afterthought.” And you know what? She’s right. And a lot of that was—

Ann:I’m not doing it maliciously to get back at you.

Dave:No, I know you love them; it’s awesome!

Ann:But you weren’t doing it maliciously either.

Dave:I know, but we hurt each other. I hurt you, and I didn’t even get to the depth of what was going on. I am longing to achieve; I want to prove myself; and you’re good. And then, I come home; and I get booed. So I go back out where I get applauded. That became our pattern.

[Studio]

Dave:We’re Dave and Ann Wilson. We’re listening to a clip that we did on the Love Like You Mean It cruise. And—

Ann:—we got into a fight.

Dave:We got into a fight after this little panel session that maybe we can tell you about later. But I said some things in front of a thousand people that probably weren’t the best; is that the best way to say it? I’m still not sure what I did.

Ann:We’ll tell you later about it. But yeah, let’s suffice it to say it wasn’t great

after that. But we’re on a cruise ship in the Caribbean, and you know what? It seems easier to resolve conflict when you’re in a good setting—away from the stress—and all the things that are going on with home life, and family, and kids.

Dave:So you want to be with us next year. Go to FamilyLifeToday.com and sign up to get the best deal of the year right now.

But let’s go back and see if you can detect what I said that sort of set my—

Ann:You already said it.

Dave: I already said it, but I probably said more; and it’s probably in this next half. So enjoy.

[Love Like You Mean It Panel]

Ann:If there’s a wife or a husband, who feels stuck—if they feel like they’re not being heard, or loved or respected—what would you say to them?

Juli:Well, first of all, if you go back 25 or 30 years, and have us on this panel at those ages, we wouldn’t have a whole lot to say. I notice we’re older—we’re old—and we all have a story of how we tried to do this in our own strength. We were frustrated; and our marriage was on the brink, and we needed the help. It was knocking your head up against a brick wall and getting nowhere.

And so, when you hear us talk—and we’re just people—but I think all of us have just encountered the work of God in our lives to see marriage differently than the world tells you to see it. It’s not about: “How do I build a great marriage?” You get to this place of surrender, where you just are like, “Lord, how do I please You in this messy situation?” When you can begin to have that posture, God answers that prayer. It’s not my job to change my husband—I tried for many years—it doesn’t work. It’s my job to love him well, and to listen to the Lord speak to me, and let God change him.

That’s sort of the trajectory that I think God takes every marriage on that really wants to surrender to Him. You may be in that season right now, where you’re like, “I have no answers; we feel disconnected.” Our whole encouragement to you is, not to give you just marriage tips and techniques, but to really tell you: “God is the Life-changer, and the Healer, and the Wisdom.”

Ann:I think we would all say that that is the answer—is our walk with God of surrendering, and laying our spouse down on the altar—but more importantly, laying our lives on the altar every single day.

Jill:And one of the things that, over the last year, I feel like God has been impressing on my heart—because we still have our moments, where one of us gets sideways or we both get sideways—I remember one day the Lord just impressed on my heart; He was like, “I want you to reflect Me; I don’t want you to reflect Mark right now.” That has righted my heart so many times; because I think our tendency is, especially when we get frustrated with each other, or we get a little off, it’s like one will power up; and then, the other will power up. Before you know it, we’re just not in a good place.

Just that whisper, that God whispered on my heart was like, “Right now, I want you to reflect Me,”—that’s it—and that’s the call for all of us. That’s what you’re saying there, Juli, is we need to reflect Christ; and then, trust that the Holy Spirit will also be working on our partner. And by the way, the Holy Spirit does not need your help; that’s really important to understand. It took me a long time to figure that one out: “He doesn’t need our help. He’s got that job covered.”

Dave:I mean, would that be your answer? And some of the questions hit on this as well, and I know pastoring for 30 years and then speaking around the country on marriage, we hear this a lot—a longing—and it goes both ways, but it seems like more from the wives that they wish their husbands would be more engaged spiritually with them. We’ve heard that everywhere we go.

It’s almost like what you just said is: “What do I do? I want him to lead,” “I want him to pray with me every night,”—or whatever it is. And again, it could go either way; but it seems often that I hear, “Can you talk to my husband?”

Ann:Yeah, I would love the men—I’d love for you guys—to answer that.

Dave:Yeah, Mark, I’d love for you to answer that.

Mark:Yeah, thanks, man/chicken. Not that Jill and I ever dealt with that at all.

Dave:Yeah, I’m sure you didn’t.

Mark:We see that all the time; we experience that. And in our home, I would try to lead in the way that I felt God was calling me to lead.

Jill:And I would tell him it wasn’t the right way.

Mark:And God’s voice began to sound like Jill’s; it was so interesting. So I would ask the Lord, “How am I supposed to do this?” It became so frustrating, because I could never please her; and I see that in other relationships. The man so wants to show up, but he wants encouragement. And so often, what happens is that the wife ends up just belittling him, or condemning him; and he says, “Forget it; I don’t want to do it.”

What I think Jill and I really work to help couples do is to move from frustrated to fascinated, and to become cheerleaders of one another, and think the best of one another; because God is bigger than your desires. And God wants us men to lead in ways that He has designed us to lead.

Dave:Alright, fun question to end tonight: “What do you guys do for fun? How do you keep fun, joy, laughter in your marriages?—do you?” I mean, we’re on a cruise; this is sort of fun. We got two minutes: give us some things we should do to have some fun.

Juli:Mike and I work together now in ministry, as I think all of us couples do.

Ann:Yeah, we all do.

Juli:So we go through seasons, where it’s like, “Oh man, we forgot to have fun.” We’re always talking about ministry; we’re always talking about serious things and about things with the kids. And my husband is, by nature, really fun.

Dave:He is.

Juli:But I feel like I broke him.

Dave:He is fun.

Juli:I made him too serious; I broke, Mike! But we have to be intentional about it. I think part of it is recognizing that God wants us to play and laugh. It declares our freedom when we play; because kids play, because they know the parents are taking care of everything. That things don’t have to be perfect for you to have fun; that it’s okay to take breaks. We need to take breaks and find how we play. Adventure—

Dave:You sort of got to have to choose it. We were working out a couple years ago down—we have this little basement, little gym; it’s terrible; I can’t even do—well, anyway, Ann just looks at me; and she goes, “I think I could tackle you. I could take you down.” I’m like, “What?!” She goes, “Stand there; I’m going to take you down.” I go, “You can’t take me down!”—not that I’m that much bigger. “Let me try!” And she, literally, boom!—grabs my leg—and I’m, literally, just like, “What are you doing?” And then, she says, “I can’t believe I can’t get you down!”

Ann:I was so mad at myself; disappointing.

Dave:It was so funny; she goes, “Let’s put this on our Instagram channel.” We put a challenge out: “See if you can tackle your husband.” The first one who responded is a quarterback, who came to Christ through Vertical Marriage, Baker Mayfield and his wife. Baker/they said it; and she’s like, “I can’t take him down either!”

Ann:Well, then,—or Dan Orlovski, who’s an ESPN analyst; he’s 6’5” and his wife is 5’1” or 5’2”, like me—and she did it.

Dave:She got him.

Ann:He wasn’t looking, but who cares?

Dave:Yeah, baby!

[Studio]

Ann:We are Ann and Dave Wilson, and we’re listening to a clip from the panel that we were on during the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise.

Dave: I wonder if Dan and Tiffany are going to hear that.

Ann:I hope they do.

That panel was fun. We were with Juli Slattery and the Savages—they were a couple that we haven’t met often—but they had gone through an affair; they talked about that on the panel. I was happy that we were frank and honest; but also, we put our hope where our hope really does come from; and that’s Jesus.

Dave:Maybe, I was too frank; because we got in a little conflict that night about something I said on the panel.

Ann:Well, it’s that you say it every time now. I feel like I’ve gotten better at not putting the grandkids before you.

Dave:We tell couples never to use the words, “every” and “never.” And you just said, “every time now.” I don’t say it every time; I’ve said it a few times that the grandkids are so important that you always say, “Yes,” to them.

Ann:We got off the panel, and I said, “Why don’t you tell me to my face before we say it to a thousand people? That would be helpful for me to know that you’re still frustrated about it.”

Dave:One of the reasons I brought it up is I’m not the only one who feels that way. Many husbands—

Ann:—totally.

Dave:—and wives feel like their spouse is distracted by something that’s more important than them.

Ann:And here’s the thing that happens on the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise: you have time to process some of this stuff; because sometimes, when you’re at home, and you’re busy, and you have kids, or work, you get distracted; and so you can’t really resolve some of the issues that come up. We had seven days to resolve the issues.

Dave:And we resolved it before we got off the boat.

Ann:Yeah, we did.

Dave:In fact, we resolved it before we gave the next talk, which is very important to do.

Let me just add this—we said it before; we’ll say it again—this is your month to sign up for next year’s Love Like You Mean It cruise,

February 14 through the 21st. This month of March: you’ll get the best deal you’re going to get the whole year. I tell you what: we’d love to have you on the boat with us. It is a life-changing week; I can’t over-exaggerate that. This is something that’d be worthy of every dollar you spend to invest in your marriage. And your kids will be glad you did; because you’ll come back a different couple, and the future will look different.

Ann:And I’ll just remind you: there are worship bands—there’s entertainment: there’s comedians; there’s magicians—incredible devotionals; and really great marriage talks that will be relevant to every single person on the ship.

Dave:So go to FamilyLifeToday.com and sign up. Or you can give us a call at 800-358-6329. That’s 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and the word, TODAY.

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