0:02

Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast. This show where you hear from amazing and inspiring wives sharing their struggles, triumphs, and advice for this journey called marriage. Here’s your host belah. Rose.

0:18

Hi there, and welcome. Thank you for joining me. Merry Christmas, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and that you spent it with friends and family and loved ones, and that you remembered the reason for the season that Jesus Christ was born. So today, we are talking with Kim Ola Shea this is her second half of the interview. Now, we all know that marriage has really great parts of it. You know, there’s definitely a lot of joy to be had in your marriage. Absolutely. But the other piece of it is, often there’s hard times there are struggles. There’s difficulties. I mean, there’s working through your own selfishness, there’s working through somebody else’s selfishness, and on and on and on. So I love that Kim talks about a wonderful book that I’ve been reading, too, actually called sacred marriage. And one thing he talks about in that book is what if marriage is to make us holy, not happy. And Kim and I talk about that a little bit. But isn’t that a wonderful thought that maybe God designed marriage to make us more like him, rather than to fulfill all of our dreams and desires, right? Maybe he loves us too much to let us stay the same as where we’ve been who we are right now. And that’s the vehicle he uses his marriage. So that’s, that’s part of what we’re talking about. This is again, the second half of her interview. So go back and listen to the first half if you’re lost on some of the things she’s saying, but let’s dive in.

2:15

So I want to ask, then, you know, you talked about Australia, you talked about a season of difficulty. You know, how are things different? How are How did? How does your marriage look like now?

2:28

Wow. I, we like I said, we’re in a we’re in a difficult season of life right now. But we’re also in a new stage of life, I have a friend who has talked about the difference between a season is something you go through and it’s going to repeat. So the there’s seasons of pain and struggle, those are going to get better, and then they’re going to get worse, and they’re going to get better, they’re gonna get worse. But we’re gonna do stage because our kids are grown. And we’re like, so now what we’re, we’re more toward the end, I just turned 56. My husband just turned 60. We’ve been in pastoral ministry for over 30 years. And it’s like, so now we have this new stage of life. And we just we we’ve been saying what does God have for us during this time? How can we be most effective for the kingdom in the years that we have left to actively serve the Lord? So the Lord’s working on so we say, it seems like one of the things that we have learned through ministry is that we wish that we learned earlier is more about being in community very much in pastoral ministry, you tend to be kind of even though you’re in a church, you’re kind of out there alone. Sometimes. You feel alone. I’m not saying you are alone, but you feel alone sometimes. So one of the things that we’re really focused on in our marriage now is really building relationships to serve together for us to serve. You know, very often he was off doing his pastoral ministry thing. And I’m over here doing my ministry thing, and we’re really working on some things together, and doing some fun things together. So recently, we’ve taken up golf, which is absolutely hilarious. We went yesterday afternoon, and it took us two and a half hours to bore of the 18 holes. So they we had to take the cart back at that point. And it we lost three balls, which it allowed us more in the water, we only lost three. But we didn’t have to yell for too many times. Because basically no one else was out there except us. So we were having that’s awesome. Learning to have fun, I think because of the ADHD is one of the reasons and because of our personality differences. We had I remember when we were really young. I don’t know if I think it was Gary Chapman’s book about your love language and how these list of activities and we looked in there’s like 300 And we’re like, I like that one. Well, I know. I like that one. Well, I don’t and we couldn’t find anything other than going out to Eat or taking a walk or something like Okay, so what do we do? So now we’re both really enjoying doing some things together. And we’ve been really, really busy. And so, one, my husband’s doing some, he’s training churches and intentional discipleship, and I’m doing the proper boys ministry, but we’re trying to find ways to connect that together. And where I can do some, some work with pastors wives, and encouraging pastors wives while he’s meeting with the pastors. And so we’re developing that, and we also lead tours to Israel. So that’s something I’ve started doing. He was doing it years ago. But I went with him in 2013. And we’re doing one every other year. And, and that first time I went was in 2013. But I didn’t want to go when the kids were growing up, because I felt like both parents don’t need to be on the other side of the world. So so when they grew up, I said, Okay, I’ll go and, and I loved it. We both loved it. So it’s something we’re doing together now as a team. And I do, because he’s not administrative. I do all the administrative in, and then he does the teaching, speaking. And when we’re there, and it’s awesome. We’re loving it. We’ve got a trip planned for 2017. That’s almost full. We’re excited about that. But, um, but it’s fun. We’re just trying to do things together. And we’re trying to develop ministry, opportunities that involve team building with other people as well. And I think that’s been huge. And it’s just an exciting time for us and that way.

6:33

That’s awesome. Yeah, I love that. I love that. The way you talk about your marriage is very, like you’re working on it. You’re you’re you’re putting in effort to start playing golf, or do these different ministries together. So I really appreciate that. And you said 37 years of marriage, right? 37? Yes, that’s awesome. Well, 37 years is not a short amount of time. So you know, thinking about, what do you think the chief three things would be that have been central to your marital success?

7:11

Okay, I want I was thinking about this. I don’t want to be trite in my answer. And I hope that no one takes it this way. But I have to some people, for what are what, what do you think kept you together? And I would always say God, I said, Well, I have to start thinking that well, God, because He’s sovereign. And he kept us where we didn’t have anything but each other in him. And second thing is Christ because of salvation. Because it’s, we were committed to obeying Him. And we and, and His plan for marriage and marriage has been since the beginning of creation. That was God’s plan. One man, one woman, and we were committed to that. So I, you know, Christ, place in our life as having first place and obeying Him, and then I, and then the Holy Spirit. And it’s his daily work in our lives, as we are in His Word in God’s word, and practicing those spiritual disciplines. Every day. That’s what produces the fruit of the Spirit, which is the love, the joy, the peace, patience, all of those things come we don’t have it. We don’t have it down. But I have to say that it all the reason we are together is because of God, His Son, and Holy Spirit and the work he is has done for us and is doing in us each day is those are the things that keeps us connected. Yeah.

8:41

Yeah, that’s awesome. I, it’s, you’re the first one that’s that’s said something like that. So I like that. I mean, we have, we often have, you know, God is the first one or you know, and then it’s kind of, but to break it down God, Christ and all the Holy Spirit for each, each of the three reasons that you stayed together for 37 years and raised five kids and now seven grandkids. And you know, it’s not an easy thing in our in our culture. I mean, yeah, so that’s awesome. That daily work of walking with the Holy Spirit. I love that. It’s also kind of going back

9:21

to certain other things that are involved, you know, yeah. Being, you know, church families and, you know, being accountable. Those kinds of things certainly play a huge role. But I just have to say, I remember we were in a restaurant a few years ago, was actually on our anniversary. We were on a ministry trip for something. And it was our anniversary, and so it was really late. Before we even had any time alone. We went to one of the, I don’t know, it was like a show knees or something. We were somewhere in the south. And we we prayed together at dinner and it was just like a really simple meal. But it was really late. We were tired. And the lady the lady that was serving us came up and she was like, wow, that was so cool. And then we’re, you know, we’ve said, Yeah, well, it’s our anniversary. And she’s like, how did you ever stay together? And she just, we just looked at each other. We said, God that’s really it. But it was really, because we got to share with her a little of our story with her. She shared her story with us, and we were able to pray with her. It’s really cool night, but not our typical anniversary, but, but that’s what got me here. And it was it’s got special memories.

10:30

Yeah, yeah. I love that. And, you know, it wouldn’t have even have come up if you hadn’t have been, you know, bold enough to be praying in public and, you know, kind of something like that. Yeah. Yeah, you know, we pray that we pray at our, the restaurants that we go to, as well. And I’ve never, I waitress for a while, I don’t remember ever seeing someone pray before they eat a meal. And it’s just, it’s a nice anyway, that’s kind of a tangent, but I think it’s a good, I think it’s a good thing, you know, praying. And the other thing is, you know, sometimes praying together is, you know, hard to schedule in sometimes, you know, I’ve got little kids and there’s just, it just feels like, you know, that’s sometimes a challenge. But the nice thing is, every time we eat, there’s always a prayer every time before bed, there’s always a prayer. So anyway, those are good, good ways of putting in prayer. But, you know, as you talk about these three, you know, what are some maybe disciplines or some things that have allowed you to put, you know, God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit in your life? Like, how have you kind of made sure that those have been first and foremost in your marriage?

11:44

Well, I think that even the best marriages require hard work. And I think because I think they are the best marriages, because people have done that hard work. You know, we go into it, our culture has so taught us about all the romance part of marriage, that we go into it with this fairytale idea of what it’s going to be like, and it’s not. It’s just not, yeah, it’s a commitment to one another through the good and the bad and ugly and not so fun times. And I remember telling a friend of mine who was going through a really difficult thing with with her husband. And I said, you know, God’s called you to be faithful, not be happy. And she told me later, years later, she says, I got so mad at you, when you send it, I didn’t even remember saying it. I only remember it because it’s only she says, she says that thing is so mad. But I’m so glad you told me that but I, I you know, it’s marriage just takes a lot of work, we have to make it our priority of our day, we have to commit to the time that it’s going to take, we have to commit to praying for one another, praying with one another week, it just, we just have to do it. This one, it doesn’t feel good. What it’s not fun. And it’s not always going to be fun. Because life is hard. And, and when we make it about us and when we when we when we decide we want to be self centered, instead of thinking of the other person. It’s not going to last that way. Because it it’s always we’ve got to put Christ first we’ve got to put our marriage before all the other activities, we got to put our marriage before our kids. And I I don’t even want to get on my hobbyhorse about that. But that is one thing that really disturbs me is that life seems to focus around children. So to the extent that that God is second place churches second place, and spouses I hear couples say, Oh, we never can. We’ve never left our kids and we’ve been married 20 years, I’m like, You are in for something bad if you do not realize that marriage because the kids are going to grow up, they’re going to move out and you’re not even gonna know each other. And I just you have to prioritize that marriage. It’s got an only thing more valuable is your relationship with Christ. And so, and when that’s right, he’s gonna convict you and show you what you need to do but, but your marriage needs to follow right along with that before your ministry before your kids before your work before everything else. It’s got to be your spouse.

14:42

I love that. Yeah, I love that. Yeah. It’s so true. I think our art you know, especially at the theater, you know, we see so many young couples because we live in New York City and there’s, you know, parks and whatnot. So we just, we just run into so many couples and I’m It’s it’s almost rare that we see couples holding hands or spending quality time together. They’re just all over their kids and talking to other spouses about other people’s about the kid. I mean, it’s just like, Where where is the camaraderie between the, the two spouses. I mean, I remember it was a few, maybe a year ago or so now. My husband, we were, we were at the park and my husband came up to me was massaging my neck a little bit. And, and then I, you know, was kind of filtering around, and I struck up a conversation with a new mom, I hadn’t met before. And she was like, you know, she was asking me what I did. And we were kind of going back and forth in here and there and, and I told her about the ministry that I do delight your marriage and, and then she just started crying. And she was and then she shared about what’s going on with her. And she was like, my husband would never even think to do something like that for me. And it was just, and it opened up this opportunity to talk, but it was just like, you know, you never know what God’s gonna do through your marriage just by just by being loving to each other and caring about each other. And yeah, so. So anyway, it’s,

16:13

I think that touch you gotta, you gotta keep holding hands. You just have to keep it alive. You have to? Yeah, if you want your yes to be wrong, there has to be that, that that touch that comfort? We just need him.

16:29

Yeah. Yeah. Well, that’s a great segue, because my next question is about intimacy, physical intimacy. So if you’re having trouble, would you be willing to share, you know, an advice or tip about intimacy that maybe you wish someone let you in on earlier?

16:45

Oh, yeah. I think that number one, we have to commit to intimacy. We’ve been in ministry a long time, I’ve heard so many stories. And it’s so sad to me to hear that couples are not sleeping in the same room. And I’m like, I just, I don’t get it. I don’t understand i It makes me very sad. But I think you commit to intimacy, even when you when you’re tired, even when you don’t feel like it. Certainly, both of you need to be considerate of each other when someone’s not feeling well, or having slept with a, you’ve had a crying baby for three nights in a row. I you know, both of you have to understand that. But I think that very often as women, we’re exhausted that the lat it’s obviously it’s the last thing on our mind when we’re exhausted. And yet, you know, if you will go ahead and commit to that, anyway, it your attitude changes. If you enter into that moment, if you were reminded that this was God’s idea. He’s the one that initiated it, created it, and he meant it for good. And my experience has been that best thing I can do is enter into the moment, even if I’m exhausted, and honestly your energy is renewed, you rest better. And, and you go to bed for you in tune with each other. And it just, it changes things when you’re when you’re committed to one another that way. And I think keep you know, the just not being loose about talking about, about your experience with your spouse, I that’s a kind of sad thing or, or downgrading your spouse, those are all things that matter. And, you know, what you when you’re not in your bedroom really affects what goes on in your bedroom. So learning to prepare your heart and mind and and and, and be committed to that understanding that that’s God’s way. And he knows what’s best for us.

18:56

Yeah, I love that. Absolutely. Absolutely. Committing to intimacy first and foremost. I think that’s I think that’s very, very wise. I so agree. Well, so due to the specific marriage that you’ve had, we’ve talked about this quite a bit. But if there’s other opportunities that you have had to get to know or serve God, could you share those?

19:20

Well, when I, by the time I was five years old, all I ever wanted was to be a pastor’s wife. And oh, is that right? I was committed to that from day one. And when I married my husband, he was actually a Christian school teacher. And we did Christian free for four years prior to doing pastoral ministry, but eventually we went into it and I just feel like that God has blessed in so many ways. My husband’s dad was a pastor for almost 50 years and and so what I learned from my mother in law and her just sweet spirit and their love for one another and their faithfulness to the Lord They’re their unconditional love for other people and not criticizing I learned incredible amounts from them. They’re both with the Lord now, but but they just met so much in my life. And then the other opportunities of just the richness of having people in ministry missionaries in our home, and what it what the experience was for our kids, and having the opportunity to get to know them to hear their stories to, to learn how God provided for them. I think those are some really incredible things that have happened in my life. And then just some of the, you know, getting to do different kinds of ministry. My husband was a pastor of a church that had a camp, we were there for 12 years, and my kids were camp age. Till elementary age, it was a day camp, and the director was our associate pastor, and he went into missions. And so they were left with kind of a hole and, and I was like, you know, when I was with my kids, I’d grown up going to camp, I just finished my business degree and had been involved in children’s ministries and stuff all through the years anyway. And I was like, well, I could do it, there was like about 20 Kids in the camp. And that camp ended up growing to like 150 Kids and the mentoring and discipleship of the staff, like, as we would have high school and college kids working. And so we got to the adults, as adults, we got to see that whole process of discipleship, or we’re discipling them, they’re discipling, the kids. So we just so many different things as a result of being married to the man I’m married to. And I, I’m very, very blessed and thankful for those opportunities.

21:40

That’s awesome. I just, I love that. It’s it’s almost this beautiful picture of, you know, when we, when we do it God’s way, when we commit to marriage with a priority, first and foremost of God, first and foremost, and then marriage, just under that, and then family and then ministry, you know, then that provides all these opportunities for ministry that we wouldn’t even have gotten to otherwise. So that’s so cool. So then, is there a book or a program that you’d specifically recommend?

22:12

Yes, actually, I was thinking I didn’t have to think long on this particular question. Because a few years ago, we, we did a Bible study at our church by Gary Thomas on and using his book sacred marriage. What if God intended marriage to make us holy? More than to make us happy is the subtitle. And Joe and I after we went through it, we were like, why didn’t somebody teach us this? 30 years ago, we’ve been in church all our lives. We’ve never heard some of the things in this book. Absolutely incredible. Lessons about what God how God uses marriage, to make us conformed to the image of His Son. And, wow, that’ll get you because you’re like, Oh, if I just had somebody different, it would be easier. No, it would just be different. But God, God puts us with that person. And whether we think we made a mistake when we chose them, or whether doesn’t matter what we think once we’re married to him, that’s God’s will for us for life as long as they live. And so God is going to use their personalities and some of the things that rub us the wrong way to smooth us out and make us beautiful for him. And so that that book has been probably one of the best studies that I have ever seen. on marriage. I highly recommend it even if you just read the book, but there’s a Bible study that goes with it. And actually, my husband now uses that for all premarital counseling, and he is also a chaplain. And so he he counsels he does premarital counseling for many couples who don’t know the Lord. And he still uses that. And they’ll come away with Wow, we never heard that before. And there have been couples that have come to Christ as a result of doing that particular study, because they just never thought of it. They never thought of marriage that way. So that’s the one that I highly recommend.

24:04

I love that. Yes. If I’ve, you know, I flipped I have the book and I flipped through it. And I’ve heard different things about I haven’t read the full book, but I think I need to go back and read the entire thing. But I love marriage. What if marriage is to make us holy, instead of make us happy? Yes, that’s so good. So then if you could go to back to your one of your marriage and sit yourself down, what is one piece of advice that you would give to you?

24:32

Don’t take myself don’t take yourself so seriously, don’t take life so seriously, and enjoy every minute with your family.

24:45

What do you mean by that?

24:48

As I said, I’m a pretty concrete sequential organized planner and I was always like perfectionist and see that’s what One way the Lord used my husband, and five children three being boys and I never been around boys in my life. But the Lord used this family to to help me not be so perfectionist. I can, I can’t make everything perfect. My husband has books, papers piled everywhere all over my house. And some days I’m crazy. I claim the dining room. And it never happens. But I have to go through this conversation like every few days with him. Honey, when you finish today, if you could just clean the table, I just need a place that’s orderly and peaceful. And, but but the Lord, that whole thing, so don’t take it all so serious. I always felt like I had to do everything perfect as a mom. Like, oh, yeah, my kid is gonna turn out bad if I don’t. So I was too strict with my older ones not so much with my younger ones. I probably wasn’t strict enough. But I always felt like I had to do everything completely. Right. Or when I was younger, it was like, you know, I thought that I had to do these things to please God. Yeah, I thought I had to be the perfect pastor’s wife. I had to be the perfect wife. I had to be the perfect mom. And and the Lord has taught me now. Yeah, you know, you’re not gonna You can’t any, it doesn’t really matter because you can do it all right, and you’re not responsible for you’re not responsible for your turnout, you’re responsible to teach them but but they’re responsible to God. And you can’t make everything at church perfect. You can’t make everything at your house perfect. So I wish I’d learned that earlier. And and if you can embrace where you are in your life, enjoy those moments when kids are little and now I’m saying enjoy those moments when the grandkids are little. You know, carrying through your house. Enjoy those enjoy those moments and I think my husband I that’s one thing we’re really working on with this with our grandkids is we there that we have one that’s 12 but the rest are all six and under. And it’s a madhouse when they’re all here. So but but we’re trying to just embrace it and enjoy it. And and I that’s what I you know what, just enjoy the blessings God’s giving you and trust in Him and rest in him. Yeah,

27:21

I love that. Enjoy the blessings God’s given you and trust in him rest in Him. It’s wonderful. Well, so where can our audience find and connect with you online?

27:33

Well, I have my, my website is proper ys.com. This is PROVR Wii U i s e.com. And also, I have a proper wife’s Facebook page, and I’m on other social media, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter. So if you know you can connect with me on any of those on my proverb wise, you can send me a private message if you have questions. Or the I think there’s a place for messages on the website as well.

28:03

Awesome. And that’s p r o v e, r B. W i SC

28:09

barette.

28:10

That’s right. Calm. Awesome. Oh, well, this has been so much fun. Kim, thank you so much for your time and wisdom and insight, really, I’ve so appreciate it.

28:21

Well, belah, thank you for having me. I’m really excited to look forward to your website. I was so excited to get the opportunity to speak with you.

28:35

I’m so grateful Kim share it. I’m so grateful to hear her lived out wisdom. And you can tell you know, this is this is the posture of her heart. You know, she relies on Christ, for her daily bread and to give her grace for everything that she does. So I want to just encourage you, whatever you’re going through, whatever your day has been so far, I would just encourage you that God is giving you sufficient grace for whatever you’re facing. He is giving you the grace, I would just ask that you ask him right now God, would you show me the grace that you’re giving me to be a person that’s pursuing holiness rather than happiness? That’s pursuing what you want me to be pursuing God above everything else pursuing to make you smile. So I hope that you have been encouraged today. I hope that you are inspired to live according to what God wants you to be about putting him first your marriage second, your family third, and your ministry and work after that. God bless you. Thank you for joining me today. And next Tuesday, I’m actually going to have a little break. It is the holiday right as the new year starts. So I want to give you a little break to focus in on what God wants you to do in the new year and reflect on what he’s done in this past year, so I’m going to be doing that. I hope you will too. And bring in the new year with a lot of joy. We are continuing our orgasm series as the second Tuesday comes about. So join us for that. God bless you. I will talk to you again soon. Bye bye.

30:19

Thanks for listening. If you’ve been blessed by this, why not share it? Until next time, live with love, wisdom and passion