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Our society today so often wants to ignore God’s design and essentially forget the fear of the Lord.
But, he made men and women in His image and those uniquenesses are incredible!
Physiological, psychological, emotional, and sexual…UNIQUE.
Each of our uniquenesses is God’s glory revealed.
It’s our opportunity to search out His glory through each other.
It makes sense that the enemy wants to undermine God’s design in every way that he can.
One way is pretending that we’re the same.
Why is this bad?
Well, husbands assume their wives are intentionally hurting them because she is “withholding” love (in the unique way he receives it), thus grounds for unfaithfulness/divorce/all manner of destruction.
And wives assume their husbands are intentionally hurting them because he is “withholding” love (in the unique way she receives it), thus grounds for unfaithfulness/divorce/all manner of destruction.
But if we start with the perspective:
My spouse, my “ezer kə·neḡ·dōw” (from Gen 2:18), is WILDLY different than me because God made him/her that way.
They desire, love, enjoy, crave completely different things than I do—let me discover what those things are!
In sum: assume you are completely different than your spouse and that you can learn how to love them the way they receive love.
“Making love” rather than having sex is a vital piece. Listen in to learn more.
I’m praying and rooting for you in this!
Blessings,
Belah
PS – Men: your free masterclass is right around the corner starting October 11 (don’t miss it…add it to your calendar!) and sign up at delightyourmarriage.com/masterclass
transcript
0:02
Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast. You’re joining me belah rose as I dive deep into the beauty, power and truth about intimacy, learn not only the practicals, but the heart behind what making love is all about. delight your marriage. Hi there and welcome. I just want to thank you so much for joining. Again, if you have listened to this podcast, you know that I am so honored that you would be here and speak with me or listen to me. It’s truly an honor. And the fact that I have an opportunity to invite you to move closer to Jesus and his welfare life is just of utmost priority to me. And very frequently, I feel humbled and so incredible, truly. So thank you for giving me a space in your life, even if it just happens to be these 46 seconds and you’re turned off by it already, and you want to go and do something else. That’s okay with me. But if you’re still here, let’s dive in. quick announcement before we get into it. First of all, I think you’re going to love this episode. It’s a kind of like a follow up to fear God forget the toothpaste, if you haven’t listened to that. I actually got a lot of response on that, which I thought was kind of cool. And I think it provoked people in. And so this is a bit more that I wanted to share with you. On similar, very related topic. So before we dive in, though, October 11, is my Men’s masterclass. And if you’ve missed it, and you’ve heard about it, don’t miss it this time. You just you don’t want to October 11 12th and 13th. Get on the list, put it on your calendar. Truly, truly wait for it and take it seriously. And many of you do you you may be one of those that have signed up and you know, have already been excited and praying through it. And people have told me they’ve reached out and actually had Bible studies around it and met on a daily to process the material together. So that’s, again, I’m so honored. But it also shows the the depth and the breadth of the work in this free masterclass that only comes around a couple of times a year. So I would encourage you delight your marriage.com/masterclass men get signed up. And shortly after the free masterclass goes through. That’s when I opened the doors for the next cohort of masculinity reclaimed. That is absolutely my favorite class to teach. And the transformations are nothing more than miracles over and over again. So if you want a miracle in your marriage, you know what to do? Do the free masterclass and see if God wants you to go forward to the full course. It’s a lot of work. takes effort takes energy takes time. But what’s more important than your first human assignment, which impacts everything in your life. More on that later. All right. Let’s dive in. Do you know that verse think it’s in James that says when many words are present or a sin is not absent? I feel like that so often because I like to talk. And when I just get in a zone, man, it’s easy to think afterwards like, shoot, I wonder, wonder if there was just too many words in that maybe I should have paused and said Okay, talk to you later. Rather than continue on my own strength and my own grace with words. But that’s kind of how I feel sometimes with interviews. So I do a lot of interviews for just different different things. Also it’s pretty cool I have a upcoming interview on a non Christian talk radio show is it gonna be it’s pre recorded so won’t be live but those sorts of things like God is so good, even non Christian avenues
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but but Interviews all by themselves are kind of funny. Because you’re on the spot, you get asked a question maybe you hadn’t really thought through before. And then you’ve got to answer it. This is the same thing when I work with churches, and they want a live q&a. And yeah, that sounds fine and fun. Until you get asked some questions that seem a little outside of what you have ever talked about, or thought through deeply. And then you’re like, I’m supposed to know the answer to this, but I just have, I don’t know, I’m just gonna kind of shoot from the hip. And so I have been in that space. And there’s two things that could happen. One is God shows up and it’s just like, ah, that didn’t come for me. Thank you, Lord. The second thing that could happen is, I think about it afterwards. I’m like, that was so strange. What a strange thing to come out of my mouth. So, Lord, that’s another opportunity for your servant to be humbled. Or I say, you know, just, I don’t know, that might be for one person who listens, the rest of them, they’re gonna think I’m a lunatic. Fine. But one person, maybe they needed that. And I’m fine with it. And again, maybe it was just me, I needed to refine how I think about things. And thank God, I was asked that question. So now I can think about it better in the future. I say all of that, because when I interview others, I do not always post it. And they may have the same situation where they haven’t fully thought through their answers, and or that person, and I just don’t jive on some of the very important things that are foundational to my work. And sometimes these are extremely famous people. And I just doesn’t matter just doesn’t. So in sometimes it feels like it could harm the relationship, my friendship with them, and I still, it just doesn’t matter. I can’t be presenting what I find helpful, what I think will be helpful in coaching people in a direction, and then give them conflicting material, even if it’s, you know, five minutes of their interview it. I don’t feel good about that. Now, please don’t put me on a pedestal. There may be parts of interviews I’ve already done that. Have chunks of them that don’t make sense to how I teach. Now, it might be because I was okay with letting that in there. or what have you take it case by case. But this is, as I’m learning and growing in this work. I’m more discerning on what I allow on the podcast. So if you’ve been one of those, again, I’m honored. One of those people who’s like, I want to hear every single episode. I mean, the truth is it is getting better and better. Because I’m learning and growing. Every day, I’m asking God for more and more wisdom, I don’t want to stay the same. So if two, three years ago, I said something that was a little different than the way I say it now. That’s because I’ve grown. And that’s, that’s what you want, right? That’s what we both want. And so hopefully, if we have walked together on this journey, you’re watching me grow, because that’s my goal with God, I think we always should be growing. I have interviewed sex therapists who have more experience working with people and education and all sorts of accolades, then I certainly do way, way more they they have because they take sex on a case by case basis. They don’t have unifying men are this way. Women are this way. They don’t have that to offer. When it’s not in a Christian worldview. Here’s what I mean. The world is getting so funny. And in silly, I would say about the differences between men and women that sex therapists have gotten to a place where they say person with a penis person with a vagina. Now I actually studied this kind of stuff in college, believe it or not, because I was a philosophy major and
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just some classes touched on this sort of thing. And those friends still aren’t fully helpful because sometimes somebody is born with ovaries, and not a not a vagina or, or what have you. And so even though these, quote woke people are trying to say that there’s no difference between men and women aside from specific genitalia. The trouble with all of that is that there’s nothing helpful you can say to anyone, it really doesn’t give any kind of helpful guide of how men think and how women think, except the, the reality is, when you look at science, the brain of men around sex, and their drive is two to three times larger than women. Like, there are so many physical, physiological differences between men and women, totally aside from sex, but including sex. And unfortunately, society is in the spot of stripping away the uniquenesses that God has given men and women totally different from each other. Equality 100%, for sure, God made us equal. But he made us so different. And that is to His glory and his credit, that we witness and see and perceive and walk according to these incredible uniquenesses he has given us. No, it’s not to say that every man is a certain way, and every woman is a certain way. But if you give, if I hear on a as a teacher level, I give you generalities, then within some frameworks, you can kind of see how does my particular marriage fit in there? How, how do I in particular fit in there? But if I don’t even give you that, then it’s just case by case I, you know, maybe, maybe those are just throwing things at the wall, there’s nothing concrete to say men are generally in this area, women are generally in this area. It’s kind of just you start at a, you know, start at square one over and over and over and over again. And that what’s the point of that, that’s not going to help? Now, let me ask you, if you think of a typical woman, and a typical man, let’s say they both had hair that was about one and a half inches, wherever they grow hair, it’s not shaved. It’s it’s about one and a half inches anywhere and everywhere, both naked. Now, imagine it’s you and your husband, so you’re not lusting after either. If there was an alien that came and sat in your living room, and saw both of you? Would they think men and women are the same? Would they think one entity is the same as could be exchanged for the other? It is vast, the amount of differences? Now wait just a moment? What if the alien asked a question? And then heard the voices of both the female and the male? And what if the alien said, why does this one have hair on their face?
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And this one doesn’t? Why does this one have this genitalia? And this one doesn’t? Why is there an Adam’s apple on this one, and this one doesn’t? Why does this one have broad shoulders? And this one doesn’t? Why does this one have wider hips? And this one doesn’t? There’s so many uniquenesses, of male and female, that it is utterly bizarre, to try to say they’re the same. And so why do we say with all the differences that are so wildly apparent, that we would say, emotionally, psychologically, mentally, innards of a woman or a male are the same? It’s wild. It’s a it’s a, it’s a bizarre thing. And I think it comes from secular things. It’s not a Christian concept, but I think Christians have adopted it, because that’s what the sexual therapists say. And that must be right. But the problem that I see with the quote experts on sex, they don’t have anything helpful to say, you can’t say men want this. Women want that because there’s nothing it’s it’s, well, a person with a penis could want this. It really depends on their childhood. And it depends on whether or not they this or this or this. And it’s just okay. There’s nothing helpful you can say, and you can’t build on experience of working with people, because everyone was case by case by case by case by case. I’m hoping that makes sense to you. What does this have to do with fearing God? Because it’s so biblical. It’s so biblical to look at men and women differently. God said He made male and female in his image, when we deny that they’re different, we deny the unique qualities of God that is represented in male, and we deny the unique qualities of God that’s represented in female. And there is not a power struggle that was presented as God’s design in the garden. The word help meet is as our connector. And what that means is connect Oh is like a perfect half to a hole. It’s a almost reminiscent of, you know, an Eastern kind of philosophy of that Yin Yang symbol, that’s, that’s a god. That’s a god idea. You know, they kind of just like every kind of everything else, that’s God’s truth, unfortunately, represented and in the wrong. Religion, if you will, it’s, it’s something we should take as as true is that we are two sides of a hole. We are two sides of a hole. God has uniquenesses as a male and uniquenesses as a female. And yes, there are times that God is described as, as, you know, when when Jesus says, I’m like, you know, when I wept over Israel, I wanted to gather her like a hen gathers her chicks. Now that’s, that’s a feminine metaphor, isn’t it? A hen gathering chicks that’s feminine.
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But oh, my gosh, there’s, there’s, you know, we talked about God the Father. So God absolutely cares about the essence of feminine and the essence of masculine. But when we think they’re the same, we undermine God’s beauty and power in the differences that he designed us. That’s why I’m so passionate about teaching men differently than I teach women. In fact, I didn’t realize this was such a secret until one of my clients said, I was talking to my wife. And she told me that, you know, when I was saying, you remember when Bella teaches XYZ, and she’s like, wait, what? No, Bella doesn’t teach that. And they, they both kind of came to realize that my curriculum for men is 100% different than my curriculum for women. And the reason is, because men need to learn a completely different set of skills than what women need to learn. And women need to learn a completely set of different set of skills. And the whole point is that you’re learning to love your spouse, well, you’re learning to love your spouse,
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well. Let me tell you something super helpful. Fearing God comes through the word of God. Everything we know about Jesus comes through that book. Everything Jesus spoke about, how many times did he say as it is written?
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As it is written as it is written? He specifically is quoting the Old Testament. He specifically speaking about the Old Testament. We cannot call ourselves Christians and not rely on the Bible. That’s not what Christianity is that secularism with a with a Christian. I don’t know. Love logo or something? If we are saying we are Christ followers, we believe that the Bible is true. Certainly there are things that we can understand culturally, contextually, language wise, there are things that we can learn. But the Bible is not to be judged by us. Jesus said, You shall not live by bread alone, but on every word that comes from God. Jesus wasn’t talking about his own experience, he was quoting scripture, he was quoting what he called the Word of God. So I have got just so excited about more of this, this department of my life because I, I love this little Bible that I have that’s, I don’t know, barely bigger than my hand. It’s so cute. It’s called a compact Bible, if you’re looking for one Google compact Bible, and, you know, the, the translation of your choice and, you know, maybe your your church tradition has a specific translation they recommend, and, you know, trust your theologians to help you with that. I’m not one, but I do have a passion for it. I do love the Bible anyway. Okay, the compact Bible I love, that’s what I use in the morning. And then I just got a, I think they call it a thin line, Reference Bible. Now, I made a mistake, I actually thought I was buying a second compact Bible in a different translation. But I actually bought one that was way bigger, and it was a Reference Bible. And the beauty of this is that when I’m reading it, it has like these little ABCDEFG, like, just all of the letters, basically every four or five words. And so it tells me then on the side, where that word or phrase either comes from elsewhere in the Bible, or that exact word comes from another spot in the Bible, etc. So it’s fascinating because now I can read something in the New Testament that Jesus is talking about. And I can go exactly to where it’s spoken of from the Old Testament. So I feel like this incredible sleuth, like here I am at just as smart as Jesus, because He is quoting something and I know exactly what he’s talking about. That’s right. That’s how I That’s my snooty voice. But the point is, that I’m learning a lot. And it’s really special for me to say, if God said it was true, it is true. And one thing that came to mind this morning, while I was reading, is like, if we looked at the Old Testament, as a movie, it would be so exciting, there is drama, and passion and bloodshed, and miracles and fire and consuming and armies and wild characters and bizarre personalities, and always unique ways of making miracles happen. And just, it’s, it’s fantastic. It’s so good. If you are reading it as though we’re removing the Old Testament. Um, but unfortunately, like I said, in our society today, so many times people read it, like, is this moral? Is this right? Is this wrong? And it’s like, you’re missing everything. You’re, you’re missing all the lessons that God pours out in those pages for you. You’re missing it all because you’re judging it. But if you take it like a little child and say, Oh, Daddy, show me, what do you want me to enjoy? I mean, it’s literally entertainment right there at your fingertips. So you don’t you don’t need to watch whoever, whatever the you know, whatever’s on the TV, or whatever show you’re addicted to, like literally, it’s there. It’s that fantastical, that exciting, that full of drama, that full of bloodshed and gore. And I mean, every bit of action is in there. Or romance. I mean, it’s all it’s just incredible if you look at it that
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way. But what’s also in there and what is so compelling, is women and men are so different. Yes, women can learn from the lives of men in the Bible. I 100% believe that, but also women, you are incredible, and you who are represented in the Bible as well. Men can learn from you. And there are prophetesses in the Bible, there are women who their whole, you know, books of the Bible are named after them. You know, there’s all sorts but, but it is important that we’re different. And so when you fear God, I want to kind of get to the crux of my point here. Why is it so important that You recognize we’re different when I said, in this title, make love. As a woman, it’s easier for me. And I think it’s easier for most women to, quote, have sex, it’s harder for us to make love. And so that’s why I want to encourage you as a woman who follows God as one myself, who’s pursuing God, that making love is not our default. Our default. If we oblige our husbands is to just have sex. It’s like, okay, I’ll give it to him tonight, fine. Or it’s duty sex, or it’s, it’s not. It’s not really engaged, your attention isn’t really there, you’re just kind of your body’s there, and that’s about it. But when you choose God’s best for your marriage for your life, and you say, God, your first, I want to love you with my whole heart, with my whole soul with my whole mind with my whole strength. Which, by the way, because of this Reference Bible, I know that originally comes from Deuteronomy. And then it shows up again, Jesus says it multiple times when he’s asked what is the greatest law is to love the Lord your God with your all your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength,
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everything, love Him with everything. And then love your neighbor as yourself. Who was your first neighbor, who was your first human assignment?
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Whether you think you chose him or her or not, that is your assignment. You may think it was a, I chose them, I said, I do fine, God is going to hold you to that commitment. They are your assignment. And they, your husband or wife is so different than you. They do not receive love, the same way that you do, just like they do not grow hair in the same places that you do. And they may grow hair in other places that you do not. There’s so many differences. assume it’s true. assume it’s true. So don’t assume that they are going to want to be loved the way that you want to be loved. And so that’s what I teach in my husband’s program, how to love a woman in my wife’s program, how to love a man. And we do it out of reverence for the Lord. We do it out of reverence for the Lord, so that we’re not distracted by a deficit of love in our lives, which causes us to feel pain. And then we can’t do what God wants us to do. But if we feel filled up in our marriage, if we feel filled up in the ways we crave love, then our capacity to do God’s work as a married person increases. Paul says it’s better if you do not marry. He wasn’t married, because I think he could easily see you’re distracted. You’re thinking about how to love your spouse. That’s a lot of time and effort and work to do it. Well. You could be better if you just didn’t worry about the whole thing. Now if you’re listening to this podcast, you got married. Alright, so bummer. All right, fine. It means you signed up for the task of loving your spouse, well, they are your first human assignment. And they do not receive love the way you do. And as a husband, your wife receives love by being safe. Emotionally, that means listening, caring about her, being the man. Just like Jesus being a man of the fruits of the Spirit safe. She can trust you. You’re trustworthy. You’re kind you’re all those things. The fruits of the Spirit. Safe known, oh my gosh, this child of God This daughter of the Most High is incredible. And not only do you know that you live like she is you think about that you appreciate those things about her in your heart and out Loud. Another third one is wholeheartedly cherished. Oh man, you love romancing that woman. That is fun. You love surprising her again, because you know her you know how to surprise her. You study this woman. You’re excited that you get to love her. Well, you get to be the one to celebrate her birthday, you get to be the one to take her to a exotic something for the anniversary. I’m just giving you ideas here. That is your opportunity. You get to love her. Well, this way you get to be the man of her dreams. So that yeah, takes a lot of work. That’s why Paul’s like, listen, just don’t get married. You can do God’s work better.
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But if you’re going to do it, you better do it wholeheartedly. Okay, let’s talk to the women here. How to love your husband.
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Uh, first of all respect. I don’t know why but God, I think God’s nature as being a God who says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. God’s nature is represented in men in that quality in that need of being respected. That is a quality of God, I believe. And it’s not weakness. It’s this is how you treat a man is you respect him. Disrespect is like trampling on top of him like it is just, I see it in the faces of men as they describe their wives criticism, critiques, yelling, corrections, fights for just silly things. It is it’s so painful. The second one is admiration. Again, I think God’s Quality of wanting those to notice his his, his incredible qualities and the admiration and the worship. Now of course, we’re not worshiping our husbands but we get to notice the good. We get to appreciate we get to command we get to give help him have confidence in himself. And then finally, wholehearted sexuality. wholehearted sexual intimacy is what your husband is craving. That’s making love. whole hearted, that you are there, that you want to be there, that you enjoy it, that you’re thinking of new things to do new actions, new risks to take new things that make him excited to see you. And you’re not focused on oh, maybe he’s seen something like this before? Oh, I don’t want to remind him of that, etc. That is you, dear wife, bringing sin into the context of your marriage bed and you shouldn’t? Does that make sense? It’s the that’s your mind. As a wife, we have to discipline our minds to stay present. And I still have to do that I still have to discipline my mind to say this is God’s goodness, this is me loving the man I am assigned to Well, that’s what making love is. And that’s me engaging in nourishing cherishing, loving the experience all the way through. And when my mind wanders, I come back. And I remember and I recognize what a good man I have. How cool is it that I get to be the one to give him this experience. I get to be the one to satisfy this longing in his heart. I get to as a wife, that’s our opportunity to love well, that no one else in his life can you get to you get to. So that’s my encouragement is when we fear God when we see his design rightly. We do not think each other is the same or should be treated. The same. We are equal. But we are unique. Women and men are equal. But we are unique. And that’s what This is about I think that’s all I had to say. And I’m, you know, nervous. If I keep talking, then sins gonna sneak in there. It might have already happened. Who knows? I’ll trust that you’re going to ask God to help you to discern what’s true for you and your situation, your season your life, how God wants you to implement or change in the ways that he wants you to. So let me pray, Father, God, give us the fear of the Lord. Lord, let it be your grace, that we recognize I was reading Paul, Lord, you were the one to knock him off the donkey. You are the one to speak out of the heavens, you did that.
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And he was blinded. And then when Anna NYAS prayed, the scales fell from his eyes. God give us the grace. God I asked for scales to fall out of the eyes. Lord scales to fall out, give us the fear of God. Give us your fear. Lord, let us not be on the wrong side of what you want us to be about Jesus. Give us your fear which makes us love others
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well. Lord, I honor you and bless you and say do we only you can do what you want to do? In Jesus name. Amen. I love you. I bless you. We’ll talk soon