In this powerful and heartfelt episode of Love Like Crazy, Jay and Stacey Coleman welcome their dear friends and neighbors, Ernest and Cindy Carrier, to share a raw, redemptive look at their 35-year journey of marriage. From early struggles with identity, emotional wounds, and disconnection—to breakthrough moments of vulnerability, healing, and restored intimacy with God and each other—this conversation is one every couple needs to hear.
They talk candidly about:
Whether you're newly married, walking through hard seasons, or just want to build a deeper connection in your relationship, this episode will leave you encouraged, equipped, and full of hope.
Time Stamps:
Don’t forget to:
Like, subscribe, and leave a comment with future topic suggestions Share this episode with friends or anyone facing a tough season
Join us next time as Jay and Stacey share more insightful and family based content.
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Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs Website: hihellolabs.com
They talk candidly about:
- The real root of emotional pain in marriage
- Why intimacy with God starts with vulnerability
- What it means to surrender your story
- How unresolved pain leads to fear, isolation, and burnout
- And the practical tools that helped transform their relationship
Whether you're newly married, walking through hard seasons, or just want to build a deeper connection in your relationship, this episode will leave you encouraged, equipped, and full of hope.
Time Stamps:
- 00:00 – Welcome + Meet Our Neighbors Ernest & Cindy
- 05:10 – Early Marriage Struggles & Identity Crisis
- 12:45 – A Turning Point: Hearing God at the Camper
- 18:30 – Intimacy with God: What It Really Means
- 26:00 – False Identities: Less Than & Unlovable
- 33:40 – When Love Languages Clash in Marriage
- 40:55 – Holes, Wounds & Arrows: Tools for Healing
- 48:20 – From Emotional Pain to Anger & Fear
- 56:15 – Why Isolation Fuels Hopelessness
- 1:03:00 – Surrendering Your Story & Finding Freedom
Don’t forget to:
Like, subscribe, and leave a comment with future topic suggestions Share this episode with friends or anyone facing a tough season
Join us next time as Jay and Stacey share more insightful and family based content.
------------------------------------
Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs Website: hihellolabs.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Love Like Crazy podcast,
where your hosts Jay and Stacey Coleman, and we're here
in our home studio today and we have the best guests.
Our neighbors are here with us today and so we're
so excited to have a conversation with them. We always
want to talk about topics that build a stronger marriage
and a stronger family.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
What's kind of funny because we have Ernest and Cindy
Krer with us today and they've been a part of
Journey Church for a long time. But the next thing,
you know, we wind up being neighbors with them, and
that is it's just so much fun. I'm going to
get back into that here in just a second, but
before we do, I just want to thank all of
(01:02):
our listeners for being a part of this podcast. You know,
the heart of this podcast is really about building a
stronger marriage, building a stronger family, and we just kind
of feel like that that's what end this season of
life we're in, that that's what the Lord is really
placed upon our hearts, that our role is not only
within the church and his pastors, but also to be
able to utilize this podcast for that, and so thank
(01:24):
you guys for supporting this, being a part of this,
And once again, if you're enjoying this, make sure you
click that like button, give us a review, leave us
a comment. If there's a topic that you would like
for us to discuss, we'd love to be able to
hear from that. And we've really been working hard on
building the YouTube channel. So if you would click that
subscribe button, and the reason for that is because it'll
(01:46):
let you know about upcoming episodes. It'll alert you to that.
And so today I am excited to talk to our
dear friends Ernest and Cindy or as we call you,
Big E. And the reason there's a reason and for
that that I'm excited about this because your neighbors. And
it's one thing as a pastor to go to church
(02:08):
with people, but y'all see us all the time.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
You know.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
It's just like you know, it's like you get home,
you can kind of let your hair down, and y'all
see us with our hair down on a very very
regular basis. So thank y'all for being a part of
this podcast today. So let's do this. I want y'all
to take a little bit of time kind of to
introduce yourselves to everybody, kind of tell them a little
bit about Biggie and Cindy.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
Well, I am Biggie and this is my wife, Cindy,
and we've been married for thirty five years. And you know,
we were both Christians when we got married, and so
we're going to have this ideal marriage just made in Heaven.
After about three weeks of being married, she looked at
me and she said, there's something really wrong with you.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
I thought I was perfect.
Speaker 4 (02:55):
So she shared that with me, and I knew right
then that some work had to be done. It just
took years to get through that, and we're hopefully going
to try to cover today some of the things that
we used, how we interfaced with God in this and
how he pointed us in the right direction to get
something wrong with me fixed.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
So Cindy, you know, hey, something needs to be fixed
in you. I think every man kind of goes into
mayor thinking like I might act together. H So kind
of speak to that a little bit. Tell us a
little bit about you. Where you are in the season
of life?
Speaker 5 (03:31):
Oh, where am I in this season of life? I
am a nanny, okay to two little girls, Kenna and Kyla.
And then We also have two grandsons who are in
their twenties, so a big age gap. Yeah, through my
step son Adam, who passed away in September of twenty eighteen.
(03:53):
So it's a fun season just enjoying the little girls.
They two are our neighbors, live right across the yard,
like within one hundred and fifty feet, so it's fun
to get them to run across and play with us.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I enjoy seeing y'all, you know, back and forth on
the road. I can actually look behind you and see
it out the door. But you know, i'll see y'all
on your side by side or bikes or things like that.
And a lot of times you get well, Kenna right
now because the other one's too little. How was a
month yet? This baby made a month yet?
Speaker 5 (04:25):
She was born January fourteenth.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Okay, she's a couple months old. But I love seeing
y'all interact with him and Cindy. I see the stuff
you put on social media. Oh, Kenna is the princess.
Speaker 4 (04:38):
She is absolutely, absolutely It kind of.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Looks like she kind of rules things and the roost.
Speaker 4 (04:44):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
And I know the other day I came over and
we were visiting, and she came in next thing. You know,
she's getting stuff out, she's doing stuff, and you're like,
you know, hold up now, and she just kind of
slowly made it, and eventually she was kind of like,
that's exactly what my grandkids do here. It's like they
have the time of their life.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Cindy ordered her a makeup kit.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
She made the mistake of telling Kenna that it's ordered
and it's coming in.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Has it come in yet? Has it come in yet?
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Well, we went up to the camp with her and
came back and it wasn't here, and she went, I'm
so appointed.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
It's such a great season too. And I know, living
on the same street together, like we we sometimes take
our grand babies for a walk and we see you
guys out and it's just it's just a fun it's
just a fun season being nana and Papa and nanny
and there you go.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
I wanted to be a pop hoop, but one of
my you know, Casey, he's pop up and uh, they
were like, well he's pop up. You can't be pop
up him.
Speaker 6 (05:55):
Why it's not the same kids.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
Yeah, it's not the same.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Kids can be more.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Papa.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Which we were at church the other day and Livy
was so funny. She started to call me pastor J.
Speaker 6 (06:08):
Yeah, she's six now, and she's like.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
That's that's you know, everybody calls you pasty And I said,
hold up, I said, everybody gets to call me pastor J.
But there's only six that get to call me pop up.
Speaker 6 (06:18):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
So that's really the cool name and you need to
stick with that.
Speaker 6 (06:22):
She's like, oh, she also called me Stacy and I
was like, okay, we need to talk.
Speaker 5 (06:26):
Yes, no church. The kids will run up to Arnest
and they they'll say, hey, mister Biggie.
Speaker 6 (06:37):
Always get to kick out of that.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
That is funny.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Well, you know one of the things that our listeners
they're not aware of. You guys are kind of one
of my go to couples whenever it comes to Marytal counseling.
You know, as a pastor, I get an opportunity to
do a lot I do. I love to do pre
mardal counseling leading up to the wedding. But a lot
of times people, you know, they've been married a year,
five years, twenty years, whatever and start running into some
marital difficulties and a lot of times, you know, people
(07:05):
come sit down with me. They feel like it's one
of the principal's office a lot of times, and I'm
just like, it's just me, you know, I'm just you know,
that's Jay, y'all. You know, come spend some time with me.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Let's visit.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And once they get in there, they're a little bit
more comfortable. But a lot of times I'll say, you know,
I have a couple that I can send you to,
and it's just like sitting down with some friends and
visiting with them, and so I send them to you guys,
and I know that'll y'all face some challenges. Y'all face
some different things, just like every other marriage. So so
kind of tell us a little bit about that and
(07:36):
kind of what brought you to where you are now.
Speaker 4 (07:38):
Well, I'd already mentioned that something wrong with me, was
anything wrong with Cindy.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
We're good there.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We already knew that then.
Speaker 4 (07:48):
But about eighteen years ago, neither one of us had
been introduced to what we do right now. We call
it pure heart weekend life mapping type things. And I
was at the point in my life where I had
embedded anger that I that I was real good at
(08:08):
holding back, but I didn't know why it was there.
I never could quite figure out what was going on.
And uh, there's a thing about a wounded heart that
you have to know about that it changes your identity.
And my identity at the time was I am an
unlovable person, so I had to overreact to that so
(08:28):
that you would love me, okay, And uh we we
had a person at church that took interest in me
for some reason, and uh, there's no way I was
going to ever have a sexual affair with anybody period.
That wasn't going to happen, So I was safe. I thought, well,
Cindy started picking up on something that you know, something's
really wrong here, something's really wrong. And I took offense
(08:52):
to that.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
You know, I took a good towards Cindy.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Towards Cindy, you know that you're wrong. There's nothing wrong
with this, nothing wrong with what was happening.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Just friends.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
We're is friends, although she's texting me about forty times
a day, and it just really got a little crazy.
And it got to the point to where I finally
left us that I can't take you nagging me anymore
about this. So I stayed gone for about a month
and I'm sitting out on the front porch of the camper,
(09:21):
and I heard God clearly say it is so, I
guess you got what you want now, Bud, and I went, no, No,
not at all. And I knew then it was time
for me to go back and we needed to start
working on this, and I didn't have anything to work
with at the time. You know, a lot of times
when we deal with couples, will tell them things like
you need to have a relationship with Jesus and they
(09:44):
don't know what that means. They don't know how to
do it. And practically doing that, you need to know how.
You need to know how to approach him and what
it means to approach him. So she had three of
her friends that went to a weekend and when she
came back, we sat down and we were talking about
what went on, and she started talking about what they shared,
(10:07):
and it hit me right then. It was a God
thing from straight from Heaven. It hit me what was
wrong with me? And I started crying. I started bawling,
and that was the moment that God started healing my life.
So I finally had to understand that my identity that
I self assigned was not the identity that God has
(10:30):
a sign to me, I am a precious child of God,
no way around it. And it took a while for
me to get from my identity to his identity towards me.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
I had to work towards.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
That, and I think, you know, for me, I went
to tall Any Baptist Christian School, and so I just
kind of grew up with you're supposed to know your
identity in Christ, and I thought I did. But when
we walk through that valley and I went to that
retreat and they shared these tools, I was like, I
(11:08):
don't think I've ever spent quality time with God talking
about me and my junk and my emotional baggage that
I've brought into the marriage. And so I think it
was just an eye opener straight from God heart. I mean,
we're very passionate about it now. So that's what we
(11:30):
share with couples that you know, we get the privilege
of talking to.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
So you experience some freedom, and so you're wanting to
share that with others in health exciety, and that's great.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
It's you know, one of the things I think a
lot of times in our prayer time we can get
caught up. You know, we talk about worship. We talk about,
you know, just adoring the Lord in that prayer time.
A lot of times people focus on the blessings, bless
me in this way, do this for me, But your
prayer time there really needs to be an intentional focus
as well on God. What is it that you want
(12:01):
to change in me? What is it that you want
to work inside of me? And we have the tendency
of thinking of repentance in a negative light, but repentance
is a wonderful thing and it's something that should be
a part of every believer's life from the time you
give your heart to Christ the time you step off
this earth. Because repentance is not just apologizing to the
(12:21):
Lord and asking for forgiveness. Is God changed me and
it's really beginning to embrace that, as you said, the
identity that He has for you.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
And at this retreat, they shared with us, you know,
that you needed to be intimate with God and that
means Jesus into me, see, intimacy into me. See. And
when they shared that, I was like wow, you know,
And once I came home and shared it with Earnest
(12:51):
and he just immediately got it and he got his
story and he said I'm unloved and I'm sitting there going, well,
I don't know what my story. I don't know what
my issues are. I don't because I had been a
performer all my life, and I.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Performed you you mean like a people pleasing type.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
Yes, exactly, you know the Sunday school envelopes that you
check off. I read my Bible daily, I prayed daily,
and here's my tide. Yes, I checked everyone.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Checking off the box.
Speaker 5 (13:26):
Exactly and I wasn't checked.
Speaker 6 (13:27):
So I thought I was good.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
I was good.
Speaker 5 (13:30):
But when they said intimacy and spending time with the
Lord and allowing him to show you your stuff, I'm like,
I need to do that too, you know.
Speaker 6 (13:42):
So, but even the we're intimacy that scares people, you know,
like they don't want to feel exposed, even if that
means like I need to open my heart and be
exposed these things, even though the Lord knows, but to
like to be honest, expose the like you said, feelings
of anger that you had and the different things like that.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Well, and I'm going to say I'm gonna kind of
dive off into this and I don't want this to
sound weird, but intimacy for a man, it's to say
intimacy with God. It sounds weird, and the reason why
is because we always think in the sexual context. But really,
what intimacy is with God is just making yourself vulnerable yea.
And really intimacy with your spouse is just making yourself
(14:25):
vulnerable to them, where you're opening up your life your
heart to them. And God wants the same thing. He
wants us to be able to open up our life
and just be vulnerable to him because when we are vulnerable,
that's when he can get to the places within our
heart and our life that he really needs to deal with.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
And there were a few terms that I learned that
really meant something to him during this period of time.
First of all, we have a relational God. He wants
to have a relationship with us. And secondly, was conversational intimacy,
not where I'm sitting down and saying Lord, can you
give me the can you give me this? Can you
forgive me this?
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Goodbye? Just sitting there and spending time with him.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
The difference between monologue and dialogue.
Speaker 6 (15:10):
Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
I think a lot of times whenever it comes to
prayer time, and I've tried to you know, to live
this out. But I've also tried to teach us from
the pulpit as well. We spend so much time talking
to God, but do we really spend a lot of.
Speaker 5 (15:23):
Time listening to that exactly?
Speaker 2 (15:25):
And you know, James one nineteen says be quick to hear,
so to speak, slow to become angry, And there's a
lot I use that in whenever I talk to people
about communication. But it also means to understand that we
have two ears and we can listen to God. Let's
just learn to shut our mouths sometimes and open up
our ears and our heart and really listen to what
God wants to speak to us. It sounds like that's
what you were doing that when she came back. You
(15:47):
were like, I'm open to hear what God wants to
And man, you were vulnerable in that moment.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Absolutely absolutely, and when it got opened up, it poured
out all it was And I can't thank him enough that.
I mean, that was just a life changing moment for
me right there.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
So you begin to understand who you were in Christ,
and it affected your marriage in a positive way.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Slowly but surely, Okay, slowly but surely, and we begin
learning different things you know. And God reveals so much
to us during that period of time, and it became
obvious very quickly that we were going.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
To talk to other people about this.
Speaker 4 (16:26):
And part of it had to do and I mentioned
identity earlier. Every person on this planet, when they go
into a marriage, or they go into a relationship or anything,
is wounded at heart. That they have things in their
heart that have happened over the years that has absolutely
changed how they look at the world, how they look
(16:47):
at God, and they and their identity. And you get
two people coming into a marriage with different sets of identities,
it's going to clash.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
It's going to clash.
Speaker 5 (16:57):
Immediately we share our story, the one that Ernest just shared,
and he's already shared that his identity was unloved and
so to make up for that, he wanted everybody to
love him. Well. Mine, once I finally got intimate with
(17:17):
God and let him talk to me about my story,
is my identity. Although I was very faithful in church,
you know, I taught Sunday School, I did all the things,
my identity was I was less than, not enough, and
so to compensate for that identity that I allowed Satan
(17:39):
to convince me of you know, you're less than not
enough is you've got to be an overperformer. And so
I did, you know, never saying no, you know, doing
all the things just being because I wanted people to
like me. I wanted people to accept me, and I
didn't want them to know my true identity of less
than not enough off exhausting. It is.
Speaker 6 (18:03):
It is.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
It's like you're constantly trying to do all this stuff
right to to make up for what the enemy is
lying to you and telling you. And here's working overtime
trying to get people to see you in this in
this way.
Speaker 3 (18:15):
Yeah right, okay.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
And an example of that would be me needing someone
to love me. Would sit on the couch, come sit
by me, and we're gonna watch TV together.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
We're gonna do this, and she's.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Going, I'm vacuuming the floor and I'm washing the dishes,
I'm cleaning the window like she's bumping around a bb
in a box car.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
She's like, why don't you come help me?
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Exactly exactly right there.
Speaker 5 (18:41):
And a lot of that. I know y'all already talked
about the five love languages, but going through that, that's
one of the tools we share too, is that. You know,
his love language language is quality time. So he just
wanted me to sit on the couch with him, you know,
and that's it. You know, watch a movie, be holds
hand or whatever. Mind's actually service. So I'm doing all
(19:05):
the things, and so that's the same.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Yes, I Well, it's funny because I actually have come
up with the six love language about this. You know,
we know the five love langues. I always joke and
said the sixth one is quality touch. That's another that's
another episode just for you. But once you all begin
(19:38):
to speak each other's a long language, it made all
the difference in the world, absolutely.
Speaker 5 (19:42):
And knowing the wounds. So one of the tools that
we share is holes and wounds and arrows, and it's
basically talking about your heart. And if you if you
experience holes in your heart, that is not getting something
(20:02):
you truly truly need. And it might be from parents,
it might be from a girlfriend, your wife, but you've
got a hole in your cart because you didn't get
something that you truly need. And then a wounding is
kind of the opposite of that, you got something that
you did not deserve.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Would that be like a traumatic experience exactly?
Speaker 5 (20:27):
A wounding, and then an arrow is when something pierced
your heart, like a betrayal, okay, or a breakup with
a girlfriend way back in high school, or something that
she said it pierced your heart, and you're walking in
that and bringing that into your marriage and you don't
(20:47):
even know it, right because you haven't had that intimacy
with God or no one shared the tools with you
that every heart is wounded, every heart has holes, every
heart has arrows. Let's talk about what yours are, you know.
Speaker 4 (21:03):
So, and if you walk into a marriage with that
and you don't understand it, you're saying to yourself, with
my wound, it's just a matter of time till she
figures me out and knows that I am unlovable, that
she's gonna want me anymore.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yeah, she's gonna reject you.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Yeah yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
And unfortunately, just a couple of weeks into the marriage,
my words were something's wrong with you, and I didn't
mean exactly, so boom, there's the wounding again. Right, So
you never know, And we always share the story of
when he decided to leave and he you know, hooked
(21:43):
up to the camber and he was pulling down wildwood,
right I'm standing at the kitchen window, and I'm thinking, well, there,
there it is. You know, you're you're truly less than
not enough. You can't even keep your husband. You're not enough.
He's leaving, and so I'm definitely wrapped up in my woundings.
(22:04):
He says. I was just in my truck and I
wanted her to run out the door and stop me.
So we're both, you know, wounded, but we're not feeding
each other correctly. But once you know the woundings, it's
real easy now to say, I feel like you're, you know,
in a downward spiral arness, something's wrong, You're kind of quiet?
(22:27):
Have I said something? Have I pierced a wound? Have
I triggered you in any way? And just approaching things
like that opens up communication, which is one of the
problems with the marriages.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Would that be learning to be intimate with one another
where you and what I mean by that is what
I said earlier, and letting yourself be vulnerable and saying
you're right.
Speaker 6 (22:48):
Talking about your feelings, being honest, share your heart. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:52):
Yeah, as a man, I'm not going to say, you know,
you hurt my feelings.
Speaker 3 (22:56):
I'm not. But when she approached me like that. When
she approaches me like.
Speaker 4 (23:00):
That, I go back and say, you know, as a
matter of fact, when you said this, it hurt me,
it hurt me, and that's not that's not mainly so.
But when you say that, she can say, I am
so sorry, I really didn't mean that, and then it's gone.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
It's diffused.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
One of my favorite verses in Proverbs, and this is
I think the Living Bible translation says, reliable communication permits progress.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Yes, it does.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
If you will really learn to communicate and be honest
with one another, then your marriage can move forward. The
relationship that you have can move forward in the right
in the right vein. So it sounds to me like, y'all,
are you really learn to acknowledge what was in your
life and communicate with each other.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
And be real, be seriously real.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Well, I thought about this, Cindy, when you were saying this,
because you talk about the love languages. We know that
that's a positive thing. Need you know, quality time, you know,
acts of service, all those are positives.
Speaker 6 (23:55):
You know.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
If I'm speaking these things into my spouse's life, I'm
speaking their love life language. And as Gary Chapman says,
their love tank is full. But everything that God has,
the devil has a counterfeit. So what he does is
the language that he has is rejection and fear and
all these different things. And what happens is because y'all
(24:16):
were speaking into that.
Speaker 4 (24:18):
You know, the less tank is depleted, right, the lest
tanks depleted, the less than, the rejection, all this kind
and so you're speaking that and the enemy taking full
advantage of that.
Speaker 5 (24:27):
Right. One of the things that we share is the
emotional cup. And at the bottom everybody has emotional compan
just like everybody has the love tank. And at the
bottom of the cup is pain. So something happened to
you that was painful to you, and you haven't dealt
with it. And if you do not deal with it,
(24:49):
like I didn't, it just kept busy, you know, just performing.
I didn't deal with that pain, it turns into anger.
So Ernest talked about his unresolved anger. Well, that's a
secondary emotion to pain, and he didn't deal with the pain.
So if you don't deal with the pain, it's going
to turn into anger. And then if you don't deal
with that, it turns into fear. You get fearful that
(25:13):
Oh yes, I am less than not enough, or oh yes,
I will never be truly loved.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Okay, Well, let me ask you this is a response
to that, the fearful. Well, eventually she's going to reject
me and leave. So he's like, I'm going to take
action before she does, and I'm out of here. That
would that kind of response, yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Beacause there's another level to it.
Speaker 5 (25:32):
Yeah, So the next level is a loneness. So if
you don't deal with the pain, then it turns into anger.
You don't deal with you know that, it turns into fear,
and then you hit that aloneness where you isolate. And
you're exactly right, he was isolating. I'm out of here.
I'm gonna go sit in the camera alone, and then
(25:54):
you don't really know what to do with all of this.
And the unfortunate thing is even Christians were walking around
with all of this. I was, you know, Ernest was
he told you about the unresolved anger. So we're walking
around with it. And when you start walking around with it,
it's going to turn into some kind of action, and
(26:16):
some of them are negative, like I can't deal with
this emotional cop and so it may be alcohol, drug
something to relieve all of this, Right, or it may
be good things, you know, busyness, exercising, but too much
exercising right, obsessed? Yes, yes, but you're going to do
(26:40):
something to deal with all this internal thing that you're
dealing with. And what we share is give it to God,
you know, give it to God. You know, the Holy
Spirit wants to have fellowship with you. Jesus wants to
love on you, Papa. God is the all ultimant love.
(27:01):
You know, they already know all this pain, but a
lot of times people don't know. I didn't know Ernest
got his Once I shared and got it immediately, it
kind of took me off to be It's like, you know,
I'm like, I got to spend time with God and
(27:22):
figure out what my true you know, pain is and
all this stuff.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
So and we've taken that with the couples that come
to us right now, okay, and let's talk about identity
and they're like, what, what's the identity? And we try
to explain it to them using the Bible, using verses.
There's a verse for each one of those levels that
she that she shares. And it's amazing the more we
(27:51):
get into it, you can see them start doing this.
We had a couple that started on each end of
the couch, and when we started sharing with them, they
started moving closer closer, and when they got to the
end they were it.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Was like, I had no idea you went through that,
you know, but the light bulb starts going off. Oh,
I had no idea you went through that. Now I understand.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
And she said, that's big. That's big.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Yes, well that you talk about that, use that word isolate.
The devil loves to isolate us. And I love to
do this in church whenever I say how many of
y'all are struggling with this, and you know, half the
church raises their hand. I'm like, look around, you know,
you know, look at the person. You're not the only one,
because I think in church we look at other people
(28:38):
and we say, oh, man, Ernest and Cindy, their marriage
is perfect, that other couple's marriage is perfect. I'm the
only one who has issues. And I don't care who
a person. Everybody has issues that they're working on, they're
growing through. And in your marriage, things that you're you're
building on and working on and making your way through,
because that's what makes your marriage stronger. But as long
as you let the devil keep you isolated, and it's
(29:00):
just me. It's only us. We're the only ones with issues.
Everybody else is perfect. He can erode and eat away
at you.
Speaker 5 (29:07):
Yeah, And you know, we always say I want a testimony.
I want a testimony, But unfortunately sometimes we don't want
to go through the test there's a lot I don't
want to go through all these marriage things, you know.
But we've turned it around and said, let us share
our story and where we were, and so now I
can see the good in it, right to share.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
And the people that hear that, it's like, oh, okay, well.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
We have problems too. We can tell you about ours.
You told us about yours.
Speaker 4 (29:38):
And the thing about isolation, I think the most dangerous
thing about it is getting into hopelessness.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Well, there's just no hope for me anymore.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
That's when that's a lot of times in the marriage
is when they throw the talent sooth. Italiane sad to
say that the divorce rate amongst you and everybody likes
to say divorce rates at fifty percent, one out of
every two marriages winds up in divorce court. Not actually true.
I think it's forty six first time marriages. I think
it's fifty one percent of second time marriage is sixty
three percent of third time marriages. I might have those
stats a little a little off, but they're pretty close.
(30:09):
But those divorce rates are pretty much almost identical within
the church. In church, and I think a lot of
times it comes down to that, people begin to feel hopeless,
and like then they say things like, well, I love them,
but I'm not in love with them, and that man,
that statement drives me up the wall. It's like love's choice.
It's ridiculous, one of those things that you But I
would say this, I know for us and probably for
(30:30):
y'all as well, the difficulties are what makes you strong,
you know. I know we've had our difficulties in marriage,
and a lot of people are like, well, our pastors
y'all's marriage is perfect.
Speaker 6 (30:40):
No, not quite, not quite. I mean we all have
a story, you know, and and you know, the truth
is like like you were saying, I mean, we have
this belief system in it and it's based on the
lives of the enemy, and then you have to change that,
get a new perspective. And and like you said, you're
(31:02):
teaching them the truth of God's word while dealing with
the pain and all the things that you know just
stack upon each you know, a lot of people have
compounded pain. You know, they might have a trauma when
they're younger, and then something else happens, and it just
stacks on top of each other, and so it makes
it a little bit more difficult, and then their test
(31:23):
is a little harder to get to their testimony, you know,
when they do decide to deal with their stuff. But
that's the thing is making a decision to say, Okay,
I'm going to deal with my stuff for myself, but
and for my marriage and begin to work together as
a as a team on that.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
You know, he's dropping the lives of the enemy and
believing the truth that statements Jesus made. Behold, I make
all things new, and the way, the truth and the
life new heart, new heart. He begins to if you
begin to believe the things that he tells you instead
of the life is that the enemy is feeding in,
(32:02):
it makes all the difference.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Well, it's a mind shift, and it's changing your perspective.
It's to be seeing your identity how the Lord sees you.
And that's that's what makes all the difference in being
able to you know, get rid of all your stuff
and then in turn work on your marriage to be healthier.
Speaker 4 (32:25):
And you know you talked about a story. If we
don't have a story, this is all just theory. You know,
it has to be worked out in reality, in our
lives and your lives. And as it's being worked out,
we see the Lord moving. Our faith gets stronger, our
relationship gets stronger, to the point of where we're unbreakable
(32:45):
because we know that we're standing on the work.
Speaker 6 (32:47):
You're united.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
We all had good times and bad times, Absolutely every
couple has that. Which of those two has made your
marriage stronger?
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Bad times?
Speaker 5 (32:57):
Bad times?
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Yeah, because you.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Learn to work your way through those bad times and
it made the foundation stronger. We all want good times,
we all want the you know, the experience. It's amazing.
And the good memories and the good stories are awesome.
We need those, but the challenges are really what make
you strong in your faith and in your marriage.
Speaker 4 (33:15):
It's almost like the bad times give you good times.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Yeah, because all of.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
A sudden we've got the foundation.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Yeah, we appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
And nobody's praying though God give me bad.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
We'll take the good things. But you have to go
through that you have to go through that.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Yeah, the cool part is, you know, everybody likes to
say he'll never leave you, universay you we know that
the word teaches us that, but I think it's a
lot of times losing sight that in those difficulties you're
walking through, He's with you, absolutely and he But so
many times I'm gonna go back to that word isolate.
We want to kind of push them away I got
this figured out, or I can do this, or we
get hopeless and throw the talel in. It's like, man,
(33:54):
if we can just learn to just what's the old saying,
let go and let God just lean into him and
trust him and God change me. And I said this
before on this podcast. One of the biggest things, and
I tell couples of this whenever I'm counseling, when I
quit praying, God change my wife and God changed me
to be the husband to her. She needs me to
be abs That's what made the difference in our marriage.
(34:16):
And that only comes with a you know, as you
if you will, you know, mature and grow, But so
many times we just want to stay there. I've said
this to four couples that come in miles. I'm like
y'all need to grow up. Y'all need to you know,
mature a little bit and grow you know, the things
you need to do. You're just not doing those things.
And that is not coming from me being you know,
(34:37):
self righteous or judgmental. That's me coming from the place
of I was there where I needed to grow up.
I needed to mature. I see you shaking your.
Speaker 6 (34:44):
Head over well, and it's making the choice yourself personally
to say, Okay, I'm going to start working on me
like you were saying, you're praying God change her. You know, well, no, Lord,
work on me. And if you if you start to
work on yourself first, then everything else is going to
start falling in place, you know, with with your with
(35:05):
your marriage and with each other to where that you
can you know, grow stronger.
Speaker 5 (35:11):
Together, right I think? Yeah? And in our story, you know,
had I not done the work and got resembled because
Ernest got in so fast, I don't think we would
be where where we are today, you know, and I
definitely would still be trying to perform, you know, and
(35:32):
do all the things. You know. Soyah, true freedom.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
How exhausting that is?
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Oh yeah, yeah, there's a book.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Our friend Rick by Zet wrote years ago is called
be Real because fake is exhausting. And I'm just like, man,
what an awesome title for a book, because man, we
run ourselves in the ground trying to make everybody else happy,
performing and trying to please everybody else. And it's just
when you can come to that place where you begin
(36:00):
to realize who you are in Christ and you can
kind of relax and be you know, like, I'm going
to strive to make my heavenly Father, you know, the
things that I'm doing, the way that I'm living. I'm
going to honor him with that instead of just trying
to go through life and please and everybody, because no
matter how hard you work, there's always somebody that's unhappy, right.
Speaker 5 (36:22):
Right somebody?
Speaker 4 (36:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (36:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
And you know.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
There's a phrase I like to use for myself. When
I get to the end of myself. Yeah, that's when
God works because that's when I said I've done everything
I can do, and he says, I know, you have
let me take over now.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (36:41):
Another thing I tell myself is it's an audience of one.
To me, it's an audience of one, and that changes me.
You know, I don't buy into my old stuff again
because it's easy to get there again, because it's in you,
you know, until you truly can let go of it.
Speaker 6 (36:58):
What's really choosing to surrender your story to the Lord? Yeah,
and making that decision that you've got to first, Like
you said, Audience of one, I need to be vulnerable
before the Lord, the intimacy comes in so that he
can do his work. And once he we allow him
to do that work in our own heart. Is just amazing.
(37:20):
The peace that comes in the freedom that comes from allowing,
you know, releasing those things to the Lord, and then
you know, the healing that can come within your marriage
because of that, because we allowed him, we've surrendered our story.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
You know, I'm going to say this, maybe we need
to change the way as Christians that we we we
say things like because guys, when you say that that
word intimacy with God, guys push back. Okay, we need
to pick a different word for or we need to
use the word vulnerable. Let's just be vulnerable vulnerable.
Speaker 6 (37:48):
Okay, that's some more word.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
Well, I'm going to tell you what. I'm so grateful
that you guys would would come and sit with us
today and share your story and to let other couples
know that we are. We might be going through a test,
but we can come out on the other side of
this and God can make us healthy and God can
make us strong. So thank you all for coming to
day and sharing your story with us.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
Thanks for asking me.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
Joe, all right, Stacy, everything you want to add.
Speaker 6 (38:13):
I think this has been a great conversation hanging out
with our neighbors.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
It's always great to hang out with you guys, but
to sit down today and begin to some things that
I knew, but but there's there's some things about your
story I didn't quite know. And Stacey asked me, He said, well,
what are we going to ask one and say? I
want I want some clarification. I want some answers on
some of these things that I know them but I
don't know. But it's been great to kind of get
to know you guys, and even you know an even
(38:38):
greater level. So thank you guys for being a part
of this today.
Speaker 6 (38:42):
We've had a great conversation here today with Ernest and
Cindy Carrier, and so we want to offer some extra
resources that may help to strengthen your marriage. Uh.
Speaker 4 (38:54):
The resource that we use almost exclusively post our counseling
is something called Pure Heart Weekend and if you'd like
to access that, you can get to it through www
dot Carter Featherston dot com at c A R t
E R F E A T h E R s.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
O n dot com. You'll thank yourself for doing that.
Speaker 5 (39:18):
Yes, we're very passionate about it. Is absolutely what saved
our marriage. So the tools and the resources that we
learn there, along with God. Getting very vulnerable with God
and allowing him to talk to us is what saved
our marriage. So we like to share those with you
as well.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
And I just want to take time to thank all
of our listeners once again for being a part of
this podcast. As I said earlier, if you're enjoying this,
make sure you click that like button, and if you're
on YouTube, help us grow this channel click that subscribe
button and share it with your friends, your neighbors, your relatives,
your enemies, everybody you know, because we all need a
(39:57):
stronger relationship with the Lord. And if you don't have
have a relationship with the Lord, I would tell you
to lean into him and surrender everything that you are
to him. And so today, as always, thank you for
being a part of this podcast.
Speaker 6 (40:09):
I'm Jay Andy and this is Love Life, Praise,
Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Love Like Crazy podcast,
where your hosts Jay and Stacey Coleman, and we're here
in our home studio today and we have the best guests.
Our neighbors are here with us today and so we're
so excited to have a conversation with them. We always
want to talk about topics that build a stronger marriage
and a stronger family.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
What's kind of funny because we have Ernest and Cindy
Krer with us today and they've been a part of
Journey Church for a long time. But the next thing,
you know, we wind up being neighbors with them, and
that is it's just so much fun. I'm going to
get back into that here in just a second, but
before we do, I just want to thank all of
(01:02):
our listeners for being a part of this podcast. You know,
the heart of this podcast is really about building a
stronger marriage, building a stronger family, and we just kind
of feel like that that's what end this season of
life we're in, that that's what the Lord is really
placed upon our hearts, that our role is not only
within the church and his pastors, but also to be
able to utilize this podcast for that, and so thank
(01:24):
you guys for supporting this, being a part of this,
And once again, if you're enjoying this, make sure you
click that like button, give us a review, leave us
a comment. If there's a topic that you would like
for us to discuss, we'd love to be able to
hear from that. And we've really been working hard on
building the YouTube channel. So if you would click that
subscribe button, and the reason for that is because it'll
(01:46):
let you know about upcoming episodes. It'll alert you to that.
And so today I am excited to talk to our
dear friends Ernest and Cindy or as we call you,
Big E. And the reason there's a reason and for
that that I'm excited about this because your neighbors. And
it's one thing as a pastor to go to church
(02:08):
with people, but y'all see us all the time.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
You know.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
It's just like you know, it's like you get home,
you can kind of let your hair down, and y'all
see us with our hair down on a very very
regular basis. So thank y'all for being a part of
this podcast today. So let's do this. I want y'all
to take a little bit of time kind of to
introduce yourselves to everybody, kind of tell them a little
bit about Biggie and Cindy.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
Well, I am Biggie and this is my wife, Cindy,
and we've been married for thirty five years. And you know,
we were both Christians when we got married, and so
we're going to have this ideal marriage just made in Heaven.
After about three weeks of being married, she looked at
me and she said, there's something really wrong with you.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
I thought I was perfect.
Speaker 4 (02:55):
So she shared that with me, and I knew right
then that some work had to be done. It just
took years to get through that, and we're hopefully going
to try to cover today some of the things that
we used, how we interfaced with God in this and
how he pointed us in the right direction to get
something wrong with me fixed.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
So Cindy, you know, hey, something needs to be fixed
in you. I think every man kind of goes into
mayor thinking like I might act together. H So kind
of speak to that a little bit. Tell us a
little bit about you. Where you are in the season
of life?
Speaker 5 (03:31):
Oh, where am I in this season of life? I
am a nanny, okay to two little girls, Kenna and Kyla.
And then We also have two grandsons who are in
their twenties, so a big age gap. Yeah, through my
step son Adam, who passed away in September of twenty eighteen.
(03:53):
So it's a fun season just enjoying the little girls.
They two are our neighbors, live right across the yard,
like within one hundred and fifty feet, so it's fun
to get them to run across and play with us.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I enjoy seeing y'all, you know, back and forth on
the road. I can actually look behind you and see
it out the door. But you know, i'll see y'all
on your side by side or bikes or things like that.
And a lot of times you get well, Kenna right
now because the other one's too little. How was a
month yet? This baby made a month yet?
Speaker 5 (04:25):
She was born January fourteenth.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Okay, she's a couple months old. But I love seeing
y'all interact with him and Cindy. I see the stuff
you put on social media. Oh, Kenna is the princess.
Speaker 4 (04:38):
She is absolutely, absolutely It kind of.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Looks like she kind of rules things and the roost.
Speaker 4 (04:44):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
And I know the other day I came over and
we were visiting, and she came in next thing. You know,
she's getting stuff out, she's doing stuff, and you're like,
you know, hold up now, and she just kind of
slowly made it, and eventually she was kind of like,
that's exactly what my grandkids do here. It's like they
have the time of their life.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Cindy ordered her a makeup kit.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
She made the mistake of telling Kenna that it's ordered
and it's coming in.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Has it come in yet? Has it come in yet?
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Well, we went up to the camp with her and
came back and it wasn't here, and she went, I'm
so appointed.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
It's such a great season too. And I know, living
on the same street together, like we we sometimes take
our grand babies for a walk and we see you
guys out and it's just it's just a fun it's
just a fun season being nana and Papa and nanny
and there you go.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
I wanted to be a pop hoop, but one of
my you know, Casey, he's pop up and uh, they
were like, well he's pop up. You can't be pop
up him.
Speaker 6 (05:55):
Why it's not the same kids.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
Yeah, it's not the same.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Kids can be more.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Papa.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Which we were at church the other day and Livy
was so funny. She started to call me pastor J.
Speaker 6 (06:08):
Yeah, she's six now, and she's like.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
That's that's you know, everybody calls you pasty And I said,
hold up, I said, everybody gets to call me pastor J.
But there's only six that get to call me pop up.
Speaker 6 (06:18):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
So that's really the cool name and you need to
stick with that.
Speaker 6 (06:22):
She's like, oh, she also called me Stacy and I
was like, okay, we need to talk.
Speaker 5 (06:26):
Yes, no church. The kids will run up to Arnest
and they they'll say, hey, mister Biggie.
Speaker 6 (06:37):
Always get to kick out of that.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
That is funny.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Well, you know one of the things that our listeners
they're not aware of. You guys are kind of one
of my go to couples whenever it comes to Marytal counseling.
You know, as a pastor, I get an opportunity to
do a lot I do. I love to do pre
mardal counseling leading up to the wedding. But a lot
of times people, you know, they've been married a year,
five years, twenty years, whatever and start running into some
marital difficulties and a lot of times, you know, people
(07:05):
come sit down with me. They feel like it's one
of the principal's office a lot of times, and I'm
just like, it's just me, you know, I'm just you know,
that's Jay, y'all. You know, come spend some time with me.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Let's visit.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And once they get in there, they're a little bit
more comfortable. But a lot of times I'll say, you know,
I have a couple that I can send you to,
and it's just like sitting down with some friends and
visiting with them, and so I send them to you guys,
and I know that'll y'all face some challenges. Y'all face
some different things, just like every other marriage. So so
kind of tell us a little bit about that and
(07:36):
kind of what brought you to where you are now.
Speaker 4 (07:38):
Well, I'd already mentioned that something wrong with me, was
anything wrong with Cindy.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
We're good there.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We already knew that then.
Speaker 4 (07:48):
But about eighteen years ago, neither one of us had
been introduced to what we do right now. We call
it pure heart weekend life mapping type things. And I
was at the point in my life where I had
embedded anger that I that I was real good at
(08:08):
holding back, but I didn't know why it was there.
I never could quite figure out what was going on.
And uh, there's a thing about a wounded heart that
you have to know about that it changes your identity.
And my identity at the time was I am an
unlovable person, so I had to overreact to that so
(08:28):
that you would love me, okay, And uh we we
had a person at church that took interest in me
for some reason, and uh, there's no way I was
going to ever have a sexual affair with anybody period.
That wasn't going to happen, So I was safe. I thought, well,
Cindy started picking up on something that you know, something's
really wrong here, something's really wrong. And I took offense
(08:52):
to that.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
You know, I took a good towards Cindy.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Towards Cindy, you know that you're wrong. There's nothing wrong
with this, nothing wrong with what was happening.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Just friends.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
We're is friends, although she's texting me about forty times
a day, and it just really got a little crazy.
And it got to the point to where I finally
left us that I can't take you nagging me anymore
about this. So I stayed gone for about a month
and I'm sitting out on the front porch of the camper,
(09:21):
and I heard God clearly say it is so, I
guess you got what you want now, Bud, and I went, no, No,
not at all. And I knew then it was time
for me to go back and we needed to start
working on this, and I didn't have anything to work
with at the time. You know, a lot of times
when we deal with couples, will tell them things like
you need to have a relationship with Jesus and they
(09:44):
don't know what that means. They don't know how to
do it. And practically doing that, you need to know how.
You need to know how to approach him and what
it means to approach him. So she had three of
her friends that went to a weekend and when she
came back, we sat down and we were talking about
what went on, and she started talking about what they shared,
(10:07):
and it hit me right then. It was a God
thing from straight from Heaven. It hit me what was
wrong with me? And I started crying. I started bawling,
and that was the moment that God started healing my life.
So I finally had to understand that my identity that
I self assigned was not the identity that God has
(10:30):
a sign to me, I am a precious child of God,
no way around it. And it took a while for
me to get from my identity to his identity towards me.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
I had to work towards.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
That, and I think, you know, for me, I went
to tall Any Baptist Christian School, and so I just
kind of grew up with you're supposed to know your
identity in Christ, and I thought I did. But when
we walk through that valley and I went to that
retreat and they shared these tools, I was like, I
(11:08):
don't think I've ever spent quality time with God talking
about me and my junk and my emotional baggage that
I've brought into the marriage. And so I think it
was just an eye opener straight from God heart. I mean,
we're very passionate about it now. So that's what we
(11:30):
share with couples that you know, we get the privilege
of talking to.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
So you experience some freedom, and so you're wanting to
share that with others in health exciety, and that's great.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
It's you know, one of the things I think a
lot of times in our prayer time we can get
caught up. You know, we talk about worship. We talk about,
you know, just adoring the Lord in that prayer time.
A lot of times people focus on the blessings, bless
me in this way, do this for me, But your
prayer time there really needs to be an intentional focus
as well on God. What is it that you want
(12:01):
to change in me? What is it that you want
to work inside of me? And we have the tendency
of thinking of repentance in a negative light, but repentance
is a wonderful thing and it's something that should be
a part of every believer's life from the time you
give your heart to Christ the time you step off
this earth. Because repentance is not just apologizing to the
(12:21):
Lord and asking for forgiveness. Is God changed me and
it's really beginning to embrace that, as you said, the
identity that He has for you.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
And at this retreat, they shared with us, you know,
that you needed to be intimate with God and that
means Jesus into me, see, intimacy into me. See. And
when they shared that, I was like wow, you know,
And once I came home and shared it with Earnest
(12:51):
and he just immediately got it and he got his
story and he said I'm unloved and I'm sitting there going, well,
I don't know what my story. I don't know what
my issues are. I don't because I had been a
performer all my life, and I.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Performed you you mean like a people pleasing type.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
Yes, exactly, you know the Sunday school envelopes that you
check off. I read my Bible daily, I prayed daily,
and here's my tide. Yes, I checked everyone.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Checking off the box.
Speaker 5 (13:26):
Exactly and I wasn't checked.
Speaker 6 (13:27):
So I thought I was good.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
I was good.
Speaker 5 (13:30):
But when they said intimacy and spending time with the
Lord and allowing him to show you your stuff, I'm like,
I need to do that too, you know.
Speaker 6 (13:42):
So, but even the we're intimacy that scares people, you know,
like they don't want to feel exposed, even if that
means like I need to open my heart and be
exposed these things, even though the Lord knows, but to
like to be honest, expose the like you said, feelings
of anger that you had and the different things like that.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Well, and I'm going to say I'm gonna kind of
dive off into this and I don't want this to
sound weird, but intimacy for a man, it's to say
intimacy with God. It sounds weird, and the reason why
is because we always think in the sexual context. But really,
what intimacy is with God is just making yourself vulnerable yea.
And really intimacy with your spouse is just making yourself
(14:25):
vulnerable to them, where you're opening up your life your
heart to them. And God wants the same thing. He
wants us to be able to open up our life
and just be vulnerable to him because when we are vulnerable,
that's when he can get to the places within our
heart and our life that he really needs to deal with.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
And there were a few terms that I learned that
really meant something to him during this period of time.
First of all, we have a relational God. He wants
to have a relationship with us. And secondly, was conversational intimacy,
not where I'm sitting down and saying Lord, can you
give me the can you give me this? Can you
forgive me this?
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Goodbye? Just sitting there and spending time with him.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
The difference between monologue and dialogue.
Speaker 6 (15:10):
Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
I think a lot of times whenever it comes to
prayer time, and I've tried to you know, to live
this out. But I've also tried to teach us from
the pulpit as well. We spend so much time talking
to God, but do we really spend a lot of.
Speaker 5 (15:23):
Time listening to that exactly?
Speaker 2 (15:25):
And you know, James one nineteen says be quick to hear,
so to speak, slow to become angry, And there's a
lot I use that in whenever I talk to people
about communication. But it also means to understand that we
have two ears and we can listen to God. Let's
just learn to shut our mouths sometimes and open up
our ears and our heart and really listen to what
God wants to speak to us. It sounds like that's
what you were doing that when she came back. You
(15:47):
were like, I'm open to hear what God wants to
And man, you were vulnerable in that moment.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Absolutely absolutely, and when it got opened up, it poured
out all it was And I can't thank him enough that.
I mean, that was just a life changing moment for
me right there.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
So you begin to understand who you were in Christ,
and it affected your marriage in a positive way.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Slowly but surely, Okay, slowly but surely, and we begin
learning different things you know. And God reveals so much
to us during that period of time, and it became
obvious very quickly that we were going.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
To talk to other people about this.
Speaker 4 (16:26):
And part of it had to do and I mentioned
identity earlier. Every person on this planet, when they go
into a marriage, or they go into a relationship or anything,
is wounded at heart. That they have things in their
heart that have happened over the years that has absolutely
changed how they look at the world, how they look
(16:47):
at God, and they and their identity. And you get
two people coming into a marriage with different sets of identities,
it's going to clash.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
It's going to clash.
Speaker 5 (16:57):
Immediately we share our story, the one that Ernest just shared,
and he's already shared that his identity was unloved and
so to make up for that, he wanted everybody to
love him. Well. Mine, once I finally got intimate with
(17:17):
God and let him talk to me about my story,
is my identity. Although I was very faithful in church,
you know, I taught Sunday School, I did all the things,
my identity was I was less than, not enough, and
so to compensate for that identity that I allowed Satan
(17:39):
to convince me of you know, you're less than not
enough is you've got to be an overperformer. And so
I did, you know, never saying no, you know, doing
all the things just being because I wanted people to
like me. I wanted people to accept me, and I
didn't want them to know my true identity of less
than not enough off exhausting. It is.
Speaker 6 (18:03):
It is.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
It's like you're constantly trying to do all this stuff
right to to make up for what the enemy is
lying to you and telling you. And here's working overtime
trying to get people to see you in this in
this way.
Speaker 3 (18:15):
Yeah right, okay.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
And an example of that would be me needing someone
to love me. Would sit on the couch, come sit
by me, and we're gonna watch TV together.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
We're gonna do this, and she's.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Going, I'm vacuuming the floor and I'm washing the dishes,
I'm cleaning the window like she's bumping around a bb
in a box car.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
She's like, why don't you come help me?
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Exactly exactly right there.
Speaker 5 (18:41):
And a lot of that. I know y'all already talked
about the five love languages, but going through that, that's
one of the tools we share too, is that. You know,
his love language language is quality time. So he just
wanted me to sit on the couch with him, you know,
and that's it. You know, watch a movie, be holds
hand or whatever. Mind's actually service. So I'm doing all
(19:05):
the things, and so that's the same.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Yes, I Well, it's funny because I actually have come
up with the six love language about this. You know,
we know the five love langues. I always joke and
said the sixth one is quality touch. That's another that's
another episode just for you. But once you all begin
(19:38):
to speak each other's a long language, it made all
the difference in the world, absolutely.
Speaker 5 (19:42):
And knowing the wounds. So one of the tools that
we share is holes and wounds and arrows, and it's
basically talking about your heart. And if you if you
experience holes in your heart, that is not getting something
(20:02):
you truly truly need. And it might be from parents,
it might be from a girlfriend, your wife, but you've
got a hole in your cart because you didn't get
something that you truly need. And then a wounding is
kind of the opposite of that, you got something that
you did not deserve.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Would that be like a traumatic experience exactly?
Speaker 5 (20:27):
A wounding, and then an arrow is when something pierced
your heart, like a betrayal, okay, or a breakup with
a girlfriend way back in high school, or something that
she said it pierced your heart, and you're walking in
that and bringing that into your marriage and you don't
(20:47):
even know it, right because you haven't had that intimacy
with God or no one shared the tools with you
that every heart is wounded, every heart has holes, every
heart has arrows. Let's talk about what yours are, you know.
Speaker 4 (21:03):
So, and if you walk into a marriage with that
and you don't understand it, you're saying to yourself, with
my wound, it's just a matter of time till she
figures me out and knows that I am unlovable, that
she's gonna want me anymore.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yeah, she's gonna reject you.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Yeah yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
And unfortunately, just a couple of weeks into the marriage,
my words were something's wrong with you, and I didn't
mean exactly, so boom, there's the wounding again. Right, So
you never know, And we always share the story of
when he decided to leave and he you know, hooked
(21:43):
up to the camber and he was pulling down wildwood,
right I'm standing at the kitchen window, and I'm thinking, well, there,
there it is. You know, you're you're truly less than
not enough. You can't even keep your husband. You're not enough.
He's leaving, and so I'm definitely wrapped up in my woundings.
(22:04):
He says. I was just in my truck and I
wanted her to run out the door and stop me.
So we're both, you know, wounded, but we're not feeding
each other correctly. But once you know the woundings, it's
real easy now to say, I feel like you're, you know,
in a downward spiral arness, something's wrong, You're kind of quiet?
(22:27):
Have I said something? Have I pierced a wound? Have
I triggered you in any way? And just approaching things
like that opens up communication, which is one of the
problems with the marriages.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Would that be learning to be intimate with one another
where you and what I mean by that is what
I said earlier, and letting yourself be vulnerable and saying
you're right.
Speaker 6 (22:48):
Talking about your feelings, being honest, share your heart. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:52):
Yeah, as a man, I'm not going to say, you know,
you hurt my feelings.
Speaker 3 (22:56):
I'm not. But when she approached me like that. When
she approaches me like.
Speaker 4 (23:00):
That, I go back and say, you know, as a
matter of fact, when you said this, it hurt me,
it hurt me, and that's not that's not mainly so.
But when you say that, she can say, I am
so sorry, I really didn't mean that, and then it's gone.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
It's diffused.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
One of my favorite verses in Proverbs, and this is
I think the Living Bible translation says, reliable communication permits progress.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Yes, it does.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
If you will really learn to communicate and be honest
with one another, then your marriage can move forward. The
relationship that you have can move forward in the right
in the right vein. So it sounds to me like, y'all,
are you really learn to acknowledge what was in your
life and communicate with each other.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
And be real, be seriously real.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Well, I thought about this, Cindy, when you were saying this,
because you talk about the love languages. We know that
that's a positive thing. Need you know, quality time, you know,
acts of service, all those are positives.
Speaker 6 (23:55):
You know.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
If I'm speaking these things into my spouse's life, I'm
speaking their love life language. And as Gary Chapman says,
their love tank is full. But everything that God has,
the devil has a counterfeit. So what he does is
the language that he has is rejection and fear and
all these different things. And what happens is because y'all
(24:16):
were speaking into that.
Speaker 4 (24:18):
You know, the less tank is depleted, right, the lest
tanks depleted, the less than, the rejection, all this kind
and so you're speaking that and the enemy taking full
advantage of that.
Speaker 5 (24:27):
Right. One of the things that we share is the
emotional cup. And at the bottom everybody has emotional compan
just like everybody has the love tank. And at the
bottom of the cup is pain. So something happened to
you that was painful to you, and you haven't dealt
with it. And if you do not deal with it,
(24:49):
like I didn't, it just kept busy, you know, just performing.
I didn't deal with that pain, it turns into anger.
So Ernest talked about his unresolved anger. Well, that's a
secondary emotion to pain, and he didn't deal with the pain.
So if you don't deal with the pain, it's going
to turn into anger. And then if you don't deal
with that, it turns into fear. You get fearful that
(25:13):
Oh yes, I am less than not enough, or oh yes,
I will never be truly loved.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Okay, Well, let me ask you this is a response
to that, the fearful. Well, eventually she's going to reject
me and leave. So he's like, I'm going to take
action before she does, and I'm out of here. That
would that kind of response, yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Beacause there's another level to it.
Speaker 5 (25:32):
Yeah, So the next level is a loneness. So if
you don't deal with the pain, then it turns into anger.
You don't deal with you know that, it turns into fear,
and then you hit that aloneness where you isolate. And
you're exactly right, he was isolating. I'm out of here.
I'm gonna go sit in the camera alone, and then
(25:54):
you don't really know what to do with all of this.
And the unfortunate thing is even Christians were walking around
with all of this. I was, you know, Ernest was
he told you about the unresolved anger. So we're walking
around with it. And when you start walking around with it,
it's going to turn into some kind of action, and
(26:16):
some of them are negative, like I can't deal with
this emotional cop and so it may be alcohol, drug
something to relieve all of this, Right, or it may
be good things, you know, busyness, exercising, but too much
exercising right, obsessed? Yes, yes, but you're going to do
(26:40):
something to deal with all this internal thing that you're
dealing with. And what we share is give it to God,
you know, give it to God. You know, the Holy
Spirit wants to have fellowship with you. Jesus wants to
love on you, Papa. God is the all ultimant love.
(27:01):
You know, they already know all this pain, but a
lot of times people don't know. I didn't know Ernest
got his Once I shared and got it immediately, it
kind of took me off to be It's like, you know,
I'm like, I got to spend time with God and
(27:22):
figure out what my true you know, pain is and
all this stuff.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
So and we've taken that with the couples that come
to us right now, okay, and let's talk about identity
and they're like, what, what's the identity? And we try
to explain it to them using the Bible, using verses.
There's a verse for each one of those levels that
she that she shares. And it's amazing the more we
(27:51):
get into it, you can see them start doing this.
We had a couple that started on each end of
the couch, and when we started sharing with them, they
started moving closer closer, and when they got to the
end they were it.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Was like, I had no idea you went through that,
you know, but the light bulb starts going off. Oh,
I had no idea you went through that. Now I understand.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
And she said, that's big. That's big.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Yes, well that you talk about that, use that word isolate.
The devil loves to isolate us. And I love to
do this in church whenever I say how many of
y'all are struggling with this, and you know, half the
church raises their hand. I'm like, look around, you know,
you know, look at the person. You're not the only one,
because I think in church we look at other people
(28:38):
and we say, oh, man, Ernest and Cindy, their marriage
is perfect, that other couple's marriage is perfect. I'm the
only one who has issues. And I don't care who
a person. Everybody has issues that they're working on, they're
growing through. And in your marriage, things that you're you're
building on and working on and making your way through,
because that's what makes your marriage stronger. But as long
as you let the devil keep you isolated, and it's
(29:00):
just me. It's only us. We're the only ones with issues.
Everybody else is perfect. He can erode and eat away
at you.
Speaker 5 (29:07):
Yeah, And you know, we always say I want a testimony.
I want a testimony, But unfortunately sometimes we don't want
to go through the test there's a lot I don't
want to go through all these marriage things, you know.
But we've turned it around and said, let us share
our story and where we were, and so now I
can see the good in it, right to share.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
And the people that hear that, it's like, oh, okay, well.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
We have problems too. We can tell you about ours.
You told us about yours.
Speaker 4 (29:38):
And the thing about isolation, I think the most dangerous
thing about it is getting into hopelessness.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Well, there's just no hope for me anymore.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
That's when that's a lot of times in the marriage
is when they throw the talent sooth. Italiane sad to
say that the divorce rate amongst you and everybody likes
to say divorce rates at fifty percent, one out of
every two marriages winds up in divorce court. Not actually true.
I think it's forty six first time marriages. I think
it's fifty one percent of second time marriage is sixty
three percent of third time marriages. I might have those
stats a little a little off, but they're pretty close.
(30:09):
But those divorce rates are pretty much almost identical within
the church. In church, and I think a lot of
times it comes down to that, people begin to feel hopeless,
and like then they say things like, well, I love them,
but I'm not in love with them, and that man,
that statement drives me up the wall. It's like love's choice.
It's ridiculous, one of those things that you But I
would say this, I know for us and probably for
(30:30):
y'all as well, the difficulties are what makes you strong,
you know. I know we've had our difficulties in marriage,
and a lot of people are like, well, our pastors
y'all's marriage is perfect.
Speaker 6 (30:40):
No, not quite, not quite. I mean we all have
a story, you know, and and you know, the truth
is like like you were saying, I mean, we have
this belief system in it and it's based on the
lives of the enemy, and then you have to change that,
get a new perspective. And and like you said, you're
(31:02):
teaching them the truth of God's word while dealing with
the pain and all the things that you know just
stack upon each you know, a lot of people have
compounded pain. You know, they might have a trauma when
they're younger, and then something else happens, and it just
stacks on top of each other, and so it makes
it a little bit more difficult, and then their test
(31:23):
is a little harder to get to their testimony, you know,
when they do decide to deal with their stuff. But
that's the thing is making a decision to say, Okay,
I'm going to deal with my stuff for myself, but
and for my marriage and begin to work together as
a as a team on that.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
You know, he's dropping the lives of the enemy and
believing the truth that statements Jesus made. Behold, I make
all things new, and the way, the truth and the
life new heart, new heart. He begins to if you
begin to believe the things that he tells you instead
of the life is that the enemy is feeding in,
(32:02):
it makes all the difference.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Well, it's a mind shift, and it's changing your perspective.
It's to be seeing your identity how the Lord sees you.
And that's that's what makes all the difference in being
able to you know, get rid of all your stuff
and then in turn work on your marriage to be healthier.
Speaker 4 (32:25):
And you know you talked about a story. If we
don't have a story, this is all just theory. You know,
it has to be worked out in reality, in our
lives and your lives. And as it's being worked out,
we see the Lord moving. Our faith gets stronger, our
relationship gets stronger, to the point of where we're unbreakable
(32:45):
because we know that we're standing on the work.
Speaker 6 (32:47):
You're united.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
We all had good times and bad times, Absolutely every
couple has that. Which of those two has made your
marriage stronger?
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Bad times?
Speaker 5 (32:57):
Bad times?
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Yeah, because you.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Learn to work your way through those bad times and
it made the foundation stronger. We all want good times,
we all want the you know, the experience. It's amazing.
And the good memories and the good stories are awesome.
We need those, but the challenges are really what make
you strong in your faith and in your marriage.
Speaker 4 (33:15):
It's almost like the bad times give you good times.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Yeah, because all of.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
A sudden we've got the foundation.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Yeah, we appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
And nobody's praying though God give me bad.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
We'll take the good things. But you have to go
through that you have to go through that.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Yeah, the cool part is, you know, everybody likes to
say he'll never leave you, universay you we know that
the word teaches us that, but I think it's a
lot of times losing sight that in those difficulties you're
walking through, He's with you, absolutely and he But so
many times I'm gonna go back to that word isolate.
We want to kind of push them away I got
this figured out, or I can do this, or we
get hopeless and throw the talel in. It's like, man,
(33:54):
if we can just learn to just what's the old saying,
let go and let God just lean into him and
trust him and God change me. And I said this
before on this podcast. One of the biggest things, and
I tell couples of this whenever I'm counseling, when I
quit praying, God change my wife and God changed me
to be the husband to her. She needs me to
be abs That's what made the difference in our marriage.
(34:16):
And that only comes with a you know, as you
if you will, you know, mature and grow, But so
many times we just want to stay there. I've said
this to four couples that come in miles. I'm like
y'all need to grow up. Y'all need to you know,
mature a little bit and grow you know, the things
you need to do. You're just not doing those things.
And that is not coming from me being you know,
(34:37):
self righteous or judgmental. That's me coming from the place
of I was there where I needed to grow up.
I needed to mature. I see you shaking your.
Speaker 6 (34:44):
Head over well, and it's making the choice yourself personally
to say, Okay, I'm going to start working on me
like you were saying, you're praying God change her. You know, well, no, Lord,
work on me. And if you if you start to
work on yourself first, then everything else is going to
start falling in place, you know, with with your with
(35:05):
your marriage and with each other to where that you
can you know, grow stronger.
Speaker 5 (35:11):
Together, right I think? Yeah? And in our story, you know,
had I not done the work and got resembled because
Ernest got in so fast, I don't think we would
be where where we are today, you know, and I
definitely would still be trying to perform, you know, and
(35:32):
do all the things. You know. Soyah, true freedom.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
How exhausting that is?
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Oh yeah, yeah, there's a book.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Our friend Rick by Zet wrote years ago is called
be Real because fake is exhausting. And I'm just like, man,
what an awesome title for a book, because man, we
run ourselves in the ground trying to make everybody else happy,
performing and trying to please everybody else. And it's just
when you can come to that place where you begin
(36:00):
to realize who you are in Christ and you can
kind of relax and be you know, like, I'm going
to strive to make my heavenly Father, you know, the
things that I'm doing, the way that I'm living. I'm
going to honor him with that instead of just trying
to go through life and please and everybody, because no
matter how hard you work, there's always somebody that's unhappy, right.
Speaker 5 (36:22):
Right somebody?
Speaker 4 (36:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (36:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
And you know.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
There's a phrase I like to use for myself. When
I get to the end of myself. Yeah, that's when
God works because that's when I said I've done everything
I can do, and he says, I know, you have
let me take over now.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (36:41):
Another thing I tell myself is it's an audience of one.
To me, it's an audience of one, and that changes me.
You know, I don't buy into my old stuff again
because it's easy to get there again, because it's in you,
you know, until you truly can let go of it.
Speaker 6 (36:58):
What's really choosing to surrender your story to the Lord? Yeah,
and making that decision that you've got to first, Like
you said, Audience of one, I need to be vulnerable
before the Lord, the intimacy comes in so that he
can do his work. And once he we allow him
to do that work in our own heart. Is just amazing.
(37:20):
The peace that comes in the freedom that comes from allowing,
you know, releasing those things to the Lord, and then
you know, the healing that can come within your marriage
because of that, because we allowed him, we've surrendered our story.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
You know, I'm going to say this, maybe we need
to change the way as Christians that we we we
say things like because guys, when you say that that
word intimacy with God, guys push back. Okay, we need
to pick a different word for or we need to
use the word vulnerable. Let's just be vulnerable vulnerable.
Speaker 6 (37:48):
Okay, that's some more word.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
Well, I'm going to tell you what. I'm so grateful
that you guys would would come and sit with us
today and share your story and to let other couples
know that we are. We might be going through a test,
but we can come out on the other side of
this and God can make us healthy and God can
make us strong. So thank you all for coming to
day and sharing your story with us.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
Thanks for asking me.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
Joe, all right, Stacy, everything you want to add.
Speaker 6 (38:13):
I think this has been a great conversation hanging out
with our neighbors.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
It's always great to hang out with you guys, but
to sit down today and begin to some things that
I knew, but but there's there's some things about your
story I didn't quite know. And Stacey asked me, He said, well,
what are we going to ask one and say? I
want I want some clarification. I want some answers on
some of these things that I know them but I
don't know. But it's been great to kind of get
to know you guys, and even you know an even
(38:38):
greater level. So thank you guys for being a part
of this today.
Speaker 6 (38:42):
We've had a great conversation here today with Ernest and
Cindy Carrier, and so we want to offer some extra
resources that may help to strengthen your marriage. Uh.
Speaker 4 (38:54):
The resource that we use almost exclusively post our counseling
is something called Pure Heart Weekend and if you'd like
to access that, you can get to it through www
dot Carter Featherston dot com at c A R t
E R F E A T h E R s.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
O n dot com. You'll thank yourself for doing that.
Speaker 5 (39:18):
Yes, we're very passionate about it. Is absolutely what saved
our marriage. So the tools and the resources that we
learn there, along with God. Getting very vulnerable with God
and allowing him to talk to us is what saved
our marriage. So we like to share those with you
as well.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
And I just want to take time to thank all
of our listeners once again for being a part of
this podcast. As I said earlier, if you're enjoying this,
make sure you click that like button, and if you're
on YouTube, help us grow this channel click that subscribe
button and share it with your friends, your neighbors, your relatives,
your enemies, everybody you know, because we all need a
(39:57):
stronger relationship with the Lord. And if you don't have
have a relationship with the Lord, I would tell you
to lean into him and surrender everything that you are
to him. And so today, as always, thank you for
being a part of this podcast.
Speaker 6 (40:09):
I'm Jay Andy and this is Love Life, Praise,
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