67. The Wives Episode - Leaving Legalism Together: Help for Couples that are Recovering Fundamentalists

all right go ahead Mary this is Mary Hollyfield this is Allison Seyfried and welcome to the For Freedom Podcast yeah so I guess should we edit that no I think it's great how it is John we have a special episode today with our beautiful wives my beautiful wife John I don't do you think your wife's beautiful John oh she's hot all right all right so they're going to be joining us today for a irregular episode before we get to that let's roll that beautiful bean footage roll it I do not mean to be mean I do mean to be mad you obey your pastor if you ain't got the King James you ain't got hey you don't have a King James you don't have a Bible I still believe if you're cold a day in hell before I get my family from a woman I'm a preacher young preachers that do love God get pulled off in the cabin is and I'll fight it I'll fight it I'll fight you in the parking lot over and I'll get personal with you when you got dressed today you dressed deity this is the For Freedom Podcast a podcast that is part of the RFP network that seeks to bring freedom in Christ from the spiritual abuse of legalism in the independent fundamental Baptist movement now here are your hosts John Hollifield and James Saifert and so fundamentalism is designed to unpack the idea of authority from scripture the problem with that is that that's not the defining principle in scripture it is a part of the defining principle in scripture is love and now I'm not saying that all men who sit under that teaching will become abusive but what I'm saying is the ones who are abusive will be drawn to that sort of teaching I don't want to give people just a list of things they can start doing differently until they have a heart out of which they're going to be doing those things bitterness is different from hurt I would say that hurt or even abuse does not have to result in bitterness all right as James was saying we have uh a very very cool topic to cover today um and probably the most important guests we've ever had on this podcast absolutely and that is we have our wives so Allison is there with James in their studio which their studio looks like tonight we're recording this because we had to um get our wives involved in this and the whole thing of kids plays a factor in this that uh they are at home this is like the kids have been put to bed they have been given drugs to they don't wake up and just joking people we don't drug our kids we use vixx at our house we use melatonin gummies okay here's your vitamin for the night and um so they're in their they're in their kitchen and we actually are in our kitchen as well and that smell that you're smelling is chocolate warm chocolate chip muffins that just came out of the oven you're not smelling it smells good it smells good I've got coffee in my beautiful uh if you didn't know guys we have a website where you can buy merchandise and I'm drinking coffee in my for freedom mug and I'm I'm drinking great value distilled water Mary what are you drinking water from my mason jar water well good well john how are we going to run this tonight all right well let's talk about what we're going to talk about we're the subject is uh something that I've been thinking about actually the the idea of having um Mary and Allison on has been tossed around for quite a while and um you know James was all for it let's just have him on a talk and I was like uh I'm not going to get Mary on here unless we have a good topic and I was like never the topic never came up like it was never just hidden what is a good thing for us all to discuss together and uh then it came to me um a couple months ago I thought a good topic to talk about would be something that I've been sort of meditating on and pondering myself and that is um leaving legalism together or maybe we could put it this way what it's like to grow as a couple as a marriage after you have left it and um my microphone just came loose sorry john when did you uh when did you let Mary know about this last night no no no no that's not last night I got the show notes last night yes this this is a false false statement this is not true misinformation is this misinformation this is uh what is it uh false news um false flag fake news and uh so actually no I think it was a week and a half ago or two weeks we let them know about it she didn't get the notes until yesterday she knew about yeah I actually sent her an article on communication watch how this communication breaks down no no no so you sent me a text message and didn't even tell me anything about what you were sending me because you send me stuff all the time so I had no idea this had to do with this yeah and the article was about communication and I said read this no I didn't say read this I didn't say read it you didn't even tell me to read it you just and so she thinks oh yeah he's trying to get me to like teach at the church and this is supposed to be teach me how to do that better and that's not what it had to do with so yeah we're going to talk about communication while we have absolutely failed at communication so there you go and you you you definitely do not want to turn this off tonight so we're go ahead go ahead james yeah we're going to get started by sort of our audience has heard my testimony my story they've heard John you've you shared your story more than I have probably on this episode on these shows and so we're going to sort of let our wives tell their stories and then we'll sort of tell how we've met and so let's start with Allie and she's been the most talkative so far tonight and so she's just going to sort of tell her story in fundamentalism where she was raised at her background and then when she's done Mary you can take the mic and tell about your story okay okay obviously I'm very nervous where do I start where you were raised okay okay I was raised at a church in Hot Springs, Arkansas Erica Pacey was my pastor am I supposed to name drop? is that okay? absolutely um I grew up there um I was actually reached through the bus ministry as a five-year-old little girl and me and my sister were picked up basically my parents just saw it as a two-hour free babysitting um at first then eventually my parents um we begged them one weekend because it was a promotion Sunday if we got our parents to come to church then we got a big prize so we would literally beg and beg and beg until they eventually said yes that they would come with us and then from there it just escalated my parents started coming very faithfully um my dad started teaching Sunday school leader led our junior church ministry led a bus route we were extremely involved um we eventually started going to the Christian school there that's where I graduated from um I got saved when I was 13 years old um I was a typical buskit if you know what a bus ministry is um I would get saved every week and then I'd get baptized the following week just because I liked um getting up in front of people and getting baptized out the I guess the attention I don't know that's not bad but um eventually as going growing up into the Christian school um I realized that I definitely was not where I needed to be um and Lord definitely led me the right way and I got saved when I was 13 and then I guess after high school that's when I met James actually I met James when I was 16 and then I went through the college graduated from the college and what type of church was gospel growing up in uh was it hard on standards was it hard on legalism in your mind or what was your perception growing up uh as a as a kid um I would say it was very legalistic very um strict um if you didn't really abide by the rules then it outcast um I just remember that there would be um girls that would like leave our school but they would come back and go to basketball games and stuff and I remember like judging them because they wore pants and just seeing them just be like oh my goodness they're so backslidden right now because they're walking through our gym wearing pants and I just I couldn't believe it so you were bought in you were like this is this is the way it's supposed to be well I felt like I really didn't know any different because my parents started going and then they were so into it so I felt like because they were so into it I had to be like I remember the day that my mom literally cut up her pants like I was running around the house in her shredded pants because then she she said the fact of you know I don't want you to stop wearing pants I'm literally a six year old little girl she said I don't want you to stop wearing pants this is just a conviction of mine like that's what I need to do all the ladies of the church you know they only wear skirts so I feel like I need to so we gave up our pants when I was six I didn't wear another pair of pants until I was married hallelujah I enjoyed those times so you said you went from high school you went from the high school to the college let me ask you this did you did you feel like there was there any other option did you did you consider any other colleges I mean what was your attitude or what was the perceived attitude during that time my parents gave me two options they said you can either go to champion or you can go to Hiles Anderson and of course I did not want to go to Hiles that was way too far away I like to be home so I was like well I guess my other option is champion champion and so you met James there and well you actually knew James before there I did and I don't know if we want to get sidetracked on how you felt about James when you first met him but that's a funny story maybe for later she was madly in love with me when she saw me and I was playing hard to get yeah yeah so I don't know if this might come out I'm looking at her in show notes I don't know if this might come out later on as we're talking but okay so you guys got married you went into the ministry and we've heard James's story about you guys leaving Idaho and leaving that ministry in Idaho and then sort of your journey in North Carolina starting going to a Southern Baptist church and then where you guys are at in ministry today so how was it for you sort of leaving the culture of where you were raised educated then going into ministry and then transitioning to where maybe your mind and heart is now I would say like even when I was in high school I would say that I was rebellious spirit because I I didn't I never understood why I couldn't do certain things why I couldn't go to the movies why I couldn't wear a pair of pants why I even I don't know there were a lot of different rules that my parents had it may have just been my parents but I think it was just the way that our church was I wasn't really ever okay I guess I just bucked against the system a lot even with music choices I had to like we would get in trouble even in in our bedrooms if our parents saw that the radio station was like programmed to one station so I I would say that I had to be bought in but I wasn't necessarily myself my heart I guess completely bought in what was your mindset when we left Idaho to come to North Carolina and you did you think we were going to go into another independent fundamental Baptist church when we came back to North Carolina or what was your perception of all that because I've shared before I thought we were leaving for a couple months to find another church another ministry like where we were from what was your thought on that did you even want to go back into ministry after we left Idaho because of how Idaho was I would say that I wasn't ready to completely jump in I know you said after a few months but I was in my heart hoping that it would have been just a little bit longer and I think the two years that we had when we were searching for another church was honestly one of the best things that ever happened to us just because we were able to focus on our family and then while we're searching for another church but I think it gave us that time to just realize or figure out who we really wanted to be what was it like walking into a Southern Baptist church for the first time it was interesting only for the fact that we were raised that King James was the only version and if you read anything else then you weren't right and I was always taught that any other religion than the religion at that church was wrong so for me it was like I almost felt guilty for being there like even for the past couple of months I've been wearing pants on a Sunday morning and I told James I said when I did it I said I actually felt like free in a sense because I've I mean I've had to wear skirts and I dresses and I I've always hated wearing skirts and dresses like I can wear nice clothes and be dressed to the nines like we were taught to be but I don't have to wear a skirt or a dress and sitting on the front pew in pants I felt guilty but yet I felt free so I mean I'm still learning how to even come out I guess of legalism and just even the little things but I would say definitely James has helped me a lot through that yeah well great John any thoughts we're just going to Mary what's your thoughts does Allison want a break yes alright so now we're going to turn over to she used some terms there for freedom baby she found freedom that's what we're here for there you go alright so we're going to turn it over to my wife Mary and the best day in her life was whenever she found the Lord as her savior second best day of her life was whenever she found me so and she's laughing right now okay so I'm going to turn it over to turn the mic over to her and James you can sort of run some questions by her that's probably what we should have started off with Allison to help her give her some direction we figured that out as we go no editing here though that's our motto we don't edit okay well if we're starting back at the beginning I grew up in a church that my grandfather pastored it was a small church mainly made up of family there was not I would not say that they were huge in legalism my husband says that they were no no I was agreeing with you oh I was like okay that's an accurate statement okay so they weren't necessarily big into legalism so the wearing skirts all the time and not being able to go to the movie theaters that was all introduced to me later on in life I became a believer when I was nine gave my life to the Lord but through some circumstances with my family my parents ended up pulling me from the public school system and putting me into a Christian school and I would say there is where legalism was very heavy and introduced to me now I was very much a rural follower so when I was presented with all the rules that the school presented I very much wanted to fit in so I had no problem wearing the skirts and following all the rules that they had there with not going to the movie theaters and just a list that pretty much went on so there you found comfort this is what we sort of always said you sort of found a comfort or a safety in the is our sound off no it was just funny because you're like was that did it make a really loud noise that's what it sounded like we could have so much editing to do so what you're saying is that you found sort of a safety and security sort of in the regiment of rules or just this is what you're supposed to do do it oh yes very much so I like to know where my lines are and so being part of that school and that system I loved the rules I knew what I could do and could not do and I guess I felt like safety in that as long as I followed those rules then I was doing what the Lord wanted me to do go to the part where you went to visit Bible colleges and you saw this really awesome guy at this college in Arkansas and you said that's the one I gotta go to oh okay was that at West Coast John what college was that again yeah no I'm confused yeah so our friends introduced us at Bible College and I had a class with him and I didn't even know it until don't tell that part don't talk about that okay okay the only part she knows John there's a lot of parts show notes John show notes well these are the show notes James and I work off of it's like bullet point is like five things it's like we just we just spitball it they're like this is nothing this is nothing to go by okay so you go to Champion we meet there and well John let me ask Mary this what was your thought of going from Murfreesboro did you mention where you were at the school you went to or no I didn't mention okay okay we're fine did you going from there to Champion was there a difference in mentality was there a difference in rule structure or was it pretty much what you were used to pretty much what I was used to okay yeah so there was comfort in knowing what you could already do and couldn't do right yeah so I went from the rules not changing at all they might have been amplified a little bit you know with certain like culotte standards you know I didn't have to wear culottes before until I went there and I was like oh culottes what are these I have to have these made you know I had that problem too it was tough wearing hose you know to classes that was a whew man that one don't get me started on that one you guys had to put water hoses around you to go to class okay being a college student and having to buy hosiery hosiery with and they had runs like all the time so you were constantly going to Walmart spending like five six dollars on hosiery was like insane I think we need to define terms can you explain what a run and a hose is I'm just joking I'm joking okay so I think that so we meet and we go into ministry we went to we actually went to a southern Baptist church first spent a year there and then we went back to an independent fundamental Baptist church and spent three years there so I think you heard we didn't get into details with James and Ellie's story but from there you sort of heard the way to do it so I guess what I wanted to go maybe transition a little bit here is to talk about like what are some helps that you can do as far as like let's say you're leaving legalism you're at one place but your spouse is in another you may have had your eyes opened the disillusionment has come off and now you're ready to be out of this you see it as mess you're you're like you're done you are done but your spouse is like we're we're we're we're leaving the faith you know they're in a totally maybe not that far maybe so but they're in a totally one of the goals that I had for this and I don't know if we're going to accomplish it but one of my goals is to help you sort of help couples in this type of situation get on the same page if we go to James and Allie's story you get to hear how it's properly done you come to mine and Mary's story you hear how it's not properly done because we had a rough I don't want to paint the picture that we had like a terrible marriage but we had a little bit of a rocky path growing together over the past eight years because I was growing by leaps and bounds reading studying listening the job I had I could listen to messages and teaching all the time and Mary's at home raising kids and didn't have that so I'd come home and say this and we get into arguments I don't know James were you and Allie's experience a little different well so what's different about mine and Allie's story and Allie sort of said this beforehand and I'll just let her say it what was what was the reason why it was so easy for you to transition away from the legalism side of it and and okay with some of the things that I was going through tell me what I said again James you said that you weren't fully bought into the system so when I started coming out of it it just made sense to you like okay we can listen to different music we can wear pants we can do these things yes I think it was like I said you reminded of me I said with like I said gosh I'm nervous I guess sorry John it's okay yeah I wasn't fully bought into it so my heart I guess was already in the motion of kind of waiting until really James was like kind of gave me the green light in a sense and just feeling something in my heart but I didn't want to just completely blow up everything that we had spent the past lifetime in 20 something years so well and one of the things even out of that that we went through was and if you listen back I don't know what episode it was John maybe you know off the top of your head we were live at Bourbon Missouri it was 45 episode 45 I don't have no idea I just threw that out there okay I'm going with it I trust you brother and when we talked about pillow talk and I sort of had that same time where I was working at Chick-fil-A and now that my wife's on here she can define your terms yes we you know I was working at Chick-fil-A so there'd be times where I'd get off at noon or one o'clock and I would do what John said I was listening to debates and I was reading books and so she would come home the kids would go to bed and we would discuss everything that I just learned and a lot of that helped me because it was just someone that I could talk to she didn't say a lot she didn't you know push me in one direction or another she didn't say I was a heretic she just listened to where the difference for me was when she would tell me things I would want to fix it if she would say well why are we doing this well I would just jump into let's fix this problem where she helped me by just observing listening and guided me along the way so she was a lot better at that than I am in those pillow talk moments I will say this okay that's what I meant by James and Allison we're sort of practicing it the right way I'm pretty sure I called you a heretic several times well let's just confess today on the episode this is episode 66 confession time with the for freedom podcast let's go back to when you said I don't want to talk on the podcast I'm just joking all right yeah I didn't I did not do you told me we had to go to just one instead I was trying to do two okay so I did not practice that well and so this is where we want to get to like one of the keys if you're in this sort of situation one's growing or one's moving and the other one is at a different pace communication is one of the biggest things that's going to help you during this time to get back on the same page I was not communicating so I would come home I would be like growing I would I read like two books and listen to like you know 35 40 hours on the King James only issue and never talked to Mary about it and so then I'd come home and I'd talk about like make some statement about how this person said this about the King James can you believe how stupid they are and Mary's just like you cannot talk about this around my family like that you know I can it makes me nervous and I'm like I did not and even at that I didn't handle it well I'm like Mary I was I was forgetting I'm here I've left her way behind here she's not taking in all of these things because I haven't communicated yeah well Mary what how what was your feelings like when John was coming home and sharing these revelations that he was having or information overload that he was having what was your in your mind how were you feeling during that time I really I know you said you called him a heretic but no I really remember having thoughts of here we are we've just left an IFB church we're here in Tennessee and I kept thinking is this midlife crisis is he is he like literally like he is searching this is new information for me I summed it up like I really had thought okay here my husband is struggling from what we came out of in an IFB church he is struggling and now he is maybe I mean confused or he is searching he doesn't even know what we believe anymore like where were you at and so as a wife I felt like oh well I need to stand strong in what I believe this is what I've been taught my whole life I need to be an encouragement to him because I felt like he was going astray a little bit yeah there's another thing that I did again that was that didn't go well was I would I would find like I would be like okay we're gonna do a Bible study together at home we'll put the kids to bed at like 830 and then I'll just put on this video of this teaching of like somebody from Ligonier or some YouTube video from somebody from MacArthur's place and we're gonna talk about theology tonight and I wouldn't tell her I was gonna do this I would just like the kids are bad I said let's watch this tonight and she was just like are you serious right now I have dealt with the kids all day long and you're gonna try to get me to think about theology at the present moment and then I again and I wouldn't handle it well I would get a little put off and then you know it would just it was I did not I did not bring her along well so this is where we're gonna talk about would you agree with that would you agree with that yeah I do agree with that and to and to the point where he started trying to get me involved so much that he would listen to stuff all the time when we were in the car to where I would get frustrated where I didn't want to hear or even listen to what he was putting on and I would just totally block it out and he'd ask me a question I'd be like I don't know I wasn't listening I wasn't paying attention to this John will get frustrated well I want to ask Ali that same question because I think just getting our wife's perspective on where they were at when because I think me and John both came out of fundamentalism probably before our wives in certain areas there were certain areas where my wife was never bought into the whole skirts and dresses and music those things she wasn't bought into but she said you were you wore the skirts well someone had to John we had all of them in the closet I wasn't going to waste but when we get to the thought of the like the King James side of it you know I came out of that after studying and looking through that so Allison I want to ask you that same question what was your thoughts when I was going through that same process did you think like Mary that I was a heretic and that I was going to hell and that I was in a midlife crisis or or what was your thoughts when we were going through that to me I was very curious to see what else was out there just because I had been told pretty much my entire life this is the way it is without reason I had so many rules that I was never told why those are the rules yes I'd said in Bible class after Bible class chapel after chapel but it was more of just this is what you do not this is why you do it and I think when you started coming home and just saying all this I was very curious it did take me a while to use a different version just because the King James was what I was used to well the first time I think I picked up a different version and actually read it for myself it was almost like the Bible had actually come alive to me like I could actually really understand it and I think what also truly helped me to not just James but even the different schools that I taught at and just seeing the different perspectives there I taught at an independent fundamental school right when we moved here from Idaho and they had even had different views than what gospel I had and so I think little by little people and then coming home and James saying stuff and it just made me more curious to want to hear what was out there. Yeah. Fun fact about that school that she taught at when we came back that was John's hometown school that he went to. I've preached chapel there a couple times. John have you gotten to preach chapel there at all? Shut up James. His picture is on the wall for the state champion the only team that ever wins state champion there but he's never gotten to speak chapel there. I've never even been invited. Yeah. And it's not going to happen now. Use your name. I want to come back to also and say this too. One of the issues one of the things I grew a lot the church we got plugged into once we came here to Manchester the pastor and I don't know if I've said this many times on the podcast but the pastor really God used him in my life to help me as well grow and him mentoring me and bringing me along and challenging me. Mary it was a it's a small church. It still is a small church and at the time it was a small church that really didn't have much young families there. So Mary was it in like she was taking care of kids or in the nursery or teaching a kids class. I mean you probably weren't in the service and this is again this is not ideal. Don't don't act like I'm make I'm just saying this is the situation we were in you know seven years ago. You probably were hearing preaching from the pulpit about like 10 to 15 percent of the time. I mean for 90 you know 80 percent of the 80 85 percent of the time you were not in there. No I was busy serving. Right. I was busy serving in the church but not hearing the word of God preached like I should because I was serving. Yeah and so that was also something that we were not doing well and it was working against us. So before we go into like the four rules four keys of communication I do want to say this that one aspect you say you may be listening and say okay so you guys we're tracking with you guys we're either tracking with James and Allison or we're tracking with John and Mary. One of the things that I would say to you is you need to get plugged into a church where you can hear the Bible being preached and explained from the pulpit on a regular basis. You need a good church a healthy church to do that. So let's go to the next thing. Go ahead James. I think I think one thing to add to all that John as well is one thing that Scott said in our last episode that I wasn't able to be on that was a fantastic episode. If you didn't listen to it I just finished it. Go back and listen to it. It's so good so helpful so much truth was given in there but one thing he said was there's not a specific step method in discipling dealing with people helping people just like leaving legalism there's not a specific step or a way to go through this. You're not going to go through exactly the way me and Ali did or the way John and Mary did. Your way may be completely different to where maybe the wife is more leaving legalism and the husband's trying to catch up and the wife's role is helping that husband through some of these communication areas and so don't think man I'm not like either one of them. That's fine. There's not a specific way to leave legalism. It's simply having the right tools in your belt to be able to help each other go through this process. Yeah. So we wanted to give you some things here that have sort of just these are what we use in biblical counseling as the what happened? Did I miss something? I kicked the mic. Sorry. Sorry. The four keys to communication. Keep your mic steady. Number one. No. The first one is be honest and so I tagged onto the side of this be honest but not unloving and if you're like me or let me say this like I was then you may say yep I'm going to be the honest person in a relationship. I don't care if it hurts you. I'm telling you the truth but I think the thing is that we need to understand is that we can we can deliver the truth in a way that will turn our spouse off completely. It may be the truth but they're not going to listen. But we can also deliver that same truth in a way that may get them to think about it if that makes any sense. I don't know James, Allie, Mary what do you guys think? I would say one thing that really got me during all of this is that you would you would give me you would always ask me Mary show me where what the Bible says show me from the Bible and that was something that consistently came up all the time when I would ask him. Sorry. You're distracting me. I distracted her. Yes. See. I was thinking. Sorry. I was thinking John. You did number one. I'll do number two. Allie can do number three. And Mary could do number four. On the list of number four there's four of us. We can sort of introduce it and talk through it. Sorry. My mind was. I'm thinking. There you go everybody. That's how we figure things out on the fly. What is our motto? We don't edit. We don't edit. All right. Mary do you remember where you were? Sorry. That was my fault. I was just a bit ball in there. I guess backing up to that you would always ask me Mary show me from the Bible. Give me a Bible for that you know and it would always I would get a little frustrated be like but it says it in there and then I'd go to find it and it's guess what it wasn't in there. And so I think a lot of the time we just I would he would just lovingly say hey you know Mary can you just show me from the Bible where it says you know you have to wear a skirt or that you should have long hair or that you know whatever it may be that that the legalism that that I was in and believed to be truth as Bible he would say show me in the Bible where that's at and I couldn't do it. So it really started turning around my way of thinking to where why am I doing what I'm doing is it because it's some it's man-made and that's what I was taught was right or is that what the Bible says. So yeah this is also on this note before I send it over to James the last James brought up the last episode and the last episode Scott made a point the right truth at the wrong time is the wrong truth and man have I not experienced that so much in my marriage and John I literally just told Allison that statement when I got home. Yeah because it's so appropriate like you could come home and you may be having a conversation about let's say you're having a conversation about your wife's in-laws right or your husband's in-laws and it well I mean this practical right I mean most issues either are money or in-laws in a marriage and money or the honey. Okay so you may be sitting there and saying like you know they may be very upset about the situation and you may throw the truth out there it may be true but at the time and the the emotion of the moment they're not going to receive it and so therefore it may actually cause a wedge in between you because the way the truth and the time the truth was delivered it was not a time where it would be received but yet at another time where emotions have calmed down and time has gone away from the situation then yeah the truth is going to make a whole lot of sense to them in that moment and man if I knew that 10 years ago my we could probably be a whole lot more you know closer to Christ closer to each other state than where we are now. Yeah and that's that's so true in a lot of ways let's go to number two for sake of time John number two here on communication is be current communicate regularly when you are in a time where you're going through this I know I've said this before and I know I've alluded to it that time for us was pillow talk when we all the kids were in bed and we had time to talk through an episode as we're watching something and there was a lot of pausing going on and we would talk and then we would unpause and then we would talk again and it wasn't always in the bed pillow talk but it was times where we're walking through life together. A lot of pausing. Yes a lot of pausing and so Allison what do you how how would you say that we communicate and even still now today do we how do you well do you think we communicate be honest that's what John just said be honest. Pastor John said that. Well we are both professional talkers I'm a school teacher you're a pastor so I mean what we do day in and day out is talks I think it's for us it it's easier to communicate we are both very inquisitive people you have questions I have questions you like to see what I'm thinking because I'm I'm not a person to just share all of my feelings all the time you may see my feelings but I don't necessarily share them and I say I would say that we do communicate pretty well. Well I'll say this I think that I think it's real easy because life can be so busy not to actually and when we're talking about talk and communicate we're not talking about like hey would what happened today or you know whatever it's it's real easy to just get into the routine of the busyness of life and never actually sit down and have a conversation with your spouse. So if like four or five days have gone by and you haven't had at least a 30 minute conversation when I'm doing marriage counseling one of the things that I always do when I'm doing marriage counseling is in a homework assignment when we give assignments at the end is at least I'm putting something in there where I want you to talk for at least 30 minutes about what you're being going over maybe this session or something because if you've gone four or five days and you haven't had a 30 minute conversation with each other uninterrupted undistracted about just life or concepts or ideas you're not communicating regularly and it's real easy for as long as the more longer and longer that goes by for more and more time to go by that that space to get wider and wider and wider. Yeah, I completely agree. Mary, what's your thoughts on that? Yes, I totally agree with that. With us having four children, I had found when we were going through the season of life where we were transitioning out of legalism that we had to intentionally make time to do that because when you have small children, I mean there were several times we tried to have conversations but it was just it would be mommy, mommy, mommy or daddy this or and it was it would it would get frustrating so we made a point to designate a time when we put the kids to bed. Okay, well let's sit down and let's talk about this or getting a babysitter and let's go out to dinner and have time where we can talk about these things so that we're not growing apart but we are growing together through this. And sometimes like I come if I if it what my schedule changed to where I was coming in like for a couple days a week at like four instead of seven and so when she'd start cooking supper a lot of times I would be I would just hang out in the kitchen we'd talk and so she's sitting there doing kitchen and sometimes that's not ideal because there is distractions there but we have found a lot of times like around the kitchen we just we just sit there and we'd talk about the day about the situations you know we're we're like you guys were in ministry so a lot of times we're talking about and what's going on in the lives of church members and getting on the same page with those things there's people telling her situations that she has to inform me on there's people telling me about situations that I got to inform her on and so you know just things like that finding those times and you know at the get-go if you're not doing that it may be important to where you say all right this night of the week like I would make my list I would plan out my week at my planner and like Friday nights I'd write down family worship quality time with Mary like I would write it down until it became a habit that that's what we were doing we spent a lot of time on that one I think the next one Allie are you good to go are you busy with with Jay Hudson Taylor our honor our honorary co-host here with us Mr. Hudson and so he just woke up from his nap I don't know if he this is not the first time Hudson has been on the podcast he is he is our honorary co-host yeah so Allie go ahead and give us the third one here if you can talk to that third one is attack the problem not the person and if you want me to do this okay so I would say definitely with this one if you're having a problem where it is there may be an issue where I may not be on the same page and whereas like John and Mary were saying like you were saying where is that found in scripture and I feel like in the sense like where we can at times where we know that I don't keep doubling my words what am I supposed to say oh you're good she's a little distracted she is a little distracted with Hudson Hudson's like he's like what are these new toys you got for me mommy so basically what she's saying is when you're going through these things you want to attack truth you want to give truth and not necessarily attack the person and that is so hard for us to do because a lot of times we will and I teach this in marriage counseling as well never bring the pastor into your marriage count your marriage sessions if you're arguing because the pastor's not better defend himself and so often we can attack a person because they're going through this instead of simply just saying hey this is truth this is what I'm going through with the problem and not necessarily attacking the actual person themselves and so it's very difficult for us to do that John what's your thoughts on that well attack the problem and not the person is sort of I like to explain it this way you know when you're in the middle of a of a argument or conflict it's real easy because because you're married and you know each other so well to start judging the motives of what the other person is saying based on what you know about them so for instance like if you're saying there's there's an argument about something that happened and this situation is going on or or let's say you may come up with a biblical situation and and you say I'm where you're talking about this and you say I don't agree with this anymore it would be real easy for a spouse to then say well the only thing the reason you don't like that is because you don't like my family and my family believes that no no what are you doing you're attacking the person now you're attacking motivations from that person and not the situation instead what would be a better route to go a better route to go would be like okay I don't see what you're saying explain to me why you think this is the wrong direction give me proof give me evidence give me Bible on why this is wrong instead of going straight to the motives and tearing the person down because you think the reason they're doing this now I was someone who would be really quick to do this and I would put Mary in this situation because Mary would would would would she would defend and she would say this and I said and I would be real quick to say well the only reason you're doing this because you're scared to death what your family's gonna think of you what am I doing in that moment I'm attacking her as a person and not staying on task of the problem and this is another aspect of this this argument too is that when you get into a conflict or argument and you veer off of this one right here manipulation becomes very very easy gaslighting becomes very very easy because now you're going after your the person and who when you're talking about the marriage relationship who is that person that you end up attacking it's supposed to be your best friend it's supposed to be your teammate it's supposed to be the one that you're in it with together for life and what are you doing you're going after them and so that is very key don't attack the problem or don't attack the person attack the problem Mary do you have any corrections that I think need to be made on that one or are we good to go on the next one okay all right so this brings us to number four and Mary wanted me to handle it it was act and don't react act and don't react and so when we talk about this we're basically meaning that emotions can get high especially with spouse arguments right because you know we're we can get hot with each other we can get real quick to really come with comebacks and talk about things so it is better to prefer your spouse and if you don't have a planned response take a breather to let the emotions simmer down instead of reacting which is the emotional spot response right there the words now can I say this James and Allison and Mary and I are not set going through all these things with you because we have them down perfectly these are these are things that we have not attained and and have perfection in this these are things still in areas where we can find ourselves struggling but there are things to keep us back on track that whenever we find ourselves going into this type of situation or this type of argument step back after the fact and say you know what I did this I need to make it right I may have been right on the point but I handled it wrongly yeah and just to give a practical illustration for us in this situation we were in our first year of marriage in Idaho and we had our little two-bedroom apartment and we had an argument we had some I don't even remember what argument was Allie Mae because she's a great much better memory than I have and the argument happened and I wanted to hug it out like I wanted to let's let's embrace let's figure out what's going on let's figure out why you're upset and she just wanted to get as far away from me as she could so she went into the bedroom shut the door lock the door and wouldn't let me come in and she said I just need time to process this well I was wanting to act upon this problem I want to fix it where she just needed time to process so I stood at the door like a immature 22 year old and beat on the door Allison Allison Allison and she's going crazy because she's just trying to process what's going on and so I learned very quickly how to deal with problems even in my marriage of acting and reacting in situations any comment there Allie I think that after that story we just need to stop and have a counseling session with James and Allison Allison Let's go Joking all right did you have anything you wanted to add there okay I okay so this is the last point we're going to cover that was the four keys of communication and I do think that Mary may have some things to say on this one because this is one that I think is also very very helpful and key as you're growing together and helping spouses get on the same page and that is develop friendships outside of the legalism bubble and what I'm talking about there is if one spouse is struggling develop friendships with people who you know love Jesus and love God but don't really have an understanding of legalism that'll really listen that that I think that Mary has told me before that really really helped her just move past some of the things that her conscience was just like scaring her to death over you have something to add about that no I totally agree as we were going through this a couple started going to church with us and I had said something about a version of the Bible or something like that or or had mentioned KJV only ism and she was like what like she had no idea you know or concept of people only believed in the KJV like she she didn't have any knowledge of that legalism or there were other aspects that I had brought up to her and she was like it was totally foreign to her because she was not raised in a very legalistic church and so she helped and she encouraged me along the way that okay so what my husband has been telling me and leading me through and the journey we had we were on okay there was other people and in other words John's not crazy not crazy John's not a heretic there's valid there's truth in this and I need to get rid of self and okay let me open my eyes and see okay what does the Bible say what is you know am I submitting to my husband am I having an open open mind about what he is saying because as a leader in our family and so I think that was a big turning point for me in our relationship well said you know well and I think even with talking about this and because Ally's rocking Hudson to sleep right now I'll answer for her because we've talked about it she it was easy for her to make friends in Idaho and it was easy for her to make friends in Rockwell because I wasn't on staff there but in the church structure we're in right now and making friends outside of that church structure and even inside the church structure because of the role we have at the church and the way the church is it is very difficult for her to make friends outside of just our little bubble to where I mean I can make friends with my my wonderful for freedom mug here that I got off of T public I could I could be friends with that all day long because I'm a I can make a friend with anything and so in her personality and because of the past and the hurt that we've been through she's less reluctant more reluctant to make friends outside because of the pain and the hurt that she's been through and so that's part of even leaving legalism that we still struggle with because building that friend group building that the that support community outside of just who we're in is very hard I was reading some some stuff out of dangerous calling today and Paul Tripp said that he he was at a church where they had just a pastor's wife small group where they were able to get together talk through things and flesh out a lot of things that were going on in their ministry and in their own personal life where they knew that it was confidential in that group and he encouraged wives to have that I told Ali about that when I got home because how often do we sometimes get stuck in our our own lane and our own attitude of what we're doing and we don't have those friends outside you know she tells me often you've got John and a couple other guys that you call and you talk to I just wish that sometimes I had those people I could have to talk to so I could talk through some of these things I'm going through so having those people outside are definitely a help you're not on an island you're not by yourself people are going through the same thing you're going through and there's people out there to help us yeah let me say this too at this point I weren't what we're I always say this at church when I'm preaching don't hear what we're not saying and what I mean by that in this case is we are not saying that you should disconnect or separate from friends that you have that are within those IFB circles by no means we're we are not saying that at all and quite honestly many of you have probably already gotten to the point where you're like no we don't you know you've been because maybe you've changed or you've gone this direction that people have you know left you but if you still have friends that I'll tell you what I still have friends very very close friends that are in that in those circles and those friendships have been tested but I can say genuinely we may disagree on some of those things that matter but my goodness if if if something crazy is happening you know they're one of the first people that I would call because through it all they're still my friend and what I'm trying to say there is they refuse to leave me as a friend because they valued my friendship as well as I valued theirs and I guess what I'm trying to say is if they are truly a good friend they won't abandon you during this time and so we don't want you to hear what we're saying and then think that you shouldn't be friends with no no no you keep those friendships but having friends in your life especially for the spouse that is that is struggling with the with the changes with the with the growth with the with the new direction maybe having friends that love Jesus but have not been in legalism is a huge thing of of just opening their minds to a world that they didn't realize existed or even could fathom existed and so I guess that's the that's the point we're trying to get at that was all we really had I think it's it's we've covered a lot we've had some fun yeah we did we covered I thought it was really good and we're definitely gonna have them back on for part two of something something we don't know what the topic is yet but we're gonna have them back on yeah in fact maybe the listeners can help us with that topic what would be something that we could we could do and the wives would Mary you're down for that right of course Allie's back there she's holding Hudson but she's I can tell she's saying yes emphatically shaking her head yes she wants to do it so we are all in the safer it's all in this is going on YouTube yes it has to our wives are like heck to the now yeah all right John it's been real and it's been fun but I think it's time for us to hit the bed because it's getting at 10 oh I forgot it said you guys are an hour yeah and you got school tomorrow all right so but uh how are we gonna close this thing down um well Allie's off to Mike she seems a little busy she can jump in okay all right Mary go ahead with the Mary's gonna give the sign off then Allie will give James his tag until next time to God not the pastor be the glory yes she was like what is it what do y'all say because she doesn't listen to our podcast oh I love it I love it love it all right guys bye hey uh all right Al you putting him to bed thanks for 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