Latest / Millennial Mustard Seed / S5 130. Carly Tebbs Micro message – Prune the Vine

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S5 130. Carly Tebbs Micro message – Prune the Vine · Millennial Mustard Seed

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  The so Prince and I went on a 30 day
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  fast over the month of March, which is our anniversary month
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  at the end, on the 30th, 12th year.
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  Woop woop. And my understanding of the fast
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  was that we were fasting for the foundation of our marriage.
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  If you go back and listen to part four of my interview with
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  Rod, you'll hear more of my testimony around my marriage.
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  And it was a really difficult fast, not just digestively, if
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  you will, because I was doing only juice, tea and coffee, no
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  eating at all for 30 days. I didn't chew anything but
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  Communion and Prince on the other hand, was was had
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  incorporated nuts. But that's besides the point.
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  It it as we were going through the fast every night we would
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  have these conflicts. And now 12 years into the
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  marriage we have decided upon the truth that God is always
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  dealing with our hearts in conflict.
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  In the beginning of marriage we often saw conflict as God.
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  If you would just fix my spouse, everything would be great.
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  But as we matured and after our our marriage nearly fell apart,
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  it became rather clear that no matter how much I pointed my
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  finger at my husband as the source of my issues, God's
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  response to me was consistently Carly, let's look at your heart.
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  And the Bible does say the issues of life flow from the
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  heart. At the end of this life, it's
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  you and him. It's me and him.
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  It's not me and Prince and Jesus, right?
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  And so as we journeyed through this and we kept having to work
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  on these serious and unresolved conflicts in our marriage, we
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  became abundantly aware that we had bitterness and resentment in
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  our heart towards one another individually.
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  And we went into this time of lamenting and mourning.
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  Prince said, four or five days we are going to read the book of
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  Lamentations. And the objective is to lament
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  the state of our hearts towards one another.
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  And that rang really true because because of what we'd
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  been through in the last four years, which was like I said,
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  really God being like, stop telling me to fix your spouse
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  and let's look at your heart, right?
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  So we went into this time of mourning and one of the pivotal
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  moments for me was God let me know that I had an idol in my
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  heart. I have a teacher named Todd
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  Edwards who teaches the Bible studies out of Bride Ministries
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  and he had said a few weeks ago that defensiveness and offence
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  are the fruit of us protecting wrong identity and protecting
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  idols. So when you are offended by
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  something, if you become defensive over something, that's
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  the fruit of an idol, that's the fruit of a wrong identity.
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  And I lived that out because what God pointed out to me one
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  morning is he said, Carly, you continually indict me on charges
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  of not being good because your idol in your heart says, until
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  my marriage is perfect, God's goodness is called into
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  question. His intent for my marriage is
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  questionable. And that was a really hard thing
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  to deal with because while he's right, he was right.
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  That's exactly what was happening.
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  And I ended up just telling the Lord I was even questioning my
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  theology as I was saying this to him.
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  But in in the throes of lamenting, I, I just let it rip.
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  But I had said to him, Lord, I don't, I don't want to be
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  married to Prince anymore. You be married to Prince through
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  me. Let this be your marriage to
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  Prince, because when I'm, when I'm the one married to Prince,
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  I'm so selfish. I'm, I'm selfish.
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  It's, you know, I, I expect too much.
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  I, I, I expect him to always meet my needs.
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  And it's just unrealistic. As as much as he may want to do
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  that, it's unrealistic really to expect that our spouse is going
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  to always show up perfect for us, be in the perfect mood,
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  respond to the secret things in our mind, intuit our our
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  expectations. Just it's not realistic, you
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  know, And by the end of of the fast, we came to a a little
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  cottage in Wisconsin and we were just hanging out.
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  You know, we're going to break our fast at midnight.
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  I was so excited to choose something Boy ended up having a
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  really important heart to heart where we were able to talk
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  through some of the things we'd we'd wanted to say to each other
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  over the years, but never really did.
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  And I've talked in the past about the importance of
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  vulnerability and the the depth of the truth of the value of
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  being willing to be vulnerable. Is it hit me in a new way
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  because when we withhold ourselves from our spouses now
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  I'm not talking about the kind of relationships that are
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  clearly abusive. That's, you know, I'm talking
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  about just standard dysfunction. When we withhold ourselves from
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  our spouses, when we we we don't share our inner thoughts and
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  feelings. When we we manipulate situations
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  instead of being forthright about what we're seeing and what
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  we're experiencing. When we when we take it upon
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  ourselves to put up a wall so that we don't have to be seen or
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  heard or understood and we don't have to really see, hear or
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  understand our spouse. We are actually becoming a
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  stumbling block for their walk with Christ because he said two
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  become one. Now it doesn't mean that I no
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  longer have my own mind. It just means that me as a
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  person, I benefit his walk with the Lord.
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  And if I withhold myself from him emotionally, mentally,
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  spiritually, physically, I am inhibiting his walk with the
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  Lord because who I am benefits who he is because Christ in me,
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  right? It's Christ in me.
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  And so I just want to encourage, I just want to encourage you
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  that that self reflecting with the Lord and in the areas of our
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  heart that are hard to look at is a is very fruitful.
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  It is good. It's good for your marriage,
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  it's good for your family, it's good for you, it's good for your
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  walk with the Lord. It's not easy because when we
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  deal with idols, it's not a quick process.
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  There's a lot of grief that comes out when we realize we've
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  put something above the King of glory in our hearts.
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  But he reveals to redeem. He chastens those he loves.
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  He's a good father. He prunes the vine, and it's
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  necessary the.