Do This to Keep Romance Alive - 208

What’s the secret to keeping love alive in a long-term relationship? In Do This to Keep Romance Alive, we dive into actionable tips and proven strategies that couples can use to strengthen their emotional connection and reignite the spark. Whether you’re in a new relationship or have been married for years, romance plays a vital role in fostering intimacy, trust, and lasting love.

Discover the transformative power of small, daily acts of romance—like sending a heartfelt text, giving a meaningful compliment, or sharing a loving touch. Learn how prioritizing thoughtful gestures can help couples maintain passion, build emotional security, and prevent complacency from setting in.

Break free from societal norms that say love fades over time. This video will challenge misconceptions about modern relationships and inspire you to take proactive steps toward creating a fulfilling partnership.

If you’re ready to overcome the challenges of maintaining romance in today’s world of high divorce rates and widespread dissatisfaction, watch now. Perfect for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of love, communication, and the power of intentional connection in a marriage or partnership.

Visit our website at www.connectingthegap.net for everything about our ministry. We pray you have a Happy New Year from Connecting the Gap!

Chapters

• 0:00 Prioritizing Romance in Marriage
• 9:08 Nurturing Romance Through Small Gestures
• 17:18 Maintaining Passion in Relationships
• 21:41 Reviving Marriage Through Love and Prioritization
• 31:07 Rekindling Love Through Communication and Effort
• 39:21 The Importance of Romantic Love
• 46:28 Weekly Podcast Sign-Off and Thank You

Transcript

Michelle Moore: 0:00

Mine was truly losing sight of God. My first love, my first true love. I mean there was multiple things that I put in front of Him and lost sight of just the relationship with Him and going through motions and putting you above and then, when you hurt me, I just let it all go downhill from there. And if I would have kept my first love there, I would have went to him first of all.

Daniel Moore: 0:28

Yeah, and you've hit it on the head with that because we know that if we keep our relationship with God where it needs to be, there's a trickle down effect.

Aria: 0:37

Yep.

Daniel Moore: 0:37

So when you take that part out of the equation, then Satan has an open door to work on that next first love, which is that relationship between the husband and the wife. This week, on Connecting the Gap, we continue our study on the four laws of love as we begin wrapping up the law of priority. This week we're talking about the law of prioritized romance. We'll be getting back into that right after this. Welcome to Connecting the Gap. I'm Daniel Moore, your host. I have my wife, michelle, sitting here with me this week as we're bringing you another episode here of the podcast, our marriage series, the Four Laws of Love. Thank you, guys, for joining us this week. If you're not familiar with our show, check out our website, wwwconnectingthegapnet, for all of our platforms. Our YouTube and Rumble links are there as well. We're also on the Christian podcasting app, edify. You can also visit us on social at facebookcom, forward slash ctgaponline.

Daniel Moore: 2:09

If you're a fan of our show, please subscribe. Feel free to leave a comment on our platforms. Give us a thumbs up or a five-star review on Apple Podcast. We'd be eternally grateful to you for doing that. We really want to stress doing the five-star reviews and giving us some interaction on our podcast each week, as that is what really helps this podcast to grow. We have a lot of listeners out there that aren't subscribed, so if you guys would just take the time to subscribe if you actually listen each week, the benefit to that is you get notified every time a new episode lands and then you can check those out as we release them each and every week. Well, we hope you guys had a Merry Christmas yesterday. It's hard to believe that we're already through another Christmas.

Michelle Moore: 2:52

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 2:53

And 2024 is almost over Just another week here and we're going to be starting 2025. Then we all got to get used to writing that year all over again, because I know for about the first month it seems like every year I'm constantly writing the wrong year on everything that I write it on. But we do hope you guys had an awesome Christmas. Of course, new Year's is right around the corner and we pray that you have a good New Year's because you'll actually be passing that milestone before you hear our next episode, and so we just wanted to give you a shout out on that here this week as we get started again. As I said here earlier, we're continuing our series this week on the Four Laws of Love, and this week we're going to be wrapping up the Law of Priority. We're going to be talking about prioritized romance here on Connecting the Gap, on connecting the gap.

Daniel Moore: 3:49

The Hallmark and Lifetime networks are known for their holiday movies. Every year they bring in impressive television ratings, perhaps aided by how easy they are to leave on while, say, baking some cookies. They also have something of a reputation for following a very specific storyline. For example, a recently dumped high-powered female executive from the city finds new love, purpose and appreciation for Christmas in a small town with the help of a handsome local fellow. So just how formulaic are these movies? Well, the New York Times analyzed all of them, available up to January 2024. The analysis asked do they all have a happy ending? The article concluded do you even have to ask?

Daniel Moore: 4:35

In many endings, the woman does leave her job and the city in favor of the town and her new man. But there were a couple of twists within the standard happy endings. For instance and there's some spoilers ahead here in Jingle Bell Bride in 2020, a New York City wedding planner in search of a rare flower meets a handsome botanist in rural Alaska, but he's the one who ends up following her back to the big city. And in A Glenbrook Christmas in 2020, a woman taking over her family's Los Angeles-based real estate company does decide to move to a small town to be with a fire chief, but she will still operate as CEO remotely.

Daniel Moore: 5:15

One Hallmark executive said we always say that whatever our woman's path is that a relationship is icing on the cake. If she's career-driven or there's some goal that she has, that's what she's going for. Well, we know that in life in general, in marriage in particular, happy endings are almost never this easy or that simple. There is usually suffering and disappointment, but the Lord can cause us to grow throughout all of these trials. But the Lord can cause us to grow throughout all of these trials. So, as we begin this week's episode, we're going to be talking about romance, and when I saw that for an opener, I knew my wife would appreciate that, because me and hers had many a conversation about Lifetime and Hallmark movies.

Michelle Moore: 5:59

Actually, when he started reading this, I started laughing. I'm like no wonder he didn't let me read these. He's reading them because he knows how I feel about them. Yeah, although you don't watch as many as you used to. I have not had much time to watch hardly any. I think I've gotten three down and that's it this year.

Daniel Moore: 6:15

Yeah, but in all honesty as—.

Michelle Moore: 6:19

Well, every time I go to watch one between you and Jacob Mom, you already know the ending of it. Why do you even waste your two hours? Yeah, and then you'll come in there and chime about the same thing and it's like it's so happy, it's so sweet.

Daniel Moore: 6:34

Well, I was getting ready to say, as cheesy as they are, it is kind of nice just to sit down and just, I guess, watch a happy movie, you know with a happy ending, and you know watch those relationships blossom and bloom and they live happily ever after. That's right, I think that's every person's dream and Hallmark nails it. I guess whenever they put their movies out every year, they've got that down to an art. That is for sure.

Michelle Moore: 6:59

You guys wouldn't have seen it, but I was like tsk, tsk.

Daniel Moore: 7:09

Guys like I looked at him and as soon as he started talking about it I was like I'll remember this one. I wasn't looking at her so I didn't have to see her pointing her finger at me. But as we know, when you watch a Hallmark movie, most generally our marriages aren't really like that.

Michelle Moore: 7:19

No.

Daniel Moore: 7:19

And our lives aren't really like that. Even how we fall in love a lot of times isn't really like that, because not all of us can go to ski resorts and everything you know these little ski towns and whatever that they seem to put in a lot of those movies. But we do have romance in our own way and there are ways that we can start our relationships off romantically. And I do think that there's so many different versions of romance. I mean, so many people have so many ideas of what romance really is. But we know that romance is a fundamental part of human connection and intimacy and it also plays a very crucial role when it comes to sustaining a healthy and a fulfilling relationship and a fulfilling relationship. So for both men and women, romance serves as a way to express love, appreciation and affection towards the partner, and then that in turn strengthens the bond between them and then they create lasting memories. So that's pretty much what romance is all about.

Daniel Moore: 8:18

On a daily basis, small gestures of romance, such as sending a thoughtful text or giving a compliment, holding hands those can make a significant impact on the emotional connection between partners. These gestures serve as reminders of the love and commitment shared between two individuals, helping to create a sense of security, and it also does give a sense of comfort as well in those relationships, sense of comfort as well in those relationships. So, as we get started here, first question here that we would like to throw out here as we get started how do small romantic gestures contribute to building and maintaining emotional intimacy in a relationship, and why might they be more impactful than maybe like big, huge, grander displays of affections, than maybe like big, huge, grander displays of affections?

Michelle Moore: 9:07

What do you think on that? I would say that, personally, I think the small gestures would be more important to me, because you just do them and you know that's what I like and it's the small things that I feel like that builds the relationship. It's because you're listening to me that commitment to our relationship is there. You've actually listened to me and not toned me out, so you know that I like those things, and not everybody. You know me. I like to hold hands, I like the physical touch and you know words of affirmation and stuff like that. Not everybody's that way, but you've paid attention to that and so it builds our relationship. It makes me happy, it makes me want to be with you more, it makes me fall in love with you more and it gives me more respect for you to want to do things for you.

Daniel Moore: 10:01

Yeah, and in the aspect of those smaller gestures like that and with them creating a sense of security in the relationship, when you have that security and closeness, that can be more impactful than having these big, grandful gestures, because they show some thoughtful effort to understand and connect with your partner on a deeper level. And I think that, like you were saying, it's kind of easy, I guess, to think of the big things that you can do, although those might be a little harder to put together, because if it's something big, there's usually a lot more intel than trying to pull that all together. But when it's the small things, those are, like you were saying, those are the things that you really have to know each other really well to know what small thing would really mean the most to you and vice versa. And so that comes along with being a certain way in the relationship to try to build that romantic relationship from the ground up, and to do that there's some things that you kind of have to put into place. And to do that there's some things that you kind of have to put into place.

Daniel Moore: 11:03

And a few points here that we can add to that about why these small gestures are impactful. The first thing is consistency. You know, unlike grand gestures, those would probably be just occasional, because you can only do so many big things so often, if you're thinking even of something that's super expensive. You can't do big, expensive, huge things all the time when you know some people just can't afford that.

Daniel Moore: 11:30

But the little small things a lot of times are free, you know those don't cost anything. And when you're and you can be more consistent with those, yeah, and that will then continue to let your partner know that that romantic flame is still there, that romantic fire is still burning, and that consistently reminds your significant other that you do care, yeah, and that you do, you know, want to make sure that that romance is staying alive. A second thing is personalization. You know small gestures. They can be tailored specifically to your spouse's or your partner's needs and interests. And what does that do? That shows that the other partner's paying attention, yep, they're paying attention to details that matter, yep, because if the partner that you have knows you and understands how you tick and how you work, then they're going to know the special things that you're going to want.

Daniel Moore: 12:19

Those are going to mean a lot more, yeah, than just doing some grand scale of a big thing. You know, then you have meaningful connection. You know, when you take time to do the small things, like making their favorite coffee or giving just a quick hug, you know that demonstrates a genuine effort to communicate with them emotionally. That shows that you know you do care about all of those different moments, each chance you get of showing what that other you know spouse or partner means to you. So that gives a lot more meaning. I think in those situations there's also positive reinforcement. Small acts of affection can act as positive reinforcement, encouraging your partner to reciprocate and further strengthen that bond. So the more often that you're consistent with these romantic gestures towards each other, that does help your relationship to grow, and it helps to grow stronger, wouldn't you say?

Michelle Moore: 13:13

I would definitely agree.

Daniel Moore: 13:14

I think you know both of us can agree to that and it reduces pressure. You know grand gestures can sometimes feel like a performance or pressure to live up to a certain standard. You know that if you put, if you do one big thing the next year, you got to outdo that big thing you did last year. You know, sooner or later, if you really have that mindset, you're going to have difficulty probably outdoing what you did before and it's going to be a lot more pressure and stress. I think if you try to do those kinds of things, whereas if you just stick to the small things, that relieves that pressure and that stress off but at the same time it makes it feel more natural and more authentic in that relationship that you have between each other. So there's a few things here about just what you might be thinking. Well, what? Maybe you're not very creative and you can't think of what a romantic gesture might be. That's small. What are some things that could be some small romantic gestures?

Michelle Moore: 14:12

A love note? Maybe a quick hug or kiss for no reason making their favorite meal running a small errand for them. Maybe complimenting them on something specific small errand for them, maybe complimenting them on something specific. Listen attentively when they talk about their day, sending a thoughtful text message, buying their favorite candy bar just something small.

Daniel Moore: 14:37

Yeah, and some of you might not even thought of some of those things because they are so simple, but in all reality that's really all it takes. You don't have to go over once. You've got a whole lifetime ahead of you, especially if you get married young. You've got as long as God lets you stay here on this earth and you stay together. You've got a long time to keep that flame burning, to keep that romance and that relationship going, and so you've got plenty of time to just think of things and just put those things into motion. And again, it's just the consistency and it's the thoughtfulness that goes into it that really shows that close bond that you have with your spouse or your partner, to show that you are paying attention and that you do care about the things they care about. So by prioritizing romance in a marriage, couples can keep that spark alive and in turn you can prevent those feelings of stagnation or that complacency that likes to creep in a lot of times. Regular displays of affection and acts of kindness help to cultivate a sense of excitement and passion in the relationship, and then that in turn keeps both partners engaged and it keeps them invested in each other.

Daniel Moore: 15:48

So many people may struggle to believe that it is possible to keep love growing and strong in a relationship because they have been conditioned by societal norms and beliefs that suggest that love inevitably fades over time. Well, you know, after the honeymoon is over, it's over, and we've talked a little bit about that already, about when we get those feelings like that, you know, by saying that the honeymoon's over. Well, in a world where divorce rates are high and unhappy marriages are common, many individuals can feel disheartened and skeptical about the possibility of maintaining a healthy and fulfilling partnership. So if we look at that the wrong way and we start thinking, well, if I can't think of these little things to do to keep this romantic flame going, I'm just going to be a statistic like the rest of these people, because society as a whole, you see so many marriages failing around you and a lot of times when you talk to those people that have those relationships that fall apart, one of the things they say is well, you know, the feelings just weren't there anymore. The flame went out. You know, whatever they did, they didn't, they wasn't successful in keeping that romantic side of that relationship going, and so, therefore, they did become stagnant and complacent in that relationship and they grew apart, and we have to be careful not to look at other people's marriages and let those affect how we feel about our own. We have to make sure we keep from doing that.

Daniel Moore: 17:18

The media often portrays romantic relationships in a way that focuses on the initial excitement and the passion of new love, leading many to believe that once that honeymoon phase is over, the relationship's going to naturally decline. This narrative can create unrealistic expectations that set couples up for disappointment when that initial spark fades. And I think that kind of comes back to the Hallmark movies, because that whole movie is about the excitement of how them two came together and how they built that relationship and it's you know, there's just a intense excitement through the whole thing while we're watching it to see how this is going to turn out in the end. But when it stops they're living happily ever after. But we know they had to stay married for years after that. The movie doesn't show all of that part and we know that it wasn't always that way, because it never is.

Daniel Moore: 18:07

You've always got your ups and downs in every relationship. You know there's external factors that can affect your marriage as well, such as stress. You've got work pressures, you've got family responsibilities. That can also take a toll on your relationship. Those can make it difficult for partners to prioritize their connection and nurture their love for each other. So therefore, without intentional effort and commitment, it's very easy for couples to drift apart and feel disconnected from each other. Well, in all reality, all of that is just absolutely false. Because in the four laws of love, god has a perfect plan and his insurance policy is that it will succeed wonderfully. Absolutely false. Because in the four laws of love, god has a perfect plan and His insurance policy is that it will succeed wonderfully. You know, one of the first things that Michelle and I realized when we started working on our marriage and trying to heal is how important that the romance side of our relationship was in our relationship. And to help understand this a little bit better, we're going to look at Revelation, chapter 2 this week, verses 1 through 5.

Daniel Moore: 19:08

And here in this passage Jesus is correcting the church of Ephesus for their waning passion and their loss of their first love for him. It says in Revelations 2, verse 1 through 5,. It says To the angel of the church of Ephesus write these things, says he who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden Ephesus. Write these things, says he who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands. I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars. And you have persevered and have patience and have labored for my name's sake. And you have persevered and have patience and have labored for my name's sake and you have not become weary. Nevertheless, I have this against you that you have left your first love. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen, repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place.

Daniel Moore: 20:02

Unless you have left your first love, you repent and if you guys remember, if you've been listening to my podcast for quite some time, I actually did an episode on that portion of Scripture. It's episode 111 about have you lost your passion? And you know, there's times in our life, even with Christ, that we lose our passion, that initial first love, those feelings that we had when we very first went down to the altar, sobbing and crying, giving our heart to Christ and wanting to live for Him. And then we let Satan come in, we let the world come in and we let them stomp us down and we sometimes come to a point where we lose that passion and in the same essence, that can happen in our marriage.

Daniel Moore: 20:47

You know, here in this passage it discusses a letter written to the church in Ephesus by the Apostle John where he commends the church for their good works. He commends them for their perseverance and their intolerance of evil. They seem to be doing everything right. However, he also rebukes them because they lost sight of their first love. And this passage serves as a reminder that even in a relationship with deep roots and strong foundations, it is possible to lose the initial passion and focus that brought the couple together. By acknowledging that the Ephesian church had strayed from their first love, this passage in Revelation shows the importance of maintaining the passion, love and commitment that initially brought partners together in a relationship. It serves as a warning that neglecting or taking for granted the emotional connection and intimacy with one's partner can lead to a weakening of that relationship over time. Been through all over through this whole process since we've been married, would you say that something similar to that happened to us and caused our marriage?

Michelle Moore: 21:54

to go the direction that it went. It did, it truly did.

Daniel Moore: 21:59

And what do you think was probably some initial causes of that from your aspect of it?

Michelle Moore: 22:05

Mine was truly losing sight of God. My first love, my first true love. I mean there was multiple things that I put in front of him and lost sight of just the relationship with him and going through motions and putting you above and then, when you hurt me, I just let it all go downhill from there. And if I would have kept my first love there, I would have went to him first of all.

Daniel Moore: 22:33

Yeah, and you've hit it on the head with that, because we know that if we keep our relationship with God where it needs to be, there's a trickle down effect. Yep, so when you take that part out of the equation, then Satan has an open door to work on that next first love, which is that relationship between the husband and the wife. And you know me looking back at that, I see that as well, where, you know, I've slacked off in my walk with God and I allowed things to come into our relationship that Satan was more thrilled about than God was. And in essence, whenever that happened, you know them voices inside my head that were coming from the wrong side. I was listening to those and in essence, that did end up causing an issue in our relationship. And when you lose that first love that you have, it's amazing the damage that it can do so quickly in a relationship.

Michelle Moore: 23:37

It's the foundation.

Daniel Moore: 23:38

It is. Yes, it's the very foundation. It should be the very foundation of where you start with your marriage, no doubt about it. So, as we look at this passage, this passage also offers hope and encouragement, by showing that the mistake of losing your first love is correctable, and Michelle and I are walking testimonies of that because we have reconciled this. Scripture suggests that individuals have the power to reflect on their actions. They can repent and make those necessary changes to reignite the passion and focus in the relationship. By recognizing and addressing the areas where they have drifted apart, couples can work towards restoring the love and intimacy that initially drew them together. So whenever we see this happening in our relationship and we see this divide starting to take place, we see the two spouses seem to be separating and going off in opposite directions. We need to go back to, like you were saying, the foundation of what's causing this problem and we need to start fixing it from the root of that issue.

Daniel Moore: 24:45

In the law of physics, matter is subject to the principle of dynamics, statics and entropy. These concepts can be applied to a flower to understand its different forms and how they relate to a marital relationship. So in dynamics, in physics, dynamics is the study of objects in motion and the forces that cause them to move. When we apply this concept to a flower, we can see how it goes through dynamic changes throughout its life cycle. As the flower starts, we do that by throwing a seed in the ground, and then that seed will then grow into a bud, which then, if it continues to grow and get watered correctly, it'll bloom into a beautiful flower. But then eventually it's going to wither and it's going to die. Well, similarly, a marital relationship is dynamic in nature because it's constantly changing and evolving over time. Just as a flower undergoes different stages, a relationship also experiences highs and lows, growth and challenges as partners navigate through life together. The next part of the law of physics is statics. Statics, on the other hand, they deal with objects at rest and the forces acting on them in equilibrium. When a flower is fully bloomed, it may appear static and in a state of balance, gracefully displaying its vibrant colors and its delicate petals. Well, similarly, in a marital relationship, there may be moments of calm and stability where the partners feel content, they may feel connected to each other and everything may seem like it's going in harmony, running very smoothly. These moments of static equilibrium provide a foundation of strength and support in the relationship and that allows partners to be able to weather those storms and challenges together, because they are equally connected and they're on the same page at that point.

Daniel Moore: 26:37

The third part of physics is entropy. Entropy is a measure of disorder or randomness in a system. Well, in the context of the flower, entropy can be seen in the eventual decay and wilting of the flower as it loses its vitality and beauty and it begins to die. Well, in a marital relationship, entropy can manifest in complacency, neglect or lack of effort to nurture and maintain the emotional connection between partners, between partners. Without proactive measures to combat entropy, a relationship can deteriorate over time, losing the passion, intimacy and vibrancy that it once had, and then it can start to die. Well, if you put these all together and understand and acknowledge the dynamics, statics and entropy of both a flower and a marital relationship, individuals can appreciate the ebb and flow of life and how it works towards maintaining equilibrium and stability. It actively combats the forces of decay and disconnection to keep the relationship vibrant, alive and flourishing.

Daniel Moore: 27:43

So in the context of the example of Jesus not standing by as the saints in Ephesus drifted away from him, we can see a parallel to the importance of prioritizing romance in a marriage to keep the relationship strong and growing. Just as Jesus fought for the priority and integrity of his relationship with his followers out of love, couples can also prioritize and fight for the health and vitality of their marriage through daily romance. Whenever Jesus saw that the people of Ephesus were falling away from him, he didn't just stand there and let them do it. He actually attacked that from the root and told them I appreciate a lot of these things that you're doing, but your focus is off. You have one major problem. He said you've lost that first love and you need to come back to me. So in that same context in marriages, we need to be proactive on that as well. We can't just stand by if that marriage starts to fall apart and disintegrate and wither and die like that flower. We need to make sure that we are proactive with that and we try to attack those problems as they arise and make sure that we try to remember to keep bringing that back to where it began and keep that together. So by actively maintaining the passion, intimacy and connection in a relationship through daily prioritized romance, couples can keep their marriage in a dynamic state, similar to how Jesus actively seeks to maintain a close relationship with his followers.

Daniel Moore: 29:13

Romance acts as a way to rust-proof the marriage, protecting it from becoming emotionally rusted out or stagnant over time. A couple that consistently prioritizes romance in their relationship will never wake up one day and find themselves emotionally disconnected and rusted out. Instead, each day is going to feel renewed and fresh, like a new beginning, as long as the passion and the romance are present. This continuous effort to keep the flame of love alive helps to sustain the emotional connection and intimacy between partners, preventing the relationship from deteriorating and ensuring that it remains vibrant and fulfilling over a lifetime. As we get into this week's discussion on romance, we're going to talk about the four elements of romance, and as we go through these, it'll kind of give an idea of what romance consists of and how we can use these different points to go ahead and keep this marriage where it needs to be.

Daniel Moore: 30:13

So the first one here, the first element that we're going to talk about, is meeting an unspoken need or desire in your spouse. So what makes romantic love so special is when it is preemptive and not reactive. It's one thing for your spouse to have to ask you to do something for them. But it's much more special when your spouse doesn't have to ask you, but you know what it is they want you to do and you do it without them having to ask. That makes romantic love that much more important and powerful. It sends your spouse a message that you're on their hearts and that you're thinking about them when you don't really have to. It tells that we love to serve them and to meet their desires. So when we think about this concept, why do unrequested acts of service often feel more meaningful in a romantic relationship compared to acts done upon request? How do you feel about that? I don't know.

Michelle Moore: 31:09

How do you feel about that? I don't know. How do you feel about that?

Daniel Moore: 31:12

Well, I feel it's important because I do try to do things for you, sometimes before you ask me to do it. I do try to stay on top of that. So when I do do those kinds of things, how does that make you feel?

Michelle Moore: 31:27

I would say it makes me feel, you know, loved, it makes me feel very appreciative of you and it makes me feel like, hey, I got more time to spend with you because I'm not going to be doing that.

Daniel Moore: 31:46

Well, I know there's times, you know, like one thing that I try I try to, especially around the house, I try to help you a lot. If I catch the trash full, I'll try to take it out, or you like to take it out sometimes. But you know I'll tell you I'll take that out. You know, I just feel like that's something that I should do. I try to keep gas in your car. There's times that your car's dirty, I'll try to take and go wash it without you asking me to do it.

Daniel Moore: 32:10

There's just there's a lot of things, and some of those things might seem minute and simple, really, but you have expressed to me before. I mean, you tell me that you're thankful for that oh, absolutely. And it's things that you don't, you know, have to worry about and necessarily have to do, and so this is some of the small things that we can think about when we're thinking about being proactive instead of reactive, basically. So one other thing to think about here on this, before we move on do you think that there are risks to relying on unspoken understandings in relationships, and how can couples balance this with open communication If you're not communicating with each other and you're just expecting the other person to know anything and everything that you want done and whatever. Is that really a healthy way to have a relationship? No, we need to have some communication involved.

Michelle Moore: 33:05

And I think that from our testimony, that's exactly what we walked. You know, there was no communication, so I put priorities on you and when you didn't fulfill those it hurt me, and there was no reason. I mean it shouldn't have hurt me because I never spoke those, and so it's like I just thought you should know that and how would you know? And I mean that was my fault. You know, I should have never expected you to do those things when I haven't even communicated with you.

Daniel Moore: 33:42

Right, and that's probably a mistake a lot of couples make, because, especially if the communication and the actual conversation starts to fade and then it is it's like you know something doesn't happen. We should have known. You know me, you know it's like.

Michelle Moore: 33:59

And I can recall saying some of those things.

Daniel Moore: 34:02

We've actually said that to each other, so we're very experienced in this part of it.

Michelle Moore: 34:06

But I would say now it's because of our marriage, and I think this is where the healthy marriage from the very beginning, if you have a healthy marriage going forward and just like from the very beginning and your communications there there's a lot of times you're gonna know what your partner's thinking and what they want right because now it's very easy.

Michelle Moore: 34:30

I mean the two of us, I mean we've just been able. I'm like I'll get ready to say something and he's like that's exactly what I was thinking and it's like okay. But I think it's because we have a healthy marriage, we put God first and we actually don't set priorities on each other. We do the things that you know, I know that's going to you, know help you, you're going to do things that help me.

Michelle Moore: 34:52

But a lot of times we don't necessarily communicate, because I think it's like the brain thing, it's like you know what I'm thinking and I know what you're thinking and I think it's because it's a healthy marriage.

Daniel Moore: 35:04

But we still don't neglect if we do need to speak up and say something.

Michelle Moore: 35:08

Oh no, and you know me.

Daniel Moore: 35:14

You know that's yeah, that's something that. So there's a balance there and once you figure that balance out, then you'll notice that your relationship does go really well, like a really well-oiled machine, and that is. It's taken a lot for us to get there, but that is where we're at at this point in our relationship and I'm thankful for that.

Michelle Moore: 35:28

I was getting ready to say the same thing. It's so funny. I'm thankful for that. I mean, we've walked a long road and a hard road at times, but I'm thankful because I don't know where you know if we would be where we're at today, right, but the most important thing is, god is the center. Yeah, god is the first.

Daniel Moore: 35:46

Yeah, and it does cut a lot of arguments out. If you're trying to expect your spouse to read your mind and they don't read it quite correctly like the way you think they should have, that's a good argument starter. You know for bad things to happen.

Aria: 36:01

Yeah.

Daniel Moore: 36:01

And so it's good to try to figure out where that balance is with your partner and to make sure you do that.

Michelle Moore: 36:07

Communication.

Daniel Moore: 36:08

Communication. Yes, that's a very reoccurring subject here in this study, that's for sure. So, as we were saying, when we fall in love, we're naturally romantic. You know we're trying to win each other over, so we are studying each other very carefully While dating. We do everything we can to impress each other and meet each other's needs. We constantly run on an emotional high as we try our best to win each other over a lifetime. Well then we get married and life happens. What once was a sizzling mass of molten love is now a doldrum of emotionless motion.

Daniel Moore: 36:42

We call marriage what happened? Well, we stopped doing what made the relationship so good in the beginning. That's exactly what happened. Once we said I do. We got lazy and started taking each other for granted. We stopped studying each other and doing things for each other without being asked or being forced to do so. Even worse, we sometimes do things we know our spouse doesn't like, even after they're complaining about it. The dynamic love that we first created now has become static or even intrepid and is falling apart. But as Jesus instructed the church of Ephesus to come back to their first love, we can do that as well. And we got lazy in our marriage, and I think that's why we ended up where we were at, so there's just so much truth to that.

Michelle Moore: 37:32

I think, laziness and the fact that when you're a blended family, you don't realize what you're taking on.

Daniel Moore: 37:38

Right, that's a lot of extra.

Michelle Moore: 37:40

It is.

Daniel Moore: 37:41

No doubt about it. It's hard enough just being first time newlyweds and trying to figure the whole initial thing out.

Michelle Moore: 37:49

Getting to know each other.

Daniel Moore: 37:50

Yeah, but then if you do that once and that falls apart and then you get remarried again, well, now you're going through the whole dating process again, the whole, trying to build the romance side of things again the whole time, while you're fighting exes and you know, sharing kids and trying to get the kids even in on the dynamics. If you have kids on both sides of the equation, it just adds so much more to it, and it does it can make it really rough. But, as we've discussed here, though, as the Scriptures and Revelation says, that there is ways to fix this, and the first step is to start paying attention to each other and focus on your spouse's needs and desires, just like you did in the beginning. As Jesus told the church in Ephesus, do the first works, even if we don't feel like it or have strong emotions against doing it. It's the only way to start the road of recovery. Can you vouch for that?

Aria: 38:44

Yep.

Daniel Moore: 38:44

I mean, where did we have to go to start this all over again? To the bottom, we had to go back to the beginning.

Michelle Moore: 38:50

We had to start all over and figure out Very bottom of everything and then start from there.

Daniel Moore: 38:56

Yep had to relearn it all over again and do it right this time and relearn each other. Yep.

Michelle Moore: 39:02

And yeah, definitely.

Daniel Moore: 39:04

Yeah, it's not an easy road.

Michelle Moore: 39:06

No.

Daniel Moore: 39:06

No doubt about it.

Michelle Moore: 39:07

But we're so thankful that God God can do anything.

Daniel Moore: 39:11

Yep, and he did.

Daniel Moore: 39:13

That's right, he's the one that corrected the whole thing. But again we had to understand our problem, yep, and be willing to go back and try it again. As individuals and humans, our greatest need is love. There is a formula for why we fall in love with someone. One half is because we see something we like or admire in that person. The other half is we like the way that person makes us feel about ourselves.

Daniel Moore: 39:38

You never fall in love with someone who rejects, ignores or criticizes you. That's very, very rare. There might be somebody listening right now that says, well, I did that and I feel sorry for you if you did, if you're not having a good marriage at this point, but in all reality, most people don't fall in love with people that don't mesh. If you guys can't get on the same page and share those romantic feelings about each other and make each other feel special, make each other feel loved and want to do anything and everything for each other to make this relationship work, more often than not, you're not going to fall in love with that person if they are constantly rejecting or ignoring you. Now, this does happen after marriage sometimes, where one spouse does reject or ignore the other spouse and that other spouse constantly fights against that because they don't want to lose that relationship and that love. It's a one-sided loss, basically, and that is really tough because you and I both have seen spouses that have gone through situations like that, where one spouse all of a sudden just changed their mind about their whole relationship and then they started wanting to veer off the other direction and started being mean to the other spouse and whatever. And that spouse sit there and took it all for years because they did not want to lose that relationship. And those people like that, you're always standing on the outside thinking, man, how do they put up with that? You know, how can they actually love that person when they're so mean to them? But there are people out there that can do that. I mean, you know they're hurt, really bad, but at the same time they're trying to hang on to every little thread that they can and trying to keep that going.

Daniel Moore: 41:21

Romantic love places high value on us and that is why we love it and need it. Not only do I admire you and am attracted to you, but you pursue me and meet my needs and desired without me asking. You make me feel good about myself. So it's a two-way street when this takes place. Without romance, that equation doesn't work. Lack of attention, energy and focus makes a person feel unattractive and unwanted. It also makes you feel bad about the person who is ignoring you and that you are just a ball and chain that they drag around. Nothing justifies an affair, but lack of romantic love like this is exactly what increases the chances of being attracted to a person outside of the marriage.

Daniel Moore: 42:09

Romantic love will fix the static, intrepid state of your marriage and make it dynamic once again. But don't think this is going to happen overnight, because me and you both said this several times through this study it's going to take some time, but you've got to be committed and trust God for the results. When things do change, don't take it for granted. Keep it going by preemptively serving your spouse.

Daniel Moore: 42:35

So when that lack of attention happens, when that energy and that focus is not there and you know the spouses start feeling unattractive to each other, when that romantic love is lost, that's when you've got to be careful, because you know that's what happened to you and I when we both veered off and the affair happened and we almost, you know, ended up getting into the situation of being divorced.

Daniel Moore: 43:04

We lost that romantic flame, that fire that once burned between the two of us when we first met. That was no longer there. That was the glue that held everything together, and when we lost all of that, bad things start happening, and so that's the thing that we have to be careful of. So don't just put you know the romantic side of things, yeah, don't just look at that as just being a sexual thing. That's part of it and we get into that eventually. But to actually have a true love for someone to the point where you want to marry and spend your life with them, that love has to be a romantic type of love between each other that states I'm yours forever, you're mine forever. There's nothing that's going to tear us apart.

Aria: 43:50

Right.

Daniel Moore: 43:50

Regardless of what comes our way, we're going to stick together, we're going to fight together and we're going to make sure that we win this battle together. Satan's not going to split us up.

Michelle Moore: 43:59

Right.

Daniel Moore: 43:59

And sometimes that's a this battle together. Satan's not going to split us up Right. And sometimes that's a hard battle, yeah, especially if there's big issues going on in that relationship. But we know that God's big enough to help us through all of those. And he can get us past. He helped you and I through some huge, giant issues.

Michelle Moore: 44:13

Yes.

Daniel Moore: 44:14

That the two of us had.

Michelle Moore: 44:16

And I think every relationship has seasons.

Daniel Moore: 44:18

Yeah.

Michelle Moore: 44:18

You're going to go through stuff.

Daniel Moore: 44:20

Yeah, but you're going to keep your focus where it needs to be and allow God to work. So we're going to cut that for this week here. We have a few more steps to go through here as we talk about the priority of romance and the steps here that we have the four elements of romance. I guess I should say We'll come back next week and finish those up as we finish this first section of our study, the law of priority. And you have anything that you'd like to add here as we leave this week?

Michelle Moore: 44:51

No, I just hope everybody has a happy new year. We pray that you know, going into the new year, it's the blessed year that you can have that you know, going into the new year, it's the blessed year that you can have.

Daniel Moore: 45:03

Yep, just be safe as you do. Whatever you're going to be doing and and bringing in the new year. Uh, some of us will probably be in bed already before the ball drops. Absolutely, because we're old. Yep, we think about staying up till midnight when we're like, yeah right, I, we try that, and it's so difficult as you get older to stay up that late. But since we live in the central time zone, we can watch it happen an hour early and then we say, okay, we saw it, it's time to go to bed. But we do hope y'all have a great, blessed New Year's Day and we're looking forward to 2025.

Daniel Moore: 45:39

It's going to be year number five for this podcast, which is absolutely unbelievable. Back when I first started this, I just didn't know if it would. I mean, I knew God wanted me to do it and I knew, with God's help, I could go through it all. But you know, from the human side of things, when you're starting something, you always have these doubts. But I want to thank my wife that she's sitting here right now. I want to thank her for her support and everything that she's always been my main cheerleader in the background, when I had hardly nobody listening at all. She was my cheerleader in the background and I do appreciate that very much, and I'm just been ecstatic here this year to finally get her on to do this with me. It's been fun, and so we're going to continue into the new year here as we get further into this study, and we hope that you guys are getting something from this.

Daniel Moore: 46:28

Well, we're going to go ahead and call that good for this week. That's the end of this week's episode. I'm Daniel Moore and my wife, michelle, has been here sitting with me this week. I want to thank you guys for listening. This show really wouldn't be possible without you. If you're a fan of the show, as I said, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts and subscribe to us on your favorite platform, and the links for those are in most of the show notes on the different platforms. Well, that's all for this week, and as we go, we believe that God's Word never fails us.

Aria: 47:20

God's Word has stood the test of time and through Jesus's testimonies and encourage each other to connect the gap. We upload a new audio podcast every Thursday and a video version of it on YouTube and Rumble. We are also on the Christian podcasting app, edify. You can subscribe to our podcast on many of the available podcasting platforms, including Apple Podcast, spotify, amazon Music, iheart Radio, tunein Radio and more. We are also available on your Alexa-enabled devices. If you would like to contact our ministry for any reason, visit our contact page and send us a message. We hope you are blessed by this ministry. This is a production of Connecting the Gap Ministries.