Welcome back to the Excel Stomore podcast. I'm so thankful that you've joined. Today's episode is sponsored by Spirit Building Publishers. This group of Christians is committed to providing fresh, relevant, and practical Bible study material for today's Christian families and churches.

Their workbooks and devotionals are rooted in scripture, easy to teach, and written for the real

world we live in. Whether you're studying with teens or leading a class or just growing on your own,

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You can visit them at spiritbuilding.com and discover materials that can help you and your church

excel still more.

Good morning. I'm so thankful that you're here, and I could not be more excited to share this topic with you today.

This is one of those occasions where I prepared something to preach and then did preach it

with no real intention of preparing an ESM episode, but the feedback after the lesson, the way

that I'm incorporating it into meeting work all year long and really just the impact in how it is shaped

the way I'm thinking each morning just feels too important to hold back from you. And so today,

we are going to talk about the relationship between mission in Christ and marriage.

There are a few things to say here at the top. Unapologetically, there will be

application to marriage, and you could say that this episode is primarily for those who are in

marriage or soon to be who want their marriages to be stronger, even if things have not been good.

Oftentimes, the solutions that are proposed for marriages that need work are

just not awesome. In fact, a lot of the advice I have given in past years has been secondary to a

much greater thing, and we'll talk about that today. That thing is mission, but here's the deal.

Mission is primary. It's central, And it transcends all forms of relationships.

And the reason I say that is this. If you will listen to the point we're going to make right out of the box on mission, it will apply to every relationship.

Mission and my kids. Mission and fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. Mission and

friendships, neighbors, coworkers. Every relationship you have will be directly affected if you are

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