How To Kill Communication

What do you need? Oh, wait a minute. I know you can't know. How many of you don't have a pass out? Oh, that's right down your questions as you go.

5 minutes and 20 seconds remaining. Johnson in the forecourt with the ball. Jerry! Kevin said the cutest thing to Mark today. He said, Mark, the reason my hands are dirtier than yours is because I'm a year older than you are. Can you believe that?

Not good. Montgomery rebounds. Jerry! He's a ball, holds up at the top of the key, and will begin the dribble. He comes to Harper. Harper, working against Washington, moves into the forecourt. Took Montgomery. Montgomery bounce passes to Howland. Back to Montgomery.

Hey! Jerry, we've got to talk. Jerry, I don't know what's wrong with us, but sometimes I feel like we live in two separate worlds. You don't seem to be interested in my life, and I feel very left out of yours.

What can I say? Well, I want to know what's going on inside of you. About me, and the kids, about spiritual things. I want to be a part of it, Jerry, but you shut me out. I can't even get your attention.

You may think Jerry's an unusually poor communicator, but studies show that the average husband and wife spend only 27 minutes each week in focused conversation, and for many couples, even those few minutes are superficial and unfeeling.

Jerry doesn't need to feel alone. There are millions of people like him. Dr. Paul Faulkner believes marriage has little chance to survive without good communication. His two-part presentation will deal with the problem of communication in marriage, and then with the solution.

Part one, How to Kill Communication, will spotlight subtle communication killers in every marriage. Let's join Dr. Paul Faulkner. There's a story that's going around, and I really like it.

It comes from a small-town newspaper. In the classified ad section of a small-town newspaper, the following ad appeared on Monday. For sale.

R.D. Jones has one sewing machine for sale. Phone 958 after 7 p.m. and ask for Mrs. Kelly, who lives with him cheap. On Tuesday, notice, on Tuesday, notice, we regret having erred in R.D. Jones' ad yesterday.

It should have read, one sewing machine for sale, cheap, phone 958, and ask for Mrs. Kelly, who lives with him after 7 p.m.

Wednesday, Thursday, was it. R.D. Jones has informed us that he's received several annoying telephone calls because of the error we made in his classified ad yesterday.

His ad stands corrected as follows, for sale. R.D. Jones has one sewing machine for sale, cheap, phone 958 after 7 p.m.

and ask for Mrs. Kelly, who lives with him. Is it? That's it. All right. This is a kind of thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. Thursday. Notice, I.R.D. Jones have no sewing machine for sale.

I smashed it. Don't call 958 as the telephone has been taken out. I have not been carrying on with Mrs. Kelly until yesterday she was my housekeeper.

But she quit. When we talk about communications, we're just talking about one of the heaviest topics of all. It's just one of those things that is uppermost in the field of business, it's uppermost in the field of marriage counseling, it's uppermost in the field of international relations, and the Bible doesn't leave it out.

Way long years ago, when God saw that man's pride was getting away from him, he's going to build a Tower of Babel up to the skies, or a tower. It's been called the Tower of Babel because God didn't destroy it with power and lightning and fire.

It just caused their communication to have problems, and the project was stopped abruptly. I think the Old Testament Ezekiel is one of the finest illustrations of the power of communication.

It was a case, you remember, in which the prophet had been told, he said, I want you to go out and preach. Well, any time you tell a preacher to go out and preach, he's going to go out and preach.

But he didn't know who his audience was going to be. He gets out into a vast valley, and the valley is full of white, dry, bleached bones.

He says, preach it, man, preach it. I've paraphrased a little bit there. But how would you like that task? How would you like to communicate and have that kind of responsive audience, a valley full of white, dry, bleached bones?

How would you like to begin your presentation? Bones? Well, he did, and he began to preach, and he began to speak.

And the first thing you know, the foot bone connected to the ankle bone, and the ankle bone connected to the leg bone. And you've heard the song, and that song comes out of this story. And the dynamic of the Bible talking about how those living words of God could resurrect a whole valley full of white, dry, bleached bones and sinew came on them, and then flesh came on them, and God breathed in the Spirit.

Fantastic demonstration of the power of the Word. That's why the Bible says in Proverbs, be careful what you say. Because what you say, your words can preserve life, or it can destroy life.

I've known people that words have just really undone and destroyed. And it's so sad. First Corinthians, the 14th chapter, talks about it.

It says, if a trumpet blows an unclear sound, or an indistinct sound, the army doesn't know whether to get up, go to bed, go to war, because the trumpet has to blow a distinct sound so we all understand it alike.

I don't know whether you're aware of it or not, but all of the studies that have come out of the Kent State Revolt indicate that words, words, from filthy-mouthed young women that had been fed to them by various professors on that campus, on purpose, where they no longer shocked these women, in turn were used by these women and others to so shock the soldiers and the guards that were there, they couldn't take the onslaught of words.

And it caused them to do things otherwise they would never have done. By thy words shalt thou be justified, and by thy words shalt thou be condemned. Words are so strong.

We can just kill a relationship between parent and child, husband and wife, boss and employee, with words. In the field of marriage relationships, two of the biggest men in the field, one says 96% of the problems in marriage relationships hook back to communications.

Another says 86% hook back to communications. You see, what really a wife, your wife would like to do is get inside your cranium and just walk around, explore all the hallways.

They want to see and feel all the synapse and the dendrites that are up there that make you tick and think. They'd like to see how you feel, your philosophy, your way of life, where you are, where you'd like to be.

And when a man pushes those things out of the conversation with his wife, doesn't want to talk about those important things, just the urgent things, you really strangle emotionally your wife.

I always say wife because when we talk about communications, that's the area the wives most dearly want us to discuss. Now, oh, there's a story I write.

My mother told me this story years ago. She's talking about an old gentleman and his wife, and she was on her deathbed just about ready to go.

And he was standing there beside her bed and said, honey, he says, you know how much I've loved you all of your life. And she said, yes, he says, your love has been good and rewarding.

He said, you know, I've always eaten the heel of the bread for you. And she said, yes, and that's the part of always wanted.

And I thought about how many people I've known all of my life. Good marriage has been married 10 and 20 and 30 and 40 years.

And they still don't know each other, don't know what the other person really wants, because they've never allowed their wives to thoroughly explore who they are. And that's so sad.

Just married singles. And we'd say, if you want to have a oneness, a beautiful oneness in your relationship, it's when you share and you get to know each other, inside out, nothing to fear.

Bird Whistle is another authority in the field of communication, and one of his studies indicated that husbands and wives just communicate about 27 minutes a week. Now, we're not talking about sitting and watching television together.

We're talking about real communication is so limited. Now, let's talk about some communication killers, some things that break relationships. One of the big ones is, is that we, as husbands and wives, are overscheduled, overcommitted.

You see, as I look at my situation, I see myself wanting to do one more thing. That's all, just one more thing. And when I get that going, something else opens up, and I just want to do one more thing.

That's all. Do you ever find yourself doing that? But the problem is, when you want to do one more thing, you don't cut off something else. And this is the problem. I heard a man make a statement one time. I thought, that's a bell ringer.

He said, you cannot really say yes to anything else, but that in the process of saying yes to that, you are saying no to something else. And you know who that no usually is to?

It's usually to your wife, or to your husband, or to your children. That time you take, as against something else. Now, the second thing that's a communication killer, is materialism.

We want things. For some reason or other, we want to get more things. You know where my weakness comes there? I just want one more thing. I used to have some property down on the river, before the Lord allowed a flood to come take it all away.

Didn't have any insurance. It's all gone. Finest lesson I ever got. All I wanted was just the land next to my house, my little cabin, and I got it.

All I wanted then was just the little cabin next to that one, and I got it. And I think the Lord said about that time, you've got enough. I'm mindful of young men that are out selling insurance and doing everything under the sun, trying to make a living, and they spend their nights, and they spend more nights, and they spend more nights, and what are they trying to do?

They're trying to get ahead and get something stored up for the wife or the children or the kiddos, so when I get it all stored up, then I'll have something to share with them. But by the time you have something to share with them, it's too late, and the kiddos are gone.

They're gone. Are you aware of what's happening to our young people today and inflation? How many young people today can buy a new home? Have you priced cars lately?

Have you priced houses lately? Do you know what the problem is? It's almost impossible. And so what's happening? Husbands are getting second jobs, right? Moonlighting. Then what?

Wives are going to work. Fifty-three percent of the workforce today, I mean, 52 percent of the women are working. And then did you know that the working wives that are taking on two jobs, like their husbands, are up 200 percent?

So what's your solution? When inflation goes up, we get another job. When inflation goes up, wife gets to work, inflation goes up some more. We put her second job? When both of you are selling your time, 16 hours a day apiece maybe, what's left?

We have the option of that right race, or we have the option of learning to live on less. And I advocate the latter. People, are you aware that there's a subculture in the United States today that's living on $3,000 a year?

They are choosing voluntary poverty. They're not living off the government. Brilliant people, college professors, newspaper editors, or magazine editors have opted to live on $3,000 a year in order that they might give themselves to some holy cause and not be caught up with the materialism that's so manifest in the United States.

Now, I'm not saying that all of us should live that way. I am saying we ought to at least see it is being done, people are living in that kind of situation and loving it. They're living with self-discipline in a very unique and special way.

I'll tell you another hindrance to good communications. It's an interesting one. What shall we call it? We'll call it old-role relationships. The way a husband looks at things as against the way a wife looks at things.

This is one of my favorite authors and she makes a little statement and she writes this. She says, I'd like to add to that list of rules of couples that you have around your house, you know. She says, After eight years of marriage, I learned this past fall that my husband wants his socks folded in a certain way.

The right one on one side and the left one on another. Right and left socks. He wants them folded in a certain way so that on dark mornings he can get them out of his drawer and put them on his feet, the right feet, without turning on a bedroom light.

And I love him for his idiosyncrasy. I said, How do you know the difference between right and left socks? She said, Oh, the right socks got the little markings on the side.

I said, Well, after they've been washed a few times. She said, Well, you have to hold them up to the light sometimes. I'll tell you another problem with communications, and that's television.

Reports continue to pour out that the watching of television has problems with home and family life. It's feeding you what it wants into your home, and we have an extremely difficult time of changing channels or turning it off.

Now, that's just been proven. Listen to this report, though. It's a recent one from National Journal and Marriage and Family, and it says that we studied interviews of 64 Minneapolis households.

Higher tension levels were found in families with higher levels of television watching. And one of the conclusions was that those levels of tension was coming up, and they were using television to kind of cover over as it were to put cosmetics on cancer, kind of cover over the problems in our family.

We turn on the television set. Let it entertain us. Let it take up the time so we don't have to deal with the important issues of life. Now, there's another problem in communication, and that is the differences between the boys and the girls.

I mean, I mean there's some crazy differences between husbands and wives. It's not necessarily just your husband. All of us husbands are kind of crazy like that. It's not just your wife.

Most wives have that same kind of crazy situation. Let me tell you what I'm talking about. How many of you wives drove the car here today to this seminar? If your husband was in the car with you but you drove, let me see your hands.

The wives drove but the husband was in the car. One, my wife incidentally. And then we got several, one, two, three, four, five, or six, out of what? Twelve or thirteen hundred?

Twelve or twelve hundred? Or however many? My! Why did the wives drive? Why didn't the husbands drive? You know why the, you know why the husbands have to drive?

Because wives can't drive. That's why. They don't know how to drive. Is that what the insurance companies say? No, the insurance, you got it.

The insurance companies say wives are the better drivers, the girls have slower and lower insurance. Why is that? They're better drivers. Why then does the old man have to drive the car?

Because he's captain of this ship. And the co-pilot's not going to sit in the pilot's seat.

He even talks about it as his car and so forth. Isn't that interesting? Have you ever been on vacation? Have you noticed the difference in the boys and the girls? The husband's driving down the highway, the wife says, oh, we got two weeks, fourteen days, we're going to have a great time.

We can just relax. And the husband's mind is thinking, uh-uh, I said, well, we got fourteen days. So he's like, look at this man. We can make it in ten days if we do this and this and this. Is that right or wrong? Trying to figure out a way.

We can get back sooner. And the wife's saying, oh, we've got such a good time, let's just enjoy it. He says, oh, but look, honey, we can do this and this. So you start out on the road, you're going on a vacation, and boy, he's driving down the highway and he's just going to make it.

Now he's promised you the fourth day out that you've driven way into the night almost every night. And finally he's promised you, okay, we'll stop early and we'll go to the motel and where the kiddos can splash and play and that kind of thing. So you're driving out, it's about four o'clock now, it's time for him to stop.

And you say, honey, there's a real nice one. Look at that. Oh, that is such a nice one. And he just keeps going right home by. And the lady will find out, there's a nice one, look at that, it's got a play pool out there and everything. And he goes right on by that thing.

He just, he's going on down. He is in mortal combat with the concrete. He's just going to go on by. Don't ask me. See, it's not just your husband.

Most of us have these enzymal problems that make us do that, you see. I don't understand all that. You notice the husbands don't have reverse gears either. You've passed up the eating place.

You say, oh honey, there's a nice one right there. Look, look, look. And he goes right on back. We'll get one on the other side of town. You get on the other side of town and he passes that one up too. And it's the last one. The next one's 60 miles ahead.

He could go back one block to a restaurant. Will he go back? Can't turn it around. There's no reverse gear. It will not turn around. Right on down the highway.

I don't know why that is. I remember an occasion in which a husband came up to me in the break time in one of the seminars in California and said, I'll tell you what, I'll tell you why my wife doesn't drive.

And I said, well tell me. Well, it says, I was out fixing the antenna on the roof and we have a pretty steep roof and I had that antenna going and I was just about silent. So I took a rope and I tied the rope through the bump of the car up over the house, tied it around my waist.

I was fixing the antenna. You guessed it. She came out, got in the car and drove a whoop him over the top and drug him down the street two blocks before they could stop her.

He's still living to tell me about it. It's something else. I remember another guy came up to me one time and he was one of those cars where he had two cars in the family. The first car was parked here. It had a dead battery. Had to get the other car to push it and he told his wife, you got to get me going 30 miles an hour.

She didn't understand the communication all that well. She got going 30 miles an hour when she hit it. So one way it didn't kill her total both cars.

I tell you, the truth is always funnier than fiction. It's just amazing. Communications is the problem and it'll stay that way. Just the difference between the boys and the girls. It's really amazing. Tell you some other differences that happen and that's when it comes time for us to go to bed.

And the big difference in the boys and the girls this time too, just the way guys and girls think differently. He comes in, he's been watching television, he turns it off, he goes in at 10 o'clock and he catches the bed and he says, time to go to bed, honey.

Now he has in mind sexual intimacy. And she has in mind what? Your girls can always, you know, tell me, she wants to talk. She wants to talk. She's been working all day.

She's been looking at the time when she could get the kiddos in bed, when she could get everything quiet and get her work done. And then she could go in and they can sit down in the bedroom or in the bed and they can talk and share with each other.

And he just doesn't understand. And so it poses a real big problem. You had a big argument that day, let's say. He slams the door and goes out for breakfast and he gets out and by the morning he sold $50,000 worth of insurance that afternoon.

He sells $100,000 insurance for it. So he comes in that evening and opens up, hey honey, how's everything going? She said, don't honey me. What's wrong? I don't understand. She says, you don't even remember, do you?

Remember what? You don't remember that you slammed the door when you walked out of the house this morning and we're having a fuss. Oh, don't worry about that. She's thinking, don't worry about that. That's where her life is, wrapped up in this husband.

And so he says, oh, it's okay honey. He comes over and he gives her a big old hug and pats her on the seat and he's going to take her to bed and they're going to solve the problem. Oh, no, you're not.

Because you don't know the difference between the boys and the girls. A wife cannot be intimate with anybody unless her mind and her heart and her frustrations have been shared with someone that she loves.

Then intimacy. Apart from that, you're abusing her. Gals, most guys, don't know it. They don't know it.

They think they're great lovers and they're going to solve the problem. So give him credit for being a clod. Well, better it's bedtime again.

He pats the bed. She wants to come in and talk. Another problem is the talk time. Now, if he's already gone to bed and he's kind of laid out flat, he's in limbo. And when a man is laid out flat, he's like a pinball machine on tilt.

He's like a baby doll that you lay down and when you're laying down the eyes go clack. He's out of it. He can groan and moan and say, uh-huh, yeah, and all that, but he's not with it. And so you're crazy to come in at a time like that and try to talk with him.

But to the guys, what do we say? Fellas, when she comes in, first of all, fellas, you ought to be helping her and you both can come to bed at the same time. Husbands, get out there and help the wife, fix those things, get that dinner ready or the kiddos to bed or whatever it takes so that you can have time.

She will have time to talk with you and it won't be so late. So she comes in and he's kind of in limbo. What do we say to the guys? When you lay down flat, what do you do? When your wife comes in and says, honey, I'd like to talk, you sit straight up.

Get the blood running again. Sit up in bed, straight up. I remember one time my wife came in and she said, honey, I'd like to talk with you and I sat straight up and she said, it's not that important, just lay back down.

So there's sometimes it's kind of obvious this isn't the time to talk. But I've gotten out of bed on several occasions and it makes all the difference in the world where you can really get involved with each other.

Hey, I'll tell you another one that's a problem in communications and that some of us men are just absent-minded. It's just crazy. You know, we see and we don't see. I remember a story of a fantastic guy. He would give you the shirt off his back but he was absent-minded.

His wife was suffering from hypoglycemia. She had fixed breakfast and after she had fixed breakfast she just kind of slumped down on the floor. He was in the room getting ready to the bathroom getting ready to leave for work.

She was just kind of laid out but she could still think. She could still aware of what was going on but she was so weak. There she was. The dishes were being washed and now she's just out on the floor. She's like, oh my goodness. He said, he'll come in and see me a minute and can take me to the hospital or take care of me or whatever.

He was in the bathroom fixing and going. He said, be right, I'm going to leave in a minute. Mary and in a minute he came right through that room and stepped over her body and walked right out the door.

She was thinking, oh, good night. What on earth? He won't remember. And about that time she heard the step stop and he came back and opened the garage door and said, see you at noon, shut the door and drove off.

There is not a wife in this auditorium today that understands that. That is impossible. He wouldn't have done that. But there's some of us guys that just get stars in our eyes and we just have a job to do, task oriented and just go right on with it and we'll step right over our wives and not know it.

That can happen. It did happen and he was the finest guy in this world going. But we need to develop some sensitivities. We share that with you fellas to say, kind of look where you step, okay? Compliments is another thing.

You know, husbands are always getting compliments and wives don't get too many. Sometimes the boss says, oh, you did a good job. Here's a new pen. Oh, you did a good job. Let's go to Hawaii. You did a good job. Come go with me to this conference. And so husbands in their work tend to get compliments.

When's the last time your wife got compliments? Incidentally, that may be one of the reasons that wives are leaving home to go work to get some compliments. Could be.

Feel worthwhile. If a husband makes that wife feel so worthwhile where she is, that motivation won't be there. Well, let's go on.

Here is a situation in which this fellow brings down the aisle. I don't know what city this was, but this fellow brought this, this, he came down the aisle and he said, listen, Dr. Faulkner, I just had, we finished our 25th anniversary just the other day and I gave my wife a $3,000 ring.

And I also gave her a $25 plaque that had a little poem that I'd written to her on it. Which one do you think she appreciated the most? I said, hands down, the poem. She said, how'd you know? I said, that's just the way it is with women.

He said, I spent $3,000 on the ring. See, to him, $3,000 said, I love you that much. And he couldn't understand how $25 would, would outweigh $3,000.

It's the difference of the boys and the girls. She looked at that beautiful sentiment, at that thoughtfulness, that sensitivity. Somebody else made that ring. He made that poem. He made that plaque, put it, gave it to her.

Well, it was the next session when we broke, he drug her down the aisle and says, I want you to see that $3,000 ring. He still ain't got the message.

Now, nothing wrong with giving of the rings, fellas. Girls, we don't want to inhibit that impulse. We just want to say to the fellas, there's more than that. Well, let me talk to you now the rest of the time about self-esteem.

It is probably the biggest communication killer. Let's look at what the Bible says. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. What I'm thinking and how I think of me and my relationships in the Lord determines my relationships.

Now, let's look at an example, too. If I were to ask you right today to make a list on the left side of a piece of paper your positive assets and on the right side of a piece of paper your negatives and your liabilities, which list would be the longest?

Most of the time, your list of negatives is longer than your list of positives. It was that way with me. And the reason is we seem to have that kind of a reaction to life.

I can just think of more negatives than positives. Most of you can, too. Now, that's not true with everyone. But what that says is we tend to knock ourselves, don't we?

we need some divine help to help us see ourselves as we really are, as God made us. Now, another thing about what we receive in terms of compliments, have you noticed that we tend to rationalize compliments?

Someone says, oh, that's a beautiful dress you've got on. I like that dress. You say, oh, that's nothing. You rationalize, you can't take gifts of compliments very well. Now, what about criticisms?

When someone gives you a criticism, what do you do with that? We say to this guy, hey, that's a good looking guy. I like the way you've got your suit, everything, you know, you look sharp. Your shirt doesn't quite match your pants, but other than that, it's super.

Now, what did he hear? I gave three compliments, one cut. What did you hear? You heard the cut. When a cut comes, what do you do?

Turn up the volume. And that's okay. Are you aware of the fact that it takes a whole lot more compliments to counteract one criticism than you would imagine?

Mm-hmm. One study indicated when children are growing up that it takes about 46 compliments to eradicate one criticism.

That's strong. And it just says we need to be very aware of our compliments and that they are genuine and authentic. That's what makes them count, is that when you do give a compliment, it is genuine and it is authentic.

Let's go to another area about self-esteem. There are four things that really knock self-esteem. And one of the biggest things in this world today is that criticism, as I see it, of the United States cultural value system.

I think our culture today is so structured that we cannot possibly grow very good self-esteem in our children or in ourselves surrounded by the concept of what success is.

In the United States, number one, the big thing that's important is if you have a lot of money. You are a success and we spell it in the direction of money. You got money, you're a success.

You say, yeah, but Dr. Falken, I haven't got much money. I'm a poor boy. Is there any other way I can make it here? Oh yeah, you can make it if you're an intelligent person.

If you're witty, intelligent, you got your bachelor's degree or your master's, if you get a doctorate, you already got it made. Yeah, but Dr. Faulkner, I'm not only poor, I'm dumb.

Is there any other way I'd make it? Oh yeah, there's another way you can make it and that is if you're a beautiful gal or a handsome guy, you can make it.

I'm not only poor and dumb, I'm ugly. Is there some other way I can make it? Oh yeah. If you're somewhat of an athlete, if you can take that ball and you can carry it from one end of the field all the way down to the other end of the field, you're going to be something special.

Or if you can take one stick and run down and job in the hole and jump over another stick higher than anybody else can, you're going to be successful. in something. Or if you can take one stick and throw it further than anybody else can throw a stick, you'll be successful.

If you take a 16-pound ball and heave it further than anybody else can heave it, you're going to be a success. Well, I'm not only poor and dumb and ugly, I'm clumsy.

Now folks, if you're like this, sorry about that, you're not going to make it. At least not in our culture.

I ask you folks, is this the truth or not? When you turn on the television and say, what do you see? Is this very far stretched? That's pretty well it. Let me tell you a solution to that that thrills me down to my bones.

Jesus came along and he said, charge them that are rich in this world not to be high-minded nor to have your hopes set on the uncertainty of riches. That make you feel a little better?

He says, God chose the foolish things of this world to confound the wise and make you feel a little better. He says, talking about himself, the prophets in the Old Testament looked into Jesus and they said, he had no form or comeliness that you should desire him.

Now we feel even better. Bodily exercise profiteth a little, but godliness is profitable for all things. You mean?

You mean I can be poor and dumb and ugly and clumsy and make it? You betcha. And that's good news. That's why Jesus came to make available happiness and joyful and important living in every person's life.

Yours and yours and yours. It's available to you. You don't have to have this concept that we Americans have determined is successful when Jesus has counted every one of them. Incidentally, if you had all of these, does that give you good self-esteem?

Have you known people that had all of these and didn't have good esteem? Yeah. So that's no guarantee even if you had all of them. Now where does good self-esteem come from?

Three things. Three things. Significance, security, and competence. All of this is found in Romans the 8th chapter. What's said is we're striving for significant living.

And Jesus says, you are significant. He says, you are so significant that I died for you. You are mine.

You can call me your father. You can call me Abba Father. That makes me significant. I would be significant if I was the son of Henry Ford.

I'd be significant if I was the son of John Paul Getty. But I am really significant when I'm the son of God. Second, I'll have good self-esteem when I know I'm secure.

Stocks and bonds won't do it. Money and all these other things are not going to do it. Some of the greatest athletes are retired now. What gives me security? Well, again, in Romans the 8th chapter he says, there's no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.

You have security. It is yours. These things have I written to you that you might know that you have eternal life. You're secure. A third thing that God has guaranteed to you is competency.

This is the third item and the last item for great self-esteem. I am competent. The Bible says, I can do all things through him that strengtheneth me. Romans 8 says, the Spirit helps us in our infirmities.

So I'm not thinking good about myself because look what I did, but God being my helper, I can do all things. It's kind of like a governor.

Here's a person over here that's in prison and he's bound and locked and chained in prison. And that person says, man, I don't feel good. I'm in a bad situation. I'm no good. And the governor comes along and says, I'm pardoning you.

And he says, yeah, but I don't feel pardoned. That doesn't make any difference whether you feel pardoned or not. Folks today say, well, I don't feel secured. I don't feel competent. I don't feel significant.

That doesn't make any difference whether you feel it or not. When the governor pardons that fellow over there in that jail and that fellow says, I don't feel freed, he is, whether he feels like it or not. And so we're just simply saying that God has made you like you are and that's good because you're a very precious, special person whether you feel like it or not.

Feelings are not all that important. They're neither good or bad, moral or immoral, right or wrong, feelings or just feelings. And let's deal with the real issues, the important things of life and train those emotions how to feel good because we are good.

This business of self-esteem has to do with your attitudes, how you look at things. My wife has a little mole right on the side of her nose and one day early on in our marriage I said, maybe we ought to get that mole cut off sometime.

She said, oh, you're talking about this? I said, yeah. She said, that's my beauty spot. Now what's wrong with that? It's your attitude. All of us somewhere along the line have to adjust and accept us who we are.

I'm six foot four and that's a problem. I wear size 13 shoes and when you're built like an ostrich it's hard to buy clothes. And I could go around feeling sorry for me and say to the store dealers, what do you mean you don't have any 42 XLs?

Isn't this a good store or not? What do you mean you don't have size 13s, normal size shoes? And I could go around telling everybody else how bad they are.

It's an attitude. I tell you, the folks who have invented these door closures and hang down indoors, they ought to, I don't know what ought to be done but something bad, I've knocked myself silly on those things several times.

Bad news. Where do the people put sinks in a house? Down about knee level. Where do they put mirrors to shave by? All I can shave is my Adam's apple.

Poor me. I can go around feeling sorry for myself all the time. Where is your self-attitude? Your self-esteem is hooked to your attitude. You can either say, well, poor me, or you can say, well, I'm glad I'm up here where I can see folks.

And you start seeing the good things that are in people. Happiness is now. Got to think good about you because, because God made you and God doesn't make junk.

Let's bow for a moment of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for today and just pray that you'd help us to understand some of the differences between ourselves and our wives that are real and understand that we just really need to capitalize on the important things of life and not let the urgent, immediate things take over.

For we ask it in Christ. Amen. This concludes part one, How to Kill Communication. In part two, The Communication Lifeline, Dr. Faulkner will present specific ways to enrich your marriage through communication.

We'll see you next time.