You’re about to leave for church when your spouse asks, “Can we talk?” You check the time. The service starts in a few minutes. “After the service,” you answer, sure there will be time.
Afterward, someone asks you to pray. Someone else stays behind to tell you something difficult. By the time you get home, your spouse is asleep. The next day, you both remember the unfinished conversation, but neither of you brings it up.
A night like that can happen to anyone. What hurts is when it happens so often that one day your spouse starts saying, “Never mind,” even though they still need to talk.
When can we count on each other?
In a report published in 2025, Barna Group found that only 28% of surveyed pastors said it was very true that they were satisfied with the time they could devote to their marriage. That figure raises a question worth bringing home: When my spouse asks to talk, do they know when they’ll have my full attention?
When Paul describes the qualities of those who care for the church, he pays attention to how they live at home (1 Timothy 3:4–5). For those of us who pastor or lead, that teaching reaches us in ordinary moments. It shows up when we close the laptop, turn the phone face down, and listen all the way through, even when what we hear makes us uncomfortable. Sometimes the most important conversation of the week begins at the kitchen table with a simple “I’m listening.”
Before the next service
Return to the conversation you left unfinished. You might begin, “You asked to talk the other day, and we never got back to it. I want to hear you. Can we sit down after dinner tonight?”
When the time comes, keep your word. Listen without preparing your defense. If you learn your spouse has been feeling alone for days, give them room to say it in their own words. If an emergency changes your plans, agree together on another specific time.
Maybe what your spouse needs to hear today is as simple as this: “What you wanted to tell me matters to me. We have time.”
Rev. Dany Sabino
Código Matrimonio
Source · Barna Group, 5 Opportunities to Better Support Pastors