Jo Vitale [00:00:35] So welcome to the podcast where we invite you to Ask Away. Hi, everyone. Welcome to Ask Away. I'm Jo. 

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Vince Vitale [00:00:45] And I'm Vince, and you are listening to a special Valentine's edition of this show. And I know everyone is wondering, Joe, what did you get me for Valentine's Day? 

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Jo Vitale [00:00:56] Well, we're going to be spending Valentine's Day with your parents this year, so I'm giving you some of your mom's home cooked meatballs for a change. I think up to 15 years of being married to me, well, we'll just be glad to get back to the original. You're welcome. 

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Vince Vitale [00:01:10] No, no. They're both great. I have no opinion on whose meatballs are better. 

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Jo Vitale [00:01:16] You've learnt something in the last 15 years. 

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Vince Vitale [00:01:18] Yeah. There you go. There's marriage advice right there. We have been laughing at how gift giving has changed over 14 years. Was it last Valentine's Day or your birthday when I gave you a hotel night by yourself? 

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Jo Vitale [00:01:31] It was my birthday. 

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Vince Vitale [00:01:32] Your birthday. 

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Jo Vitale [00:01:33] It was glorious. The best present ever. 

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Vince Vitale [00:01:36] Early in our marriage, before we had kids, it would have been a night away for the two of us. But in this season of life, it was Jo having a night away on her own with a full 12 hours of sleep. 

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Jo Vitale [00:01:48] It was truly marvelous. 

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Vince Vitale [00:01:51]  Yeah, we're excited to dig into just the topic of marriage, dating, singleness. We've been thinking about this a lot more recently than perhaps the few years before that because we're in a church, a home church, and there's quite a lot of college students in our church. And so we've been getting requests to meet up and talk about dating. And, boy, dating has changed since we were in college as well. 

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Jo Vitale [00:02:16] Yeah, we were like pre dating apps. 

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Vince Vitale [00:02:17] That's right. We were pre dating app, so we're trying to figure it all out. But it's actually been really good for us as a married couple as well, because sometimes we're talking to people who are either dating or thinking about dating and we'll sort of make a point and then we'll kind of catch each other's eyes and be like, oh yeah, we should probably do that and probably take that advice. So it's been really good for us, and we hope this episode will be of use to you whether you're in a dating stage of life or not, whether that is relevant to you or not. We've been reflecting on how sometimes we don't discern well in this area because we have a misconstrued view in the first place of what marriage is, and therefore of what the purpose of dating is, and therefore of who we should be looking for, or even when or whether we should be looking for someone at all. So, Jo, if someone's asking themselves, when should I get married? What are your initial thoughts? 

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Jo Vitale [00:03:08] Yeah, I think we got to take it a step back from that question because I would drop the when. I think the real question first and foremost should be, well, should I marry? Is marriage something that I should be aiming for? And I think for all of us, really, we've been conditioned by everything from the films that we watched growing up, the books we read, the expectations of family and community and parents, just to be trained to think that marriage and particularly romantic and sexual intimacy are the goal and the purpose of life. And that if you don't have those things, then actually you'll never be complete, you'll never be fulfilled. But I just think from a Christian perspective that is so far from reality. Not to say that those aren't good gifts. Marriage is spoken about highly in the Bible, but it is not the ultimate thing. If nothing else, as Christians, we know that you can live a fully human life full of purpose and love and meaning and significance without being married, because the most fully human life ever lived, the life of greatest significance and love and purpose and meaning was lived by Jesus Christ. And he was single. He's somebody who never got married. So if we think our life is going to be incomplete or lacking or that somehow God has abandoned us or betrayed us if we never wind up getting married, then I think we actually have some really deep misconceptions about what life is all about. I remember in college when I had somebody who had just broken up with me, and I was really devastated. 

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Vince Vitale [00:04:33] It was not me. It was not me, for the record. 

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Jo Vitale [00:04:38] It wasn't Vincent. But I was totally heartbroken. And I went to one of my close friends and I think I was just looking for some comforting platitudes in the moment. Like don't worry, there are plenty more fish in the sea. Or another bus always comes along or something like that. I mean, she just looked me dead in the eye and she said, "Jo, God doesn't promise us a partner. He promises us himself." 

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Vince Vitale [00:04:59] Good friend. 

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Jo Vitale [00:04:59] Good friend, but didn't feel like it in the moment. I'll be honest, I was kind of mad. That wasn't what I wanted to hear. And I remember that felt like bad news to me. And it was actually only much, much later on, maybe even a couple of years later, that I reflected back on that and thought, oh my goodness, God promises us himself. God promises us himself. How is that bad news to me? Why does that feel like settling or like the last good option? In one sense, I think, when people long for marriage, their understanding something about the path, which is that the goal of life is intimacy; that we are wired for intimacy, that we are made for intimacy, we're made for love. But we're made for love with God. God is the one who made us. He is the one who is love. We're told in the Bible God is love. And so all of those longings that we have that we think a human person is supposed to fulfill in us, actually people are not supposed to be placeholders for that. We're supposed to look higher and to God. In one sense, you might say, yeah, of course you should marry, but the person you should marry according to the Bible, is God. And there's this beautiful metaphor of marriage that runs all the way through Scripture, through the entirety of the Bible. But actually that metaphor of marriage that we're all called to it's between God and his people, between Christ and his bride the church. And so that's what we're really aiming for. And it's epic and it's huge and it's intimate and it's amazing. It's the one relationship where we can be fully known and fully loved. But I think if we displace that and try and look for that in a person as opposed to in God himself, then actually we're doing a disservice to other people and we're putting an incredible burden on human relationships that they were actually never made to carry. We can't look at another person and expect them to solve a lot of problems or fulfill all of our needs. And nobody can actually do that. You're great, Vince, but you can't do that. 

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Vince Vitale [00:06:56] Not even close. 

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Jo Vitale [00:06:57]  I think it was Saint Augustine who said, "You've made us for yourself, O Lord. And our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you." And I just think that's true. And I think even in the best of human relationships or marriages, if you're looking to put on a person what can ultimately only be found in God, you'll still wind up feeling restless and dissatisfied. And you're going to feel like, why doesn't this relationship fulfill me in the ways that I expected it to. And I think that's when relationships and marriages get into trouble because we put something on them they were never intended to carry. That actually is only God you can know us completely and love us in full anyway, and that's an amazing thing. But that means he's the goal. God is the one we should marry. 

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Vince Vitale [00:07:40] Yeah, that's so good. It just reminded me of hearing someone talk about this idea that actually if I put you first, I'm actually going to love you, Jo, less than if I put God first. And then allow my love with him to overflow into our relationship. And it's sort of counterintuitive, but I want to love you as much as I can and then actually, counterintuitively, means not putting you first because that's the way that God has designed things for our marriage to actually point towards that ultimate marriage. The other thing that I think sometimes we don't realize, which I think is really interesting, is that there's a sense in which we're all called both to singleness and to marriage. If we just put together some of what we've already said, we're all called to singleness, at least for portions of our lives at the beginning of it, for sure. For many of us at the end, if our spouse were to pass away before us, and for some people throughout the middle portion of life as well. And then as the church, as you've said, because we are all the bride of Christ we're also all, in a sense, called to be married. So it's this whole dichotomy of singleness or marriage is really not the right way to frame it. We're all called to both. And bot are good because both point in their own ways to the ultimate marriage that we were created for. Singleness reminds us that we are waiting in hope for our truest companion, God Himself. And marriage, likewise, is a season of points beyond itself by foreshadowing and reflecting that ultimate union again with our truest companion. So both are intended not as ends in themselves, but to spur us on into deeper relationship with God. So big question to start with. Singleness is a gift. It's given to some. How do you know if it is right for you? 

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Jo Vitale [00:09:29] Yeah. And so I think we've got to frame it in terms of what the goal is. So if the aim is to get close to God. Then actually in different ways you've said it. Singleness of marriage can both do this. Scripture calls them both gifts. In 1 Corinthians chapter 7, the apostle Paul says, I wish that all were as I myself am. He was single, but each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. So he's calling both singleness and marriage gifts. I think we get a little bit confused here. Sometimes I think people can start to think, well, maybe the gift of singleness means you have some kind of superpower where you're just so excited to be single, or vice versa for marriage, as if that just means you're wired for it and it's your heart's desire. And I think we have to be honest that actually sometimes that isn't the case. Is it? To some people who are single, it doesn't feel like a gift. Some people who are married, it doesn't feel like a gift. But I think we have to acknowledge when Paul's talking about it here, he's not talking about a special super power of one or the other. He's actually just talking about the state that you're in. Whatever state that you're in, that is the gift that God has given you. Doesn't mean it's a permanent state as you've already said, but that is the gift. And in a way, the question of how do I know which one is right? For me, it's a little bit complicated because that question assumes you're the one who gets to decide. And that's not always true, is it? 

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[00:10:51] The idea of a gift is actually it's something given to you by God. And I think we can be honest, that sometimes we can look at someone else's gift and wish it was our own. And there can be a struggle in that. And I also think we need to think about what do we mean by gifts? I'm doing a study on the life of Mary, Jesus's mother, recently and looking at all of the words used to describe her as someone who's highly favored by God and he's blessed by God. You read the opening chapters of Luke's gospel, and you think this woman is going to have the easiest, best life ever. But then as you read on and you realize how hard her life becomes, particularly being one to stand there at the cross watching her son be killed. And you suddenly realize, wow, for someone to be blessed and favored by God doesn't mean that life will be easy. And that helps me want to think about this here as well. That sometimes God gives us gifts, that they are good gifts, but it doesn't mean that they're going to make life easy. And that's true of both singleness and marriage. There are times when singleness can be extremely painful and it can feel very lonely. There are times when marriage can be extremely challenging and you think, my goodness maybe it would be easier if I was single. A gift from God doesn't mean it's always going to feel easy. Both in their own ways have challenges, both in their own ways have tremendous blessings. But I think the reason they're a gift is because whichever state you're in, whichever one God has given you, there's an opportunity within it to draw closer to him. So I think the real question is just whichever one I have, it's okay to desire one or the other. I know people who feel strongly either way about which one they would like. 

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[00:12:28] Paul says himself, if you desire to be married, go for it. And but also recognizing sometimes for all sorts of reasons, it might not be possible that we wind up with the gift that we want, but whatever one we have, there is an opportunity within it to continue to draw close to God and to look to him. And so if you're married, there's something about a marriage relationship that humanly is symbolic of the covenant of marriage that we have between God and his people. And so there's a sense in which marriage on earth is the closest thing we have that can point to the kind of intimacy we're made for with God. It's a signpost, in a sense, a foreshadowing of something better to drive you closer to him for singleness. There's a gift within that as well, to be able to say, actually, whatever human relationships we have are not ultimate, but we're made for more and we're waiting for more, and we're waiting for the day when we get to heaven. And it's described as like the feast of the bridegroom, this wedding celebration and there's a significant symbolism in that as well. And there's a gifting in singleness as well, isn't there? Because as Paul puts it, your tension isn't divided. In the same way, you're less distracted. You are able to pursue God in a more straightforward way in some ways in that sense. So there are blessings and challenges to both, I guess would be my point. But whichever one you find yourself in, whichever one God has given you for however long it may be, make God the goal in that. Look to how can I, in this gift, receive it as a gift and give it back to him? 

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Vince Vitale [00:14:00] Yeah. And in that discernment, one thing I would say is whichever direction you're discerning in, to make sure you're motivated by what God is calling you to and not anything you're trying to run away from. In Matthew 19, the disciples say to Jesus, "It sounds like it's better not to marry." And Jesus says, "Not everyone can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given." So it is given to some sense of it being a gift. And then later in the same paragraph, and there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. And I just think it's significant that it's for something. It's for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. It's not motivated by fear or insecurity in either direction, whichever direction you discern, but has to be motivated by love. You don't want to choose singleness out of fear that no one will want to be with you, or that someone will leave you. And you don't want to choose marriage out of fear that you won't be enough on your own or out of fear of loneliness. God does not call us out of fear, but into love for the sake of the kingdom of heaven, to love God and others in a particular sort of way. So whether you're pursuing singleness or marriage, pursue it because of what God is calling you to, and not because of anything that you're trying to get away from. 

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Jo Vitale [00:15:14] Yeah, that's really good. But I guess the question is, if you are in a sort of prayerful posture and you're open handed for God as to which gift he's going to give, how do you know? Let's say you're sensing, actually, like Paul said, I do eagerly desire to be married. How do you know when you're ready for that or when you should be actively pursuing it versus kind of being in a place of waiting and saying, hey, I'm not ready for that yet?

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Vince Vitale [00:15:39] The first thing I'd say, and probably the most central thing that I would say is definitely don't get married until you're already married. Which requires some quick clarification. But hopefully it's just memorable to think of it that way. Before we got married, Jo, I remember a couple friends who maybe were not of a mindset where they were going to get married anytime soon kind of asking, aren't you terrified of marriage? And I think this particular comment [inaudible] general comment on marriage. And I remember saying to a couple of people, no, actually I'm not, because I've already been married for years, so I know what I'm getting into. And they would sort of look at me with an odd look because as far as they were aware, I had not been married before. But because I conceive of my relationship with God as a marriage, which is how the Bible conceives of it, I had already been living in a marriage in a very tangible sense, and in some ways with the most challenging spouse of all, God. No one challenges as hard and consistently as he does. No one demands faithfulness and honesty as intensely as he does. No one's a more jealous lover than he is. I think this is such a blessing of the Christian faith. You've kind of alluded to it already, but in other ancient Near Eastern myths, might have been typical for gods to have other divine lovers. But this idea of God being the lover married to finite human persons, that's radically new in the Old Testament. Hosea, Isaiah, Song of Songs. 

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[00:17:13] It's because, though, that I had been living in that marriage relationship with God, that even before I married you I knew something significant of what it was like for someone to be with me all the time and to know everything about me, even the most shameful things. I knew what it was like for my sin to directly affect another person. I knew what it was like to make decisions together with another person, and to yield to them and to make sacrifices because they were in my life. And Jo and I specifically knew what it was like because we were married to God to be getting things wrong in a marriage and needing to receive grace. And hopefully that made us more ready to pass on that grace to each other as we stepped into marriage. And so even on our wedding day, our vows were not foreign to us because Jesus had promised for better or for worse. And we're so thankful that he did that. If he was only interested in what was better for him, he never would have endured the cross for us. And he promised, for richer or for poorer. And that was not just a metaphor. He literally gave up the riches of heaven in order to enter into union with us. And Jesus is God in the most concrete way, making that most radical wedding vow. All that I am, I give to you. The reason we could grasp the magnitude of the vows we were making to each other on our wedding day, I really think was because they were exactly the vows that God had showed us how to make by making them to us. We had confidence in the marriage we were stepping into only because of the marriage we were already in, and that made a huge difference as we pursued marriage with one another. I really think that it did. And let me throw it back to you, Jo. Once we start to have a better understanding of what marriage is, what would you say to someone who asks, okay, whom should I marry? 

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Jo Vitale [00:19:14]  I think our starting point here it's so often wrong. I think when it comes to this question of who to date, what's going on in the back of our minds is often the assumed question of, well, who's going to be best for me? We see this in the language that's around dating all the time, don't we? We talk about things like, oh, she's too good for him. Or he's way out of her league or she could do better. He's seven. She's a 10. I mean, what is she thinking? But the basic premise here, it seems to be that there's a scale, that some people are better than others. And so we always need to be shooting for the very best that we can hope to get according to where we come in ourselves on the ranking. The question is, who is best for me? But if that's your framework, if the starting point is, well, who's the best fit for me, who am I best with? It's actually really hard to commit to anyone because I think you're always wondering, what if someone better comes along? What if this person is actually settling when there's my soulmate is just around the corner. And so, how can I ever narrow down my options in the world of dating, particularly in the culture we're in, where you can always swipe to the next person, right? You can always, well, let's just check out the next few people before we fix on this one. And that just makes it really challenging to get anywhere, doesn't it? Because I think in the back of our heads, we're now more aware than ever in this world of just so many opportunities in dating as in everything else, there's that feeling of but if I say yes to one person, that means that I'm saying no to everybody else. And so I think we really get stuck here because it's being filtered through this sort of fear of missing out. I guess there's a lot of FOMO, but I just wonder if actually we're really asking the wrong question. What if we went with a different starting point. Rather than who is best for me, what if we framed it again thinking about Jesus and thought of the question, how did Jesus decide to marry? And what if Jesus had decided by asking that same questions? What if Jesus did ask the question, well, who's best for me? 

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Vince Vitale [00:21:13] Yeah, wow. 

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Jo Vitale [00:21:13] Who am I compatible with? Imagine if he'd ask that. Thank God he didn't, right? Because if Jesus approached marriage that way, he would never have married me. This relationship would not exist. At the end of the day, it wasn't at all about what was best for Jesus. It was about his desire to serve others. So I think if we're asking that question, is he the best for me? Is she the best? We're asking the wrong question. A better question is am I good for him? This person the one that God is calling me to serve and to love and to spur on, are we both good for God together? Yes, we want our relationship to be healthy, but we want to ask, has God gifted me uniquely to serve this person? Who is God calling me to bless and does the person that you're pursuing actually come alive because of your presence in their life? Did they become more like Christ? One of the ways that I actually realized that Vince was a good fit was because he seemed to be more for me than I even was for myself. The way he approached dating really shocked me because he just didn't seem to be about himself at all. But he was my greatest champion and cheerleader. He never tried to change me. He wasn't pushy, but he was so committed to me becoming everything that God had made me to be, to become the woman that God had crafted me to be. 

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[00:22:33] And he was absolutely committed to playing his part in assisting me into that. Not by nagging or criticizing, but by encouraging and supporting and speaking truth and life into areas of my life where I got stuck in condemnation and lies and just creating these spaces and opportunities for me to become who it seemed God was calling me to be. And it just made me think of Romans eight, verse 29. This verse talks about that the ones who God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. As Christians, we kind of understand that to be our purpose in life, to be conformed to the image of Christ. And what I loved when I met Vince was it seemed that he was so committed to that for me in my own life. To help me be conformed into the image of God's Son. He was all about helping me become that. And the more I saw him do that, the more I thought, oh, that's what I want to be for him. How can I do the same? He's loving me so graciously in this way. How can I respond the same way? So it kind of flipped everything. It wasn't about what could we get from each other, but it was so much more about what can we give? How can we serve? How do we help one another conform to Christ? 

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Vince Vitale [00:23:39] I think what you said before, Jo, about how did Jesus decide who to marry is just so critical. To think that if he asked some of the same questions that we ask, he never would have married us. I just want to sit with that for a moment, because we need to make sure we're not taking an approach to dating that if God took, he never would have married us. If we do that, then we're actually in opposition to the gospel. And the wonderful thing about this gospel vision for marriage that Jesus lays out for us is that it means marriage is not about what we deserve, which has been such a blessing in our marriage. Remember, we tell that story about where-- were we just dating or engaged when you looked at me and said, "Vince, I don't deserve you." 

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Jo Vitale [00:24:27] I think we were dating. 

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Vince Vitale [00:24:28] Dating. And maybe you were fishing for a couple of compliments. 

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Jo Vitale [00:24:32] I was definitely fishing for a couple of compliments. 

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Vince Vitale [00:24:33] Fishing for a couple compliments. And it just came out of my mouth. I just said, "No, you don't." Not the sort of recommended response. 

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Jo Vitale [00:24:41] Rude. 

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Vince Vitale [00:24:43] But I continued and I said, "No, you don't. And I don't deserve you either. Isn't it wonderful?" And I just think that's been such a blessing to us, because it means that we can rest. We don't need to worry that someone better is going to walk around the corner one day. Even if they did, I don't think it would register for us because we just don't think about each other in comparative terms. And neither of us deserve each other. How could one sinful human being deserve another human being in the image of God as their very own? Surely that's beyond what any of us could deserve, but therefore our marriage isn't some sort of ranking. It's not a ranking system that we can lose; it's a gift and therefore it's ours for good. And that means we can stop competing to be loved and just enjoy it. And I think sometimes we miss this. We know that our relationship with God is based on grace and yet sometimes we still treat all the other relationships in our life as if they are some works based competition. But the gospel is not just that relationship with God is based on grace, but it's an invitation for all of our relationships to be founded on grace. As we receive grace from God, we in turn extend it to others. We treat others with the grace that we've received. 

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Jo Vitale [00:26:05] And the awesome thing about having a foundation of grace is that it allows for something really important, which is that marriage is founded on things that can be unchanging. Because you can run into big problems when we make timeless vows to each other, but we make them based on things that will inevitably change over time. Like if you marry someone for their looks, you're in trouble. None of us are going to look the same in 30 years. It's been 15 this year, we don't look the same. 

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Vince Vitale [00:26:31] Forget 30. 

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Jo Vitale [00:26:36] [Crosstalk] But we don't. No one stays the same, do we? Life experiences form us. So much changes us. It's not just looks, but what you do for work, the communities and friendships you're a part of, kids. Having kids changes everything about the dynamic of your relationship, the crises and the hardships that you go through. Financial challenges changes, and in situations you have so much in your life is going to change. You will not remain the same people that you were on the day that you said your vows to each other. But if you're getting married because God has called you to serve someone, and he says that call is for a lifetime, and that he's going to provide everything necessary for you to live it out for a lifetime, he'll keep giving you that grace, pouring it out into your life. Then that can remain unchanging, even if people do change, because it's not based on circumstance. It's not based on how does Vince change or not change over the years? Or how do I change or not change? It's based on God whose promises and vows are unchanging and his grace that he keeps on extending to us every single day. 

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Vince Vitale [00:27:37] Yeah. And that's why I've been really challenged by few of our international friends who have had arranged marriages, in a sense, need to be careful here, but they very much had willful decision over who they married, but it was still very different than the way we tend to do it in America or in the West maybe more generally. Families identifying people who might be a good fit for one another in some sense, involving the community and the family much more in the discernment process, but possibly only meeting a few times with the person that they were going to marry and then making a willful decision to move forward into that marriage. And we have oftentimes found some of those marriages to be strong and healthy. And I think part of the reason is what you're saying, Jo, that in the best case scenario, in that sort of situation, part of what that can speak is actually we're concerned about the things that are unchanging, and those things are from God. We don't need to like date the field and check everyone out to see if there's somebody that's a little bit better looking or somebody that's a little bit more compatible with me. Actually, I know this person has a serious faith. I know that God is making these vows with us. I know that if we make that decision to step into that union, it's not about the ever changing circumstances of life, it's about God's unchanging character and what he promises he'll provide. And if you are really surrendered to that and really relying on that, I really do believe that God will give what you need for every challenge of marriage. And it's just been interesting to see some of those friends look at us and go, you guys are the ones who do it really weird. 

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Jo Vitale [00:29:28] Right. 

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Vince Vitale [00:29:29] So you just find somebody on an app and just have a date with them and you don't know their community, you don't know their family, they don't know your community, they don't know your family. The vast majority of your discernment about whether you guys are right for each other, just kind of on your own independently. And then it doesn't work out, you just kind of move on and now you got all these emotional scars. And now you've dated like a dozen people before you find someone and you're carrying all of those scars into your marriage. It was really challenging to think, whoa! They do things, some of our friends, very differently. But if it's founded on what God brings to the table and not us trying to figure it out and manifest it ourselves, there can be something really healthy in that. All right. So if we get to the point now where someone thinking they do want to date, there's a sense that maybe God has marriage in front of them, when would you say is the right time for someone to start dating? 

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Jo Vitale [00:30:26] Yeah. So I guess it's about needing to know where you're headed and why you're heading there before you can plot out a good route. You've got to know what's the destination. And so when you know what marriage is about, when you know what the angle of dating is, then you're able to make a good decision about how and when to date. And it's been said, but when we understand marriage isn't about filling some void in our lives, that's God's job. But it's also not about getting a life upgrade. It's actually that sacrificial call to serve another person. That is the framework. I think then when you're in the context of a friendship and you begin to feel a particular longing to serve another person, and you've built up enough evidence that your presence and service in their life helps them to be more of who God has created them to be, those are all good signs that this could be heading in a good direction. And then if you begin to feel a desire, and particularly to count the cost of pursuing relationship with that person-- we had a friend say the other day that a value is only a value if it cost you something. So that was a really profound line, actually. We think about dating as just receiving, but actually it's supposed to come with a cost. I mean, think about the cost it came with for Jesus to just say yes to us and. And recognizing there is that sense in which part of the cost is you are saying no to everybody else, but also you're saying no to the ease of a life that comes without that person. 

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[00:31:46] And there are certain ways you can be more self-centered when you're just on your own. There are sacrifices that may come with choosing to be married. It's part of the reason, I think, some of the statistics we're seeing about why people aren't getting married as much today. When you're hearing some of the decisions younger people are making in terms of not choosing marriage is partly because they're now recognizing actually the truth of the cost of it is actually that it does impact your career, that it does impact your location, that you may even wind up living in another country. You may even wind up living in America if you're willing to count the cost. And so I think there's this recognition, and rightly so, that there is a cost to choosing marriage. But rather running from that-- which is what a lot of people are doing today. They're saying, oh, this is too costly. I don't want to do marriage. I'm going to aim for it. I mean, you hear the phrase now that they say it's like situationships. Just do something temporary with the understanding it comes with a sell by date. That there is going to be an end date to this relationship, but it's just a temporary pleasure for the two of us. But we're not going to make those long term choices because actually they seem too costly. I think they're sensing something right. That marriage is supposed to cost you a great deal. 

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Vince Vitale [00:33:01] Good point. 

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Jo Vitale [00:33:03] That true love is sacrificial. The best love is sacrificial. That's what we see in Jesus Christ, isn't it? It is actually going to cost you everything to truly lay down your life to love somebody else. But I think that's actually a call to be excited about rather than something that's a reason to run the other direction. 

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Vince Vitale [00:33:21] Yeah. And this is one reason why I see a real challenge in, let me put it this way, at least the way that a lot of people use dating apps. And I'm not trying to say that's evil and that can't work. Well, I have got really good friends in really healthy marriages who met in a way that seems healthy online. So I'm not making some sort of sweeping statement like that. But if part of what you're looking for is, do I sense this calling, this leading from the Lord to sacrificially serve the other person? I think one of the challenges, at least, is that if you just see someone online and you read a couple of things about them, and then all of a sudden you're sat across from them at a dinner table on a date, and before you basically have any evidence about whether God might be drawing you in that way towards a sacrificial service of this person, all of a sudden you're already there. You're already at the dinner table, the emotions and the attachments are already being elevated in really intense ways. Whereas, if that same person was worshiping in your church community, you might have observed them for months praying, worshiping, serving others, just having good conversation in the context of the community. And then by the time you're actually sat across someone on a date, you have a much better starting point, I think, and perhaps more confidence about where it can be headed. So no sweeping statement there, but just something to take seriously and think about now. However you find someone, one of the biggest questions that we get is who should I date? 

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[00:35:00] Like what are the specific criteria that I should have on my spreadsheet, on my Google doc? And based on my experience, I would say I really went through a journey on this. And one way I put it is to reject the Christian test in the sense that I think a lot of times people have some list of 20 characteristics, maybe more, that they're looking for. And that someone happens to be a Christian is like number 14 or something. It's just like one of the 20 characteristics that's significant. And then almost kind of like, is this person saved? Are they a Christian? Are they a believer? Yes. Okay. We can check that box. Now we move on to kind of the other elements. And I remember a specific conversation that I had. It was a group of us in a car, a couple guys, a couple girls in college, we were actually headed down to a mission trip to a Christian group. And somehow the topic of dating came up and I turned to one of the young women a couple years older and I said, well, what do you look for in a guy? And I kind of mentally had my notepad out and I was like, that's great, she can give me like 20 things and I'll take all my notes. I'm getting the inside scoop here. And she just she looked me dead in the eye, and she said, "An awesome heart for God." Full stop. Period. The way she said it I kind of, like, waited for a bit. 

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Jo Vitale [00:36:35] And after that? 

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Vince Vitale [00:36:37] Okay. All right. Cool. That's number one, but what about the other 19 points? And that was all she was saying. And it really had an impact on me. And I found over time that I kind of started with all these things in my head, and that list just got narrower and narrower, but also deeper and deeper. And at the end of the day, really what I was longing for, if it was in God's will, was somebody who loved him deeply, who loved his church deeply, and who might even love me deeply. There's so much else that just pales in comparison to those three things. And so I would look in that way, an awesome heart for God. And maybe one other way to say it is just someone who is fully surrendered to God, not just someone for whom you could check off that box and say, yeah, they're Christian, but are they fully surrendered to God? Nothing off limits to him. You need that surrender in marriage because you do not know what's coming. You have no idea what's coming in your life. You have no idea what God might ask of you. Just read through the Bible and see the things that he asked of people unexpectedly. You have no idea what he might ask of you, and you do not want to wind up caught between the will of God and the will of your spouse, because those two things are not aligned if he or she is not fully surrendered to God. So make sure that the first thing that you look for is someone who is fully surrendered to God. And you know in your heart, if God asks us to do something, then this person is going to joyfully, even if it's painful, say, yes, that is what we will do. 

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Jo Vitale [00:38:16] Yeah, I'm so glad your list of 20 criteria got whittled down to three. I'm pretty sure the other 17 I was not coming up strong. 

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Vince Vitale [00:38:25] No way. Not a chance. 

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Jo Vitale [00:38:29] Do you want it enough or you thought it wasn't going to be me?

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Vince Vitale [00:38:29] I disagree with that. 

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Jo Vitale [00:38:30]  Anyway, but what Vince is just said about having an awesome heart for God is just so relevant to this question of whether Christians to date non-Christians. And people get really stuck on this. It's not that there's some kind of arbitrary rule here. I think you can hear that. And sometimes people say that is so judgmental. Like you're saying, well, no one else is good enough. But it's not about that. It's not about saying some people are better than other people. It's not about who we shouldn't be looking to date. It's about who we should be looking to date. Because if Jesus has his rightful place in our lives, if we think the whole purpose of life is to get to know God and to fall more deeply in love with him. If he is the lens through which everything about us and where we're headed makes sense, then it's actually only natural that we're going to need to be able to share Jesus with whoever it is that we're dating. It's super uncomfortable if one person thinks that there are two people in your relationship, and then it turns out there are actually three. I mean, that's an awkward conversation. If you sign up for just the two of you, that's going to come as a bit of a shock. But at the heart of the Christian relationship, God is there. And in a very real sense, Christ is at the center of a marriage between a Christian man and a Christian woman. 

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[00:39:43] And so if the goal of intimacy within your marriage is actually to be helping each other, to be constantly moving closer to God, if one person in the relationship doesn't even want God in that marriage, in that relationship, it's just not going to work. You're aiming in different directions. If Jesus is how you define your life, if he's central to your life in that way, then it doesn't make sense to be with someone who's going on a different trajectory. I can remember there was a point in my life when I was dating somebody who didn't really want Jesus at the center of their life in the way that I did. And I can remember at the time someone prayed for me, and they just shared how as they were praying what came to mind was like a picture of a three legged race, like on a field sports day or whatever. I don't know what you call that in America, like a school sports day, when you're tied together to someone else and you're in a race and you have to run together. But their point was not only in this relationship you're running at a different stride, but actually if you're tied together with somebody who doesn't love Jesus, when that's what you're trying to do, you're actually running in opposite directions. They were going left. I was going right. And you're pulling opposite ways. You're just going to land on a heap. Like you're not going anywhere. You know, there's a sense in which if you don't understand Jesus, you can't understand me. Like, my life isn't going to make sense to you. And so, of course, I actually need to date or marry someone who's able to understand me. 

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Vince Vitale [00:41:04] Yeah. And related to that point, I want to fulfill my wife's every desire. I do, but the only way that I can fulfill your every desire, Jo, is if your every desire is Jesus. That's the only way I've got a shot. If you feel that every one of your desires can be fulfilled in Jesus, then I can continually point you to him. If I'm trying to fulfill those desires myself, then I can't fulfill that desire of my own to fulfill your desires because I don't have a chance. But if you are someone who's surrendered to Christ and truly believe that he is everything, then I can just continually point you to him. 

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Jo Vitale [00:41:49] Yeah. That's good. And speaking about our desires, you can't really talk about dating without saying something about physical attraction. 

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Vince Vitale [00:41:59] We're going to go there? Oh, boy. Okay. 

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Jo Vitale [00:42:00] We're going there. How does that desire play into things? Because we're embodied beings. So it's always going to have a part to play. It's always going to be important to us as human beings. But I just want to be really clear here. I think physical attraction is important, but I think it should primarily be the result of relationship rather than the basis for relationship. And I've always loved the fact that when you read the book of Genesis and talk about the creation of the world, and we're repeatedly told God saw that it was good at the end of every day. God saw that it was good, but one thing I love about the Hebrew there is that that same word in Hebrew (Tov) it actually also has a secondary meaning, which means beautiful. The sense being that it's not just good, but good and beautiful, that these two things hold together. And I think that's really significant because I think that's how we should think about physical attraction and beauty as well, that actually goodness and beauty kind of belong together. I think it's a very Western notion or modern idea to really see them as distinct. You can be physically beautiful or attractive without being good in some way. 

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Vince Vitale [00:43:07] Right. 

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Jo Vitale [00:43:07] And I think our language, we do serious disservice to people when we use the words like hot. When you call somebody hot because you're not making any comment on their character., the comment on appearance is completely disconnected from who they actually are. And that's what makes that objectification. I wrote a PhD on beauty in the Old Testament and it used to drive me mad when people come and ask me the question, well, who's the hottest woman in the Bible then? Never ask me that question. 

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Vince Vitale [00:43:34] Noted. 

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Jo Vitale [00:43:35] Because it's not a category that the Bible talks about people in. There's not a single woman in the Old Testament who's called ugly or in the New Testament. It's not language that is used to describe the way that people look. It's just not a category that women are being examined through in that sense. And so I just think there's something about that good and that beauty and even the way language comes together in the Hebrew there that is so rich because one illuminates the other. I would say my attraction to Vince is very physical, but it's illuminated by who he is. We joked earlier that 15 years in everything goes downhill. But that beauty of attraction because it starts from the heart, actually, it means that I can find him more attractive as the years go by every year because I know who he is. And so I see who he is shining through all of it. The little things would mean nothing else to anybody, but to me they mean so much. I love the random freckles on his shoulder or the way he talks with his hands or the way when he laughs his nose really crinkles. 

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Vince Vitale [00:44:41] Does not. 

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Jo Vitale [00:44:43] It crinkles. But those things are infinitely precious to me because they're his. And in them I see who he is shining through, the way that he moves through the world with strength and conviction. I see his joy and his kindness. And so, yes, it's physical, but it's not on the basis of some random worldly standard of what is hot and what is not, but on the fact that those are the physics of him. 

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Vince Vitale [00:45:06] Yeah. And thank God for that, because apparently your nose and your ears don't stop growing, so you got that to look forward to. Okay, let's push a little deeper into this. If you're single and open to marriage, here I think is a really hard question worth wrestling with. It was really, actually significant for me in a season to wrestle through this question. Are there people who you wouldn't date because they aren't good-Looking enough? And be honest with yourself, with the instinctive answer of your heart. Because for most people, the answer to that question is yes. And that is true inside or outside of the church. But as far as I can tell-- and if you if you disagree, at the end you can write into us and we'd love to hear it and be challenged. But I just don't think that that's a Christian answer. I don't think that is a biblical answer. It really seems to me like that is us being enslaved to the world's standards. And that's showing favoritism, which the Bible speaks against so strongly. And it bothers me when all the good looking people wind up with all the good looking people, like, in terms of what our culture says is good looking. And the people who aren't as good looking tend to wind up with people who aren't as good looking. And we find it so odd. Jo said it before, like, if you're a seven why they wind up with a 10. We find it so odd if that happens. And that seems to me so fickle. God is not constrained by our random cultural perceptions of what counts as good looking and what doesn't. I mean, sometimes that complete opposites from one region of the globe to another region of the globe, whether being bigger is beautiful or whether being thinner is beautiful. But sadly, this doesn't appear to be any different in the church. We seem to be constrained more by the cultural perceptions of our time and place than by this union of goodness and beauty that we see in the biblical terminology and the biblical vision. 

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[00:47:10] And so, in my opinion, physical attraction is something that should primarily come after you're attracted to someone's character and faith. There may be that instinctive attraction before, but the primary lasting physical attraction comes on the heels of that. You find yourself attracted to someone's awesome heart for God and for others. And then all of a sudden you really like the way the person walks. You find her posture appealing, her smile, her voice becomes attractive, her mannerisms, all of these things. And, again, as Jo has said, don't get me wrong, this is a very physical attraction. I'm not being a Platonist here and saying the physical isn't important, just look on the inside, it's all spiritual. I'm not saying that at all. I'm just saying that it is imperative for our physical attraction to be a godly physical attraction, one that actually can increase over time. And that's going to be a challenge as we get older if we don't have this. So what if your wife or husband were to get severely disfigured, would you just resign yourself to being less attractive to them? No. Here's a crazy thought. What if they just got older? No, we're not going to just resign ourselves to being less attracted to a person. But the way that we have found physical attraction has worked in the confines of our marriage as we have gotten to know each other's character, each other's faith, the more deeply we have, the more those things have become symbolized in these physical aspects of what we see in each other. The smile, the crinkled nose, Jo's ears. I got to say something about her now because she said about me. Jo's ears that wiggle when she smiles, I love that. And there's something even about her character that gets symbolized in the way she physically operates in the world, and that's an attraction that can be lasting no matter how many years we're together. 

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Jo Vitale [00:48:57] Yes, my ears will always wiggle. 

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Vince Vitale [00:48:59] Yes. 

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Jo Vitale [00:49:00] But I think we need to be really serious about this and really honest about the struggles here, because our whole lives we have been conditioned to see the world and to see people a certain way. And we're constantly, constantly being fed imaging everywhere saying there is a standard of beauty and that we need to measure up against it ourselves, and we need to measure everyone else against it as well. And it becomes addictive, doesn't it? I mean, it leads to not only the way that we see the people around us, but it leads into pornography and it leads into all kind of addictions that we get into about physical attraction and physical appearance. And we need real hot work here, and we need real help here, particularly if we want to have healthy relationship with other people. And I think that requires, first and foremost, complete honesty and vulnerability. If you are struggling in this area, if you're struggling with pornography or other ways of distorting the place of physical attraction in a faithful relationship, we've really got to face that and we have to bring it before the Lord. But you also need to bring it up in the relationship that you're in, because it so easily becomes a form of unfaithfulness to the person that you're with. And it's really important that if you're thinking about marrying somebody-- you know Paul even talks in the New Testament about our bodies belonging to one another, about becoming one flesh in a really deep sense. And so you need to share with somebody what you're doing with your body, because that's going to be their body someday. 

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Vince Vitale [00:50:23] Right. 

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Jo Vitale [00:50:23] They're literally going to own your body. They have a right to know how you're using it and what you're doing with it, whether it's with your eyes or anything else. And so I just think this is really key for us. We sort of pretend we don't have problems in this area. Or we think, well, now I'm dating somebody, that'll solve my problem. Like that'll solve my pornography problem because I can just put that person in the place of this addiction. It doesn't work that way. If you can't be faithful outside of a relationship, then how are you going to be faithful in it? Like marriage doesn't fix porn problems. Only God can fix these things. Only he is able to actually deal with these addictions. They may go away for a time if you stick someone else in the place of them, but when you come to struggles in your marriage or a challenging time, you just fall right back into it if you haven't actually dealt with the root of it. So all of these things about how we see the world, about how we see other people, what's even been wired into our brains through the things that we've been watching and how that is formed us. Some of this stuff goes really, really deep, and we have to be honest about that because it's increasingly problematic in our culture. It's increasingly easy to access. It's increasingly impacting people's relationships and their marriages. And so I think we really need to have some honest conversations about what the impact is on us and how we get free, and what freedom actually looks like and what faithfulness looks like. 

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Vince Vitale [00:51:40] Yeah. And just one additional thought on what you've said, is if you're thinking about entering into even just a dating relationship with someone, I actually think if you're struggling with something like pornography or an addiction of some sort that's related to sexuality, I think you need to disclose that early. Because I think a person has a right to know if there's someone who's dating as a Christian, seeing this as something that ultimately would be a pursuit or a hope of marriage, even in that early stage, I think that they have a right to know as they take those initial steps, because it's not fair to someone to just sort of ease into the relationship and not going to share this for a while; now all of a sudden the emotional attachments are really strong, but all potentially under the assumption that this significant thing is not there. And then by the time someone gets to the point where they're discerning about marriage, all of a sudden you're throwing a big wrench into a situation that already has a lot of emotions and attachments related to it. So I would just say that person, if it is the right person for marriage-- Jo and I confessed things to each other early in our dating relationship, and I think we had more trust from each other and we earned more credibility with each other because we shared those things early on and didn't just hope that, look, if we are in a relationship for a year and the emotions get intense enough, then kind of the person won't want to step out of it so now we can share this thing. 

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[00:53:07] Do the right thing, share it at the start. Trust that God can, if it's right, bring forgiveness out of confession and move forward in that way. The other thing I would say is just to say, we all need to take this seriously, and we are all complicit in the sexual immorality that is absolutely plaguing our society and the church. And so I'm not looking down my nose at anyone. None of us should be doing that. All of us should be asking, how am I complicit in what's taking place? Even more so in such a visual time, in a social media time, it's devastating, and we are blind to some of the ways that we contribute. It was just not long ago when I was watching a show on Netflix, and I can't even remember what show it was and two people started kissing on the show, and I wouldn't normally think that was a big deal. And all of a sudden it hit me, like, these two people are married to other people. And it like smacked me in the face because I was like, how did I not even think? I did not even think about that. Well, I just get drawn into watching something. And here are these people having a pretty passionate kissing scene and they're married to other people. And I'm not trying to make some sort of big statement about what's right and wrong here, I'm just trying to make a statement about myself that as a Christian, I don't think it's okay that I have watched innumerable episodes where that takes place and it hasn't even clocked for me. Whoa! That's something to think really seriously about. I am paying money for a subscription in order to receive entertainment by two people who are married to other people kissing each other. Like, okay, I got to take that to prayer and maybe I got to make some different decisions about how I spend my money and how I use my time. None of us are apart from this plague that is happening, and we all need to take it really seriously how we're involved, what our responsibility is moving forward. 

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Jo Vitale [00:55:18] Yeah. That's a good segue into this area and in all areas. It's a good question to always be asking, like, how am I complicit and what are the things I need to own up to and to say sorry for? I would just say this in terms of thinking through who do you date? Who do you marry? Maybe for me, this might be the biggest character thing that I would want to look for. It's are you with somebody who actually is able to be repentant? I guess would be the way I would put it. We've all heard the phrase love means never having to say I'm sorry. Biggest lie ever. That's the biggest lie ever. Just so unhelpful. Jesus said the exact opposite. He said it's the one who's forgiven much who loves much. It's when you've been forgiven much that you love much. And so I just think fundamental to who you want to date is somebody who understands themselves at the very core of who they are to be a forgiven person, that being absolutely fundamental to that identity. And I think we can kind of lose sight here because often when you're dating somebody, you in this kind of season of like rose tinted glasses, you never argue, when there are tensions you sort of sweep them under the carpet. And then it can be only when you get married that suddenly things start coming up that you didn't expect. You're living with someone in a different way. You're doing relationship in a much more intense way. And suddenly there are areas of conflict in your life that you may not have experienced in your dating relationship. And at that point, it suddenly dawns on you, oh my goodness, it's really important that we know how to do conflict. But often it's the area that we're worst in and the area that we least practice deepest in our relationships. And one way to think about it is marriage is a decision about who you want to do conflict with for the rest of your life. Because there are always going to be areas where you're going to see things differently and disagree, and you're going to get things wrong, and sometimes you need to challenge each other. 

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[00:57:10] And so who do you want to be in that with? And so many marriages fail I think because we just never learn how to do conflict well. There's a friend of ours who shared with us a while back that when she'd asked her mom as a child, "What should I look for in the man that I want to marry?" That her mom had responded, "Look for someone with a listener's heart." I remember thinking that is just such good advice for life. Somebody who's actually able to really hear what you have to say, who doesn't just instinctively respond defensively if you raise something that's hard to hear. That instinct isn't to contradict you or to shut you down or to ignore you or to pass over you, but who really lessens and particularly can listen if you're bringing in a challenge or if you're saying something hard or something that might bring them to conviction. And perhaps one way to think about this in terms of relationships, this one really practical piece of advice that we try to implement in our marriage is to never stop at just saying, I'm sorry. First it sounds good. Okay, you said you're sorry. That's great. But actually sorry in itself it doesn't give up control, does it? It's just a statement of how you feel. It doesn't really make you vulnerable. It doesn't really require that you humble yourself before someone else. In fact, sometimes I'm sorry depending on the tone you say it in, could actually be a very defensive thing. Like, oh, I'm sorry. You kind of shut it down before you have to have the conversation or really own it. I said I'm sorry, so you got to let it go. But actually it doesn't really do the work, does it? So perhaps instead of saying, I'm sorry, one thing you can say is just to ask for forgiveness instead. To actually live out the gospel that you both know already. It's only when you've humble yourself before God and really ask for his forgiveness that you begin to know true relationship and true life, and so bring that same principle, that same gospel into your marriage by regularly humbling yourself before each other, looking each other in the eye, not just saying I'm sorry, but saying, "Will you forgive me?" Then having to vulnerably wait for a response is such a different experience, but it's such a powerful thing to have that at the center of your relationship. And then when you hear somebody ask that of you, your spouse ask that, will you forgive me? Just to be reminded of how God responded to you when you asked him that question and to be reminded of his lavish, unconditional forgiveness that he's given you and that overflowing love and grace that he has shown you. 

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[00:59:34] And then to be able to pull that out on somebody else, it's such a powerful thing. So I would just say, when you're thinking about who to date, one really good question to ask is perhaps when have I ever seen this person truly repent and ask for forgiveness? If you can't think of an incident where you've actually seen them respond to a challenge or conviction by really owning it and really apologizing, then that actually might be a big red flag. A lot of people you can point to all sorts of things about the character where they look really great on the surface or really humble or all sorts of things that look great, but have you seen them say sorry and really mean it and really live into it? And if you haven't, just be really cautious because that's going to be such a key part of your marriage. So if it's not present in them, it's going to be very challenging. So much of marriage, about conforming to the image of Christ is that it becomes a process of iron sharpening iron. Vincent talk all the time about how marriage shines a spotlight on your sin. It really shows up all the things in your life that you were blind to, that suddenly someone else sees all of it and you see it and it gets really ugly at times like, oh, I can't believe it's this bad and this ugly. And all of these things I never even saw about myself. But so you need to be able to be with someone who can look at those things and not feel threatened and shut down or live in denial, but actually who's excited by the opportunity to grow, to repent, to become more like Christ, to hear the challenge and doesn't see it as a threat, but actually as a gift. 

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Vince Vitale [01:01:04]  Yeah. Because I don't care who you're marrying. You're marrying a sinner, right? I actually think it's one of the most significant things that we did in our marriage when we banned I'm sorry from the relationship and said actually, again, not to make a sweeping statement. Like that phrase is always wrong, but we just found for ourselves we could throw around I'm sorry as kind of like a statement of how we feel. You're still retaining control. You just sort of say the words. But instead to have to ask, we've made a rule I have to say, when I've wronged you, "Will you forgive me?" And it's like it's vulnerable. It makes me humble myself. And then I have to wait in silence for your response. And that means I really need something from you. I really need your forgiveness. So we commend that. We commend that to you if you're in a relationship, that may be a blessing to you as well. Let me try to just bring this episode to a close. Part of what we're trying to say is that there's a stark chasm, a vast chasm, a stark divide between a vision for relationships that is worldly and not of God, and then one that is a beautiful gospel vision that Jesus provides for us in the scriptures. I heard this quote yesterday and it was "Marriage is like real estate. It's the house you built, and sometimes your tastes change.". 

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[01:02:29]  And I thought, oh, that is so depressing. And how could you ever have any confidence, any trust, any hope in this fickle, broken, changing world? I'm just so on my knees grateful that with God, marriage and all of our relationships are called to be something so much grander than that. One of my favorite stories that always sticks with me is about how one of my best friend's parents first started dating. His mom had just gone through a terrible season of life, and her girlfriend, her friend, suggested going on a road trip together. And so the road tripping in this convertible, wind blown, no makeup, just divorced, eight months pregnant, an emotional wreck. Okay. And happens to bump into my friend's dad. And right there in that conversation, he asked her to coffee. And that was the first date. And, years later, my friend remember saying to his dad after he had heard the details of the story. He said, "Dad, mom must have looked terrible. What were you thinking?" And I think there's a lot of wisdom and beauty in his dad's response, he looked at his son and he said, "Well, I wasn't looking for someone perfect. I was looking for someone I could love." And thank God that he wasn't looking for someone perfect, he was looking for someone he could love for you and for me, and not because of what he needed from us, but because of what he could give to us. And this Valentine's Day, let us find joy in extending to another the same wonderful grace that we have received. That's all we have time for today. Thanks for being with us on Ask Away. Keep listening to hear how you can send us your questions. We love receiving them. And happy Valentine's Day! 

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Jo Vitale We’re so glad you joined us for Ask Away.

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Vince Vitale If you have a question that needs answering, we’d love to hear it.

Send us an email at askawayquestion@gmail.com or call and leave a voicemail at 321-213-9670.

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Jo Vitale Ask Away is hosted by Vince and Jo Vitale, and produced by Studio D Podcast Production.

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Vince Vitale New episodes come out regularly, so make sure to subscribe.

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Jo Vitale The best way you can support Ask Away is to leave a review. All you have to do is open up the podcast app on your phone, look for Ask Away, scroll down until you see “Write your review” and tell us what you think. 

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Vince Vitale See you next time. And remember, if you have a question, it’s worth asking.

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