Loving The Fight Marriage Podcast

Episode 177 | What If Today Was Your Last Day?

• Travis Rosinger and Dawn Rosinger

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Your reading this so that must mean that your alive! Do you realize what a gift that is? The life you are enjoying today is something other people aren't experiencing. They never made it out of yesterday. Their life ended, but yours continued. That isn't just a gift, it's a blessing from God! So, you're alive today but what if you knew you wouldn't be alive tomorrow? What would you do differently today? What would you say, what intentional actions would you take, and where would you go? One thing is true, if all of us knew that today was our last day, we would probably live differently!! Your last day is coming some day. So, why wait?

Join hosts, Travis and Dawn Rosinger, as they highlight recent experiences about dealing with married couples who were facing life and death. They share what a potential "last day" might look like and challenge married couples who are listening to make those kind of changes today, regardless of how many moments or years they might have left. This is a sobering, must listen episode you won't want to miss!!

Travis and Dawn Rosinger are the Loving The Fight Marriage Podcast Hosts and Authors of the books, Verbalosity - 7 Steps to a Verbally Generous and More Fulfilling Marriage and their newest book, Gripping -  What Matters Most | A Life and Relationships That Hold on to You


For more information about Travis and Dawn Rosinger go to Loving The Fight

Dawn Rosinger:

How cool that this morning, our eyes popped open, our hearts were beating and air continued to flow in and out of our lungs. What a gift. If you are listening today, you have received another day of life, one of the greatest gifts anyone can be given. How cool is that? With that, I want to welcome you to the Loving the Fight Marriage Podcast. My name is Dawn and I'm sitting here today, breathing and alive, with my husband and co-host, travis.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, hey, welcome everyone. We're so glad that you're tuning in and, dawn, I'm glad that you're breathing and you're alive.

Dawn Rosinger:

Yes, and I'm glad that you're alive next to me too.

Travis Rosinger:

Well, I don't look alive. When I first wake up in the morning I kind of look like the walking dead.

Dawn Rosinger:

But anyway, yes, I'm alive. Why, though, you don't have hair? It's not like your hair's sticking up Like what I had hair it used to stand straight up because.

Travis Rosinger:

I'm a violent sleeper, I flop around a lot, but no, no, you're right, like I'm alive and I'm awake and I'm so glad to be here and wow, it's a wonderful day it is, the sun is out and we're breathing and we are alive.

Dawn Rosinger:

Yeah, we need to celebrate that every day.

Travis Rosinger:

We definitely do. This is the day that God has made. We want to celebrate it and be glad in it. Well, hey, we've had a really good week. Only there's bumps and bruises and things that don't go so well sometimes, but, man, some of the highlights that we've enjoyed this. Last week we talked about this on our podcast, but we ended up getting $1,600 in gift cards, visa gift cards. They got mailed to us because we allowed ourselves to get bumped from a flight yeah, from.

Dawn Rosinger:

Delta. And they suddenly showed up on our front step yesterday. Yeah, just a few days later we got them electronically given to us. But we had the option to order them real and we wanted the real ones so we could put them in our wallet and use them. But they came.

Travis Rosinger:

They're here Like just a few days later.

Dawn Rosinger:

It's crazy to look that we have $1,600 in gift cards. Oh my gosh, just because we're willing to wait a few extra hours, go on another plane so we could sit together.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, so fun. What a blessing from God. So it was fun to actually see those like physically. But also this week we get to celebrate our daughter's birth. Talk about celebrating a day or life man just celebrating her 27 years. I believe on this earth that's amazing.

Dawn Rosinger:

And I know one thing that we've done in our lifetimes. Not everyone celebrates birthdays, but we do. We feel like life is a gift and we want to make sure that we are celebrating our kids and each other. So every time there's a birthday, we stop and we honor that person on that day and celebrate them and love on them.

Travis Rosinger:

Oh, we have to. I think it would be a crime if we didn't. It's so important when it comes to you know, when you lose people, to stop and, you know, have a memorial service or celebration of life service. But when people are alive, we also especially should celebrate them. It's so good and we had a chance to. I know, Don. I got to spend some time with my parents just hanging out, talking to them, connecting, and then we got to go see your mom, Don. That was so much fun.

Dawn Rosinger:

Yeah, but sure was. She recently moved into an assisted living so we were able to go over their goal on a short walk and get her some treats and just hang out and have a donut with her and just really spend some time chatting, which was great.

Travis Rosinger:

And we didn't have coats on it.

Dawn Rosinger:

It felt like it was 70, 80 degrees that day, and it's a beautiful day.

Travis Rosinger:

Big deal for us because it's supposed to be winter and there's no snow and we don't wear coats. We're trying to get used to this, loving it.

Dawn Rosinger:

Of not having snow, and it's great.

Travis Rosinger:

It's a good oddness. I'll take it every year.

Dawn Rosinger:

Well, many of you guys know from listening to our podcast that we are both pastors and we love what we do. We are in a great church, surrounded by some incredible people, and we get to spiritually challenge and encourage people every single day. That's what we get to do with our lives. It's incredible.

Travis Rosinger:

It's so much fun.

Dawn Rosinger:

Being a pastor, though I feel like it's so fun because of all of the people that we get to interact with, that we get to meet people of all demographics male, female, every culture, rich, poor, educated, uneducated people maybe who are struggling with substance abuse and addictions, and people who are exploring Jesus and faith for the first time, or some of them for over 50 years. So just a wide range of people that we get to be a part of and interact with.

Travis Rosinger:

It's just wild the diversity, the amount of variety that God created when he breathed the breath of life into Adam and Eve became. You know what was formed. It's crazy how much of an artist God is, and it's so fun. I'm actually almost always surprised when I meet someone new and I literally hear their whole life story. I'm like, wow, I never would have guessed. It's crazy and it's just a blessing.

Dawn Rosinger:

Yeah, and honestly, such an honor to be with people. Well, not only do we get to know these people, but we get to celebrate birth and celebrate lives of people who have passed away as well. It's amazing that all that we get to be a part of.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, we're so grateful, I think you know, just to be around these amazing people that God has created and those of you that are listening right now. You need to know that you're unique, you're special and you're amazing. You are someone that God loves so much, and we love you and not just because you're listening but, we literally love you and are grateful for you.

Dawn Rosinger:

It's cool to know that God created us all in His image, right, and so God doesn't make mistakes. None of you are mistakes. We're not mistakes, and he's created us all individual and given us all gifts and talents.

Travis Rosinger:

So there's a purpose for every single one of us, yeah, and to think, you know, we're created in God's image. Like whoa those of you that are listening you got some pretty serious awesome DNA. Yeah, like God loves you so much and you're so incredible that you kind of look like an image of God, a reflection of God. So we've kind of come through an interesting season over the last couple of months.

Travis Rosinger:

As pastors, of course, we can from time to time be asked to officiate a funeral, but really there's been a fair amount to that just in the last two months two and a half months down there, you and I have been walking with people either through some type of a loss or through death itself, and they have been, you know, really an honor to be a part of, you know, to be a part of those people's lives and to help, love on them and encourage them, but be there for them and listen to them as they're grieving and dealing with loss.

Dawn Rosinger:

I know you have done and officiated a few funerals at your campus and I walked a man through hospice and his family, which eventually led to his funeral as well. But because of what we do and the people that we interact with and just dealing with loss in funerals, we are, honestly, we're very aware of life and death and we're not scared of it. We know that we all have a date, that we will someday die, and we don't need to fear it the more that you're around death and life, the more that you realize like the brevity of death and life right.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, totally Just being able to celebrate those births but then being there with people in their last moments of breath, yeah no.

Dawn Rosinger:

And again, such an honor to be a part of those moments. But with that in mind, with just like what we do and just talking about death and realizing that we don't need to be scared of it, we don't need to fear it, we just want to take a few minutes today and just talk about the frailty of life, because we understand that each day is really a gift, kind of like I started off this podcast with in the beginning. And tomorrow we may not receive that gift. When we realize that it makes how we live today matter, when we understand that life will come to an end, the choices that we make and how we treat each other today will look different.

Travis Rosinger:

It will. It should look different, and it's so important to be thinking that through the moments of every single day.

Dawn Rosinger:

You know, the Bible totally talks about this clearly in James 4, 14, where it says you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes, a way that Bible talks about we don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. Life is a vapor. If you ever look at a vapor, if you ever spray even a mess, you know it's just gone.

Travis Rosinger:

It is gone. I agree with you, don, and I just think it's so important to think through this verse. I mean, this verse is so crazy. It says you don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. What's your life? It's like a vapor and, like you just said, that vapor, that mess, it disappears in a second, quickly, so quickly. And so this verse is really inferring it's kind of slapping us in the face actually and just saying you might not be here tomorrow.

Travis Rosinger:

And so if we could swallow the pill of that, if we could think it through and allow that to impact our minds and our hearts every day, I mean it would begin to reflect our actions and how we treat others and hopefully especially our spouse, because they're the person that we're closest to. What are we saying, don? I might not be here tomorrow, you might not be here tomorrow. The world will be gone tomorrow. We need to stop and enjoy each other today. We need to celebrate each other and celebrate our moments of life today, and I think our lives would look differently because of our gratitude for things and people. I mean, as we think through this verse, it would go off the charts, it would, yes, it'd be like oh, oh, my gosh, I'm like that messed. Okay, I better really enjoy this. Next, you know scoop of ice cream.

Travis Rosinger:

Right yeah, or you know this next conversation with this friend, you know, or that we're drinking coffee at a coffee shop. Well, here's the thing, here's the challenge Be grateful for each day, for each breath, for each circumstance that God has given us and those moments with our spouse that we get to do this all with.

Travis Rosinger:

Like it's all a gift, and so is that person, that special person that God has put there with us. So we happen to think that proof of having gratefulness, or that idea that we might not be here tomorrow and that our life is like a vapor, that the proof and the results are things that we would see, and they'd be things like this, where our words would be more guarded and loving.

Dawn Rosinger:

Right, yep, if I knew that these were my last words, man, I'm gonna pick them wisely.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, yeah, and you're probably gonna use words that are encouraging, loving, right, but also our actions would be more intentional. I mean, that's the real world version of that verse, or the effect of that verse that we wouldn't just waste time or just do this because we want to, or that We'd think it through and go, whoa, this could be it, what should I do? You almost wonder. If you knew you were gonna die tomorrow, how would you live?

Dawn Rosinger:

differently today. We would completely live different. I know we would.

Travis Rosinger:

Completely and really. Another way that it would look or the result or the effect would be that we would let the petty things go and not allow them to bother us so much. We'd be like, okay, well, that's them not on me, who cares?

Dawn Rosinger:

The driving, the toilet seat, the way you drink and gulp like little things that are so goofy I wouldn't even think twice about that.

Travis Rosinger:

We wouldn't. Yeah, yeah. I think Elon Musk once said life is too short to hold long-term grudges.

Dawn Rosinger:

Oh, that's good.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, and it's like, oh, come on, just let it go. Let it go because life is short. Forgiveness, of course, would come easier if we were living each moment, knowing it could be our last and our marriage would be on a mission together, which is what it should be. It should be yep. Dr Martin Luther King Jr once said life's most persistent, an urgent question is what are you doing for others? And that is our question to ourselves today, that is our question to all of you that are listening what are you doing for others? And especially knowing that your life could be gone tomorrow?

Dawn Rosinger:

Right. You know, it's crazy is when I was sitting with the man in his living room who decided to go on hospice and he knew that he only had two to four weeks to live, I didn't go and visit him and talk to him about his 401K or his stocks. I didn't talk to him about politics or how bad things in life were looking and going. You know what? We talked about his faith. We talked about what heaven would be like, what heaven would look like. We talked about the people in his life his wife, his kids, siblings, his friends and his church. That's what it all came down to. He only had just a few weeks to live and so those were the things that were just we wanted to chat about and like, really discuss and lament about and honestly be like. This is amazing, what God has given you.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, the most important things.

Dawn Rosinger:

Yeah, you know. And when I met with the family after he passed he passed away like 11 days later we planned out the funeral. I talked to them about what they love the most about their dad and what they will miss the most about their dad or their husband or their brother everyone that was in the room that day. We talked intensely about faith and I reshared this man's faith story with them and how we can know that he is in heaven because of his decision to follow Jesus and make him the Lord of his life. Those moments in that family planning when we were planning the funeral, were priceless and we only talked about the things in life that really mattered.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, yeah. And that that happened to me too, don. Right after I had officiated in the funeral of a very young woman. Her husband came up to me afterwards and he just said you know, there would be so many conversations, there'd be so many special moments, and we would just sit there and enjoy them, but he goes. It never occurred to me that they would suddenly be gone that those?

Travis Rosinger:

conversations, that those moments, why? Because she was so young, and to have him just privately pull me aside and share that, it was just powerful. It shook me up. I was glad that he shared what he was really thinking about or processing, because it made me come home and go wow, I need to be a different person and I'm not as good as I should be, but I need to hear that. I need to hear that someone who lost their young wife is devastated because those conversations and those moments are gone. They're gone forever.

Travis Rosinger:

What are we trying to say? Life is a gift. It's not perfect, it's never going to be perfect, but it's a gift. So what do we need to do? We need to cherish each moment and be intentional, especially with the words that we speak and our actions. If you're not telling the people around you that you love them, start, if you're not encouraging them and calling out the great things, the good things attributes about them, begin to speak those things and your actions. Share what's on your heart, but then put it into action. Do something with those words.

Dawn Rosinger:

The gentleman that I was visiting that was on hospice. I looked at him and said well, what a gift you actually have two weeks to a month to be able to tell and say all the things that you've even wanted to say in the past Ask for forgiveness from anyone, but just really love on people. Some people die in a car crash and they never get those moments to take words back or to say those powerful words. But he had those moments to do that. I know that's exactly what he did.

Travis Rosinger:

Yes, so priceless, so special moments. Well, in the Bible, in the book of Psalms, chapter 39, it says Lord, remind me how brief my time on earth will be, remind me that my days are numbered, how fleeting my life is. You have made my life no longer than the width of my hand. My entire lifetime is just a moment to you At best. Each of us is but a breath. We are merely shadows moving, and all of our busy rushing ends in nothing. We heap up wealth, not knowing who will spend it. And so, lord, where do I put my hope? My only hope is in you.

Dawn Rosinger:

I love those verses powerful. Unbelievably. It totally just makes us refocus to what is the most important thing that our time is brief. And where should our hope be found? It's found in the Lord.

Travis Rosinger:

It's found in Jesus Totally found in God, and I think one of the coolest things that jumps out to me here is we are merely moving shadows and all our busy rushing ends in nothing. You know what that says. It's like slow down, slow down, enjoy life. I don't know. You know all the things that you're building up. Somebody else is going to spend all that money anyway. Just slow down, enjoy life. Don't be lazy, don't just sit around, but really enjoy things and put your hope in God.

Dawn Rosinger:

I think if you are forgetting what our purpose here on life is, there's just two greatest things in life, and it's found in Matthew 22. Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment and the second is, like it, love your neighbor as yourself. You guys, love God and love people. Love God and love people and do both things very well. Jackie Robinson says this a life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives. Again, love God and love people. Make sure that you are saying the words that you want to say, having those actions to back up the words that you're saying. Love people. Will we make mistakes? Absolutely. That's when it's great to go back and say, hey, I'm sorry that I made you know, ask for forgiveness.

Travis Rosinger:

Yeah, yeah, be real.

Dawn Rosinger:

You know, ask for it, but then also extend forgiveness.

Travis Rosinger:

So how are you going to cherish your spouse today? How are you going to take what we've talked about, what you've listened to at these powerful verses and these quotes that we've given you, and just say, okay, now I'm going to put it in action? So what are you going to do? Is it, is it a text? Is it flowers? Is it a card? Is it just stopping and getting away for 30 minutes? But do something and allow that change today. Allow that be a new change for the rest of your life. Become a different person and celebrate this moment, this life, this marriage that God has given you. You are alive, and so is your marriage. Live that way.

Dawn Rosinger:

You know, life is a gift that has been given to you. It's in your hands to make the best out of it. Like I said in the beginning, when we started off this podcast, if you woke up this morning and your eyes popped open and you have air in your lungs and your heart is beating, it is a gift. Make the best of it.

Travis Rosinger:

It is. You won the lottery. You're alive. Well, hey guys, we want to thank you for listening to this episode of the Loving the Fight Marriage podcast.

Dawn Rosinger:

Remember, guys, you can do it. You got this. Keep loving the fight.

Travis Rosinger:

It was time you.