Remember madlibs? I got a kick out of madlibs for several weeks when I was about 9 years old. You fill in several blanks on a page: a noun here, a verb there, and voila! Turn the page and read your hilarious story! It seems that everything in the evangilical Disneyland that we call America now has a fill-in-the-blank answer for every problem.

Kids hate you? There’s a “Christian” book for that! Is your cat feeling particularly melancholy? There’s a “Christian” book for that! Do your co-workers think you’re incompetent? You can learn to fake your way through the work day with another “Christian” book! How convenient! It seems as if there’s a book for every single problem an evangelical could encounter, and there’s more coming off the presses every day.

I caught one such selection as I was driving to work yesterday. One of the leading evangelical “relationship” guys was recommending a book he’d read lately, called “The Scorecard: The Official Point System for Keeping Score in the Relationship Game.”

Fortunately, as you can see, you can pick this one up for pretty cheap. At least the radio host was honest enough to pick a book to recommend to his male listeners that wasn’t even trying to masquerade itself as Christian. “It’s so overtly non-Christian, you can take it to the workplace, and you won’t have to be embarrassed about it!”

After a couple of experiences in evangelical churches, I noticed many Bible studies that were centered around these sorts of books. I have an answer book that has such good advice in it, I carried it with me everywhere. Whenever an evangelical would have some sort of problem in their life, I could just take it out and flip through it, and find an answer for them. Unfortunately, whenever I would do this, their pre-millennial eyes would start to dart back and forth, in an attempt to make sure that no one was watching. Then they’d extricate themselves from the conversation as quickly as possible, making a mental note to never ask me for advice again.

It’s a great book for answers, but you’ll have trouble getting many church-goers to read it.

If you go to church every Sunday, vote Republican, and think you’re all set, and you find yourself drawn to all these “relationship” books, I have some good news for you. If your wife is “keeping score” and you’re always fighting with her, guess what! I’ve diagnosed your problem and I know how to fix your marriage! Here’s my free relationship-fixing program:

Step 1: Fall on your face. No, not in front of your wife. In front of God. Your problem isn’t that you haven’t read the right relationship book. It’s not that you’re from Venus (Or is it Pluto? Whatever.) Your problem is that you’re a self-righteous, navel-gazing sinner who’s never come to grips with the fact that you’re not really saved. Let me put this in a rather blunt fashion. You’re going to go to hell. (I know, your “bud” who delivers the message at your “church” every Saturday night never talks to you like this.) You need to fall on your face and weep over your sin before God, and pray in faith that His only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, will save you through His precious blood.

Step 2: Pray that God will save that score-keeping demon who keeps making you sleep on the couch.

There! I fixed your marriage! (That was free, by the way, no charge on that one. You’re welcome.)

On a more serious note, in every relationship counseling session my wife and I have done with couples, this ends up being the problem. One or more members of the always-fighting couple isn’t really saved. Interestingly enough, these talks usually start out as a debt counseling session. When the professing Christian can’t seem to submit their life to the will of Christ, because the cost is too high for them, it finally comes out that they’re not saved.

If you’re a Christian, you’re called to die for Christ, and for your wife. Not for your job, not for your toys, not for your truck, but for Christ and for your wife. These concepts are in that answer book that I recommended earlier, by the way. Christ died for His church, just as you are to die for your wife. I hope that puts things in perspective for you just a little bit. In an age when men can’t be bothered to open a door for their wives, the Christian man is called to lay down his life for the woman he’s married to.

Here’s an audio file from Paul Washer, a guy who seems to understand this concept very well. (The audio file is called a “sermon”, which is similar to the “message” you hear in evangelical churches every Saturday night, but with references to something called “sin”.)

If your wife is keeping score, there’s a very good chance that she is not a Christian. If you are a husband and you find yourself keeping score, ______________________.