President/Founder, Inspiration for Women Ministries, non-profit, non-denominational counseling center, since 2005
B.A., Christian Counseling, Cornerstone University
M.A., Clinical Counseling, Calvary Theological Seminary
Married, 25 years to her husband, Del
Children: Tess, 25, and Tad, 21
Jason and Leah Jackson agreed to
take Kim’s challenge to cook for 4 nights and share their experience with Kim on The 700 Club.
Jason is the music pastor at Faith Alive Church, in Chesapeake, Virginia.
Jason and Leah married almost 3 years ago and have an 18-month-old son, Jaden. The couple just found out recently that they are expecting another child.
Guest
Kim Reutzel: 'Kissing and Cooking' for Couples
By Mimi Elliott
The 700 Club
CBN.com
– KEEPING IT SPICY
Kim met her husband, Del Reutzel, when she was 18 and he was 20. They met through friends who were hanging out. Those friends never went out again, but Del and Kim got married! With her background in counseling, Kim wanted to give biblical advice to women who were going through divorce but couldn’t afford counseling. Soon men even started coming into see her.
“A lot of men’s issues were marital,” Kim said.
Also, a few marriages in their community had disintegrated at the same time. Kim wanted to do something to keep her own marriage from failing.
“I knew I needed to develop something, not only for my life, but for others,” Kim said.
One day, Kim was watching a cooking show and solutions to keep her marriage spicy danced in her head.
“Could we cook together?” Kim asked herself. “I was not a domestic goddess, so what was I thinking?”
Kim realized she had to think of something to entice her husband to participate. She would make his favorite lasagna dinner. So, she planned this first kissing and cooking night. Del’s job was to simply make sure a lot of kissing got done. He obliged.
On the day of their cooking date, Del and Kim teased each other all day.
“Things started to get hot in the kitchen and it wasn’t from the oven!” Kim said.
Before their date, Kim even planned on asking questions to stimulate conversation and intimacy. The questions were designed to go outside their normal everyday conversation.
“We both learned new and interesting things about each other and had a lot of fun,” Kim said. “We left with a new understanding and bond to each other.”
KISSING AND COOKING
What started as a kissing and cooking date night, became the solution for Kim’s desire to help other couples. The date night starts out with tasks for him and for her. There is a menu and list of ingredients to purchase ahead of time. There are exchange cards to fill out and give each other during dinner.
“It helps to give positive feedback to each other,” Kim said.
She says cooking together and working to create the meal is good for a marriage, too.
“It’s putting the meal together for the common good,” Kim said.
Kim designed the meal so that cooking won’t take longer than an hour and both participate. If only one person can cook because of time constraints, then Kim suggests taking the book to the table to ensure conversation takes place.
Kim says marriages take work. So many times, a wonderful wedding is planned but not much effort goes into ensuring that there is a wonderful marriage.
“There will be tough times we need to work through,” Kim said.
One thing she and Del agree on is to disagree.
“Basically, I call it throwing in the towel,” Kim said.
There are times when couples simply cannot resolve an issue.
“The best thing a couple can do is discuss it later when there is less anger,” she said.
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