Sir Wilfred Grenfell, the famous medical missionary to Labrador, was a fast worker when it came to falling in love. He was on board a ship returning to England when he spotted a charming lady on deck. He was 43 years old, and so it was not as though he had never spotted a charming lady before. But this woman had such an appeal to him that he proposed to her shortly after he met her. She naturally resisted saying, "But you don't even know my name." He responded, "It doesn't matter, I know what its going to be." Here was a case of love at first sight, and history is full of such romantic stories where people find their mate in a moment and live happily ever after.
Others who are equally open to God's leading have a tough time finding their life partner. Billy Graham is a prime example of this side of the coin. Graham was going steady with Emily Cavanaugh in college. He felt she was beautiful, talented, and spiritual, and he told his parents he planned to ask her to be his wife. She admired Billy a great deal, but she came to a point where she told him she had reconsidered his proposal, and she could not accept it. He was devastated and felt the world had ended.
Later Graham developed a relationship with Ruth Bell. Their love grew, but it also hit a snag. She was a missionary kid and felt God wanted her to be missionary, but Billy felt called to be an evangelist. They became engaged in 1941, but at Wheaton College Ruth told Billy she was unsure after all. There were tears and struggles before Ruth could make a commitment to be his wife. She realized he needed the balance she could give him. He was too serious, and she could add the lighter touch to his personality. They have had a long and happy marriage, but the point is, there was struggle and a lot of adjustment.
Love stories can be romantic love at first sight, or tangled webs of struggle type stories. In one of the great love stories of the Bible we have a case which is both. The story of Jacob and Rachel is a classic case of love at first sight. She came with her flock of sheep to the well, and Jacob became an instant servant by rolling away the stone from the well to impress her. A short time after he was negotiating for her hand in marriage. But the story takes on the characteristics of complexity and struggle as Laban throws his oldest daughter Leah into Jacob's bed, and thus began a lifetime of conflict and competition in Jacob's love life.
Out of this both simple and complex love story God brought forth His people-the 12 tribes of Israel, and the blood line to the Messiah, and the greatest love story of all-Christ and His bride the church. Romantic love is to be celebrated because the whole redemption plan of God's love revolves around the romance of human love. You cannot tell the story of God's love without the story of the love of husband and wife. Romance is at the very heart of God's plan of salvation, and it becomes an effort in futility to try and separate love into the sacred and the secular.
Romantic love is a vital part of the sacred plan of God to save a lost world. It is valid, therefore, to celebrate the gift of romance. God does so Himself by making romantic love such a major part of His revelation. It is exalted to the highest level in the Song of Songs where we read of romantic love in 8:6-7, "It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love it would be utterly scorned."
Jacob's love for Rachel illustrates this. He wanted her as his mate so strongly that he would work for 7 years to possess her as his own, and v. 20 says the 7 years were like only a few days because of his love for her. It was a small price to pay for such a treasure. Love was his motivation; love was his energy, and love was the fire that could not be quenched even though one wet blanket after another was thrown on its flame. There is no escape from the emotional side of love. It is a passion, or an intense feeling. The story of Christ's suffering for his bride is called a passion play. His intense feelings were a passion. Passion can be torment, and love sick people can go through torment in what they are willing to pay in terms of suffering to possess the object of their love.
I remember the risks I used to take to see Lavonne when she lived 20 miles away from me. I was a teen driving 50 dollar cars, and more than once I was broke down on the highway between her home and mine. If I had a date with her nothing else mattered but the keeping of that date. I literally risked my life to keep a date with her. Blizzard warnings were irrelevant, and I would take off in a car most people would not keep for parts, and head into the storm to get to her. In our courtship I put 18,000 miles on an assortment of junk bound cars as I traveled that 20 mile stretch over and over. I had to get out sometimes and put snow in the radiator to keep the car from burning up. I had to get help from both her father and mine to get out of the ditch. I had to suffer the torment of near worthless vehicles over and over, and all of the pain of it was nothing for the joy of being with Lavonne. I know the power of the passion to possess.
Romantic and Redemptive love have this in common-they are passions to possess. God's passion to possess fallen man, and Christ's passion to possess His lost sheep were so great that they took on infinite suffering in order to make it happen. The greatest power in the universe is the power of love. It moves and motivates persons toward more goals than any other power. It is the prime mover of God, for God is love, and because He is love He created all that is, and he provided a plan whereby fallen man can be redeemed and restored to fellowship with Himself. Love is why there is anything to celebrate at all. Love is why there is a heaven to hope for, and why there can be joy in a fallen world.
The most powerful motive for the overcoming of any problem is love. Aleida Huissen had smoked for 50 years and tried often to quit but just could not do it. Then 79 year old Leo Jansen came into her life and proposed. He refused to set the wedding day, however, until she quit her smoking. Will power had failed her for years, but love was stronger and she was able to quit for the sake of love. Love was the passion that gave her the power to do what she could not do without love. A. Z. Conrad said of love, "It furnishes to the world its progress passion. It is storm-defying, energy-conquering, venture-challenging, soul-awakening. It eats up the fires sent to consume it. It swallows the floods sent to drown it."
If we love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength, it will not be hard to give up anything that interferes with that love. If we cannot do it we lack the love that give us the power of passion. If we cannot give up things that hinder our relationship with our mate, it is a sign that we have let the passion of love drain away. When we lose the passion of love we lose the power that makes all relationships the priority they need to be.
Jacob loved Rachel, and when a monkey wrench was thrown into their lives, and he had to work another 7 years to possess her, he did it for his love for her kept her in the place of priority. This love story is like many of the classic romance stories of literature. It is often like a tragedy. Rachel had to fight the battle of the other woman, which was her own sister. She had to watch as Leah gained status by giving Jacob children she could not give him. She eventually bore him his beloved Joseph, but she never won the competition to give him the most children. She also died before Leah and Leah got to be buried with Jacob in the end. There were a lot of tears in this love story, but it is still a beautiful and powerful story of passion and priority that should motivate us who have less complex lives to celebrate the joys of love.
The passion of Jacob for Rachel was persistent through all of the changes of life. Rachel did not stay the cute little shepherdess she was the day they met, and the day he fell in love with her. In chapter 30 she became a jealous wife and a nag. She wanted children so badly that she became obsessed, and Jacob had to get angry with her. Later she stole her father's idols, and she risked getting Jacob into serious trouble. It was not a trouble free marriage at all. Both had blemishes on their character, but they never ceased to put each other in a place of priority. "Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds."
As monogamists we think we only marry one mate, but the fact is we all marry a number of people because our mates keep changing, and we have to adjust to these changes and learn to love a different person than the one we married. Through the years all mates change, and sometimes it can be hard to adjust, for your mate may not be the person now that you expected them to be for life. You have to fall in love again with a new person. Those who cannot adjust to changes in their mate often get divorced. All couples go through what is called divorce periods where they are in the process of deciding if they love the new and different people they have become. This is where love is again the power that keeps them together. If love is allowed to fade, and there is no effort to rekindle the flame of passion, there is a danger that they will part. Those who make it through these periods do so because they work at rekindling the flame. Those who neglect love and just drift tend to drift apart completely. Divorce is a refusal to remarry the new person your mate has become. Long-range marriage is a commitment to keep on marrying the mate you have no matter how often they change.
Here is the other side of love that goes beyond the feelings and emotions of passion to the act of the will. Love on this level is a matter of choice. In Gen. 30:2 Jacob is angry at Rachel. He is no longer filled with passion to roll away stones for her, or to labor for 7 years for her. He now has negative emotions, and he wonders how she can be so ridiculous as to hold him responsible for her barrenness. If love was only passion and positive emotions, Rachel could have been divorced at this point, but Jacob's love was a commitment to her to love her even when she was totally unreasonable. One sided definitions of love that stress it to be a feeling fall far short of the real thing. Some have defined love this way:
1. "A tickling sensation around the heart that can't be scratched."
2. "Love is a dizziness that won't let me go about my bizziness."
Such feeling oriented definitions lead to serious problems when people take them as the whole picture, for these feelings may be real for a time but they do not persist, and if people expect them to always be present they will feel that love has left them and they will move on to find it again with someone else. Feeling oriented love will lead people into affairs, for people can have strong feelings, and even passion for complete strangers who are attractive. If you let this kind of feeling and passion be your guide you will never have a lasting relationship of love. Love is commitment and choice to be loyal to one person even when the feelings are not there.
The world's advice is to find a new partner when you come to a divorce period in your relationship. This is a rejection of the other side of love which is commitment. Commitment is what enables love to bridge the divorce period in marriage. The feelings cannot leap that gorge, and so two people are cut off from each other unless there is some other means by which they can remain in contact. Commitment is that means. Eliminate commitment and live only on feeling love, and you can count on being a statistic, for divorce is almost inevitable where there is no commitment.
Commitment is a choice. If I commit to turning right I cannot also turn left. Every commitment means a loss of some other choice. If I choose to be faithful to one person I cannot also choose to play the field. But on the other hand, if I choose to play the field I cannot ever again choose to have been faithful to one. Everybody has to give up something, and so the wise person looks at the record of where different choices lead. Our promiscuous people the happiest people? Are prostitutes noted for being the happiest partners in wedded bliss? Does anybody give the playboy highest marks in being the example for youth to follow? The facts are that two people committed to one another for a lifetime are always the ideal of what love is all about. This is the kind of love that continues to grow, and makes a poet like A. Warren writes,
We could not know, my dear, we could not guess
How years augment the miracle of love;
How autumn brings a depth of tenderness
That is beyond young April's dreaming of!
How there would burn a richer flame some day
Then that which first threw glory on our way.
The Bible makes it clear that God's ideal is two people who fall in love and passionately seek to possess each other, and spend the rest of their lives committed to weather all storms, and keep that passion alive until they are parted by death. This means that marriage is not a gamble. It is a sure thing that it is going to be costly. Love is a commitment to pay that cost of maintaining the relationship. The Jacob-Rachel love story shouts out for all of history to hear that bad times, conflict, and obstacles do not destroy a love which has gone beyond feelings to commitment. The reason the world is full of people who once loved each other, but are now divorced is because of a one sided love, which is passion that never developed the other side of commitment.
The number one secret of a strong marriage is the assurance that your mate is committed to you. You can fail them, and get angry at them, but you know they are committed to you. This is the solid rock on which marriage is built. Jesus said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." And Paul said, "Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." This is the foundation for security in our faith. When you have that kind of security in your marriage you build on solid rock and not on sand. Lack of commitment leads to insecurity. If we had no assurance that Christ's love was permanent in spite of all our sin and failure, we could have no sense of security at all. Some polls have revealed that many Christians feel spiritually divorced, for they do not have the assurance they will go to heaven. They have a very unhappy spiritual marriage. Mates who do not feel secure are also unhappy, for they feel their failure could lead them to be forsaken. Commitment is what makes mates realize their failure will not ever lead to being forsaken. It can be costly to make such a commitment, but it is worth it for those who want the full potential of love in their relationship.
When we celebrate love we need to see it as a matter of rejoicing in the cost two people have been willing to pay to keep their relationship alive and growing. Jacob had to give up always feeling the energy of his passion to labor for Rachel, and instead feel the energy of anger at her pouting and depression. She had to give up the ideal of being the one to give him his first son, and the most sons. She had to endure the heartache of barrenness. Anybody could write a script for romance better than what reality produces, but reality is the price we have to pay for love in a fallen world. Nobody gets it without cost, and that even includes God. But God says, and history says, and life says, love is worth the cost. Therefore, let us rejoice in romantic and redemptive love, and celebrate love as God's greatest gift.
Here are some things I picked up, and am working on still!
Treat her as a part of you, united with one flesh.
Being a wife is a role she plays, but she is of infinite worth as a person.
If you have a bride, you have found unmerited favor with God.
Love her and sacrifice for her freely, giving up self-centeredness, because it is who you are, or are striving to be. No strings attached.
Be a good steward over her life which was entrusted to you.
Live with her and seek to always listen.
Seek to understand her heart and what makes her tick.
Providing does not end with food, clothing, and shelter.
Nurture and encourage her physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health.
Think more of her than of yourself. .
Be teachable and learn what she likes.
Let her always be the love of your life, no matter how rough it gets.
Tell here how beautiful she is, since she truly is fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God.
Treat her as La Reina, "The Queen"
Show the kids how much you love her, always.
Be involved in raising the children, not absent, get to know them too.
For the spiritually-minded:
Ask God how to bless the wife He has given to you, and to have the heart and ability to do all these things and more.
There is so much written on this topic. How can one person add to it and make a difference? My own experience began with a troubled marriage where she almost left me ( with good reasons too). It was clear that our 7 years marriage, which we thought was pretty good, paled in comparison with God's love, and it had begun to crumble, which is a good thing. It had to be torn down and rebuilt on unconditional Love. It was worth every bit of struggle and trouble! I sought God and His ways, and somehow our love grew and grew....
"Husbands, love your wives. Avoid any bitterness toward them" (Colossians 3:19).
The story is told of the discontented husband who fortunately went to a Christian friend for advice about a divorce. This wise man told him, "Go home and court your wife for a year and then tell me the result." A year later the grateful man went back to his friend and thanked him for the good counsel. The friend advised him, "I hope you will continue to court your wife as long as you live."
Authority permitted by God can quickly degenerate into authoritarianism that makes life a hell on earth for both partners. The lady of the house responds to compassion and passion, in that order. True authority leads rather than pushes; it directs rather than controls; and it requests rather than demands.
If the husband is miserly and miserable, he can hardly expect an abundant crop of love, for what we sow in the way of philos and philanthropy in the home, that will we reap in abundance of cherishment and appreciation. It is only a mean-spirited wife who will not respond to Christ in her beloved husband.
Conversely, the husband is entitled (what I call “marital entitlements”) to the same endearments. And no “that’s women’s work” or “men’s work” mentality, please. It is love that pushes the vacuum cleaner or the lawn mower when the spouse needs help. I have a beloved sister-in-law who amazes me. Her husband has been ill for quite a few years now, and she mows the lawn and does a few more of what I call the “men-chores”.
One more bit of advice, Spouses and Lovers: Don’t wait until the morning of Valentine’s Day and then run to the grocery store and buy flowers that are on sale – and then present them to your beloved while you tell him/her you found them on sale! I can guarantee you that you have gone down several notches for that one!
Love, sex, and intimacy are essential components that great marriages require for complete stability. Real love is the spiritual aspect, sex is physical and intimacy is emotional. It would be difficult to love your spouse if you only thought about yourself. This is not real love. Selfish people often have a difficult time giving of themselves, and yet, that is what love is all about. Love is more than a feeling, it is an action, and therefore, real love takes effort and sincerity.
LOVE:
In scripture, a husband is commanded to love his wife. What do you think is going to happen if that love is not a sincere love for his wife? She will feel frustration, resentment, and anger, and she will have a very difficult time submitting herself to the man she married. When a husband does not love his wife the way God has asked him to love his wife, all sorts of problems will develop in the marriage, mainly rebelliousness, and selfish thinking.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her, to make her holy, cleansing her by washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife, love himself. Ephesians 5:25-28
Husbands are commanded to love their wife for a very beautiful reason. It brings about the ideal biblical marriage that God designed himself. Marriage is a holy union, and a living symbol that needs self-sacrificing care. A husband should be willing to sacrifice everything, including himself, for his wife. He should make her well being of prime importance to him. Meaning, do whatever it takes to protect, care for, and love her, without expecting anything in return. I do not think there is a woman on this planet that if loved by their husband in this way, would fear submitting to him if he treated her in this way!
SEX:
Sex between a man and a woman in marriage can be a totally beautiful experience when real love is felt and acted upon. The sexual relationship can be a healthy and productive when both husband and wife feel good about their designated roles and positions in the marriage.
Why do some women feel that all their husbands ever want or care about is sex? If a husband is neglecting certain areas in the marriage where a woman needs to feel like a woman and feel good about who she is, then she will feel exploited and abused by her man sexually.
A woman who feels neglected in the love department will not want to have sex with her husband. A woman, who knows that she is loved in ALL areas of marriage, will not have a hard time taking pleasure in having sex with the man she married. She will not have a difficult time initiating the lovemaking either.
This is precisely why God says for a man to love his wife as Christ does the church because if a woman rejects her husband sexually, what do you think he is going to do? That's right, look elsewhere. So men, don’t neglect your wife in any area of the marriage, give away your love willingly, without wanting anything in return, protect, and care for your wife, and be willing to give everything up for her and she will submit to your love in every way imaginable to her.
INTIMACY:
Intimacy like love takes action to complete its purpose. Having a loving, giving, and sharing relationship with the person you married provides couples the closeness that marriage craves. The bonds of intimacy are shared on each level in marriage from romance, to sex, to areas of communication. Couples can feel intimate by sharing a simple conversation with one another.
Women who are loved and feel close to their husbands are more apt to be respectful and devoted wives. A woman who is truly loved will utilize all of her creative talents and god given abilities that she has been blessed with; her husband will never be in need of anything. So you can see how, love, sex, and intimacy are all desirable attributes for a healthy and productive marriage.
If you lack in one of the areas described above, discuss it with your spouse, find out together what you can do to bring out the attribute you are lacking and work on it together. I encourage you to see just how truly unique and special your marriage can be by loving and sharing yourself with each other on an intimate level.
Dear Children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.
1 John 3:18
~~~
Angie Lewis is the author of two marriage books. The first, Journey on the Roads Less Traveled is a book about love, life, addiction and marriage.
Love The Man You Married is an informative and biblically centered book tackling such issues as adultery and learning to completely forgive your spouse.
For more information on these books, visit Angie's marriage ministry at http://www.heavenministries.com and while you're there, sign up for the monthly marriage newsletter.
Nevertheless Husbands Love Your Wives
And Wives Respect Your Husbands
By Desert Rose
This is a key to a good marriage.
Not that wives should not love their husbands and husbands should not respect their wives, but God knew that worldly parents would teach men more about respect and physical strength and women more about love and vanity. The world does not teach men enough about Love and it does not teach women enough about respect.
What the world does teach is deception. It teaches that we can find love through sex and that we can find respect through equality.
To prove my point about sex and equality, take out sex and equality from any marriage and see how long it will be before you have marital strife.
What does the Bible say about sex and equality? Actually there are many things, but I will start you with a few and then you can go from there. As I have said before, Biblegateway.com is a great resource for looking up Bible verses in the Bible of your choice. You can enter key words such as marriage and find all the verses with that word in it.
In 1 Corinthians 7 Paul begins by saying that it is better not to have sex.
1 Now concerning the things of which you wrote to me:
It is good for a man not to touch a woman.
He continues on by explaining that sex is not good because the world has turned sex into sexual immorality. He also is saying that because of our sinful nature, marriage has changed and now has a new purpose.
2Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.
He then states, that in marriages, men and women should give each other the affection they need, to prevent sexual immorality.
3Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. 4The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.
Paul then tells us about himself and his gift of celibacy and how he wishes that all were like him, and would remain unmarried and celibate. He states that his opinion of marriage, is now a concession, but acknowledges that the desire for marriage can be a gift from God.
6But I say this as a concession, not as a commandment. 7For I wish that all men were even as I myself. But each one has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that.
8But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: It is good for them if they remain even as I am; 9but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.
We also have Christ's teachings. After telling his disciples about the downfalls of marriage because of sexual immorality, Christ also taught about celibacy.
Matthew 19
Jesus Teaches on Celibacy
11 But He said to them, "All cannot accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given: 12For there are eunuchs who were born thus from their mother's womb, and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He who is able to accept it, let him accept it."
So, because of our sinful nature, marriage and sex have become burdens instead of the gifts they were intended to be. And the Love that God had intended, got changed along the way.
Women were created as the weaker vessel, whether they like it or not. To respect your husband, you must accept this.
1 Peter 3
7 Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.
In a world where women have fought at the head of armies (i.e. Joan of Arc) and won Nobel Prize Awards (i.e.Marie Curie), it is hard to acknowledge them as the weaker vessel. But God uses who He wills, for His purposes, even when they are the weaker vessel. King David was a shepherd and a musician and was not the strongest of men, but he was made strong by God. God made woman comparable to man, but He had a purpose in mind for both of them.
Genesis 1
18And the LORD God said, "It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him."
28Then God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
Genesis 3
And Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.
God created woman to be the mother of all living things and He created man to provide for her and their children. In this way the mother could be devoted to the child in pregnancy, childbirth and the training years of their children (training them to be God's lights in this world). During this time the father would provide for the needs of the woman and child. In order for a man and a woman to be fruitful and multiply God gave them the gift of sex. This was a gift that He didn’t have to give, but He did and His reasons came from a Pure Mind and Heart.
It was to be an affection that would keep the husband and wife close. It was so mankind would bear children and stay together as a family unit.
Because of the hardness of our hearts, sex became selfish and the original purpose was lost for so many. Sex became the foundation for marriages and when things got rough, it was easier to give it up. Besides, young men and women weren't taught about the Love and respect they needed to keep their marriages strong.
Hopefully now you are beginning to understand where mankind went astray and how love was lost and so was respect.
And now for my purpose for this article.
My hopes are that many will realize the importance of teaching their sons not to be lovers or warriors, but to be kind, gentle and humble to the woman God created for them to Love and respect. In this way you are teaching your sons about Loving a wife. Don’t worry, history has shown us that the world will teach them how to be lovers and warriors, whether you want it for them or not.
My hopes are that many will realize the importance of teaching their daughters not to be leaders or beautiful and vain, but to be a good and humble helper and encourager to the man that God created for them to Love and respect. This is the way to teach your daughters about respecting a husband. Don’t worry, history has shown us that the world will teach them how to be leaders and about vanity, whether you want it for them or not.
God and His Son commanded us to Love God and to Love each other and this cannot be done if we do not understand God and His purpose for making all of creation. God wanted a family and He wanted His family to understand the importance of being Loving and respectful, both to Him and to each other.
So now I say to you: Love and respect God above all things, and then Love and respect each other.
Dear Lord Heavenly Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, please help parents teach Your children the things that You want them to learn and not the things that the world wants them to learn. Amen
Women are funny creatures
By Dr. Sharon Sheutz
Women are funny creatures. A woman will hide her feelings, mulling them over until she thinks herself into worry. She worries about her problems; she worries about her family, she worries about her church, her neighbors, and her job. Left unchecked, her worry turns into depression. She masks her pain, deceiving herself and everyone else, until she is ready to explode at the slightest provocation.
Does this sound like someone you know? Perhaps it is your wife. Remarkably, you, her husband, make a greater difference in her life than anyone does. By learning about a few basic needs unique to a woman’s nature, you can help her develop into the wonderful creature God designed her to be, the one you married so long ago.
A woman releases her pent up emotions through talking about her feelings. This is how she finds solutions. Generally, she will not open up until she feels she cannot endure any more pressure. It is important that she have someone she can trust, someone who will really listen when she is ready to share her feelings.
She needs a husband who will allow her to expose her heart safely, and reveal her inward self. If you will not listen to her without criticism, judgment, or rejection, she will withdraw and find someone else to share this part of her life. Consequently, your marriage will suffer the loss of intimacy and trust. Although a husband with a compassionate ear is rare, you can learn the art of listening.
Why do women do this? Who really knows? Why do men not understand women? The best answer is that God wired us both differently. It is human nature to believe that everyone sees the world as we do. Men are especially guilty of thinking that women should think and behave a certain way just because that is how they themselves would do it. It is like bananas and strawberries. Both are fruit, but each has its own shape, flavor, and texture. By themselves, they taste good. However, mix them together and you have a wonderful fruit salad, yet each part keeps its own unique characteristics.
Marriage is like that fruit salad. A man and a woman, each with unique shapes, textures, and flavors, are good by themselves. Nevertheless, mix them together and you have a completely new creation. Yet, each one is still an individual.
Normally, when a man hears his wife cry, he embraces her and wants to help solve her problems. Once she gets a few intelligible words out through her sniffles, he holds his head back, sometimes he is even dumb enough to laugh, and he not too wisely says, “Oh, is that all? That’s simple. This is what you need to do.”
He is dumbfounded when she stops talking, looks at him and clearly says, “Never mind! I’ll figure it out myself,” and walks away with her hands up in the air. Now she is angry and frustrated as well as depressed.
He has no idea why she did not throw her arms around him, plant a big kiss on him, and thank him for all his wisdom. Men are ready to offer women a solution after hearing a few facts. Never mind that they heard on a fraction of the details. They do not need to hear it all. They have the answers and they want women to accept and act on them. Usually their answers are correct, if not appreciated.
The resulting argument puts pressure on an already strained relationship. What men fail to understand is that women do not want the answers given to them. That defeats the purpose. Men get aggravated when women reject their quick fixes.
God designed your wife to hold her emotions in, releasing them as she speaks. Through talking, she verbalizes her feelings. Her emotions begin to unwind, her mind starts to loosen, and confusion dissipates, allowing her to recognize the solution staring her in the face. You probably offered the same solution. Nevertheless, because of her tangled emotions she just was not ready to hear it.
So many marriage problems could be resolved if we all understood one simple fact. God made each gender different. Our desires are different, our thinking processes are different, and our needs are different. Each gender has specific needs. Understanding them can help us make great strides in relating to one another.
There are four things that every woman needs for security and a sense of completeness in marriage. When understood you can make a big difference in your marriage, revolutionize your home, changing the atmosphere from disappointment, confusion, and indifference to one of harmony and oneness of spirit and purpose.
The first thing your wife needs from you is the steady guidance of a spiritual leader. As a strong spiritual leader, you can fill many of her needs. Spiritual leadership reveals a man’s spiritual condition and shows the direction he is going.
A wife aches for leadership when her husband fails to be the spiritual leader. God did not design her to take on the pressure of spiritual leadership of the family. If you fail here, you expose her to pressure not meant for her. She feels that her life is out of control. The resulting fear and helplessness forces her to make decisions she should not have to make. Then she has to accept the consequences and sometimes the blame from you if she makes the wrong choice.
As her spiritual leader, she needs to see that you have a real desire to know God. She sees this when you read his word, pray, pay tithes, and faithfully attend church. She needs to see that you have strong convictions based on Scripture and that you consistently follow your convictions.
You must reassure your wife that she is meeting needs in your life that no other woman can meet. This is the second important need universal to all women. She needs to feel special. God made her to be your "helpmate." The needs that she is meeting in your life must be important to you. The more impor¬tant they are, the more you should compliment and appreciate her.
A man has the tendency to hide his real needs from his wife, wanting her to admire him and see him as a success. Before you have her honor, however, she must see your humility. You will receive and hold her love more quickly by sharing your failures with her than you will by sharing only your successes. You must not only explain your needs, but you should help her understand exactly what she can do to help meet them.
There are many needs in your life that only your wife can meet. She can help you guard against other women with wrong motives. We live in a world permeated with sensuality and lust. She can give you the joy of a physical relationship without guilt.
Her need for security and steadfastness will make you want to make sound decisions instead of hasty ones. It grieves a man when his wife suffers because of his poor decisions. When he understands that his choices affects his whole family, he takes more time and weighs the consequences before acting rashly.
Your wife instills godly character in your children and discerns their real needs. She is probably with them more than you are, and as a mother, she will often have insight in their lives that you may not. She serves as a buffer during conflict and is usually a peacemaker.
She will become discouraged if she feels that you are more concerned with the needs of employers, employees, col¬leagues, friends, and church members, than you are with her needs and her world. She wants to be an important part of your world. If she is not, her world begins to disappoint and close in on her.
Third, she needs to know that you cherish her and enjoy setting aside time for intimate conversation. There is a difference between loving her and cherishing her. Most men love their wives whether they show it or not. Few men actually cherish them. To cherish her means that you value her as a person, that you protect her and you compliment her to others.
Your wife must know that she is an important part of your world and that you love her beyond what she does for you. Show her that you love her for her sake and that you long to be with her. She wants to know that the qualities in her that you fell in love with are still important to you. You need to repeat expressions of your love to her often.
While men get much of their self-worth and approval from their profession, women get most of their value affirmation from their husbands. Even women with successful careers receive most of their personal affirmation at home.
You can exhibit your value of her in small ways. Showing her, the simple, common courtesy that you show the women in the office or the boss’s wife will go a long way to show her that you cherish her. Take the few extra seconds necessary to open the car door for her. Open the door for her in public, pull out her chair and wait until she sits down before you do in a restaurant. Help her on and off with her coat, and lift heavy objects for her. You do not have to do all of this at home, but when you do it in public; you send a message to the world that she is important to you. This message does not escape your wife’s notice. She will glow for weeks.
While leaving a restaurant several years ago, my husband, Michael, opened the car door for me, and our seventeen-year old son, Michael Jr., opened the rear car door for our fourteen-year old daughter, Kathryn. The woman in the booth seated next to where we had been sitting saw this through the window, reached over, and hit her husband. Kathryn and I laughed, but I was smart enough to realize how blessed I was to have a husband who enjoys "showing me off in public."
Your wife needs intimate conversation. This is possible only when you share oneness of spirit. She needs to talk and communicate her experiences so she can express her confused feelings. She needs to know that you are listening and not anxious to get away and do something else.
One way to assure intimate conversation is to have a regular time planned for it. Ultimately, the most intimate level of conversa¬tion occurs when your wife can trust you with the secrets of her deepest emotions.
Many wives have deep fears and feelings that they never share with their husbands. There are several reasons for this. Sometimes they feel guilty for their feelings and simply hope that these feelings will pass. They may fear condemnation and rejection from their husbands. Many times, they just want to reduce their husbands’ burdens or they just know that they don’t know the answer anyway.
You can help your wife overcome these fears by allowing her the respect and value of listening to her and encouraging her to talk. Whatever she has to say, it is important to her. Be careful not to belittle her or make what she has to say appear insignificant. If you do, she will find someone else to talk to, and your relationship will suffer.
Mike and Tina are so busy during the day that they sit up talking late many nights. This is usually the only time they have alone. As a woman, Tina often has emotions bottled up. Through the years, her wise husband has been a sounding board. Many times, he never says anything. He will often just say, "Urn-hum, yeah. Right.” He draws her out with well-worded questions that helps her work through harbored doubts and fears.
As a woman talks, she finds solutions on our own. If things stay inside it just confuses and confounds her until she is an emotional wreck. She has to get them on the outside so she can “see” them.
Your wife’s fourth need is to know that you understand her by protecting her in areas where she may be weak. She needs understanding, especially from you. She wants boundaries that show your concern for her. If you fail her here, she will feel neglected. She wants you to be aware of her spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical strengths and weaknesses. She also wants you to have the wisdom and courage to provide loving but firm direction, so she will not fail by going beyond her limits.
She may occasionally ask you for something she really does not want, just to test you. She wants to know if you are perceptive to her real needs and the dangers she faces. If you give her whatever she wants, she will feel insecure. You should know your wife so well that you understand when to be firm and when to be lenient. She appreci¬ates and respects loving firmness when you both know that it is right.
The main function of the head is to develop, train, and protect the rest of our body so the whole being can achieve God’s purpose. In this sense you are to be the head of your wife (Ephesians 5:23). It is your responsibility, as your family’s spiritual leader to set the example in your home. When your children see you treating your wife with this kind of love, they will respect her and admire you for being a man of strength and character.
As you learn to meet your mate’s important needs, she will respond with acts of love and a respect for you that until now you have only imagined. Helmut Thielicke once wrote:
"I knew a very old married couple who radiated a tremendous happiness. The wife especially, had such a gratitude for life that it touched me to the quick. Involuntarily, I asked myself what could possibly be the source of this kindly person's radiance. In every other respect, they were common people, and their room indicated only the most modest comfort. But suddenly, I knew where it all came from, for I saw those two speaking to each other, and their eyes hanging upon each other. All at once, it became clear to me that this woman was dearly loved.
It was not because she was a cheerful and pleasant person that her husband had loved her all those years. It was the other way around. Because he loved her, she became the person I saw before me."
