Are Happy Marriages as Elusive as Unicorns?

Well that depends on what you mean by a happy marriage. If by “happy marriage” you mean that both spouses are deliriously happy with one another all the time, then yes. I would have to go with common conventional wisdom and agree that happy marriages are as elusive as unicorns.

My definition of a happy marriage however, is a based a bit more in reality. Firstly, a happy marriage is one where both man and wife understand that marriage is not a perpetual courtship. Somewhere along the line we have redefined marriage from vocation and sacred union to an institution designed to make us happy and keep us emotionally fulfilled. Rough patches are no longer rough patches to work through and come out on the other side more mature and loving. Instead, they are a sign that one or both of the parties “made a mistake.” Our culture has nearly completely abandoned the idea of challenges as an opportunity to grow, and marriage has suffered as a result.

Secondly, we have found that the good days almost always outnumber the bad when the a commitment to staying together has already been established. I have learned from some couples that this isn’t always the case, but I think it can be the rule rather than the exception. SAM and I have learned to laugh at the things about one another that drove us crazy in the early years of marriage. We were able to do that because we finally understood that some of these quirks are things we are just stuck with. So we laugh with (and sometimes at) each other and adjust accordingly. Anytime you can laugh together in your marriage, you’re making an investment in the possibility for a happier union.

Thirdly, I don’t try to make my husband be my BFF. When I wanted to go see The Help, I called a girlfriend. We took our teenage daughters with us, and we had a great time. There was no marital bonding to be had by trying to drag my husband to a movie he’d rather gouge his eyes out than watch. While I appreciate the sentiment behind the idea of your spouse as your best friend, and my husband is certainly the one I turn to with my deepest fears and biggest dreams, that need not mean that he can’t have fun with the boys without me tagging along even though I have no interest in watching a pick up basketball game. Great friends? Yes. BFF’s? Not so  much.

And then of course, there are the bones of contentions which I hesitate to wade into but as a firm believer in Christian marriage, I would be remiss if I didn’t. They are of course, submission and sex. There is more than enough on this in the archives for those who want a more detailed idea of my thoughts, but I can sum it up in two points:

1. Wives, submit to your own husbands and let him lead the family with you as his first mate. I have yet to see a marriage where the man was being led around by his wife when he didn’t look dejected and take every opportunity afforded him to be away from her. I think C.S. Lewis expounded quite well on the issue in his book, Mere Christianity:

Something else, even more unpopular, remains to be dealt with. Christian wives promise to obey their husbands. In Christian marriage the man is said to be the ‘head’. Two questions obviously arise here. (1) Why should there be a head at all — why not equality? (2) Why should it be the man?

(1) The need for some head follows from the idea that marriage is permanent. Of course, as long as the husband and wife are agreed, no question of a head need arise; and we may hope that this will be the normal state of affairs in a Christian marriage. But when there is a real disagreement, what is to happen? Talk it over, of course; but I am assuming they have done that and still failed to reach agreement. What do they do next? They cannot decide by a majority vote, for in a council of two there can be no majority. Surely, only one or other of two things can happen: either they must separate and go their own ways or else one or other of them must have a casting vote. If marriage is permanent, one or other party must, in the last resort, have the power of deciding the family policy. You cannot have a permanent association without a constitution.

(2) If there must be a head, why the man? Well, firstly, is there any very serious wish that it should be the woman? As I have said, I am not married myself [Lewis later married], but as far as I can see, even a woman who wants to be the head of her own house does not usually admire the same state of things when she finds it going on next door. She is much more likely to say ‘Poor Mr X! Why he allows that appalling woman to boss him about the way she does is more than I can imagine.’ I do not think she is even very flattered if anyone mentions the fact of her own ‘headship’. There must be something unnatural about the rule of wives over husbands, because the wives themselves are half ashamed of it and despise the husbands whom they rule.”

2. As for the issue of sex: Paul wrote that we are not to deprive one another of sexual affection. That the Bible says it should be enough but when has it ever been enough? Just do it, enjoy it, and take the time to get to know what makes your husband tick. This includes be willing to pass on the apple pie a la mode for the purposes of staying in decent shape.

Will any of this guarantee a blissful union? In life there are no guarantees, so I stop short of offering any. One thing I do know is that won’t hurt us to get outside of ourselves long enough to see if it’s just possible that a happy marriage is possible, even after many years.

This post is being contributed to Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum.

Learning and Sharing Wifehood With Dearth of Titus 2

This post is less about a specific marriage issue and more about my continued passion for healthy marriages as well as a plug for Sheila’s weekly marriage posts at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. It’s also a brief treatise of my views concerning online marriage mentoring.

One of the things I have noticed is that in online discussions on the subject of marriage, there are many women with lots of questions and just as many people who believe that no one online should attempt to give them answers. In a perfect world I’d agree with that, but we live in a world that is far, far, from perfect. What’s worse we live in a place where there used to be a relatively consistent standard of right and wrong but that has vanished. I often think of an example from my childhood when I ponder this issue.

When I was a teenager I remember that a  young girl in our school found herself pregnant. She lived in our neighborhood and the girl’s mother thought the best course of action was to terminate the pregnancy. When the time came however, they changed their minds. I still recall what the mother of the teenager reportedly said: “We’re not religious people, but even we draw the line at at ending the life of a baby.” I imagine that baby is around 24 or 25 now. And when I think back on it I mourn a bit because I know that such common standards of decency and right-thinking that crossed religious lines is no more. This is as true in the area of Biblical marriage as it is anything else.

And so we have young men and women, nearly half from broken homes themselves, taking the leap of faith required to embark on the journey of marriage in a world where the very definition of marriage itself is undetermined. A significant number of young believing couples start out with few if any role models in their families or in the church for how to love selflessly and submit joyfully.  More than a few women have stumbled upon this blog and emailed with all kinds of questions from the mundane to the shockingly intimate. And yet, those of us who have been longer married are supposed to turn them away because it’s “not our place” to advise them on matters of communication, sexuality, finances, or whatever dilemma it is that hurting people with nowhere to turn need answers to.

I truly believe that a wife’s first line of defense is to talk out issues with her husband. However, I know what it is when that doesn’t work, when two people married in unbelief and one is converted and praying for the other. Communication can be very difficult to almost nonexistent when two people are looking at the world through different lenses. Communication can be difficult even when both spouses share the same faith convictions. What is a wife to do when every believer they turn to for help has determined that it’s “none of their business?” Are there no supportive or helpful words to offer a sister in such a situation?

One of the reasons I stopped writing Wifey Wednesday posts (besides the fact that they were growing redundant) is because they often felt contentious. Every general observation or rule of thumb was met with anecdotal exceptions or admonitions that advice being offered was too specific . I have a great deal of admiration for Sheila’s passion for marriage and willingness to stick to her assignment despite the detractors she may draw. It’s one of the reasons I decided to write this post for Wifey Wednesday; so that she knows she has my continued support.

The fact that we don’t agree on every minute matter doesn’t change the fact that she (and her husband) are doing what they can trying to help couples. Far too many of us fail to be supportive of the couples in our sphere of influence because we have ingested this evil American tendency toward rugged individualism at the expense of community even among believers. Live and let live is not found in the Scriptures and I don’t believe that it’s how believers are to relate to one another.

Let me remind those of you who have the great fortune of having been raised by godly mothers or are plugged in to good churches where you can find a good role model to mentor you not to take these things for granted.  Do not assume that everyone has them because not everyone does. I’d wager that most people don’t. When they happen upon someone online who holds a Biblical view of marriage, that is a good thing, not something to begrudge them because they could’ve clicked on something a lot worse.

Recently in what could only be described as a fit of desperation, a woman virtually called out for help and when I didn’t know to say to offer her immediate comfort,  I was thankful to be able to direct her to a post on Sheila’s blog that tackle her dilemma from both sides. The first was “Should You Change to Make Your Marriage Better?”  No, it’s not the same as a supportive church family counseling session or even a sage and godly mother, but this sister had neither. And she was thankful for those posts that steered her in the right direction as she attempts to be a good and godly wife.

I am not content to offer abstract spiritual platitudes and Scriptural quotes sans anything practical and am so very thankful that should I continue to live and breathe I have an open line of communication with my daughters and they will have me available to do as Titus 2 commands. To admonish my young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed. There will be times when they will need practical guidance on how to walk that out.

I belong to a church where people come in off the street and are saved. Lately there are not as many believers who hop from church to church in our congregation. This makes me more aware of the reality that there are families out there raising my potential future sons-in-law.Couples who may or may not have the support that most of us lacked when we embarked on our own marriages.

We don’t live in a small, cloistered, rural community of fundamentalist homeschool families committed to Biblical courtship. The chances of them marrying someone who doesn’t have what they have had at home are as good if not better than their chances of meeting a man who did. So any and every woman I can help in any small way to have a better marriage and a better chance of success, I want to be able to do that.

I don’t want to offer pat, religious sounding answers to complex questions. I want to live my faith in a real way and feel free to talk to women about real issues without fear of offending those who have been blessed to be spared severe trials in their marriage. Who are blessed to have someone in their lives they can turn to when they have sexual incompatibility, struggles with communication, problems submitting to a man who seems to be leading in the wrong direction, etc. If you have that kind of support never underestimate how blessed, and rare, you are.

But mainly, I just mourn the dearth of godly older women who have chosen service and sacrifice over self-fulfillment. Who would have stood against the need for a time when young women turn to technology for answers they should be getting from their mothers, aunts, and grandmothers. Or even their church mothers.  We live in a time where significant numbers of young men and women reach adulthood having never known what it is to see a man love his wife as Christ loves the church. Or a wife submit to her husband as unto the Lord. Someone has to be willing to offer support and godly counsel.

I wish there was no need for blogs like To Love Honor and Vacuum or even this one, where women still stumble upon older marriage posts in their search for answers. But since they seem to be needed, I am very thankful they exist.

This post is part of Wifey Wednesday hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

I Think I’ve Run Out Of Things To Say

…On the subject of marriage, that is.

It was my intention to stick with Sheila through the entire 2011 calendar year and participate in Wifey Wednesday. I have a heart for marriages and what we can do as wives to have great marriages. The more I think about this, however, the more I realize that it really comes down to a few key issues, most of which need to be individualized by each couple. And most of them I have addressed here repeatedly:

1. Obey the Scripture. Yes, this means submit to your husband. Your own husband that is. I know it’s not popular.
2. Pray for wisdom, guidance, and the right spirit when dealing with your man.
3. Realize that love by definition, is focused on the other person’s needs and not your own. “But what about me?” really isn’t a loving question. This is not a dismissal of a wife’s needs. Please don’t interpret it as such.
4. Listen to your husband. Pay attention. Most of what I learned about what makes my husband tick came through paying attention to him.  He would same the same about me. For example, does he react particularly pleased when you wear a certain color or appreciate something he does that you might think is insignificant? Learn his love language. You may never have a “moment of truth” on some of these matters but attention to details can make or break a relationship.
5. Give your husband the permission to speak freely. To express his opinions without fear of retribution from you. This, from what I have witnessed, is  a major issue for women, although they have no problem expressing a litany of complaints to and about their husbands.
6. Sex, meeting his needs, and expressing yours.  I shouldn’t have to say more than that so in the interest of discretion, I won’t.

Committing to making an effort in these 6 areas will work wonders in any marriage. It requires selflessness and consistency. But our marriage are worth it, are they not?

Have a wonderful Wednesday.

This post is a part of Wifey Wednesday hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. There’s an excellent post up today written from the male perspective. Click on over today and every Wednesday for more wifely encouragement.

It has been an honor to participate in this effort with Sheila.

Marriage Requires Adapting and Adjustment, But It’s Worth It

I once read an article  in which a wife was extolling the virtues of a marriage where she and her husband live in two different apartments. He didn’t have to deal with her messiness, she didn’t have to listen to his depressing classical music. When they had children, it got a little more complicated but the pros outweighed the cons, so they continued the status quo, simply incorporating the kids into the system.

Now I’m not one for denying reality. If we were willing to entertain such an absurd arrangement, we could certainly find reasons to justify it: He wouldn’t have to listen to my snoring (at least, not every single night!), I wouldn’t have to endure his science fiction television. He doesn’t even prefer the new stuff with the cool special effects! He likes the black and white Twilight Zones and the first generation Star Trek series. He wouldn’t have to deal with my endless collection of books cluttering the closet. Even though I regularly mine for books to give away, I create new clutter after a trip to the used bookstore. I wouldn’t have to freeze at night because he likes to sleep in a cool house (with the ceiling fan on!)

But I also wouldn’t experience the warmth of  his arms around me when I wake up in the morning. Or that he still thinks I’m beautiful even when I just woke up looking a mess. I’d miss out on seeing him reading his Bible at the crack of dawn before he gets ready to start his work day. He’d miss out on having me prepare his oatmeal for breakfast or the fruit that he grabs each day as he rushes out the door. The list is endless. There are too many things a couple can’t experience any other way than being together.

And isn’t that what marriage is all about? Two lives becoming one with each partner growing by learning to adapt their needs and preferences to those of the other? We grow in marriage as we learn to put our spouse’s needs before our own. Our children learn the value of loving another person enough to endure, with joy I add, the things about them that don’t necessarily gel with our personality and preferences. And over time, we learn to appreciate what our husband or wife adds to our lives that we never would have experienced on our own.

I’m starting to develop a taste for the science fiction, even The Twilight Zone, which I thought I’d always hate. My husband reads a lot more than he used to. Stumbling over books has that effect, I guess. What would I really gain by having a marriage engineered specifically so that I avoid those parts of my husband’s personality I like least? What would he? One thing’s for sure: we’ve added far more to each other’s lives living together than we ever could living apart.

Is this idea the latest thing our culture has come up with so that we can have our cake and eat it too? It’s probably just one couple on the fringes because most couples would never consider such a thing. Personally, I think it will probably just add to our out of control divorce rate if it ever catches on. Becoming one flesh is a process that can’t be done successfully with each person constantly trying to find ways not to have to change.

I had to learn to accept and love my husband, as he is, faults and all. He has to learn how to love and accept me. Isn’t the true test of a commitment in the ability to love through it all? If I never have to deal with the thing about my husband that I may not like, how do I know my love is real? How does he? Marriage isn’t designed to be a perpetual courtship experience. That may be fun for a while, but it doesn’t make for a love with roots that go deep and lasts a lifetime.

This post, recycled from November 2007, is a part of Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there fro more wifely encouragement.

Learn to Speak His Language

I’ve been pretty reflective the past several weeks and I’m sure it’s due to the fact that I’m moving into a new stage of life. One of our children is entering her final year of high school, and another beginning the first official year of her homeschool journey. Our family is in a transitory period. I’m introspective by nature, but all of the milestones of the coming year have made me even more so.

Today is also the first of my last five days as a 30-something.  After spending most of this year dreading the looming milestone, I’ve settled into a thankful anticipation of what the latter part of my life will bring. Despite our culture’s obsession with all things young, there is something to be said for the wisdom and experience that comes with having lived a bit. Many of the biggest lessons I’ve learned have come within the context of my marriage. Since this is Wednesday, the day we talk marriage around here, I thought I’d share one of the lessons I’ve learned after spending almost all of my adult life with SAM: Pay attention to how my husband receives love, and act accordingly.

I have a little book on my bookshelf called The Five Love Languages. It’s an interesting little book and for those who have never read it, I highly recommend it.  The gist of it is that each person has a love language, or a way that they most readily perceive and receive love. You can find a synopsis of the love languages here. It’s s good resource because our natural tendency is to love and relate to others in the way we most readily respond. For a woman whose love language is words of affirmation, being married to a man of few words can create some tension if she’s not paying attention. And for the first few years, I wasn’t.

This subject took shape in my mind after reading this post from Cindy. It was about the problem of women “letting themselves go” after marriage and childbirth. She asks some good questions and got me to thinking. Y’all know I have a thing about weight, am constantly striving to look my best for my man, and encourage other wives to do the same. But I don’t think a wife should measure her attractiveness on any scale except her husband’s. To do otherwise is a mistake. After you examine yourself, your husband is the final arbiter of whether or not you’ve let yourself go. No one else can do that, since they don’t know the time and effort you put into doing whatever it is you do to care for yourself, for him, and for your family. What does this have to do with love languages or paying attention? Well, everything!

My husband is really into me. This is just true, and the feeling is totally mutual. It’s obvious to anyone who knows us very well. In a world where youth is worshiped and perpetual youth is marketed as the key to happiness, it feels good to be settled and content in a relationship based on shared values, shared history, and shared faith. A relationship where love made is truly love made is satisfying in ways difficult to put into words.  After 5 babies with the resulting up and down weight loss, and not a few abdominal stretch marks, SAM still thinks I’m beautiful. Part of it is because I’m just his type, which luckily for me isn’t the Hollywood standard of beauty. More importantly, I think it’s also because I learned his love language, and make a real effort to love him the way he needs instead of the way that I need or the way someone else has prescribed as “the way” to love a man.

His language is physical touch followed closely by acts of service, preferably acts of service where I help him fix the car or cut the grass. He finds me most attractive not only when I’m all fixed up, but when I’m dirty from helping him do “man stuff.” I’ve applied that lesson I learned, and he has learned that a few words fitly spoken are worth far more than diamonds and pearls. Date nights are far less important to me than words of affection and appreciation. Given the choice between having his wife sit next to him and rub his back or spend half an hour shining the kitchen sink, my husband will choose the hands on his back every time. A neat house is good, a super clean house not so much if it means I can’t sit close to him because I’m cleaning it. Filter what you read at Flylady through the prism of what works in your own marriage and family. Nothing personal against the Flylady. I rather like her. I’m just sayin’.

If there’s one thing that has struck me about online conversations, it’s how they can get you thinking about things in an unhealthy way if you’re not careful. For example, I never really thought much about my looks, except for my weight which multiple pregnancies has caused  me to watch closely, until I stumbled into the blogosphere. All the talk of modesty and femininity and such was good in many ways, and not good in others. The same can be said of spiritual issues. There are a lot of ideas floating around the Internet and it’s a landmine for those not secure in their faith, values, and beliefs.

In other words, any prescriptive advice I offer to a wife whose husband’s love language is words of affirmation may cause more harm than good because I’m used to dealing with a man whose love language is physical touch. Forgive me if the marriage posts may begin to seem redundant around here because the most valuable lesson I’ve learned in the past 17 years is to pay attention to my own husband, learn how to best love him, and act accordingly, no matter how I much it requires me to step out of my comfort zone. It’s the best advice any wife can offer to another.

Fortunately for me, touching my husband is very comforting. Resisting the urge to talk his ear off? Well, that’s another story. Funny thing about preferring another before yourself: it is deeply gratifying once you get over yourself. I’m not sure why preferring others gets such a bad rap.

Our culture has created a billion dollar industry from books detailing the differences between men and women. Volumes are written with catchy slogans like Men are from Mars and women are from Venus. Counselors charge hundreds of dollars an hour to tell you that you can’t love your man properly until you fully love yourself. In other words, they take your money to give you advice that lands you in divorce court, all under the guise of helping you save your marriage.

There’s one thing I know for sure: Love is by definition focused on its object. If I’m thinking about me, I am not focused loving my man. “How do I love thee, let me count the ways…” makes my heart swell, but that’s just not his thing. And that’s okay. I have learned to speak his language, and he has learned to speak mine.

It’s the best linguistic study. I highly recommend you try it.

This post is a part of Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

Adapting To What Works In Your Marriage

Last week’s Wifey Wednesday post on what a husband’s leadership in marriage looks like has unfolded into a lengthy, conversation about the nature of male leadership. That and wifely submission, of course. Somehow it always comes back around to this. To submit, or not to submit; that is the question. The answer to the question is: submit. Practically speaking, what does that look like?

I think what it looks like depends on the individuals involved. For some women, it may mean learning how to be more quiet and with that allow her husband grow into his role as leader of the family and man of the house. For other women it may mean learning how to rise to the occasion when the situation calls for it and speak up. There are no hard and fast rules in the Bible for how we are to relate to our men except for the words “love”, “submit”, and “respect”. Beyond that, I don’t have much to offer. I can however, offer personal examples from my own marriage.

The early years of my childhood were difficult. Our family endured a lot of hard trials, and I lived in something of a survival mode. Some kids become hardened and assertive as a result of overcoming challenges.  For a naturally docile child such as I was, that manifested itself with a compliant nature. I wasn’t inclined to rock the boat, believing the best way to handle challenge was to grin and bear it. Experience had taught me that things could always be worse, particularly if I rocked the boat so it was better to let well enough alone.

SAM on the other hand, has a strong personality and a commanding presence. He prefers to cut to the chase and lay all his cards on the table. He doesn’t like ambiguity and he doesn’t want to have play mind reader to know what I feel and need. And he doesn’t want me to have to do that, either.  He doesn’t think it makes any sense not to express your feelings to the person you’re closest to. The docility that drew him to me when we began dating became something of a stumbling block as we began to build a life together. In our marriage, submitting to my husband  meant learning to speak up, not remaining silent when I am unhappy. Submission in our marriage in no way calls for me to be my husband’s doormat.

It was important that I learn to be assertive when the situation called for it, and that applied at home as much as anywhere else. Most of those who read this blog would agree that I’m quite adept at expressing and defending my convictions. I wasn’t always this way.

It took some time to get used to expressing myself and my needs openly, but I learned. Sometimes a little too well, my husband might say. And our relationship is markedly better for it. Because of that, I am a bit leery of those who teach that wifely submission means never offering a different point of view or never expressing your needs. That would’ve been terrible advice for me to take when my husband has articulated that he prefers just the opposite. I think most husbands are open to hearing their wife’s concerns.  If he loves his wife, her concerns concern him.

I’m not referring to materialistic nonsense and petty trivialities. A wise wife knows better that to burden her husband with silly matters of no lasting importance. Issues of time, affection, being overly stressed or other emotional issues are certainly worth discussing in a calm, respectful way. At the right place and the right time, of course. Even when the issue is a valid one, it helps to weigh all considerations.

For example, there are certain times of the year when my husband works more hours than others. I miss him during those times and I don’t like to see him wear himself out. I could begin nagging him by saying things like, “You work too much.” However, that doesn’t take into consideration the fact that he is working to feed, shelter and clothe a wife and six kids, not to mention himself. A discussion about the hours he works may be valid, or it may not be valid. I’ve found that the best way to handle his busy seasons is to be extra supportive and accommodating. Asking what I can do to help him is infinitely more constructive and productive than complaining about how much of him I’m not getting.

Discernment is required to know when speaking up is constructive, and when it’s just a knee-jerk attempt to save face or earn the respect one thinks she’s not getting. That kind of outspokenness does little to enhance intimacy or build trust. I had to learn that as well.

I have a few cardinal rules for how I relate with my husband. The first is that I don’t contradict him on issues in front of other people. I’m not saying that you have to do it my way, but that’s a gesture of respect that I offer him. My husband is not very talkative anyway, so there are few times when he says anything in a group setting that I disagree with. If he does however, I wait until we’re alone to ask him to clarify his meaning or express my take on it.

Secondly, I don’t interpret every cross word or slight gesture as an opportunity to vent my frustration or have equal say. It was very easy after years of silence to start talking and not know when to shut up. I need to pray for wisdom about what issues are worth the trouble. When I don’t, my husband helps me out with that . As I have learned to measure my words, they carry more weight when I say, “We need to talk.” Besides, doesn’t the Bible admonish us to be slow to speak?

Thirdly, I do believe that submission to my husband includes a measure of  obedience and I try to act accordingly. I don’t always do it perfectly, but I make a prayerful, earnest, heartfelt attempt. I respect his veto power since he is responsible before God for the direction that our family takes. In turn, he appreciates my perspective, seeks my input when we need to make decisions, and respects my insight and intellect. One of the good things about having married so young is that we have sort of grown up and evolved in our views together. It is rare that my husband has “pulled rank” on me when a decision needs to be made.  More often than not, we agree.

Not every husband has an outwardly strong a personality like my husband. Some men are laid back and easy-going. In such cases, a wife who doesn’t weigh her words and time them carefully can seem like a nag or as if she’s usurping his position.  Her husband will withdraw and let her have it. Most wives who find themselves in the driver’s seat don’t like it all that much.

Some men may need to be encouraged to open up about what they need to way my husband had to encourage me to open up. The best way to get him to do that is to not punish him for telling the truth.  In fact, I’ve said this before and I think it bears repeating:

If there is one piece of advice that I could give any wife besides obeying Scripture with regards to your marriage, it would be this:  Make it safe for your husband to tell you the truth. I have come full circle from viewing my husband as overly opinionated, to viewing  his honesty as a gift. Listen to your husbands talk when you get together to fellowship with other couples. You’d be surprised what you hear. My husband has heard far too many men say that they could never tell their wives what they are really thinking because there would be heck to pay. Wives, however, usually feel perfectly at ease reciting a litany of complaints to their husband.

There really  is no “one size fits all” approach to working out the Bible’s guidelines for how we relate in our marriages. Yes, we are to submit to our husbands. But personalities, backgrounds, and perspectives are too diverse for any one person to insist that what works for them can work for me, and vice versa. In fact, I really like the way the Amplified Bible translates Ephesians chapter 5, verse 22:

Wives, be subject (be submissive and adapt yourselves) to your own husbands as [a service] to the Lord.

Adapt to your own husband. Good words.

This post is a part of Wifey Wednesday hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

On The Doctrine of “Mutual Submission”

Believe it or not, I actually believe the principle of mutual submission is a Biblical concept. Even the most hard-core complementarians would be hard pressed to read the Bible and come away without a clear understanding that husbands have a responsibility to consider the needs of their wives and go out of their way to understand those needs. And this is not just a New Testament concept. This passage is from the Old Testament:

“When a man has taken a new wife, he shall not go out to war or be charged with any business; he shall be free at home one year, and bring happiness to his wife whom he has taken.” Deuteronomy 24:5

Clearly the Bible position isn’t one of wifely inferiority, and the first year of marriage is so important that Scripture commands husbands to take the lead in laying a sure foundation for the relationship. Of course, that was commanded under the Law and Israel was a theocracy. I am not suggesting that a modern husband can or even should attempt to fulfill this mandate, although I imagine a lot of personality and chemistry problems could be well worked out early  in a marriage with this level of intense focus.  My point is that the Bible in no way insinuates that a wife is her husband’s slave or that her needs don’t matter. I don’t think those of us who “preach” the message of wifely submission are indicating that either.

The New Testament commands husbands to love their wives as they love themselves. To dwell with their wives with understanding. There are numerous Scriptural admonitions on how believers are to relate to and defer to one another. These commands apply to both spouses when both the husband and the wife are believers. Those who teach that wives deserve to be treated with less dignity or are of lesser importance are perverting the Scripture and should be roundly denounced.  John MacArthur expressed it well:

Submission is thus the responsibility of Christian husbands as well as of wives. Though [he is] not submitting to his wife as a leader, a believing husband must submit to the loving duty of being sensitive to the needs, fears, and feelings of his wife. In other words, a Christian husband needs to subordinate his needs to hers, whether she is a Christian or not.

It is a part of the Christian mandate to love your neighbor as yourself no matter your gender or position. This applies in much in marriage as anywhere else. Moreso, I’d suggest. However, the husband is not to submit to his wife’s leadership of the family. Leadership is his position and his wife is to accept that and help  however he needs her to. Therefore, the idea that mutual submission means that no one is in charge should also be roundly denounced. It too is a twisting of Scripture. The Bible makes it clear repeatedly that the husband is the head of the wife, and that she is to submit to him as unto the Lord.

There is a balance to be struck here and we’d do well to find it. The problem arises when we choose to focus on what the other person should be doing rather than our own responsibility. I am a wife, therefore my focus is primarily on my responsibility to honor, respect, and submit to my husband as Scripture commands. My husband is focused on doing his part. Together, it works well.

This not an all-or-nothing proposition, and we shouldn’t treat it as such.

This post is a part of Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

Before Taking Any Online Advice: Is Your Husband On Board With It?

No matter what we read online, no matter how godly it sounds, no matter how much it resonates with us, we go dangerously astray when we fail to filter the advice and views we receive through the reality of the man God has given to us in the covenant of marriage. Further, if a husband is not asking his wife  to do something that is clearly sinful, then she is to submit. The only  issues where there clear Biblical  directives for how we are to interact with our husbands are the issues of love and fidelity, sex, and respect/submission. You don’t have to take my advice on any of these (though you can find it here and here), but you do have to listen to your own husband and act accordingly.

We must also appreciate our men for who they are and not attempt to squeeze them into the mold of some blogger’s husband, a man we don’t even know. If your husband needs a half hour of down time at the end of the day when he first comes in the door, let him have it. It doesn’t matter if you read somewhere that an online Titus 2 mentor and her husband take time at the beginning of the evening to catch up on each others day.  If it works for them that’s wonderful for them. It’s better for you to wait until the time that’s best for your husband. Appreciate your husband’s strengths and you will be less likely to look at him through critical eyes as a result of what you’ve read on another woman’s blog.

I realize some issues are much bigger than the one I described above, but I believe the principle still holds. I can hardly count the number of sisters I have encountered since I started blogging who have either commented or emailed me about the fact that they envy my large family. How they wish their husbands would relent and consent to having more children! I hope they can one day experience the joys of a large family as well, but I often also wonder: how many of these women were completely content to parent their 2 or 3 or 4 children before they stumbles onto the Christian mommy blogs? More than a few, I’m sure.

This is not to debate the issue of whether or not birth control is Biblical or not. If you want my opinion on the issue of children as a blessing you can read this post and leave a comment there. I implore you not to begin a debate on the issue of birth control here. That is not what we’re aiming to discuss. Rather, this is a discussion of that little phrase in Titus 2:5 that reads as follows:

“…obedient to their own husbands…”

Don’t you marvel sometimes at the wisdom and simplicity of the Scripture? God, who certainly could have given a concrete list of do’s and do not’s  for every matter under the sun, chose instead to advise us to work these matters out in the context of our individual marriages. Even in those areas where you may feel your husband is off base Biblically, I would advise to pray and approach your husband with an open heart rather than a holier than thou attitude. Remember the admonition of Proverbs 21:19:

It’s better to live alone in the desert than with a quarrelsome, complaining wife.

I was raised in a frugal family. My husband was, well…not. In our earlier years of marriage, I thought he was wasteful and he thought I was cheap. After many years of trial and error, we reached a comfortable balance financially. I have learned to appreciate that there are instances when you really do get what you pay for. He has learned that there are times when you have to prioritize. He’s aggressive about  saving more and I’m less fearful when it comes to money.

Everything is going great. However, on several blogs one year I saw pledges of commitment to giving only handmade gifts that Christmas season. I could literally feel my heart rate increase with excitement over the prospect of a truly frugal Christmas. I could hardly wait for my husband to come home so that I could run it by him.

Just as quickly however, reality set in. This was simply NOT going to fly in my house. We’d already decided what we’ll spend and what we were going to buy the girls. A scaled back Christmas was already on the horizon as extended our new, more frugal ways into the holiday season, which is the one time of year when we were more inclined in the past to throw caution to the wind. Not racking up debt mind you, but still spending more cash. NOW I wanted to push it even farther by springing this handmade idea? Uh-uh.

Maybe with much prayer and more time to prepare, it might work in the future. But I know my husband. He doesn’t change over night unless he has concrete biblical reason to do so. Furthermore, it’s unfair of me to place some other woman’s expectations on my own husband. He has never done that to me. Probably because he doesn’t spend an hour every day clicking around on blogs about Biblical manhood!

Again, please know that I am not suggesting that we can’t introduce new ideas to our men as we become more enlightened and educated in any number of areas as a result of reading on line. If we have sound Biblical reasons for doing so, I think it’s a good idea. While I firmly believe that the best way to fulfill the Titus 2 mandate is in person, it would be foolish of me to assert that we can’t grow and learn something while reading edifying sites on the Internet. Of course we can! If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t be here.

We do need to keep in mind however, that God has called for our husbands to be the heads of our homes. If our husbands are following the Lord, then we have a responsibility to joyfully follow their lead. Once you have made your requests and desires known, if he doesn’t respond right away, commit the matter to prayer and trust that if it’s meant to be, it’ll be when the time is right. If your husband is not a believer, you’re still to follow his lead, but you have bigger issues to pray about than whether or not to have another baby, homeschool, or even whether or not you can quit your job next week.

I sincerely believe that people who know you and your husband personally and who are invested in the success of your marriage are in the best position to offer advice that is anything more than suggestive if it isn’t clearly articulated in Scripture.

Now watch me offer prescriptive advice next week and have a reader call me out on that.

This post is my contribution to Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

Why Romantic Movies May Be Bad For Marital Health

“If this sounds like a radically different view of marriage, it’s important to remember that the very concept of “romantic love,” which is so celebrated in movies, songs, and cheap paperbacks, was virtually unknown to the ancients. There were exceptions-one need merely read Sons of Songs, for instance- but taken as a whole, the concept that marriage should involve passion and fulfillment and excitement is a relatively recent development on the scale of human history, making its popular entry toward the end of the eleventh century”- Excerpt from the book  Sacred Marriage, by Gary Thomas

Given our culture’s aggressive insistence that a marriage sans romantic bliss is a marriage that should be discarded, it’s hard to imagine a time when people saw marriage as something deeper and more meaningful than fleeting feelings or romantic flights of fancy. When I first read the above quote, it hit me that we have elevated fleeting feelings and romantic flights of  fancy to the status of deep and meaningful. When the feelings go, so does the marriage. One wonders where we learned to cultivate such a shallow and disposable view of what used to be a solemn and sacred commitment.

Last weekend one of my daughters asked if we could rent the movie Letters to Juliet.  The longer I’ve been married, the more I found myself becoming leery of Holly wood’s version of romance. Romantic comedies in particular aren’t a good fit for me because I like comedies, and I like romance. The combination, when done well, can suck me in. I haven’t seen many done well. Besides marriage isn’t always romantic, or funny.  I’m still a romantic at heart though, so after a bit of recon to insure that the picture wasn’t objectionable, I went ahead and rented it.

It was clean movie, romantic in that sappy Hollywood sort of way, and stuck to the formula: Girl meets boy. At first she finds his personality objectionable but he grows on her. That doesn’t matter of course, since their budding attraction is complicated by one or both of them being already spoken for. Girl and boy part ways. She is confused and heartbroken. He is dejected. Girl loses the boyfriend (who was obviously objectionable, of course) that precluded her from exploring her feelings for her true love. But is it too late? Alas, it isn’t! *Surprise, Surprise* Boy professes his undying love complete with assurances that he will move across the Atlantic to be with her if he must. He strikes all the right notes in a perfect speech, the music crescendos, they kiss, and the credits roll. The end.

My girls ate it up. I kind of enjoyed it too. I would have enjoyed it more if I didn’t know that it’s this very kind of thing that has made far too many women mistakenly believe that we can expect this in real life. My girls and I have conversations about the difference between fantasy and reality. It’s important to do that from time to time because it seems far too many of us confuse the two and marriages suffer for it. I remember when I was susceptible to Hollywood’s formulaic romances and the unrealistic expectations they foster myself. As I searched my mental Rolodex for an example of what was considered a great romantic movie when I was younger, I remembered Jerry Maguire. Some of you may or may not remember the closing scene.

Anyway, I saw this movie back when it was released in 1996. At the time almost every young woman I knew thought that these were the most romantic 60 seconds ever captured on film. My friends, nieces and cousins were running around saying they wanted someone who’d say they completed him. I was already married then, but I was immature not to mention an unbeliever. I could never watch that movie now, nor do I recommend it. However, I still remember the final scene:

I find that somewhat trite now but it moved me back then. I may have even teared up. What can I say? I simply must point out the irony that Tom Cruise’s character makes this declaration of undying love in a room full of women in a support group who “hate men” for various reasons. I didn’t fully appreciate the implications of that back in 1996.

Hollywood romances have away of ratcheting up our expectations. We all have expectations. It’s a part of being human. Without expectations most of us if not all of us would have no reason to get up in the morning. When our expectations are set by things that have no basis in reality however, we can get into trouble because real life isn’t like the movies.

When I’d been dating SAM for a while he came to my apartment to pick me up. While waiting he took a closer look at my book shelf. Right next to Little Women and The Sun Also Rises, was a couple of cheap Janet Dailey paperbacks. I remember him telling me he didn’t think I was the type to read that kind of stuff. But here’s the kicker: He also asked if I thought “whatever we have here” was going to be anything like that. I assured him I didn’t, haven’t grown up with far too much reality in my life to expect what I read in fantasy books to ever resemble it. Still, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that the stuff hadn’t subtly infiltrated my thinking. Of course it did.

The heart of the matter for the Christian of course, is that our lives aren’t supposed to be all about what makes us feel good. We’re commanded to love others as we love ourselves. To do unto others no less than what we would want them to do for us. In other words, stories like Eat, Pray, Love should repel us. Sadly, for far too many Christian women, they don’t.

Which brings us back to the quote I started this with from the book Sacred Marriage. For the believer, I can think of no other state that offers more opportunity to die to self on a daily basis than marriage. I’m tempted to offer motherhood as a parallel example, but I think marriage tops the list. For a man to love his wife as Christ loves the church and a woman to submit to her husband as unto the Lord is a daily exercise in self-denial. If there’s one lesson we rarely see preached in today’s culture, it’s the lesson of self-denial. Particularly to women.

We’re told that anything that requires we put the needs of others ahead of ourselves is oppressive. We’re admonished not to commit to marriage too young and not to “lose ourselves” in it when we do. To our own selves be true. Follow our hearts wherever they may lead. We only live once, after all. This all sounds great on the surface. Movies, songs, and cheap paperbacks present it to us in an appealing and beautiful package, but is destructive to the sense of maturity and commitment we need to be good wives.

Consider this my reminder to myself as well as the reader to take the sweet, sappy movies that I occasionally indulge with a grain of salt. I’m a wife. I have responsibilities. I keep fiction, which I still enjoy, in its proper place. Real romance built on a shared history, deep commitment, and without drama is much more satisfying anyway.

This post is part of Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.

Husbands Are People, Too

Women can do anything a man can do.  Men can wear pink and still be masculine. Gender roles are obsolete. Leadership is for tyrants and women with no brains. A real man knows that all you need is love, love. Love is all you need. Truth is whatever each couple determines it to be.

In this corner of the ‘net, we often decry the androgyny that our culture has embraced in an effort mask the innate differences between men and women. There is an increasing backlash here against that type of foolishness, and rightly so.  In our zeal however, we have to be careful not to box men into the same rigid corner that those who hate complementary marriage claim women need to be liberated from. Our men are called to lead, but not to sacrifice their humanity in some misguided attempt to “be the man” at all costs. They need to be able to lean on us, and we need be able to let them without challenging their manhood when they do.

Maybe I’m an odd duck, but I rather enjoy being married to a strong, authoritative man. I like feeling protected and I find his decisiveness rather sexy. I like that he has an opinion about what I look like. At least I know he’s looking. I think it a credit to his resourcefulness that we rarely have to call someone with something breaks, even something major. He works well with his hands, and his hands often bear the scars of hard work.

I love that, but beneath all of that armor is a man with a heart, and sometimes he needs to be able to be vulnerable enough to reveal that heart to me without worrying that I will view it as a weakness. One of the things I learned early on in my relationship with my SAM was to appreciate that my husband, who is very overtly masculine, has feelings. He gets sad. He has fears, hopes, and dreams just like me. Not to mention tear ducts. I’ve known my husband for 19 years and I’ve only seen him shed a tear twice, but I’ve seen it.

It’s very easy for a woman married to a harder man to forget that a man’s reluctance to express his vulnerability doesn’t make him invulnerable. Sometimes it takes a bit longer for him to trust his heart to anyone, and marriage won’t automatically make him comfortable doing that. But when he does,  his wife should do all she can to make it clear that his vulnerability doesn’t make him weak in her eyes.

The church’s swinging pendulums in reaction to the culture are actually dangerous and detrimental, in my opinion, and I see this as one area where we need to tread lightly. We should be able to stand on the truth as revealed in Scripture and work out how that looks in each family. We can do that without having to discard the truth just to function, which is what far too many “believers” have decided to do.

We seem incapable of being balanced, don’t we? We react to henpecked men by encouraging them to seize their authority or attempting to browbeat wives into becoming boring and docile. Isn’t it better if married believers can just trust that God’s ideas of masculinity and femininity are light years better than anything we can come up with and live that out? When we do that, our men can rest in the knowledge that we trust them to lead not only because it makes us feel secure, but because we trust that God knows best. He commands us to submit to our husbands, and we’ll do that to honor Him, and we’ll do it for better or worse, in sickness and in health.

A while back I alluded to some care repairs that SAM walked me through when he was injured and couldn’t do them himself. His injury was actually quite serious creating a scenario where I had to step up and do a whole host of things I wasn’t used to doing for well over a month. I was  relieved when he got better but I was thankful for the opportunity to learn to do something new and surprised at how quickly I picked up the skill in a few instances. My husband’s temporary period of injury didn’t make him any less strong or capable than he was before. He was still the same person; he just needed a little help from his helpmeet. That’s what I’m supposed to do.

During a season of economic turmoil, when many men (particularly those skilled  in male dominated fields of work) are attempting to reset and start over, it’s more important than ever that wives not undermine their authority in the family. To do that while allowing them to share their vulnerability is a delicate balancing act, but one that every wife, regardless of her husband’s personality, needs to strike.

This post is a part of Wifey Wednesday, hosted by Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum. Click on over there for more wifely encouragement.