Steward's Portion

I WANT GODLY SUBMISSION to be my first response in every situation so I spend a lot of time meditating on it.  God is pretty clear in Scripture that we don’t have a choice in the matter, but what should our motivation be?  Hagar was commanded by God to submit, just like you and I, so let’s see what motivated her to obey.

Submission is an obedience issue.  Whatever authority God has placed in your life, He has done so with the careful knowledge that it will be hard to submit to it!  Yet we are commanded by God to do it.  It is a biblical imperative, not a suggestion or something you do when all the external circumstances line up just right.   What that looks like in real life is that most of the time you should submit, it is the last thing on your mind.   Most often we think of submission in reference to a wife submitting to her husband, but let’s step outside that common example and look at another woman’s struggle: a slave named Hagar.

And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.  And Sarai Abram’s wife took Hagar her maid the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife.   And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived: and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes.  And Sarai said unto Abram, My wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid into thy bosom; and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: the LORD judge between me and thee.  But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.  And the angel of the LORD found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur. And he said, Hagar, Sarai’s maid, whence camest thou? and whither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai.  And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands.  (Genesis 16:2-9, KJV)

Hagar was “given” to Abram as a slave wife to bear a child in Sarai’s place.   When Hagar discovers her pregnancy she suddenly realizes her change in rank from just another slave, to the future mother of Abram’s heir and she gets puffed up and begins to despise Sarai.   Until that point I think its safe to assume she was pretty submissive to authority since she was the one selected as the surrogate, and she obeyed.   But here we see an attitude shift, one I have been training myself to recognize and avoid as soon as possible.  Entitlement.

Women, beware!  Feeling something is owed to you, or that you deserve better always leads you down a wrong path.  Remember Paul’s admonition: “Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves” (Philippians 2:3, KJV).  Hagar abandoned lowliness of mind and provoked Sarai to jealousy.  Sarai began to make her life miserable.  Hagar fled.  But here is where God steps in and confronts Hagar.  He sent an angel to tell her to return and submit.  It is interesting to note that the bible uses the same word for “dealt hardly with” in verse 6 as it does for “submit thyself” in verse 9.  God was not mincing words: going back meant returning to hardship. Nothing will have changed back home for Hagar and returning meant ongoing mistreatment.  Now, put yourself in Hagar’s shoes, does submitting sound like a good idea?  Do you suppose it is what she wanted to do?  What motivation does God offer her to return?  Blessing!  Let’s look what happens next:

And the angel of the LORD said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude.  And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.  (Genesis 16:10-11, KJV)

Hagar’s reward for obedience in submission will be a blessing for her son and his offspring.  A blessing surprisingly like the one promised to Abram!  God gives her son a name that means “God will hear.”   We know from continuing to read the story that she did return and stayed in submission to Sarai for many years until Sarai finally bore Isaac and drove out Hagar and Ishmael for good.   Even at that point God heard Hagar and intervened to save their lives with provision and promise.   Hagar must have lived a very difficult life during those years with Abram & Sarai, but she laid hold of the promised blessing through her obedience and submission.

So how does this apply to us today?   I am not advocating that women should remain with abusive husbands.  If you or your children are being abused you have every right (and indeed an obligation) to separate yourselves from harm.   Often, when we submit to the leadership above us, God is swift to move on our behalf and bring correction.  But in the case of Hagar, we see that sometimes God will specifically call you to submit to difficult circumstances, which will result in a blessing.  Jesus faced this kind of submission when He submitted to death on the cross.  He had asked His Father if there was any other way, but there wasn’t.  So we are told that for the joy set before Him, He endured the shame of a death on the cross.  (Heb 12:2)  Jesus had His eyes on the blessing He would receive:  a pure and spotless Bride and the right to be seated at the right hand of God in Glory.  Jesus didn’t feel entitled to something better, He fully trusted that God the Father had a perfect plan and submitted to it to obtain the promised blessing.  We, like Jesus, need to learn to take the focus off our selves.

I believe one of the hardest places a godly woman can find herself in is being married to an unbelieving husband.  (Singles pay heed: there is a reason God says its a no-no!)  I believe that like Hagar, God is directly commanding the wife to stay in the relationship (painful though it will be) and show godly submission.  Obeying God will always reap a blessing now and/or in heaven.   In fact, Paul alludes to the fact, that there is a slim chance part of that blessing might even be that your husband will come to the Lord.  (1 Corinthians 7:16)

Submission is a crucial part of our ongoing Christ-like transformation.   (If there was an “extreme makeover spiritual edition” I promise you it would deal with submission!) In all circumstances I believe biblical submission to be a win-win.  Either God corrects me because I am wrong (win), God intervenes and corrects the leadership I have submitted to (win) or God pronounces a blessing over me for my obedience (win).  Any opportunity that we are given to submit should be viewed as a stage upon which we openly display our love for God through our actions.  Jesus said it best: “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love” (John 15:10, KJV).

IS IT OK TO PRAY about getting married?  What if you have someone in mind already?  What if you haven’t met anyone you think would be a good match? Praying for your future husband is God’s invitation to co-author your own love story.

Our God is a God of relationship.  He designed marriage and families to teach us about His own heart and emotions towards humanity.  He also designed man in His image, with the same capacity to feel emotion and long for relationship.  It should not come as a surprise that within our own hearts we find longings that have been planted there by the God who also longs.

If within your heart you find the longing to be married, consider that your invitation to press in and dialogue with God about what you desire.  If you are born again you do not need to fear that your heart is still deceitful and desperately wicked (Jer 17:9) but you can rejoice that you have been given a new heart (Ezek 11:19).   As you put your eyes on God and seek Him first, He will give you the desires of your heart (Psa 37:4), because they were planted there by God Himself!  Too often we push away the desires of our heart because we fear that God will not answer them and we would rather not be brokenhearted.  By not talking to God about our desire, we  in fact only delay its fulfillment. We shy away from the One who is longing to hear our voice and before long we are truly heartsick.  (Prov 13:12)

How exactly can you co-author your own love story?   God is writing the history of your life and just like a choose-your-own-adventure book the choices you are making affect the outcome.  Your free will is mingled with God’s divine plan.  In this way, by actively praying about a husband you are writing the first few lines of that chapter of your life, you are drawing God into a part of your heart that you may never have opened to Him before now.   So where do you begin?

1:  Resolve that God is a good leader and can be trusted with your heart! Try to put things into proper perspective: as a born again believer you have decided to trust that Jesus Christ has redeemed your eternal soul from the damnation you justly deserve.   You are believing that when you die you will not be cast into Hell, but instead will one day be resurrected in a new glorified body and live with Jesus and all His saints forever.   If you can believe that He has your afterlife in the palm of His Hand, you can easily believe that God also has a plan for you here on Earth!   God is a good Shepherd, He will look after all of your needs and He longs to answer the desire of your heart.  Can’t you trust Him to pick the perfect husband?  The enemy will cause you to doubt God’s leadership, so watch out for this attack and stand firm in the Love of God.

2. Pray specifically! When you pray for “a Christian man” God is looking at a pool of millions of eligible candidates.   God has placed specific desires in your heart and He wants you to discover those, begin to pray for them and watch as your faith actually becomes a more substantial image of the thing you are hoping for! (Heb 11:1)  In one sense God is waiting for you to engage Him with a “fully fleshed out” request.  How else will you have the confidence that God has answered your prayer and you have met the “one” for you unless you have asked specifically?   Your prayer list can include things like 1) the calling he has on his life, 2) spiritual and physical attributes,  3) the thing you most want to respect about him,  4) his family and background, 5) his occupation and hobbies…etc   Trust that anything that gets added to your list that is not of God will be made clear to you by God.

3. If you already have someone in mind, pray for divine appointments. In this early relationship stage if you have peace in your spirit regarding this man, you should move forward by asking God to confirm it to both of you as you get to know each other better.  God loves to be involved in all the little details (like a best girlfriend who wants to hear you talk about every little detail, He really does care!)   It doesn’t matter if the man doesn’t even know you are alive or is your best friend: begin to pray that God will awaken a desire in him to be married and that God will point you out as the perfect fit.  No matter how well you already know him, ask God to begin to give you divine appointments; times when you just run into each other unplanned.  If you do that, God will orchestrate amazing “coincidences” and you will not be able to avoid each other! You might both end up being invited to same dinner party, standing in line next to one another at the grocery store, or serving on the same ministry team, yes it is even possible that God will physically have him “bump” into you as you come around a corner.   Letting God take the leadership ensures that you are not simply manipulating the circumstances.  I also recommend not letting it be widely known that you like the man in question.  What really has value is for God to show you his character when he is not already trying to impress you by putting his best face forward.  Many times it will be during the mundane moments of life that God will point something out to you and speak regarding whether or not this man in question is the one for you.

4) If you haven’t met yet, ask God to arrange an introduction! God is well able to help you meet your husband whether he lives one block from you, or is on the other side of the world.   Pray that God would order his steps in your direction, specifically that God would cause opportunities to arise that will bring him to where you are.    It is also a good idea to pray for his purity so that the enemy will not lure him into other relationships.  Begin even now to pray for him like you will for the rest of your life as his wife.  You can pray for protection, for blessing, for encounter with God, even that he would begin to long for a wife -just like you!

5) Is there truly a MR RIGHT for me? The choice of a spouse (for choice it is after all) remains with the two individuals.  The only prohibition given concerning marriage between Christians is that we are to be equally yoked (marry someone who is a Christian). (2 Cor 6:14).  It falls within the will of God for you to marry any unwed Christian believer (divorcees will be addressed in a separate future article), but in the spectrum of available men God knows who will be the very best match for you.  This principle of who to marry would therefore be classified as one of those issues which is lawful, but must be weighed in terms of whether or not it will also be profitable? (1 Cor 10:23)  Even if you marry someone who is not the one who would have been the best match for you, God is able to make you both more Christlike and make a strong marriage (because it is lawful), however much more heartache and difficulty lay down this path which would have been lessened had God’s best been pursued. (not the most profitable).

6) The big BUT…  BUT what if I’m supposed to be single? There are many reasons why a person would choose to be single: illness, persecution, war, specific ministry calling, desire to be single…   Do not fear: singleness is both a calling and a choice.  God will call some people to be single, but it is still their choice to remain single.   For some, singleness is a way of fasting and just like fasting may be for a short period of time or a lifetime.   Remaining single for the sake of pursuing God with an undivided heart is awesome, it is what the Apostle Paul was called to and chose to do.  You can tell by his comments that he was not sorry for his choice! (1 Cor 7:8)   For those who have that unrelenting desire to be married, who’s eyes are always scanning for the perfect mate, who’s hearts are lonely, who are desiring to raise a family, Paul recommended marriage instead of frustration.  (1 Cor 7:9 yes this also has a sexual implication!) Singleness in itself isn’t intrinsically better than being married.  It is also not something to be feared, for if God is calling you to be single He will also extend to you a measure of grace to fulfill that calling.    I believe that unless God is clearly calling you to a life of singleness, if you find the desire to be married is in your heart, thank God for that desire and pursue Him about its fulfillment.

THE ENEMY will continually seek to attack and erode your marriage.  The attacks are easier to spot if you maintain an awareness that your divorce is a trophy Satan is fervently seeking.  He will not rest night or day in this pursuit.

THE TWO STRATEGIES:  The first strategy will be a full frontal assault.   This can wreck a huge amount of damage very quickly.  These attacks come quickly and will catch you by surprise.  However they are also pretty big and easier to spot coming.  The second strategy is tunneling. Beware the slow erosion that happens in the unseen corners.  The tunnels the enemy digs in your own private mind will catch you unawares unless you continually focus on maintaining your godly foundations and a love for truth.

From the very beginning of your marriage you will hear the lies Satan whispers to you.  I assure you they are not reality and come from the pit of hell itself.  Depending on your particular fears and weaknesses they could be things like:

• this was a mistake, God had someone else in mind for you, but now you’ve blown it.
• you aren’t good enough, you don’t deserve this man, sooner or later he’ll grow tired of you and you’ll be tossed aside.
• you’re stuck.  Whatever conflict just happened can never be fixed and you have to suffer like this for the rest of your life, God will not rescue you, people don’t change.
• have you seen how beautiful his secretary is?  He desires her more than you.  You should distrust him.  You should withdraw to protect yourself.  He doesn’t love you.
• you aren’t attractive.  You need to do X, Y, Z and then maybe he’ll love you.
• why does he always treat me like this?  Its just like X used to do.  Why did I end up marrying someone like him?  I should kick him to the curb and look for what I deserve: better!

You may find that at times of weakness or anger your husband will be pushed by the enemy to voice some of these things to you.  This can be the cruelest of all attacks and may seem to confirm the very fears that have been growing.  Stay on your toes!

THE FULL FRONTAL ASSAULT: The enemy’s game plan is to craft every angle of a situation so that you can logically draw an incorrect assumption.  First you will hear the lie.  Then if you don’t hold every thought captive and test it, you will linger on it and soon start to wonder if the lie is true.  This will often come with a flood of emotional feelings.  You will feel it is true.  You will say yes to the hurt that it brings.  Now you are wide open for the final volley to come your way, some sort of outside confirmation or confrontation. Lets look at a scenario and spot the workings of the enemy.  Yes its simplistic, but life is like this, lets learn to recognize things early and deal with them in righteousness before God.

SCENARIO: Your husband just called from work to say he’s running late and not to expect him for dinner.

THE SET UP: The enemy whispers: “He doesn’t  like to eat your cooking. Remember how his mother commented at Thanksgiving that you still have a long road ahead of you in the cooking department? Remember how last week he said he thought the chicken was overcooked?  He knows you are making chicken again tonight, coincidence???”

YOUR FIRST CHANCE: Recognize that even at this stage (when nothing has technically even happened yet!) there is a fork in the road.  You can now choose to assume that your husband hates your cooking, or you can ask him about it later.  If you decide not to ask him because you’re pretty sure its true, you’ve taken the first step in believing the lie.  The second step is equally small.  Now that you’ve reeled that thought in and started to make it your own, you now feel terrible that your husband hates your cooking.  In come the emotions, a relentless flood of disappointment and hurt, anger towards him, self hatred towards yourself and perhaps a desire to be short and snippy with him when he comes home later.

YOUR SECOND CHANCE: Your primary battlefield will be your own mind. Even if you believe that he hates your cooking you can choose to talk to him about that later tonight and see about finding a good solution.  But, if you now allow yourself to take this a step further you will think and linger on the things you could say to lash out and ease those swirling emotions: “So, I didn’t save you any of that chicken you hate to eat. You know, I don’t live my life just to slave in the kitchen coming up with meals you won’t eat.  Sorry my cooking isn’t to your liking, guess you can have cereal or fend for yourself!”

YOUR THIRD CHANCE: Now comes the actual confrontation…  up until this point you can still back down and ask God to reveal the truth to you or set your heart to ask your husband directly before you walk directly into trouble.  When your husband walks in the front door at 8pm if you attack him you have a 50/50 chance that he will give in to the enemy and be pushed to react in a way that confirms the lie.  However, if you welcome him home and then find a quiet time to politely ask him (yes, ASK him, not accuse him, not attack him, not make statements at him or for him) you can dismiss the lie of the enemy and no harm is done.   Lets say that when he comes home you lash out at him in some way over your perceived hate for your cooking and a fight breaks out.

YOUR FOURTH CHANCE: During the fight you still have the opportunity to make a u-turn.  You can stop,  apologize, and ask him if he likes your cooking.  This is something that takes practice and is very difficult.   I can guarantee that if you pick a fight based on something the enemy sent your way, the enemy will send in spiritual reinforcements on both sides and tempers will flare.   The enemy wants love to grow cold.  He desires for you to believe lies about each other and about yourselves.   He would love nothing more than to sever all lines of communications and have you both operate in continual assumption and accusation towards one another.  Oh, and as many hurtful things that you can hurl at each other in the process, all the better to him.

YOUR FIFTH CHANCE: After the fight has ended and an appropriate cool down time has elapsed (perhaps because one or both walked away during the fight?) spend time in prayer and repent.  Then spend time confessing to your spouse and forgiving one another.  Usually it will be during this time of confession that God will help you trace the origins of the hurt.   In this case, forgive your mother-in-law and cast out the lie that your husband hates your cooking.  Afterward, enter into a “council of war” discussion with one another.   These talks have one purpose: to strengthen one another against further attacks.  Resolve to ask each other about everything.  No more assuming.  No more accusing.

THE TUNNEL STRATEGY: Godly behavior is not defined by doing everything possible to avoid getting into fights. In this case if you “behave” correctly and didn’t get into a fight, but still let that lie go unanswered you have still lost.   In the eyes of the enemy this is a great outcome!   In rolling over and playing dead you’ve let the enemy transition a simple direct attack into a more dangerous long-term tunneling campaign.   That lie about your cooking is going to fester and go deep.    You will take that hurt and push it aside and try to live normally but sooner or later it will eat away at you and be a hot spot the enemy hits again and again.   The enemy wants you destroyed.  He wants you to become his captive.  He wants you to lock up your heart and stop caring.  He wants you to despair and hate yourself.   The only escape is to learn to live in reality.   It can be really painful and difficult to take every little thing you think and ask yourself, is this true?    This process should be lifelong.  I think of it as poking around for tunnels.   I know the enemy is trying to tunnel under me and breach the fort, so I will continually go poking around and examine everything.    I’m still learning about this, I hope to write more fully on this topic in the future.

DURING OUR FIRST YEAR of marriage, Michael spent a lot of time teaching me about biblical submission.  I confess that it was my own behavior (which regrettably was anything BUT submissive) that often prompted these times of teaching.  At times the tears flowed freely and I felt so frustrated and that all the days of my life were going to be filled with me being crushed into the ground and losing myself.    The transition from single to wife can be wrought with difficulties and the first year of marriage is usually the hardest.

Submission is a lesson you learn over and over.  Each time a situation arises you have the opportunity to behave in a godly fashion, or chose to indulge the flesh.  When faced with that split-second, in-the-moment choice it will always cost you something to obey.  You have to put your flesh to death in a very real way by refusing to indulge it.  Submission always produces life and liberty…but usually not right away.

So what is the seed that you can choose to water so that the desire to submit will actually grow within you?  It is an understanding of proper authority.  Did you know that the Godhead actually operates in submission?  The Holy Spirit is in perfect submission to Jesus who is always in perfect submission to The Father.  What a discovery!  As a believer I live under the authority of God.  And as a wife I live under God’s delegated authority to my husband.  So in a very real sense when I am submitting to my husband, I do so knowing full well that I honor God and His representative in my life.

Submission will always remain a choice.  This is a truth that deserves some serious meditation.  Each choice I make, no matter how little pleases the very heart of God when I obey.  Since Jesus says that those who love Him will obey him, I keep this in mind and my obedience therefore becomes my joy.  I water this seed over and over and pray that God will unfold this truth to me so that when an “opportunity” to submit arises, I can more easily side with righteousness.  I can bring forth spiritual fruit.

This is not an issue of always “giving in” to my husband or being a doormat.  This is an issue of me keeping myself within the will of God and positioning myself and my husband for blessing.  Rebellion does not produce life.

Submission is a perfect choice, it honors God, it honors my husband and it brings forth the very character of God in my life.

Lord I pray that this understanding will minister to the ladies who will read this blog post.  May it be a seed that they will plant in their hearts and water with prayer and meditation.  Bring forth a great harvest and bless your beloved daughters.  Amen.

Setting Your Heart to Love the Things Your Spouse Loves

IN THE FIRST BLUSH OF LOVE the thing that often holds us fascinated is how much the other person is “just like me.”  This commonality is a strong platform for the beginning stages of a relationship and if carefully nurtured will bond two people together very closely. It is a starting point for conversations and will provide inspiration for dates that will interest and excite both parties. In fact the more two people have in common the easier it is for them relate and respect each other. Everyone one of us loves what we do, wants to be loved while doing it and have someone equally interested partake of our joys.

As a relationship progresses a sense of the different (yet complimentary) strengths and interests develops. The woman who never had a knack for cooking will sing the praises of her husband who excels in the kitchen. The differences in social dynamics are also seen as positive. The introverted man will appreciate the more extroverted woman who is at ease at parties and can start conversations easily. He likes sports, she likes tailgating and it seems as if things couldn’t be better! Finding ways to become a team adds a new level of closeness and its exciting to discover that two people can fit together so well even in their differences.

At some point the glow starts to wear off as all the little things that were so easily overlooked start to take their toll. Sin has a way of unraveling our love for one another. The man who at first was praised for his confidence is now seen more as a braggart. The woman who had such grace and ease in conversation is now seen as more of a gossip. Whether it is the dirty socks next to the bed every night or the unwashed dishes in the sink, the enemy knows just how to push our buttons. In small ways the woman will start disrespecting her husband, and the husband will feel the love he holds for his wife slowly ebbing away. (For a wonderful and complete examination of this specific problem, please read the book ‘Love and Respect’ by Dr. Eggerich!)

There will usually emerge one specific thing that a wife can identify as the thief of her husbands affections. This perceived “affection thief” can take many forms: sports, cars, video games, poker night, hunting season, camping or fishing trips with the guys, his job, his family, the book he would rather be reading… any number of pursuits that hold his interest can feel like your worst nightmare. What is a woman to do?

Our natural fleshly reaction is to wage war against this intruder to our marriage. Who can sit idly by while a thief is stealing from you?  Our natural instinct is to attack the thief and defend what rightfully belongs to us.  But unfortunately, this means attacking something our husband holds dear, and that will never produce the intimacy we so heart-fully desire.

In my own marriage I struggled to capture the attention and affection of my husband. His hobby shifted in my heart from being something I had once admired to what began to feel like an excuse not to spend time with me.  His hobby had not actually changed, but our relationship had.  I now required more “face time” from him than his hobby provided.  But I didn’t know how to communicate this need to him in a way that he could understand.  Men and women have different needs and it can be hard to grasp a need you don’t have yourself.

I prayed for months that God would help him disconnect from his hobby so I could claim his time for myself.  I prayed that God would turn his heart towards me, that I could be half as exciting to him as his hobby.  But no change came.

I have learned that when I pray consistently and see no change that it is time to ask God what I’m doing wrong.  When I did this, God answered.  As usual, His answer made so much sense.

God reminded me how much I like it when my husband loves what I do, and how close I feel when we are together in purpose.  Could it be?  Should I turn my heart and seek to love the things my husband does? So I began praying that God would help me support my husband and be a helpmate to him in this area. I surrendered my own battle and asked God to go to war against anything that displeased Him. I was now free to devote myself wholeheartedly to pursuing what my husband loved and I did a u-turn in my heart concerning his hobby.

It is an amazing truth to discover that your self-will can set the course for your emotions. If you set your mind to love something, in time your emotions will gradually realign themselves. It may take hours, or days or weeks, but it is going to happen. Don’t believe me? Take the challenge and see!

Soon I was noticing that he was less interested in his hobby and more eager to spend time with me. Within a few weeks he was telling me about his heart changes towards the way he spends his time. As I genuinely changed my heart, God genuinely changed his. Make no mistake, he still loves his hobby, but now I do too (genuinely and with all of my emotions).

Now I can almost hear you thinking that this is a very idyllic situation, so lets address the big “what if’s” that pop up:  What if my husband loves something I could never love?

Good news! This principle works on the simple things as well as the more difficult things. In fact the tougher the resistance (on his side, or on yours) the bigger the breakthrough God has in store for one or both of you. Let’s use the example of a man who is a hardcore hunter and his wife who is vegan. How could those two ever see eye to eye on that?  First of all, make no mistake that it will take God to make the change.  That will only happen through submission and prayer.  For the husband it may involve his heart being changed to other things. For the wife it may involve a total turnaround on her original position. It may involve a little of both. God is creative, and has no problem identifying for you, or for your spouse, what needs to change.  In every area of your life that you submit to God’s authority, He is faithful and will bring about the needed changes so there will be a new partnership and connection where neither is fighting the other anymore.

What if what my husband loves is ungodly or even dangerous? Let me first say that if you are in danger you should always remove yourself and your children from that situation right away. I am also not intending for you to end up loving and supporting ungodly behavior. What I am encouraging you to do thru this article is to learn to properly apply Godly submission to even the small things and watch God bring about positive changes, even in things as small as hobbies. When things are really bad, God is big enough to deal with them…. but you need to make sure that you, as the wife are not out of line as well. In the case of your husband acting in ungodly ways (from the big things like potentially cheating on you to taking drugs, to some of the smaller things like not wanting to go Church weekly or not making time to pray with you each day) first off stay out of his way. It is not your role to tell your husband over and over again that he is wrong. I like to think that I have the obligation as his helpmate to tell him ONCE that he is wrong and express my heart. Then I back off 100% and never mention it to him again. Now each time I want to open my mouth I turn around, walk out of the room and go seek God on my knees. HE is the one who is going to bring about change, not me. Just remember that: “HE, not me.”  If you are trying to help God along, or take the reigns to make sure things change then YOU are out of line and trust me, nothing happens until one of you repents and comes to God. If you’re pretty sure it won’t be your husband, then it had better be you who realigns with God’s will for your life. Your role is to pray and ask God to intervene, and in the meantime support your husband in every good way that is still possible. (I’m not saying if he’s got a drug addiction that you go buy his drugs for him, I’m saying that during his rebellion phase, you are in your obedience phase. Persevere in prayer and maintain a correct attitude towards him and your marriage.)

What if my husband isn’t a believer, is there any hope this might work?  I can say without a doubt that your obedience and submission to God will position your husband for change. 1st Cor 7:14: “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife.”

That word sanctified means “to make holy, to ceremonially purify and consecrate.” Things that are holy and pure and consecrated are things that are set apart for Gods use. Yes, since your husband isn’t a believer this will usually take more time and you will have to go to war spiritually against the darkness that holds him captive, but there is hope. This doesn’t necessarily mean that he will become a believer, but only that God will honor your prayers and change his heart if his heart is the one that needs changing. Hint, hint.

What if I change my heart and begin to pray and support him and nothing changes? This can only mean one of two things: you aren’t doing it properly, or you were the one who needed the changing! In my experience I pray until I know for certain which of these two applies. There have been many times when I’ve stopped opposing and started praying, but God still requires me to go further and start supporting before things change. I’ve also shot myself in the foot many times by continuing to bring it up.  Call it nagging or encouraging, but I assure you they are the same thing. You should only tell your husband once and then let God take it from there. Are you concerned that your husband has forgotten that you even said anything?  Back off and ask God to remind him. There have also been countless times when God wanted me to die to self and have a total turnaround and by no means does my husband have to change at all. Each time that was the case I would eventually hear from God that He was pleased with my prayers and change, and that my heart change was His will all along.

A surprise effect was that my love and support for him are actually a source of great attraction. Learning this principle can re-ignite the romance more than those 10 pounds you are trying to lose, more than the new haircut or outfit you would like to try out, more even than that island getaway you are saving up for! And best of all, the resulting closeness lasts.  A new spiritual bond is created and the love that is generated on a spiritual level for another is much more powerful than merely emotional feelings or physical attraction.