What It Looks Like For Wives To Let Husbands Lead

This exert is from Cindi McMenamin’s article and I just wanted to share. 

What It Looks Like to Let Him Lead

Consider the viewpoint of husbands and what it looks like in their homes for their wives to let them lead:

• “Ask for my opinions and input on decisions.”
• “Don’t assume he’s going to always agree with your ideas or suggestions. Be willing to adjust or re-arrange your ideas to be in line with his.”
• Offer statements like ‘What do you  think?’ ‘What would you  like to do?” “Do what you think is best – I trust you” and really mean it.
• “If a decision of his flops, don’t chastise him or berate him for it – we all make mistakes. Talk about how the situation can be turned around or recovered (think in terms of solutions because that’s probably how his work world operates).”
• “She can let me lead by valuing my opinion, telling me she trusts me, telling me her needs, bringing her concerns to me in a constructive way, making suggestions not making demands, and respecting my point of view in front of others, especially the kids.”

For her entire article, you can go to www.StrengthForTheSoul.com

Why Aren’t Women Getting Married?

BCC Women’s Conference

Men Want To Be Sexed, Not Vexed

How important is sex to a man? Since the fall of Adam, wars were fought, kingdoms united and torn asunder, vast wealth transferred, and families forsaken, all for sex. The wisest man in the bible, King Solomon, fell victim to taking hundreds of wives and worshipping their gods, all for sex. God’s first command to Noah and his wife after they stepped off the Ark was to be fruitful and multiply, basically have sex.

If you ever tried to quit cigarettes, alcohol or drugs, you can appreciate the urge that a sexually active man has to contend with. The difference is the sex drive must be managed as part of our nature, not purged like a chemical dependency. Husbands cannot just turn it on when their wife walks into the bedroom in a teddy and turn it off when the appealing secretary walks by in a mini-skirt. By the same token, husbands have to consistently guard all five of our senses from society’s sex-crazed bombardment. No, we cannot completely block out all enticements, but it does call us to check our motivations for going to lunch with that flirtatious co-worker. Is it to feed our stomach or our ego?

God commands married couples to lay with each other often and proverbs 5:18 reads, rejoice in the wife of your youth. Sex within the holy context of marriage is God’s mandate. Spouses need to express that part of their nature to bring their whole being into balance.

In marriage meetings, many men confessed that fornicating was how they felt validated. There is a spiritual and biological truth that is being perverted here. Wives, you validate your husband when you make love to him.  You’re affirming his virility and self-esteem as someone who is capable and desired.  If you think about it, this is one time in the Bible where God specifically encourages us to act on our natural urge.

By withholding sex, wives set a snare for their husbands in plain view of the harlot. She is merely the enticement, like a piece of cheese in a mouse trap. The snare is the climate of pent up sexual frustration created by the lack of intimacy.

If a man who is use to having sex goes without it long enough, almost anything can distract him. The smell of perfume, revealing hem of a skirt; the very act of his jeans brushing against his loins as he walks can be a distraction. Going without it removes an element of protection from the man and his marriage. So a wife who withholds sex can expect to  watch her man slowly weaken until finally he cracks. When he does, with masturbation, pornography or even adultery, bombarding him with emotional condemnation will not work.

Wives, I know sex begins in the kitchen (title of a popular marriage book). You can go but so long fulfilling your husbands’ needs without yours getting met. A husband can be so emotionally stunted that he makes his wife feel like nothing more than a receptacle for his release. But hold on for just one second before you focus too deeply on your needs not getting met. If you play the, when he does this, than I will do that game, you will waste priceless years in misery and deprivation. All of us have some expectation beyond what our spouse is willing to meet. God does not want you to mete out sex as you feel like it. Sex is not a reward to train your husband to behave according to your wishes like a circus animal. It is God’s design for a marriage as a vital aspect of intimacy that builds and protects, yes, even repairs it. Sex is a lot like paying tithes. You don’t stop doing it when things are not going well. A raging fire is not the time to turn off the water.

Finally, a word about adultery because I know that there are some women who absolutely will not have sex with their cheating, unrepentant husband no matter how much they pray or read the Bible. Far be it for me to tell you what to do in your situation. I just know that God will tell you what to do if you listen. Jesus says in Matthew 19:8, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning.”  His affair is not your fault, but a heart that is hard is. You are not listening for God when your heart is hardened against anyone, including your spouse.

Hebrews 11:1 reads, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Your emotions act contrary to faith because they are designed to respond to external circumstances, the evidence of things seen. But if you are hoping for a restored marriage than your actions will eventually have to reflect a faith in God that transcends how you feel at the moment.

Getting Baptized

Baptized as a child unaware of my condition,

I do it again of my own volition.

Already born of the spirit, I need no intercessory.

Baptism by water is significant but unnecessary.

I do so by faith and so publicly proclaim,

lust, fear, and doubt are no longer my shame.

Jesus was baptized and just like his history

trials and temptation will also beset my ministry.

If unholy you enter, no holier will you get.

Water only serves to make a sinner wet.

Ritually, God made a way to cleanse the sin of men,

except each year, he had to do it again.

‘Till John the Baptist would boldly cry,

one comes whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.

Jesus submerged by John’s laying hand,

the final sacrifice of an unblemished lamb.

And upon his person a dove did ease,

when his father proclaimed, with you I am well pleased.

Now we no longer need a sacrificial stud.

What man does by water, Jesus did by his blood.

21 Days

Fasting

State of Your Union Address

Often it is a particular crises or event that motivates a married couple to seek outside help. This could take on average 4 to 6 years before a couple finally takes this step. Unfortunately, many couples who come before counseling do so with their mind already made up as to a course of action they are going to take. The counseling sessions degenerate into a contest between the spouses to convince the counselor who is right and who is wrong. They come seeking some relationship skill technique to apply to the immediate pain they are experiencing, overlooking the fact that the pain comes from a deeper source. They want relief from the symptoms but not a cure for the ailment.

It is far better to assess your marriage at regular intervals. It does not have to be long appointments in front of counselors. In fact, if you just spend regular quality time with your spouse to gauge how he or she is feeling and make small adjustments, your marriage will stay in good shape.

At our most recent workshop, we divided into four groups of couples and practiced assessing the state of our marriage in four particular areas. The results were very enlightening.

The first group assessed how strong is their marriage which is determined by the ability to overcome external or internal conflict. How resilient is your marriage? In other words, how well can you cope by successfully going through trials? If you are confident, then you will not be afraid to bring up sensitive topics to your spouse.

Conflict comes to all relationships with the end result to strengthen or weaken it. Conflict exposes your character, both the good and the bad, which is probably why we try to avoid it. However conflict is God’s method for transforming us.

Scripture tells us in James 4:1-4 that the source of our arguments comes from our own motives and desires which are not of God. We don’t ask God for what we want and instead try to achieve under our own power. When our spouse doesn’t comply, we lash out with anger, frustration or passive aggressiveness.

Some questions that group one discussed were…

• Think about the last crises, external stressor or marital conflict you experienced. Did the final outcome serve to strengthen your marriage or weaken it?
• What can we do as a couple to make sure crises ultimately strengthens our marriage?
• What has your behavior pattern been for dealing with conflict? What would you personally like to do differently in future conflicts?

The second group assessed marriage intimacy in its 3 forms; spiritual, emotional, and physical. When one suffers, the others usually suffer as well because we are triune beings made in the image of our creator. We are spiritually intimate with those who we pray for and pray with. Emotional intimacy depends on our communication at the highest level which is to discuss our ideas, opinions, personal information and feelings. Physical intimacy can only be fulfilling when the other two are nurtured.

Nurturing intimacy requires communicating at the highest level with some regularity in order to really connect with your spouse. Group two was asked to have a 2 minute discussion with just their spouse and converse about something OTHER THAN…

• Work
• Children
• News events
• Ministry / Church
• Television/Entertainment
• Home chores and daily tasks
• People outside of your marriage

Group two did not have time to complete this but we urge you to have this type of discussion with your spouse for at least 4 minutes a day (the average) and build from there. Some of their other assessments were…

• Ways to keep the physical intimacy alive in your marriage
• The effects of pornography, masturbation or having fantasies on marriages
• Ways to give your spouse his/her own space to grow spiritually

Group three assessed commitment, defined as taking steps in a relationship that cannot be undone. Commitment is a three step process. The first step is trust which takes your consistent reliability. The second step is vulnerability which requires courage.  The third step is sacrifice and that requires Jesus.

Counselors, coaches or therapists can impart relationship skill techniques to address certain crises but there can be no lasting change without the third step of sacrifice. We see from scripture that during Jesus ministry on Earth, he made the blind see, the dumb speak, the lame walk…all quick fixes to immediate crises. However, it was His sacrifice that brought about salvation, the permanent solution to what really plagued mankind. In the same way, it takes your sacrifice to bring about healing and real transformation of your marriage into what it is supposed to be.

Group three addressed the following questions…

• What does the act of trust, vulnerability and sacrifice look like in your marriage?
• What have you done to earn your spouse’s trust?
• What are some examples of acts of commitment that you can take in your marriage to move you forward in God’s purpose?

Group four discussed marital happiness. The Institute for American Values and the National Center on African American Marriages and Parenting charts an index of the five leading marriage indicators. Their conclusion was that children are directly affected by a couple’s emotional state. On average, children raised by happily married parents fare better on almost every measure of child well-being compared to children raised by unhappily married parents. A happy marriage is also linked to physical health.  As for the rationale that it is better to get divorced than to subject children to an unhappy marriage, the statistics on how children in single parent households fare compared to both parents tell otherwise.

A University of Texas study concluded that married persons with more favorable attitudes toward divorce actually experience less happy marriages than those who oppose divorce. In other words, if you are miserable, divorce is an option. You just haven’t justified it yet. If divorce truly isn’t an option, you will be happier, what other choice makes sense?

Some of the questions that group four addressed were…

• How realistic is it to say that happiness is a choice we make when confronted with an antagonistic or hurtful spouse?
• Is happiness and vulnerability mutually exclusive in marriage; meaning do we have to choose one over the other?
• How have you dealt with sadness or depression in your relationship? What advice do you have for others?
• Do you consider it phony to come to church and act “happy” when you are experiencing marital difficulty? How should we conduct ourselves in public when going through problems? How should we conduct ourselves in private?

These were just four topics out of many that you can assess. What you give a priority to depends on your marital core values and greatest pain areas. Perhaps these should be the first things that you assess. Start practicing assessment today. Start with just 4 minutes a day and build a habit. A conversation a day keeps the marriage counselor away.

Leading and Submitting

Amid all the pomp and circumstance of the wedding ceremony, we can overlook the fact that a man is immediately given the enormous title of husband. Unfortunately today, too many women are getting married without taking enough time to discover if that man’s character can sustain those responsibilities. The hard truth is that men are not properly trained nor have they experienced many successful models of marriage. The alarming rise in single parent, female head of households means that boys have not had male role models of leadership inside the home. We grow up to excel in all sorts of occupations, but we have not learned to apply these leadership skills in the home. The result is that women have had to step in to fill leadership roles that biblically and traditionally men are supposed to occupy.

These responsibilities come by way of a man’s positional authority as Prophet, Priest and King of the home. Among those responsibilities are to protect, set goals, be a blessing, create opportunities and organize the family unit. What ends up happening because of abuse of authority is that men use their power of influence to control, dominate, create insecurity and stifle their wife’s participation in decision making.

But God is good, merciful, and in his infinite wisdom, works on a husband in the harness of responsibility. Wives participate in transforming their husbands into the leaders they are called to be by giving them personal authority over their lives. Whereas positional authority is inherited, delegated by a higher authority, or taken by force, personal authority is granted to the leader by the people who are called to follow him. Personal authority is earned by the leader through trust. Trust is established through demonstrating relevance, competence, good character and integrity over time.

Unfortunately, many wives no longer want to submit and grant this personal authority because society at large is saying that the husband is increasingly irrelevant in the home. In our post-modern, so called enlightened age, women can now achieve anything a man can and submission is viewed as a weakness.

However, Jesus shows us a different model in His relationship to the Father and to us. Jesus teaches men to lead, develop and care for their spouse as a shepherd does his flock. This is illustrated through various scriptures in the Bible. Jesus modeled this because He did not impose His positional authority as Lord and Savior who created everything, and instead only exercised the personal authority that an individual gave Him over their lives. Once you submit to giving Jesus personal authority over your life, He blesses you in the following ways:

Heal (Pr 27:23)   Guide (Ps 23)   Nourish (Ps 23)

Cast Vision (Ps 77:20)   Defend (Ps 78:70-72)  Nurture (Isaiah 40:11)

Teach (Je 3:14-15)   Intercede (Ez 34:7)  Pursue (Ez 34:11)

Enforce (Ez 34:19)   Sacrifice (Jn 10:11-15)  Provide (Jn 21:15- 17)

Cast Vision (Ps 77:20)  Vigilance (Acts 20:8)  Equip (He 13:20-21)

Model (1 Pe 5:2-4)

This is just a partial list of the way Jesus loves us. Ephesians 5:25 reads, “Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her..” This means that everything Jesus does for us, a Husband is to do for their wives! This is certainly a tall order and not achievable apart from the Holy Spirit. It is also not achievable unless the wife grants her husband that personal authority that Jesus asks of us.

This is not easy for wives because it means submitting to their husband in ways that society frowns upon. The worldly concept of submission is that it is subservient, defeatist, and admitting weakness. But the biblical definition is that it takes faith, strength of character and love. Submitting to the husband means granting him the personal authority in her life that will activate the full blessings of God in the marriage. A wife’s husband can be her prophet, priest and king but the process of him becoming that takes time. She must help him through encouragement and applying her skills and abilities in a way that is uplifting to the husband and not denigrating.

A wife is her husband’s help mate. He cannot do it without her but also she cannot hope to live out her call and election in Christ Jesus without him.