What capable women must know

There’s certainly nothing wrong with being a confident and capable woman.  In fact, I usually feel pretty strong, confident, and capable.  However, over the years of my marriage to my late husband Raul, I realized something very important to the health of my marriage.  I needed to allow my husband to be needed by me!  When I acted like he wasn’t needed, I could sense that he felt emasculated.  Your husband probably might feel that way too.

Men are wired by God to be leaders.  In fact, in Ephesians 5:22-24, God makes it pretty clear that the husband is the leader, not the wife!  “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.”

So, even though you are a strong capable woman, give room for your husband to lead.  Avoid making all the decisions for your family.  Ask him to make some decisions.  Even though you’re perfectly capable, ask him to help you with some projects.  Yes, you can re-arrange the living room furniture without his help, but he will enjoy being needed by you if you ask him to lift the heavy furniture.  (And don’t forget to admire his muscles!)

How to break free from insecurity

I’m a fairly confident, secure woman….most of the time.  But there are still moments where that awful insecurity shows up.  How about you?  For me, it often relates to the way I look.  I compare myself to other women and fall way short.  Sometimes, I’m insecure in terms of whether friends or even relatives really like me.  Other times, I get down on myself about whether anything I do really matters.  Ugh.  I hate feeling so insecure!

So, how do we become more secure?  Well, for me, it means turning to God for my “value”.  I need to remember the only audience that really matters is an audience of one.  God is the one with whom I will spend eternity.  He is the one who created me to be in relationship with Him.  He is really the only one I need to please, and what he says about me is really all that matters.

Meditate on these Scriptures and if you’re anything like me, you will feel a warm blanket of security envelop you.

Psalm 139:13-16

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.  My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.  Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

Zephaniah 3:17

The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you; He will quiet you with his love; He will rejoice over you with singing.

Hebrews 13:5

Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you