We all inevitably go through stretches in our marriages (or with kids, finances, health, etc!) that are pretty rough on our hearts. Yes, we can persevere, pray, and trust in God during those times, and all those things are super important. But sometimes, we just plain need comfort. We need to sit in the lap of our heavenly father and have Him hold us tight.
Here is what I have discovered. Reading the Psalms slowly and out loud is like a warm embrace from my heavenly Father. As those words roll off my lips, I can almost feel His love and compassion flow over me. I sense the tenderness of His heart toward me. I gain hope once again.
Try it for yourself. I would suggest some of these Psalms: Psalm 103, Psalm 91, Psalm 34, and Psalm 37. God longs to comfort you. He loves you. As Psalm 103 says, “Our Father is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love.”
God recently drew my attention to 6 key verses in the book of Philippians and 1 in Ephesians. They are verses He highlighted as especially powerful and transformational, and I sensed Him urging me to pray these verses on behalf of my husband, children and grandchildren. If I were to summarize, praying these 7 verses will cause your loved ones to understand the depth of God’s love for them, live a fulfilling, effective and productive life for His kingdom, and be filled with peace and gratitude. Awesome! Here are the 7 verses to pray, and you can basically insert your loved one’s name in each verse:
Ephesians 1:4-5 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.
Philippians 1:9-11 I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding. 10 For I want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. 11 May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.
Philippians 2:3-4 Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. 4 Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.
Philippians 2:13 For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.
Philippians 4:6-7 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:8 dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
Philippians 4:13 For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.
I don’t claim to be the authority on the Bible’s instruction for wives to submit to their husbands, but after spending considerable time studying God’s Word, here’s what I have come to believe on this controversial subject. God definitely plans for all of us to live under authority. I would imagine He knows this prevents chaos from breaking loose! So, in a family unit, God has placed the man as the authority, and the wife and children are under his authority. If we used a business analogy, it’s rather like your husband is the general manager who must make the major decisions on the policy and ground rules for how the business will operate.
So what does this look like for a wife? This means choosing to treat your husband respectfully and allowing your husband to lead you and your family. Instead of you jumping into to take over leadership, and instead of you deciding how everything should go, you allow your husband to lead. However, just as in a business, a wise husband will value the input and sage counsel of the wife who is usually more intimately involved with handling family matters each day.
Now, where “submitting” to your husband can go haywire is when the husband veers off course morally or Biblically. When the husband starts leading the family (or requesting the family) to engage or support wrong behavior, then the wife need not submit to such decisions. Her first allegiance is to God and His commands. God is the ultimate authority. I believe that is why the Bible includes a “qualifier” in one of the instructions for the wife to submit to her husband. It is found in Colossians 3:18, which says “the wife must submit to her husband, as is fitting in the Lord”. If your husband is asking you to do something that is not “fitting in the Lord”, I don’t believe you must submit to such leadership. I believe a wife can respectfully draw the line. In addition, it’s my belief, from studying all of God’s Word, that “submission” does not mean the wife must be a doormat who tolerates disrespectful or even abusive behavior by her husband. Such behavior by the husband is not “fitting in the Lord” either. Submission is not being a doormat.
Have you ever had this thought…”I don’t respect my husband”? Honestly, I had that thought quite often in my first marriage, and because I didn’t FEEL respect, I didn’t ACT particularly respectful. Unfortunately, I just went with how I felt. I rolled my eyes at his ideas. I took control of most everything in our family because I didn’t think he was capable. I corrected him a lot. And…..after quite a few years, he turned to other women for validation.
I learned many lessons after that failed marriage. One of them is that a man desperately needs the respect of his wife. He needs to know that she believes in him and is FOR him. Now, this doesn’t mean she is supposed to ignore destructive and sinful choices in his life. No, she needs to gently, but firmly, confront him if he is caught in a pattern of sin. But, even then, she can be loving and kind and respectful!
In my 2nd marriage to Raul, I began pressing into this Biblical command (Ephesians 5:33) for wives to respect their husbands. And oh my, what a difference it made! He told me many times that he wouldn’t be able to tackle the things he was doing in life and for God if it weren’t for me being FOR him. In fact, he often got tears in his eyes when I treated him respectfully because it was a new thing for him as well…and he desperately craved my respect. All men do. Try it and see what happens in your marriage. Have you already tried it? How has it impacted your marriage?
Don’t you sometimes wish you could silence the voices in your head? You may hear the voice that runs you down and reminds you of your failures…or conversely, you may hear a voice that tells you your husband is a loser and you’re doomed to a life of misery. Either kind of thought is from the pit of hell!
We MUST examine every thought rolling around in our heads and determine whether it’s true or whether it’s a twisting of the truth that’s inspired by Satan. Remember, Satan’s mission is “to steal, kill and destroy” (John 10:10). He wants to slowly crush you with the weight of his lies about your value, your future and your husband.
2 Corinthians 10:5 instructs us to “take every thought captive” and we really need to do that. The next time a self-deprecating thought enters your mind, stop and ask God if this is really true. (I bet it won’t be!) The next time a hopeless thought enters your mind, ask God if it’s true. (I know it won’t be!). The next time you have the thought that your husband is beyond redemption, ask God if that’s true. (Absolutely not!). It’s time we stopped believing every thought that pops into our minds! We must intentionally pause and ask God whether that thought is true or from the devil. Here’s a simple, but hugely clarifying, question to ask yourself in that moment: “Does this sound like something God would say?”
I never thought I would be dating again late in life, but when my beloved husband Raul passed away in November of 2021, I sensed that God was saying he would provide another husband as my life partner for the rest of my years. So I began that crazy, sometimes frustrating, journey of dating! I began applying some of the dating insights I had gleaned over my many years here on this earth along with guiding Bible principles. So, I want to pass on some of that to you in this short little devotional. First, God makes it clear that a Christian should not be linked in close partnership with an unbeliever. 2 Corinthians 6:14 Don’t team up with those who are unbelievers. How can righteousness be a partner with wickedness? How can light live with darkness? This is critical! If you end up marrying an unbeliever, Satan has total entry to wreak havoc in your marriage! You two will not be pulling the same direction. Also, without the Bible as a moral compass, your husband will have no constraints on immoral or disrespectful behavior, and that can definitely lead to heartbreak for you. Next, keep in mind that a lot of guys might SAY they are a Christian, and they might even attend church, but that does NOT mean they are a true follower of Jesus. You need to look for evidence of Christ’s presence in their life. Do they show any fruit of the spirit? Galatians 5:22-23 the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. And here’s one other huge tip. Stay sexually pure while dating. Save sex until your marriage. This is clearly God’s will, and when we obey God, he blesses us. I don’t know about you but I want to have God’s blessing!! Here are 4 quick little tips to avoid falling into sexual sin while dating: 1) Don’t get horizontal! 2) Don’t stay overnight at each other’s homes even if you have good intentions to sleep on the couch. 3) Don’t stay together after midnight because that’s usually when temptation creeps in. 4) Resist the urge to French kiss before marriage. I know it’s tempting, but it’s also super arousing and may lead to where you vowed not to go until marriage!
We are all going to be frustrated or concerned with our husbands from time to time because they aren’t doing things right. Of course, we define “right” as “our way”!!!
For you, perhaps you’re upset and frustrated with the way your husband is parenting the kids. You don’t think he’s doing it the right way. Maybe he is handling the finances differently than you would. Perhaps you disagree with his opinion on women serving in pastoral roles at your church. What is a wife to do?! Here are 3 things that God showed me as I asked him this very question, because believe it or not, my husband and I don’t always see eye to eye on everything!
1) Ask God to help you see if you have a pride problem. Think about it. The minute you say that your husband isn’t doing things “right”, you’re implying that your way is the only way that’s correct. That’s pretty arrogant, to put it bluntly. The exception would be if your husband is entangled in a pattern of sin. That should, of course, be addressed. Otherwise, differences of opinion are normal. Different ways of handling things are normal. It doesn’t mean he’s wrong and you’re right.
2) Ask God to help you focus on what your husband is doing well; the things you can and should be grateful for. Instead of dwelling on the little differences of opinion and the small disagreements, focus on what he does well. For example, if your husband attends church and loves the Lord, be super grateful for that, instead of getting upset that his opinions about church dynamics are different than yours.
3) Ask God to help you remember that your husband is a work in progress in the hands of God. No one has arrived at perfection, including you. We are all being slowly molded and matured by God. Maturity takes time!! 2 Corinthians 3:18 puts it this way: And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. So, as you’re waiting for God to slowly transform your husband, pray that God would gently convict him if he’s off course in some area. God will definitely answer that prayer…in his own timing.
If we could all truly embrace the Biblical principle of taking just one day at a time, we would all be better off! Yes, this is a Bible principle. Jesus says in Matthew 6:34: “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” In other words, instead of worrying and fretting about the “what if…” questions, Jesus tells us to just focus on doing what we should do today. How does this apply to you? If it seems overwhelming to you to put your marriage back together after betrayal, just choose to move forward, one day at a time. If you tend to avoid confronting your husband or establishing boundaries on wrong behavior because you fear the possibility of future tension, trust in Jesus and move forward, one day at a time. If it seems daunting to take off the 50 pounds you’ve gained in recent years, don’t think about how hard this is going to be for the rest of your life. Just choose to eat healthy today and take it one day at a time. Worrying about the future is pointless. Being consumed by the “what if…” questions will only keep you trapped in fear. Let’s do what Jesus says. Let’s decide each morning to do what we know we should do that day, and let’s trust God to handle tomorrow.
The Appreciated Wife 