A Wife’s Confessions

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This wife is so adorable!  I love the way she articulates this struggle.  I think she expresses so well this universal struggle we as women have with learning to respect our husbands and submit to them as the Bible describes.  Of course, first we must respect Jesus and submit completely to Him.  It really is ALL about Him and our relationship with Him.  The marriage stuff is just the “lab” where we learn to put the theory into practice. 🙂  A HUGE thank you to this sister of mine for being willing to share her journey:
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The whole daily take up your cross can be easy thing to forget, but an important part of our staying connected and humble before Him.

I did an EXTENSIVE study on Rom 7 (why is it I do the things I do not want to do?). John Gill talks about a civil war going on inside of us.

How true this is!!!! The flesh does NOT want to be humble. It does not want to submit to my husband. I was reading in the Amp version of 1Peter 3 that wives should DEPEND ON their husbands.

Okay, icky secret: I don’t want to depend on my hubby. I actually hate it???

So, how many layers of pride must be peeled off to get me to a comfortable place of dependence? YIKES!!!

I catch myself getting impatient with my husband

  • cuz he walks too slow
  • he wants to hug me and I push him away.
  • He rubs my belly (when I’m sitting and the fat is spilling over), so I get mad cuz I’m so vain.

Why he doesn’t give up on me is a miracle!!!

Just a little while ago I got upset cuz he spilled some purified water. I’m feeling really dizzy, I don’t know why, so I think I’m a lil scared. I’m like this crazed person that HATES waste.

Anyway, it just reveals my inability to trust God. I value a few drops of distilled water over my super kind husband.
So what if he doesn’t validate me. Ugh, that’s something that really hangs me up. Being validated. How do you get past that?

At Wed. nite study we did 1Peter 3, to the wives and then we got to the part about the husbands. I tried to not listen too closely or I knew my flesh would want to use it as a “see, what you’re supposed to do” thing. But then our pastor said that husbands should not get embittered to their wives. This happens cuz some husbands never say no. Then it turns out bad and he has to take the responsibility, so he gets bitter with her.

My pastor said that a godly husband needs to know when to say, “No.”

YIKES, I’m sure my husband has learned to say no, cuz I would ALWAYS want my way thinking I am MORE right.

I struggle when he says no, and sometimes I’m right but I’m learning to let it go.

Pray I will not waver in my trust in God. That I will not doubt His goodness and plan even if it doesn’t look good from my perspective.

My flesh NEVER wants to trust God in the things I can’t fix. The things that seem so wrong. Yet He has given me patience and worked things out. I really need to trust Him more.

HERE IS PART OF MY RESPONSE TO SOME OF HER QUESTIONS:
Let’s see – how many layers of pride?  Umm… in my case, it was dump truck loads every day for weeks and weeks and weeks.  And then more layers revealed for a long time after that.  Pretty nasty stuff – and my heart is so deceitful that I may not even see it in myself even though everyone else can see it plain as day.
 
This wife’s icky secret is EVERY wife’s icky secret, as far as I can tell.  We want control!  We are daughters of Eve and we think we know best.  That awful pride entangles us and we want to elevate ourselves and our wisdom above our husbands’ authority and above God’s Word and above God Himself and be in charge of the universe ourselves.  We want sovereignty!  
But what we need is to humble ourselves and learn to trust God to lead us through our imperfect husbands.  It is our greatest test of faith as women, in my view!
Being validated – AH!  Yes.  We love that!
 
Well – for me, accepting that I would NOT be validated was part of learning to tear out my idol of “feeling loved.”  
 
I had to learn that I am not learning respect and biblical submission to control my husband or change him or to make him love me more so that I can feel loved.  That is REALLY important!
 

When I want validation – it is a signal to me now that I need to look to Christ alone for approval and for worth.  I am doing this for GOD – not for my husband, not to have control.

 

It is actually a blessing sometimes NOT to get validation – otherwise, it is easy to think you are controlling him with your respect and submission and turn that into an idol or a form of manipulation.