MARRIAGE: THE As-Zs OF NEVERS:
C-CHANGE
(Trying to Change the Husband)
The most important gift from God is
a personal relationship with Jesus Christ made possible by a growing spiritual
life. Only through the spiritual life
is the believer able to have an active and thriving relationship with Jesus
Christ and a truly Christ-centered life and marriage. For the married woman, God’s next most
important gift is her marriage. It is a
relationship God creates and honors. As
she responds to her husband in the way God means her to, she can expect God to
bless her. However, if she sets out to
build her marriage on her own machinations, she will live in marital
frustration rather than marital bliss.
One common problem area for many wives is the attempt to change her
husband. Any time a Christian wife is
tempted to try to change her husband, she should pause
and reflect on just how out of line such an activity is with what the Word of
God teaches. The idea that a wife is to
change her husband goes against every single passage in the Bible on marriage.
Apart from a relationship with Jesus
Christ, marriage is indeed the greatest gift on earth. However, like any great blessing there are
adjustments and challenges. When you get
married you get something new and something old. After the exchange of “I dos,” when you begin to unwrap your
package (no pun intended), the gift often turns out to be a surprise. Some even discover that they married the
wrong person. It is important to
realize that, even though you did not know exactly what you were getting, God
did. The wonderful thing for the doctrinal believer is the confidence in
knowing that God will take all things and work them out for good, as long as he
puts God first (Rom 8:28). God can use
the very thing in your husband that you dislike the most to advance you and
mold you into the image of Christ. God’s
will is for you to settle down to a lifetime of enjoying the gift you promised
to honor and cherish.
Through spiritual growth, the
Christian wife increasing learns to accept others, including her husband, by
reflecting on how Christ accepts her (Rom 5:8). God loves and accepts her
unconditionally. She understands that
she is not on probation with Him.
Unconditional love and acceptance, then, should be the basis of any
marriage.
At times you may feel that it is
asking too much of you to accept your husband as he is. But I guarantee that as you begin to accept
him, you will develop a more meaningful relationship with him because both of
you will have the freedom you need to thrive and mature.
When you accept your husband the way
he is, you will give him the freedom to be the man he wants to be. He will have the freedom to come and go as he
pleases and to make his own decisions.
In other words, true love is letting go!
Your husband will love you freely as he did when he chose to marry you
unless you stifle that love with your possessiveness. As you love your husband unconditionally –
without demands and ultimatums – you will see him drawn to you like steel to a
magnet.
As the wife is consistently in
fellowship with God, the Holy Spirit produces in her God’s dynamic love (Gal 5:22). This divine love is described in 1 Cor 13:4-7: love
endures long… is patient and kind…never envious nor jealous, does not insist on
its own rights or ways, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful
or resentful…it takes no account of the evil done to it... pays no attention to
a suffered wrong….it does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness…love
bears up under anything and everything that comes, is every ready to believe
the best…its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances and it endures
everything (without weakening). What a
difference the spiritual life can make on any marriage!
The basis for carnal wife’s
discontentment and inability is her ignorance of Bible doctrine or refusal to
use it. Instead of living in God’s
expectations of her, she lives in discontentment because her husband does not
measure up as he fails to meet “her” goals and ideals. When he fails to live up to her
expectations, she is hurt, irritated, disappointed, and becomes self-absorbed
and disoriented to reality. The wife
must learn to stop setting goals for her husband and stop expecting him to be
who he is not. The wife who does not
put her spiritual life first will find herself with a void and emptiness that
she will expect her husband to fill – therefore making the situation even more frustrating.
It may seem only right for the wife
to help her husband change attitudes, traits, and actions that are making her
unhappy. But all well-meaning efforts are not only
unbiblical, they communicate to him, “I do not love or respect you as you
are. I want you to be different.” This will create resentment. It is natural for a man to want his wife to
be proud, not ashamed of him. When she
is not, he is tempted to become embittered against her (Col 3:9). It is hard for any man to live a healthy,
masculine, satisfying life when he is constantly on trial by his wife.
God never gave the wife the job of
convicting her husband of sin or his shortcomings. That is the work of the Holy Spirit (Jn 16:8-11; 1 Pet 3:1-2).
The wife was never appointed to be the husband’s mother – to correct and
train him. When the wife develops an
attitude of “correcting” him, communication breaks down in such an atmosphere
of non-acceptance. Why should he
communicate if he is likely to hear from his wife about what “he should
have done”? Why should he confide in a
wife about how he feels about things if she is likely to be critical or
ridicule and belittle him?
Again, don’t try to change your
husband by demanding your own way.
Though you may feel you have succeeded in some area when he gives in, he
may just want to keep peace in the household.
Over a period of time, your domineering attitude has a way of destroying
his personal love for you. You may win a
few battles, but you will lose the war.
Forfeiting a beautiful, fulfilling marital relationship is not worth the
temporary “success.” Most women know
this intuitively. Only arrogance thinks
it is worth the fight.
Proverbs 14:12 There is a way which seems right
to a man, But its end is the way of death.
Doctrine
matters!
For more
information on marriage with its interrelationships and responsibilities go to http://fbcweb.org/Doctrines.html
Pastor
Don