How many A+ marriages to you know of? Most men struggle to name one.
Here are some nuggets from HUSBANDRY 44, a six week Workshop on God’s Design for being a Husband, a subject most of us know little about. https://www.jesusspokenhere.com/husbandry-44/
God’s desire for all of us is to learn how to receive His love and Abide in Christ. From the moment of salvation, His transformation of us is fully available. We either depend on our self-sufficiency or Christ Himself. This is called the process of sanctification. This growth and change is what God desires for us. Marriage is a primary tool God uses.
Marriage is actually a picture of what God wants from us in relationship with Him. We are the Bride, and He is the Bridegroom.
So, if our wives are the closest human relationships we’ll ever have, why wouldn’t God use her as His most valuable tool in sanctifying us? HE WILL AND HE DOES.
“The Role of the Man in the Family” by David McLaughlin contends that the divorce rate among couples who pray together is one in 10,000. Praying in marriage is the epitome of intimacy. However, intimacy is the reason that its uncomfortable and unusual.
Be happily incompatible,
Don’t fight your differences.
Model this — “I was wrong, I hope you will forgive me”
Average married couple spends as few as 4 minutes/day in quality conversation.
COMMUNICATE Tip: Be curious with your wife
The happiest couples have a very unrealistic view (in a good way) of their spouse and they endeavor to find the most generous explanation for their spouse’s behavior and then believe it.
Women confront to connect,
Men confront to confront.
Unaware husbands being dismissive to their wives’ questions – DANGEROUS!
For the courageous, ask your wife if she ever feels dismissed.
Changing your reaction to her seemingly challenging question can be powerful. Instead of reacting to her question with some form of dismissiveness, ask the LORD, “Is there something you want me to pay attention to in what she just asked or said?” You know, God wastes nothing. He may be using her innocent question to grow you in a specific area.
God uses the vulnerable, and relentlessly transparent marriage relationship as the primary mechanism to make our progress as Christians/husbands or the lack thereof obvious via His mirror (Your Wife).
We’d give up our life for our wife, but we don’t take her advice.
Sex is a gift not a right
Marriage is the closet human physical emotional and spiritual attachment that two humans can have. INTIMACY is a key success factor in an abundant marriage.
A study by The 4-11 Foundation showed that,
If a wife becomes increasingly unselfish, most husbands remain selfish,
If a husband becomes increasingly unselfish, most wives become increasingly unselfish.
1 Peter 3:7 is the most direct instruction God gives husbands. Given that fact, maybe we husbands should know it well? It also should be noted that Peter, the author, is the only known married guy among Jesus’s original Twelve.
7 You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman; and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered. [1 Peter 3:7]
What is the phrase above “in the same way” referring to? [1 Peter 2:21-23]
For you have been called for this purpose, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you would follow in His steps, 22 He who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth; 23 and while being abusively insulted, He did not insult in return; while suffering, He did not threaten, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously;
Being a better husband is not about trying harder or trying more precisely, it’s about the Holy Spirit indwelling you. Don’t walk this journey alone – He is in you! We just have to be honest and “empty” enough to allow Him to do His work.
God designed your wife to respond to your Christ-likeness.