November 29, 2005 10:13 AM
Husbands and spiritual leadership - a reader's experience
Nilda, who has been reading this blog for a while wrote a comment which was so powerful and authentic that I asked her if I could move it to this space. She said yes: "I’ m so thankful to be able to share what God has been teaching me lately, mostly about surrender, not only to Him, but to the man He brought to my life."
So Nilda is guest blogger today:
Hello, just wanted to add my two cents to this issue of Spiritual Leadership of the husband.I was born and raised in a Christian family....a Pastor's family to be exact. Although I was as far from God as one can be when I met my husband, after we were married we both wanted to be closer to God. We found a Church and we loved it from the beginning. I recommitted my life to Christ and my husband gave his life to Christ in January 2000; but I have to say: we are still growing.
I grew up in a very legalistic environment so I had to re-learn what God wanted from me (my heart) and not what others wanted me to be like (my outwardly appearance).
I tend to be controlling, so submitting to my husband was very hard for me; I have to add that I am older than him by almost four years and I have gone thru different things in life that give me a different view of things. So when it came to giving him the leadership of the home I could find a million and one reasons why I couldn't and why he couldn't handle it (wow, just writing about how I used to think makes me sick).
I wanted him to be the spiritual leader of the home but I wasn't willing to give up other things. It has been only about a year that God started to show me all of the areas where I had it wrong. I realized I had most of the control in our home; I was handling the finances (without informing my husband of every thing I did with the money) and making every other decision necessary and then informing my husband about it. I don't know how he put up with me.
Then I wanted him to be the spiritual leader of this family. He could not assume that role.......and I wondered why?
It was God that little by little showed me that it was not only the spiritual part he had entrusted my husband, it was everything else. And I had taken over from the beginning. I wrestled with God for what seemed a long time and God brought different things to our life that made me recognize that I needed to surrender and submit to my husband. It took a while but I would say that this whole year I have strived to submit to him even in the little things (like where to go out for lunch) not to mention the BIG things, like controlling the finances.I confessed to him that I was overwhelmed trying to do everything and I was always worried and irritable because I had too much in my hands. I told him how for a very long time I thought I had to do everything because I didn't think he could handle it.....I asked him to forgive me for thinking that way about him. I told him that I recognized all of the qualities and qualifications God had equipped him with to be able to manage our home and I asked him to forgive me for not recognizing that before. I invited him to take his place as the head of our home and I told him "I surrender".......his reaction blew me away....tears began pouring down his face and a BIG smile appeared too. I saw his self-esteem and his manhood grow right in front of my eyes.....and I finally he was more than capable of being the head of the family, I just didn't want to see it, I was too busy controlling him.
He began to flourish as the leader and today we are better than six months ago because of that, not only financially but relationally and spiritually.
I'm not saying that this is [the case of the reader who brought up the topic]. I just wanted to share with you how I wanted him to be the spiritual leader but I wasn't willing to give up all of the other areas of our home. I hope something I said here would be of help to you
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Posted in Marriage | Permalink
Comments
I think you really hit the nail on the head when you said you recognized all of the qualities and qualifications God has equipped him with. As women (wives) I think we have a tendency to think we can do it better and right and so we take over. We take over "waiting" for him to be qualified, we want to "see" it and yet at the altar with the vows God qualified him! We need to realize God will equip him and so what if mistakes are made? We make mistakes even though we may not want to admit it. Maybe we really should be helpmeets. Meet him where he is and come along side and help, not take over. If we come along side our husbands might actually want to hear our input more often! We need to watch our tone of voice also. May we have an encouraging tone and not a condescending one.
I think many of us should do as the writer of this post did and humble ourselves and go to our husbands and apologize for how we thought they were unable!
Truly it is God who makes them able, not us.
And let's face it, how well are we fulfilling our role? Are we doing it "perfect"? Yet that is exactly what we ask of our husbands! A good thing to do for your husband whether he has a strong walk, weak walk or no walk with the Lord is pray Ephesians 3:18-21 for him. Open your Bible in front of you and pray this in a personal way for your husband. And while you're there - don't forget to thank God for your husband as well!
Posted by: Leigh | November 29, 2005 1:12 PM
I agree with the poster, except I think it is worth mentioning that sometimes the husband will mess up, BIG TIME!
But that needs to be confronted the same way you would expect to be confronted about your own insufficencies.
About a year ago I gave up the reins on things, especially financial, and my dh made big time mistakes that resulted in pretty much the worst possible consequences. Since then it has gotten both of us a little closer to being able to make responsible decisions. We all need to live and learn, and we are better for it.
Posted by: paige | November 29, 2005 1:44 PM
Thanks for your insight. This is definitely a challenging post.
Posted by: Carrie | November 29, 2005 11:55 PM
