Status Updates From How to Speak Life to Your H...

The research is clear, whether we like it or not, couples who are madly in love are not simply married to better people; they are instead choosing to concentrate on what they love about the other.

I can remember such moments of confirmation bias quite vividly. They were a daily way of life. I believed the worst about Dave, so even when he did a chore or came home early from work, I wasn’t satisfied because I couldn’t see past what I was already believing about him to actually see what he was doing.

We are grown men, but in many ways on the inside, we’re just little boys who are looking for encouragement. When we are challenged in an encouraging “I believe in you” way, we want to rise up and seek greatness.

“I think when a man stands toe-to-toe with his wife and looks into her eyes, he sees the man he could become.”

But instead of battling side by side, we often get mad at and disappointed in each other, turning to fight the one who is supposed to be our co-warrior in the fight. How our enemy must gloat with glee when we stop fighting him and start fighting our spouse instead. But in God’s original design, even the differences between a woman and man were intended to be like iron sharpening iron for the betterment of both.

there is nothing subservient or inferior about being a helper. The term actually carries the idea of strengthening someone in a way they cannot do for themselves, which reveals a powerful understanding of God’s unique strength and influence given to the woman.

Though I didn’t believe I was the man Ann said I was, I began over the course of time to want to become that man. I not only started trying harder to be the husband and father Ann knew I could be, but more so I started believing I had real value as God’s son—and yes, as Ann’s husband. That set me free and gave me a lot of peace.

Then I started learning that if I have something important I need to say to Dave that might be hard for him to hear, I should go to Jesus first and ask him how to phrase it in a way that will bring life instead of death.

Every criticism, accusation, critique, and nagging word only serves to lop off more and more of the husband until, at least when he’s at home with us, he’s merely a wounded stump of the man God intends him to be. The reality was, though it felt super justified in the moment, I sliced and diced a once vibrant and confident man into a withdrawn, bitter, belittled one.

We may not realize it as it’s happening, but with each criticism, we’re lopping off so much that, eventually, the only thing left of a once full and lively plant (of a husband) is a mutilated, stumpy remnant.

When we take our eyes solely off of our spouse and look at ourselves as well, we will realize just how much we need the same amazing grace we are so often unwilling to give to our spouse.

I thought this was part of my job—to make Dave more like Jesus. So I tried, but it wasn’t working. That’s because it was an assignment never given to me. It was God’s job, not mine.