Transforming Marital Harshness Through Prayer and Respect
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I would encourage our friend to pray both for her husband and for herself in this matter of his harshness. Jesus said that we should ask God that his will would be done on Earth and that would include in our marriages as it's done in heaven and that includes that his will be done uh the way the Angels would do it husbands would love their wives and wives would love their husbands the way Angels obey God namely joyfully and fully and without begrudging. [00:02:00]
It's completely fitting that she would intercede with her father in Heaven that her husband would be softened and moved toward greater christlikeness in his demeanor toward her and I say that she should pray for herself as well because even though he Bears his own peculiar burden of responsibility before God for his own change we know from scripture and experience that God uses the behavior of of husbands and wives to bring about change in each other. [00:02:42]
In First Peter uh chapter 3 veres 1 and two Peter says to wives that they should try to bring about Godly change in their husbands by means of their quote respectful and pure conduct in other words Peter underlines what we know from experience that a person may be helped in his deliverance from his own sinning by The Godly way that others behave around him especially people close to him that he loves like his wife. [00:03:40]
I would guess that among the kind of conduct that God might use in the case of a harsh husband to bring about change would be what God Said in Proverbs 15:1 for the wife for example a soft answer turns away wrath or maybe turns away harshness or Proverbs 25:15 a soft tongue will break a bone the bone of harshness in other words I would encourage her not to return evil for evil or harshness for harshness which will probably only SP spiral into a worse situation but rather to try to win him toward gentleness with gentleness. [00:04:22]
There will probably come a point where she desires and needs the support of others in this effort to love her harsh husband she will need them to pray for her and encourage her counsel her but I would earnestly caution her against badmouthing her husband behind his back with other people this will almost certainly backfire in a more hopeless situation. [00:05:12]
During some of our darkest days of marriage Noel and I both knew we came to a point where we knew we needed to have others to counsel us we weren't sure yet whether it needed to be a professional counselor a Christian counselor which it did eventually uh but we wanted some friends to encourage us pray for us where we could unburden ourselves be heard with with sympathy and yet not naively as though everything is her fault or his fault. [00:05:52]
We knew we did not want to talk about our problems just randomly to everybody that came along that would have been harmful so we asked each other we just agreed with each other on a handful of very trusted friends and we gave each other the trusted permission to say anything that seemed helpful to say and ask that other couple not to share anything. [00:06:30]
I would encourage this wife to recognize that very likely part of what she is experiencing in her husband's harshness is owing to sin part owing to sin and part of it is probably owing to the what should we call it the inherited genetic Tendencies embedded in his own basic personality or or in his upbringing now I'm not excusing any sin by saying this but I am being realistic and acknowledging how complicated human beings are. [00:07:58]
I know people whose personality is such that you wish they would smile more you wish that they would oil the relational Wheels with a few more kind words or forthcoming encouragements um or affirmations but in instead there's almost continual bluntness tness unemotional communication and I have learned over the decades that in certain cases this is simply not sinful this is a deeply ingrained personality trait with no ill will there's no ill will behind it. [00:08:46]
When it comes to actual approaching the husband here are a few thoughts about how to go about that it is perfectly biblical as you can uh see from the way Paul approaches the problems say in First Corinthians to find explicit things that you can say by way of thankfulness and encouragement and affirmation call them evidences of God's grace that you see in his life so that criticisms when they come are embedded in a rich context of love and verbal affirmation. [00:09:41]
Try not to globalize that is uh instead of saying you always do this yeah you're always saying it that way you always do it that way I can tell you human beings do not like the word always I mean if you want to push somebody away yeah make it sound like this criticism is global it's all consuming that's all you are as a human being because what what that says to the other person is there's there's no hope for you that they will feel paralyzed and helpless. [00:11:28]
If you both feel stuck after a while it is perfectly biblical and right to seek help from close friends or even if if it comes to that from a wise Christian counselor. [00:13:04]
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It's completely fitting that she would intercede with her father in Heaven that her husband would be softened and moved toward greater christlikeness in his demeanor toward her and I say that she should pray for herself as well because even though he Bears his own peculiar burden of responsibility before God for his own change we know from scripture and experience that God uses the behavior of of husbands and wives to bring about change in each other. [00:02:42]
In First Peter uh chapter 3 veres 1 and two Peter says to wives that they should try to bring about Godly change in their husbands by means of their quote respectful and pure conduct in other words Peter underlines what we know from experience that a person may be helped in his deliverance from his own sinning by The Godly way that others behave around him especially people close to him that he loves like his wife. [00:03:40]
I would guess that among the kind of conduct that God might use in the case of a harsh husband to bring about change would be what God Said in Proverbs 15:1 for the wife for example a soft answer turns away wrath or maybe turns away harshness or Proverbs 25:15 a soft tongue will break a bone the bone of harshness in other words I would encourage her not to return evil for evil or harshness for harshness which will probably only SP spiral into a worse situation but rather to try to win him toward gentleness with gentleness. [00:04:22]
There will probably come a point where she desires and needs the support of others in this effort to love her harsh husband she will need them to pray for her and encourage her counsel her but I would earnestly caution her against badmouthing her husband behind his back with other people this will almost certainly backfire in a more hopeless situation. [00:05:12]
During some of our darkest days of marriage Noel and I both knew we came to a point where we knew we needed to have others to counsel us we weren't sure yet whether it needed to be a professional counselor a Christian counselor which it did eventually uh but we wanted some friends to encourage us pray for us where we could unburden ourselves be heard with with sympathy and yet not naively as though everything is her fault or his fault. [00:05:52]
We knew we did not want to talk about our problems just randomly to everybody that came along that would have been harmful so we asked each other we just agreed with each other on a handful of very trusted friends and we gave each other the trusted permission to say anything that seemed helpful to say and ask that other couple not to share anything. [00:06:30]
I would encourage this wife to recognize that very likely part of what she is experiencing in her husband's harshness is owing to sin part owing to sin and part of it is probably owing to the what should we call it the inherited genetic Tendencies embedded in his own basic personality or or in his upbringing now I'm not excusing any sin by saying this but I am being realistic and acknowledging how complicated human beings are. [00:07:58]
I know people whose personality is such that you wish they would smile more you wish that they would oil the relational Wheels with a few more kind words or forthcoming encouragements um or affirmations but in instead there's almost continual bluntness tness unemotional communication and I have learned over the decades that in certain cases this is simply not sinful this is a deeply ingrained personality trait with no ill will there's no ill will behind it. [00:08:46]
When it comes to actual approaching the husband here are a few thoughts about how to go about that it is perfectly biblical as you can uh see from the way Paul approaches the problems say in First Corinthians to find explicit things that you can say by way of thankfulness and encouragement and affirmation call them evidences of God's grace that you see in his life so that criticisms when they come are embedded in a rich context of love and verbal affirmation. [00:09:41]
Try not to globalize that is uh instead of saying you always do this yeah you're always saying it that way you always do it that way I can tell you human beings do not like the word always I mean if you want to push somebody away yeah make it sound like this criticism is global it's all consuming that's all you are as a human being because what what that says to the other person is there's there's no hope for you that they will feel paralyzed and helpless. [00:11:28]
If you both feel stuck after a while it is perfectly biblical and right to seek help from close friends or even if if it comes to that from a wise Christian counselor. [00:13:04]
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