by Lara McConkey, Pastor’s Wife
Grace Baptist Church
Joppa, Maryland

As women, we all have a natural desire to fix things or to help teach or train someone who may need a helping hand. This wonderful trait can be very advantageous in so many areas of our lives. If, or when, we are blessed with children, we constantly teach and train and teach and train….

For those of you who are like me, this “wonderful” trait followed us into our marriage. We said “I do,” and then shortly thereafter we began to see areas in our husband’s life that needed to be adjusted. Thus began a “much-needed tuneup” to be performed under the best of intentions. The potential end result and motives were very good. However, many of us started fine-tuning an engine that wasn’t ours to fine-tune.

In Genesis 2:18, we are told “…It is not good that the man should be alone.…” God then created Eve. Adam was to have dominion (supreme authority according to Genesis 1:26 and 28). Eve was to be Adam’s help meet (or aide). Depending on your upbringing, being your husband’s aide may be a difficult task for you. Our society has so engrained into a woman’s thinking that she has an equal leadership role with man that it is hard for a woman to know and understand a true Biblical relationship. Hollywood often portrays men as incompetent fools who can’t make it in life without a woman’s telling them what to do. This philosophy goes against a woman’s being an help meet.

Indeed, women are very capable. Women are able to multi-task. God made a woman to have qualities that will help her husband become a great man. But…

– Have you ever gone behind your husband trying to fix all of his mistakes?

– Have you ever found yourself correcting your husband?

– Have you ever tried to help your husband with a project so that it can look perfect to everyone else?

This natural desire to help can sometimes get in the way! God created a woman to be an “help meet.” He did not create a woman to control her husband.

Be careful that you don’t get these two terms switched like I once did. It takes time to purge out some wrong thinking and some bad habits. The more you step back and the more you let go of the reins of your husband, the more God will be able to work in his life.

As ladies we see things that are sometimes oblivious to our husbands. Rather than pointing them out to your husband, go to God. Talk to God about them and allow God to reveal them to your husband. Sometimes our husbands aren’t growing spiritually because we simply aren’t allowing them to grow spiritually. Instead, we have our hands all over their lives. We stand between them and God.Wives, we need to get out of the way!

Your husband will never be a “perfect” man, nor will you ever be a “perfect” wife.

– Ask God to open your eyes and to help you see what you can work on to make your marriage a happier one.

– Ask God to show you what you can do to help your husband have a closer walk with God.

As you grow closer to God, God will help you along the way.

I used to be bothered when preachers would say that a man should be closer to God than to anyone else. The closer a person gets to God, the better the marriage he or she will have really is true. For me, I can look back over the years and see the exact time that my focus changed from remolding my husband to talking to God about my husband.

I discovered that the more I talked to God about my husband, the more I saw in myself that needed some fine tuning. I began fine tuning me, and God began fine tuning my husband and me! What a miraculous change there has been in both of us! When I got out of the way, God could work in my husband’s life. My attitude change also allowed God to work in my life as well.

May I challenge you to start talking to God constantly about everything? He truly is an amazing God Who will answer!!