Wife

How To Love The Man You Married

Do you love the man you married? What is a priority in your marriage? Is it doing whatever you want by living the way you want and getting what you want when you want it? Or do you and your husband both agree or disagree on important issues and problems that affect the marriage? When we disregard our husband’s protection and decisions for us then we are basically living our own life. This surely doesn’t mean that a husband has the right to disregard his wife’s feelings either and do whatever he wants. It works both ways.

Do You Reject Your Husband’s Feelings?
When we get married, we’re not daddy’s little girl anymore. Well we are, but we now have a new responsibility-to be a good wife to our husbands. When we get married our life is now with our husbands. Most men want to be respected for their position as the man in the marriage. Loving your man is regarding him with respect and reverence just because he is your husband.

I do realize there are many good wives out there who treat their husbands with respect, but I think there are just as many who don’t. Loving the man you married is not about getting your way all the time. It is not rejecting your husband sexually or in any other way. Just because a woman doesn’t feel like having sex doesn’t mean she should deny her husband. This works both ways too.

Are You Respecting the Man You Married?
Respecting the man you married is not constantly nagging and complaining to him over minor issues and circumstances going on around the home because you feel the need to control or have power over him. Some wives do this often and don’t even realize they are doing it. Husbands don’t even realize this is happening. Then we wonder why our man strays from the marriage. Is it because we are devaluing our man’s position in the marriage? I should think so.

When you feel yourself wanting to gain some aspect of control over certain issues, stop and ask yourself, “Is this really worth arguing with my husband over”? Take a deep breath and relax. Understand that there are, and will be, many, many things you do not have control over. The more we believe that we can change something to fit our needs better, the more we get disappointed when nothing changes.

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When Loving a Spouse is Difficult

Ask Angie: I cannot seem to find love for my husband. We have been through difficult times and we were not able to work together on anything. There were months when we did not speak to each other and just went on with our lives without communication. I have been hurt so much…. It is wrong but I cannot find forgiveness for him nor seem to be able to detach with love. Our children see the problem we have and now have issues in their lives since we did not show them a good marriage/ family…I have been working on my spirituality so much but still find that my heart is heavy.

Ask Angie: Dear Angie, It’s me again. I was reading the stories about the women who are married to alcoholics. My husband is not an alcoholic though he displays the same kind of behaviors. Life with him is unbearable at times. He told me last night, again, that most of the time he does not want to be married, and during those times he treats me like he does not want to be married. The few times he does want to be married, he looks at me with kindness, it’s very short lived. Then the cycle repeats itself. I am tired. I am getting physically sick from it. How does a Christian woman stay with a (Pastor) husband that 95 percent of the time does not want to be married and shows his wife no love?

Marriage Guidance: I will address the issues that are italicized above. Both of these women are experiencing similar issues in their marriage. Although one is having difficulty loving her husband, the other’s husband is having difficulty loving his wife. Please print out this marriage column and give it to your husbands. Read through the article resources together. Talk about the questions at the end of the articles. Marriage needs both husband and wife to be willing to put in the effort.

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I Love You But I’m Not “In Love With You” Anymore

Has your spouse told you they weren’t “in love” with you anymore? Well do I have news for you. The saying “I love you but I’m not in love with you anymore” is a worn out cliché. It’s not possible to “fall out of love” because you weren’t “in love” to begin with. The excuse “I’m not in love with you anymore” is nonsensical. Let me tell you why.

There is no such emotional condition as falling out of love; it’s a justification for doing whatever you are planning on doing. It’s a way to let your spouse down easy. What you’re really feeling and should be saying is “I don’t want to love you anymore”. It usually means that the attitude towards your spouse and marriage is not what it once was. Perhaps you are talking yourself into having an affair or perhaps you have already had an affair.

The person who says “I’m not in love with you anymore” is searching for a feeling.

The marriage has stopped giving them a feeling they want and expect to have. It is an attitude that builds up after months and or years of a lifeless marriage – a marriage that has no intimacy. This is why quality time spent together (intimacy) is more important than sex in a marriage. Not that sex isn’t important, because it is, but that sex IS NOT INTIMACY. Sex may be a part of intimacy but it is not the whole picture.

Intimacy can be as simple as playing a board game or planting seeds together in your garden; or intimacy can be as complex as working together in a business or getting involved in a hobby with your spouse. But couples aren’t doing any of these things together anymore! They have drifted apart, each doing their own thing. When couples stop doing things together they lose the intimate bond between them they once shared when they were first married.

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How To Stay Faithful In Your Marriage

Did you know that our thoughts and beliefs become actions over time? The more we think about being with other people outside of our marriage, the more these thoughts will become our actions. Knowing this then, the first step to conquer infidelity is not to have the desires within our mind in the first place. Easier said than done? Not really.

We desire others sexually because we have been conditioned into believing its ok to do so – it’s a mindset. We have been trained to desire others sexually at a young age, and we have been conditioned into believing it’s ok to look at scantily dressed women and men. Our conscience may even tell us that it’s wrong to actually commit the act of sex outside of marriage, but does our conscience tell us that the desire is wrong?

The bible definitely lets us know that desiring others sexually is wrong because it leads to sin, so then what is the problem? The problem is we aren’t going to the root of the problem. The root of sexual lust is in how we think towards human beings. So then to stop the desire we only have to change the way we think about others. Are we really respecting others in the way that Christ has taught us to? If we truly respect another person then we should have the attitude to not think about desiring them lustfully and disrespecting them in any way.

You were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge in the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love you neighbor as yourself.” Galatians 5:13-14

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Pornography Addiction: What Can a Wife Do?

Don’t give up on your marriage! Porn addiction doesn’t have to mean the end to marriage. In fact, it is time to nurture your marriage with the tender loving care it so needs and deserves. You can actually learn from this and have a better marriage over it. I encourage you to put forth every effort to reinforce the bonds of trust and love that may have been broken between you and your husband.

The moral outcome of a husband viewing pornography does not only affect him but the wife as well. A wife may feel unloved, invalidated, and sexually unattractive. “Why doesn’t he want sex with me anymore? Why does he look at all those gorgeous naked women?What’s wrong with me?”

Nothing at all is wrong with you! This problem has NOTHING to do with you. It is your husband’s problem. Don’t make yourself feel victimized by this issue in your marriage. Your husband is looking at porn and acting out sexually because of an underlying problem within his inner awareness that is still haunting him. He may not even be aware of it himself.

Most likely your husbands porn addiction is caused by something unpleasant that happened to him in his childhood that is manifesting itself within his mind. He may be feeling anguish over his past and for a temporary “feel better” fix your husband is acting out his emotional pain and feelings of grief through the use of porn.It makes him feel better emotionally and mentally.

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Overcoming Porn

** Are you having less sex with your spouse or stopped having sex with your spouse because you are looking at pornography?
** Are unhealthy emotions overtaking your thoughts and controlling the outcome of your actions?
** Have you tried to quit looking at porn but can’t?

If you answered yes to any one of these then you are addicted. Anytime we are addicted to something it means we are under its control and have become a slave to it. Does being addicted to porn mean you are a bad person? Not necessarily.

What it means is that you have a sexual temptation that you desire more than you desire the goodness of self brought on by God. You are allowing the sin to overwrite the natural goodness of your character. Satan is pulling at your flesh to look at porn, while principles and mores are put on hold somewhere in your mind.

Bad people remain in their addiction all the while getting worse spiritually and emotionally. Bad people don’t even try to come out of their addiction but rather revel in it and eventually get worse in their sinful behavior. Bad people don’t know they are lost, they believe they are following the right path already. Bad people are literally holding hands with Satan.

Some of you might be playing a game of tug and war because your conscience is having a difficult time dealing with your actions. This is the flesh (physical and emotional feelings) fighting with the spiritual aspects of your nature. The spiritual aspect of self knows right from wrong. Which way are you tugging? Did you fall into temptation again?

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Five Ways to Help an Alcoholic, Addict or Dysfunctional Person

1. Prayer
Since the alcoholic, addict or dysfunctional person cannot be helped until he or she wants help, it is necessary that we begin to pray for them, asking that God will bring them to that place that he/she will seek help. Do not be discouraged. Things might get worse before they get better; but remember, God answers prayer.

2. Offer the Gospel
In Romans 1:16 we read, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth.”

So often, we tend to try everything but the power of God in helping the addicted or dysfunctional person. Now it is true that he may always need medical help, possibly psychiatric help, and the help of a counselor may be profitable; but without the power of Christ working in the life of this individual, nothing will be of lasting value. Witness to him or her of your own faith in Christ and through your church, putting them in contact with others who have a vital testimony to the power of God to change lives.

Good Christian literature will also be a help in getting this message across and we would be glad to make suggestions as to what books he might find profitable.

3. Fellowship
One of the strongest points of recovery groups is the fellowship that they have one with the other. It is necessary that when an alcoholic, addict or dysfunctional person makes a step toward recovery that we be willing to offer them fellowship, to make them feel welcome, to make them feel needed and to encourage them to share with others. This could be done through CIR or through the fellowwship of a church or a Christian businessmen’s committee such as a Gideon Camp.

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Marriage is About Honoring God

Marriage is very special to the Lord. He didn’t just create two genders and throw them together, hoping that they might be able to work out some kind of relationship. He actually create marriage when he created men and women. In other words, what’s important isn’t so much the relationship as the marriage itself.

Proverbs 18:22 NRSV
He who finds a wife finds a good thing,
and obtains favor from the Lord.

In our society, we have lowered marriage to simply relationship. It’s so much more than that. Marriage is an earthly picture of the Church’s relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. In Ephesians 5, Paul calls this kind of joining, two becoming one flesh, “a great mystery” (v. 32). And it is just that. When two—a husband and wife—join together, they become something wonderful. And that “something” is also a picture of how God wants to be joined with us.

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Is Porn the Norm?

Several years ago, Faith Popcorn, America’s foremost trend expert, hailed by the New York Times as the “trend oracle” and as the “Nostradamus of marketing” by Fortune magazine, declared, “Porn is norm.” She was not endorsing pornography, but predicting that media technology would push the limits of what is acceptable and would facilitate a culture of instant gratification; thus porn would be the norm. True to her prediction, pornography has moved out of the back allies of the urban scene and onto the main streets of America.

While most Internet businesses were going bankrupt, the porn industry was raking in huge profits, making it perhaps the most profitable business on the Internet. In the past, one had to travel to sleazy backstreets to find porn; now, it’s only a click away on the computer and on the remote control of the cable/satellite TV. Easy, private and nobody knows?except God. At home or in the hotel, porn is private, available and acceptable. Some estimate that as much as 70% of in-room hotel profits come from porn and that over 50% of hotel patrons participate. As people consume it in private, porn becomes the norm and goes public.

Whether it’s the infamous Super Bowl incident or the recent Paris Hilton hamburger commercial, porn is seducing its way into the mainstream. The church needs to be on guard against this tsunami of trash. As it inundates our culture, it is also seeping into our churches. Shepherds must be vigilant and use the rod and staff to defeat this enemy and guard Christ’s sheep.

A Reality in the Church

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What does it mean to surrender a loved one to God?

What does it mean to surrender a loved one to God? Does it mean you turn your back and walk away?

No, certainly not. Surrendering does not mean abandoning. It does not mean you no longer care.

Surrender is motivated out of love — such deep love for the person that you are willing to get out of the way and let God sit in the driver’s seat. Admit it: with us in the driver’s seat, things weren’t going quite so well. There were just too many things we were powerless to control.

Surrender is choosing to yoke up with Jesus.

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