At the encouragement of my dear friend Kat I am going to share and ask you women and men in this blogworld about the position of Head of the Household and who leads it in your home.
Of course I have to share who leads in my home, that is only fair right?! My answer ~ My husband.
But for years that was definately NOT THE CASE! Not only did he not lead but guess who was the one who kept him from taking his rightful place? ....ME! Why you ask?
because I NAGGED him
because I put myself in his place
because I didn't trust him to do it the right way
because I judged his walk with the Lord and because I didn't see what I thought was enough prayer, or reading the Word ENOUGH then he surely couldn't be doing all he should to be the godly man that I needed him to be or the Spiritual Head of the household that our family needed him to be ~ so by golly someone had to do it......
you know what all of this equaled?
ME not trusting God and not allowing God to do what HE WANTED to do. I was Fearful. I was WRONG. PLUS, so many other things that the Lord had to show me and discipline me for but in it ~ HE showed both of us the way. He showed us how VERY much He loves us and how to grow in intimacy not only with HIM, but with each other.
First of all I want to share that as close as your husband is to you is as close as he is to God. If your marriage is struggling in communication there is a high chance that your husband is not communicating with the LORD. pretty much 100% chance.
They can never be close to HIM and not to us ...why? Because the LORD would never allow it. Think about that for a minute.
Secondly, I learned that the more I nagged my husband about his prayer life or his time spent reading the Word the further away he would go. One day, I was posed with the question "Why does that bother you Loren?" "Well, because I am afraid if he isn't spending time with the Lord then, well, you know"...."OK why are you scared?" "and if you were really honest wouldn't it be true that you aren't trusting the LORD to do HIS job in and through Brian and truly you are putting your faith in Brian and not in the LORD?" OH SNAP I was busted! Honestly I was putting my faith in myself and judging that because I was attending Bible Study & I was in the Word then I had to be the one to lead us. Has anyone been there? It is truly a sad place to be and it leads to disaster! It brings so much strife into your house and trust me ~ everyone feels it ~ especially the kids!!
I went to a conference one year and afterward this precious man who taught came up to me and we were talking. I remember sharing my concern about my husband and he looked at me and said "You don't strike me as a woman who is conniving or manipulative but your issue here is FEAR. You have got to STOP putting yourself on that Cross ~ stop being a human HOLY SPIRIT ~ LAY HIM DOWN AND TRUST THE LORD. He encouraged me that every time I picked up my DH and carried him (emotionally or spiritually) that I needed to stop, repent and pray FOR BRIAN!!! Ok many times I laid him back down but as time went on I actually started to recognize WHEN I would do this and I would stop, pray, lay him down and guess what..... I changed and not only that but so did my DH :)
I had to first repent to the LORD. I had to then repent to my husband for taking the place of Spiritual Head of our family and TRUST even when I didn't see anything, I mean anything. Brian is and will forever be the Spiritual Head of our family.
There are times when I would get upset because of something I wasn't see him do that I thought he should be doing and I learned that at those moments when I was upset it was the HOLY SPIRIT prompting me and showing me something about me. I may have a judgement against someone or I may have a fear in regards to something. Again, this was the LORD speaking to me ~ teaching me ~ helping me to forgive someone or to put my trust in HIM more and more!
Let me just encourage you, if you can relate to anything that I have shared and if you are leading your family spiritually, girls ~ it is NOT our place ~ it is not our job! Our men have everything in them to lead us and God will guide them and they WILL be all you ever dreamed them to be but our job is to love them, to pray for them and to lift them up and trust them and God, no matter what we see or don't see. Share your heart with your husband but make sure you come to them "in love" not in accusation. Share your heart with the LORD ~ HE knows it already but desires for you to share with HIM. Dialogue with HIM, HE will speak back to you and LONGS TOO!! The LORD will honor this and when your husband sees that you honestly are supporting and believing that HE can and will lead ....OH MY, it will bring you to a whole new level of love with the LORD and with your husband! I PROMISE!
It is a journey, it will take you places, but the destination is AMAZING ....
IN HIM
