Reason #708

Sometimes I wish I knew more about the women in the bible. I wish I knew what kind of wives and mothers they were. What they struggled with, and how they overcame. I wish I could talk with these women, these matriarchs of the Christian faith, and ask them a few questions. Because I read their stories, and I read about the Proverbs 31 woman, and I don’t know how they do it. I mean really, when does Proverbs 31 sister get a break? Never. She’s up before the sun and she going to bed long after it has set. Her day is crammed packed with things to do for her family, and I just wonder what she’s thinking. I wonder what goes through her head as she lives out her roles of wife and mother, and I wonder if she ever says anything about it.

Clearly, the Proverbs 31 woman is independent. I mean look at how capable she is. Really, there isn’t much she can’t do. There is no mention of construction or mechanics, but that’s about the only thing missing from the list. She is a go getter, no doubt. Maybe even a take charge kind of woman. When I think about this “new testament” example of a Godly woman, I also think back to “old-testament” Ruth and I see some similarities. Conveniently enough, Ruth is my next reading. That worked out nicely!  

So I’ll be really candid tonight. I’ll be really honest about myself, and it’s not a lot of pretty truths. I often feel like I fail as wife. Like maybe I wasn’t cut out for this job. I’m not a “natural” at it. I hate the feeling of letting someone down, but I feel like I tend to end up in that place more often than not. Not because I want to be there, and not because I enjoy it. It’s the little things that pile up. The little things that stress me out and frustrate me. And as much as I want to be this super-wife figure, I struggle being her. I struggle “getting it,” I suppose you could say. And I just have to wonder if Ruth ever felt that way.

It takes a lot of courage to be loved. To open oneself to the scrutiny of love, rather. To be vulnerable and willing to hear the truth about yourself. It takes some serious guts to become one. To allow someone to share that much of your life with you. Because human love, unlike God’s love, is not perfect. Only perfect love drives out all fear, and so sometimes love is scary. I have to think Ruth understood that. She went from losing a spouse, which is terrifying, to moving and being on her own, to meeting Boaz and becoming his bride. None of these events were easy. Some were definitely more enjoyable than others, but none were easy. And so I wonder if Ruth struggled in her role as a wife. If she had days where she just fell flat on her face. I wonder if she ever lost her temper, got frustrated, said things she shouldn’t have, complained, griped, or cried her eyes out. Was she good at this? Was she a natural, or did it take a lot of work for this super-woman figure who seems to do everything right?
 

I read a short article today about one of the roles of a Godly wife today, and I was highly convicted. So many times in marriage we spin our wheels trying to change the other person when, in reality, we’re the ones who need to be changed. We’re too busy trying to force them into being the person we think they should be (basically, clones of ourselves) that we end up losing sight of what marriage is about – a reflection of Christ and the church. We love them in the way we want to be loved, and we serve them in the way we want to be served. And when selfishness isn’t working, we lose it. Yet in reality, we’re all made in the image of God. The thing is, we all reflect different aspects of God. Usually, the aspect that we don’t reflect is the one that our spouse reflects. Ironically, that tends to be the one we often try and change. Yet rather than changing it, maybe we should try and find an appreciation for it. After all, if we’re rejecting that God given characteristic they possess, aren’t we kind of rejecting a part of who God is? Changes things, doesn’t it? Because if you were both perfectly patient, would you appreciate a God who is perfectly patient? And if you were both excellent planners with timely execution, would you even notice the beauty in God’s perfectly timed plans?
 

Well, I don’t know what kind of wife Ruth was. From everything else I’ve read about her, I bet she was pretty darn good. But, you’ve got to start somewhere I suppose. And the good thing is that when our marriage is truly set up to mimic Christ’s relationship with the church, we’ve got plenty of time to work on getting it right.
 

#708 – For God given characteristics that reflect a part of who He is.
 

“Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness…” – Genesis 1:26