Sometimes a Beautiful Bride… can become an Ugly wife…

I remember that beautiful, sunny, perfect weather September morning like it was yesterday. My bridesmaids and I, walking out of my Grand mom Mattie’s front door, and stepping ever so gently off of the low porch step toward the two beautiful white stallions that had taken the form of shiny white limos, waiting to take me down a road that would lead me from bride…to wife. And I remember my mom saying, “You look so pretty Taria.” I remember at our reception, while floating on a cloud of white satin and tulle happiness, guests would say, “You are a beautiful bride.” And I felt like a Princess wife. And I remember thinking to myself, “If I make a beautiful bride, I’m definitely going to be a beautiful wife.” And I have to say that 15 years later, through trials and many errors, I am finally on my way to becoming that beautiful wife that I was meant to be. I am finally on my way to being the kind of wife whose actions make my husband a king. Proverbs 12vs. 4 KJV  says, “A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband…” But before I could even begin to travel down this road of beauty, away from ashes, there were 2 big lessons that GOD had to take me through (some of them multiple times), to teach me how to be the kind of wife that reflected him…

 

1-I have to protect the heart of the matter…

“And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. Genesis 2 vs. 22 KJV I have read this verse many times and never really thought too much of it, other than the fact that Eve was created from Adam’s rib. But one day, as I was reading (probably for the 100th time) about this Proverbs 31 woman, verse 11 literally jumped off the page to me. It says, “The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her…” The Amplified (AMPC version) says, “The heart of her husband trusts in her confidently and relies on and believes in her securely…” I started really meditating on this verse while at the same time, thinking about Eve, (the mother of all) and how she, the 1st woman, was made out of Adams’ rib. I became curious as to what the function of a rib actually is (human anatomy was mannnnyy moons ago for me, and one that I was never really interested in, as it relates to science anyway.) I read that the ribs have three important functions: support, respiration and protection. One of the main things the rib does is encloses and protects the heart from external injury. In that moment of reflection, I realized that as a wife, I needed to make sure that my husband could trust me to protect his heart from anything outside of our marriage. I needed him to be able to tell me the things in his heart, his worries, fears, his weaknesses along with his hopes and dreams, confident that I would hold these things safely and securely at all times, even in the midst of tension and strife between us. I also realized, that no matter how frustrated I was with him, outside of GODLY counsel, I should only be speaking about these things, to GOD, in prayer for my husband…I understood that just like in the natural body, if I didn’t protect the heart of my marriage, if I allowed external entities to get past the rib (me) and reach his heart, if I injured his heart, I risked my marriage suffering cardiac arrest… and not recovering. I had to protect his heart…

2-Misuse of my wifely influence can cause my family dire consequences…just ask my Great Great Great Great Great Grandmothers…Eve and Sarai/Sarah…to name a few…

“And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.” Genesis 3 vs. 6 KJV Although Eve knew which tree they were not supposed to eat from, because GOD had spoken that to her husband, Adam, she thought it looked good and ate it, and then just gave it to Adam who ate it…Talk about the power of persuasion…without saying a word…

“Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said. Genesis 16 vs. 1-2 NIV Sarai’s slave Hagar ends up giving birth to a son, but something else was also birthed, jealousy, envy and division on Sarai’s behalf. Sarai ends up being blessed to birth her own son, but the two brothers are divided into separate nations. After reading these two stories, I was struck by the fact that both of these women were clearly able to persuade their husbands into following their plan, because in their minds the end result would turn out great for their family.

After giving the side eye to Eve and Sarai, GOD clearly reminded me of times when I was able to persuade my husband to do what I, Taria thought was best for the family, even though he had already told me how he felt about the matter. This is not to say we don’t have a discussion on the matter and that I don’t have a voice because I definitely do, and there are times when he says, “What do you think we should do?” But I am speaking about the times when different things would come up as it relates to the household and my husband was very clear in his position as to how he felt led to handle things. BUT, because I felt like we could handle things a different way, I would lay out a plan of what I needed to say to get him to just agree with me and do it my way, with no consideration to how that made him feel.  And I admit shamefully, there were also times when I went ahead and followed MY plan first, and then laid it out to him after. As different scenarios throughout our marriage flooded my mind, GOD showed me that I couldn’t continue to look to HIS word as the blue print for how to be a GODLY wife and how to build a strong marriage if I was going to constantly write my own plans in the “revision block” and consistently try to reestablish the scales of the blue print, that GOD had already laid out, when I felt like it. GODs word is very clear, “And the Lord GOD said, it is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.” Genesis 2 vs. 18 So whether he wants to save up a certain amount of money for retirement, put extra money towards a college fund or pay off a particular bill, I will meet him at that area and be a help, not become a hindrance and cause a divide.

I want to encourage all of you beautiful wives reading this to remember, your power doesn’t come from being the “perfect wife” or the “pretty wife”…your power comes from being a “Praying wife”…

I love you and thank you for reading…

“Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.” Proverbs 31 vs. 30 NIV

P.S. “A Handsome Groom can also become an Ugly Husband”…But I’ll save that topic for my husband…he may want to tackle that in a guest blog post 🙂