Real Marriage_ The Truth About Sex, Friendship, and Life Together - Mark Driscoll [37]
A Few Tips for the Guys
Here are a few practical tips for husbands in addition to some of the things mentioned above:
1. As the family leader, model humility, honesty, repentance, service, study, and worship. Your life preaches at least as loudly as your words, so teach and model humble godliness by the grace of God.
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2. Make sure everyone in your family has a good, age-appropriate Bible that they regularly read. Read the Bible yourself and with them so they are encouraged to read on their own.
3. Make sure you have some basic Bible study tools available for your family in either print or digital form and that everyone learns to use them. If you do not know where to begin, ask your pastor or a godly student of Scripture in your church about things like a good Bible commentary, concordance, dictionary, and atlas.
4. Buy good Christian books for everyone in your family to read. Include Christian biographies among those books.
5. Choose good books that you and your wife can be reading together, including books of the Bible, and discuss what you are learning.
6. If there are Bible-based classes offered in your church, attend with your family.
7. Redeem your commute by listening to good sermons and classes, many of which you can download for free.29
8. Have dinner together with your family most nights, and use that time to pray together, keep a journal log of prayer requests for other people, and read a portion of the Bible and talk about it together.
9. Pray for each member of your family every day and let them know you are praying for them.
10. Place a hand on the head of each of your children every day and pray over them. Then kiss them on the head and make sure they often get a loving hug.
11. While either snuggling or holding hands, pray with and for your wife every day and remember to include the reasons you are thankful to God for her that day.
If these things have not been common in your home, it is very likely that your family has been aching for them and will be thankful for your loving leadership as the head of your home.
Your wife gets to be the umpire on the content of this chapter. If it helps you remember that fact, buy her a white-and-black-striped shirt to wear to bed at night—she’ll look cute, and it will serve as a reminder. You may read this chapter and think you are loving and leading well. But it is your wife who gets to make the call on your performance.
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Ephesians 5:22–33 is perhaps the clearest section of the Bible on the role of husbands to lead their families as the head and wives to respectfully submit to them. When a wife is critical of her husband’s performance as a loving leader, he may be prone to dismiss her by telling her she is simply wrong and needs to submit. But the verse that sets up the responsibilities of husbands and wives, Ephesians 5:21, commands them to be “submitting to one another.” This means she gets to decide if you are loving and leading well as the head, and you get to decide if she is respecting and submitting well as the helper. And if one of you should come to believe the other is simply wrong or unreasonable, a mediator in the form of a pastor or Bible counselor needs to play the role of referee and make the call. Until then, without defending yourself for any shortcomings, start asking your wife how you are doing at loving and leading and what you can do to improve your game in those areas.
As men we bear a greater burden before God for the well-being of our families. Our wives and children (should God gift us with them) should flourish under our loving leadership. My hope is that you would not find this condemning, but challenging. By the grace of God you can be who God has called you to be, do what God has called you to do, and love as God has loved