This week’s sermon was based on the book Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. [Please visit his website to get more in depth and specific information.] He suggests that many problems in marriage can be traced to one of two things:
1. Husbands doing unloving things toward their wives
2. Wives showing disrespect toward their husbands
These, of course, can be done intentionally or unintentionally.
Here are some examples:
A Husband acts in unloving ways when he:
- Forgets anniversaries, birthdays or other important dates
- Doesn’t share his feelings with his wife
- Leaves his clothes on the floor, again
- Clams up or walks out the room when there is a disagreement
- Doesn’t apologize
- Doesn’t follow through on commitments
- Refuses to connect with his wife emotionally
A Wife acts in unloving ways when she:
- Rejects her husband’s insight into problems
- Criticizes him in public
- Criticizes his attempts to connect her
- Rejects him sexually or uses sex to manipulate him
- Ridicules his attempts to provide for her
- Complains because he is not being the leader in the home, but then criticizes him when he tries
The Crazy Cycle
These actions often times sets up the crazy cycle where the wife reacts to the unloving acts of her husband in disrespectful ways. The husband then reacts in unloving ways and the cycle repeats. Some times it starts with the husband, sometimes with the wife. On and on it goes a before long no one knows why.
We can get off the crazy cycle when we:
- Assume both are good willed
- Understand that a husband needs respect just as much as a wife needs love.
- Realize what is happening
- When one of you decides to be the mature one and refuses to get on the crazy cycle.
- The cycle stops when one of you decides to grow up and be mature
How can husbands to show love to their wives?
Closeness
- Your wife longs to connect with you
Openness
- Open up to her, share your day with her, ask about her day
Understanding
- Listen when she share a problem, don’t try to “fix it”
- Don’t dismiss her fears no matter how irrational they may appear
Peacemaking
- Learn to say, “I’m sorry, please forgive me.”
- Let her vent her frustrations and hurts without getting angry
- Keep the relationship up-to-date and resolve hurts quickly
Loyalty
- She needs to know you are committed to her
- Be involved with the things that are important to her
- Don’t look lustfully at other women
- Keep your commitments
- Speak highly of her in front of others
Esteem
- She wants you to honor and cherish her
- Encourage her and praise her for whatever she does
- Open the door for her
- Teach the kids to show her respect
How can wives show respect for their husbands?
Conquest – his desire to work and achieve
- Thank him for working
- Listen to his work related stories
- Don’t dishonor or criticize his work
Hierarchy – his desire to protect and provide
- Verbalize your admiration for his desire to be willing to die for you
- Don’t put down his job or how much he makes
Authority – his desire to serve and lead
- Husbands are responsible before God to lead
- Support his image as a leader
- Praise his good decisions; be gracious with the bad ones
- Disagree with him only in private
Insight – his desire to analyze and counsel
- Thank him for his advice
- Be respectful when you dis agree
- Realize when you see things differently, his ideas are not wrong just because they are different
Relationship – his desire for shoulder to shoulder friendships
- Sometimes doing nothing together can build your relationship
- Tell him you like him and show it
- Engage in recreational activities together or watch him
- Encourage him to spend time with his guy friends
- Don’t denounce his shoulder to shoulder friendships
Sexuality – his desire for sexual intimacy with you
- Husbands crave sexual intimacy the way wives crave emotional closeness
- What if your husband didn’t talk to you for 3 days, weeks, months?
- You can’t get what you want by depriving you partner of what they need
- Allow him to acknowledge his sexual temptations with out fearing he’ll be unfaithful and without shaming him
- Don’t use sex as a bargaining chip