Pizza w/a Side of Wife [wisdom]

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“Find a good spouse, you find a good life---and even more: the favor of God!” Prov. 18:22

“Better to live on a corner of the roof than to share a house with a quarrelsome wife,” Prov. 21:19.

“A hearty wife invigorates her husband, but a frigid woman is cancer in the bones,” Proverbs 12:4.

“Charm can mislead and beauty soon fades. The woman to be admired and praised is the woman who lives in the Fear-of-God,” Prov. 31:30.
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The conversation usually ensues over a hand tossed dough with hungry, eager eyes following its whirling path. Chris tosses the dough like back in the day when he wooed me at the job we shared at Pap Pap’s pizza and subs. We talk about how Daddy made Momma laugh when we worked together. How I noticed Daddy was there to offer help to whoever was in need with a quiet steadfastness. Chris talks about noticing a spunky cashier girl who challenged him and knew how to assert herself without being aggressive. Then he sheepishly admits, that he still remembers the strawberry blonde pony tail and green gingham shirt I was wearing the first day he met me.

We talk about the friendship that ensued and budded into a dating relationship. I was 16, he was 18, and marriage was the absolute last thing on either of our minds, yet here we are 22 years later! I tell them how my boss Bruce used to say, “be careful who you date Jennifer, one day you will marry him.” In youthful arrogance I thought he was crazy!

We ask the boys to tell us what makes a good friend and they list in rapid succession:

• make me laugh
• kind
• share with me
• tell me when I’ve done a good job
• like to ride bikes together/play basketball/make up clubs/play card games
• not mean
• do silly tricks
• laugh at my jokes
• helper
• we can get things done like building a fort without a lot of arguing
• lots to talk about at sleepovers
• like doing Waldo searches with me

Then the conversation progresses to what makes someone a bad friend. The list is rattled off a little more rapidly:

• mean
• won’t share
• always want their way
• rude
• lie
• bossy
• make fun
• won’t listen
• think they know everything
• always try to one up
• greedy
• show off

I am passionate to imprint on their little minds the truth that those very same virtues that make a great friend will also be what makes a great wife someday; and the converse being true, what makes a bad friend will make a bad wife. Course it’s easy for them to be convinced of this now, before hormones have made their table turning grandstand. I imagine this conversation will get trickier as times goes on. When they get into serious relationships I hope to be able to pull these lists out as reminders of what they said was important to them in a relationship.

Chris and I are passionate about our marriage being a solid foundation for our boys to view a healthy God honoring union from so they have an opportunity to experience the joy found in marriage. We are starting young to cast a vision for what a godly wife looks like. We take the responsibility very seriously to help shape these boys into godly men who will honor and love their wives for much longer than they will be sons in our home.

Ultimately the choice will be theirs, but they have been taught the wisdom of Proverbs regarding friend choices which we pray will guide them to a wife who loves the Lord with a passion. We pray she is responsive to God’s work in her life and she knows her worth in Him. We pray she is a ‘help mate’ as Genesis says to come along side him in all of life’s ventures. We pray they would share much laugher and their home would be a place where honor, respect, joy and forgiveness are able to flourish.

We have worked with young married couples in our church since we were a young newly married couple (17 years ago). Through the course of all those years of service we’ve learned a few things. First, all couples will struggle. The degree to which they do and the effect it has on their marriage is largely dependent on two things: the nature of the relationship between the spouse and the Lord (is it thriving and is there a realization that God’s commands take supremacy over any selfish desire) and the depth of the friendship the couple shares.

Couples who lack a solid foundation in Christ and whose relationship was built largely on physical attraction, tend to feel the battering of the storms without the cleansing it was meant to bring. They find it more difficult to see God’s hand in their desperate situation. Their fledgling walk with the Lord often finds them reverting back to ‘it’s all about me’ attitudes which divides a household into camps that reflect hostility.

On the flip side, couples who love the Lord and have a solid friendship as their base seem just as battered by the storms that erupt; however, their ability to withstand and weather the storm without it sinking them often astounds. The storms cleanse instead of destroy. The couples tend to emerge stronger and have more of an awareness of the holiness and grandness of God. Their love grows as their understanding of the role that God desires to have in their life. They seem to take one step deeper into His kingdom and out of their own.

We realize of course this is way out of scope for little boys to understand. As they get older, we’ll peel back a little more of this vision to share with them. It is obvious to us, at this age, they do understand what it’s like to spend time with people they do and don’t get along with. They understand they have a responsibility in the relationship to work for peace but sometimes personalities clash. We ask the boys to evaluate what kind of friend they are being when things are going well and not so well in their friendships. Daily we break down what it looks like to honor people in our lives, especially girls/women. We pray the Lord will use these conversations to help pave the path towards them experiencing the joy found in a marriage grounded in Christ.

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“Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church---a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ’s love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything He does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They’re really doing themselves a favor---since they’re already “one” in marriage,” Eph. 5:25-28.
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