Getting Past Your Past

Face it – marriage is not what most of us expected. And we are not well prepared for it. But, we take our vows and there it is-- an unexpected adventure for two novice explorers. Many of us have previously experienced and witnessed only the worst that the marriage voyage has to offer.

Once we are married, we are obligated to commit to God's view of the journey. The dangers of that commitment surround us at every turn, but our relationship with God requires that we trust him "though he slay us". We may not erect walls of self-protection, but must place our lives in His hands as He does what He pleases in and through us. It is the natural thing to try to protect ourselves from the pains we have previously suffered at the hands of others we have trusted. But while we are looking that way, Satan attacks from another direction.

The experiences of our past often inform us in ways that are not useful. We resist trusting in God’s ways because of past hurts. It is hard to recall that it was not God who betrayed us but the "hardness of men's hearts." It is distressing how our past wounds can cause us to "halt between two opinions," trying to decide whether to follow God, who knows the way on this journey, or to resort to our own flawed devices. Some of us have allowed bitter roots to form within us that keep us from committing fully to another human being. These must be exposed for the ineffective protection they are, through prayer, counsel and self-confrontation.

One of the mysteries of marriage is what God can do through us if we follow and obey Him. My prayer for every married woman is that she trust God with her husband and her marriage, and attempt as much as possible to bring her thoughts and behavior into alignment with what the word has to say. As scary as that may be, it is the only way with a promise. .
! Peter 3:5-6 (NIV) . . .like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.

@Tina Green 2007

Safe Travel

When you jump in your car to make a trip or run an errand you are trusting that the vehicle that you carefully maintain is in good and safe condition. As you drive down the road you are careful. You make every effort to obey the rules of the road and make wise, prudent decisions. You are depending on the other motorists to do the same. Yet, you have no control over their actions, their decisions, or the condition of their equipment. No doubt, in your prayer time you have placed in God's hands those things that are outside the range of your influence. And so you continue on your way.

I was thinking about this a while ago when I attended a women's meeting. On the subject of submission someone offered that wives are only expected to submit to their husbands as their husbands submit to God. That sounds like a sensible approach to a process (submission) that holds so much potential danger.

And yet, a study of the Word does not support this conclusion. When a wife obeys the instructions of God she is in much the same position as when she drives her car. She can only control the vehicle she is driving. Whether or not the other drivers are being as diligent as she does not change her responsibility to adhere to the rules of safe travel. If "submission" is a rule of safe travel for wives we must follow that rule, entrusting to God all of those things that are outside our range of influence. The condition of our husbands' relationship with God is not a condition of our obedience to the Word. Trusting God, we submit, and continue on our way.

Tina Green, 2010

What's an Older Woman to Do?

What's an Older Woman to Do?

Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God. Titus 2:3-5 NIV

In the 1960s there were several revolutions that changed American society forever. While I am grateful for many of the outcomes those great movements accomplished I grieve the loss of what I will call “a sense of individual responsibility.” In the marriage relationship, for instance, equal has become same, same has become together, together has become reciprocal, and reciprocity has led to a mandatory fifty-fifty division of labor. Role definitions have become blurred beyond recognition. I am afraid that in that climate individual responsibility can be avoided if “my partner does not do his/her part.”

Before the revolutions, women’s magazines contained articles and stories about how to be a wife that were very useful. They would probably send today’s woman screaming from the room. In 1961 I was given a book titled "The Marine Officer’s Wife" (I was one) that sounded like instructions for a medieval serving wench. But, we may have thrown away some of the baby with the bathwater when we all became more enlightened.

Those books and magazines had helped us understand that “wife” really is, among other things, a job title. There are ways responsible wives should or should not behave regardless of the circumstances surrounding them. We must acknowledge that there is special power in owning your job description and submitting to the requisite training. It is this that makes firemen run toward a fire, makes paratroopers jump out of planes, makes a nurse or doctor touch the patient despite the damage and disease. A wife is a Wife. She needs to embrace the job, the job description, and the training. Since the revolution the training has been a hard thing to come by.

Some of the confusion is understandable. The terms “couple” and “one-flesh” certainly suggest the connection between two people united in marriage. “Marriage counseling” is usually defined as “couples counseling.” How can we work on the marriage if we can’t get both partners to come in? But that is only defines part of the relationship..

A few years ago I gave a talk at a women’s conference and women began to call to talk to me about their marriages. Some of these women were behaving very badly in response to the bad behavior of their husbands. It seemed unwise to allow a woman to believe she could not change her behavior or her circumstances unless she could get her husband to cooperate.

Looking carefully at Scripture I found that there were no provisos, no reciprocity, no quid pro quo. Each person was expected to behave according to the instructions, the job description, written for them in the Word regardless of the behavior of the other spouse

So, a woman would come to see me. She would tell me about her husband’s behavior. Some of these stories were agonizing to listen to, but I refused to be overwhelmed by the tale. (This assumes there is no physical abuse.) Then I would ask about her behavior. We would determine what God wanted her to do, and I would send her off to do that. Invariably, if she persevered with all diligence she would report a difference in her situation. She would have changed the only person on earth she has the power to change. Herself!

This is not a guarantee that all marriages can be saved or even improved. But if a woman takes responsibility for her own behavior something changes. My work at this time focuses on helping women understand how to be a Wife. I try to pass on the training that keeps them from being dragged around by their emotions, their circumstances, or their limitations, or the behavior or shortcomings of others. I would like to begin a new revolution that elevates marriage to its rightful place in our hearts and minds. I am starting with women because I know them best. Besides, I have to start somewhere, before everyone forgets what marriage looks like.