The Christian Husband: Loving Your Wife, Part 1

Bob: When was the last time you said, "I love you," to your wife without saying anything? Here is Dennis Rainey.

Dennis: The other night on the deck, Barbara was working on sanding some chairs, and I went out on the deck with her, and I helped her with those chairs and took a couple of screws out of a chair that needed some repairing, and she told me later, she said, "You know, just you spending that time with me made a statement to me that you love me, and you care for me, and you want to be a part of what I'm doing." Those kinds of things motivate a woman to do what she was designed to do. [ Read Full Transcript ]
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Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Wednesday, January 23rd. Our host is the president of FamilyLife, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine. We're going to talk today about a number of the ways that a husband can tell his wife he loves her and do it in ways that she'll understand.

And welcome to FamilyLife Today, thanks for joining us on the Wednesday edition. We're going to spend some time talking about an assignment that God has given all of us who are husbands, and that's the assignment of loving our wives. We're going to talk about how we can do a good job doing that.

[Theme song from "Mission Impossible"]

Dennis: Do you hear it? Do you hear it? That's the theme song – you know it – from "Mission Impossible," do you hear it?

Bob: It feels that way sometimes, doesn't it?

Dennis: Well, but this is not Mission Impossible, it really isn't. In fact, I want to just read to our husbands for a moment, and at this point all the wives are moving to the edge of their seats, they're reaching forward to the radio, and they're turning the dial a little …

Bob: … making sure we get it right.

Dennis: A little louder, they're getting a pencil out, sharpening the lead, getting some fresh paper – well, this would be a good idea for every husband to listen up on. Ephesians, chapter 5, verse 25, and here is just a little more than a dozen words. I mean, it's not a lot of words, but it's a huge assignment. It is an assignment, however, that is achievable. It is Mission Possible. "Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her."

Four words – "husbands, love your wives." You don't stop there, though, you have to look at the rest of the – really, the description there, "just as Christ also loved the church."

Today on the broadcast we want to do a little equipping. We're going to have a little seminar. I have a lot of listeners who come up to me – I know they do to you, Bob – they come up and say, "You two guys are helping me – well, you've helped us shape our family, and it's like you're a mentor, you're training me, you're teaching me how to do certain aspects of building a Christian family."

Well, today, this is no different. In fact, for the next couple of days we're going to be talking about Bob Lepine's new book, "The Christian Husband," and specifically this area that you talk about in chapter 9 of "How to Love Your Wives."

Now, Bob, do you remember the first time you told Mary Ann you loved her? Can you remember back that far?

Bob: I do remember it. It was actually a little creative, and there's a disclaimer I've got to give here at the beginning because, first of all, I was young; second, I was stupid; and, third, I didn't know Christ. So all of that was factored into this.

But what I didn't realize is that when a young man says to a young woman, "I love you," he's saying one thing, and she's hearing something else. I mean, I was saying, "You're a really nice person, and I like you a lot. In fact, I like you better than most of the girls around here. I'd like to get to know you better, and I'm kind of drawn to you."

Dennis: But Mary Ann was hearing …

Bob: She was hearing "The ring is next." You know, "I love you."

Dennis: She was hearing the Wedding March, is that it?

Bob: Well, it was entirely premature. We had known one another for two or three weeks, all right? And I was walking by her car one evening. It was parked out in front of her sorority house on the campus at the University of Tulsa, and I saw her car, and I was going around hanging up posters that were "Vote for Bob Lepine for School Senate." You know, I was running for some office there at the university.

And so I had my posters, and I had my masking tape, and I saw her car, and what I did was I took the masking tape, and I put masking tape all over the driver's side window, the front window of her car just on the driver's side – covered it from the top down to the bottom with masking tape. Then I took out my magic marker, and I wrote her a note on the masking tape.

Dennis: Good idea.

Bob: Okay? And it said …

Dennis: Very creative.

Bob: "Dear Mary Ann, I love you, say you love me or I'll die eventually." And then I signed it, "Your friend, Bob Lepine."

Dennis: This was after you'd only been dating for how long?

Bob: Oh, we hadn't been dating yet. We just had kind of known one another for two or three weeks.

Dennis: That was pretty forward.

Bob: That is pretty forward, pretty bold, pretty stupid, right? See, I didn't know any better than that and, again, my definition of what love looks like had nothing to do with commitment, it just had to do with how I was feeling at the time.

Dennis: You know, most single people today, though, I think have the wrong picture of what love is. Love is equated with a feeling. It's commitment, but it's commitment with a small "c", not big "C," and they don't understand that when you do tell someone you love them and you're committed to them, than at that point you're defining the relationship, and it's going in a certain direction. And it ultimately ends in marriage at the point when you really begin in earnest to truly love another person.

Bob: And I've told my sons, and they're still young, but I've started early with them. I've said, "Son, you never say 'I love you' to a girl until the next words are ready to be, 'Will you marry me?' If you can't follow up 'I love you' with 'Will you marry me?' you're not ready to say 'I love you,' because that's what it means to a young woman."

I think the Ephesians have the same problem here, Dennis. That's why I think Paul said, "Husbands, love your wives," now wait a sec, "as Christ loved the church." Did He have a lot of warm, gooey feelings about the church? You know, was it a sentimental, emotional thing for Him? No, Christ's love for the church was practical, it was sacrificial and, really, as you look at that whole expression, you see that he loved us in a full, complete sense, in a way that really redefines what love ought to be.

Dennis: You know, the Bible is all about relationships and whether we're single, whether we're divorced, married, I believe every person can benefit from what we're going to talk about on the broadcast as we attempt to get our arms around love and understand from Scripture what it means to love another person.

In fact, the Bible, all the way from the Old Testament to the New Testament is filled with illustrations, living illustrations of love and how we are to love other people.

Bob: Mm-hm, and one of those living illustrations is the Book of Hosea, which I think defines the first aspect of how Christ loves his church. Back to Ephesians 5:25, it says "Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church." And then it goes on to say, "and gave Himself up for her."

Now, we can get to the issue of sacrifice, but before Christ ever loved us sacrificially, He first loved us unconditionally, and that unconditional love – we talk about it at the FamilyLife Marriage Conference, it's receiving your mate as God's perfect provision for you without any conditions attached, without any strings attached, not based on her performance, not based on how she responds to you, it is loving her no matter what in spite of those things that may annoy you at times.

And you look at the Book of Hosea, what a great illustration of that. I mean, God comes to Hosea and says, "Take a wife. And, by the way, Hosea, this isn't going to be just any wife. Your wife is going to be a harlot."

Now, we don't know from the Book of Hosea whether his wife was a harlot before he married her or if she became a harlot after he married her. It's kind of ambiguous there. But, either way, God's assignment was keep loving her even when she rejects you, keep loving her even when she sins against you and against the marriage – never give up on her.

And God was saying here, "I'm going to make you, Hosea, a living illustration of my love for my people. I'm going to show everybody how I love you by the way I'm calling you to love Gomer, your wife."

And so Hosea's wife goes off, and she commits adultery, and she is living the life of a prostitute, Hosea is home with the kids, she doesn't even come home at night, she's not at the house, she's just off doing her thing, and Hosea perseveres, and God comes to Hosea and says – "She has made such a mess of her life that she is now in the slave market. She has squandered any money that she had. Her debts have gotten higher than her ability to generate income. She is now a slave. I want you to go buy her back. You pay money to buy her back."

And there had – the Bible doesn't record it, but Hosea had to have some thought – if he didn't verbalize it to God, he had to be thinking, "Are you sure about this? After all we've been through, you want me to go love her? Couldn't I just start over with somebody else? Couldn't I find a good, godly, righteous woman who doesn't go out and do these things?"

But God said, "Go buy her back."

I had a guy call me, and he said, "Are you saying that this example of Hosea, that this is what I'm supposed to do if my wife does the same thing?" And I said, "The story of Hosea does not teach us that this is what a husband must do if his wife goes off and commits adultery. It does teach us that the quality of love is that it should be unconditional, and that's the first quality of Christ's love for the church, and I think it's the first thing that a husband needs to do to love his wife."

Dennis: And, you know, I don't have any research to back this up, but it sure seems to me, in a lot of single people's lives when they get married, near the top of God's agenda in the first year, maybe even the first weeks and months of their marriage, is to learn this lesson you're talking about – that love is unconditional, and yet most of us have loved as long as the other person does a certain thing. And yet I reflect back on my first weeks of marriage, and I remember, it's as though it were yesterday, I was facing this, it was frontal. I am called, as a man, to love Barbara even though.

Bob: Right.

Dennis: And I don't know where I heard this, I heard some couple who used to walk around in their home, and they would say, "Even though, even though, I love you even though, even though," and it made an impression on me because that kind of love, Bob, that's not an earthly kind of love.

Bob: No, that's right.

Dennis: That's a heavenly kind of love that God implants in the human heart.

Bob: In fact, I would say that until your wife is unlovely, until she offends you, you haven't really loved her. It's the moment that your wife is no longer lovely, that's when you really start loving her.

Dennis: Yeah, Bob, and, you know, every woman listening to this broadcast right now wants to know that they're loved even when they're unlovely. That is a powerful desire of not just women, by the way, but certainly of a wife. I mean, she needs to be loved when she is unlovable, "even though."

What's another aspect of love that we need to learn today?

Bob: Well, if we look again at how does Christ love the church and say that's our model for how a husband ought to love his wife, and then I think the next thing after unconditional love is covenantal love.

Dennis: Now, wait a second, that's an awful big word.

Bob: Well, it is a big word, but we've been talking a lot about the marriage covenant on our broadcast. When we talk about covenantal love, we're talking about declaring the unconditional love formally for everyone to hear all around us. It's a pledge that it's not just something that we'll do in the background, but we declare it to be the case.

Take, for example, Abraham. Abraham was called by God from Ur. God went to Abraham and said "I want you to leave Ur, leave your family, and follow me, and I'll show you the place I'm going to take you." And Abraham responded to that.

But then there came a point where God appeared to Abraham, and he said, "I'm going to make a covenant with you. I am going to bind myself to certain aspects of behavior. I'm going to bind myself to a promise that I will fulfill," and he spelled that out for Abraham in chapter 12 of Genesis, and then again in chapter 15 of Genesis. He had a covenantal ceremony, where he pledged himself to Abraham.

And so a husband who unconditionally loves his wife still has to formalize that in a covenant relationship. That's what we do at the altar. We stand before God and before our wife, and we make a verbal pledge that we will love our wives unconditionally.

Dennis: Well, I can hear a man asking right now, he's saying, "Well, hey, Bob, I did that 20 years ago at the wedding altar. Is there something I'm missing here? What is it you're trying to drive home when you challenge me with the idea of covenantal love? Isn't that in place if I established that then?"

Bob: Well, there are two things I'm trying to drive home. One is you probably didn't have a clue what you were saying back when you said it. So it's time to revisit that pledge …

Dennis: Okay, that's agreed.

Bob: Understand what you need to be all about. But the second thing is, I don't think this is something we declare once, and it's over.

Dennis: Ah, good.

Bob: I don't think the covenant is something that we just stand up and declare, and then it's done. How many times in your life would you estimate you have said the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag?

Dennis: Right.

Bob: You've probably said it thousands of times. Every day at the beginning of school, right, you stood up – and I can see an eighth grader who says, "Hey, I said this yesterday. I don't need to say it again." But before every baseball game we stand back up, and we pledge allegiance to the flag, or we hear the Star-Spangled Banner, and I think husbands need to be regularly reminding their wives of their covenant for them. Not just acting it out but verbalizing it, because our wives need to hear, they need to know, they need to be told over and over again, "I'm going to love you forever, I'll never stop loving you. I'm here, and you can count on that."

Dennis: This morning when I had my quiet time, I was just thinking and praying and meditating on Scripture, and I was thinking about Barbara for some reason, I don't know why, but the Lord brought her to mind, and I haven't seen her since my quiet time, and what I'm going to do tonight when I get home is I'm going to take her in my arms, I'm going to hold her face in my hands, and I'm not just saying this, by the way, just because of what you were talking about here. I really have been thinking about doing this, and I'm going to say, "You know what? You are a wonderful woman, and I'd marry you all over again, 10 times out of 10."

Bob: Now, has she ever heard you say that before?

Dennis: Yeah, sure, and in fact she's heard me say "I'd marry you all over again 10 times out of 10," I mean, I want to remove all doubt about the deal. I just was thinking about her, though, I was thinking, you know what? Our wives need to be cherished. They need to be cared for, and they need to be reminded of that. And I think that's your point that you're making here, is covenantal love is not silent.

Now, some guys think because they said it 20 years ago, that it's still in effect until they revoke it. That doesn't do a lot for a woman. A woman needs to be reminded through verbal words, through written words, tender words, tender touch, maybe even carrying the garbage out – some household duties that would communicate to her that you love her.

The other night on the deck, Bob, Barbara was working on sanding some chairs. Now, this is the way she relaxes. I'm sorry, sanding chairs, painting chairs, would not be one of the ways I would relax. I'd head to the woods or go fishing but not do that kind of thing.

And I went out on the deck with her, and I helped her with those chairs and took a couple of screws out of a chair that needed some repairing, and she told me later, she said, "You know, just you spending that time with me made a statement to me that you love me, and you care for me, and you want to be a part of what I'm doing."

Bob: Well, and that taps into what is the third area of how Christ loves the church, because if we look not only is it unconditional, it's covenantal, but the third thing is it's incarnational.

Dennis: Now, that's even a bigger word, Bob. "Covenantal" was big, but that's got a lot of syllables in it.

Bob: "Incarnational" – in the first chapter of John's Gospel, he says "Jesus became flesh, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us," and that's what it means to "incarnate." It means to "dwell among us." Literally, that passage means he pitched his tent right where we live.

And for a husband to love his wife, one of the aspects of that needs to be incarnational love. That means you step out of your world and into her world, and you love her in her world.

Dennis: Okay, let's talk about how that happens at the Lepine household.

Bob: You did it when you stepped out and helped sand those chairs on the deck. Mary Ann, one time, we were sitting in a Homebuilders Bible study, and the question we were going through in Homebuilders that night was "What's the most romantic thing your mate's done for you recently?" And I thought, "Gee, what's Mary Ann going to come up with?" You know, I started to flash through what have I done recently, I hope there's a good one here, I wanted to look good in front of crowd, right?

And it got to her turn, and she said, "Well, I'll tell you, the other night Bob was watching the news on TV, and I was doing the dishes and without me saying anything, he turned off the TV and came in and started drying the dishes, and that was really romantic." And I thought "Huh? That was romantic? Drying the dishes?"

Dennis: So you said at that point, "Give me a tea towel," right?

Bob: I asked her about that later – I said, "You know, what was romantic about that?" And she said, "You just – you were in tune with where I was living. You stepped into my world, and you met me there." And, you see, that's the picture of Christ. He's got all of the benefits of heaven, and He sets them aside, and He comes to dwell among us as men. And the Bible says that He became a sympathetic high priest who knew the kinds of things that we're afflicted with and became like us in that regard.

And a husband who really loves his wife, steps in and says, "I need to understand your world. I need to understand what you're living with. I need to understand what it's like for you to be around kids all day, or what it's like for you to have friends who say cutting things about you, or what it's like for you to go through your day so that when I get home at the end of the day, and I step into your world physically, I can also step in emotionally and be there with you and help you and support you."

Dennis: And I'm going to tell you, every woman who has a man who steps into her world like that, and not with a clumsy feeling but with a tender side to him that says "I want to understand. You know, I'm a man, I'm not a woman, but I really want to understand where your struggle is, I want to understand what your fears are. What are your dreams and your aspirations? What things are knocking your legs out from under you right now? What are you worrying about? What can I shoulder with you? What can I shoulder for you? What could I fix around the house?"

Those kinds of things motivate a woman to do what she was designed to do, which was be a helpmate and be a support in the family.

Bob: I'll tell you, the other day I left the house in the morning, and I could tell it had not started off as a good day for my wife. She was feeling pressure, she was frustrated, she was just not in a particularly good mood.

And we had a little dialog before I left, and I was trying to see is there anything I can do? Am I the source of any of this, you know, and it was pretty obvious that this was something that was just on her heart.

So in the middle of the day I picked up the phone, and I called her, and I said, "Honey, I'm just calling to tell you that I wish I could fix this. I can't. I know you're having a lousy day. I'm praying for – that's the only thing I know how to do, and I want you to know I spent some time praying for you this morning."

And she said, "This is because you wrote that book, isn't it? It's all coming back out of there," and the Lord had just prompted me that morning. There's not anything you can do, but you can pray, and then I verbalized that to Mary Ann, and I think I was just trying to say to her, Dennis, "I know what's going on in your world, and I'm here for you."

Dennis: You know, there's a fourth way a man can love his wife, but I'm feeling an urgent need right now to communicate to the men how they can get a copy of your book, because I think this would be a great book to give away to – well, your husband or your son, who may be married and maybe starting out a marriage and needs some good guidance. I want to promise you, this book, "The Christian Husband," by Bob Lepine is a great book that's going to challenge him spiritually. I've got to tell you, this is not a featherweight book, this is not a lightweight. This is a heavy, theological book from the co-host of the broadcast here, Bob Lepine, and I want to encourage you to pick up a phone and call our 800 number or go to our website and maybe even write a little not in the front of it and just say, "You know, I hope that God helps you to become all that He intended you to be as a husband." And then just sign it, "Love, Mom," or "Love, Dad."

But reach out and do something of permanence and significance that will enrich that loved one's marriage.

Bob: Well, and as you might imagine, we've got copies of the book, "The Christian Husband," in our FamilyLife Resource Center. You can go to our website, FamilyLife.com, and in the middle of the home page you'll see a red button that says "Go," and if you click that red button, it will take you to an area of the site where there is more information about how you can get a copy of the book, "The Christian Husband," sent to you.

Again, our website is FamilyLife.com. If it's easier, you can call 1-800-FLTODAY, 1-800-358-6329, and let us know if you'd like a copy of the book, "The Christian Husband," and we're happy to send it out to you. 1-800-FLTODAY is the number or online at FamilyLife.com.

Now, this week at FamilyLife, we want to ask you to consider doing something extraordinary. We want to ask you to consider becoming one of the few, the proud families in your community, families who help underwrite the financial costs of FamilyLife Today by becoming Legacy Partners.

These are folks who, each month, make a contribution to the ministry of FamilyLife Today to make sure it stays on the air not only in this city but in other cities all across the country and, as a Legacy Partner we stay in touch with you providing resources throughout the year to help strengthen your marriage and your family. And, in fact, if you'd like more information about what it means to become a Legacy Partners and how you can be a part of that program, go on our website at FamilyLife.com, and you'll see information on our home page about becoming a Legacy Partner. We hope you'll consider that and hope to hear from you.

Again, our website is FamilyLife.com. You can also call for more information at 1-800-358-6329. That's 1-800-F-as-in-family, L-as-in-life, and then the word TODAY and just say "I want to know what it means to be a Legacy Partner, and we'll be happy to get you the information you need, and we appreciate you considering your financial support of the ministry of FamilyLife Today.

Now, tomorrow we're going to talk about why it's biblical for husbands to suffer long. That's what the Bible says is characteristic of love, and we'll talk about that tomorrow. I hope you can be with us for that.

I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.

FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas, a ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ.

Becoming the Man of Her Dreams

What do Sean Connery and Harrison Ford have in common? Whether playing James Bond or Indiana Jones, these actors have been Hollywood's idea of a manly man for decades. They're rough and tough, and can fight, shoot, punch, or drop-kick their way through a crowded alley of bad guys ... while barely cracking a sweat. They're unstoppable. Unflappable.

And they usually get at least one girl in the end.

After all, jumping in the sack with any available warm body just goes with the action-hero territory. They reach for the thrill of sex without paying the price of intimacy. Take James Bond. Give him an adventure, and he'll be in and out of more beds than a mattress salesman.

In the absence of models who know how to love, cherish, and relate to one woman over a lifetime, is it any wonder that for the last few decades boys have grown up to be men who are equally clueless about how to give themselves to a lifelong love? Taking their cues from Hollywood they enter into marriage with guns blazing, thinking that their tough guy routine will save the day. But the show barely gets started when they find out how woefully ill-equipped they are to give a woman what she craves most.

A relationship.

I'm convinced we have a generation of married men who are confused and lonely; they're stuck in a lifeless marriage because they never learned how to cultivate a relationship with a woman that speaks to her romantic need for intimacy. Sandy, who attended one of our conferences, described her relationship with her husband this way:

Dennis, I'm afraid that I am losing respect for him as a man. He is not really contributing to our marriage or even to his own life, so it's like having a dependent rather than a husband, a partner.

If Sandy's husband is ever going to become the man of her dreams, the best place to start is by meeting her relational needs. Unfortunately the media reinforce the notion of experiencing sex devoid of a relationship. Men have been led to believe that great sex, like fresh fruit, is hanging off every tree, ripe and waiting to be picked. All they have to do is reach out and grab some. They've been duped into thinking the same should be true in a marriage.

However, great romance is the by-product of a relationship.

Simple Gardening Tips

The secret is learning how and what to sow in the garden of a woman's heart. When you sow the seeds of respect, kind words, acts of tenderness, and thoughtfulness, you reap a reward from your wife in abundance. As God said through Hosea, "Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love" (Hosea 10:12).

On the other hand, if you fail to cultivate this relationship, or if you sow seeds of criticism, neglect, or rage, sex becomes little more than a cold, physical act in which your wife feels used and unloved. That's because God hard-wired a woman to desire relationship. Just as your wife has the power to affirm you sexually, you'll have tremendous power to provide her with the relationship she longs for, namely, a connectedness to your heart and soul.

When you withhold a meaningful relationship (I'm speaking about her need for conversation with you, her desire to see you plugged into family life, her thirst to hear words of affirmation), she finds it difficult to give herself totally to you. Think with me for a moment: Do you sometimes feel your wife is not excited about your sexual advances? Step back and consider how much of an investment you've been making into her relational bank account. Her heart can be like a bank account where you make deposits and withdrawals. Far too often as men we can make withdrawals and disregard making deposits or investments. Every wife needs you to invest security, acceptance, and an emotional connection in her life.

Let me give you an example of what happens when a man squanders his power to validate and romance his bride with a relationship. Pam, a listener to our radio program writes,

My husband Keith has called me almost every low-life name that he could think of. He's called me "fat" and said that I'm "bad in bed." Although it has been almost eight years ago that Keith said these things, I can't forget them. We've been married seventeen years and the TV is still more important to him than me. Recently, while staying in a hotel, I purchased a new nightie. When I changed clothes in front of him, his look was one of disgust. Keith didn't have to say a word. The look on his face told me exactly how he felt about me.

I feel so rejected physically I can count on one hand in the last two years the times Keith has told me that I look nice. He's never at home in the evenings to help me with the children. On weekends, Keith usually finds something other than his family to keep him busy. When I've tried to talk about this, I get yelled at or spoken down to. I hate living like this. I don't know where to turn for help.

Now, I don't know Keith's side of the story but from what Pam has said, Keith has all but abandoned his role as the provider of a safe relationship—at great cost to his marriage. By calling Pam names, Keith failed to accept her. By ignoring her in favor of the television, he failed to make an emotional connection. And by refusing to involve himself with his family, he undermined her sense of security. His marriage is a divorce waiting to happen unless he recognizes that "love is patient, love is kind ... It is not rude, it is not self-seeking ... It always protects" (1 Corinthians 13:4, 5, 7).

A woman's need for relationship carries into the bedroom too. While a man is usually able to engage in sex almost instantaneously (almost anytime, anywhere), a woman needs the context of a relationship if she is to freely and playfully respond to physical intimacy. Sometimes a man will meet the relational needs of his wife during the day, but doesn't nurture their relationship in the bedroom. And men wonder why women resent their sex drive.

When a man pressures his wife to perform sexually without regard to the relational aspects of such intimacy, sex becomes shallow. Physical intimacy becomes a battle of the wills or a manipulative game that ultimately dies a slow death.

Have I Told You Lately That I Love You?

Just as your wife might wonder why sex is so important to you, you might be wondering why relationship is so crucial to her. You might even be scratching your head about why God wired men and women so differently. Look at it this way. As you know, God created Adam first. But did you know that Adam never asked for a wife?

It was God who said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him" (Genesis 2:18, emphasis added). God, in His wisdom, created Eve to be the companion that Adam didn't even recognize he needed. She was created to remove Adam's aloneness. No wonder God placed in Eve an intense drive toward relationship.

God knew that man's tendency was to be alone. He gave us a gravitational pull in marriage—our sex drive—so that we would pursue our wives who, in turn, would call us to know and be known in the context of a relationship.

For a man, achieving relational intimacy is both a mystery and a challenge. I believe God wants to knock the edges off me, as a man, so that I learn to love my wife in a way that communicates love to her. During more than thirty years of marriage, I have repeatedly learned (emphasis on repeatedly) that Barbara needs me to pursue a relationship with her—not just when I want romance, but as a way of life. When a man pursues a relationship and gives his wife compliments only when he's interested in sex, his wife will feel used.

For example, Barbara and I have a family of eight. As you can imagine, there are quite a few responsibilities that I've got to tackle on a typical weekend. As a man, I tend to count up the "points" that I've racked up over the weekend. You know what I'm talking about: I think if I just knock off about a half dozen items on her "honey do" list—cooking breakfast, weeding the garden, and so on—then Barbara will feel romantic when we go to bed at night.

But points are irrelevant to Barbara if she feels disconnected from me. In my way of thinking, a little sexual intimacy will connect us. But that may not even be on her radar screen as a woman. Romance for her begins heart to heart and is consummated body to body. In her way of thinking, she wants me to be her friend first, then her lover. Giving her a relationship first is how I become the man of her dreams. In other words, to her there's a big difference between doing things for her and being involved with her. Sure, she appreciates what I do for her and for the family. But connecting on a friendship level with her is what she dreams of.

Adapted by permission of Thomas Nelson Inc., Nashville, TN., from the book entitled Rekindling the Romance, copyright 2004 by Dennis and Barbara Rainey. All rights reserved. Copying or using this material without written permission from the publisher is strictly prohibited and in direct violation of the copyright law.

Demystifying Differences Through Communication

After twenty-seven years of marriage, I've discovered some of the secret passageways between women's words and men's ears. The following four communication techniques have helped my husband and I understand each other—demystifying some of our differences.

1. Allow Room for Venting

I tend to think aloud. I use my words to help me sort out my thoughts and decide how I feel about something. Sometimes I don't want a solution; I just want to "vent."

For some reason this makes my husband, Ron, uncomfortable because he wants to fix it, forget it, and move on. I like to take a long, hot bath in my problems before I even think about solving them.

When we were first married, we moved into a new neighborhood and began attending a new church. I was almost friendless because I was shy and waiting for a warm and wonderful woman to approach me with a sign on her forehead that read "Friend of Nancy's." She hadn't yet appeared, so I wanted to share my feelings with Ron, "I'm lonely. I wish I had a girlfriend."

Ron, with the best of intentions, started to help me solve my problem. He gave me a lecture titled "Friendship 101": In order to have a friend you must be a friend. What have you done to be friendly? Then he got out a legal pad and a wide-tipped Sharpie and wrote in block letters, "Nancy's Friendship Goals." Next, he started to draw a flow chart. He was befuddled when I started to cry and said, "I don't want a diagram. I want a friend!"

Now if I just want to vent, I tell Ron ahead of time. He's even learned to ask me, "Do you want my advice or just my ear?" What a guy. I think I'll keep him!

2. Want to Please Me? Don't Tease Me!

Many couples tease each other, and if you can keep it friendly, it might be fun. If, however, your humor is at someone else's expense, it's too costly. My husband is a funny guy. When we met, he was performing stand-up comedy in Los Angeles clubs like the Improv and the Comedy Store. He even took joke-writing classes from professional comedians like Steve Martin and had a one-on-one lesson from Bill Cosby.

He was always looking for a laugh. So when I ruined a meal or gained weight, he thought of it as new comedy material. I thought his comments were insulting and cruel. We had some of our biggest fights about his definition of humor. After I explained how much it hurt me, he stopped making my butt the butt of his jokes. He's still funny, and we often write comedy scripts for Christian plays. But now, we share the same rule: cruel personal insults are not funny.

3. Be Specific; Be Heard

A few years ago, I hit on a principle that's saved us from hundreds of misunderstandings and arguments.

One afternoon, I was frantically cleaning the house for our son Nick's birthday party. Ron was sitting in the den reading the newspaper. "Will you please pick up those papers," I asked, "and sweep the front steps? They'll be here soon!" "

Uh ... " he grunted, without looking up.

"I'll take that as a yes," I shouted as I sprinted upstairs to fix my hair and make-up.

Twenty-five minutes later, I looked out the window, and saw a guest's car in the driveway. "They're here!"

I heard Ron bustling around in the den as he jumped up from his chair, shoved the papers into the wastebasket, and zipped to the front door with the broom. He was sweeping the porch steps as our guests walked up the sidewalk!

He had no idea why I was upset. Later, when our guests left, I said, "Why didn't you do what I asked you to do?"

He said, "I did!"

"But you did it when our company was in the driveway!"

"Yeah ... so? You didn't say when to do it."

He was right—I didn't. I had the expectation that he'd do it as soon as I asked, but I wasn't specific on my timeframe. Here's a news flash. Your spouse can't read your mind!

Now I ask, "Can you do this by 6:00?" or "Will you be able to have this done by Tuesday?" If he can't do it, he'll tell me, and then I can either do it myself or make other arrangements.

4. Hint and Miss

Another way I drove Ron crazy was to hint at something and then throw a fit because he didn't "get" the hint. For example, one warm, sunny day as we drove by a Baskin Robbins Ice Cream store, I said, "I love lemon sherbet."

He just kept driving. How dare him! I guess he didn't know that my hint meant, "Stop the car. I want some ice cream!"

My girlfriend Tonya would have understood the hint and said, "Good idea. Let's get some!" But Ron was oblivious. He thought I meant just what I said ... go figure.

Men rarely hint because they've learned to ask for what they want. If women would stop the "hint-speak" and ask for what we want, we'd be much more likely to get it.

These changes didn't take place overnight. I think the issues related to teasing took several years to resolve. If I can see that Ron is making an effort, then I give him some room to fail occasionally. If I went "postal" on him each time he forgot, he'd get discouraged and stop trying.

So as you see your mate start to develop new positive patterns, encourage him or her, and be willing to overlook an occasional slip. Be sure to verbalize your praise and notice when your spouse does it right. Your marriage will grow sweeter as you have less conflict and more understanding and patience.

Adapted from Avoiding the Greener Grass Syndrome (Kregel 2004).
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My Wife's Affair Shattered (and Saved) Our Marriage

Nancy repeated the statement I could not understand: "I'm moving out."

I searched her eyes for the familiar fire. Seeing none, I thought, Who is this woman? My wife of two years had become an instant stranger.

"What are you saying? Why do you want to leave?" I asked.

"I'm unhappy … lonely … miserable actually," she replied. "There, I said it. You make me miserable. Maybe with a little distance between us, we'll get closer."

I touched her arm, but she pulled away. "That doesn't make any sense," I said. "How can distance make us closer?'

"I don't know, but I do know that I can't stay here. I need some time to sort things out—a little space. I'm not even sure I even love you … that I ever did."

I stood frozen as I begged, "Please don't go now. Can't you wait until tomorrow?"

She silently picked up her suitcase, flung her purse over her shoulder, and with a dramatic toss of her hair, walked out our front door.

A Hidden Affair

I knew that I hadn't been the best husband, and that I got angry at her too often, and that my need to be "right" often made her wrong.

I knew that, lately, she had been distant.

But I didn't know that my wife was having an affair.

During the month Nancy was gone, I was a mess. Each time I called her, I would cry and ask her what I could do to get her to come home, but she answered my questions with one-word sentences. Then she would abruptly say, "I gotta go" and hang up.

I asked friends to "spy" on her, and they told me that she seemed fine. They told me to move on with my life and try to accept the fact that she was gone.

When Nancy told me she was filing divorce papers, I believed our marriage was over. Then, one night, after a miraculous change of heart, (read Nancy's book Avoiding the Greener Grass Syndrome for the full story) she came home and said, "I've been lying to you for months, but I'm going to tell the truth now. Ask me anything."

"Is there another man? Are you having an affair?"

She looked away and whispered, "Yes, with a man at work. But it ends today. I'm going to quit my job tomorrow and I will never see him again. I hope that you will take me back and we can stay married."

Rebuilding Our Marriage

The decision to forgive came quickly, but the rebuilding of our marriage took a long time. I would feel good one day and hopeless the next. Then she would become frustrated and confused. There might be a week where we would be caring and loving, and then we'd slip into old patterns and have to remind ourselves to get back on track.

When we got back together, it was a good day if we were just polite to each other. If we could say "please" and "thank you" and not fight or yell, that was as much as we could have hoped for.

The first thing we did was get godly advice from a wise Christian couple. Then we spent several months seeing a Christian marriage counselor. We got involved in our church's couples group, and started reading marriage materials like FamilyLife's HomeBuilders Couples Series®.We knew we had to find out, "Okay, what does a husband do? What is my role? What does that look like?" She had to find out, "What is a godly wife supposed to do?" We learned biblical principles and found practical ways to apply them.

Another important ingredient to healing was that we offered each other mercy while we were trying to change.

When we slipped up, we tried not to get too bent out of shape over it because we both knew we were trying. It was like we were two parallel pendulums swinging back and forth, just missing each other. But through self-control and studying God's Word, and putting those principles into our marriage, eventually we became like two pendulums, swinging in sync—together. But it took time, self-control, and a strong commitment.

Many of the habits we had established were very difficult to break. Before, we would be waiting for the other person to make a mistake so we could point it out. But when we began this new cycle, I was trying to please her and she was trying to please me.

A New Personal Mission

Probably the one thing that helped me the most was the verse in 1 Peter 3:7 where it instructs me to dwell with my wife in understanding. For years and years, every comedian on television says, "Oh, I can't understand my wife." It's the proverbial joke in our culture. But if the Bible tells us to dwell with our wives in understanding, it must be possible.

I did not ask for details of Nancy's affair. I didn't want to obsess about what she did and where she did it. When the thoughts of her with him came to taunt me, I didn't allow them to stay. Instead, I chose to think about the future we were building. I read Philippians 4:8, which helped me think about things that were pure, admirable, lovely and good.

But I made it my personal mission to understand my wife.

I learned that my wife is more sensitive than my buddy. I can tease and make wise cracks at my friend's expense, and he's just going to respond with a playful insult. But when I make fun of my wife, it breaks her down emotionally and spiritually. It hurts her and she pulls away from me.

I learned that if my wife says, "You're tailgating and it's scaring me," I should stop tailgating. If I love her, why would I want to frighten her?

The more I understood about my wife, and respected those God-given differences, the less we argued. We used to have "brush fire arguments"—little spats that turn into World War III in 90 seconds. As we extinguished the brushfires, the intimacy grew and our love grew.

Soon, Nancy realized how much my forgiveness meant to her. She thanked me many times for being willing to take her back. She treated me with new respect and I began to appreciate her.

25 Years Later

I never regretted my choice to forgive Nancy. It's been over 25 years since Nancy's affair but we've never stopped learning from it.

Her affair was a symptom of a terminally ill marriage. I'm not excusing her behavior, but I was not an attentive, loving, encouraging husband. She repeatedly told me how sad, lonely, and discouraged she felt and I selfishly tried to talk her out of her needs. I didn't compliment her enough and I was not the spiritual leader of our home. Our marriage was a mess and a lot of that was my fault.

We had to learn that the Word of God is our value system and though our emotions may change, God's Word doesn't change. The truth is the truth.

Our theory is: Always work at fine-tuning your relationship. Never let your guard down for a moment. Never take each other for granted and be careful not to get caught up in emotions because our emotions can deceive us.

We are amazed at how far we've come; we laugh a lot now and really enjoy each other. Our 21-year-old son often sees us holding hands and sees that we are living examples of mercy and restoration.

We had a broken home, but with the Lord's help and a lot of work, it is fully restored and stronger than before. My wife's affair shattered our marriage … but it saved our marriage, too.