Husbands Who Understand

Introduction

The most important vocation, hobby, past time a husband can take up is that of understanding, paying attention to, and appreciating his wife. If it is a woman’s duty to submit, then it is a man’s duty to lead. Tony Evans says, “You cannot lead someone you don’t understand”.

Much of the dysfunction in our relationships whether it with spouses, family members, co workers, or fellow laborers in the kingdom is birthed out of a lack of understanding. We expect and sometimes demand everyone else to see things the way we see them and do things the way we would do them. Although the New Testament does exhort us to unity, it does not demand conformity. This lack of sensitivity to diversity causes issues so deep that we are sometimes not able to overcome them. For husbands the inability to understand his wife, or live with her in an understanding way can create a deep gulf that can divide a house much in the same way our country is divided over many of the current social issues. It is possible to live in the same house, sleep in the same bed, eat at the same table, and yet for a wife to feel completely detached from her marriage and her husband, simply because of his lack of understanding.

A man said, “I don’t understand my wife. She has everything she could want—a dishwasher, a new dryer, a nice house. I’ve been faithful and I don’t drink. But she’s miserable. I can’t figure out why.” His love-starved wife would have traded everything for a single expression of genuine tenderness from her unromantic husband. Appliances do not build self-esteem; being somebody’s sweetheart most certainly does.

So the question becomes what is there to understand? Or what must we be trying to understand?

A husband who understands understands who his wife is, who she is not, and why it is so important that he learn to live with her in a way that is understanding.

I. Understand Who She Is

II. Understand Who She Is Not

III. Understand What’s At Stake

Conclusion