Wedding bells ring; congratulations, gifts, and honeymoon ensue; newlywed bliss begins. You are so excited about the new life you and your husband are beginning together. Today, I want to encourage you, young bride or bride-to-be, that your husband’s calling is your calling, too. Join him in that calling.
Wedding cards and love songs often offer words that conjure up an image of two young lovers on separate paths, but who, unbeknownst to them, have been headed in the same direction all their lives. Fate causes their paths to meet, they fall madly in love, and then this young, head-over-heels couple gets married.
In this scenario, the man and woman leave their original paths that brought them together, and the two of them begin a new path and a new life — their new life together.
Stop. News flash: You are not starting a new life from scratch with your husband. Wives, I want to offer to you what I believe is a more Biblical model than the one I gave to you above. A dear friend of ours shared this secret with me when I was a newlywed, and it has helped me many times since then.
Rather than the tale of two young lovers forging a new life together, God has called you, young wife, to leave your own path, to jump on board your man’s path, and to join him in his life and calling. His calling is your calling, too.
May I offer to you the story of the first man and his wife? God created all things in six days, and on the sixth day, He made a man. God created him of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. God gave this man a calling, a job, a vocation: he was to tend and keep the garden of Eden. God gave him work, purpose, and meaning.
And then, God said:
“It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.”
There was no suitable helper found for this man among any of creation, so God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept. While he was sleeping, God created a woman from one of the man’s ribs, and then God brought the woman to the man.
Now, this woman, too, was given a calling, a job, and a vocation: Eve is called a “suitable helper” to her husband.
God gives Adam gifts and talents, and a path, a calling, and a job to do. And then God gives this man a wife to help him in his calling.
Eve is full to overflowing with gifts and talents, and this wife has a clear path, calling, and job: to help her husband in his work and life, bringing glory to the Father, sharing in fellowship with one another and with God.
Now, please don’t misunderstand me, dear woman: You are an active participant in serving, glorifying, and loving God. You do not have limited access to God or to His direction and leading.
It may even be that God has joined you to your husband at a stage in his life where God has not yet revealed to him his life and vocation and calling, or God may call him to a different “path” sometime in your future.
However, in faith and trust of God, as a daughter of Sarah (1 Peter 3:1-6), faithfully follow God by seeing to it that you respect and honor and help your husband. Your husband’s calling is your calling, too — in whatever calling God places on his life.
God has a plan for you and your husband — a plan to bring glory to His holy name. As He reveals to the two of you the direction your life and work will go, you will be a richer and wiser woman to remember that, in your marriage, you are here for your husband — not the other way around.
(“For Adam was formed first, then Eve..” 1 Timothy 2:13.)
<3, amanda
Are you married? What is the best piece of marriage advice you would share with a young bride or bride-to-be?
..This post is happily shared with Living Proverbs 31, Fellowship Fridays, Family Fun Friday, Essential Fridays, Thoughtful Thursday, I Choose Joy, Thrive at Home Thursday {Link-Up}, the Titus 2sDay Link-Up Party, and Wifey Wednesday..
Melanie Redd says
What a wise post, Amanda!
You are so right! We are there to help them and to support their calling. I’ve followed my man across many states, many jobs, and many changes. His calling is to serve the Lord; mine is to serve him and the Lord.
I think if more women “got” what your post is proposing, more marriages would be happy!
Hope you have a blessed week~
Melanie
Melanie Redd recently posted…5 Bible Promises to Strengthen Your Faith
amanda says
Your life and marriage inspires and encourages me, Melanie! Thank you for being a wise, godly woman coming alongside and training and teaching us younger women. What a blessing you are to me and so many others!
Penny Lane says
I’m sharing this with my Bible Study ladies as we are studying this exact thing right now. Thank you, it was beautifully said. I feel the curse so strongly in my desire to lord over my husband, so I feel this is something I need reminded of over and over again.
Penny Lane recently posted…The Empowered Girl’s Gift Guide
amanda says
Penny, thanks for your encouragement. It’s a lifelong battle of persevering in faith and believing God’s word, and I have to be reminded all the time, too.. <3
Kaylene says
Best piece of advice….I like to talk so thats asking a lot! LOL Best piece of advice…. respect & honor your husband based on his God ordained position, not on his bumbling sinful performance. Great post, btw! Thanks!
Kaylene recently posted…S.W.A.G.: She Exudes Joy
amanda says
Kaylene,
Amen! Thank you! It is the Lord God whom we serve, and our respect and honor for our husbands is an outpouring of faith and trust in God.. Thank you for your encouraging comment! <3, amanda
amanda recently posted…His Calling Is Your Calling, Too
Tiffany says
Great post. I definitely believe the woman is to be the helper and the man is to be the provider and spiritual leader of the household. I know, in this day and age, that’s not how it always works out. I’m glad that it is working out that way for my husband and I. We’ve been married for one year. He is in the military and I had to pack up and move to where he was stationed. I had to follow his calling and join him. I will go where he goes. Thanks for posting!
amanda says
Tiffany, I’m glad you enjoyed the post, and congratulations on your marriage <3 The idea that you were created to be a help suitable to your husband is definitely counter-cultural....but it is biblical. I am praying this morning for you that God will continue to equip and strengthen you to love and serve Him in your service to your husband. Thank you for your sweet comment! <3