Ignite The Fire In Your Marriage - What Men Need

This is the third message in my "Ignite The Fire In Your Marriage" series. Follow this link if you missed the last two messages in this series.

In the last message, I talked about the importance of communicating our needs with our spouses and being honest with our feelings. For the next several posts, I'll be sharing what men and women need, according to the Bible and a survey I posted for my book.

We'll start today with: What Men Need

Respect

"The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down." Proverbs 14:1

Our husbands need to know that we respect them and are proud of them. Ephesians 5:33 says that a husband must love his wife as he loves himself, and a wife must respect her husband. My husband and I attended a Bible study on this verse years ago.

I have heard women misinterpret this verse and become defensive and say, "Well, a man should respect his wife too." My husband and I learned through this study that men and women see things differently.

For instance, when I build my husband up, by letting him know how much I appreciate him for being our provider, I am showing him respect, which he views as me showing love toward him.

This is how our husbands want us to show them love, by respecting them. I, however, see my husband show me love in more physical ways, like going out of his way to romance me, helping me with the housework and kids, and listening to me. His acts of love show me that he respects me. We are both showing love and respect, but in different ways.

One woman in my survey shared how she shows her husband respect, "I try to make sure he knows that I appreciate all that he does to take care of me, not just monetarily, but with the remodeling of our home and even car repairs."

Just a little "I appreciate all that you do" is what our husbands want. It will motivate them to be better husbands, better fathers, and better providers if they have us cheering them on through life.

Companionship

"Enjoy life with your wife (or husband), whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun..."
Ecclesiastes 9:9 (emphasis mine)

My husband is truly my best friend. We have a lot of fun together and we miss each other when we are apart. I've learned as with all friendships, to have a friend you have to be a friend. This especially applies to marriage. To be a good friend to our husbands we have to be considerate with their interests and not selfish with our own.

Warren Baldwin wrote a great post about men's needs, and understanding their interests. He wrote:

If a husband invites his wife to a ball game, a day hike or even a deer hunt, that is his way of saying, "I love you and want to be close to you." It may not have quite the romantic appeal to many wives that a movie and dinner out does, but realizing the husband's intent may help make the invitation a little more desirable (or at least bearable).

I see too many married couples living separate lives, doing their own things. This only pulls couples further apart. I don't exactly enjoy watching football or hockey, but I enjoy spending time with my husband. We should enjoy being with our spouses, no matter what we do. I've found the more I spend time doing what my husband enjoys, the more he spends time with me doing what I enjoy.


This series will continue on 2/17!

*Next week is National Marriage Week. I am giving away the Kindle version of "You Can Have a Happy Family" for FREE at Amazon ALL DAY Wed & Thurs (2/8-2/9). Be sure to download your free copy and re-ignite that fire in your marriage for Valentine's Day!