Special: (L) Led
Secure Protected Enjoyed Courted Intimate Affirmed Led
We hope you have enjoyed this little detour from our normal 52 Week Plan on Relational Needs. We will do the second half of this focus on what it means to CHERISH your spouse in a few weeks. This week our focus will be on our last letter of SPECIAL, “L” – being LED and what that looks like in our families. We sure hope you discovered new ways to make your spouse and family feel SPECIAL by leading wisely from a heart of love!
L: Led
The Key to LEADING your Family well is to lead by good example. Leading well will involve these ingredients: Love your family as Christ loves, serve your family, make important decisions for and with your family, forgive quickly, apologize quickly, discipline in love not anger, spend time with your family and most important LEAD yielded to Christ’s biblical direction.
Let’s get some “bad ideas” out of the way…. We all know the verse in Ephesians 5: 22a Wives, submit to your own husbands but we often get hung up on the submit part. I want to put your heart at rest. Let’s look at what the rest of the chapter says.( Italics are mine)
Consider the passage in Ephesians 5:22-33:
22 For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, (How beautiful is that? Ladies, I don’t know about you but I want to be loved like that! ) 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, (Husbands, do you cover your wife with the truth of scripture – Praying over and for her? …leading her as the scripture leads you?) 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.[ a ] 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, (What a beautiful picture of a husband’s love towards his wife.) 30 because we are members of his body. 31 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. (Wives, do you respect your husband? Let’s remember what the definition for Respect is in the Intimate Encounters book. Respect: Valuing one another highly, treating one another as important, and honoring one another with our words and actions. )
Let’s break the stinkin’ thinkin’ about what it means to submit and what it means to be the leader of the family.
Wives, submitting does not mean that you are a doormat and that you are subject to your husband’s every wish or command. It does not mean that your opinion does not matter. It does not mean that you are a slave to be told what to do.
Being submissive does mean you release control to your husband when you both cannot come to joint decision. It means trusting your husband’s leadership. It means knowing you are valued by your heavenly Father and knowing He is for you even when your husband doesn’t communicate that loving care very well. The passage in verse 22 says to “submit …as to the Lord.” So submission is a voluntary yielding to another person’s leadership out of reverence for the person, when possible, but always out of reverence for Christ.
When someone abuses their authority and does harm or seeks to lead us into a place of violating God’s higher laws and principles, we are not required to submit since we are already to submit to Christ first.
Husbands, being the leader of your family does not mean you are all powerful and that everyone in the house is under your thumb. It does not mean your word is the only word. It does not mean you can be bossy. It does not mean it’s your way or the highway.
Being the leader of the family does mean you value your wife’s thoughts and opinions and take them into consideration. It does mean you take all things to God first. It does mean you love your wife and want her to know that you are for her. It does mean you protect your family above all else. It does mean you are accountable to God as the spiritual leader of your family.
Husband’s you have a great responsibility on your shoulders placed there by God, so wives understand that and trust your man in God’s hands.
Mom and Dad, you both are to lead your children well, leading by example. The old “they learn more by what is caught than what is taught” holds so true. Kids “act out” much of what they see at home. You could look all nice and polished with your Sunday best for all to see, but it is what happens everyday inside the home that your kids catch.
Leading by example means; Showing respect to your kids. When making family decisions ask them their thoughts, as age appropriate. Say you are sorry and ask for their forgiveness if you treated them in a way you shouldn’t have. Show your love for your spouse with appropriate levels of affection in front of the kids. Gasp! Kiss in front of the kids? Gross! haha…They need to see mom and dad loving each other. Pray with them. Read the Bible together. Be there for them when they have had a tough day.
Have you ever seen this diagram?
Ultimately, we are all under God’s leadership. Let us bring our whole family before Him and seek His wisdom as we lead in our home.