I’m struggling with the proper relationship between husband and wife. The wife is supposed to hearken to the counsel of her husband as her husband hearkens to the counsel of the father. In bringing that up I don’t wish to sound like I want subservience but I do believe that men and women have different roles to play and that when both spouses are seeking to act righteously and push still comes to shove that covenant indicates that the wife should defer to her husband because he is responsible to answer first for the decision (whether it was his idea or hers originally).
Right now Laura and I are having a struggle with the balance of power in our relationship and I feel that a good part of that struggle is an outgrowth of how much I have deferred to her and answered to her in an effort to avoid being domineering over the years. I feel that we have proven the ineffectiveness of that approach to “equal partnership” but because she can’t recognize the source of our struggles she doesn’t agree with the way I believe we need to change our interactions. She also believes that equality means that she has as much right to expect my deference as I do to expect hers while failing to comprehend how much deference I have consistently given. When she thinks of the wording of the covenant she interprets it to mean she should hearken to my counsel only insomuch as she believes I am hearkening to the counsel of the Lord with the implication that she can/should second guess any of my decisions against what she thinks the Lord wants – worst of all, as she does with most people, she sirens most of her time thinking that I am not in tune with the Spirit.
Leave a Reply