Over the last four years, I’ve been writing to encourage men, primarily men who are married, to encourage them to lead and love their wives in the best way they can. The reason I started this was because I was struggling so much myself. I didn’t start writing out of my expertise unless you call repeatedly messing up expertise. Instead, I started doing so because I knew I needed to do better, and I thought I could connect with and encourage other men who were in the same boat. Iron sharpens iron.
You were created to lead and love your wife no matter how hard or even confusing it is. If you’re married, you know leading and loving your wife isn’t always easy; but like me, you were created to lead and love your wife no matter how hard or even confusing it is. Most of us are comfortable with the notion of the leadership of a team, at work, in the community or perhaps even in ministry. But not so much at home. Our challenge is first determining what that looks like with our wives and at home.
Some leaders you’ve been under may be more on the dictatorship side. Or, maybe that is your leadership style at work. But that’s not going to get us great results in our marriages. So how do we lead and love, or lead our wives with love? Here are three ways to do both:
3 Ways to Lead Your Wife
- Encourage her. How much more do you want to do when you are encouraged? How much better do you feel? How does that impact your desire to follow someone who is encouraging? I’ve learned a leader who is encouraging is more effective than one who is not. Encourage your wife and watch the best come out of her.
- Serve her. The greatest example of leadership is that of the servant leader. In my opinion, the greatest servant leader was in the person of Jesus Christ and the impact of his leadership changed the world. Leading your wife isn’t about getting her to do what you say, it’s about leading by serving her and meeting her needs.
- Be the example for her. If you want to get out of debt, be the example and cut your spending. I know a husband who didn’t eat out for months, at least a year, I believe. They were in over $100k in debt. But they weren’t taking any real action. He led by example and his wife followed. Three years later, they were debt free.
3 Ways to Love Your Wife
- Learn to “speak” her love language. If you’ve never heard of The 5 Love Languages, pick it up now. Your wife feels most loved when you speak her love language: 1) Words of Affirmation, 2) Physical Touch, 3) Acts of Service, 4) Quality Time or 5) Receiving Gifts. Learn hers and speak it to her often.
- Sacrifice your will for hers. Going back to the leadership example of Jesus, he also showed us the greatest way to love someone—and that is to sacrifice for them. In His case, he laid down his life. I hope you don’t have to lay down your life, but love your wife by sacrificing what you want for what she wants.
- Care for her better than you care for yourself. Outside of our bad diets, most of us take really good care of ourselves. We don’t intentionally harm our own bodies. Instead, we care for them. One of the greatest ways to love your wife is to care for her better than you care for yourself. Give a massage without intentions. Go out in the cold so she doesn’t have to. Get up early and get the kids ready, so she can rest.
Huddle up with your wife and ask, “How am I doing as the head of our household? How well am I leading and loving you?”