Leawood, Kansas, United States - The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection Daily Guide grow. pray. study. for Thursday, 28 August 2014 "Guidelines for family living"

Leawood, Kansas, United States - The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection Daily Guide grow. pray. study. for Thursday, 28 August 2014 "Guidelines for family living"
Daily Scripture:  Colossians 3:18 Wives, understand and support your husbands by submitting to them in ways that honor the Master.
19 Husbands, go all out in love for your wives. Don’t take advantage of them.
20 Children, do what your parents tell you. This delights the Master no end.
21 Parents, don’t come down too hard on your children or you’ll crush their spirits.
Reflection Questions:
Too often, both men and women get stuck on verse 18, one of the most often misinterpreted and abused verses Paul ever wrote. We get a clearer sense of what he meant from a parallel in Ephesians 5:21, where he said "Submit to one another" before specifically speaking to wives and husbands. Verses 19 and 21 may sound mundane to us, but were revolutionary in a world where most pagan moralists lectured women and children on how to behave, with no related duties for husbands and parents.
Paul's command to husbands was "Husbands, love your wives and don't be harsh with them." In the Bible, "love" referred to a chosen set of attitudes and actions, not just an emotional state. How does this show that Paul did not intend to "let husbands off easy"? (In Ephesians 5:25, he got even more explicit: "Husbands, love your wives just like Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.") In what ways have you seen mutual submission strengthen loving relationships?
In Paul's day, the Greek, Roman and Hebrew legal codes all gave parents virtually unlimited power over their children. How did Paul's vision of family life lived under God's principles emphasize mutual respect and caring, rather than a one-sided, tyrannical relationship? How can you, as a parent or a child, live out the principles of verses 20-21?
Today's Prayer:
Heavenly Father, you came in Jesus to win my heart, not to harshly order me around. Help me learn from you how to live that way in all of the relationships that matter most to me. Amen.
Insight from Janelle Gregory
Janelle Gregory serves on the Resurrection staff as a Human Resources Specialist.
I don’t mean to brag, but I have been rockin’ it as a wife lately. My husband, Brandon, and I have been married for nearly seven years, and while we’ve hit our normal amount of waves along the way, things have been pretty smooth sailing as of late.
So happy and confident was I that, earlier this summer, I prayed that God would show me more ways that I could bless my husband. I realized that this would be a particularly difficult challenge for Him, perhaps requiring Him to dig deep into the annals of history’s perfect wives, but I figured He’d be up for it. Mind you, I chose not to go directly to Brandon with this request. I figured it would be my little secret with God. Brandon wouldn’t necessarily need to be involved other than to enjoy our wedded bliss that much more.
Yet while I made this earnest request to God, I was still completely taken aback when a couple of weeks later I found myself in a conversation with my husband in which he offered me a few “friendly suggestions” on how I might be a better wife.
I’d like to say that I responded by throwing my arms around him exclaiming, “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! This is exactly what I’ve been praying for.” That’s what I’d like to say… but I can’t. I did my best to listen to his requests and respond well, but my soul was wrestling with the grace and love I wanted to extend and the pain and frustration I was feeling.
Hurt. I was hurt. He wasn’t trying to hurt me. Though we both could have worked on how we approached the conversation, my husband wasn’t unfair in his requests. I had hurt him too, and hearing this kind of feedback was difficult.
But this was the answer to my prayers. This is what I wanted. I asked for ways to bless my husband, and here they lay right in front of me. So through my pain and because of his, I’m choosing to listen to his requests and take them seriously. It’s not enough to be made aware of how to bless your spouse if you’re not willing to actually do it.
God faithfully answered my prayers, even though I wasn’t fond of the initial response. And more importantly, He’s taught me that I need to go straight to the source and check in with my husband to see how I am meeting his needs periodically. I’ve even put it on my calendar!
And while I’m assuming that this may help me in my desire to be a better spouse and teammate, I have no delusions that we will live entirely happily ever after in the land of rainbows and roses. No, I’m sure we will spend a lifetime hurting one another. That’s the reality of all close relationships.
But the joy and blessings we receive far outweigh the hurt. We take seriously our roles to care for and encourage one another, because we not only believe that marriage is a way to give and receive love between the two of us, but it goes far beyond that as well. Marriage is a partnership in which we work together to extend that love to everyone around us so that the kingdom of earth might look more like the Kingdom of God because the two of us have joined together in that endeavor.
Viewing our relationship through this lens of a united force helps to alleviate the idea of his needs vs. her needs. All of a sudden it goes from “my needs are not met” or “his needs are not met” to “one of our needs is unmet.” This perspective makes me want to meet his needs all the more and not be so secretive about doing so. And it’s also this context that provides an aloe to any wounds that come when each of our needs undoubtedly goes unmet.
I choose to love my husband through words and actions (aka – being a rockin’ wife) because I genuinely love him. He’s one of the kindest, wisest, funniest, and smartest people I know. But I also choose to love him (and find ways to better love him) because he makes me a better person, and together we make a better team – a team whose love is continually perfected by God and reflected to others with the hope that this combined effort draws people to the heart of the One who is the ultimate giver and very essence of all real and sustaining love.
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