As wives there are ample opportunities for demonstrating love for our husbands in practical ways. A site was recently recommended: http://www.the-generous-wife.com/ You can receive daily tips and reminders of things to do which will communicate love and support. Here are a few basic beginning points.

Provide healthy meals in timely fashion. Learn to know his likes and be happy to accommodate his preferences cheerfully. Manage your life, as much as possible, around his schedule. Some guys work crazy hours which may not always allow for shared meals, but try to come up with a system which provides good foods for him. And cater to him by making his favorite dish or dessert from time to time, even if it’s not his birthday!

Keep his clothes clean and available. It’s that simple.

Minister to his desire for physical relationship. Never hold back, be generous in this area. Learn to serve him even if it may not be the top thing on your list for that day. If it’s on his list, it’s important that you not only participate, but do so gladly. Granted, husbands in this day and age aren’t taught about a woman’s needs in this arena, but that is not what I am addressing at the moment. That’s for him to learn. Your responsibility and privilege is to bless him. Warmth and genuine affection communicate care, appreciation, respect, and desire. He needs to know you find him attractive. And he needs to know you are happy to belong to him.

Be a good listener. Just sit and hear him out before lending him your two cents. Maybe his pocket is already full change and he doesn’t really need your opinion (right then anyway.) Just listen and care about his heart and dreams. Show sincere interest in the things that interest him. Learn about those things and genuinely care about them.

Be kind. Guard your words, keep your countenance pleasant, write notes of encouragement or love. Show him all the courtesy that you show your friends. As your husband he deserves that and more.

Do yourself and him a favor: guard his time, especially his family time and devotional/study time. Screen phone calls when he is in prayer or study. Train your children to respect his need for privacy and time with the Lord. Keep non-family members from interrupting unnecessarily during special times set aside for the children or you. In our modern world, intrusion upon privacy seems constant. Help guard him from the onslaught.

Every relationship will have particular and peculiar opportunities to express love in very hands-on practical ways. Love that isn’t visible and tangible is not truly functioning. We deceive ourselves if we think we love when these practical areas are lacking expression of genuine care. Real love is observable by others and experienced in real ways by those we care for.

Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. NKJ

This scripture makes it clear that in our relationship with our husbands we must take care to show respect. Interesting that Paul calls for a husband to love his wife and a wife to respect her husband. Could it be that respect is a critical component in building your husband? Were you aware that women can have an active role in building men? You, as a wife, either build up or tear down.

Husbands need our respect. Theirs is a weighty calling: to work dutifully, to seek God on our behalf, to lead us, to love us as Christ loves the church. Responding with respect creates a safer environment in which he can carry out these duties. A loving, supportive wife is a treasure. A nagging woman who spews disrespect is far from that.

When we fail to show respect for his person, his words, or his decisions we are actively destroying his confidence. Negative comments and gestures tear down his sense of personal worth and value, stunting his leadership development. Often times I hear a wife claiming to want a stronger leader, complaining that her husband is not willing to be the head of the house. I guarantee that if a man is trampled on every time he tries to lead, he will be tempted to either shrink back or leave you behind. Neither one is desirable.

“But how can I show him respect? You just don’t know what he’s done!”

I know that some of you face very difficult situations; I don’t pretend to understand your dilemma. But I do know that what God commands us to do, He empowers us to do. His grace is sufficient. I don’t say that flippantly; I realize that for some women this is an extremely challenging command. My confidence is in His ability, not yours or mine. His love is present and available for a sinner like me — surely it can meet any other sinner as well.

“Why should I show him unconditional respect? He’s sinful, lazy, fallible…”

Exactly. Wives need to be taught to show respect because when a husband fails respect is not the natural response. The fact that your husband is a sinner is no surprise. You did marry a mere man. But his sin is not beyond the Lord’s redemption. Part of His redemption plan includes our display of respect. Our willingness to walk in respect toward our husband encourages, releases, and enlarges. When a man senses that his wife is respecting him, he walks more carefully and boldly. He is free to grow because he is free to make mistakes without being blamed, nagged, and scolded.

Am I saying that true respect never speaks a contrary word? Not exactly. I am saying that respect never speaks a nagging, belittling word. There is always room for an appeal to a decision, for us to voice an opposite opinion; Godly appeals are not belittling but are full of wisdom and encouragement.

Here is a simple chart comparing honoring and belittling.

Showing respect is required both privately and publicly.

For instance, when you’re alone together he deserves to be given full respect. Don’t roll your eyes at his suggestions. Don’t jump in with a negative response before he has even finished his thought (and don’t jump in with a negative response even if he has finished his thought.) Don’t say, “I told you this would happen” if something goes wrong when you suspected it might. Why do wives expect their husbands to share their intimate thoughts and dreams if they are met with this kind of response? And why do we think they will become valiant leaders if we throw their failures up in their faces?

Now imagine this scenario. You are with your friends without hubby. Words slip into wrong directions and soon hubbies are being roasted right and left. You could jump in with that most embarrassing moment story of his, or you could join in by saying, “You’ll never guess what my husband does…”, or you might be tempted to voice your recent complaints. Don’t. Not even in jest, unless of course it is a story that has been previously approved by him. Sounds a bit extreme? Let’s remember “Do unto others”. When people tell a joke at my expense, it can hurt. When my failures become the brunt of humor, it can embarrass. It does not build. We can enjoy a good laugh as long as it in no way degrades or belittles or reveals sin. Love covers, love builds, love encourages.

Here’s another one: You’re visiting with a few other people and your husband endeavors to recount a story. A few sentences into his tale, you add a correction of his facts. He makes two more statements and another correction is made. This continues until he finally says, “Why don’t you tell the story — I never get it quite right.” Now, it may be that you have mutually agreed that he is not a good story teller. If so, that is fine. But if not, he may be feeling a bit put down. At that point you need to ask yourself, how important was it that the house was blue, not green? Did it really matter that the little boy was two and a half, not three? Maybe honoring your husband’s moment of story-telling was more critical.

An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who causes shame is like rottenness in his bones. Proverbs 12.4 (emphasis mine)

When we show respect, we bring honor to him. When we cause shame, we are like the Proverbs 14.1 woman who foolishly pulls down her own house. So let’s remember once again to love our husbands by showing them the respect commanded by the Word of God.

Our ability to freely love our husbands begins with a true love for God. Without first loving Him we cannot love our husband. We do not have the capability to love apart from Him.

Matt. 27.37-39 Jesus said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

We often dismiss the call to love our neighbor when that neighbor is a member of our household. Siblings fail to love one another, wives fall short of loving their husbands. Somehow family is exempt from “neighborly” treatment. It should not be so. Family, as well as neighbors, are to be loved as we love ourselves. Forget looking out for #1 with this exception: let it determine the standard of treatment toward your husband, family, and neighbor.

1 Jn. 4.19-21 We love Him because He first loved us. If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.

We deceive ourselves if we think we love God but do not love our husbands. It is hogwash, actually. Now that is brutal; honest, but brutally so. But such litmus tests are good for us. They keep us on course, and they keep us in need of Him.

How many times have I thought, and have I heard other wives lament, “But I just want to be loved!” Do our husbands fall short in loving us? Most assuredly, even the most perfect husband fails to love continuously. Are we to wait for his success before we give love? Is this meant to be tit for tat? Must it be a “love in return” situation? Absolutely not!

“We love Him because He first loved us.” The first thing we learn from this verse is that love begins with Him. We are not the originator of love. In order to have love ministered through us, we must first receive love from Him. That provision was made through His Son, Jesus Christ and His death on the cross. We must accept and know His love for us, then we must draw regularly from that source.

There’s also a principle revealed here: love given reaps love in return. You cannot out-give God — what you sow you shall also reap. Sow His love and you will have love poured into your life. This is not magic; it is simply a spiritual principle.

Is this a guarantee that your husband will become everything you ever dreamed he would be? No! This is not a manipulative tactic. This is to be sincere love. Check out 1 Cor. 13 again.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

We find that love is not self-seeking. When you set yourself to serving your husband and looking out for his interests, your heart is transformed as well. Will he be touched and changed? Absolutely, but that is not the goal. Love from a pure heart is what God is wanting. Pretense does not produce fruit, genuine love does.

At the same time we do know that love is powerful; it has transforming potential. God is love. God is all-powerful. We can know that love lavished upon an individual yields change in that person’s life. It is undeniably true. But that is in God’s hands. Our part is to love Him and to love others.

So begin afresh today — determine to love your husband. Love him as God has loved you and as you love yourself, and do so freely.