By Rodetta Cook

Rodetta Cook has been a pastor’s wife for over 40 years. She and her husband, Ron, have actively served the Lord together in ministry during the entire time and are co-founders of Care for Pastors. She understands the expectations, loneliness and how hard it is to find balance in ministry as a pastor’s wife. Rodetta also leads the pastor’s wives initiative at Care for Pastors called The Confidante and ministers to hundreds of wives each week. She strives to share blogs with other pastors’ wives that will help them in their ministry walk.

Posted by Rodetta Cook

Topics: Family · For Pastors' Wives · Resources for Pastors' Wives

Love and Respect

Monday, February 27, 2017

During the month of February we all think about “love” and some of us have a wonderful loving husband and some may have a husband that is allowing ministry to rob him of his love for his wife. And many times the church has become the other woman.

We as pastors’ wives and our husbands think that we must put on this mask that everything is just fine in our marriage because after all, what would the church think if they knew the truth? I know I have said it before, but if we let our priorities get out of balance then life is going to be out of balance. We must remember to keep things in order – God, Family and then the Church. If this has gotten out of balance for you and your family, please seek counsel and learn to set some boundaries.

I want to ask you a few questions this morning.

Has ministry taken its toll on your marriage?
Do you and your husband have good open communication?
Do you stuff your feelings instead of sharing them with your husband?
Do you and your husband have a date night?
Do you resent the church?

This list could go on and on but I just wanted to ask a few probing questions to get you thinking about how your marriage is doing. I believe every woman reading this today can relate on some level. You may have a strong wonderful marriage, but it didn’t come about without hard work. Therefore, I would say at some point in your marriage you could say ministry has taken its toll on you and your marriage.

In dealing with hundreds of pastors’ wives here at Care for Pastors, we see a lot of issues in their marriages. Of course, we can’t address all of those here today but I want to encourage you to evaluate how things really are in your marriage. Take the mask off and really examine your marriage. We as wives need to feel loved and our husbands need to feel respected. It seems a lot of marital issues begin with those two needs not being met and many times it is because the church has become the other woman.

I would like to suggest a book to you, whether your marriage is strong or whether you have some glaring issues, and that is Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. This book is a wonderful tool in any marriage. It addresses those two needs: a woman needing to feel loved and a man needing to be respected. There is also a workbook that is very helpful and I would recommend that as well. So wherever you find yourself, whether you are in a strong marriage or you have some issues that need to be addressed, we can all use refining from time to time. Even if you have read this book before, I would encourage you to go back and review it. We can’t invest too much time in our marriages.

Ministry is stressful and it does take its toll on us as individuals as well as on our marriages and families. We are here to help in any way we can.