Fighting for a Great Marriage

“A great marriage is a combination of history, mystery, and chemistry.”

— Kay Warren

Marriages have been under attack from the enemy of God ever since the Fall. For every very happy marriage there must be 10 other marriages that struggle, even if only for a season or two.

There may be no marriage where both partners whistle blissfully through the entire journey without doubts as to their love and commitment to one another. Occasionally marriages reach breaking point, and, like two ships passing silently on the night, one gives up; typically the woman.

Somehow the husband gets so committed to his work (or a pastime) that he loses sight of things closer to home. He is wired to work and to work hard, and then he is punished for doing what society often requires of men.

But the woman at home, busy with the kids and her own work, plus the juggling of household priorities—added to the loneliness of emotional disconnection from her husband—is found emotionally spent and spiritually exhausted. She may feel she has become a shell of a woman. She may have harboured silent thoughts for what to do.

And if her husband had even half an inkling of what she had been considering, it would sincerely rock his world. Most husbands have no idea when their marriages are heading toward the ice. All looks fine on the surface, and there is no vision of the icebergs beneath that will cut open his ship and sink it.

Too many marriages end in such ways, where communication has been slowly annulled.

There is hope, however, when we take a look at our marriages and fight for them every single day.

Three Good Reasons and Ways to Fight

Every marriage has its history, and such a history is typically precious to both partners. What God has built humankind should not separate. And God has built a memorial to the marriage by the history that the marriage partners share.

A marriage’s history should be retold and frequently reclaimed as one’s own, particularly together.

Then we should accept that marriage is a mystery, and that in the best of marriages both partners delight in such a fact. Mystery provides spontaneity; a holy spark that ignites the excited way the couple shares their companionship.

Chemistry is what brought two people together, and such a chemistry should never be denied. And chemistry never dies, but it does go dormant. It takes great faith to believe in the rekindling of chemistry, but where we have such faith it is rewarded every time.

If we were once in love we can find ourselves in love again, but not without commitment to journey openly together.

***

A great marriage is one worth fighting for, and most great marriages have been fought for. It should be no surprise that most great marriages have had their struggles, but both partners knuckled down and did their work, cooperating with the Spirit of God, so that hope would light the eternal flame of love in that marriage again.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Swimming Safely in Pools of Uncertainty

As a child has view of his parent from 10 feet away in the pool as he first learns to swim, both parent and child are possibly fretful. There is safety with the instructor about. But there is never so much safety that their guard can be dropped completely.

Much is the same experience for any of us when we are plunged into a pool of uncertainty, and it’s all the more fatiguing as we continue treading water beyond where we would prefer to stop.

Sustaining energies when the bounds are open can be frightening. We doubt ourselves. We have vision of our past failures and they create moments of anxious dread. It’s the human imperative to fret. But then we possibly overcome the quavering moment, reasoning in our reasonable minds that all will be well; that we can and will overcome.

But the opportunity remains to connect heart with mind.

Safety Is in Gentleness

Uncertainty of circumstance is combined with uncertainty of soul, redoubling angst.

Here we find our outer situation, which is new and changing, combining with an inner situation where we are betwixt and between thinking and feeling states—the logical mind and the honest heart.

The heart feels with honesty and resists the change. And the mind provides therapy of logic. We all need logic to overcome our fears, but if we don’t entertain our fears we don’t learn how we are truly feeling. It’s important to listen to our feelings, because our souls are communicating important information. Listening to our feelings is giving credence to our unconscious mind. It is respecting the self.

There is safety in gentleness, as an outward reminder of the sort of treatment we need and deserve to give ourselves. We imagine our gentleness coming from the mature self. We all surely have some self-concept of a mature self that is diligent in providing the appropriate self-care. After all, we cannot be strong in honesty and humility for others if we are not being honest and gentle with ourselves.

Being gentle with ourselves is the ideal focus for being gentle with others.

When we are safe within we provide a safe home with which others can rest. Perhaps there is nothing better in this world than being with people that remind us of the love in God. By our gentleness we have that opportunity; we are safe for ourselves and for others.

***

Uncertainty reminds us of our vulnerability. Gentleness with ourselves is the antidote to feeling especially vulnerable. We are honest and rest while we can. There is safety in gentleness, for us and for others as well. And when we detect loving fellowship, we receive support as we give it. Gentleness is allowing God to work in our situations.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Accepting All Things Are Not Equal

I had one of those us-husbands-have-it-tough moments recently, when helping my wife with the grocery shopping. She, being pregnant, was loading up on all the expensive items like vitamins and baby accessories, whilst my treat was a packet of $1.50 crackers. Oh, I did get $18 worth of soup-in-a-can as well!

I laugh while I write this, because realistically I do complain about the oddest things.

It shouldn’t have needed to be pointed out to me that all the money being spent on baby stuff was not really my wife’s treat at all. Just because she was spending a comparatively high amount of money on things for the baby, and vital things for a pregnant woman and nursing mother, didn’t necessarily mean that I should have more money also just to ensure things were ‘fair’.

Fair is not equal. Equal is not fair.

Both of these concepts—fairness and equality—when placed together, are abstract and tend to be very subjective.

In a world of male privilege, where men and boys are used to getting their ‘fair share’ when compared with their women, there is often the case of inequity simply because in ‘making things equal’ things become unfair.

This is about a call for maturity; to understand that discretion and subjectivity have their place.

Time to Grow Up

As Paul mentioned in 1 Corinthians 13:11, we have this opportunity to resist the clamour of our childhood desire; to grow and take on the full complement of manhood and womanhood. True adulthood is about recognising the differences in life, yet not complaining about them, but instead appreciating that many differences exist, and often for very good reason.

The more we can accept that things are not equal, and often never should be, the less we stress about the things we cannot change.

Accepting that things are not equal brings us to an acceptance of the way the world is. If we expect things to be equal we will, most of the time, end up disappointed.

The key to Paul’s message on love in 1 Corinthians 13 is the linkage of maturity. Where we embrace the calling of God on our lives to grow up, we find God has already started work in growing us up. Our Lord loves such childlike faith that corresponds, ironically, with an adult frame of mind.

Things will never be equal, as long as we live and breathe on this broken and very complex planet. Accepting this is wisdom. When we accept not all things are equal, really accepting it, we stand to be truly blessed.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Ending the Journey of Hurt and Pain

For the many, this will be a pipedream—to end the journey of hurt and pain; relational hurt and pain.

Let us face some facts: nobody is beyond hurt and everyone has buttons, that, when pressed, light up an alarm panel of stinging and putrid rejection. Everyone, of course, has different ways of dealing with such a thing. Some just dismiss it out of hand. Others take it more to heart. The latter is not weaker than the former, just different, and perhaps more relationally caring.

We should not pretend that ending the journey of hurt and pain will be an easy one. What seems so simple from the outside is calamitously complex from within.

We cannot do it without God.

This is the point. The only way through to any semblance of healing from the hurt and pain of relational conflict that was buried long ago, or may have even been recent but that which really wrangles, is through the power of God to give us the temporary power to make a decision, commit to an action, and then carry that action out.

Sometimes these actions need to be ongoing. Day upon day we have the same challenge. The sustainability of such actions will be tested. We may fear giving up. That is a rational fear.

We are all susceptible to such fear.

And because we are relational creatures, our fears, mostly, come about because of the relationships. The world would not be one tenth as complex if it wasn’t for other people who are so different from (or perhaps too similar to) ourselves. It’s not their fault any more than it is ours.

Our opportunity is to forgive—this day; no delay. To set ourselves free from the bondage of having our thoughts stolen away and our feelings held to ransom, because we are hurt, is the answer of God, due our simple yet comprehensive obedience of surrender.

Yes, surrender.

We know such a word, yet we do not like it. It requires sacrifice on our side of things. We are the hurt, yet we are the ones that have to do the work. It just seems more unfair.

But as we take the initiative, we wrest the control of the situation.

It’s the only thing we can do, yet it is the only thing we need to do. When we are prepared to give the smaller issue away, we gain the larger issues of life. When we reject our feelings of rejection and embrace any sense of acceptance that is real for us, we experience the feeling of healing. But the source of acceptance needs to be a healthy one.

Surrendering these things that have held us captive for too long is peace and release. A life that started large, yet, because of hurt and pain became small, gets large again, and beautiful in its experience of God through our relationships.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Love Beyond Rejection Toward Truly Belonging

Regarding relationships within the church, Jesus said:

“Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

— John 13:34b (NRSV)

There is a fact about life, in the presence of community, that every now and then we get hurt. And when we get hurt, we withdraw; having felt isolated we become even more isolated. It’s a snowballing effect. The more withdrawn we become, the more comfortable we get to be in our own company, the more our confidence in social situations plummets. And alone, in that hurt space, we think all sorts of unproductive thoughts as we become captive to fear.

From such a spot of felt isolation we sense the difficulties of life in irregular enormity.

Such is the direction surrounding the hurt of rejection that it takes us into a veritable hell. We enter a situation where the light of life vacates into the distance.

But if we know this, and we ward against staying hurt, through some practical actions, we can avert this sense of disaster of isolation, for social isolation was never meant to be how we were to live.

Knowing that we are especially susceptible to feeling rejected means that we can focus, with intention, upon the power of God repelling that type of slide.

This may be the most important thing we could do so far as human fellowship is concerned. And as Christians, it is even more fundamental; we need to remember that the Scripture verse quoted above is a command of the Lord Jesus.

If we call ourselves Jesus-followers we will want to quickly obey this Word.

Love Like Jesus Loved

Can we but imagine, just for a moment, what it must have been like for Jesus to love Judas Iscariot—his betrayer—or Peter—the Rock upon whom the church would be built, who rejected Jesus in his hour of need—who had betrayed him?

Jesus speaks many times through the Gospels about forgiving one’s enemies, and we can understand that within our minds, but can we live it within our hearts?

With faith on our side we can reject the idea of staying stuck in our hurt as we abandon our pride. Yes, we may have been in the right, but what matter is it if it means we, or anyone else God loves, is out of fellowship? We can only be blessed when we have a real desire for unity.

In living the genuine Christian existence, we have an opportunity to move beyond our hurt places, and to bring healing within—the Holy Spirit’s healing—through the simple act of obedience to love like Jesus loved.

When we hold to the standard of Jesus’ love we know we can never love enough, so we stay compelled to just keep loving the best we can and to never give up. When we love people as Jesus loved his disciples, we forgive the people who hurt us, and there is then no barrier to belonging.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Moving Forward from Church Hurt

Regarding discipline and forgiveness within the church, Jesus said:

“If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone...”

— Matthew 18:15a (NRSV)

Because the church is a spiritual hospital, many are the maimed, diseased, and partially paralysed—indeed, all of us have our broken bits to contend with and, therefore, necessarily, others must contend also. Others must put up with us, as we must put up with others. And such is the testament of love that, largely, we achieve this in the gladness and degrees of humour.

But inevitably things run awry.

Through lack of care/feedback/acknowledgement or criticism, church members are easily disenfranchised. Sometimes the people on the other end of the lack of care, feedback, or acknowledgement (etc) simply do not know their ‘failing’. At other times they do, and issues prove irreconcilable.

Problems for the Hurt Person

What generally underpins the hurt within the person hurt is a history of hurt.

In such hurt is a history of unreconciled pain.

If we were to trace back through the passage of life of the person hurt we might expect to find significant irreconcilable issues, even quite disconnected from the present hurt. In this way, it is not just the presenting hurt that is the problem, but matters underneath compounding the present hurt.

It is a very unfortunate reality that, if, we suffered abuse and neglect as a child, we will be more susceptible to the ugliness of betrayal through our ensuing life. But the person who has grappled with such a disastrously broken past will not be so prone.

Unreconciled hurts build upon one another, to the point that incoming hurts cannot be handled at all well.

The best policy is rigourous honesty with ourselves, but the irony is the more hurt we are underneath the less desire we have to be honest. We may need honesty all the more, but we may have less capacity than we need. As soon as we are honest we can understand that conflict needs to be addressed, so the situation, and ourselves, can be healed. This, of course, takes significant portions of courage.

The Challenge for the Hurt Person

Healing is a challenge for the hurt person. They may very well feel it is beyond them.

Healing rests in peace. Whatever outcome we seek we must be able to live with. When we are honest, and we accept that addressing the issue means confronting another person or people in love, we have a way of moving forward. But we need to be ready for both positive and negative results. We need to do this in order to protect ourselves.

Meeting the person one-on-one, having planned what we will say, and having prepared ourselves to listen to them also, we communicate clearly and concisely. We harness our emotions by keeping mindful of how they might be feeling.

Whatever happens, the challenge for the person who has been hurt is to meet the perpetrator of the hurt, wherever possible, and seek an acceptable reconciliation.

If such an acceptable reconciliation isn’t possible, the hurt person is presented with a challenge not too unique in this life—to accept the things they cannot change, in the knowledge that they did the best they could.

***

Church hurts are an ever present threat. When they occur we cannot let them fester. Jesus has commanded us to meet the person who has hurt us. This is the way we move forward. Having done this, we either addressed the hurt through courage or we learned to accept that which we could not change. Either way we can have peace and, therefore, healing.

Situations of hurt need to be resolved through actions of reconciliation; a process by which the hurt person needs to initiate.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

A Passionate Quest to Live for Others

“The tragedy of life is what dies inside a person while they live.”

— Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965)

What is life without a unique you-shaped purpose? Rekindling our purpose, keeping its fire stoked, we experience joy again, vitality, and renewal... the blessings of Abundant Life. Or perhaps for the first time. It’s never too late to surrender ourselves to living boldly in the direction of our purpose.

It’s what we’re here for.

But then comes a balancing act, for with passion comes the tenacity to live, and then possibly, later on, the potential for or the reality of burnout. Living a passionate life is living on a knife’s edge.

Fear of burnout, however, should not dissuade us from living life to the full, so there is a motive—purer than all others—that transcends the potential for fatigue.

When God is the centre and heart of our purpose, when we have given our lives away in order to gain the only life we can get, we are gifted the capacity to love that banishes desire of reward. Oh, this is a fabulous life! To serve in the redeeming of our purpose, and do it because we want to, because we have fallen in love with it, life takes on a transcendent quality where we might bound out of bed in the morning in order to simply get to work again.

And life just gets better.

Then, at the appropriate times, because our purpose is not about us, but about others, we quietly take our rest and reflect on the blessings of God in others’ lives in order to be encouraged ourselves to continue. We don’t feel bad about resting; we know we need it; we enjoy it!

This passionate quest to live is centred on God, but, in that, it is centred on others. The more we give them, even secretly, without thought of reward or recognition, the more God gives us. Why would we want to reward or recognition when we know that God rewards love in the eternal realm, even as we experience it within the body—like when we moved with goose bumps—a special anointing of blessing by the Holy Spirit.

When we understand that God’s reward and recognition is all we need, we no longer settle for, or even desire, recognition or reward from our contemporaries. Sure, we may need to be reminded from time to time, but knowing God is blessed by our service to others is enough reward and recognition in its own right.

***

The best purpose of all is a purpose where we give ourselves away for others without any thought of reward. Then we know God has won our hearts. Then we know God more fully than ever before. And the heights of blessing are ours.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Letting the ‘Young Man’ Go

In the case of initiation, when the boy returns, having fulfilled his rites of passage, “the boy’s mother pretends not to know him. She asks to be introduced to ‘the young man’.”

— John Eldredge (paraphrasing Robert Bly)

This is a hard word for women with sons, but it is necessarily true in the folklore of masculinity.

Men need men and boys more so. If the root of many of the crimes within society committed today lay exposed, we would acknowledge the great injustice that is spurned against most if not all young men, that the rites of initiation are largely lost in our modern Western culture.

The lack of men in men’s lives has harmed our men for decades, if not centuries.

The ancient tradition was for boys and young men to work with their fathers, and, at the age of about 12, be sent off for a little while with the older men to learn men’s ways. What is vital about this is that ‘men’s ways’—properly constituted—are critical for the safe and healthy functioning of society.

Knowing men’s ways, and being approved by other men to that end, means a young man is comfortable in and with himself.

When a man is comfortable with himself as a man he is gentle, and particularly gentle with women. He is respectful and sensitive and able to be intimate. He earns and values trust. He’s not overly fearful. He is responsible and, indeed, a hard worker, with the right motivation to work. He knows his role in the family and in society and he rarely needs to be reminded. This is a real man.

This may seem a perfect picture, and, though none of us are perfect, he is the man all men should strive to be.

What Mothers Can Do For Their Sons

This is a truth that applies to all mothers with sons, whether married, widowed, divorced, or single. One of the most important tasks is to enlist the help of responsible male role model. With the right man to look up to a boy learns to emulate manly attitudes, values, and behaviours. It works without effort. All that is required is time, and an intentional focus on behalf of the mother and the male role model (whether it is his father or not).

In doing this, the mother is, for her son’s own good, to let go during these times; and to let go, in the ultimate sense, when he reaches ‘age’—about age 12-13. A big part of the letting go process is in not shaming him.

If the son has been mentored appropriately he will be ready to take up the mantle of a young man at age 12-13. He is not a man yet, and cannot be expected to be a man, but the transition to manhood is very well underway. Any mother that refuses their son this privilege is holding him back and damaging him. Yes, this is a hard word!

One of the responsibilities of mothers with sons is the letting go process—knowing when and how to let go; so in ascribing to him his manly dignity. And whilst the mother is always there to pick him up should he fall, she should allow him to fall, for no one is destroyed in the falling.

This is very much a wisdom task for the mother with a son.

***

For a boy to become a man—a safe man, who is safe in himself and caring with others, especially women—he must be trained and approved by other men. Women and mothers, no matter how well they try, struggle to take him through this transformation. Real men—responsible men—know how important it is to encourage and how to gently push men (and boys) younger than themselves. They know the importance of men for a man’s self-esteem.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Embracing the Privileged Life

Rarely do we awaken bristling with the wellbeing we ought to encase.  There are too many distractions.  Too many cares.  For the number of active disruptions to happiness there are amply copious underlying disturbances.    

Our minds are busied.            

And a special truth is passed over.      

We have privileged lives, to the fact we even exist.  This is well besides the desire to consume—to take ‘our share’ of life.  (Oh, yes, we’re pretty skilled at that.)

Talk to an infertility doctor sometime about the miracle of life.  The obstetrician knows.  So does the traffic policeman, the paramedic and the ER nurse.  Their nightmares, the voices and faces in the night, bear witness.

Notions of Christmas, vacations, rest, achievement and family (really, the list is endless) confirm for us the reality of unpredictability.  Life really is like a box of chocolates.  Thanks for that, Forrest Gump.

This is important by nothing less than life is truth; always harder or softer than we expect.  Surprises make us cognisant we’re alive.  They remind us of our sense for things.  However painful or blissful life is it’s us who lives it.

We have our part in history.      How amazing is that?

We exist!

Think about that for one moment.   At some point in the future we will cease to exist as many we have known.   Some, who are in pain, truly yearn for that day, but the vast majority of us cannot contemplate death.   The contemplation of death brings us to the precipice of the importance of life!   Our lives truly are important.

By the interaction we have with others, and the impact we have on their lives, including the impact they have on ours, we have something magnificently significant.

What a privilege it is to know another person; someone uniquely like us, but, just the same, someone uniquely unlike us.   We may be made in the image of God, but how many different moulds does God have?   His design of one human being is unbelievably unique.   And such uniqueness ought to be celebrated for the privilege it is in knowing this absolutely matchless life.

Embracing the privileged life is taking the life we’ve been given and living it to the full.   Each of us has the same opportunity; the same challenge; the same expectations; the same hopes.  (Give or take.)   The best of life is received in viewing life as a privilege to experience.   If we so believe, the best is yet to come.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Speak Up, Listen, Communicate Well

“The single biggest problem about communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

— George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

Probably the first thing many lecturers within university and college courses remind their students is, “If you are struggling, tell me early; don’t leave it too late, to the point I cannot help you.”

But it is fear within us that contrives to pretend we have it all together when we haven’t. Many unconscious fears stand behind our inability to communicate. We may make veiled attempts at communicating, yet without clarity people have no idea.

We may tell ourselves, “I’ve done my bit,” when, in fact, we haven’t.

Proper communication takes courage because it requires authenticity. It requires us to put ourselves out in the public domain, which is a risk many of us struggle with.

But when we understand that the art of communication is mastered when we put other people first, we suddenly get it, and are motivated to communicate. The rest is easy.

The ‘Simple’ Art of Communication

We all know that communication is not simple at all, though it is an art—a skill-form—we can develop in. But beyond the skills of thinking and talking and listening, is a whole raft of character tests; these are determinations of our inner values.

We don’t become good communicators unless we resolve to be stewards of social concern. When the whole world has ceased to be about us and has become, as God wills it, the whole world again, then we may communicate, knowing the importance and centrality of communication within the system of life.

When we comprehend that this not-so-simple art of communication is contingent on love and care for others, then we are sufficiently motivated and therefore able to communicate effectively.

Communication is, and always has been, about other people.

From that vantage point, we see others and their needs of us, and we communicate to meet those needs. In having met those needs, the principle of reciprocity kicks in, and others want to reciprocate, most of the time. Hence, commun-ication.

Communication is a bilateral thing, but, it starts with us; the edified.

Communication’s final goal is about trust and respect; respecting others in desiring clarity of communication that proffers trust in ways that deeper relationships are possible.

***

Communication is easier to get wrong than to do right, but, when we put others and their needs first, it suddenly becomes much easier. Communication is about discerning and meeting other people’s needs, whilst inviting (but not demanding) them to meet our own.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.

Husbands and Their Beauty to Rescue

“Why do most of us get lost somewhere between ‘once upon a time’ and ‘happily ever after’?”

— John Eldredge, Wild at Heart (2001)

God told me once, near on ten years now:

Fight for this marriage OF YOURS.  Whatever occurs, there is no room for regret.  There is room only for a fight.  If you love her, you will fight passionately for her, for your relationship with her, for your mutual destiny together.

I believe that with all my heart, having believed, because I had to, that this book—Wild at Heart—had been written for me, and for my marriage, in the hope of saving it.

Alas, I fought hard for nine months; gestation enough for a new marital identity. And although I did everything in my power, and those efforts proved ultimately forlorn, I still now believe that fighting for a marriage that appears over is the only thing a man can do in not only attempting to save the marriage, and save her, but to save himself—all savings by the power of God.

The purpose of all the ‘saving’ is to fulfil the destiny of God.  Those God put together should never be separated, but should grow in love together, more and more.

I still believe, that, where wives have finally given up, as mine had, that there is a tiny window of opportunity, no matter how desperate the case may be, where, for all our lives as husbands, we must turn our lives upside down and stop at nothing properly loving to rescue our beautiful wives by reinventing our love for them.

Three Powerful Reasons To Fight by the Power of Love

The first powerful reason we ought to fight by the power of love for our marriages—whether they are failing or not—and all marriages go through that tremulous, hopeless time of significant mutual doubting—is to convince our wives we love them so much they are the only important thing when all else is stripped away. (We fight only in ways that will be of obvious benefit to them—as our wives would define benefit.)

We are all wounded, but by our wives wounds we, as husbands, offer our strength.

This strength is borne of love. Again, she, like she was originally, is the only important thing.

A second reason we ought to fight by the power of love for our marriages is for ourselves. We are not only fighting for our wives, who may feel convinced we don’t love them, we are also fighting for ourselves—for our own male identity. If we don’t fight well enough (with not enough passion, courage, and sacrifice) we will feel we have failed, yet again. This is a fight of, and for, our manhood.

The third reason is simple. It’s all about the future, gathering within us a powerful picture—a vision—for how life might look like when we have either vision of stinging regret or vision of thankfulness that we followed a path by courage and by the wisdom of God.

As far as marriages are concerned, life is not of the past.  Life is of the future.  All that matters is the future.

***

We have no room for regret. We have no time for second chances at getting our marriages right. The time comes for all men to fight by the power of sacrificial love for their marriages.

It is incumbent on us men to show our chivalry; to show our wives that they are the most important thing on the face of this earth; that we believe, by the power and wisdom of God, that we are anointed to be their lovers in every good and imaginable way. This is the very fight of our lives—a fight where our wives come first, this time and every time.

Whenever a husband fights like this for his marriage, in spite of the final result, he walks away with no regret having been blessed by God to be his wife’s warrior.

***

Marriages have been under attack since time in memoriam.  The husband must fight, with every sinew of love within him, to convince her of his love, and of his vision for their marriage.  The devil cannot win the battle without a fight, as we husbands fight by the power of sacrificial love, sacrificing ourselves for our wives in service to them.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.