Is Your Husband REALLY Your Problem?

**In June 2023, I wrote this post for my daughter Jessica to use for her marriage newsletter that she does regularly. At the bottom of this post is her information so you can contact her and get on her email list for one of the best marriage newsletters I have ever read. It’s called, “Faith Heights for Help Mates” and is full of helpful wisdom from her and God’s Word. Go ahead & contact her directly, or you can email me through the website and I’ll get you connected.

This meme is so funny because it is literally how I felt for years. I know most of you ladies, if not all of you, have experienced this viewpoint at some time in your marriage. Âs I was constantly bringing my husband, and all the problems I thought he had, before God, and I can admit that I viewed my husband as MY problem. I felt he was the whole entire reason that I was how I was and that things would not change until he got changed first. He was not innocent, but I am only responsible for my own actions, not his, right?

Here’s the truth though. I was how I was only because I was husband focused instead of God focused. I was problem focused instead of victory focused. I saw my man as my problem. I saw my man as a roadblock to my happiness.

This happens a lot when married couples are not moving forward in their God-given purpose at the same pace. A frustration can settle in and take over your emotions and distort your vision. You can begin to view everything about your spouse through the lens of what’s wrong with him!? He’s hearing the same message that I am hearing, so why isn’t he acting on it like I am? Sounds puffed up, doesn’t it?

I know we have been told to basically suck it up buttercup when we feel frustration and disappointment. But is that what God is really saying to us? Is God really telling us to IGNORE what we see going on in the life of our spouse? Is God telling us to ignore what we need from our husband and ignore our emotions regarding what’s going on in our marriages? I think not. God made us humans. We have needs and He gave us emotions. If our spouse is obviously not experiencing God’s kind of love, freedom, and forward movement in their walk and relationship with God, it can affect us wives. If we don’t watch it, we can become bitter and angry at our spouse because we have expectations that are not being met.

What help I hope to bring you ladies today is this. I would like for you to get to the point where you change your focus, and move it off your husband, not forever, but for a period of time though. (In another post, I would like to share what I mean by that) My heart is that you see how it’s most important that YOU receive the revelation that God loves YOU and sees YOU as an individual, outside of the marriage relationship with your husband. Once you are personally, for yourself, living your everyday life through experiencing God’s faith, love, strength, hope, joy, peace, power, and wisdom, you will be able to see your husband correctly. You will be unlocked from his actions. You will then stop viewing him wrong and start really being able to help him. Why? Because you will not be frustrated and discouraged by what he is doing or not doing. Does this make sense yet? Maybe not yet, but I believe it will.

Listen Ladies, you are so loved by God, as an individual first. God doesn’t ONLY see you as your husbands help-meet. He sees you the way He saw you before the foundation of the world. He sees you having the individual purpose He put inside of you, just hoping you find it. You were not adopted into His family as a married woman. You were not ONLY made to be your husband’s wife. There is something unique inside of you that God sees, and He wants you to see it also. So, my point is, if you are constantly getting hung up by what you see your husband doing or not doing, you are off track. You are off your own track, distracted, and off your own life path.

Your first calling is not as a wife. Your first calling is to have an intimate relationship with God, your Heavenly Father who created you. I hope this takes some pressure off you so you will stop wearing yourself out by trying to earn your husbands affections and trying to get your husband to change. Your fellowship with your Heavenly Father is the key to every victory in your life. What do I mean by that? I mean that we wives can live out of God’s love, joy, peace, and everything He has given us no matter what our husbands or other people around us are doing.

First Corinthians 1:9 tells us that we were called into fellowship with Jesus. Nothing else is more important because out of that fellowship we have with Jesus, is where abundant life is. No matter what is happening around us and no matter what our spouse is or is not doing.

Without Gods help, we, in and of ourselves, can do nothing except that which is fleshly. His Spirit IN US is what gives us supernatural strength and hope. It is what helps us bear fruit. The kind of fruit that remains. Read John 15:5.

Jesus’ ministry on Earth was a great example to us. His life on Earth reveals the fruit of His fellowship with God His Father. He is our example. Read John 5:19.

I believe we wives can learn to live out of our born-again spirit, setting us free in so many different areas, so we can begin to experience the love and freedom that is available to us as individuals. Take the pressure off yourself and definitely off your husband and stop constantly taking your husband to the altar with you. Take yourself to the altar first and begin a new and fresh relationship with God. Let Jesus and His attributes live through you, to your spouse and others, as you. Look like Jesus to your spouse and family the way Jesus looked like His Father to others. I call this living from the inside out. You are well supplied to be able to do this.

Remember, your husband is not your burden to carry around. He’s too heavy! Take a load off and give him to God!

You are sooooo loved!

Cheering for you and your marriage!

Dana Marie Ecklund