"I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine." (Song of Solomon 6:3)
We husbands are given one of the most special privileges in creation: to be the husband of one wife. This is such a great honor, to be entrusted with the care, protection, and provision of a special woman for the rest of our lives. And we should give it all we've got.
I'd like to encourage all the husbands (and future husbands) reading this article. I want to share with you one attitude that every Christian husband needs to have towards his wife:
We've got to love our wives with all that we've got.
Taking it all in
All husbands around the world must know that among all women in the world, no one will be as close and as precious are their wives. See, if God wanted man to have many women in his life, He would've taken out several ribs and formed several women. But no, God didn't want that. He saw that there's a need for just one wife, that there's only room for one woman in a man's life.
That said, guys, we need to look at our wives and see them as the only one we have and the only one we'll ever have. And yes, we also do it the other way around: we separate ourselves from other women because we're the only husband that our wives have, and will ever have.
We are to consecrate ourselves for God's purposes, and that includes separating ourselves from other women. Truth be told, there's no other woman that could make us happy the way God wanted. And thus,
"I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine." (Song of Solomon 6:3)
No other woman
Friends, I'd like to encourage you to love your wife. I know it's a challenge, especially for husbands with unbelieving wives, but we've got to do it. The fact is, no other man on earth has been given both the opportunity to love and responsibility to care for our wives but us.
With that in mind, we need to establish this one attitude: I will love my wife with all that I've got.
I know we have friends and all, but at the end of the day we go home to our respective wives. We might have several good colleagues at work, but no one else has been designed to be our partner in this long-term career called life. We might have many daughters and a huge family, but they're not our own spouse.
We need to prioritize our wife's needs more than our own comforts. Christ gave Himself for the church, and that's how we are taught to love our wives.
We need to prioritize our marriage more than we prioritize our kids. How we treat our wives affect our kids, and kids from broken families can attest to this.
We need to prioritize our relationship with our wives more than any relationship with others, especially with other women. In fact, our wives should be the ones connecting with them, not us.
In closing
Guys, I'm not promoting a "worship thy wife" kind of thing here. I'm promoting a "love your wife as Christ loved the church" principle here. Christ only has one Bride, and so He's giving her everything that is needed for her to be holy. We only have one wife, and so we must give her everything that she needs to pursue the Lord.
"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her." (Ephesians 5:25)