R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Do you wanna hear my odd analogy of many marriages today? O.k. you asked for it. Marriage is like a wonderful buffet filled with fresh fruit, mouth watering steaks, and scrumptious desserts. Marriage is full of beautiful blessings. The problem is that men and women spend years with each other only feeding off the salad part of the buffet. We miss out on the blessings that God offers within the marriage relationship. Marriage is the greatest blessing in my life. And the more Tom and I seek the LORD on our roles and the more we learn about each other's needs, the sweeter it gets! It isn't something that happens without sincere effort. If you think it'll just happen, don't hold your breath.

Tommy listens to a Christian radio program everyday called http://www.familylife.com/ and I too enjoy it when I can. This week Dr.Emerson Eggerichs was on the program. He wrote the book Love And Respect. The subject was respecting you husband. Before you tune me out ladies, let me say it was very insightful. Honestly I thought I was doing pretty good in respecting my man. After listening to this, I found that respecting Tommy meant more than what I thought. Respect is a need a man has....let me say it again...a need...a need a man has apart from his performance. Ashamedly I admit sometimes I would think men just need to stop being so insecure and whiny. The thing is women have the need to feel loved apart from our performance right? Its a crazy cycle. Without love, women react w/o respect and without respect, men react without love. So who is going to make the first move. It was an awesome program. I really urge you women and men (it talked about men playing their part too) to listen to it. The link is http://www.familylife.com/site/c.dnJHKLNnFoG/b.3876235/k.8398/Advanced_Search.htm
Here are a few helpful things I learned:
1. men aren't a group of insecure whiners...respect is a God given need for our hubbies
2. we can't disrespect our men in order to motivate them to be loving
3. a man needs to be respected apart from his performance
4. no husband has loving affection toward a woman who he thinks despises him as a human being
5. my man [Tommy]doesn't like the motherly finger that treats him like a 5 yr old
I know that the few women that read my blog knows what respect means to your man but pass it on to a uninformed wife you know. I hope this blog doesn't sound preachy because this message of respecting my man I needed to hear. I burned the program on cds so if you wanna borrow them, they are yours. I'm out.