The Making of a Marriage – Serving Your Man


There we were sitting in our living room when my man asked me to get something for him. 

REALLY?! I had just tucked myself in the bean bag chair and propped my feet on the ottoman. Getting up was going to take some maneuvering and so the attitude started brewing and the eyebrows began to join one another in the middle of my forehead.

Why is it that we are so often willing to be inconvenienced by others but frequently feel frustrated when it’s our spouse? Why is it so hard to serve the one we love yet we will go way out of our way for someone else?
Serve. It ranks just a hair under Submissive among a woman’s most disliked words. Serving may be somewhat controversial, but it isn’t archaic, it’s biblical… its one of the ways we demonstrate love.

Some may say it’s ridiculous to ‘serve’ your husband, but it’s what we’re called to. Jesus served us and left us with a beautiful example of what it means to serve.


John 13:15-16 tells us,

“If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.”

Galatians 5:13 says,

“You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.”

If one of my friends would have asked me to get them something after I had already crumpled myself up in my beanbag chair, I would have said, “No problem.” Why would I cop a ‘tude when the love of my life asks the same thing?

As we consider our marriages, it’s important to remember that scripture is scripture. It can’t be compartmentalized. God’s call on our lives to serve not only means we should serve in our churches and outside the four walls of our home but that our service to God begins in our homes and is demonstrated by the way we serve one another.

There are a lot of things you can do to make your marriage sweet, but serving your hubby is definitely up there on the top of the list of building blocks to a better marriage.

He may not serve you like he should, but you can only focus on what you can do for the glory of God. So, look for ways to serve your man.

Not sure how to serve him? Try some of these 10 ideas:


1. Make his favorite meal and have it ready when he walks in the door.


2. Make sure he can find clean socks and underwear in his drawer.


3. Offer to make coffee or his favorite drink before he can ask.


4. If he takes his lunch to work, get up early and make it for him.


5. If you both work, stop by his favorite restaurant & have a candlelit dinner when you get home.


6. Help him with the chores he normally does around the house.


7. Get up early and make a special breakfast for him.


8. When he’s tied up at work surprise him by taking lunch to him.


9. Have his car washed for him without him knowing it.


10. Serve him the best way you can… on your knees in prayer.


There are a ton of ways you can serve your man. Every time you choose to go out of your way to serve him, you are being a wise woman who builds her house.

Proverbs 14:1 says, 

“The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.”

Each act of service is another building block in the foundation of a strong marriage. Each selfish act pulls a block out of place.

Serving one another is an important part of the making of your marriage. You may be weary serving a man that may not be serving you like he should, but your goal is to honor God regardless of whether your hubby gets the ‘serve’ thing down or not.

Perhaps your example may even spur those same actions in him. But even if it doesn’t, you glorify God by the way you do.

What about you? Do you find it hard to serve your man? Have you seen benefits in your marriage by choosing to serve him?

 

4 Comments

  1. Wonderful article! We so need this today to show our love for our husbands! Thank you!

  2. Thanks for your encouraging words. Serving is not the most popular word in the dictionary, but when we serve, we look like our Master! 🙂

  3. WOW, I can’t belive what I juet read. I’m a man, happily married and I certainly DO NOT want my wife to be a servant. I want an EQUAL PARTNER, someone I can count on during my lows, someone to share my highs with. Someone I can help through her rough patches and have fun with when times are good.
    Where or what era are you from? The dark ages? Hello this is the 21th Century, WOMEN ARE EQUAL.

    • M F,
      I appreciate that you popped over and read the post about wives serving husbands. As a woman whose audience is 99.9% women, my calling is to speak into women’s lives and encourage them. But your comment indicates that you may have skimmed through the post rather than reading it completely.

      I understand your resistance to the word. It has taken on only one form of its definition in our culture. But it means much more than some type of condescending behavior.

      In our generation, serving others is seen as demeaning. But you mentioned you are a married man, so I assume there are times when you get your wife a cup of coffee, or when you cook dinner for her and so on…and I’m sure there are times when your wife does things for you. When you do that, you put her needs above your own and serve her. Not like a slave serves a master, but like a husband ministers to (serves) his wife.

      It’s a mutual way that couples should behave when they love each other as a way of putting the needs of your spouse above your own. 1 Corinthians 13 gives a beautiful picture of what love is and as you walk through that chapter you find that love is all about doing what is best for the one you love. That means you put their needs above your own. By definition, that’s serving them because you love them.

      In customer service, the word “service” is used because it is serving the customers. It doesn’t mean the one serving is less than the one being served.

      God created men and women to be equal. Men and women are very different, we have different roles, different ways that we see things, different ways that we handle things. But we are all definitely equal.

      Husbands serve their wives because they love them. Wives serve their husbands because they love them. It a choice that is made when a person understands that life is not all about them and that the world doesn’t revolve around them…that they are married to someone and that when the put their spouse’s needs above their own, then they are demonstrating love.

      I hope that helps you understand my post better. What I wrote does not make any woman less, but it was written to remind wives to love their husbands well and love means putting the needs of others above your own. When a husband does the same then both spouses are being more concerned about loving each other well than they are about being selfish and having to have their own way.

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