A few years back I was watching a video clip of an internationally known Pastor talking about his marriage. In the video he was talking about the struggles they had early on in their marriage. When he went to summarize the troubles, he basically said that they both spent too much time trying to fix each other and almost no time trying to fix themselves. I have become convinced that many marriages struggle for this very reason.
Too many people spend far too much time trying to fix their spouse and don’t spend enough time fixing themselves. The wife figures her marriage would be so much better if her husband could just improve. The husband figures that if his wife would just follow his direction more and do what he says, that they would both be happy. We spend too much time looking at specks and not enough time looking at logs. (Matthew 7:3) In a marriage, this is all the more critical as Proverbs is quick to show us:
Proverbs 21:9
“It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife”
Proverbs 27:15–16
“A continual dripping on a rainy day and a quarrelsome wife are alike;
to restrain her is to restrain the wind or to grasp oil in one’s right hand.”
We could easily argue and debate what that word “quarrelsome” means, but I don’t think it is too far a stretch to include the idea of “nagging”. One who is quarrelsome is one who is always arguing and debating – someone who is contrary. “Why did you do that?”, “What do you think you are doing?” or “You can’t do it that way, you need to do it this way…”. Certainly ‘criticism’ is a part of the problem, but it goes well beyond and includes this constant barrage of trying to fix, correct, and redirect.
As a pastor, I have seen that there are plenty of people in the church who are contrary – we don’t need more. My wife may not always agree with me on things, and she is always free to point out when I am wrong. But when a decision is made, unless it is morally or biblically wrong, or someone will get seriously hurt by it, what I really need from my wife is her support.
One thing my wife has never been is a nag. I am grateful for that. Don’t misunderstand me, I give her plenty of opportunity to nag me. There are plenty of things that I do that bother her, and I want to do better. But thankfully she is gracious and patient with me.
However, as a pastor, when stress is high at the church and I come home from a meeting having heard another list of complaints, the last thing I need to hear is about how I squeeze from the wrong end of the toothpaste! It has never happened by the way! I always squeeze from the right end and even if I didn’t , my wife is mature enough to never say anything about it.
A pastor who is doing his job will know well when he has made his mistakes. If he is really a follower of Jesus and leading his sheep well, he will look in the mirror in the morning and as the day goes, he will not easily forget the flaws that he has seen. (James 1:23ff). A good pastor will have enough humility to know his flaws and to see his mistakes if someone else hasn’t already pointed them out. He doesn’t need his wife to pile on.
What the Pastor needs is someone who will help him walk after being criticized. When he has spent the week dodging arrows that have been fired at him, what he needs is someone to help soothe the pain, someone who will help patch up the wounds so that he can stand up on Sunday and speak out of love to these same people who have attacked him. It requires that we be gentle with one another, that we be patient with one another, striving to be kind.
I would argue that it involves overlooking things that bug us. Galatians 5 is very helpful here. It gives us two lists. The first is a list of bad stuff, and includes things we often overlook like division, strife, fits of anger and the like.
Galatians 5:19–23
”Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality,
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions,
envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Those things can be cancerous in a marriage and detrimental to the ministry of a Pastor and his wife. Later in the same chapter we get another list which is the good stuff, the fruit we should be showing and includes stuff like peace, patience, and kindness.
Galatians 5:22–23
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
Sometimes we talk about confronting the sins of others as being one way of showing love and kindness. While I understand the point, from my experience most of the time it isn’t. Attempts at supposed correction most often come out of selfishness and sometimes even out of anger. My suggestion would be that we strive to eliminate all forms of criticism and correction unless you see the possibility of someone getting hurt or a sin being committed. I would argue that the more spiritually mature are ones who are patient and are able to bear with one another despite the faults. Maturity is reflected in our ability to function even when things aren’t always going our way.
My prayer as a Pastor is that my home be a sanctuary in the many ways that it can be defined including that it be a safe place free from attacks, criticism, manipulation, and correction. The home of a Pastor should be a place of peace. The marriage of a Pastor and his wife should be one in which they stand back to back fighting off the criticisms of others while defending and holding each other up.
