Perfected Weakness

    He’s laying on that hospital bed all ready to go in for surgery number five. I’m sitting with him in this small room on an uncomfortable chair. We wait. Nurses come in and out, they talk to us, hook up the IV and try to make him comfortable. Everyone is nice. But I just want it to be over with.

    In the midst of nurses coming in and out to prep Jonathan, when no one else is around, he hands me his wedding band. You’re not allowed to wear any kind of jewelry in surgery. I take it from him and feel the weight of it in my hand, it feels so heavy. He tells me to put his ring on my necklace so I won’t lose it.
    “What?!” I think, “This necklace isn’t strong enough to hold that bulky ring.”

     The chain holding the diamonds in the shape of the heart, close to my heart, is beautiful but delicate. It’s the necklace he gave me on the day I became his wife. It’s precious to me and I’m very unsure of placing his tungsten carbide metal band on it, surely the weight of his ring would snap the chain.

    I shake my head, “It’s too thin.” I tell him that I’m afraid his wedding band is too heavy for the necklace, “It’ll break it.” I say. 

     He just rolls his eyes at me. This man knows me well. He’s all too aware of how much of a worrier I am. He just smiles, gives me those ‘come on, trust me’ eyes and hands me his ring. I undo the chain from around my neck and thread the heavy circle of metal onto it. I feel the weight of the ring pull my necklace down on my chest.

     Is this what he feels all the time? Not the weight of the ring, but the weight of responsibility that comes with being a husband?

       If you look at Scripture, the requirements that God places on the husband are not for the faint of heart. God designed that the man should be the head of the home. He is held accountable for his family. Yes, we are all held accountable to God for our personal decisions, I realize that. But being the head of the home, the husband is responsible for the spiritual direction of the family.

For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, His body, and is Himself it’s Savior. Ephesians 5:23

But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband and the head Christ is God. 1 Corinthians 11:3

    That isn’t something to be taken lightly. And Jonathan knows it.

    I asked him about it weeks later, after the surgery. What does the responsibility of being a husband feel like to you? He told me that there’s pride in being a husband, pride in the fact that you’ve been entrusted with so much. But also the fear of failing. 

    He said, “It’s like representing your country in the Olympics. Everyone is watching you and you just can’t let them down.”
   “How serious are you about being the leader in the home?” I asked.
    He admitted to me that sometimes he doesn’t take it seriously enough (I so much appreciate his humble honesty!). 

    “I need to take it as seriously as I take my next breath.” He said. “My wife and, one day, children depend on me. I am responsible.”

    Maybe sometimes Jonathan looks at himself and feels like I did when I looked at the chain for my necklace. I thought it was to weak to hold his ring and maybe he feels to weak to carry all this responsibility. Sometimes, I know, he feels like he just can’t do it. It is overwhelming.

    I also asked him how he deals with feeling overwhelmed. His answer made me proud:
    He said, “You take on the role of being the husband with joy because it’s a privilege God has given you.”  

    I know that Jonathan gets scared of his own limitations at times. But that doesn’t stop him from trusting God and accepting this responsibility. And it doesn’t stop him from everyday trying to please God in how he handles all the demands of being the leader in our home. But Jonathan is human and he doesn’t always get it right. God knows that we are weak, Scripture tells us that,

“As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear Him. For He know our frame; He remembers that we are dust.” Psalm 103:13-14

     He knows with His power we can do the impossible. Even be a God-glorifying husband. God works abundantly in grace.

And from His fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. John 1:16    

    The day he had his surgery I placed that ring on my necklace and it was heavy. At times I thought it might break, but it didn’t. The necklace held. And kept holding together all through his surgery until afterwards when he was in recovery and put his wedding band back on. He’s told me before how he doesn’t like not wearing it, he feels incomplete without it.

    And how incomplete are we without the awareness of our limitations but moreso, the foundational truth that,

“I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13

    I’m so proud of the husband that God has given me. He is a very precious gift. But much more than that I realize, and am very grateful, of the grace of Jesus Christ and the working of the Holy Spirit. Without it, we would snap under the responsibilities that God has given us. But with it we can live this life how God intended us to: As husband and wife representing (not at all perfectly) the love Christ has for His bride, the Church.

But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. 2 Corinthians 9:8

“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in Me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.” John 15:4-5

On our wedding day, August 20, 2011. First year anniversary coming up very soon! So blessed :)
Picture by Abby Law.