How to Really Love Your Wife

To be a great husband, you must understand your God-given role in marriage.  While men and women are equal in value, they are very different in the roles that God has assigned to them in marriage.  The wife’s role is to submit and support, and the husband’s role is to love and to lead.

2 THINGS LOVE IS NOT

1) Love is not dependent upon your feelings. 

When the Bible tells you to love your wife, it is not telling you to feel good about her; it is telling you to act good toward her.  Don’t get me wrong; feelings are important in marriage.  It is important in marriage to work at staying in love with one another.  But the reality is that the feelings will come and go, just like the seasons in the year.  You are not to love your wife only when you feel like it; or only when you feel "in love" with her.  You are to show love to her always.

2) Love is not dependent upon your wife’s performance.

You are not called to love your wife when you think she deserves it, or when she has been meeting your needs, or when she is doing a good job of loving you.  You are to love her unconditionally. 

WHAT IS LOVE?

A basic Biblical definition of love is that it means doing what is best for others and meeting their needs.

First, love means doing what is best for someone.  Love is not necessarily making someone feel good.  Sometimes the loving thing to do is the painful thing to do.  For example, a loving parent sometimes has to spank their kids.  It doesn’t feel good for the child, but that’s what’s best for them.  Love means doing what is best for your wife.  

Second, love means meeting your wife’s needs.  This is different than meeting her wants.  Your wife may want you to disobey God, but you shouldn’t do that.  You are not called to meet all of her wants; but you are called to meet her needs.  

2 WAYS A HUSBAND SHOULD LOVE HIS WIFE

So with that in mind, there a two specific ways you should love your wife.  

1) Put your wife before yourself.

Ephesians 5:25 says, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.”  Husbands are to love their wives sacrificially.  That means you are to put your wife before yourself.  Not only are you to do what’s best for your wife and meet her needs, but you are to do what’s best for her before you do what’s best for yourself, and you are to meet her needs before your own.  

Her needs, her desires, her problems, her comfort, and her happiness take priority over yours.  

The idea of putting your wife first should be seen in everything you do.  When you pick out a new car, put her first.  When you go see a movie, put her first.  When you go out to eat, put her first.  When you are making career decisions and financial decisions, put her first.  When you are planning out your schedule, put her first.  When you buy a house, put her first.

2) Discover and meet your wife’s needs.

Ephesians 5:28-29 says, “In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.  For no one ever hates his own flesh but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church.”  To love his wife as he loves his own body; feeding and caring for it.  In other words, to love your wife means meeting her needs.  

That’s your job as a husband.  Your job is to discover and meet her needs – all of them.  Her spiritual needs, her physical needs, her sexual needs, her financial needs, her emotional and psychological needs, and her relational needs.  You are called by God to be your wife’s provider.  

Let me put it this way.  God loves your wife, and He wants to take good care of her.  And His plan is to take care of her through you.  You are God’s method of caring for your wife.  

WHAT ARE YOUR WIFE'S NEEDS?

Your wife has many needs, and the most important are her spiritual needs.  Your job is to do whatever you can to make sure your wife is spiritually nourished.  Go to church with her.  Pray with her.  Talk about the Bible with her.  Buy her good Christian books.  Encourage her to seek the Lord and participate in church.  Seek Christ with all your heart so that you don’t lead her away from Christ and into sin.

But where most Christian husbands fall short is meeting their wife’s emotional needs.  Emotional needs?  Did you know that the Bible commands you to meet your wife’s emotional needs?  Let me show you a couple of verses that might surprise you.  

Deuteronomy 24:5 says, “When a man takes a bride, he must not go out with the army or be liable for any duty. He is free to stay at home for one year, so that he can bring joy to the wife he has married.”  In Old Testament Israel, the government could not force a newly married man to leave his wife for any kind of civil service.  They had to let him stay close to home for a full year.  Why?  So he could bring joy to his wife.  Your job in marriage is to bring joy to your wife – to make her happy.  In other words, your job is to meet her emotional needs.

Let’s look at a second verse, this one in the New Testament.  1 Corinthians 7:33 says, “But the married man is concerned about the things of the world – how he may please his wife.”  In this passage the apostle Paul is actually advising single Christians to stay single so that they can focus solely on pleasing the Lord; because once you get married, then your interests are divided between pleasing the Lord and pleasing your spouse.  But don’t miss the implication.  If you are married, your duty is to please your wife.  That’s what it means to be a husband.  You are to strive to make her happy; to meet her emotional needs.  

HOW TO MEET YOUR WIFE'S EMOTIONAL NEEDS 

Dr. Willard Harley is a Biblical counselor who has identified that five main emotional needs of women in his book His Needs Her Needs.  If you want to meet your wife’s emotional needs and make her happy, and please her, and bring her joy, then you need to know her five needs.  

1) Affection.  A hug; a greeting card or note expressing loving care; a bouquet of flowers; an invitation to dinner – alone; open the door at every opportunity; hold hands – especially in public; go for a walk after dinner; back rubs; phone calls during the day just to check on her; hug and kiss your wife before you leave and when you get back home; tell her that you love her; give her gifts on special occasions.

2) Conversation:  She needs you to talk to her.  Set aside 15 hours a week to give your wife undivided attention (recommended by Dr. Harley).  

3) Honesty and openness:  She needs to trust you totally.  If your wife asks how you feel, tell the truth.  Your wife wants to know your good and bad feelings, your frustrations, your problems, your fears and worries – anything that is on your mind.  Dr. Harley teaches that there should be nothing hidden between husband and wife.

4) Financial Support:  She needs enough money to live comfortably.  You need to be a good provider.  How much should you earn?  Make sure that your wife is satisfied with your income.  If not, find a way to earn more.  You need to become an expert at financial management.  Financial success is not so much what you earn as what you do with it.  So I recommend you start with Dave Ramsey’s book The Total Money Makeover.  That book will change your life.

5) Family Commitment:  She needs you to be a good father.  Be a good example to the kids.  Be the kind of man that your wife would your boys to imitate, and the kind of man that your wife would want your kids to marry.  Spend time with the kids.  Have family meals together.  Have Bible time with the kids.  Play with the kids.  Discipline the kids.  Read books on parenting.