Renewing Love Newsletter
Summer, 2008
RENEWING LOVE LINES
AS A NAVY WIFE, HOW DO I COPE WITH SEPARATION?
By a Navy wife
Before I married my husband, I was aware that he was a flyer and planes, ships and the Navy were his choice for his career. The decision was mine to accept the life style that he would be living. I could choose to be happy or unhappy and to make the most of our long separations and many moves in the years we faced ahead. It was my choice. I decided to be happy and it worked!
How I dealt with sea duty—I didn’t start with a negative feeling about being left alone while my husband was off on a “pleasure cruise.” Long before time for the ship to depart I thought about my husband and what he must be feeling. I made a list.
1. Feeling guilty about leaving our family.
2. Being cramped aboard a ship and closed in.
3. Little time to be by himself and to have quiet time.
4. He couldn’t take his hobbies, his children or things he enjoys doing with him.
5. When he wanted to get away from “togetherness” he couldn’t take a long walk, look at the trees or visit a friend.
6. Would
not be there in emergencies to help us.
After looking over his situation, I was feeling sorry for him and felt fuilty that I would have all the comforts of home.
I made a list for myself:
1. I had home and children.
2. Firm ground.
3. Telephone to talk to relatives and friends.
To make this list short I will just say in comparison, I still had everything I always had except my husband. I decided he needed more help to cope than I did.
I wrote many notes to tuck away in his shorts, shirt pockets, socks and pants. I bought small gifts for surprises. I bought him a paint by number set, and I found a small organ that had an electrical circuit. He put it together with the use of the ship’s soldering iron. He learned to play tunes on it and enjoyed it so much. All the fellows had to take a turn and learned to play a tune. He talked about that one small little gift for years and what joy it gave to so many. I still have that little organ.
To get back to the home front, of course I missed my husband. It wasn’t always easy and I spent many lonely hours. But I would not allow myself the luxury of feeling sorry for myself. The important thing to do was to fill those hours and continue on the same as when my husband was home. I tried to look to each day in a positive way; I told the children what their father would expect of them and carried it out. I tried to keep the feeling going. The rules were the same as when their father was home. That made it easy for him to complete our circle when he returned home.
I gave all my cares to the Lord, I gave my husband to the Lord, and I gave the children to the Lord. I asked for guidance and let Him be in charge of my life. I had complete peace in knowing that God was in control. The children tuned in on the peace and had more confidence that everything was all right.
I didn’t feel sorry for myself. I read the Bible, and I prayed, prayed, prayed and prayed. I would not allow myself to build up resentment about being left alone. I thought about how my husband must feel. I wrote to him, talked to him, prayed with him in my letters. The children wrote to him and him to them. He called us whenever he could. It was money well spent. Hearing his voice helped us feel he wasn’t so far away.
When I wrote to him I wrote happy letters and found that made me happy too. I never wrote and complained about the broken washing machine or the car being in the garage. I knew worrying about us could be very dangerous on a critical flight.
I got together with other wives and children for pot luck dinners and picnics and concerned myself with others. They had so many more problems than I had. Helping others gave me little time for self pity. I was involved in brownies, scouts, PTA, church and Sunday school. It was a marvelous time to work on improving myself. I worked on better health habits, my appearance and took courses. I did the sewing, painting and reading that I had very little time for when my husband was home.
Toward the end of the cruise I spent hours with other wives to make banners and all sorts of busy work to welcome my husband home. The children enjoyed being a part of planning for their father’s home coming. I took photographs of wives and children at our gatherings to send aboard ship. My husband would post them for everyone to see. Children and babies grow a lot in six or more months.
In one of our groups there was a sixteen month old boy. His father had been at sea most of his life. His mother would often show him a portrait of his father and tell him “Daddy.” He would look at his father’s picture and say “Daddy.” His mother felt he would recognize his father and not be afraid of him. One day she was cleaning out a closet and had pulled out some empty picture frames. Her son picked up one, handed it to her and said, “Daddy.” (Did they survive? Yes!! The boy is now 16 and his father is an admiral. His mother looks great!)
I have learned that each hurdle is preparing us for life. How we handle it tells us much about ourselves.
DO I HAVE A SUBMISSIVE ATTITUDE?
By Jo Anderson
God by His very being is pre-eminent. He is THE AUTHORITY by virtue of His position as Creator and sustainer of His creation. How He loves us!! He provides for our every need. He has given us His blueprint to live by. He has given us eternal life and His spirit to dwell in us. We are totally dependent upon Him for everything. We truly owe Him our allegiance, praise, love, service, dedication and obedience.
God knows the need we have for obedience and order in our lives. Therefore He gave us parents whether natural or adoptive to help Him. As parents cooperate with God's plan, they teach their children how to live a godly life--by example and the Good Book. When it is necessary to administer loving discipline in order for their rebellious stubborn wills to be molded in a Christ-like manner, they do so.
As a child submits himself to his parents, he learns what it means to be one under authority. And to have his will curbed! If the child learns these lessons well, then he goes into life prepared to obey his bosses and respect the authorities in his life. If his contrary will is not broken or tamed, there is continual friction--perhaps conflicts--in all authority relationships until he learns how to respond to and grow under the protection of the one who is over him.
If a daughter learns to obey her father and mother, then it will be less difficult to understand the marital relationship because she will have learned, first-hand, the wisdom and protection the ones in authority can offer her. She can develop a trust in her husband and become a helpmate to him by doing him good all the days of her life.
Even though submitting always seems to be a challenge, there will be love, loyalty and support shown. Christ has a way of reversing our thoughts, and He tells us that if we want to be great, we must become a servant. Do we have a servant's heart? Would anyone say of us, "Well done, you good and faithful servant?"
What a joy it is when a husband comes to fully appreciate his responsibility in the home--how, for example, he is to provide for the needs of his wife and family. So many times a husband thinks of needs in terms of material possessions only and leaves the family for long hours to make even more money--which only frustrates the whole family, because many real and basic needs still are not being met.
A husband also needs to appreciate that he has to sacrifice his time, desires, and projects to meet certain basic emotional and spiritual needs of his family. It is a labor of love--a real sacrifice on a man's part--as husbands can get every bit as carried away with things to do as we as wives do. We can be busy about many things, yet miss opportunities to serve our families in a loving, healthy way.
Have you ever noticed that with your children, when you give them things and money, without giving of yourself to them, they become very ungrateful and demanding?! Are our children crying out for that loving touch from us which is so needed in order for them to feel secure and loved by us--so that they can grow in the nurture of the Lord Jesus Christ?
One of the major sins in our life is that we like to think of ourselves as equals. It reminds me of Lucifer when he said that he wanted to be as the most high God. He, or course, was not equal to God, nor could he be, but this was his lust for power!
Are we so different? Do we want to be equal to someone much "lower" than ourselves? To the drunkards, the slothful, the welfarers who do not want to better themselves? Do we want to be equal to those of lesser circumstances of power or status or abilities? I dare say the answer would be a loud, "NO"!
Then whom do we want to be equal to? To someone over us? Perhaps our husbands, our teachers, our boss, our parents, our pastor and spiritual leaders, that rich person, or whomever! Do we want the power, control, influence, respect, admiration, and honor that is theirs, but not their responsibilities?
Do we fight to be equal to those of equal education, wealth, abilities, circumstances, influence, etc."? Perhaps, if we are very competitive persons who desire to show up better than they do. But the answer could just as well be, "NO," because in reality there is no need to fight to be equal when we are already equal!
Would this sound like anything we would ever do, plot, think, or execute? We try to appeal to one who has any form of authority over us. He does not see it our way. We explain, use every pressure we can think of, apply logic, statistics, reasoning, others with like opinions, bring in fears of what would happen if things went their way and the good that would come from doing it our way. But he will not bend to our will. Then what? Do we react in one or both of the following ways?
A. Go about proving how wrong, unreasonable and unthoughtful that person is. Even gossip, tear down their credibility, make fun of them, mock them behind their back, get others to see how unreasonable that person is, use every opportunity to seek occasions that would prove your opinion because of other decisions, remarks that we also consider unworthy, foolish, in keeping with your opinion of him or her.
B. Build ourselves up. If I were in charge I would do the following things. Even make a campaign to others to show my abilities, wisdom, knowledge, expertise, know-how, what I said should have been done, now look at what is happening, it is all their fault, if they only had listened to me--all would be well, etc. Campaigning for self-glory in one form or another in subtle ways that fool ourselves.
Do we fight to be equal because we are not satisfied with our position or station in life? Or dissatisfied with our abilities, influence, or those in authority over us? Is winning more important than being loving?
Did Satan want to be equal to God in order for us to become wiser, richer, more loving persons? No! Satan from the beginning was out to steal, kill and destroy. His desire is to bring us down to his level and to his end punishment. He wants to tear us away from Christ and His blessings, and offer us pleasure for a short moment and ensnare us in his trap that leads to death and destruction.
Isn't that the same with people that are living in a "lower" state than we? If we can't influence them to God and they refuse our beliefs and life style, what do they try to do? They try to bring us down to their level. How many Christians have been drawn away by the lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh and the love of the world? And we give up those that give satisfaction and have eternal worth and get caught up on the ways of this world and the power thereof. Are not they taking the same strategy as Satan does?
Now let's think in terms of our own husbands. When we can't be in control as we want and appeals do not work, then do we lover ourselves to bring them down to our level by demeaning them and dishonoring their abilities and decisions and elevate ourselves because we have so much wisdom? After all, do we not know what is best, anyway?
Are we being blinded to the strategy we play on our husbands? Is it any wonder they stop leading, or become dogmatic in their ways as they tire of our wheedling ways, or they feel backed to a wall, or they stop giving suggestions and opinions because they know no matter what they come up with, that it will be challenged by us and we will even help the children to challenge him also.
Let's on the other hand, look to see what Christ's example is: In Phillippians 2:5-11, "Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.
And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
Just use your imagination for a moment. Can you even begin to think of the glory, the beauty, the power, the love that Christ lived with in heaven when he was willing to be obedient to the Father who sent him to this earth to be born of a virgin in this world? This blows my mind when I think of how He had everything, beyond my greatest imagination, and was willing to be one of us. One of fallen humanity so defiant to their heavenly father, capable of breaking every rule, lawless by nature, full of lust, sin and rebellion.
And he left glory to come as one of us on earth to picture for us God's great love and to live out the life that should be copied by every human being. He showed us the way to live, think and be. He was our perfect example. How else could we ever understand?
Yet not once did he fall into our sin pattern and do the sinful things that our nature is so prone to do. He identified with the sinner, but was free from the sin. When it came to His sacrifice on the cross He bore our sins and became our perfect sacrifice. The one and only sacrifice needed for all the world to be redeemed. He did what animal sacrifices could never do. This was a once-for-all sacrifice given freely to you and to me.