Free your wife. Make it possible for her to serve one day a week in a place of her choosing, not where "duty calls." Stay home and watch the kids so she can do this.
Pray for your wife and with your wife. The shepherd can be so busy praying for the flock he can forget the needs of his shepherdess!
Respect her opinion. Ask for her input for important matters, such as what she thinks about a prospective ministry move. Be willing to take her advice and come to a consensus before a major change.
Encourage her to continue her spiritual and intellectual education. When an adult is around small children all day, she tends to think, eat and talk like them. Adult company and stimulation helps keep her fresh and up on things.
Delight in your wife regularly, creatively and tenderly. Plan a picnic, revisit some favorite place or activity you enjoyed when courting her or carve out a special day in the middle of the week for her. You will discover that, if you delight in her, she will delight you!
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Taken from Pastor’s Family magazine, Dec 1996/Jan 1997.
Jill Briscoe and her husband, Stuart, have served Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wis., since 1970. They have three grown children and nine grandchildren.
Jill is executive editor of Just Between Us, a magazine for ministry wives and women in ministry. (For more information, contact Just Between Us at 800-260-3342.) She is also the author of Renewal on the Run (Shaw).
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Copyright © 1996 Focus on the Family.
All rights reserved. International copyright secured.
© Copyright 2001 by www.globalpastorsnetwork.org or Jill Briscoe