We were asked what we would do if our husbands watch R-rated movies with sex scenes in them. I answered we should pray for our husband that God would convict him of his sin but nagging and complaining about it will accomplish nothing. Another reader wrote the following comment ~
There’s a Biblical process to follow. (Matthew 18, start with verse 15.) You respectfully confront him yourself. If he doesn’t listen, you bring someone else with you. It’s NOT loving to let someone continue in sin, unconfronted. If he doesn’t repent (as the confrontation escalates) you all treat him as an unbeliever. That doesn’t mean hateful, or disdainful, but as someone who is lost and far from God.
I was wondering if she would give the same advice to a husband who wrote that his wife was not submissive to him. Would she tell him to go through the same Matthew 18 process with his wife? I think not.
The Matthew 18 process needs to be used very carefully. We all struggle with sins or have areas in our lives that we are not convicted about. Some Christians do not believe it is sin to see R-rated movies. I have for a long time so it would be sin for me to see most R-rated movies. {I try not to be too legalistic about this, however, because some R-rated movies have no sex scenes or nudity in them.}
Many new {and old} believers don't see this as sin. As one grows in their faith, they become more and more convicted of sin in their lives. But to use this process on a husband one disagrees with seems far from its intent.
If a husband is having an affair, this process would be a good one to use. But we must be very careful in judging other's sins when most of us struggle with our own. I doubt anyone would advise using this process on the many women who are unsbumissive to their husbands and don't obey them in everything!
You must clearly state your convictions to your husband, once, but then you must leave it in the Lord's hands to convict your husband. The Lord does a much better job of changing and convicting others than we do, especially our husbands. We may win our husbands without a word as they watch us live a godly life. This is the promise we have from God.
Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.
Matthew 7:1-5
