Do you have a low grade irritation with your husband almost all of the time? For the first 23 years of my marriage, I had a low grade irritation with Ken. I was usually irritated with him about something. Sometimes, it would flare up into a high grade irritation but it was mostly a low grade one. He rarely would act the way I wanted him to act. Every once in a while, it would come to a head, we'd have a huge fight, and he'd apologize. We would have a few peaceful days but then that low grade irritation would rear its ugly head again.
I'm not sure what I was trying to accomplish with this behavior, since it never accomplished anything beneficial. It caused conflict and unhappiness between the two of us. You will never win your husband to yourself by being upset and angry with him. You will never win him with a low grade irritation. Have you been around a person who is always irritated with you? It's no fun at all! You know they don't like you much or accept you the way you are so you prefer not to be around them. Do you want your husband to feel this same way around you?
What causes a low grade irritation? Selfishness and dissatisfaction. He wasn't behaving and responding the way I wanted him to so I was irritated with him. Ken felt like he could never please me for long unless he was perfect, according to my rules. He eventually gave up and our marriage tanked. We became roommates and that was all. If he had a choice, he certainly would not have chosen to stay with me, since there was no joy in our relationship.
Is this the way your husband feels around you? Does he know you are generally irritated by him? Are you irritated often? If you are, stop. When you are irritated you are only thinking about yourself and what you want. God calls us to love others more than we love ourselves. We're usually not irritated with ourselves. We want the best for ourselves, so we must begin wanting the best for our husbands. They want our acceptance, grace, mercy, and love. This is what they want since they will never be perfect and may never live up to our expectations, but they can live happily with a grace-filled wife.
A grace-filled wife won't allow the little things bother her. She will have a long fuse. She won't get offended or her feelings hurt easily. Instead, she will be a peace maker who accepts others just as they are, especially her husband. She will never speak ill of him to others but only builds up and encourages him. Others, but mostly her husband, will love being around her since she is joyful and rarely complains. How does she do this? She can act this way because she understands who she is in Christ and never wants to blaspheme Him with her actions or her words. The Holy Spirit lives mightily within her and she believes the promise that she can do all things through Christ who strengthens her.
A grace-filled wife won't allow the little things bother her. She will have a long fuse. She won't get offended or her feelings hurt easily. Instead, she will be a peace maker who accepts others just as they are, especially her husband. She will never speak ill of him to others but only builds up and encourages him. Others, but mostly her husband, will love being around her since she is joyful and rarely complains. How does she do this? She can act this way because she understands who she is in Christ and never wants to blaspheme Him with her actions or her words. The Holy Spirit lives mightily within her and she believes the promise that she can do all things through Christ who strengthens her.
Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another,
because love covers a multitude of sins.
1 Peter 4:8
