Sunday thoughts - Submissive or Weak?

On Friday night my friend Sarah over at Like Sunshine in the Home, gave me the heads up on a Amish show/documentary that played on BBC2 called Amish: A Secret Life. 

She knows how much I love Amish anything, so I immediately went and hunted it online and was able to find it, actually posted it on the Diary of a Stay at Home Mom page on Facebook.   You can watch it here, or by clicking the link above.

While watching the show, one of the clips shows how the Amish wife got up at 4:30am to fix breakfast and lunch for her husband, and after he left for work and she's doing the dishes, the interviewer/show producer/whatever she was, wanted to know why she got up that early to fix coffee and breakfast for her husband if he was perfectly capable of doing it for himself.  Why do that for him, why get up so early, why be submissive.

To be honest with you, it rubbed me the wrong way, because in that moment I saw myself in that Amish woman.  I too get up at 4:30am to fix coffee/breakfast/lunch for my husband, and I too have been constantly asked why do it if he is capable of doing it himself. 

Being a submissive wife is seen in society as being weak, as taking orders from your husband, as spoiling him and doing things that he can do for himself.

So why is it that so many in society confuse Submissive with weak or subservient?

That is not how I see it at all.

Do I do these things because I think my husband can't do them for himself?  ABSOLUTELY not.  He is a military man, he is more than capable of fixing his own coffee and meals and many many more things.  And doing this for him does in no way, shape or form take that away or make him less of a man.

I do it because I respect him.  Because I think that in a small way this shows him how much I love him and respect what he does for us every single day.

Submissive to me, is about being respectful, mutually.

I'm a very independent woman and I'm outspoken, I would never take orders from my husband or be his servant, and he knows this, he treats me as an equal in our marriage.

Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. - Ephesians 5:22

But what does it mean to submit to our husbands?

It certainly doesn't mean being a door mat, having no opinions of your own or doing every single thing he tells you to do.

I have been called old fashioned.  I have been told that I shouldn't dish food for him first because I'm not his servant, I have been told that I should just stay in bed and sleep in not needing to get up at 4:30am.

Let me set something straight right now.  My husband has never asked me to get up early with him, matter of fact there have been many times where he's told me that I can sleep in, that I don't need to be up so early....but it's MY choice to do so.

Why is it that society so easily forgets that in the Bible, men are directed to esteem their wives and love them as much as they love their own lives?  Nowhere does it say to make their wives their servants.

The time that we spend together each morning is precious and it's one of the reasons why we are as much in love today as we were when we got married almost 14 years ago.

So I will continue to get up early, I will continue to fix his coffee and his breakfast and lunch and dinner, and wash his clothes and take care of the house. 

If people want to think of that as me being old fashioned or a submissive wife, then I guess I am.  It doesn't bother me, I will continue to be the wife that I want to be and think I should be, and I will continue to let my husband know how much I love him.

With that in mind, I'm starting a 30 day feature called 30-Day Husband Encouragement Challenge, it's something that I saw on the Revive Our Hearts website and I think that it will be wonderful to do for my husband.

The first post will go up tomorrow with instructions on what to do.  It's nothing crazy, nothing difficult, and weird, just a lot of praise for different aspects of his life etc.  I'm going to keep track of what happens to my marriage over the next month, and I would love you to join in with me.

I will have a Mr Linky up everyday, you don't have to post about it on your blog, but if you're joining in with the prayer or whatever the task is for that, I would love for you to add your name to the list so that we see just how God is working in our hearts and how many husbands are being lifted up to the Lord.

What do you say?