Honor Your Wife
Wives and Husbands     Part 3
1 Peter 3:7      11-17-2012 & 11-18-2012

Summary: Strive to understand your wife, especially areas of weakness. She is more sensitive, which makes her more vulnerable to pain. LISTEN to her and understand what it is like for her. And honor her status as a fellow heir of salvation. This will result in unhindered prayer.
	
Introduction
Understand Her Weakness
Women Want to be Understood
Consider Her Feelings
Listening
Care about what she is saying
Nagging
Relational Knowledge (Enter into Her Suffering)
Weaker Vessel
Physical and emotional weakness
Sensitivity
She is weak for you
You are her protector
Gentleness
Honor Her Status
Coheirs
Heirs
The Reward: Unhindered Prayer
1:25 Questions

1 Peter 3:7 Husbands, in the same way live with your wives according to knowledge as a weaker, feminine vessel, showing honor as also coheirs of the grace of life so that nothing will hinder your prayers.
Introduction
There is a movie titled “What Women Want,” and the main character of that movie is a man who, for some reason, suddenly has the ability to hear the thoughts of the women who are around him as if they were talking out loud. And in the movie, he wins all kinds of favor with all these women because he is the one man on the whole planet who can finally understand women. I don’t think the people who made that movie understand women. If you think that just because a man could hear all a woman’s thoughts, he could therefore understand her – you do not understand women. There are some women, who, if you heard all her thoughts, all it would do is thoroughly confuse you. She knows all her own thoughts, and she does not even understand herself. There is a lot more to a woman than just her thoughts. There are attitudes and emotions and inclinations and desires and appetites and affections. Someone sent me an email with the subject line: “The Unabridged Manual for Understanding Women.” And you scroll down and see this picture:
No doubt about it – women are complex. But before we join in with everyone else with the jokes and just throw up our hands and say, “Understanding women is utterly impossible,” let’s remember that if you are a Christian man and you are married, you are commanded to understand at least one woman. We have been studying verse by verse through the book of 1 Peter and we come this morning to chapter 3 verse 7.
7 Husbands, in the same way live with your wives in an understanding way…
We live in a culture that hates God’s design for the family. They are head over heels in their pursuit of alternatives. And many of those attitudes have infected the Church. So many Christians do not want to be looked down on by the culture, so they try to merge worldly ideas about men and women with the Bible. And whenever you do that – whenever you merge human wisdom with God’s Word, what you end up with is 100% human wisdom with religious lingo. So what we have is a corrupted culture and confused church. And so for the last two weeks Peter has been setting us straight in our attitudes toward the role of the wife, and now, in verse 7, Peter is going to instruct husbands.
This is significant, because in order for Peter to do this he has to stray from the topic at hand. The topic at hand is how the Church is to deal with unbelievers. And the way to deal with unbelievers is by being submissive to their authority in order to win them to Christ. And Peter gives three examples. But in each case Peter only addresses the person who is under authority. When he speaks of the governing authorities, he implies that those in power should carry out justice, but he does not address them directly. And when he speaks to slaves, he implies that the slave owners should be good and considerate, but he does not speak to them directly. But after talking to wives, Peter breaks that pattern and goes ahead and addresses the one in authority – the husbands. When it comes to the marriage relationship, there is so much at stake that Peter does not want to leave the husband’s side up to a mere implication. Even though it is a little off his topic, he wants to take the time to really make it clear how the husband is to behave toward the wife.
Understand Her Weakness
7 Husbands, in the same way live with your wives in an understanding way 
Literally, it is live with her according to knowledge. And when the Bible uses the word knowledge in the context of a relationship, the idea is experiential knowledge. It means to know something by experience. I think the NIV gets it right – this is referring to knowing your wife so well that you live with her in an understanding way. You get inside her skin to the point where you really do understand what life is like for her.
Women Want to be Understood
Women want to be understood. The comedian Tim Allen once said, “When a man designs a stop sign, it just says ‘STOP.’ If a woman designed a stop sign it would say, “If you really loved me, you would know what to do right now.” Comedians have gotten a lot of mileage over the years out of the tendency women have to want their husbands to know what they are thinking. Why are women like that? They are like that because God made women with a strong desire to be known. There is something especially wonderful about being thoroughly and deeply known by someone who loves you and understands you. That is why the psalmists make so much of the fact that they are known by God.
That is a good desire. However, ladies, you need to make sure you are not looking to your husband for something that can only come from God. Only God knows your deepest thoughts and feelings. Do not expect your husband to know what only God can know. On those occasions when your husband does understand something about your heart – take that as a wonderful sampling of what God’s love is like, but you are not the one to decide which things your husband should be capable of understanding. If you look mainly to your husband for your desire to be deeply known and understood, you will always be disappointed - even if he is doing a great job at it.
So ladies, seek that from God. But men – strive to love her like God loves her as much as possible, and remember that you are commanded to understand your wife. You may not be able to read her mind, but in most cases there is a whole lot about her that you do not understand right now that you could understand if you worked hard at it. It just takes some effort. You cannot read her mind, but you could open your mouth and ask her how she feels about something. There are so many men who will do physical labor until their muscles burn, but they are never willing to do any emotional heavy lifting. They are too lazy to put forth relational effort. Trying to understand how she feels, trying to empathize – they try for two minutes, find it difficult, and give up. Emotional, relational pansies. 
I sent out an email last week to all the women of Agape asking for their help with this sermon. I asked them for examples of ways they really wish their husbands would understand them better. I sent that out Tuesday night. By Wednesday morning my in box was piled with responses. It is not a hard question for most women. I won’t read you all the email responses I got, but when I read them all, I did have this thought: How about this – what if you just sit down with your wife this afternoon and ask that question: “What is it about you that you wish I understood better? How could I do a better job understanding you?”
Now, wives – one thing to watch out for – do not always assume whenever your husband does not do what you want him to do that it is because he does not understand or is being insensitive. Sometimes women think, “He just doesn’t understand how I feel. Otherwise he would do what I want.” Not necessarily. It may be that he understands exactly how you feel, and he is compassionate and empathetic, but still feels the wise course is to go another direction. It is easy to fall into thinking, “Obviously he doesn’t understand what I’m saying and feeling because otherwise he would agree with me.” That is not always the case.
Consider Her Feelings
But men, very often it is the case. There are cases where if you really gave serious thought to understanding her point of view and how she feels, it would change your mind. Let me read you the first response I got from that email.
“Speaking as someone whose husband does live with her in an understanding way, one of the things I appreciate most about him is how if he thinks he has hurt me, he puts himself in my shoes and explains to me how he thinks I must have felt. Usually it is even worse than how I actually felt, and it softens me toward him. I think it takes a lot of humility to do that.”
Sometimes a husband can do something that hurts his wife, and when he realizes it he apologizes and asks forgiveness. But then she is still upset. And when she stays upset, that makes him upset. He is thinking, “I said I’m sorry – what more can I do? Why doesn’t she just forgive me already?” But a lot of times we make it hard for our wives to forgive us, because we do not even really understand what all we need to be forgiven for. We think we are just asking forgiveness for a particular action. But we have not thought through how it affected her and how it made her feel, and those are the much bigger issues. It is very difficult to forgive someone who is sorry for making a mistake, or sorry for saying or doing something, but can’t spare the half hour it would take to talk to you about how it hurt you. It is hard to forgive someone who is sorry for 10% of what he did. 
Listening 
So listen to her. Almost every one of the responses I got from the women had to do with listening. That was by far the biggest issue. Your wife is telling you about her day, and suddenly you hear her saying, “Are you listening to me?” 
“Yes, I’m listening.”
(And by that you mean, “Yes, I’m vaguely aware that you have been talking.”) When your wife asks that question, there is a reason she asked. It might be the glazed-over zombie look, it might be that you started snoring – or maybe you are looking her in the eye and nodding your head like crazy, but she just senses – you are not engaged. Why does she think that? I think I know why it is. Ninety percent of the time, when she thinks you are not engaged, it is because you are not engaged. And the reason you are not engaged is because you don’t really care about what she is saying.
Care about what she is saying
“But it’s not my fault. I’m trying to listen, but she’s just rambling all over the place. I just need to know if she ran the errand to the post office, and I’ve already heard three sidebar stories about details related to her drive. I just need a yes or no.”
So you checked out because she was not conveying information in the quickest, most time efficient manner, and was using triple the number of words necessary to convey the information. The thing we men need to understand is, what if her purpose in talking to you right now is not mainly to provide you with information? It is not a briefing. What she wants to do is have an enjoyable experience talking with you. You know how when two people go out to a restaurant together, it is not just for the purpose of getting calories into the body in the most efficient manner? They go there to have an enjoyable experience together. Or maybe they take a vacation or go to a beach or go to a movie or go into the bedroom or whatever – doing some activity together not just for the purpose of getting that activity accomplished, but mainly for the purpose of having an enjoyable experience together. One of those activities for a woman is conversing. Exposing her heart to someone who cares. That is what she is trying to do, and you are standing there like Joe Friday on Dragnet – “Just the facts, ma’am. Don’t tell me anything else that is on your heart – just give me the information I want and then be quiet.” That is great if you are a detective, but it is not love.
“But I can’t help it – the things she wants to talk about are so boring. They aren’t interesting to me. It’s not a subject I care about.”
If that is you, listen to Psalm 10:17.
Psalm 10:17 You hear, O Lord, the desire of the afflicted. You strengthen his heart. You listen attentively. 
Did you know that when you pray – as long as you are pouring out the genuine desire of your heart – God listens attentively? Why does God do that? Is it because your rhetoric is so fascinating to Him? Is it because what you are saying is more important than any of the other things going on in heaven or around the world? Is it because your prayer is so intellectually stimulating to Him? Is it because God needs the information? No. Psalm 139:4 says that God already knows your entire prayer before you say a single word. So if He already knows what I am going to say, then why does He bother listening? And not only does He listen – it says He listens attentively. Why? Because that is what love does. When your child comes bursting in the door, face all lit up, and says, “Dad! Guess what! I won first place!!!” – you are interested to hear that. Even if you already knew the information, it is a delight for you to listen. Why?  Is it because his conversation is so intellectually fascinating? No. It is because you love him. This is what love does. God does it with us, we do it with our children, we do it with our friends, and most importantly we do it within the one-flesh union of marriage.
Learn to enjoy it when your wife not only shares her body with you, but also shares her heart with you. And if it is not interesting, you need to work harder at living with your wife in an understanding way. If God can be interested in what you have to say, you can be interested in listening to your wife. It is a matter of love.
If your wife comes to you with something, and before the words are even out of her mouth you already know that your answer is going to be no – don’t feel like you need to skip right to the bottom line. Have a conversation with her first. When you go to dinner or a movie or skiing, the goal is not to get it over with as soon as possible, and neither should this be. If you are going to say no, save that for the end. For now, take some time exploring your wife’s heart. Why does she want this so much? Why does she feel the way she feels about the various parts of it? Why does she dislike the alternative? Just say to yourself, “I’ll give an answer in twenty minutes. But for now, I’m just going to enjoy taking a tour through my wife’s heart.” I do that with Tracy and a lot of times after the twenty minutes my answer is not what I thought it would be. But even when it is, so many times I find out that Tracy’s main concern was not so much to get me to agree to a certain thing, as much as it was to take me along with her on the ride of her thoughts and feelings about the subject. And once I have done that, and she has seen my heart on the matter, very often she is fine with going the other way.

Nagging
And one way to gain insight into her unique points of vulnerability is by paying close attention to those topics that she tends to bring up in conversation with great frequency. I do not want to use the word “nagging,” but we all know there are times when a wife’s communication seems to the husband like it is coming with incessant, tiresome, maddening repetition. Usually that happens when the wife wants the husband to take action or make a decision about something, and he is not ready to take action or make the decision. She wants it dealt with now; he thinks later is better.
Men, when that happens, maybe she is right; maybe you are right. But either way, if your wife keeps bringing it up, listen to her because that is a window into her heart. Instead of arguing with her or ignoring her, focus your attention on a response of compassion. Think this way – “What is it like for her to have to carry the burden of worrying about that issue all day long every day with no light at the end of the tunnel?” Talk to her about it and empathize with her concerns. Maybe you think her fears are unfounded, but can’t you at least acknowledge to her how terrible it would be if her worst fears did come to pass? Admit to her that it is possible that you may be wrong, and that those things may indeed come to pass. Instead of arguing with her or ignoring her, help her find comfort and peace from God’s Word.
Relational Knowledge (Enter into Her Suffering)
God commands that you understand your wife, and you will know you understand her when you feel genuine compassion for her. Don’t think understanding her means just making a brilliant analysis of the problem. Understanding her means entering into some of what she is experiencing. Again – this refers to a relational, experiential kind of knowledge. 
So often a wife will come to her husband with a problem, and immediately he is firing off ideas on how to fix it. She is not even finished explaining how she feels, and he has already offered five different solutions and is back to surfing the channels on TV. And she gets frustrated because he is showing zero compassion. And he is frustrated because she is still upset even after he solved her problem.
Imagine your little pre-schooler comes running in from the back yard screaming. She fell off the swing set, and broke her arm. And you just take one look at her and say, “Oh, I know exactly what to do.” And you march out to the back yard and start working on putting in some sand under the swing set. Meanwhile your daughter is in the house almost passing out from the pain. Is the sand thing a good idea? Yes, but not right now. Right now the issue is your daughter’s suffering. You need to show compassion, comfort her, help her calm down, take her to the hospital, give her some aspirin – something to deal with her suffering.
Our wives are a lot more mature than our kids, so when the same thing happens emotionally to your wife, and you start going off about all the solutions to her problem, she probably won’t be screaming and crying like your child would. But the emotional pain she is feeling on the inside might be even worse than the physical pain of a broken arm.
She might need you to help with a solution, and that is wonderful – but first deal with the broken bones. Talk to your wife about how this whole thing is affecting her. Take a half hour or an hour to help her sort through some conflicting emotions. Put some effort into helping her put her feelings into words.
And remember, the issue is not whether you think she should be feeling emotional pain. Whether she should be or not, she is. And even if the problem is imaginary – still the pain is real. Emotional pain hurts – even if it is caused by something that is irrational. 
Weaker Vessel 
So be understanding – especially in the areas of her weakness. That is the specific thing Peter calls us to have knowledge about
7 Husbands, in the same way live with your wives according to knowledge as a weaker, feminine vessel
The word vessel refers to a household utensil like a clay pot or vase. The Bible refers to human beings (men and women) as vessels. We are utensils in the hands of God that He uses for His purposes. Both husband and wife are vessels in God’s household, but the wife is the weaker vessel. And that weakness is the thing Peter is calling husbands to understand. 
Physical and emotional weakness
Now, what kind of weakness is this talking about? Some say, “It’s only physical. Women don’t have the same brute strength as a man, but in every other area, women are actually superior to men.” Is that all Peter has in mind here – “Husbands, live with your wife with a deep, profound understanding that she is physically weaker than you”? You need to have compassion for her and understand what it is like not to be able to open a jar by yourself? Is that all this is talking about?
No, there are other points of weakness beyond just the physical. Women are not weaker in every way. In fact, there many areas where women are more capable than men. But there are some areas of weakness that women have beyond just the physical. And one of those areas is the emotions. Most women are hurt emotionally far more easily than most men.
Sensitivity 
God made women more sensitive, which makes them more vulnerable to pain. You can see that in the way God designed our bodies. Women have far more nerve endings at the surface of their skin, which gives them a superior sense of touch. But it also makes them feel more pain. A woman’s skin bruises more easily than a man’s. Men’s skin is thicker and we have one million more red blood cells in each drop of blood, which means our blood clots faster. We do not feel the injury as much and we can recover more quickly. But we do not have the sensitivity she has. She has superior sensation, but the downside of having all that sensitivity is greater vulnerability to pain. So women experience far more pain than men do throughout their course of life. They bruise more, bleed more, feel more pain. Migraines affect four times as many women as men. Women feel some sort of physical discomfort 43% of the time, men 28% of the time. 
And it is the same emotionally. Women have all kinds of advantages over men socially, but the things that give them those advantages are traits that make them care more. And the downside of caring more is when things go bad relationally, it hurts more. Rejection hurts more, insensitivity hurts more, neglect hurts more, abuse hurts more, misunderstanding hurts more, lies hurt more, betrayal hurts more, being gossiped about or slandered hurts more – everything that hurts emotionally tends to hurt women more. So listen to your wife when she says you are hurting her. When an abrasive object rubs up against a soft object, which one feels it more? The soft one. If you have a rough, calloused hand that touches some highly sensitive, soft area of skin, that soft, sensitive area will feel the roughness but the calloused area won’t feel anything. So let your wife be the judge of whether or not you are dealing roughly with her – because she is the one who can feel it. I ask my wife about this every single week on my accountability sheet. I do that on a weekly basis, because my soul is too callous to feel the roughness, so I need to find out from Tracy when I am being harsh. She knows better because she has the sensitivity. 
She is weak for you
Why did God make her like that? Why does your wife have to go through life being more vulnerable to pain? It is for you! God made her that way to make her a suitable helper for you! Part of being suitable includes tenderness, compassion, gentleness – the ability to give comfort, encouragement - the strengthening we talked about last week. And much of what enables her to be all of that for you is her sensitivity. The tools that God gave her to make her a suitable companion for you are the very things that also make her more sensitized to pain and injury – both physically and emotionally.
Some husbands get irritated about their wife’s weaknesses. “Why does she have to be so emotionally fragile?” And he does not realize – God designed her that way, in part, for your benefit.
So men, if they have to go through life that way for our benefit, the least we could do would be to be considerate and gentle with them! If you were at a dangerous construction site, and the big boss forced a co-worker to give up his helmet so you could wear it and be protected, and the fellow worker willingly does it so now he is more vulnerable for your sake – don’t you think the very least you could do is refrain from smacking him in the head all day long?
The woman’s superior emotional sensitivity is a great asset to the “team” in the marriage. It is a great asset for carrying out the man’s overall task. But the very fact that she has that asset makes her more vulnerable and in need of protection.
You are her protector
And God has appointed you as her protector. And it is a difficult task that requires a great deal of knowledge of your wife because her weaknesses change from year to year. At one point it is fine for her to handle all the finances, but then the time comes when for whatever reason that becomes too burdensome. And the sensitive husband will keep his finger on the pulse of that and know when it is time to take that off her shoulders.
At one point she might be going along, doing all her housework and everything else and she is doing just great, and then all of a sudden it is just overwhelming to her. It could be any one of a hundred different reasons, but whatever the reason, she just does not have the strength to do some things that she had a month ago. And if you are not living with her in an understanding way, you are not going to know at exactly what point the pressure needs to be relieved. So you try to pitch in and help with laundry, but that does not do anything because what she really needs is a break from the kids. Or you give her a break from the kids as often as you can, but that does not help because what she really wants right now is not so much a break as much as for you to appreciate how much she is doing – and mention that once in a while. Maybe she feels like you are just taking her for granted, and you just kind of expect her to do everything and you act like it is no big deal.
Or maybe she feels like she needs help or needs a break but in reality what she needs the most is for you to gently, sensitively, help her learn from Scripture how to enjoy fellowship with God through her work.
Maybe what she needs is for you to realize that there are things that frighten her that do not frighten you. Something is putting her in a context of always feeling uneasy or insecure. And living with her in an understanding way means being aware that she feels that way and doing what you can to either do away with those threats if possible, or if not, help her find courage through Scripture.
Maybe she does not have any idea what she needs, and neither do you, and so what she needs is for you to seek some counsel from an older couple that might have some insights that neither of you have thought of.
Never forget that God has appointed you as her protector. So think about what it is like for her when you inflict pain on her. Think of what it is like for her to be sent by God into this harsh, cruel, hard world with acute sensitivity to pain, only to have her protector in this life be the one inflicting pain on her.
Gentleness 
This is hard because the curse really hit us men hard in the area of gentleness. God told the woman that the man would dominate her with a heavy handed suppression – “your desire will be to control your husband but he will rule harshly over you.” And the Gospel always overturns the effects of the curse. So the instruction for Christian husbands is:
Colossians 3:19 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.
Be gentle and tender and soft and understanding toward her, because harshness derails Gods purposes for marriage. It ruins oneness, it ruins companionship, it ruins intimacy, and worst of all, it distorts the picture of the relationship between Christ and the Church. Christian husbands who are harsh are lying to the world about what Jesus is like toward His Church.
Honor Her Status
OK, so we men are to live with our wives in an understanding way. That is the first command. Now look at the second command:
7 …showing her honor as a coheir of the grace of life  
We must honor our wives. Usually the emphasis in Scripture is for husbands to love their wives, and wives to honor their husbands. But here husbands are called to honor their wives. And the reason for honoring them is the fact that they are coheirs of the grace of life.
Coheirs 
Peter seems to be using the word grace here in the same way he used it back in 1:13.
1 Peter 1:13 set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.
The word grace is used there as shorthand to sum up all that we will receive when Jesus returns. And Peter uses it the same way here, but this time he is a little more specific. The grace that we will receive on that day will be life – eternal life from God. And our wives deserve special honor because they are heirs to that great inheritance. 
Now back in chapter 2 verse 17, Peter instructed us to honor everyone. Then he told us to give special honor to the king. And now we see there is a special honor for our wives. What does that mean? What does it mean to honor your wife? What kinds of things do we do when we are dealing with VIP’s who are worthy of great honor? I can think of a few things we don’t do. We don’t ignore them. We don’t take them lightly. We put a lot of weight in their presence in the room. When a VIP walks in you take notice, right? If you are trying to honor someone you certainly do not speak in a condescending way to them.
What kind of specific things should you do? That is tricky because different people receive honor in different ways. There are things that would make one person feel like a million bucks, but another person would not even like it. So how about your wife? Do you know what kinds of things would make her feel honored in your home? Or when you are with other people? How could we possibly discover this information? If you do not have any idea what particular things you could do, that would make her feel honored, or which things you do that make her feel dishonored, what could you possibly do to find out? I was racking my brain on that question, and out of nowhere it came to me – you could ask your wife! On the drive home today you could ask her, “Honey, what could I do to make you feel more honored? And what things do I tend to do that make you feel demeaned or slighted or dishonored?”
Now, I know some of you are thinking, “That does not sound like a fun conversation. All that will do is get her started again on all her unending complaints about me, and the more she goes on about it the more riled up she will get rehearsing it all, and the next thing you know I’ll be sleeping on the couch.” First of all, if you respond in a humble, gentle, understanding way, it might not go that way. But in some cases, it might still go bad even if you have a godly response. This might be hard and painful for you. Good thing you are not the weaker vessel! Good thing God gave you thicker skin. It is a good thing we are not as fragile emotionally so we can handle things like this. Be a man. A strong man should be able to handle this and still respond with gentleness. 
Why are you here in church right now? Isn’t it to hear the word of God so you can conform your life to it? Well, this is the Word of God. It is telling you to honor your wife.
Heirs
That woman you are married to, if she is a believer, is a coheir with you of the great, eternal inheritance we learned about in chapter 1. That means God has chosen her and adopted her into His family. She is a major player in the universe – a daughter of the King Himself. That makes her royalty. She is a princess, a child of the King – that makes her very, very important. Someone of that status walks into the room – you had better take notice. Because if you don’t, who does it insult? Who does that snub if you take His daughter lightly? The King! Her Father. If you claim to worship Him you had better honor her.
The Reward: Unhindered Prayer
And if you don’t, then do not expect God to listen to your prayers.
7 treat them with honor as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.
Peter mentions prayer three times in this book, and all three times he presents it from a unique angle. Normally we always think in terms of prayer being a means of grace. If you want to overcome sin in your life, prayer is one of the ingredients to do so. And that is exactly right. We should pray for increased godliness.
Matthew 26:41 Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. 
So we definitely pray in order to live right. But all three times Peter talks about prayer he turns that around and calls us to live right so we can pray. In chapter 4 he calls us to be alert and sober minded so we can pray (4:7). Later in chapter 3 he tells us to keep our tongues from evil and our lips from deceitful speech so that our prayers will be heard. And here he says honor your wife so your prayers will not be hindered. God does not look with favor on the prayers of people who continue in unrepentant sin.
Proverbs 28:9 If anyone turns a deaf ear to the law, even his prayers are detestable.
Fail to understand and honor your wife, and your prayers will be hindered in several ways. When you are at odds with your wife, you are distracted from prayer. And when you are fighting with her you have guilt and anger and all kinds of emotions that keep you from praying. But beyond all that, even if you do pray, God will not listen.
But the good news is, the converse is true. If you do honor your wife, God will listen to your prayers. Look down at verse 12.
1 Peter 3:12 For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer 
Are there some prayers in your life that have not been answered, and you cannot figure out why? Prayers for financial stability, prayers for getting a job, prayers for overcoming some sin in your life, prayers for your kids, prayers for the church, prayers for a loved one, prayers for your wife? How many of your prayers are not being answered just because you are taking your wife lightly and are failing to honor her? And what kind of benefits will come in the kingdom of God when all those prayers start being answered because you had the courage on the ride home today to ask your wife, “How could I show you honor?”

Benediction: Jude 1:1-2 To those who have been called, who are loved by God the Father and kept by Jesus Christ: 2 Mercy, peace and love be yours in abundance. 
1:25 Questions
1.	Women: The reason you experience more emotional pain is because God gave you greater sensitivity. Are you using that greater sensitivity for His purposes? What could you do to improve in that area?

Men: God has given you greater strength. Are you using that emotional strength for God’s purposes? What could you do to improve?

2.	Married men and women: What do you think your spouse would say if you asked, “How could I honor you more?” When you are alone, ask and see if your guess was right.

Singles: Name a couple ways someone could show you honor in a way that would make you feel honored? Is there someone in your life you should be doing those things for?