“There must be millions of people all over the world who never get any love letters…I could be their leader.”
CHARLIE BROWN
Your Project
Husbands, you guessed it. You have to go into a store, look through the cards, find one that declares your love for your wife (or talks about a private joke you two share), purchase the overpriced card, write just one sentence in it, sign your name, and put it somewhere creative where she will find it. (No cards containing jokes about age or weight are allowed.)
Purpose of the Project
Encouragement
We all need to know that we’re appreciated. Guys, you get to be your wife’s main encouragement today.
A confession for all you wives out there: Oh, how I hated the Proverbs 31 woman. If you’re new to the Bible, let me give you a glimpse of her:
• She’s the woman who always looks like the “After” in the “Before and After” pictures in InStyle magazine.
• She is the annoying mom on your kid’s soccer team who makes homemade organic snacks, and all the kids actually eat them.
• She works morning until night without a power nap.
• All of her family’s meals are grown locally and made at home. The “perfect” wife would never even consider takeout.
• She’s an entrepreneur, a homemaker, and a dutiful wife. Put another way, “she can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never ever let him forget he’s a man” (you must be over 40 to get this reference).
• Oh, and her children are perfect.
I have to tell you, she was giving me a complex.
I admit that I have gone through phases of trying to be the best wife I possibly can. I have worked and raised kids and done all the right stuff—and was absolutely miserable. I was trying to live out some unobtainable version of what I thought being the “good wife” looked like. I would look at the best of the women around me, the Proverbs 31 women, and feel totally inadequate all the time. I got to the point where I just gave up—if I couldn’t be perfect, why try at all. It never occurred to me that God created me the way that He did because He liked me. I just figured that God was constantly disappointed with me in every regard.
Recently, I actually tried to sit down and study Proverbs 31. The first line blew me away: “Who can find a virtuous and capable wife?” (v. 10 NLT). I love that! The fact that being a virtuous wife is difficult is laid out there for us. This “wife stuff” is really, really hard. It’s hard to be everything that everyone wants (or needs) us to be. Being a great and honorable wife takes a lot of different skills. And it takes a lot of effort.
Husbands, your encouragement can go a long way in giving us confidence to say no to an unobtainable notion of what a wife should be and to say yes to what God has called us to be. When we as wives know that our actions cause you to feel loved and respected, suddenly failing to spin our own fabrics isn’t so guilt inducing.
We can’t rely on our own strength as wives or as husbands. We need guidance and the power of God every step of the way—not only to give us strength to finish the things we’re supposed to do but also to sustain us as we say no to those things we’re not supposed to do.
The best marriages are the ones where each partner is regularly thinking, “How can I let _______ know that I appreciate him?” As a spouse, I may not always be the person my partner wants me to be, but I’m always doing something that can be praised and appreciated.
“People have a way of becoming what you encourage them to be, not what you nag them to be.”—Anonymous
“And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24).
Prayer for Today
Dear God, help me say yes to everything You want for me and my marriage, and no to those things that are not part of Your plan for my life. Help me to also be an encouragement to my partner, every day.
Getting Creative
Places you could leave a card for her to find:
• On the seat of the car
• On the wall of the garage (so when she pulls in she’ll see it)
• Inside her coffee travel mug before the coffee goes in (make sure it’s highly visible)
• Mailed to her office (making sure the note is G-rated)
• Inside her favorite magazine you know she’ll read today
• Taped to the bathroom mirror
• At your local coffee shop (see if the barista will deliver the card with your sweetie’s regular drive-thru order; leave a big tip)
• Inside the box of microwave popcorn she’ll snack on tonight
• On the DVR remote
• In the mailbox (finally, something besides credit card applications)
Project Reports
“My husband bought me a blank card with a puppy on the front. We’ve been together for over 23 years, and in the card he told me something he has never told me before. This probably was one of the most meaningful projects to me because he normally doesn’t write anything but his name in a card and never buys one for me just because. After being together so long, it meant a lot to me to find out something new.”—Rachael
“I went to Walgreens at lunch. Decided on the more serious card rather than the funny card I would normally get. I didn’t hide it, just gave it to her directly. I wrote about how important she is to me, and how much fun it is to watch her grow into a godly woman.”—Elliot
“We were on vacation when this project came up, so I figured he would just skip it. Instead, I crawled into bed and found the card on my pillow. I think of my husband as being pretty thoughtful all the time, but I could tell that he took a lot of thought and time in writing this card and telling me what I meant to him. It’s the best card I’ve ever received from him. It made me feel very loved.”—Marie
Here’s an idea from my husband: one Valentine’s Day he cut up almost 100 cards with cute words and sayings and put them in a decorated box for me to open and look through. Trust me, that box will be saved and looked at for the rest of my life.
Your Plan for the Project (copy your plan into your Project Planner)
Results (mate’s reaction, my reaction)