Honor her for all that her hands have done,
and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.
PROVERBS 31:31
My first job in high school was being a hostess at a 1950s style café. I got to wear saddle shoes and a black-and-white checkered poufy skirt. Although I loved that job, I knew I didn’t want to be sixty years old and still seating parties of four there. I made plans to have a career in broadcasting.
What career plans have you made in your life? You’ve probably been intentional about attending classes, getting a college degree, or interning to learn a trade. You’ve done grunt work, asked questions, and worked your way up professionally. Women are naturally self-starters, go-getters, and multitaskers. When we’ve got our eye on something we want, we’ll move heaven and earth to get there.
Let’s transfer this strong work ethic to our marriages. Have you made any career plans as a wife? Do you have any goals to achieve in your marriage? Most of us don’t approach marriage like this. We’re intentional at work or in parenting, but when it comes to our marriages, we often let the chips fall where they may.
In the next few days, you’ll be challenged to be more purposeful and professional as a wife. Treat your role as wife not as a dreaded job but as a promising career. What you’re creating at home isn’t akin to flipping burgers at the corner fast-food restaurant. It’s more like being the vice president of a Fortune 500 company—although it may not feel like that on some days!
You’ll never find this job listing in the classifieds, but it’s something greatly needed today in families—Wanted: Virtuous Wives. From ancient times, a woman of moral excellence has been hard to find. Proverbs 31:10 asks,
A wife of noble character who can find?
She is worth far more than rubies.
I was a guest in my son’s third-grade class, and I read a story from William Bennett’s The Book of Virtues. Imagine my surprise when I asked what a virtue was and no one except my son could answer that question. Kids aren’t the only ones who don’t ponder what it means to live a virtuous life. Virtue means moral excellence, right living, and goodness. Unfortunately, many marriages are more influenced by desperate housewives than virtuous ones.
So how can you plan on purpose to make virtue a vital part of your job description? Perhaps you can make it your first goal as a professional wife to read Proverbs 31:10-31 every night before you go to bed this week. In Proverbs 31, we can find many qualities of the virtuous wife. She is trustworthy, good, diligent, hardworking, responsible, charitable, wise, entrepreneurial, savvy, prepared, and she’s even clothed in fine linen and purple. Matthew Henry’s commentary says this about her relationship with her husband:
He thinks himself so happy in her that he envies not those who have most of the wealth of this world; he needs it not, he has enough, having such a wife. Happy the couple that have such a satisfaction as this in each other!1
100 Percent Wife
There are numerous songs, skits, blog posts, and even movies about the many hats we wear as women. We have a work hat, wife hat, parent hat, daughter hat, friend hat, volunteer hat. Sometimes we get confused and overwhelmed by the many responsibilities that tug at our time, attention, and affection.
Bethany Palmer can certainly relate to that. She’s the president of Envoy Financial, where her father serves as the CEO. She’s co-CEO of The Money Couple with her husband, Scott. She works with her husband and father, and then has her roles as wife and mom to her two school-age children.
Being that wife that you want to be really comes down to a decision every single day. When I get home, it’s time to shift gears and focus on my husband. I want the house clean. Every day when he comes home, I want him to feel it’s a special place to be. I give him a big kiss, because in our situation I just saw him two hours ago in the office, but this is the time for me to be a wife and to make the home a place where he is excited to come to. He kisses me before he greets the dog, and it’s those little things that make you feel special. It’s that conscious decision to take the joy I have in my heart and make him a happy husband. I take a minute before I put on that wife hat, and I breathe and ask how can I wear this hat in the best way possible today?
Do I do that perfectly every day? Absolutely not. But something that has helped me is that conscious decision of knowing what hat I’m wearing and doing it the best that I can do and not worrying about the other hats while I’m wearing that one.
Isn’t that a great perspective? When you are wearing your wife hat, be in that role 100 percent. Don’t be distracted by other things when you have that precious time during the day to be a wife to your husband. Be intentional with that time together. Bethany continues,
It’s so easy to blur all your roles. When you need to be in the parent mode, you’re talking to your husband about work. But the time to talk about that is when you and your husband are working together, not when you’re in the parenting and kid mode. Understanding the hat and understanding the mode—I think that really brings happiness because we have to be intentional with our relationships. Our relationship with our husband is a relationship that we have to mold, massage, and protect or it just dwindles.
We have to give our perfectionism over to God. We sometimes think we have to do it so perfectly, so we add all these additional commitments. The work and everything will be there tomorrow. It’s not going anywhere. Leave it at work. Leave it in those walls. Let it go and wear your wife hat.2
But Wait, There’s More
As you probably know from experience, anything carried to an extreme can become problematic. If you are unmotivated, totally laid back, and apathetic about your role as a wife, you’re going to drift your way right into marriage counseling. But if you find all your significance in your role as a wife, that’s not healthy either. One relationship alone cannot meet all your emotional and spiritual needs. Leslie Vernick says about her husband,
One of the things we do is we give each other a lot of respect and validation. “You have great strengths and I appreciate you.” It’s not all just about the marriage. We each have our own goals. I think that is so important in a healthy marriage.3
So it’s healthy to have personal, business, financial, spiritual, and family goals. Just make sure in your next goal-setting time that you include a few goals as a wife. What can you do to strengthen your marriage in the next six months? Here are a few ideas to get you started:
• Pick up a hobby that you and your husband can enjoy together.
• Read a book to help you understand your man better.
• Serve together for charity.
• Pray together before bedtime.
• Make your husband’s favorite meal.
• Participate in a sports event together, such as a walk, bike ride, or team sport.
Sometime today, hold a photograph of your husband and take ten seconds to stare at his face. You made a vow to love, honor, and cherish him all the days of your life. As you purpose to grow as a wife, you’ll not only have job security in the years ahead. You’ll love every minute of your lifetime career and calling as a wife.
If your husband had to write a job description for what he needed in a wife, what do you think would be three top qualities he would be looking for?
If you dare, you can ask him this question later today and see how your answers correspond.
Today’s Prayer
Lord, thank You that I am a wife. I am grateful to be married to my husband, and I want to better understand the important role I play in our home. I don’t want to be passive about being a wife. I want to be intentional. Show me how to be productive and virtuous like the Proverbs 31 wife. Take me through it one step at a time so I won’t be overwhelmed. Help me to manage my household with wisdom and grace.