The Power of a Praying Wife Devotional (31 page)

L
ORD
, I come to You with the need my husband and I have for Your provision. I thank You that You are the Lord who provides (Genesis 22:14). Show us what we can do to further open up the flow of Your abundance in our lives. Or show us what we should or should
not
do to keep from stopping up the flow of all you have for us. Not that we can ever do anything to deserve Your blessing, but I know there are things we
can
do that will keep us from being a hindrance to all You want to bring into our lives.

On behalf of my husband, I surrender all that we have to You. We release from our hands to Yours the things and people we have held too tightly. I dedicate our lives to Your purpose and glory. Show us whatever You want us to let go of, and help us to do that. Everything we have been clinging to, we release into Your hands. We thank You for all You have given us, for we know that everything we have comes from You. I praise You as our loving, heavenly Father, who provides for all our needs. Thank You in advance for Your wonderful provision to us.

In Jesus’ name I pray.

58

Through wisdom a house is built,
and by understanding it is established;
by knowledge the rooms are filled
with all precious and pleasant riches.

P
ROVERBS
24:3-4

W
E
’
VE ALL SEEN
beautifully decorated houses that seem cold when we are in them. We’ve also seen simple and humbly put together homes that are so warm and inviting we don’t want to leave. But this is not a case against beautifully decorated homes, because we’ve also all seen just the opposite—a beautifully decorated home that is warm and inviting, or a humble home that is quite cold and uninviting. It is not the decoration or size that determines whether your house becomes a sanctuary or a refuge; it is the spirit that resides there. And people can sense that spirit when they walk in the door, whether they know what it is or not.

Invite the presence of God to reside in your home. Ask God to help you arrange your home in a way that is a comfort and blessing to the people who live there, as well as those who visit. Ask Him to give you the wisdom, understanding, and knowledge that come only from Him in order to accomplish it.

The “precious and pleasant riches” that make a house a refuge for you and your husband are the peace, love, and joy that are the rejuvenating qualities only God can bring—in other words, the presence of God. Invite God to provide the precious and pleasant riches of His Holy Spirit so He can decorate your home with the beauty of His presence. It will be a sanctuary in which personal revival will happen daily.

My Prayer to God

L
ORD,
I invite You to inhabit our home. Fill it with Your Spirit of love, peace, and joy, so much so that it affects my husband and me in a powerful way whenever we are there. Help me to do what it takes to make our home a sanctuary, for us and for whoever spends time in it. Show me how to create a refuge that is warm, inviting, orderly, and strife-free. Give me a vision of what needs to be done, changed, or enhanced in order to make it more inviting. I pray that our home will be a place we always want to be. May it be so rejuvenating that it gives us strength and health just to be there.

I invite Your presence to dwell in our home so that we both sense Your comfort, calm, and beauty every time we walk through the door. Take away any tension or coldness we have brought into it. Surround our home with Your protection so that no harm comes to it or anyone inside it. Keep us safe from all intruders and dangers. I pray that no fire, storm, earthquake, or any other disaster will ever damage or destroy it. Enable both of us to care diligently for the home You have provided for us. I pray we will never allow in anything that is not in keeping with Your ways and Your will. Fill our home with the “precious and pleasant riches” of Your Spirit and the beauty and comfort of Your presence.

In Jesus’ name I pray.

59

Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor,
and evil speaking be put away
from you, with all malice.

E
PHESIANS
4:31

I
F THERE IS ONE
difficult situation I hear about most from wives—other than the way-too-common sin of infidelity—it is about husbands with an anger problem. And this is a problem of major proportions. I don’t know any wife who handles a husband’s frequent anger well, especially when it is directed at her. Many women endure it because of God’s grace, but it is a constant source of pain. And it too often becomes so unbearable that divorce seems a welcome relief. When a wife feels her own survival is at stake, then separation and divorce are an automatic reaction for self-preservation.

God’s Word tells every husband to treat his wife with understanding and honor, and to be considerate of her vulnerability and delicacy, so that his prayers will not be hindered (1 Peter 3:7). I have never seen a man who verbally or physically abused his wife who continued to have success in his life. This same verse also says that a husband and wife are “heirs
together”
(emphasis added) of all God has for them. So if a husband refuses to treat his wife well and instead vents his anger on her,
he
will not inherit the blessings God has for them both, and his prayers will not be answered.

If you are too often the object of your husband’s anger, and it has become emotionally or physically depleting for you, seek God about finding help for this situation. The Bible says, “The discretion of a man makes him slow to anger, and his glory is to overlook a transgression” (Proverbs 19:11). It also says to “cease from anger, and forsake wrath” (Psalm 37:8). That means he has a choice about whether to vent his anger or not. Pray that your husband will make the right choice because the consequences for not doing so are severe. If you are one of the blessed few who has a husband who never vents anger, thank God for that and pray he will always be that way.

My Prayer to God