A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband: but she that maketh ashamed is as rottenness in his bones.-–Proverbs 12:4
There is an old story that beautifully illustrates the principle of honor within marriage. A drunkard husband, spending the evening with his jovial companions at a tavern, boasted that if he took a group of his friends home with him at midnight and asked his Christian wife to get up and cook supper for them, she would do it without complaint. The crowd considered it a vain boast and dared him to try it. So the drunken crowd followed him home, and he made the unreasonable demands of his wife. She obeyed, dressed, came down, and prepared a very nice supper and served it as cheerfully as if she had been expecting them.
After supper one of the men asked her how she could be so kind when they had been so unreasonable and when she did not approve of their conduct. Her reply was: “Sir, when my husband and I were married, we were both sinners. It has pleased God to call me out of that dangerous condition. My husband continues in it. I tremble for his future state. Were he to die as he is, he would be miserable forever. I think it my duty to render his present existence as comfortable as possible.” Not long after, her husband was saved.
The notion of honor seems quaint and outdated to many in the modern world, but it is at the very foundation of any healthy and loving relationship. The Hebrew word for honor means “to give something weight—to treat it as valuable or important.” When we show disrespect in words or actions, we are revealing a failure of love. Marriages do not usually collapse suddenly. Instead they fall due to a long process of erosion that continues unchecked, and undermines the foundation.
It is not possible to love someone as you should without also treating them with honor and respect.–Dr Paul Chappell
