Commentary

Commenter Rose accepts male leadership in marriage

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Recently, I decided to write again on the question of whether women should be willing to have sex with their husbands when they are not in the mood for sex. Commenter Rose wrote a passionate statement recognizing that men need to be the leaders in the home. I kept reading the comment expecting to find some point where we disagreed, but I could not find one. I was especially pleased to see that she was very careful about qualifying her view so that she was not coming across as a doormat. Men need to be leaders, and it’s the woman’s job to make sure that they can be leaders without opening up the door for men to abuse the power that they are entrusted with.

Anyway, here is the comment by Rose. (I broke it up into paragraphs)

Thank you for posting this blog.

What I have to say is more than likely, not going to be very popular with the other women who have posted, and I want to give a brief bit of background information. I have been married twice. In both marriages, I was the leader. I was the leader spiritually, financially, emotionally, intellectually (and that isn’t saying a lot), and physically. Both of my ex-husbands wanted me to be the one to always initiate the sex and they had this desire for ME to be in charge. I am a very independent woman and in every area, I took the lead, except (as much as either of them would have enjoyed for me to) in the bedroom.

Now that I am not in either marriage and I have had the opportunity to look back, I can safely tell you that being in a leadership position is NOT where I was created to be. I honestly feel that God created woman FOR man. In Genesis 2:20-22 we see these words: “ But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib[l] he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.” It is very clear in that scripture that WOMAN was created to be MAN’s helper.

Before I go any further, I want to state for the record that I know that above all, our purpose is to glorify God and to build God’s Kingdom, and I do take that very seriously. I do not worship the man in my life, but I feel that my purpose, after the Kingdom work, is to please the man God has blessed in my life.

I am in a new relationship that is above and beyond the answers to all of my prayers. I have taken a vow of abstinence and that vow is not only honored, but expected of me. This man is a wonderful Christian man and has the need to be the leader in the home. For me, having a man who leads is not just a want or desire, but a NEED. We have discussed the very topic of your blog and I strongly feel that there is NO reason that after he is my husband, he should be told no to sex. My greatest pleasure, as a woman, is making him happy, pleasing him, and I feel more alive, more cherished, more protected than I have ever felt in my life. Paul gives us very clear on how we are to treat each other, as a married couple, sexually and why. (1 Corinthians 7:3-5: The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. The wife’s body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way, the husband’s body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife. Do not deprive each other except by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.) This scripture relates in clear understanding that the ONLY reason either husband or wife should “deprive” each other is when it is mutual (meaning both agree) and for devoting yourselves to prayer. This doesn’t say that we deprive our husbands because we aren’t in the mood. Perhaps if a woman isn’t in the mood, then she should explain this to her husband and they could take time to pray that together for understanding and for an agreement.

Sex is an emotional thing for both men and women, but our emotions are different. As maturing Christian adults, we should be able to recognize that about each other and communicate with our spouses what we feel and think. I am so glad that, in our relationship, we are taking the time, before hand, to relay those feelings, those insights about each other. We have found ways, even before we are married to practice and discuss him being the leader. Some of the things we have incorporated (even in our different homes) are:

  • I discuss decisions with him before I make them. He listens to what I have to say, we discuss it, and he gives me his opinion. I have not found a time, yet, that I didn’t see things his way after we discussed them and prayed about them;
  • I know what his tastes are as far as clothing and even though he has not “insisted”, I find myself wearing the things I know he would like or approve of, and it makes me feel wonderful to know I am doing something to please him;
  • We discuss financial matters and have begun to set up our future budget to have the same goal of paying off debts in our sights.
  • We are both teachers of God’s Word, but he still teaches me so much and helps me keep my focus on the woman God has created me to be. Likewise, he expects me to respectfully let him know if he is making decisions or acting in a manner that is not glorifying God.

As I see Eph. 5:22-33, A man may not always “feel like” submitting to God’s will, but it isn’t an option, it isn’t a request, it is a command. Husbands may not always feel like loving their wives, but again, it is a command. Wives may not always “feel like” submitting to their husbands or the Lord, but it doesn’t say “submit when you feel like it.” This again, is not given as an option, it isn’t a request, it is a command, “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”

For me, and I know that most women will not agree, I think the idea of being available to my husband whenever he wants me is a very sexy, very exciting, very natural thing. I also believe that if I am available to him anytime he feels the desire for me, then when I have a desire for him, that need will also be fulfilled. According to WintryKnights reply, in today’s society, I am a minority. I go against the grain, and that is where I know I belong. I AM pro-life, pro-family, pro-guns (and I hunt and fish, too), pro-male, accept sex roles, focus on raising children, am chaste, court on substance, (and I must respectfully disagree on the fun statement because we have had a blast getting to really know each other), am very serious about the challenges to marriage posed by socialism and secularism, study apologetics (we actually do this together and discuss it, I am for small government, small business, small education, small taxes, males teaching males and females teaching female, and so on.

In the past, I think I have wanted that Prince Charming or Knight (no offense, Wintry) to come riding in to save the day. The more I have grown and thought about it, I am under the impression that arranged marriages are not such a bad thing. I feel like my Father, the King of all Kings, has arranged a marriage for His princess. He has let me know that I don’t need a prince or a knight, but I need someone with KINGLY characteristics, someone who can lead, someone who can rule, someone who can follow HIS lead and be an example to me and our family.

In submitting, to my “future King”, he has made it very clear that he does not want a doormat. He wants a woman who has an opinion and doesn’t mind sharing it, and he has to know that I can make the right decisions for our family on a whim when he may not be there to help in those decisions. He has to know that he can trust me to be a portrait of what a Christian woman looks like, to his children. His sons need to know what God’s word says about submission and so does his daughter. What better way to teach them than through our example.

I have found so much freedom in submission. I am truly happy in a relationship for the first time in my life and I look very forward to our future together as his wife to bring him all of the desires of his heart, his mind, and his body!!

In Christ,
Rose

Now when I read that comment, I immediately cautioned her to test this new guy severely and to be certain that he could be trusted with this much authority, and that he was capable of doing his job as the husband and father.

I wrote:

Now obviously you are going to have to vet this man like crazy before giving the lead role in the relationship – so please make sure you do that. But I have a feeling that you know this and are willing to take the responsibility for making a good decision. The time to check the man to see if he can handle being the quarterback is before the marriage. Test him every way you can – insist on seeing evidence that he can do the job of protecting, providing and moral/spiritual leading. Don’t marry someone who hasn’t demonstrated that he can fulfill his obligations.

And I hasten to add that I think that submitting to a man should never be done when the man is committing one of the four As: adultery, assault, abandonment or addiction. But honestly, I think she provided enough background there to see that her basic bias is in favor of submitting to male leadership because she understands men. Men like to get involved with women and start homes when they feel like they have a special role as leader of the home.

Having said that, there is nothing in the idea of male leadership that says that a women can’t make the man spend a year of his life completely abstinent in a courtship with her where the focus of the interactions is on the man proving that he can do without sex for two years while he is courting the woman. Courtship is the time to make sure that the man has self-control and will not be a brutish beast. That’s why we have that “no sex before marriage” rule.

Women: Make the man prove himself before you decide whether to give him the leadership of the home. Look at his resume. Look at his portfolio. Interview his former girlfriends. Interview the fathers of his former girlfriends. Be thorough. You are responsible for making a good choice. It’s your JOB to read everything, understand everything, and choose wisely. Making a wise choice is how you serve God. Choose what’s right. Don’t choose what you like. Don’t choose what makes you happy.

News

Senator Tom Coburn lists some bad examples of government waste

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Here’s the story.

Excerpt:

Coburn, R-Muskogee, whose office regularly churns out reports mocking federal projects and programs, said Monday that “cutting wasteful and low-priority spending from the budget is not only sensible, but essential.”

“In today’s economy, we can’t afford to spend nearly $2 million to showcase neon signs no longer in use at Las Vegas casinos; nor can Congress and federal agencies afford to spend nearly $1 billion a year on unnecessary printing costs.”

The 100 projects cited on Monday tread some familiar ground for Coburn reports — road signs paid for with stimulus funds, research projects that sound like folly — and are mostly domestic. There is no mention of Iraq or Afghanistan, despite government reports documenting millions lost to fraud and waste.

Topping Coburn’s list is the conclusion of a FOX News story that the Department of Veterans Affairs spends $175 million each year to maintain buildings it can’t use, in some cases because they’re in such disrepair.

Other items on the list:

• $217,000 for a University of California and Stanford University study on when and why political candidates are ambiguous.

• $90,000 to fund promotion of the Vidalia onion, including $60,000 for a campaign timed to coincide with the release of a Shrek movie.

•  $2.5 million on the Census Bureau’s television ad that aired during the Super Bowl to promote the head-count but left many viewers scratching their heads in confusion.

• $465,000 for an international AIDS conference in Austria.

• $35 million paid in fraudulent Medicare and Medicaid claims to an alleged Armenian crime ring.

• $48 million for a streetcar system in Atlanta that runs the same route as the city’s subway system.

• $900,000 to settle sexual harassment claims against a former housing director in Philadelphia.

•  And $28 million to print “rarely used” paper copies of the Congressional Record.

Here’s a recent post from the Washington Examiner that compares Democrats and Republicans on pork barrel spending. (H/T Gateway Pundit via Muddling)

Excerpt:

Press coverage of the budget frenzy on Capitol Hill has suggested that pork-barrel earmark spending is still a bipartisan problem, that after months of self-righteous rhetoric about fiscal discipline, Republicans and Democrats remain equal-opportunity earmarkers.

It’s not true. A new analysis by a group of federal-spending watchdogs shows a striking imbalance between the parties when it comes to earmark requests. Democrats remain raging spenders, while Republicans have made enormous strides in cleaning up their act.

In the Senate, the GOP made only one-third as many earmark requests as Democrats for 2011, and in the House, Republicans have nearly given up earmarking altogether — while Democrats roll on.

The watchdog groups — Taxpayers for Common Sense, WashingtonWatch.com, and Taxpayers Against Earmarks — counted total earmark requests in the 2011 budget. Those requests were made by lawmakers earlier this year, but Democratic leaders, afraid that their party’s spending priorities might cost them at the polls, decided not to pass a budget before the Nov. 2 elections. This week, they distilled those earmark requests — threw some out, combined others — into the omnibus bill that was under consideration in the Senate until Majority Leader Harry Reid pulled it Thursday night. While that bill was loaded with spending, looking back at the original earmark requests tells us a lot about the spending inclinations of both parties.

In the 2011 House budget, the groups found that House Democrats requested 18,189 earmarks, which would cost the taxpayers a total of $51.7 billion, while House Republicans requested just 241 earmarks, for a total of $1 billion.

This is why stimulus spending, which is advocated by Democrats, costs jobs. Democrats waste money. They take money out of the job-creating sector of the economy, and they waste on government spending. If private companies wasted money like government, they would go out of business. Unfortunately, government can waste money like this all the time, and they just borrow more money. When you hear a Democrat say that they want to “invest” money they stole from businesses and workers in order to “stimulate” the economy, what they are talking about is wasting money and/or buying votes from their favored special interest groups.

Commentary

Wes Widner wonders if there are worse things for children than spanking

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This is a magnificent, must-read, post. (H/T Wes Widner)

Excerpt:

I got into a discussion a while back about the legitimacy of corporal punishment. Liberal parents are fond of labeling any form of punishment child abuse1.

Corporal punishment aside, lets look at the notion of child abuse a bit more.

That’s all you get. The post is amazing. Go read it. You will not be disappointed.

And I think that it is here where there is a way for Christians to distinguish themselves by caring so much about children that they are willing to restrain their pursuit of pleasure to make sure that children get a safe, stable and moral environment to grow up in.