Last week we considered 13 ways a wife felt secure within her marriage and I thought it best to not leave the men out of this one. So, here are 15 ways a man can feel secure within his marriage as shared by a husband.

1. She puts her relationship with God first in her life.
2. She has a daily devotional time in order to listen to her heavenly Father.
3. She cares about herself physically and emotionally and the image she reflects.
4. She loves, cares for and sacrifices for her children unselfishly.
5. She prioritizes caring for her husband in big and small ways.
6. She cares for her home, keeping it neat and in order. There is no confusion around her.
7. She holds her husband’s hand and is affectionate even in a long-term marriage relationship.
8. She is not trying to change her husband, but accepts him as he is.
9. She brings a cold drink to her husband when he is working outside in the heat.
10. She pray’s with and for her husband daily.
11. She blesses and encourages her husband’s hobbies.
12. She is her husband’s best friend.
13. She quickly forgives.
14. She has eyes and emotions for her husband only and enjoys a healthy sex life with him.
15. She loves her husband unconditionally and tells him daily.

Go on a date and ask your husband what helps him to feel secure in your marriage relationship. You may be surprised by what you hear.

I recently asked a very godly woman what makes her feel secure in her marriage.  She shared these thirteen things about her husband:

1. My husband loves and prioritizes God as #1 in his life.
2. My husband spends time daily with his Savior in the Bible and in prayer.
3. My husband is committed to me, to our marriage; he speaks this regularly and often tells me that he loves me.
4. I have a home that is safe for my children, others and me. My husband built this home with his own hands and labor of love and there is a spirit of peace that resides in our home.
5. My husband has lived by Biblical financial values and made sure that we are not in debt; all the while, investing into our future. Our bills are paid and we have a savings account.
6. My husband affirms me – my gifts, my passions and my contributions. He affirms my work, my person and my beauty.
7. My husband has always believed in me, encouraged me and encouraged the gifts that God has placed in my life.
8. I can truly trust my husband because he incorporates strict codes of behavior and boundaries concerning relationship with the opposite sex.
9. My husband is faithful with his eyes – he does not view pornography, but uses self-control and is honorable.
10. He is really good with people and I trust him to speak life, wisdom and grace-filled counsel.
11. He prays with me and for me.
12. He encourages me to hear God for myself.
13. He encourages me to express my gift of giving.

What would your wife share if you asked her what helps her feel secure within your marriage? Better yet, go out on a date and ask that very question.

Living with another human being feels almost impossible at times.   We can continually deal with questions like: Will she ever change? Can he ever see beyond himself? When will my needs be met? Since when is our credit card bill more important than me? But here’s part of the deal… Marriage points out our selfishness rather clearly. Marriage kicks individuality in the butt. Marriage holds us accountable. Marriage exposes our commitment to God and our faith. And marriage has a way of exposing our immaturities.

All of the above can be seen as a huge negative or a huge opportunity for change. Once we realize the truth about this partnership called marriage, we have two choices. We can either dismiss what is being exposed within us or we can embrace it and begin to put into place mechanisms for change. For some, “dismissing” is going to the extreme of ending the marriage and looking for another partner only to eventually be confronted with the very same self-conflicting issues.  But for others, marriage provides an opportunity for God-stretching truth that exposes what’s on the inside of us.  It’s that “inside” part that scares us sometimes and we’d rather keep it hidden. We can accomplish that during engagement perhaps, but not when we spend over fourteen hours a day together.

I suppose it’s that “real us” we’re afraid of letting out. However, God already knows about that real us intimately and most likely so does our spouse. So, go ahead, be real while listening for that voice of change causing you to become a more mature life partner.

The belief that one in two marriages end in divorce has been debunked regularly, but still today touted from pulpits and academic broadsides as truth. It is not true and NEVER has been true or statistically factual. Next we heard the one in four marriages end in divorce and that stat also being true in the local church. Is that your experience? I haven’t seen 25% of true believers divorcing.   It’s just plain scary to think about marriage in these terms. Would you get on a plane if one in four crashed? What is the truth about divorce statistics?

Shaunti Feldham in her book, The Good News About Marriage found during eight years of research of divorce statistics that the divorce rate overall may be around 31%, but for couples who regularly attend church it drops to 15 to 20%. One pastor she cited tracked 143 couples for 25 years and less than 10% had been divorced. We need to know this because the truth instills faith and gives us hope especially as couples go through rigorous premarital counseling and follow-up with postmarital throughout the first few years.  Consider these ten ways to divorce proof your marriage:

1. Be committed to accountability and oversight for your marriage to a spiritual leader. Answer to someone(s) outside yourselves.
2. Be committed to a local church where you not only receive truth, but where you serve together in ministry.
3. Create a marriage mission statement that declares why you are married and what you are called to within marriage. Find your co-mission.
4. Never, never, never mention the “D” word = divorce. Decide that divorce is not an option and neither of you will ever consider it.
5. Receive marriage counsel as needed. When you run into a roadblock maturely enlist the help of others and admit your faults freely.
6. Pray together creating the most intimate communication you can create.
7. Create a budget and be committed to follow it so that finances do not come between you. Find the strengths of each of your financial personalities and utilize them to generate unity.
8. Know that marriage struggles will serve to strengthen you as you maturely deal with them, rather than avoid or run from them. The deeper the struggle the deeper the growth of your marriage as it is worked through.
9. Praise in public and construct in private. Never put your spouse down before others. Speak life to one another and use language that builds one another up rather than criticizing one another.
10. Seek God first and become intimate with Him so that He can continually change you. The marriage is not the issue, rather the two people in it are. Change and grow yourself and your marriage will also change.

Finally, my personal bonus: Incorporate the nine most important words in marriage regularly: I am sorry; I was wrong; please forgive me.

We make decisions on a daily basis according to our personal life values. Our values are the key to our priorities and will greatly affect our lives and our marriage. Identifying those values can help you and your spouse bring your most important beliefs to the table for discussion. Many of our differences are actually rooted in our life values. For example, one of us might highly value being out of debt while the other sees certain types of debt as acceptable. What’s the difference? The difference is often found in our financial values.

Here’s a key: When we discover such differences it is actually an opportunity to find “us,” our value, rather than just his or her value. Finding us is crucial to growth and maturity as a couple. Finding our deeply rooted beliefs and how we will walk them out is a portion of the glue that holds us together. My wife and I struggled with the values of saving money versus spending money early on in our marriage. While that looks like polar opposites at first, it actually forced us to find our value. As we looked closer at the differences, what we discovered was that I was saving for a future need and she was giving to others for a present need. Combining those two values and keeping them in balance has been life changing to our relationship and to our finances.

Take some time as a couple to look at your “opposing” values and you might just find a new normal that wisely incorporates the best of both for “us.”