Home > Marriage > Spirituality
Marriage Partnership, Winter 1996
Heart & Soul: Truth and
Consequences
My wife's honesty was the slap in the face I didn't want—but
needed
—by Dave Goetz
Jana was forking the last bite of an order of banana pancakes into her mouth
when our conversation screeched to a halt. I was frustrated because my father
had turned down our request for a loan to use as a down payment on a house.
I launched into a tirade. My face reddened, I pounded the table, I vented.
"This is the way it has always been. My brother gets what he wants, but not
me."
Jana might as well have twisted her fork into my stomach, for her next words
were: "We've been having this same discussion for the past two years. Every
time you talk about your family, your face gets red and you pound the table.
I don't know what to say anymore. I think you need to see a counselor."
I felt the blood drain from my face as I mumbled something about needing
someone who really listened to me. I felt hurt, even betrayed, by Jana's
forthright comments. But I couldn't shake her words. A few weeks later I
found a counselor who, in the course of several months, helped me locate
the source of much of my unresolved anger. I was forced to look into the
fiery furnace.
The words of Proverbs 15:4 are true: "The tongue that brings healing is a
tree of life … " Jana's truthtelling launched me on a journey that invited
the presence of Christ into a back corner of my soul. She had exercised an
unpleasant kindness; she had served me by telling the truth.
Truth's Painful Task
In the book Resident Aliens, Duke University professors Stanley Hauerwas
and William Willimon state, "Ultimately, there is for us only one good reason
to get married or to stay single, namely, that this has something to do with
our discipleship." For Jana and me, as followers of Christ, discipleship
means we are called to serve one another with the truth. "Even in marriage
between Christians," write Willimon and Hauerwas, "we meet as strangers unable
to tell one another the truth. Yet Christians believe that nothing is more
important in marriage than truthfulness."
I don't mean to imply that Jana and I confront each other regularly. We don't.
Doing so too often would break down trust and create a climate of legalism.
The times we do, however, we try to break the news with gentleness and grace,
employing "I feel" statements rather than "you always" indictments.
There isn't always a pain-free way to tell the truth, but the alternative
is a marriage built around a series of covert compromises. "People often
lie most readily in marriage," write Willimon and Hauerwas, "exactly because
they fear losing the intimacy they have achieved to that point. They know
that nothing can kill the fires of passion quicker than truth."
Truth may initially douse the fires of passion, but over time it creates
new possibilities for genuine intimacy—the intimacy that comes with being
fully known by another. The gust of God's grace now blowing through our marriage
is experienced in a little more transparency, a little more honesty, and,
consequently, a little more intimacy.
Self-Serving or Spouse-Serving?
When Jana served me by speaking the truth in love, it cost her something.
She had to endure my angry response, and then my sullenness. There have been
other times when I had to endure some personal sacrifice in the process of
serving my wife.
A few months after we moved from Colorado to Illinois, Jana and I drove in
a cold spring rain to Door County, Wisconsin, a beautiful, timbered resort
area. We hoped the weekend would warm up, but things turned a lot colder
on Sunday when I made a flippant remark about the church Jana grew up in.
Our recent move to Illinois put us in Jana's hometown, and we were in the
process of deciding whether to attend her home church. The covert pressure
I felt from Jana and her family irked me.
We finally settled on Jana's home church, and we've been attending there
for several years. But for much of that time, I've carped and criticized:
"The church is poorly organized"; "It's friendly only to the insiders"; "It's
too bound by tradition." It wasn't that I didn't like the people in the church;
it's just that, well, I didn't get my way.
Looking back, I know our decision was right, and my attitude was all wrong.
Yes, I was making a sacrifice for Jana's sake—but I did my best to make
sure she knew it. This kind of honesty was destructive: It was self-serving
rather than spouse-serving. Recently I declared a truce by confessing my
fault to Jana and promising to change my attitude.
As I've reflected on my sniveling, I've been dismayed to realize I'm not
the person I imagined myself to be. I want to reflect the fruit of the Spirit
listed in Galatians 5:22-23: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." I like to remember the times
when I live out those traits. But I also have to admit that the fruits I
sometimes display come from another tree, also found in Galatians 5: "The
acts of the sinful nature are obvious … discord, jealousy, fits of rage,
selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy … "
Serving my wife is much easier to trumpet than to live out. But the gust
of God's grace is at work. I am now a little more aware of my tendency not
to think of someone other than myself. And I'm grappling with the importance
of the gift of sacrifice in our marriage.
Displeasing Service
A red rose after a wintry contest of wills. A cup of hazelnut coffee
with cream and sugar while Jana blowdries her hair before work. A Hallmark
card slipped under her pillow that she finds only after I've left for a business
trip.
I've gladly given each of these to my wife. I enjoy pleasing her and hearing
her say, "Honey, that was so special." Yet I've discovered that I'd much
rather please my wife than truly serve her. Pleasing her often triggers a
gratifying response, while serving her may, at first, not please either one
of us.
The red rose and the Hallmark card are nice expressions of love. But Jana's
insistence that I had a real problem with my anger was a beautiful expression
of her love for me, no matter how difficult it was for me to accept. And
my choice to attend the church she preferred was also an expression of love.
Gifts of truth and sacrifice have a value that lasts long beyond the moment.
Ten years ago, my family buried our Russian-German grandfather in a patch
of South Dakota prairie with a headstone that reads: "Let this mind be in
you, which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5). The verse preceding that
one reads, "Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also
to the interests of others" (Phil. 2:4). And one of the verses following
it reads, "But [Christ] made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a
servant … " (Phil. 2:7).
The very nature of a servant. That was the mindset of Christ. And that is
the mindset I want to live out in my marriage.
Dave Goetz is senior associate editor of Leadership journal. He and Jana
live in the Chicago area with their son.
Copyright © 1996 by Christianity Today International/Marriage Partnership
Magazine.
Winter 1996, Vol. 13, No. 4, Page 12
Marriage Partnership
Home | Archives | Contact Us
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Try an Issue of Today's Christian Woman Free!
|
 |
|
No credit card required. Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery. Offer valid in U.S. only. Click here for International orders.
If you decide you want to keep Today's Christian Woman coming, honor your invoice for just $17.95 and receive five more issues, a full year in all. If not, simply write "cancel" across the invoice and return it. The trial issue is yours to keep, regardless.
Give Today's Christian Woman as a gift
Buy 1 gift subscription, get 1 FREE!
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
| 
