The Power of the Praying Wife: We go through the pain to get to the joy

As we prepare to start "The power of the praying wife", please bear in mind that it is not a means of gaining control over your husband. It’s laying down all claim to power in and of yourself, and relying on God’s power to transform you, your husband, your circumstances, and your marriage. It’s a gentle tool of restoration appropriated through the prayers of a wife who longs to do right more than be right, and to give life more than get even.

Praying for your husband will be an act of unselfish, unconditional love and sacrifice on your part. You must make this commitment knowing he may never make the same commitment concerning you- so release him from that obligation. If he doesn't pray for you, it’s his loss more than yours. Your happiness and fulfilment will not ride on whether he prays; it will depend on your own relationship with the Lord.

We don’t have authority over our husbands. However, we have been given authority “over all the power of the enemy” (Luke 10:19) and can do great damage to the enemy’s plans when we pray. But we can say: “I will not allow anything to destroy my marriage”, “I will not sit idle while an invisible wall goes up between us”, “I will not allow confusion, miscommunication, wrong attitudes, and bad choices to erode what we are trying to build together”

You have authority in the name of Jesus to stop evil and permit good. You can submit to God in prayer whatever controls your husband- alcoholism, workaholism, laziness, depression, infirmity, abusiveness, anxiety, fear, bad financial management – and pray for him to be released from it.

The strength of a man and wife joined together in God’s sight is far greater than the sum of the strength of each of the two individuals. That is because the Holy Spirit unites them and gives added power to their prayers. This oneness gives power that the enemy doesn’t like. That why he devises ways to weaken it. He gives us whatever we will fall for- low self esteem, pride, the need to be right, miscommunication, or the bowing to our own selfish desires. He will tell likes like:

“Nothing will ever change”, “You failures are irreparable”, ”There’s no hope for reconciliation”, “You’d be happier with someone else”. – If you believe the lies, your heart will eventually be hardened against God’s truth, and you may be cutting off the future of your marriage. When the heart becomes hardened, there is no vision from God’s perspective, you only see the way it is, not the way God wants it to become.- In such instances, you need to deliberately lay down your life before His throne, die to your desires, pain- and give your needs to Him. When you begin to trust God, you are then able to envision His ability to resurrect love and life from the deadest of places. You will then experience firsthand the resurrecting power of the Lord- the power that raised Christ from the dead in just 3 days!

But it doesn't happen without a heart for God that is willing to gut it out in prayer, grow through tough times, and wait for love to be resurrected. We have to go through the pain to get to the joy. Pray to the Lord for an end to the conflict and breaking hold of the strife in your lives. For Him to take away the hurt and armour you've put up to protect yourselves.

As you begin this journey and discover the power of the praying wife, don’t give place to impatience and don’t worry about how it will happen. It’s your responsibility to pray. It’s God’s job to answer. Leave it in His hands.

Extracted from The Power of A Praying Wife by Stormie Omartian