How to Honor Your Wife: Be a Guardian and a Gardener
by David Chadwick
In Bible times, for a city to be safe, there needed to be strong walls erected around the city. When an enemy attacked a city, he would first lay siege against the walls. When the Babylonians captured Jerusalem in 586 BC, they completely razed the walls surrounding the holy city. The Jews were taken into captivity for 70 years. Persia eventually overthrew Babylon and became the world’s foremost power. Cyrus, the king of Persia, then allowed some Jews to return home to Jerusalem and the surrounding area.
In the Bible, the book of Nehemiah tells the story of Nehemiah getting permission from Persia’s king, Artaxerxes, to rebuild Jerusalem’s walls. He returned to Jerusalem to accomplish this call from God. Amidst fierce opposition, he eventually succeeded. The walls around the holy city were rebuilt. The city was now safe again from the exploits of surrounding enemies.
Nehemiah is an example of what husbands should be. We are builders and restorers of the walls around our families. We build them high, wide, and impregnable. We know there is an enemy who wants to destroy marriages and families. He is wily and tireless. He will use an array of different weapons to rob marriages and families of their God-intended purpose.
Therefore, God calls the husband to be aware of the enemy’s underhanded, evil tactics. He calls the husband to build strong walls around his home and be the primary guardian against all evil attacks. And regularly walk those walls to make sure the enemy doesn’t try to invade.
As the spiritual leader of your home, you are not only a guardian, but also a gardener. Israel was called a vineyard, with God as the vinedresser. His job was to carefully nurture Israel’s spiritual life. In the same way that God was a gardener to Israel, so is Jesus to his church. Similarly, husbands should be gardeners who care for their wives and children. They are called by God to spiritually nurture their homes, as God did Israel and Jesus does his church.
What, then, is the primary job of the gardener? Yes, there is a decided defensive aspect to his responsibilities. He is to pluck weeds from the garden. He is to prune what is unnecessary. He is to carefully look for pests and signs of disease. In these ways, he is similar to being a guardian and a watchman who walks the walls of his family’s city.
But there is also an overt offensive aspect to his responsibility. He is called to place nutrients in the soil. He is to fertilize the plants. He may even build a greenhouse to ensure the best possible environment. He uses these offensive strategies to give the plants the best chance for survival. The gardener knows that without obstacles and enemies, a fertilized plant will most often grow to full health. It will become what it was intended to be.
This series is adapted from David Chadwick’s book, Eight Great Ways to Honor Your Wife. To download your free PDF copy of the book, please visit our website by clicking here!