No, our job—my job, your job—is not to change that man
but to respect him and then leave the rest to the Lord. When
you do this, you’re not letting him off the hook at all—you’re
just leaving him to God. You’re also well on your way to
discovering something else: he’s likely not the only one who
needs to do some changing. In fact, he probably isn’t the one
(at my house, at least) who needs changing the most. The more
you pray for your husband, the more the Spirit will shine a
spotlight on the places in your own heart and actions that need
a bit of work too.
The only effective way to fight in marriage is to pray. The
way to see the real truth behind whatever’s happening in this
whole situation of yours... is to pray. The way to get the
wheels moving again that have clogged up or perhaps totally
come off... is to pray. Prayer is how we isolate the real
problems. And prayer is how we get up behind those problems
and attack them at the roots. It’s how we isolate the real enemy.
It’s how we keep him on his heels and off our man.
And prayer is also how God gets through to us, even while
we’re praying for our husband, convincing us that maybe what
our husband needs most right now is for his wife to become a
soft, safe place for him to land, rather than a prickly, nagging