15 minutes about husbands loving their wives.

25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her
- Ephesians 5:25

This verse is part of a controversial passage, but for today, I just want to focus on this verse.
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"I need you to fight for me, because I don't know how."

Those are the words I said to my husband yesterday morning. It was a tense, tearful discussion, but a necessary one.

I bet that a lot of moms need to say those words to someone in their lives. We are wired to spend ourselves fighting for our children and our husbands. We try to make sure that their needs are met and they are reaching their full potential, but we often forget how to do that same thing for ourselves.

You see, the church is the bride of Christ. She is his hands, his feet, striving to make his kingdom come here on earth day in and day out. At least, that's what it's supposed to be. Christ loves his bride and knows that a healthy church must keep its body healthy in order to continue this important work. A loving husband must strive to do the same thing.

It's an everyday thing for moms to live off of the leftovers on their kids' plates, to arrange our sleep schedules around night wakings. To make room in the budget for the home school curriculum or the field trip or the princess shoes. We want our homes to look nice so our husbands feel welcome. Really, we do, even if it doesn't always look like we work hard to keep our homes clean.

We fight to climb that laundry mountain. To keep the healthy, tasty, meals coming while still keeping within budget.

We fight so that our children can see their full potential, so they can be challenged and grown and have every opportunity.

We love it. It is fulfilling and ultimately our heart's desire to love on our family day in and day out.

Still, in all of this fighting, a mother's deepest needs may go unmet. The introvert may wither under the constant conversation needed by her child. The extrovert may crumble without the social outlet she had before becoming a stay at home mom. The artist might nearly explode from all of the unexpressed creativity and nowhere to express it. The intellectual may go numb from lack of mental stimulation. On and on the list goes, because moms are, after all, people just like everyone else.

Somewhere, sometimes, in the middle of this love giving, we need someone to step in and say "You are more than this laundry pile, this meal plan, this budget and even these children. I want to you to see your full potential, to be challenged and grown and take the opportunities God has given you." We don't know how to do this for ourselves any more. We may even push back a little, afraid of being selfish. That's where the fight comes in. You have to use more than words to encourage us to pursue our passions. You have to carry some of our load. Take the kids for a while. Make room in the budget or time in the schedule. The whole family, and God's kingdom, will benefit from you fighting to let your wife pursue the passions He put in her.