The Love Dare-Day Eight

Determine to become your spouse's biggest fan and to reject any thoughts of jealousy.  To help you set your heart on your spouse and focus on their achievements, take yesterday's list of negative attributes and discreetly burn it.  Then share with your spouse how glad you are about a success he or she recently enjoyed.

Love is not jealous-  Jealousy is one of the strongest drives known to man.  It comes from the root word for zeal and means "to burn with an intense fire"  The scriptures pointedly says, "Wrath is a fierce and anger is a flood, but who can stand before jealousy?"  (Proverbs 27:4)

There are two forms of jealousy: legitimate jealousy based upon love, and an illegitimate jealousy based upon envy.  Legitimate jealousy sparks when someone you love turns their heart away from and replaces you with someone else in the mind, body or both.  Illegitimate is in the opposition to love-one rooted in selfishness. This is jealousy of someone or of someone being more popular and can lead to feeling of hatred towards that person.  When you were married, you were given the role of becoming your spouse's biggest cheerleader and the captain of his or her fan club. Both of you became one and were to share the enjoyment of the other.  Because love is not selfish and puts others first, it refuses to let jealousy in.  It is time to let love, humility and gratefulness destroy any jealousy that springs up in your heart.  It is time to let your mate's success draw you closer together and give you greater opportunities to show genuine love.

  
Wow.  This is a powerful chapter because I have at one time in my marriage felt both ways and have allowed each type of jealousy to rule my thoughts and my heart.  I do not know anyone who hasn't.  One of the great things about being a child of God is we are not meant to be perfect, He does not expect us to be perfect and live a perfect life.  What God wants for us is to have free will but make good choices and when we are in the wrong admit it, ask for forgiveness and let go of it by giving  it to Him.  Our sins are the reason Christ died on the cross.

I did do what the challenge asked me to and burned my list of negative thoughts about my hubby.  It was a tough day yesterday because there was some uncertainty going on in my marriage which put me into a few hours of fear.  Once the fear set in, even as much as I tried to put it out of my mind and stay busy working, then the jealousy came into play.  It is amazing how they go hand in hand and can totally take over your mind and heart if you allow it to.

But this day instead of freaking out and reacting I just stayed within myself.  Yes, it was in my mind and there was panic and fear but I did not allow it to control me.  Normally these kinds of feelings can set me into a tail spin and I will spin out of control.  But I continued to tell myself "These are just feelings, you are not going to allow them to control you... what will be will be it is out of your control."  I silently said prayers to God to give me strength and I prayed for forgiveness for spending time jumping in and out of the Depreciation Room (see: The Love Dare-Day Seven)

By the end of the day my hubby was home and I was able to openly share with him my fears.  And you know what happened?  He listened AND heard me, he did not get defensive and he did not react either.... We just had a simple conversation about my fears and he helped me get over them.  This was God at work in my marriage because this is not our pattern.... God is good!

This chapter asked me how hard it was to burn the list, it really wasn't hard for me at all.  I love my hubby, I KNOW he is the man for me and I KNOW he can be all that he wants to be in this marriage and in his life.  I KNOW these negative attributes are not the only things that make him up and I know that he tries to overcome them.  My hubby is a good man, he has a big heart and he loves his wife and family.  He just has his own things he needs to work on and realize they do not define him and he does not have to let them rule his life or his choices.  This list was easy to burn, because I know this is not the man my hubby is meant to be, this is not the man God meant for him to be.  He will overcome and WE will live the life we were meant to live...... together.

I am my hubby's biggest fan, I always have been and I always will.

~Mellie

****I have a couple friends who are struggling in their marriage.  I challenged them to take the Love Dare with me.  This is a 60 day love challenge based off the movie FireProof Your Marriage.  I have started this challenge in the past but not fully dove into it or completed it so I thought if I got these ladies to do it with me we could all work through it together.

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I am always looking for ways to improve my marriage, my faith and my relationship with my hubby.  I am doing this for me more so than FOR him.  It is about changing who I am and who I want to be as a wife and mother and child of God.****