Y'all may want to sit down for this one.

Overall, I liked this chapter.

Yes, you're reading Keer "Unplugged." LOL!!!!

Chapter 13 is about reverence. On page 124 Mrs. Pearl opens with:

A wise woman understands that her husband's need to be honored is not based on his performance, but on his nature and his God-ordained position.

She quotes from Ephesians 5:32-33:

This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church...and the wife see that she reverence her husband"

And I love how the Amplified Version expands on verse 33:

...her husband [that she notices him, regards him, honors him, prefers him, venerates, and esteems him; and that she defers to him, praises him, and loves and admires him exceedingly]

Page 125:

Reverence: to revere, to be in awe; fear mingled with respect and esteem.
1. Obedience is doing what you know the other person wants you to do.
2. Submission is your heart giving over to the other person's will.
3. Reverence is more than just doing what a man expects or demands. It is an act of the woman's will to treat him with a high degree of regard and awe.
Obedience, submission, and reverence are all acts of the will and are not based on feelings. Showing deference toward one's husband is an act of reverence toward the God who placed you in that role.

Mrs. Pearl shares a couple of examples of women who reverence their husbands even though they most definitely do NOT deserve it. The first woman, Judy, reverences a man who began seeing prostitutes shortly after they married. She has convinced their young son that his daddy is #1 by the things that she does to reverence him. Page 127:

I have to confess that as I typed Judy's letter into my book, I wept. Judy has turned her heart to God, for only God could have done such a work of grace in a woman. She is reverencing a man who does not deserve it, and in so doing she is reverencing God.Do you understand that concept by now? She is reverencing God by reverencing her husband, not because her husband is a fit representative of Christ, and not because he is a worthy substitute, but because God placed her in subjection to her husband. And, when it gets humanly ridiculous to obey that lousy man, and when he gives her every reason to not respect him, there is only one controlling factor left - God. This woman is obeying and reverencing God, and no one else. That creep of a husband is the fortunate recipient of honor being given to God. Her faith sees beyond the sinning man to the God who created us all and "so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son..." (John 3:16).

If her faithfulness is never rewarded with a new birth change in her husband, her commitment will not be wasted, for the grace that God is working in her heart is making her supremely fitted to be the bride of Christ. It is an eternal work taking place in her soul. Her obedience to God, and her willingness to go beyond the extra mile, prevents her husband's sin from damaging their son. She has covered a multitude of sins with her love and forgiveness (I Peter 4:8).

Now, I do want to make clear that there are situations in which church discipline may be in order, or that the wife at the very least needs to say something to her husband about whatever he is doing (like in Judy's case - she does need to speak up about the prostitution at some point, even if it's just to protect herself from disease). But many of us aren't dealing with "major" things like that. Many of us are dealing with husbands who aren't leading family devotions or who won't wash a dish/change a diaper/fold a towel to save their lives or who haven't spent money very wisely. Men do some pretty dumb things...and God commands their wives to reverence them ANYWAY. (We women do some pretty dumb things too! ;-) ) If women like Judy can go beyond the extra mile and reverence their husbands, so can I, even when my husband is acting like a goober. (Which is about as often as I act like a goober too. ;-) )

A section titled "Play It Again, Sue" begins on page 128. I know all too well what Mrs. Pearl is talking about.

In our own strength, we women tend to have minds like old LP records that are scratched. We take our husband's faults and replay them in our thoughts over and over again, "he's insensitive...he's insensitive...he's insensitive...he's insensitive...." We get worked up over the smallest offense until our agitation sours into bitterness. He will forget to feed the dog three days in a row. We will look at the empty dog bowl and attribute all kinds of evil motives to him. He will leave us waiting in the car for an extra ten minutes, and we convince ourselves that his lack of consideration is just the tip of the cold iceberg of his heart. Since we are "Christian" ladies, and the kids are watching, we don't rant and rave; we just give him the stone-cold, silent treatment. He must know how much he hurts us, and the best way to retaliate is to hurt him back by depriving him of what he wants most - respect, honor, and love.

Page 128:

The difference between a good marriage and a lousy one is not found in good husbands and good wives versus bad husbands and bad wives, for all marriages are made up of two sinners with lots of faults.A good marriage is good because one or both of them have learned to overlook the other's faults, to love the other as he or she is and to not attempt to change the other or bring him or her to repentance. A bad marriage is not one that contains more faults between the two of them; it is a marriage where one or both of them gets worked up over issues that good marriage partners let slide and cover up with love and forgiveness.

Um....sort of. I can see what she is trying to say here, but that's most likely because I'm approaching it from a pretty good marriage. We have our "issues," but I don't have to worry about him bugging my e-mail, getting mad if I drip water on the bathmat, or not coming home at night. (Those are all true examples from assorted friends of mine.) Many times, yes, women get all up in arms over STUPID STUFF like leaving the toilet seat up or not wringing out the washcloth or not cleaning out the garage. But for SERIOUS ISSUES (like abuse, infidelity, etc.), the wife can overlook, forgive, etc. all she wants, and it won't necessarily turn their marriage into a "good" one.

So as I said, I see what she's trying to get at, but it's not a given that if you forgive your husband when he's a jerk to you, you'll have a good marriage.

Now THIS I agree with (continuing in that paragraph):

When a woman gets it in her mind that she must change her husband before she will allow him to relax in the security of her honor and respect, she will never see so much as the bottom side of a good marriage, except when she is kissing hers good-bye.

I've known too many women like that. They treat their husbands like jerks and expect them to change before they treat them kindly. And if they are Christian women, many times they'll demand that the husband love them like Christ loved the church! GROAN!!!!!

Next is a section entitled, "Eve Has Many Sisters," and the basic premise is found in the first sentence:

Where men struggle with fleshly imaginations, we women give ourselves over to emotional imaginations and create a world of hurt for ourselves and those around us.

Overall I'd say that's a pretty true statement. Women tend to LOVE pity parties and "Oh let me tell you how mean my husband is being to me...."

Mrs. Pearl discusses how that's how Satan went about tempting Eve:

Eve was deceived through her runaway imaginations. The root of her sin was doubting God's goodwill toward her. Eve, today, has many sisters. We still doubt the one in authority over us and imagine that he does not intend good for us. Like Eve, we imagine that we can disobey the authority of God's Word and of our husband's word because we "imagine" that we have a higher purpose - to be more spiritual.We have been tricked into believing that our husbands have committed offenses against us, all the while thinking that we are more spiritual because of the insights we have. We all agree that any man who lives in a lustful daydream is a godless man. And I say to you readers, that any woman who lives on the edge, expecting to be offended and believing ill will on every hand, that woman is living in vain imaginations and is a godless woman. It is time to get yourself under God-ordained authority. Believe God, believe the best of your husband, your neighbors, your church, your family, etc., and get on with the blessings and joy of life and marriage.

For women who are truly imagining things, then yes, they need to get on with the blessings and joy of life and marriage. But let's face it. Some women AREN'T just imagining things. Some women have husbands who won't shower, and then when the wife washes sheets a little more often for sanitary reasons, the husband yells at her for THAT. Some women are in lose-lose situations and NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO, they cannot please their husbands, no matter how hard they try. So a woman in a situation like that...it's not that she is doubting God's good will for her...she just knows that her husband AIN'T LISTENING TO GOD.

But as I said, I know that many women do tend to imagine the worst when their husbands do/don't do something. "He did that on purpose, just to make me mad," "He doesn't care one iota that I'm stuck here with a sick child, and he's galavanting all over town," etc. We need to GET OVER it, quit imagining the worst, and believe that our husband ISN'T the insensitive jerk we think he is.

And here Mrs. Pearl comes back to Judy, the wife of the "#1 Daddy."

Not one of us honestly thinks Judy's husband deserved her reverence, or her love for that matter. He is a first-class jerk and deserves to sleep alone in an alley under a cardboard box. But God has called us to a higher plane. It is on this higher plane that we discover the wonder of life, of love, and of forgiveness. And it is the place where we will come to be cherished. Few men are able to continue being angry, lustful, and selfish in the face of such a strong force as being reverenced.

IN GENERAL I'm sure she's right. If someone strikes us on the cheek we are to offer them the other one. Judy's story is a very inspiring one. Would I go so far to say that she has a "good marriage" though? I'm not sure. I hope that her husband was able to see past the end of his nose and see what she was doing for him. I can't say that her response was necessarily the one that ALL WOMEN EVERYWHERE need to have when faced with similar situations. Begging God for direction and wisdom in how to proceed is the key. Some women He might lead to leave, so that HE can break their husbands. But others He very well could lead to bend over backwards to please their husbands. Only He knows what is going on in the husbands' hearts, and only He knows what will break the husbands' will so that they will come to repentance.

Page 131:

When a woman does not provide for her husband a comfortable nest and a reverent attitude, she has to rely on his goodness to "keep him" faithful. She is a fool to expect him to be a good husband when she is not being the help meet God has created her to be.*snip*

Women take it for granted that a man will be faithful because it is his Christian duty to be faithful (and it is). It is also a woman's Christian duty to be a help meet: honoring, obeying, serving, and reverencing.

*snip*

Counselors agree that in almost all marriage conflicts both husband and wife share the blame almost equally. A man's guilt is usually easy to see. A woman's guilt is less obvious but just as destructive and just as evil. God ordained a woman to be a help meet. She is to provide a haven of rest and satisfaction, and to be a delight to her husband. When she fails to obey God, there is often "hell to pay." when she obeys God, even if she is married to a "lost" man, she will usually reap heavenly results.

*sigh* These could have been such super paragraphs if it weren't for her faulty definition of "help meet" overshadowing everything.

While it IS a husband's responsibility to remain faithful despite what his wife does, his wife should make it easy to remain faithful. And I know what she is talking about when she says that the woman's guilt is often less obvious. Especially in today's society, where women are bombarded with the "need" to "stand up for their rights" and the "need" for equality and the "advancement" of femininism, blah blah blah. All too often women are told they need to expect (and sometimes demand!) more out of their husbands when it comes to doing things around the house, with the family, etc. And then these women get up on their self-righteous high-horses about it and point fingers when their marriages fall apart. They feel they are "victims."

Now, I HAVE known situations in which the women truly ARE the victims. Their husbands were/are abusive (and I don't use that term lightly). I'm not talking about them. :-)

But then we come back to my *sigh*. Being a help meet is so much MORE than what Mrs. Pearl makes it out to be (keeping the house clean, taking care of the children, cooking good food, keeping the husband happy in bed, etc.) A wise woman I know put it this way, "Debi describes a 'yes man'... not a real helper. A real helper isn't there to just soak up all her dh's errors, misjudgments, flaws, etc. God wouldn't have GIVEN him a helper if he didn't NEED a helper."

Well, at least Mrs. Pearl wrote that usually the woman will reap heavenly results rather than hint at a guarantee as she does in the rest of the book....

Mrs. Pearl then writes about a girl named Sunny who married a man who turned out to be a violent, alcoholic wife-beater. This girl chose to stay with her husband and to obviously reverence him. Instead of speaking ill of him to others, she ONLY spoke good things. She honored him even though he didn't deserve it by ANY means.

Again, this is an inspiring story, and one I think we all can learn from. Most of us don't have to deal with physically abusive husbands or anything even CLOSE to that. Yet we don't think twice to say something negative about our husbands to other people, and if we don't do that, often we simply don't say anything. Many times we certainly don't PRAISE our husbands to other people! I've been trying to make more of a conscious effort to do so, and while I respected my husband before, I'm finding that I respect him even more, even though he hasn't really done a whole lot differently. :-) I also try to tell HIM how proud I am of him. It's funny...I can almost see him grow an inch from standing just a little taller when I say things like that. (Yet I make sure it's not just flattery!)

HOWEVER, I cannot support Mrs. Pearl's statement on page 133:

I spent hours in prayer and counseling with Sunny that evening. I asked her to make a decision, either to leave Ahmed once and for all and put the pieces of her life back together, or to stay with him and begin a campaign of winning his heart and saving their life together. I fully expected her to leave him that night, but I discovered something amazing about her: Sunny really wanted God's will in her life. She had grasped an eternal vision about life, and she now believed God could save her man.

I do not disagree one bit that God could save her husband. What I disagree with is the insinuation that leaving a physically abusive situation is contrary to God's will. It is simply not for us to decide that. I'm glad that things turned out well for Sunny, but it is more of a testimony of God's faithfulness than Sunny's "obedience" by staying with an abusive husband. Mrs. Pearl is putting the emphasis on the wrong person in this story. This was a story about a miracle worked in this man's heart, NOT about how Sunny "obeyed" and won her husband.

Now, obviously this is what the Lord wanted SUNNY to do, but does he call EVERY SINGLE WOMAN in a similar situation to do the same??? No. But I fear for the women who read this book and think that by physically removing themselves and their children from their husband's presence, that they will be disobeying the Lord. :-(

In the "Time to Consider" section at the end of the chapter, Mrs. Pearl again reminds us how important it is that we wives reverence our husbands. She lists "Traits of a Good Help Meet" that are very true:

She acknowledges the "good traits" in her man.
She speaks of her husband with esteem.
She defers to him.
She never responds to him with scorn or ridicule.

These would be very good habits for all wives to practice. :-)