love yourself – Vanessa A. Harris

Two members of my extended family live with different autoimmune disorders. All autoimmune disorders boil down to the same thing: one part of the body no longer recognizes another, deems it an enemy, and attacks it. There are enough things in the world trying to take us out.

What do you do
when your own body
fights against you?

Recently I caught up with a friend I hadn’t checked in with in a while. She asked if I’d seen the movie, War Room and commented on how her marriage might have turned out if she prayed for her husband, fought for her marriage.

It is easier to complain than to pray, isn’t it?

Later the Lord showed me that marital strife is nothing more than an autoimmune disorder.

Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24

Marriage is the coming together of a man and woman to live as ONE.

When a husband treats his wife poorly, he’s really destroying himself. He’s essentially looking at part of his body as the enemy, and attacking her.

So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. Ephesians 5:28-29

When a wife doesn’t respect her husband’s leadership role in the family unit, she’s disrespecting herself.

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord…and let the wife see that she respects her husband. Ephesians 5:22, 33

In short, how you treat your spouse is how you treat yourself, because you are one. When you’re gracious to your spouse, you’re actually being gracious to yourself.

So if you have trouble treating your spouse well, do a wellness check on yourself. How are things with you? Are you swallowing words that should be shared with your spouse. Are you hiding wounds that are now festering?

Pray for insight on when your injury turned into an infection. What lie do you believe that has you so inflamed that instead of addressing the injury, you see your spouse as the enemy?

Then take care of yourself.

Sanitize the wound by sharing with your spouse only what hurt you and how. Resist the urge to have an “everything but the kitchen sink” discussion. Keep the conversation about the incident and nothing else.

Then dress your wound with truth. Your spouse’s truth about his heart towards you, though, admittedly, he hurt you. And the truth that the injury neither speaks to your identity in Christ nor to DADDY God’s heart towards you.

In tending to your soul, you see clearer the one whom your soul loves (Song of Solomon 3:4). And treat them accordingly.

And for more on healing the little girl in you, I recommend my book, DADDY’s Girl Forever, available on Amazon. In it, I empower you to move past the limits of your relationship with your father to find identity, acceptance, and unconditional love in the ultimate DADDY-daughter relationship with God.

Tag: love yourself

Marital Strife: A Civil War