Experiencing Hope - From My Side of the Pulpit

The particular role of being married to a minister seems to have evolved barnacled with unscriptural misconceptions, faulty interpretation, and human traditions.

Theologically, God’s design for man and woman is found in Genesis 1.27-28, Genesis 2.18, Genesis 2.22-23, and Genesis 5.1-2. Man and woman have personal equality as image-bearers of God.  

Allowing for biological distinctives, both have the same human nature, qualities and abilities.  Maleness and femaleness, though distinct, are fully harmonized.  God’s precedence in male creation reflects God’s order and not superiority; woman has a distinctive role function within that equality. While man has the responsibility of headship, woman has the responsibility of being the “helper comparable to him.”  Each supplies what is lacking in the other. They are complementary because they are distinct.

 The Hebrew word for “helper,” ezer, in the Genesis 2:18 passage is presented in five major ways throughout Scripture: (1) to forgive and overlook fault, (2) to recompense by word or deed, (3) to cater to one’s need, (4) to forgive, not harboring grudges, and (5) to clear from charges.

The second half of the word, neged,  means “like unto himself,” “comparable to himself,” “a help as agreeing to him.” The root word from which it comes means “to tell,” “to acknowledge” or “to confess,” “to publish,”  “to proclaim” or ”to reflect.”

Woman is a perfect resemblance of a man.  She possesses neither inferiority nor superiority. Everything about her being is like and equal to him in essential being.  She is his spiritual partner to assist the man in keeping the Word of God and performing a spiritual service.

Pastor’s Family magazine indicates that forty-five percent of ministry wives surveyed fear physical, emotional, spiritual and marital burnout.  Nearly sixty percent work outside the home.  Forty-five percent indicate that they have no close friends.  And more than half surveyed worried about raising children in a “glass house.”     
     
In a 1993 survey, fifty-three percent of minister’s wives believed unrealistic expectations, either of their own or the perceived expectations of the congregation they served, to be the most gigantic problem they faced.

A survey sponsored by Focus on the Family identified loneliness and feelings of isolation, balance of family and church, expectations of church members, criticism of spouse, ministry, or children, and finances as the greatest challenges they faced in a ministry marriage.

A fact revealed in a survey taken by the National Association of Evangelicals is that one of the main reasons clergy are leaving the ministry by the hundreds is the stress placed on the clergyman’s wife.

Submitted by Barbara Liner. Used by Permission.