Being Humbled In Marriage

I felt like God was teasing me, and all the while asking me, “What are you gonna do now, missy?” Have you ever felt like God was teaching you a lesson in a humorous fashion? Well, that’s what my story for this post is all about. God teasing me, and teaching me a lesson.

Let’s figure out the lesson together, shall we?

Just a couple of weeks ago my husband—who has had double knee replacement surgery—was saying goodbye to our kids and grandkids, outside, on a cold night, and then, proceeded to “run” up our driveway.

The next day it had become apparent he had done some kind of damage to one of his knees. Instead of feeling sympathy and compassion my main emotion was anger. I’m humbly embarrassed to admit this, but it’s true. I was mad at him.

“Why would you run, up our driveway in the cold after you recently had knee surgery?”

“Why?”

I was peeved at him.

Even though I felt bad that he was in pain and had trouble walking, I still felt peeved.

He did as our doctor recommended and his knee healed very quickly, it was a short lived injury.

Then, just this past week he and I were at a seminar/conference training thing and while walking upstairs my knee started hurting. Out of nowhere. It had never hurt like this before. Ever! As it got worse—to the point where I was limping around and in a lot of pain—I tried to figure out what I could have done to cause such pain.

It hit me. As I walked up to ask a question of the presenter I tripped, almost hitting the deck, but caught myself and landed on my feet. Such grace. I tend to do stuff like this. It’s hard to look credible while you’re stumbling over your own feet.

For days, after getting back home I had to nurse my knee back to normal. And do you want to know who was the most compassionate and loving and caring? Yup, you guessed it, my husband. He instructed me on exactly what to do to heal.

Here’s the thing. I had never experienced anything like this with my knee before.

As I described the pain, it was exactly what my husband felt.

It was the same injury Mike had.

The biggest difference was that he didn’t get mad at me or “chastise” me for not being more careful. And he didn’t moan and groan about the pain like I did with my leg up, on the couch, on a pillow.

It felt like God was teaching me a lesson.

It was as if God said,

“How do you feel now?”

“Stop being such a bully.”

 “What are you gonna do now, missy?”

Please understand, I am not at all saying that God somehow gave me an injury. All I am pointing out is that I learned a lesson from getting the same injury my husband had.

I just know the facts of the case.

How this lines up theologically?

That I can’t tell you.

What I can tell you is…

I apologized to my husband and felt humbly horrible for not being more compassionate and understanding.

“Treat others the same way you want them to treat you.”

-Luke 6:31

This is definitely a motto to live by.

Especially in marriage.

Lucille Williams is the author of “From Me to We” and “The Intimacy You Crave: Straight Talk about Sex and Pancakes”   order a copy today to enhance your marriage. Subscribe to Lu Says for weekly encouragement.