Letter from your husband

Dear _______,

I know I don’t show it enough or know how to show it, but I appreciate you. Not only all that you do - and most of it in secret - but who you are and who you’re becoming.

I know I only get to see 10% of all the heart-work and hand-work you do each and every day. Quietly and faithfully, without recognition or to the sound of applause, you have been consistently cultivating a home atmosphere and home culture that is pleasing to the Lord, and filling the air of our home with love, wisdom, and compassion for our children to grow and to flourish in.

It’s evident in the faces of our children that you take pains to see to it they wake up in security, safety, and joy. Their souls are flourishing too, and I know it’s because they have a mother who prays for them and with them, nourishing them in a God-bathed world. That is more important to me than a clean, perfectly swept house, or home-made, slaved-over meals.

You extend yourself and try to learn and develop skills in areas that are difficult for you and don’t come naturally to you - all because you want to give your best for our family. I know it’s hard work to stretch yourself like that, especially after a long day of being mommy, teacher, counselor, nurse, triage, chauffeur, referee, janitor, cook, actor in a play, doll’s voice, advocate, dance competition judge, cheerleader - I can’t list all that you do in a single day! Please know that it’s okay that things don’t turn out as you hope, or you get tired (we all do!) so certain tasks slip from your mind. I know you try hard, and you have high expectations for yourself. But do remember to give yourself time and space to rest too. I see your self-sacrificing heart.

I see the way you go above and beyond in homeschooling our children. Whether one child or 30, lessons plans have to made for each grade. You do that for each child! I’m so very proud of you. Our children are extremely blessed to have a teacher who truly sees them, with love, with vision from God, and relentlessly works and researches to give them the best that we can in this season of life.

I know there must be so many times you’ve protected me, defended me, and shielded me from burdens you knew my weary shoulders were too burdened to carry. You carried them for me. Alone. How you must have felt alone! I’m sad to realize this now, but I know you are a courageous woman of God, and through it, you drew nearer to Him, who took the burdens from your heart.

How often you must have prayed for me. Even fasting for me each month with your Life-giving Motherhood sisters. I wasn’t aware at the time. I probably don’t know how much you cried for me, how much you understood and empathized with me. I didn’t know how to share everything with you, and I guess sometimes I felt ashamed to. I know now how foolish that was of me. You are so strong. You’re strength is a supernatural one from the Holy Spirit. Praise God for the way He upheld you through all these years.

I’m so sorry that when I come home, I’m so focused on my own exhaustion, I don’t stop to think how exhausted you must be. I have one job, while you have multiple jobs that pull you in many directions. I wish I could turn back time, and knew to give you a least an hour to yourself, to refresh your introverted soul - that I could show you I “see” you, and now that I’m home, I want to take care of you. You’re always being poured out for our family, and I know you would give your last breath to keep loving us. Please forgive me for keeping just “taking, taking, taking” from you, expecting you to be this unending fountain. Because I see you as so strong, with so much self-control, I forget that you are just as much in need of respite as I am. I will do better.

Thank you for being the protector of our home when I couldn’t be, and the spiritual leader for our children too, when I was too busy or too tired. You upheld the fort. You held and are holding our family together. I know this is because Jesus is your Strength, your Rock, and your Refuge.

Please forgive me for not knowing how to be more interested in what is important to you. I know it often seems I’m only encouraging appointments and tasks you do that support my work. But that’s not true. I want to know what you love and what you’re passionately called to as well. You are a born person, uniquely created and called by God too. I want to learn how to listen well, to your heart, without distraction. Forgive me for not knowing to be supportive in what God calls you to, or understanding the gravity of it - that out of the overflow of your home ministry, God has called you to minister to mothers like you. I don’t mean to tune out or seem disinterested, I’m just still figuring out how to play the supporting role. I do want you to feel safe to share it all with me, to trust me with your God-given dreams and ideas. I know I need to earn that trust back. I want to. Would you help me learn my part?

I know I don’t say it as often as I should, and I know I’m usually lost in my own thoughts of work, or oblivious of aaaall your fingerprints over our family’s life, but I do know that it is SO good because God knew you were my missing rib, the one closest to my heart.

I love you and I want to keep loving you, and protecting this deepening love for you. It’s not a love that began in me, but that began from God, before time began. I want to enter into His love more and more with you.

“Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: “Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all.” Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her off the fruit of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates.” (Proverbs‬ ‭31‬:‭28‬-‭31‬ ‭ESV‬‬)

Preparing for forever together,

Your loving, being-sanctified-with-you husband

DISCLAIMER: The content of this letter is not derived from any one person’s experience but a compilation of heart-stories shared with me by many, many wives and mothers, over decades. I share with the hope that our Lord speaks to you and encourages your heart, because HE sees you. And that’s all that matters for eternity.

Written July 2023.