013 : Words Hold Weight
in this episode of the refined sisterhood co-hosts maddie and kait discuss the importance of using life-giving words in your marriage. maddie and kait express that they know first hand how easy it can be to speak out of anger or frustration and neglect to consider whether or not it is respectful to your husband—and they even share personal examples of times in their marriages where they used words that were not life-giving. this episode is full of biblical advice as to how to combat the anger that often overtakes our words when moments of weakness and instead turn them into life-giving words of comfort and encouragement.
to set the precedent of this week’s episode, maddie poses the following question:
“have you ever been in a weird funk, where you feel like your marriage is just spinning in circles, and you are not communicating well, or you just feel like you and your husband are just not seeing eye to eye?”
it is really easy in marriage to get into the swing of things and forget that the lord has set an expectation for our marriages that we should be striving to meet everyday, even if our spouse is making it especially difficult in certain instances.
in order to kick-start this conversation, maddie and kait express how important life-giving words are to both of them and share instances where they know they were not using life-giving words when speaking to their husbands.
kaitlin shares that since having a baby there have been so many instances where words have come out of her mouth that she instantly regretted because that they were not only not life-giving, but they were almost destructive to her husband because she was almost questioning his ability to be a dad, and kaitlin shares that that is not okay with her.
it is so easy to act out of frustration and anger, especially if you are like kaitlin and like things to be “perfect”, or just exactly the way you want them to be.
maddie then chimes in and says that people are wrong when they say that the first year of marriage is the hardest because she thinks the hardest year in her marriage has been this past year after having keegan. since having a baby, maddie expresses that there have been a lot of conversations between she and her husband that she did not want to have or intend on having, or she responded to situations in a way that was not the best. we are all guilty of this in one way or another. and especially in marriage there are so many arguments that stem from things that were said out of frustration “in the moment.”
maddie then shifts the conversation to why life-giving words are so important in marriage.
the lord calls us to speak words of life into others.
kaitlin shares that as a wife she is called to love and submit to her husband in a way that is respectful to him, especially when it comes to how she uses her words.
maddie piggy-backs off of this to say that both she and kaitlin are very dominate people so hearing things like “submit to your husband” can be very triggering in a way, but ultimately that is what the lord calls women to do in a marriage.
maddie introduces a book that she and her husband, shaun, read in premarital counseling that really puts things in a way that makes sense: Love and respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs
husbands are created to give, receive, and expect respect according to the law of the lord, the bible. maddie discusses an illustration in love and respect of a circle going round and round (shown with arrows) and one person, either you or your husband, has to break the cycle of the circle and reset the routine of honor and respect to one another.
maddie shares that there have been so many instances where she knows she has treated shaun in a way that is disrespectful and is aware that it dictates the love he shows maddie in return. we all want our own love stories to look like a movie and be “picture perfect” but ultimately, movies aren’t real. your own marriage is the only one that you need to care about.
kaitlin shares that she and maddie both have really strong tones and personalities and they both recognize that their tones play a large role in how respectful they are to their husbands. the lord calls us to be slow to anger so that we do not repeatedly say things that we do not mean when we are angry or frustrated and react immediately. maddie and kaitlin state they are very aware of how aggressive they both can sometimes come accross to their husbands and know that they cannot expect their husbands to be a leader of the household if they are speaking to them in a way that comes across in a motherly way, instead of an encouraging, wifely way.
in order to aid listeners in being more respectful and life-giving to their husbands, as well as for themselves. maddie and kait share some ways to practice using life-giving words:
take your moments of frustration and turn your words into life-giving words of encouragement for your husband. be slow to speak.
do not put unrealistic expectations on your spouse.
maddie shares that she is the first born of five children whereas shaun is the youngest of four kids—so their “roles” were set in their family based on birth order, yet that cannot carry into your marriage.
do not expect that your husband just automatically knows what to do.
offer grace and understanding when your husband “doesn’t know what to do.”
be sure you are taking in positivity because your words and actions will reflect that.
unfollow accounts on social media that promote disrespectful demeaners.
“what you believe will dictate how you live your life” -maddie’s pastor
pay attention to how you are talking to yourself.
if you do not talk to yourself in a way that is positive and uplifting then how do you expect to have the positive words to use towards your spouse.
practice uplifting yourself.
be in the word everyday and take in god’s truth more than any other words.
kaitlin reminds listeners that marriage is sacred between you, your husband, and the lord and she personally believe that by disrespecting your husband you are also disrespecting the lord because he gives specific instructions on how we should live our lives in-order to be pleasing to him.
to close out the episode, kaitlin and maddie share some prayers that you can pray over your marriage:
ask the lord to eliminate selfishness from your marriage and pray that you will seek to not find faults in one another; that selflessness will out-weigh selfishness.
pray that you will not put unrealistic expectations on your spouse.
pray that your words would speak life and not death.
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Music : Better Than Life by Oliver Dodge