We’re on Week 10 of the The Excellent Wife series. You can catch up on the older posts here. This week we’re diving into chapters 19 and 20.
Chapter 19: The Wife’s Fear
Fear ranges from mild anxiety to a full blown panic attack. I admit, I fear a lot of things. I fear my husband will get hurt playing football… I fear we might meet with an accident when bigger vehicles graze by our car… I fear the kids might stop breathing again… At times I can actually feel fear gripping my heart and knotting up my insides.
“Regretfully, fear is a fact of life in a fallen world. How we respond to our fears depends on our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. In Christ there are tangible solutions to fear.”
Thankfully, fear no longer has a grip on me. God showed me how destructive such anxiety was in my life. He reminded me that He has not given me a spirit of fear. In this chapter, the author discusses biblical principles concerning fear and solutions to help us overcome it.
Here are some of the solutions the author has mentioned, that also help me overcome anxious thoughts:
- Remind myself of God’s Word – I recite verses from the Bible that comfort me and give me peace. {Yet another reason to memorize scripture.}
- Realize God is ever-present with me – He is Immanuel, God with us. He is there with us in the midst of our trying situation.
- Trust God to keep His Word – I’ve heard it been said “Fear is the absence of Faith”. It’s true, isn’t it? If we’re fretting over something that God is in control of, it simply means we don’t trust Him enough to take care of it.
The author ends the chapter with thoughts on how to deal with legitimate fears. She teaches us to focus on what God wants us to do today, rather than jump to rash conclusions. She also teaches us to pray through our fears based on Philippians 4:6-9. If you are struggling with fear or anxiety, I encourage you to read God’s Word and rest in His presence today. I pray that His words will comfort you and envelope you with peace.
Chapter 20: The Wife’s Loneliness
I’m sure all of us have felt lonely at some point in time or the other. The worst isn’t being alone – it is being with a whole lot of people and still feeling lonely. The author gives us a list of people in the Bible who battled loneliness – Elijah, Jeremiah, Jesus and Peter.
“By far the most poignant and heart-wrenching picture of loneliness is that of the Lord Jesus Christ in the garden of Gethsemane and later on the cross.”
While Elijah and Jeremiah felt sorry for themselves, Jesus and Paul sought refuge in God. The author explains how Elijah and Jeremiah looked inward sinfully, but Jesus and Peter looked upward biblically.
“Loneliness in exacerbated by self-pity. Regardless of our circumstances, if we feel sorry for ourselves, we are likely to experience intense loneliness. Self-pity will throw a wife into the pit of depression very quickly.”
I agree that self-pity is the root cause for a lot of depressing thoughts. The author suggests that to combat self-pity we must be grateful to God and to our husbands; learning to be content in our circumstances. If God doesn’t remove us from our circumstances, He must have some purpose in them for us.
The author ends this chapter encouraging us to make the best use of our alone time by seeking God. When we feel lonely, we must let our emotions be a signal that we need time with God, to listen to Him and experience His presence.
If you feel lonely today, I want to remind you that people will always disappoint you. But there is a God who never will let you down; who never leaves you alone. For He has promised, “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5).
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