The Respectful Wife

Again a warning.  My egalitarian friends (men and women are equal and have the same roles) will not enjoy Grace Driscoll's complimentarian (men and women are equal but play different roles) perspective.  Chapter 4 of the Driscoll's book on marriage is written by Grace and is titled 'The Respectful Wife.'

I suppose you could summarise much of her teaching by saying that she encourages a positive (making the effort to notice the good things about your husband) rather than a negative (always focusing on his failings) approach.  That being said she believes that a wife should be willing to confront her husband and encourage him to change.  Not only does she criticise the contentious wife, she also highlights the problems of the silent compliant wife.  She says that wives need to work on disagreeing respectfully, counselling respectfully and submitting respectfully.

Some quotes:

'A wife is the most powerful person in her husband's life, with a great opportunity to encourage her husband towards godliness through her words, actions, and body language.'

'We believe ... the husband gets to decide when he feels disrespected ... And the wife gets to decide when she feels unloved ...'

'A wife flourishes with a loving husband, and a husband becomes courageous with a respectful wife.'

'... our goal cannot be to fix our husbands or even to save our marriages, but rather to glorifying God by submitting to our husbands, trusting that His commands are those of a loving Father who not only wants our lives to work but to be ones of worship.'