There is no shortage of places you can get quality leadership advice. Countless books, podcasts, and yes, even blogs, like this one exist to help you navigate leadership waters. However, the best leadership advice I ever received came in 1990 and had to do with the most important leadership role I play – husband. This advice has served me well for over 25 years. It is advice I revisit often. Here’s the story:
Our church was conducting a revival. For those of you unfamiliar with this term, a revival is week-long time in the life of a church with its purpose being spiritual renewal. Revivals also had guest speakers who communicated on a nightly basis to those in the church.
The communicator for this particular week was a gentleman named Manley Beasley Jr. One evening he was speaking on marriage and gave those in attendance the best leadership advice I ever heard.
When a husband and wife are in a disagreement, the husband should always back down, apologize, take the blame, and let the wife win – especially when he is RIGHT and done NOTHING WRONG!
I know this is counter-intuitive but Manley went on to explain. The reason husbands should back down, take the blame, let the wife win even when he did nothing wrong for is because this is what Jesus did on the cross.
Jesus lived a perfect, sinless life. He was right and did absolutely nothing wrong. Yet, He took all the blame, all the shame, all the guilt, all the abuse, all the embarrassment, and paid the ultimate price of death so the relationship with His bride, the church, could be restored.
Nothing has helped my marriage more over the years than applying this principle. Men, if you are like me, we have a gift for naturally messing up and saying the wrong things. When this happens (and it could happen again today!) just say you are sorry.
Ironically, you will not be shedding any new light to your wife or those closest to you when you admit you messed up. They already know you have messed up.
When you are in a hole, stop digging. Someone reading this post is currently in a disagreement. You need to stop what you are doing and go apologize right now. Even if you think you’re right (and you very well may be), remember what Jesus did on the cross. The pain and embarrassment you will feel won’t seem so bad when compared to what Jesus experienced.
If you practice this type of servant leadership, you may have a marriage that stands the test of time.
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