Passive Persecution Born in High Expectations

Expectations ruin relationships ~ from Ann VosKamp 1000 Gifts.  

Ann noticed how different her youngest child viewed life.  She gave her a camera and then while viewing the pictures she had taken, noticed how different everything looked....different vantage point....lower view.

The joy of a child, notice they are never expecting.

"Eucharisteo makes the knees the vantage point of a life...remembering her glee, because isn't that how children live?  Life as large surprise. A child has no expectation .... A rollin ball? Surprise! A laughing aunt? Surprise! Again and again? Surprise!" 

So I am looking at my life and how much of my angst is about meeting some imaginary expectation I have in my head.

Making things 'look' a particular way.  

Measuring an outcome with a standard set by me.  

Rejecting anything that does not 'match my picture'.  

How long has this been going on?  

How many relationships have I passively persecuted?


From Sacred Marriage Devotions by Gary Thomas "an entire category of wounding in marriage receives little notice, that is passive persecution."  He continues to warn about that moment in your marriage when that kind of neglect became an active wound.  

"What is withheld starts hurting, and it becomes a living irritant. Its devastation grows worse when the sore wound gets regularly pummeled by continued neglect." 

I have the tendency to battle with words, what I would not place in the category of of passive persecution, but you can be the judge.  Recently, as I am studying about marriage (and men's brains) I am finding out that what I have been doing is completely wrong if I want to affect my husband's behavior; hence improve our marriage.

Ladies, are you with me?  Ready for a real example?

Well, the first fact is that most men find it difficult to receive (or listen) to several words in a row spoken to them.  Ladies, we have the capacity to speak many many words to communicate what we are wanting or feeling.  Have you ever notice the blank stare...the distant gaze...they don't hear us after the first few words.

~~~~~

Example

I am leaving for a one day trip with a friend and need to leave our car in town.  I call my husband who is on a tractor in the hay field.  I call to ask about going on the spur-of-the-moment trip, he says ok~go.

I call back as I am problem solving to ask about where to leave the car.  I suggest a friend's house or Cracker Barrel.  It's a holiday weekend and I am concerned about parking it in a safe place. 

He says "leave the car at the church", I say; "I have heard that there have been cars broken into at the church ... (many more words) ... I think I'll leave it at a friends house."

Later in the day, my husband calls with an upset tone in his voice "where's the car? I'm in the church parking lot with my truck, trailer and equipment, I need the car".  YIKES!!

Here is what I learned from this; I had an expectation that my husband would listen to my several words as I problem-solved ~ not WE problem-solved.  AND I (notice again I) did not do what my husband asked me to do.

This has been an issue for me most of my life.  I think most 'independent' women will understand this.  As I study God's design of marriage, I see that my husband is the leader of this family and too much of the time in my life, I have problem-solved with the wrong intention in my heart.  

My true intention was not to listen to my husband, say to myself that I have no need to go any further in my thinking, and just do as I am told.  If I am telling the truth, I am not calling him to ask, I am calling him to inform and demonstrate my independent thinking.

My expectation as a wife has not been biblical.  Now, don't for a minute think I'm saying wives are to be a doormat and so subservient to their husband they no longer think for themselves.  

I'm saying that there is freedom and true 'joy' in God's design for marriage.

What a load to be taken off of my shoulders, to just trust and obey.  To take away that expectation of 'gotta think for him and for me and argue with him'.

 "Let's allow kindness and even generosity to govern us.  The person you're talking to took a tremendous risk.  Out of all the billions of people on the face of the earth, he or she chose to spend this life with you.  When your spouse made this decision, her or she put himself or herself at your mercy since, as we said before, there are certain things only a spouse can provide.  Let's honor that trust with open hands and enthusiastic hearts." ... Gary Thomas in Sacred Marriage