Proclaimer Blog
Your wife is beautiful
No really.
One of the 'commands' of Scripture is to find delight in the 'wife of your youth.' It's a strange phrase to unpack. But whatever else this means (how many wives have you?) at the very least it means that you, Mr Married Preacher, are to find your wife beautiful. You should delight in her. Even if time has ravaged you both. I think this is one of the most helpful things I ever learnt giving marriage prep. We need to discipline ourselves to find our wives beautiful, whatever the cultural pressures tell us.
Driscoll, in one of the helpful things he says (!) puts it like this – men, whatever your wife looks like, that is your standard of beauty. Small breasts? Then you like small breasts. Large? Then, that's your thing. Wide hips? Then you like them. Narrow. Ditto. Short? She's the girl for you. Tall? Likewise. And so on. This is advice we need to heed and teach to men in our congregations too.
I was thinking more about this today when I read this extremely positive article on the BBC website about a US photographer who has photographed women post childbirth. Jade Beall, for that is her name, wanted to show the beauty of the normality of the post-birth woman. She's right. Her photographs are, I think, quite stunning. Eve was given the grand title – Mother of all living – and motherhood is indeed gloriously beautiful. It deserves to be celebrated and should be part of our wives beauty, not something that destroys it.
Your wife is beautiful.