Love Must be tough-DISRESPEST-2

[Romanseight2005]

The Bible talks about humility. Dobson talks about CONFIDENCE. I'm curious what the rest of you think.

I haven't read Dobson's book. I do want to point out though, that while the bible is really big on humility, I think our understanding of humility needs some work.

For instance, God is Himself humble. Jesus showed this humility while on this earth. Yet, he fully confident of who He was, and what His abilities were.

Scripture tells us to think of ourselves, as we ought. We are not to think more highly of ourselves than we ought, but we are told to have confince where it is due.

Romans 12:3-4

3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.
NIV
1 John 2:28-3:1

28 And now, dear children, continue in him, so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming.

29 If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.


NIV

 

[hijklmnop]

I would really like to know from everyone what action could one take to combat the underlined above?

For me it was a combination of factors: I started going to counselling, I started going to Celebrate Recovery for codependency, I read a book on codependency, and really dove into the Word and prayer. I just had to decide that the begging, crying, misery, etc, wasn't doing anything positive for me or my kids who need me to be okay no matter what...and marriage-wise, I realized that if he was going to stay married to me, I wanted him to do that because he WANTED to, and was willing to do whatever it took to do that and do that well, as opposed to being guilted and dragged back into it because he felt obligated to me, or sorry for me, or anything like that. Otherwise it wouldn't be real. It would be the love and commitment that I really desired. I knew that if I wanted REAL love and commitment I had to let that come from him, with no grovelling on my part anymore. So I decided I was going to back off him, stop trying to convince/influence him on what to do, and let GOD speak to him instead of me. I knew that backing off might mean having to let him walk, but I also knew that that could happen either way...I could choose to be depressed about it or I could choose to respect his choices, let him walk away, and walk in my own direction with my head held high to pursue a happy life with my kids. MOST importantly, I had to focus on the fact that letting my h's choices/our marriage determine how happy or destroyed I would be would mean that I had made him my idol. I needed to focus on the fact that my help and my strength come from the LORD, not from my husband or my marriage. Reminding myself of that made all the difference.

 

[sdmsanjose]

Dreamer, you do not speak from theory but from real life experience. That gets my attention. Glad that your marriage had hope and was salvaged.

Your statement below is worth noting.

I needed to focus on the fact that my help and my strength come from the LORD, not from my husband or my marriage. Reminding myself of that made all the difference.