Bad Shelter

For Tuesday, December 5, 2007
Proverbs 27:15-16

A continual dripping on a rainy day
and a quarrelsome wife are alike;
to restrain her is to restrain the wind
or to grasp oil in one's right hand.

One purpose of a home is to find shelter from the storms. To enter a home on a rainy day and find the roof leaking is discouraging at best. Being powerless to stop that leak during the storm stirs feelings of frustration. So it is to come home to a spouse who is quick to complain. There is no rest. But of particular frustration is the impotent feeling of being unable to stop the complaining. To restrain her, or the meaning may be to shelter her from her own storms, is like restraining the wind. Imagine standing in a strong wind with arms out trying to make the wind stop. Or imagine holding on to oil being poured into your hand. It can't be done, and it is particularly frustating to watch precious oil, meant to a soothing balm, slip through your fingers and fall wasteful on the ground.

The home is meant to be a place of rest. A marriage is meant to be a place to build up one another, to shelter one another. All the more reason then that tempers explode and patience is broken when storms enter into the home. All the more reason then to do whatever is necessary about yourself. If you cannot restrain the wind, then you need to think how to find the shelter you need.

God's Word tells us what that shelter is to be:
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say to the Lord, "My refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust" (Psalm 91:1-2).

Our complaining and our frustration says more about our failure to find the real Shelter than it does about the terribleness of the storm. A quarrelsome wife is a woman who does not find contentment in her Lord. A husband who retaliates does not turn to the Lord for his shelter and strength.

Do what is necessary - i. e. do what the Lord gives instruction about finding your peace, your shelter in him, so that you will be a wife who is a true helpmeet to her husband, and be a husband who is a true head sheltering his wife.