Light Bulb Moments

Have you ever had one of these moments? You know, like when the light bulb in your minds just clicks on and all of the sudden you get it!! Well I had one of those moments last night as my wife and I were sitting off the beautiful cost of Lake Michigan catching a spectacular sunset (they are the extraordinary here in St. Joseph). It just clicked and there it was. Now, before I tell you the rest of the story I must say that some of you may read this and think, duh! That a fairly common understanding, but I assure you and if I were a betting man I would lay money down that more than half of marriages out there (in particularly men) have this problem within there first five years of marriage.
My wife and I have been through a whole lot in our first few years of marriage, like graduating college, getting our own place, several different jobs, oh ya having an adorable baby girl who is now 5 months old, moved 3 times, and probably some other things in between that I'm missing. The point is, is that we have been through a lot. So naturally things can be stressful at times. Now my wife doesn't deal with stress very well, (she'll tell you that) and on top of that she has just been though a lot. On the other hand, I am the type of guy who really doesn't worry a whole lot and not to mention just the male/female differences in thinking, I just don't have a whole lot of stress in my life.
So for the past several months to a year now we have been dealing with Casey's anxiety and stress related problems. And the other night the light bulb came on for me! I began to realize that I was a big part in contributing to her stress. There are several factors that come into play on how God revealed this to me, so many I don't have the time to list them all, only to say that God is always trying to show us and teach us something about ourselves if we would just listen.
While we sat on that swing that overlooked the lake as the day was turning to night, it was then that the Holy Spirit just spoke to me and said, "Love your wife as Christ loves the church" I mean it was just like that, plain as day, at that moment I realized that I have not be loving my wife like she needs to be loved. Ya, I was doing all the "right things" so to speak, but I wasn't loving my wife with that sacrificial love as Christ gave His life up for us.
Eph.5:25 "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her"
Now, there are plenty of reasons how and why, especially us men fall into this problem in our marriages and not even realize it, and I'm not taking the time here to address all the reasons, but I do want to say that if we want to be men of God then we must first learn to what it means to have healthy families and marriages so that we can leave a lasting legacy for God's glory and for His Kingdom.
Once I realize this, it was like I had a paradigm shift in my mind and now each day I am making a conscientious effort to uphold my wife and her needs above my own and love her with the sacrificial love as Christ loves us and gave himself up for us. Oh, and by the way I believe that this is the main key to having a successful marriage, because in return our wives will love us as they are to, unto the Lord.