29 thoughts on “BiblicalGenderRoles.Com to be featured on Alan Colmes Radio Show”

1. That’s awesome, BGR!
   I used to watch Hannity and Colmes for a while also (seems like there was something before I remember Colmes from, too…Crossfire maybe?)
   I will be listening tomorrow.
   Congrats. 🙂

2. I’ll mirror Liz. Will try to listen. By the way Liz. I think your pleasing your husband will pay you back in spades. If envying someone was not sinful i would envy your husband. Since i believe it is sin, i give a toast to your husband and admire your true support. Women have no idea how that can positively affect a man. Kudos. I think my wife is really trying to move from not refusing to actually wanting to please. Pretty cool seeing her sound like a screaching feminazi to a generous wife.

3. Thank you for your kind words, Jeff. 🙂
   It definitely has “paid off” for me. I am very very blessed.

   “Women have no idea how that can positively affect a man.”
   I couldn’t agree more.
   My husband and I have had very few “dry spells” in our married life together, but in the few we’ve had I’ve seen significant changes in his behavior. I think this is true of women too, fwiw, though to a lesser degree. But women’s libidos are so nuanced they don’t recognize the connection between sexual intimacy (or the lack of), their overall demeanor, and how they relate to their spouse.
   The results are so striking in fact, if the pharmaceutical companies could bottle those benefits in a pill form and sell it everyone would be running to buy it. Instead women choose to fuel their own depressions/psychoses, deny thier husband sex, blame it on (choose any: the husband isn’t romantic enough, the mundanity of life, they are feeling fat today, and/or “stuff”).

   I’ve observed this a lot through the years watching others, and it’s always interesting to see people (from what I’ve observed women in particular engage in self sabotaging behavior patterns and lack of self awareness in general) stubbornly creating their own problems instead of doing anything to solve them and choosing a happier life.

   I’m really looking forward to hearing this broadcast tonight!
   Glad to hear your marriage is improving, Jeff. 🙂 I think with the continued sexual intimacy and closeness, it will get better and better. I’m quite certain I’m chemically addicted to my husband and one thing probably has something to do with the other.

4. Liz,

   Your Statement:

   “But women’s libidos are so nuanced they don’t recognize the connection between sexual intimacy (or the lack of), their overall demeanor, and how they relate to their spouse.”

   Liz – let me echo Jeff’s statements and just say again that your husband is a fortunate man to have a godly wife like you who not only does not fight against the role God has given her, but you enthusiastically embrace it! 🙂

   I have said something like what you said here that most women, unlike men to do not realize they actually need to have sex too. While both men and women release oxytocin during sex, in women its effects are much more potent because of their higher estrogen levels. It helps to bond them to their husbands and calm them mentally.

   No one would argue with the fact that men need to talk whether they realize it or not. Sometimes our wives have to pry our feelings out of us but we do need to talk. No one would argue with this fact that husbands and wives need to talk and women are the ones that more often than not initiate the talking.

   But somehow when it comes to sex we have a double standard. Husbands and wives need to having sexual relations on a very regular basis and God puts the stronger instinct in the men to initiate this(like he puts in women the stronger instinct to initiate talking) – yet we are told someone how that regular physical relations are not as needed.

5. Liz,

   Did you write the “Lizfortoday.wordpress” (the Life of Liz) blog?

6. BGR,

   I agree. And I think when it comes to talking about discipline it’s not discipline we’re against. We are disciplined in church, work, we discipline our children our dogs, those under us at work. Our wives are disciplined at work and discipline children, dogs etc. Notice I didn’t say women are disciplined at church. For some reason we complete loose our minds when we think of women getting disciplined by a pastor or teacher in church or by their own husbands.

   We go to great lengths to find an example of a husband who beat his wife or how it hurts her self esteem… read humbles her.

   Imagine this for a moment. Your wife works for a man and submits to his authority because he is her boss and at work becomes her “head”. Imagine if you will she doesn’t feel like getting a task done on time or a regular basis. The world will not end, but it disrupts business and the managerial relations. Now imagine this boss cannot fire her, he cannot say anything or do anything about it. What are his options. To do the task or higher someone to do it.

   Does this not sound absolutely ridiculous? The female employee balks and says you have authority, but you cannot make me do that task and you cannot discipline me for not doing it, by the way you can’t fire me either….

   Imagine a pastor who has a congregant who always interrupts, causes strife, doesn’t do the serving she was called to do and wanted to do originally. He cannot discipline her, he cannot make her leave his church…. oh my…. because, low and behold it’s his wife! Heaven forbid it’s another man’s wife… how does he handle it?

   Anna and Tobias,

   That is where authority is for. It’s not a disagreement of what needs discipline or who needs it or how to handle it. It is mainly who has the authority to dole out the discipline. Can you think of one reason why the hang man wears a sack over his head? It was designed so that those watching and the one ready hang not know who it is…. he doesn’t love the job, he was assigned to it.

   Jesus didn’t tell the 12 they will be loved and welcomed. He actually said if they do not accept you shake the dust off your sandles. So yes, God will judge them, but a husband will be accountable as her leader.

   Sorry, ranting again.

7. Bee,
   I am not the Life of Liz liz, no. 🙂

8. Jeff, I understand where you’re coming from when you say that pastors and churches do not discipline women these days, but please realize that is not across the board true (although it is likely more often than not unfortunately), nor is it linked to Tobias and my opinion about proper discipline in marriage. We do not lose our minds when churches discipline women. We have thankfully not had to see a huge amount of church discipline in general, but it has included men and women.

   Also please realize that we never stated that discipline was wrong in any and every situation. We did say that the motivation needs to be right which can make it extremely difficult. Because of this, we don’t give approval of its across-the-board use to strangers whose character we barely know. This is not the same as saying there are no proper uses of it.

   When it comes to the employer of a woman vs her husband, these are two entirely different scenarios. And I’m pretty sure you don’t want to settle for the authority that an employer has, because sex in those situations has a habit of either not happening or being illegal. A husband has no authority in and of himself. He is a medium of God’s authority to her. Therefore, he can only do as much as God allows him to do. As wives are called to submit, husband’s big commandment is to love. If he can discipline with loving motivation than so be it. It’s just that the line between “i love my wife” and “i need more sex” can get blurred pretty quickly. Employers are entirely different. They aren’t really a medium of any authority, but they are guided by laws of the state/country in general(sexual harassment, equal opportunity,wage laws, etc.) . As long as those laws are not being broken, an employer is well within his rights to terminate, withhold a promotion, or give verbal warnings/discipline to employees. However, there are plenty of drawbacks to this like no sex, no lifelong commitment, and the employees only work for pay.

9. @Jeff
   “Women have no idea how that can positively affect a man. Kudos. I think my wife is really trying to move from not refusing to actually wanting to please. Pretty cool seeing her sound like a screaching feminazi to a generous wife.”

   It does pay to please your husband and have sex whenever he wants it with a good attitude, we’ve always had a marriage like that for 8 years now, and I’ve seen the positive affect is has on him.

10. Good luck Larry! 🙂

11. Dragonfly,

    Well done. Again thanks for the correction on the two name thingy. Hugo Stiglitz rolls off the tongue easy, so it wasn’t meant to be sneaky. Love that movie!

    Anna,

    I see your point. Not quite sure it wasn’t a little convoluted. Motivation and intentions are between the person and God though, don’t you think? Who gets to decide the motivation or intention? That could be judged by the wife subject to how she feels at the moment. If you turn the wife over to the pastor and say, “see, she needs discipline”. He may disagree with you. If he does agree that she needs discipline you have now abdicated your authority and headship of your wife to the pastor… might he now “go into her” too?

    I am not pointing fingers in an accusatory manner…. see Larry’s feminization of the church. I believe you have seen men and women disciplined in church. I have only seen men discipline and excommunicated. One of the churches was highly into nouthetic counseling. The church is suppose to be very highly regarded and expositional. The pastor’s sermons are phenomenal, but even he admitted that he leans toward women being more spiritual. My wife and I were very blessed to have his counseling as how busy he is and he just happen to be on sobbatical (sp). He was floored and had a very very difficult time in our case because if was so obvious the lack of submission and blatant disrespect my wife had. What is funny is she use to have a sort of pastor worship hypergamy thing going. She would talk him up to me, friends, relatives, fellow members etc, then she would all of a sudden get annoyed by his hair, voice etc. This was one pastor after another. Fortunately she listened to me and repented from this behavior.

    Anyway, Anna he never finished counseling us because he couldn’t answer my questions straight forward. He would use extreme examples, straw man and convolute his counseling. It wasn’t that I was faultless it was that I forced him to confront my wife and he had a very very difficult time doing this and couldn’t finish. He is nationally known and studies the word very well, but could not say it… you could see it in his eyes… he was distressed like he was physically uncomfortable. He could go through the routine of saying wives submit and respect etc, but couldn’t say how, when, where and why.

12. Jeff, I’m sorry if I was confusing. I do struggle saying what I want clearly and succinctly. Intentions are definitely between the person and God, and I would say it was the husband’s responsibility to discern his intentions (knowing that God sees the heart and cannot be fooled even if others can). I do think it is appropriate for others including the wife to respectfully point out if the intentions seem to be flawed, but ultimately it is the husband’s decision. Tobias was recently correcting some very bad behavior on my part and it was difficult because in the moment, he was definitely motivated by anger and frustration rather than love. Thankfully Jesus got a hard enough grip on me that I was able to repent and then respectfully asked him to consider if he was treating me the way Jesus would have. He came back later and admitted that he had not. We both grew closer to each other and to Jesus in that moment.

    I’m sorry you had such a terrible experience with that pastor. While the feminization of the church is becoming a widespread problem and men in church leadership need to be able to speak the truths of God boldly, I wonder if you think that promoting Godly female counselors would help as well. For someone with a negative view of sex and men, it would be easy to think ‘yay, another sex-crazed man telling me i need to have more sex with my husband’. There might be things women are more effective at. That is why it is so encouraging to me to see women like Liz and Dragonfly who have been married longer than myself, speak the truths of God’s word.

13. Godly women should already be doing that ie. Titus. They haven’t been nor do they now! They are failing young women and men miserably.

    Female counselor teaching a man? Hmmm.

    My wife wanted to use this feminist counselor when we were first married when the sex dropped off a cliff. Very nice counselor who had been divorced twice… Long story, but my wife kept telling me she gets creeped out thinking her dad was very sexual implying may have touched her and her sisters, but wouldn’t come right out and say it. I forced the issue and said we need to confront father, mother and talk with sisters….. ooooh no! Wouldn’t do that…. cleared that up very quickly, never brought it up again. This is a feminist first line when sex drops off in marriage ” I was abused”. It’s classic FI. Even if they are not outright feminists, they lean toward the female imperative or FI.

    First session with this woman, then she went alone like 9 months. I said in first session lack of sex and I wanted help finding a solution. This is back in 2000. I was frustrated and so went to last session. Lack of sex was NEVER brought up…. counselor just looked at me. She asked my wife what was up with that…. That was our last session with her because again my wife was confronted.

    Went to a pastor…. He had no clue what to do and said he has same problem in his marriage and advised we just pray. Oh, great!

    Few years later my wife asks me to go to “christian counselor” THAT SHE ALREADY WENT TO WITHOUT TELLING ME. Problem was he didn’t know that I didn’t know she went until later in her first session and he told her immediately that she needed to call me and going to him behind my back was very telling. He was the one who dx her with HVNPD. We went to him maybe 4 times and he had a difficult time with us seeing her as hyper vigilant of everything and that made her controlling. She lacked trust in anyone but her mom and her mom was so flaming feminist liberal it’s not even amusing.

    So my experience with counseling is for 2 types of people:

    1) They want support and affirmation to continue doing what they are doing.

    2) They want help changing someone else to conform to their “world”.

    If you read what you are typing it sounds like the wife gets all the benefits of marriage and very little of the trouble and accountability. Nothing lost and all to gain…. if he would only stop nagging about sex and do the housework I could raise these kids!

    Anna,

    Click on Rollo’s Epiphany…. read it. That is my wife to a capital T. That one article changed my world. I thought I was going insane until I read that.

14. Jeff, it is a strawman to take my suggestion of a ‘female counselor’ and automatically come up with ‘feminist counselor’. Obviously that is not what I am suggesting and I am very aware that many unfortunately exist anyway. The ideal that I can think of, would be a man/woman team (ideally married to each other) who counsel couples together.

    I have also spent a majority of my life with a great distrust, and probably even fear, of counselors. This stemmed from a terrible counselor I had as a child whose goal was to get me removed from my family (something I did not want or need). She would ask me loaded questions and tried to take what I said in response out of context in court. Thankfully she was ultimately unsuccessful. However, the great number of terrible counselors out there is no reason to cede the ground entirely to them. If anything, it should encourage Christians to produce Godly counselors who will fight back against sin.

    I am by no means saying that a wife gets all the gain without any accountability. I am pushing for the right kind of accountability. Godly counselors and a Godly husband acting out of love for her, are two very good forms of accountability (although obviously not exclusively).

    I read the article and I’m very sorry that your wife acted (acts?) that way. I am confused what you were trying to prove with that though. The only reason I can think of is that that is why you feel you need the ability to discipline your wife. However, right and wrong do not change because of crisis. The reason ‘what else are men supposed to do?’ is not a good one when it comes to wifely discipline. That assumes there is never a situation where there might not be any desirable options, and in this sin-cursed world, that’s simply not the case. Our Lord was an excellent example of this at Gethsemene, as well as how to deal with it.

15. AnnaMS,

    Your Statement:

    “Jeff, it is a strawman to take my suggestion of a ‘female counselor’ and automatically come up with ‘feminist counselor’. Obviously that is not what I am suggesting and I am very aware that many unfortunately exist anyway. The ideal that I can think of, would be a man/woman team (ideally married to each other) who counsel couples together.”

    I realize you are not suggesting a feminist counselor, but rather a female counselor. But the reality that vast majority of female counselors are feminist to a certain extent or another. I recommend that men vet counselors before they take their wives, whether it is a Pastor or professional counselor. Its not a matter of him going in – “this is my side, this is her side” and I understand most counselors would want both the man and woman there for that so that they can represent themselves.

    The first appointment would not be to talk about any particular issues in the marriage – but rather to get from the counselor their philosophy of counseling. Do they hold to the Biblical model of marriage? Do they stand strongly on male headship in the marriage? Do they believe in the Biblical duties of a husband and the Biblical duties of a wife? Only once you establish the counselor has firm Biblical foundation then you can come back with your wife and discuss particular issues. Otherwise the counselor can actually cause more damage than good.

    In agree with you Anna – that Husband/Wife counseling teams are absolutely the best way to go. In most cases this would be a Pastor and his wife – but again you have to make sure the Pastor and his wife do not have feminist tendencies. I think women connect better with women on these issues sometimes. I think the best approach is for the Pastor and his wife do some counseling together as a group and then sometimes to separate off and have the woman counsel alone with his wife so she feels comfortable opening up about any issues from her past or any issues currently with her husband.

    Your Statement:

    “The reason ‘what else are men supposed to do?’ is not a good one when it comes to wifely discipline. That assumes there is never a situation where there might not be any desirable options, and in this sin-cursed world, that’s simply not the case. Our Lord was an excellent example of this at Gethsemene, as well as how to deal with it.”

    Anna – it is not a matter of “what else are men supposed to do?” – it is more of a matter of “what men should be doing”. Discipline is about principle, it is not about the end result. God disciplined his wife Israel for her rebellion, and at the same time held his hand out to her tell her if she would only repent it would stop, and he would bless her and restore her again. But Israel did not choose learn from God’s discipline but continued in her rebellion. In the end God had to divorce her.

    Whether it is as parents with children, or as husbands with wives all we can do is bring discipline into their lives in order to trying get them to change course. But God gives us all a free will and ultimately we must choose to learn from discipline or rebel further against it.

    We as husbands must simple exercise our authority within the bounds of God’s law to discipline our wives but when we reach the limits of that discipline if she will not repent then we leave her in our higher authorities hand.

    But sometimes the ultimate discipline is to end the marriage as God did with his wife Israel, but only after all other measures have been tried.

    For instance few people here would say that a man did not have the right to use the ultimate discipline and terminate a marriage when his wife is having affairs on him. Few here would say a wife does not have the right to divorce her husband for beating on her. We would not call these “sucky situations” that we just have to live with. We would not say we have to cope with these kinds of situations because we live in a sin-cursed world. We would agree these situations must not be coped with, but rather confronted head on.

    The disagreement here is when it comes to chronic sexual denial. Many Christians wrongly in my opinion believe this is a “sucky situation” that we sometimes just have to live with because we live in a sin-cursed world. But I respectfully disagree with that assertion. God makes it clear in Exodus 21:10-11 that sex is core requirement of marriage, without the marriage is broken, the covenant has been broken. Sexual denial is simply the flip side of adultery on the coin of marital unfaithfulness. It must be disciplined against and confronted.

    I agree there will be many times when there is “a situation where there might not be any desirable options”. No man who loves his wife wants to have to discipline her – it is not a desirable option. No man wants to live without sex either – again not a desirable option. But what is missing in this argument is – this is not about a man getting what he wants. It is about a woman performing a core and central part of her duty in marriage.

    There are many sinful quarks and deficiencies that husbands and wives must simply live with in their relationship. There are sometimes personality issues which may not be sinful, but just are differences and we have to learn to manage and make it work. But things like adultery, abuse and yes chronic and willful sexual denial are not something God calls to just “suffer through”. These sins are in a special category that can potentially destroy the marriage.

    Yes Christ overcame his emotions the Garden and he did his duty in spite of them. His example in the Garden rather than being an example of a man suffering through his wife’s sin of sexual denial(or what I would call enabling it), is rather an example to women that they can overcome their emotional hurdles to do their duty and have sex with their husbands as they ought to.

    Christ did not sacrifice himself to enable our sin, but rather to pay for our sin. Then he tells us to go and sin no more.

16. BGR, I realize a lot of female counselors, heck a lot of male counselors, have feminist tendencies even if they are Christians. Looking back, it is obvious that my childhood counselor was a feminist hiding behind a Christian cover (this was before the whole ‘Christian feminist’ term really took off). Where I was more focused on healing and moving on, she was determined to keep me in a perpetual state of victim-hood. This is why I believe Godly churches need to actively produce new Godly counselors. I am advocating for a change, not expressing my satisfaction with the current system. Unfortunately we cannot just throw out the old lot and start fresh, although in a professional setting we can definitely take our business elsewhere, but we can start producing new fruit. Light new candles in the midst of so much darkness. I honestly think you, Jeff, and I should be on the same side here.

    I absolutely agree that counselors should be vetted first and I don’t have a problem with the man being the only one to do that as long as he avoids making the first meeting like taking a grocery list to a store. If he tells the counselor “i am looking for you to change ‘xyz’ in my wife, can you do it or do I need to look elsewhere?”, he is likely to get a negative response. Even in situations where 99% of the problem is with one spouse, it is still good to be open and allow some vulnerability and counselors will want to see that. However, a truly Godly counselor should appreciate a man taking his leadership role seriously enough that he is willing to put himself out there and ask the hard questions. Tobias and I were blessed with great pre-marital counselors who dealt with unpopular topics like sexual denial. I imagine people like them would appreciate your vetting them first. I’d love to get to the point where it was assumed that Christian counselors weren’t feminists and would teach Biblical truths, but we are nowhere near that at present.

    I also realize that you don’t believe in wifely discipline because it’s the only option available for men. Even though we don’t agree, I realize you hold it as a Biblical conviction and I’m not trying to strawman you here at all. I was confused by something Jeff was saying and was trying to address that.

17. Anna,

    ” If he tells the counselor “i am looking for you to change ‘xyz’ in my wife, can you do it or do I need to look elsewhere? ”

    Never said that. Christian counseling would look at the marriage and if there is a lack of sex, they would say 1 Cor 7 and it needs to be done in a loving joyful manner. You are looking at it the wrong way. If she burps after a meal, that would be change xyz in my wife. To tell her that within marriage sexual denial is sin and you are obligated to have sex is following the bible, not some character idiosyncrasy.

    There is absolutely no reason that a woman would go at it like there is no tomorrow, get married and stop having sex… It is absolutely a sin nature to do this and that would need correction. The husband is the head and would be the corrector. If it was the mother of the wife and the husband told the mother in law, and the mother in law told her “You need to be having regular sex with your husband and fulfill his need and if you do not don’t blame him if he finds it from someone else.” we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation. We would shrug our shoulders and go home. But since it is the husband and we live in an age where feminism and the FI have take such a strong hold we balk and say the husband cannot and should not enforce what her vows state during the wedding. Granted, a christian husband will not find it some where else… he’ll just suffer because it’s sucky!

    Again use the analogy of not being allowed to talk unless your husband allows it, and he allows it every other month. Most women would go insane.

18. Jeff, do you honestly believe that I support sexual denial? I absolutely believe it is a sin and that churches, counselors, spouses, etc. should take a stand against it. I think your ‘talking’ analogy is spot on here. I literally don’t know how you missed that.

    The beginning part about counselors was in response to BGR.

19. Anna,

    I do understand. No I don’t think you support sexual denial. My issue is correction/discipline.

    Bible believing pastors would agree that sex in marriage is spiritual. Husbands are called to lead their wives and family spiritually. When it’s spiritual we balk in this age and say it’s up to the person and God.

    What if the wife believed in the prosperity gospel? Leave it up to her and God? Just tell her and leave it at that? Make her go to and listen to biblical teaching? How do you make her go to a bible teaching church? If she doesn’t?

    “Well talk talk talk doesn’t solve issues when they continue”. Let your yes be yes and no be no. We find it humiliating to think we have to do that in a marriage, but again what is the hard/negative/down side of authority? Making the final decision on the color of carpet or car? That is ridiculous. The hard part is doing what is necessary to spiritually lead your family.

20. Ok, I’ll bite. Let’s say your wife did believe in the prosperity gospel. I’ll set aside the obvious that that should have been a glaring red flag back in the dating days (although really I think a lot of marriage issues could be solved with a little more attention to detail prior to marriage). As a husband, it is your job to tell your wife what you know: that the prosperity gospel is a load of crap. Show her the Bible, speak the truth in love, and show her the error of her ways. Although not the typical use of this, you could mention it to the pastor and start the process of church discipline. What, your pastor’s a feminist? What are you doing in that church anyway? But you say, what if she doesn’t change? Continue doing what you are doing to the best of your ability, remembering from Ezekiel that God does not hold you responsible for her false beliefs. Or do you really believe that canceling date nights on Wednesdays or shopping trips on Fridays will convince your wife that the prosperity gospel is false? If she really holds her beliefs in such low value, she might claim she’s changed her mind to get her allowance back. But I’d be mighty skeptical of everything that was going on in her heart. Not to mention that if you or a belief can buy your wife with one date, someone else or some other idea will likely be able to buy her away with two. This is why it’s nice to get these prickly issues squared away before saying ‘I do’.

    You have to keep in mind what your goal is here. If your goal is simply to get more sex or to get her to smile during sex, than yes, behavior modification might work (or again, it might blow up in your face). But if your goal is to address whatever sin or false belief about sex has taken root in your wife’s heart (and again, I agree with you that it indeed has done just that and that your wife is in sin), than behavior modification is the last place you want to go.

21. Anna,

    Some of us got married before coming to Christ.

    Again we went at it like rabbits so sex was an issue before.

    We did go to a pastor . He was stumped because either: he didnt have any husband confront him on the meaning of headship and how it is applied in marriage, or he knew that he himself would have to see the issue for what it was and lose his worshipped status that i believe 9/10 pastors love having by labeling usurp of marriage headship in his own church and christianity as a whole.
    If marriage is like Christ and church why would Jesus discipline the church since husbands are not allowed to discipline wives? Yes restricting things does work!!! It has in my marriage. Are you saying Jesus must be doing a poor job of leading the church if the church is in rebellion? Saying you are not responsible takes away washing her with the word to present her as pure….

    What is the husbands authority for?

22. Jeff, I get that a lot of people get married prior to becoming Christians. In fact, I’d argue that if only one person became a Christian after marriage, that does not mean he is in violation of the ‘unequally yoked’ command because he did not know as much before the marriage. However, if people aren’t Christians when they are married, it really shouldn’t come as a surprise when they exhibit un-Christian behavior after marriage. It is similar to when men marry a woman with feminist tendencies or a woman marries a man with lazy behavior and then is surprised when both those sins continue into the marriage. If nothing else, the other person is at least being genuine!

    I know that you went to a pastor and were underwhelmed with the results. Maybe try another pastor and move to a different church if necessary. If the church you bring your wife to is preaching feminism, that is a massive problem. Church is supposed to be a spiritual help, not to negate everything you tell your wife during the week. I know the next pastor is not guaranteed to be any better, but good pastors are out there. Neither BGR’s pastor, nor my own, would defend sexual denial.

    Husbands are allowed to discipline their wives. I have said this numerous times and am getting rather sick of it. I just might not say it again. They just have to make sure they are doing it with the right motivation. Same as Jesus, it’s just that since He is perfect, that’s not a concern for us. Since we as humans are not, that’s not just something that you can assume about yourself. You say restricting things does work and maybe (like i mentioned previously with the silent treatment), it does. But again, what do you mean by ‘work’. If you mean your wife had more sex with you, than great. However, I think it is obvious that the sin in her heart is still there which is why you are still dealing with this issue. There are men that restrict stuff every few weeks because their wife has gotten lazy about sex again. That is hardly fixing the issue. Getting more sex seems to be all they care about, and indeed that is all they get.

    Also, I’m not the one saying he is not responsible for his wife’s continued sin. If you have a problem with it, take it up with Ezekiel and Jesus. Don’t be like the women who try to pretend that the verses about submission aren’t in the Bible because they dont’ support their argument.

23. Anna, I might be misunderstanding it, but I think Jeff is trying to say his wife did the whole bait and switch thing. A lot of women seem to do this, especially non-Christian women who are promiscuous (and I mean that in the way that they are fine having sex outside of marriage).

    It’s not uncommon for them to have lots of sex before marriage, marry the guy, and then turn around and stop having sex either suddenly, or slowly to where they’re almost in a sexless marriage.

24. Ok, and I get that that is a big problem. I don’t understand how that changes anything I’m saying though about discipline.

25. “However, I think it is obvious that the sin in her heart is still there which is why you are still dealing with this issue. There are men that restrict stuff every few weeks because their wife has gotten lazy about sex again. That is hardly fixing the issue. Getting more sex seems to be all they care about, and indeed that is all they get.”

    Anna, I don’t think that they only care about getting more sex… part of discipline is training someone for something good, for their own benefit. A good portion of BGR’s blog is devoted to helping husbands (and wives) help their spouses to be better Christians or just better people – people who keep their word, people who value their responsibility in marriage, people who actually keep their vows and LIVE their life keeping them.

    Discipline doesn’t always mean “punishment.” A lot of times it literally means biblically, “causing to learn.” So things that help the wife realize that her actions have consequences (and the husband as well), are tools to help people grow into maturity. The silent treatment is not at all what Larry was advocating for, as it’s just manipulation and doesn’t even try to explain to the wife what is going on.

26. Also, the men that try to do things to help their wives understand they are sinning, aren’t capable of really changing her heart – I think they can greatly influence it, hence why I think BGR’s site is great for once, giving husbands back their confidence and authority in their marriages. But from what you told Jeff, it looks like you think husbands have the responsibility to change their wife’s hearts somehow through the discipline, and that’s just not always possible (I’m sure you agree here).

    But telling Jeff that his methods obviously aren’t working because they aren’t able to change her heart (something only God truly has control over, and the wife herself), is putting blame on him or responsibility on him that isn’t his.

27. Dragonfly,

    Your Statement:

    “Discipline doesn’t always mean “punishment.” A lot of times it literally means biblically, “causing to learn.” So things that help the wife realize that her actions have consequences (and the husband as well), are tools to help people grow into maturity. The silent treatment is not at all what Larry was advocating for, as it’s just manipulation and doesn’t even try to explain to the wife what is going on.”

    Well said. I have never advocated for men to give their wives the silent treatment although I know some men will use that as a tool – but I do not agree with it. The reason is that two wrongs never make a right. Me knowing my wife(talking to her daily and knowing her needs and concerns) is not conditioned on her showing the proper respect to me or meeting my needs in the bedroom. It is part of the unconditional love that God calls me to show my wife.

    However as I have stated on more than one occasion, I don’t have to talk to my wife AS MUCH if she is willfully sinning against me in these areas. I can pull back a bit where I don’t give her as much of my free discretionary time. In fact I have left and gone for a drive when my wife goes on disrespectful tangent. Sometimes I go to my office. I tell her – when you want to speak to me in a calm and respectful manner I would happy to have a conversation with you. But this is not the silent treatment – it is simply teaching a person that they cannot be disrespectful.

    On the sexual front – perhaps my wife has not be talking to me disrespectfully but if she is neglectful of my needs in the bedroom or has displayed a wrong attitude toward sex I might distance myself a bit and get more involved in other things. Its not the silent treatment and I still talk to her – I just don’t give her as much of my free time as I might normally do.

28. Dragonfly,

    Your Statement:

    “But from what you told Jeff, it looks like you think husbands have the responsibility to change their wife’s hearts somehow through the discipline, and that’s just not always possible (I’m sure you agree here).”

    I think you hit on a key issue that I have tried to expound on here when it comes to discipline. I will hit on this more when I someday get to my parenting articles. 🙂

    Biblically speaking discipline is not about the end result. The end result is completely dependent on the person being disciplined and their reaction to the discipline. Will they change and just do the right action but with the wrong attitude(no change of heart)? Or will they do the right thing with the right heart? That is between them and God.

    Our responsibilities as authorities whether as husbands or parents is to bring the discipline into the lives of those under our care – but it is ultimately their responsibility as to how they react to that discipline.

29. Ok, first of all everything I said about the silent treatment was in response to Jeff’s analogy. I never said BGR supported it. I wouldn’t support it in the vast majority of instances (and even then, it would be the watered down version that BGR does support). Like all other discipline, it’s the motivation that’s important.

    Secondly, I’m sure there are men that care about more than just getting sex. And that is where having the proper motivation for discipline comes into play. Again, keep in mind what the goal is here. The few times Tobias has corrected me in anger, it was because he just wanted me to stop doing/saying something. Nothing about my spiritual growth or being a better person. He just wanted the annoyance/grievance/whatever to stop. The times when he has corrected me in love, it hasn’t ever been about him. It’s been him showing me the truth of God and there were no ulterior motives present. Of course when my behavior then changed, I’m sure it benefited him as well and I’m not saying that husbands can never reap benefits from it. But that shouldn’t be what’s motivating the discipline.

    Finally, I do not think a husband is responsible to change his wife’s heart, nor do I think he is even able to (although he can definitely be a positive/negative influence in the process). If anything, Jeff puts more responsibility on men here than I do. However, just because a husband cannot change his wife’s heart doesn’t mean that he should not try to get her heart to change. By this I mean that even though a husband cannot force a wife to give up a false belief in prosperity gospel, he still has an obligation to point out her error and show her the truth. What she does about it is between her and the Lord (again, pointing back to Ezekiel).

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