(Proverbs 18:22) Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD.
A married man who counts his blessings begins with his wife. No matter how difficult the marriage, financially, emotionally, or whatever, Proverbs 18:22 never goes away. There may be many things that we desire, but what we need, we already got; favour of the Lord in our wife. God looked at old lonely Adam and said (Genesis 2:18) It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. It’s a good thing to be married to a good thing. God’s favour. We can’t earn it, but we sure can cherish it.
Proverbs 19:12 The king’s wrath is as the roaring of a lion; but his favour is as dew upon the grass.
The dew comes upon the grass slowly, small tiny water pockets. And as the night goes on, they get bigger and bigger and bigger. And by the morning, it’s looks as if it rained all night. The blessings of a wife can be like that. It’s not showers of blessings. It’s a slow and steady saturation of God’s love toward you. The blessing beads may seem small and insufficient, but hold on through the night. When the morning comes, you won’t be able to contain them.
And then, it’s every morning. Every day the sun comes up, by noon the dew is gone. The hot sun rules the day. It’s work work work! Toil toil toil! The nose to the grind stone all day long. And you go to sleep dried out from the day. But when you wake up in the morning, there’s the King’s favour, like dew upon the grass. Amen. It’s God’s original plan, seen in Adam and Eve. But it was also seen in other aspects of creation.
Genesis 2:5-6 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. 6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.
It was after the fall that God sent the rain. I understand showers of blessings. Yes I do. But I think it helpful to consider God’s original plan: the foggy mist and the dew that settles from it. I’m telling you, it get’s the job done. Sometimes, that’s all a crop gets through a season, but it’s sufficient to see it through to fruition. I like the big rains, but many times, they’re gone as quick as they come. The dew is steady consistent blessing every morning. And that’s what a wife is. That is the favour of the Lord. That is what we need. It grows through the night and lasts well into the day and is renewed everyday.
You need not look far to find the good things that God has given you if you have a wife. Sometimes we get down in the dumps because we don’t see the big blessings. We hear of the grand miracles that God does for others and wonder when our turn is going to be. Or the cares and trials of marriage can distract us. We got our eyes on the tomorrow’s forecast, but the showers never come and we pout. And we miss the mist of God’s favour upon us all day long, every day, every morning. The good dew that clings to us faithfully as God is faithful to us in our wife.
I tell you, I’m glad my wife has stuck around. She’s been faithful and good to me. And that comes from nowhere but God, for only God is faithful and only God is good. God was right. It’s not good that the man should be alone. We grew up together. We got saved together. We’ve pursued God together. And as the years have gone by, the dew drops of God’s blessings in our marriage have gotten bigger and bigger, have run down unabated, and has been faithful to help grow and bare fruit.
(Ephesians 5:25) Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;
And of course, this gives us a picture of how we, as the bride of Christ, should be toward our Christ. Could Christ look at us and say, I found a good thing? That’s a tough one, ain’t it. Where is our devotion to him? Our faithfulness? Are we like scattered showers; there today and gone tomorrow? Or is it just the normal cycle of our day to soak and saturate our Lord with praise, love, and affection?
(Lamentations 3:21-23) This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. 22It is of the LORD’S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. 23They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.
Therefore, our devotion and love to him should be fresh and new every morning. I know we fail. But He sure is worth it, ain’t He? (Exodus 30:7) And Aaron shall burn thereon sweet incense every morning: