A Prayer for My Husband

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
— Proverbs 3:5–6

There are things we carry for the people we married that they don't always know about — the quiet prayers said over a sleeping back, the worry swallowed so they don't have to carry it too, the asking of God to do for them what we can't do ourselves. Loving someone that closely means watching the weight they bear and knowing we can't lift it off, only hold the other end. And so we pray, because prayer is the one thing that reaches where our arms don't.

Lord, take care of him.
You know the weight he carries — the things he talks about and the things he keeps to himself.
Steady him. Direct his path, even when he doesn't ask you to.
Give him rest when he won't take it and wisdom when the road splits.
Protect this marriage. Soften the places where we've gone hard with each other, and don't let the years make us careless with what we've built.
And help me love him the way you do — patiently, completely, on the days when it's easy and on the days when it's not.
Amen.

Marriage has a way of teaching us the limits of our own love — the places where we run out, where we get impatient, where we need something bigger than ourselves to fill the gap. That's not a failure. It's how it was always meant to work. The verse says trust in the Lord and lean not on our own understanding, and I think that applies to marriage as much as anything. We cannot understand each other fully. We weren't meant to. But we can hand each other to the One who does, and let him direct the paths we're walking side by side.

Say it over the one you love. Ruby writes a short devotional every morning in the same spirit — a verse, and a few plain words for two people trying to walk together. You can subscribe — it's free, or stay a while and read more of her writing.