Six Ways to Lead and Love Your Wife: Dave and Ann Wilson

Episode Transcript

FamilyLife Today® with Dave and Ann Wilson – Web Version Transcript

This content has been generated by an artificial intelligence language model. While we strive for accuracy and quality, please note that the information provided will most likely not be entirely error-free or up-to-date. We recommend independently verifying the content with the originally-released audio. This transcript is provided for your personal use and general information purposes only. References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. We do not assume any responsibility or liability for the use or interpretation of this content.

Six Ways to Lead and Love Your Wife

Guest:Jim Mitchell and Bruce Goff

From the series:Six Ways to Lead and Love Your Wife (Day 1 of 1)

Air date:April 25, 2025

Dave:One way to cherish your wife is to ask her good questions. Is that true?

Ann:I mean, I like it because words are important to me, but asking good questions makes us feel like you care about us, you’re interested in us, you’re curious about us. Anything spiritual if you’re going to enter that world, I love those questions. What are you learning right now? What do you feel about God and your relationship with God?

Dave:How can I pray for you?

Ann:Yes. How can I pray for you? And then if you text us later in the day and said, “Hey, I’m praying for you right now,” that’s really good.

Dave:Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Dave Wilson.

Ann:And I’m Ann Wilson. And you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.

Dave:Alright, today, you know what? I really like the guest we’re going to interview. Oh, there’s nobody in the studio. It’s just you and me.

Ann:I think you’re funny.

Dave:I’m glad you laugh at my stupid jokes. I’m guessing nobody watching or listening is laughing. You better be laughing at my stuff.

Ann:I think you’re funny.

Dave:I stay up nights all night coming up with this funny, funny stuff. Anyway, today’s sort of a Wilson Original. We get to talk about whatever we want, and I came across this blog article by a pastor in Indiana—I think I’ve actually met Brad—Ways a Husband Can Lead and Cherish His Wife.

Ann:Okay.

Dave:So I thought—

Ann:Did you hear what today is about? We as women, if you’re working out, if you’re working, if you have a break, if you’re in the kitchen or folding laundry, today’s our day.

Dave:What are you saying?

Ann:I’m saying this is an exciting day. Should we pass this along to our husbands?

Dave:Yeah. Well, man, I hope they listen as well, and I thought it’d be sort of fun. His name is Brad Merchant. He’s a pastor in Indianapolis, and he wrote a blog called Six Ways to Lead and Love Your Wife. And so I thought it’d be interesting to say, okay, let’s walk through what he said, and you can comment as a wife.

Ann:Okay, and I think it’d be good if you’re listening, think through—maybe you could say what the guy’s application could be. But I’ll say as a woman, think through as you listen to us, think, “What are the ways I can help my husband to love me or to cherish me? What makes me feel loved?” You might not agree with all of these, but you probably have your own, and I don’t know if your husband knows them, so maybe at the end we’ll talk about the best way to be able to communicate that as women to our husbands.

Dave:Yeah, there’s the right way and there’s the wrong way. We know the wrong way.

Ann:I’ve done it.

Dave:Yeah, so in Ephesians chapter five, a passage that many Christian husbands recognize is the command by the Apostle Paul to us as husbands to love your wives. Ephesians 5:25, “Love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”

Ann:That’s a biggie. Does that make you feel under pressure?

Dave:Oh yeah. I mean, it’s awesome, but it’s like, how do I do that? What’s that look like? And Paul even tells us, well, it has something to do with self-sacrifice because the example is Christ. What did Christ do? He laid down His life. So in many ways we know, okay, it’s not about me. I’m going to lay down my life, but we often don’t know what makes you feel loved and what makes you feel special. And later in the passage he says husbands nourish and cherish your wives. And so even when we teach this at the—

Ann:Does that mean you’re going to start cooking and feeding me?

Dave:That’s not what nourish and cherish means. That means I’m supposed to nourish and cherish my body with your food. But here’s the thing, later in Ephesians 5, when He says nourish and cherish, I thought, “What’s that word cherish mean?” Because when we say we love something, often love has lost its meaning. We say we love Jesus, we love the Detroit Lions, and we do love the Detroit Lions.

Ann:Yeah, we do.

Dave:But it doesn’t mean anything. It’s like I love ice cream. But cherish, I looked up the definition. It says to cherish something is to care for it deeply, to treasure it, to hold dear, related to the words that mean costly and belove. Now that, I think we can understand. And so when Paul says husbands cherish your wife, it’s like care for her deeply, treasure her, hold her dear and costly and beloved means spend a lot of money on her. I’m just kidding. But I thought for a lot of men, at least for me, when we hear treasure something, spend money on it. I thought we as men, and again, maybe I’m just talking about me, we can cherish possessions, stuff. You know this.

Ann:Do you think you do?

Dave:I do. I mean, we wash and clean and protect our car. We’re careful who drives it, where we park it but for me—

Ann:Not everyone, but some are.

Dave:Yeah. And a lot of guys I know whether it be their golf clubs or TV or

Ann:—hunting guns.

Dave:Yeah, for me it’s guitars. I have a few guitars and they’re hanging in a room right this second.

Ann:Your babies.

Dave:And in that room is a humidifier.

Ann:It’s going right now, isn’t it?

Dave:Yeah, and on my phone, I can tell you how much humidity is in that room because my phone is synced to that humidifier to make sure the wood in those guitars doesn’t warp. And especially in Michigan winters where it gets really dry. So as I think about how I cherish my guitars, and by the way, I’m not letting anybody pick that thing up and play it unless they’re a guitar player.

Ann:Do I need to say what you did?

Dave:Go ahead.

Ann:In Michigan, the winters are so dry and so cold that everything dries out. That’s why Dave has a humidifier in that room because the guitars that are made of wood dry out.

Dave:It’s at 48 percent right now.

Ann:We’re in bed one night and I had had a terrible bloody nose. I’d had a bloody nose for three days because it’s so dry in Michigan. And I get in bed, and I have this tissue stuck up my nose trying to stop the blood. And I turned to Dave, and I said, “I wish I was your guitar.” And he goes, “What?” I said, “I just like, man, you look at your phone all the time, you look at the app and then I see you refilling the humidifier and I just think there’s my humidifier beside the bed. And every night it’s empty except for those nights that I fill it.”

Dave:Okay, can we move on to something else? This is not where that was supposed to go.

Ann:We’ll have to do another—

Dave:But I think we’ve actually shared this at FamilyLife before.

Ann:We have.

Dave:So guys, all I’m saying husbands is if you’re going to love your wife, it means to cherish her. Now, one of the things that Brad said in this article, one way to cherish your wife is to ask her good questions.

Ann:I like that one.

Dave:Is that true?

Ann:I mean, I like it because words are important to me and words of affirmation are really important to me. But asking good questions makes us feel like you care about us, you’re interested in us, you’re curious about us, and even what we have to say. So yeah, I like that.

Dave:I remember when our kids were little, you said to me on one of our date nights, “When we go out, I would love you to ask me, how are you doing?” You actually—remember you said, “Write this down.” I’m like, “Write it down. How are you doing?” And I’ll never forget that. This is 30 something years ago. You were like, “Nobody asked me. Nobody cares. A stay-at-home mom with little kids and it’s exhausting. And I would just love to look a human being, my husband in the eyes and say, how you doing?”

Ann:Well, I think my friends would ask me that question, but I wanted you to ask me the question because you’re the most important person in my life, and so for you to ask me makes me feel like you care about what I’m feeling, what I’m going through.

Dave:I cherish you.

Ann:Yes, exactly. Sometimes I think because maybe you were afraid of what I would say when you asked that question because I would maybe critique our relationship or confess how I thought we should be better. Maybe you avoided it because of that. And so asking that question might be scary. You think that’s true?

Dave:Yeah, but I discovered you come alive when you sense that I really cared enough to just say, “How are you doing?” Which also means if you’re not doing well, how can I help?

Ann:Yeah, that’s good.

Dave:What are some questions husbands should ask their wives to make them feel loved and cherished?

Ann:If you have kids, how are you feeling about being a mom? Because we carry so many insecurities. How do you feel about this stage of our marriage and this stage of our lives with kids or without kids? What’s the hardest thing that’s been going on in your life? If you asked your wife, what’s the hardest thing? Or maybe this is one I usually advise men to ask, what’s the heaviest thing you’re carrying in your life right now emotionally? She might cry if you ask that question.

Dave:What do you mean cry? Why?

Ann:Because it feels like nobody does care or nobody is helping us. We carry such a mental load, such an emotional load. And as women, I don’t know if men are like this, but we are processing continually. How am I doing as a wife? I’m failing as a mom, and I need to take care of my parents or my husband’s parents and my friends. We have so much on our minds for you to ask, “What’s the heaviest thing you’re carrying right now?” feels like you’re entering our world with us, and you want to participate with us. That feels good.

Dave:Yeah. One of the questions that Brad wrote down in this blog was, and this is a scary one for a husband to ask his wife, how can I grow as a husband?

Ann:Ooh, you’ve asked me that.

Dave:Yeah, but I didn’t want to. Trust me, I only asked you because I know it made you feel loved. And I also knew you had plenty to tell me. But I mean, it takes humility to say, “I’m not the best husband I need to be. I want to be better. You know how I can be better.” So to ask, I’d ask another guy, and I don’t feel intimidated or scary, but to ask you, the answer means I’m failing in this area.

Ann:If your husband asks you that question, I would need a little time to process how to answer that. And I would really recommend all of us take some time to pray or just say, “Oh, that’s such a good question. Let me get back to you.”

Dave:That’s wisdom, because you would’ve jumped on that question 30 years ago. “I could tell you five ways you can grow as husband.”

Ann:Yeah, “You need to be home more. You need to help around the house more,” but—

Dave:So why are you saying you should pause?

Ann:Because you want to say it in a way your husband can receive it. You want to lace it with grace and love and encouragement but speak the truth in love. So I think both of those are important. And I think you had some other really good questions, and this is one I really liked too. How are you encouraged or discouraged in your faith right now? Anything spiritual if you’re going to enter that world, I love those questions. What are you learning right now? What do you feel about God and your relationship with God?

Dave:How can I pray for you?

Ann:Yes. How can I pray for you? And then if you text us later in the day and said, “Hey, I’m praying for you right now. I’m praying for this specifically,” that’s really good.

Dave:That’s the first one. We got thoughts in the gallery in there.

Ann:Oh, the gallery.

Dave:We got two husbands sitting in there.

Ann:We have Jim Mitchell and Bruce Goff.

Dave:Both married.

Jim:Also husbands.

Ann:Also husbands and fathers.

Jim:Yeah, I had some thoughts. I actually started a little list in my phone of ways to lead my wife, and I was thinking of it in terms of some husbands can lead in a way that sort of consolidates power. It becomes a power imbalance. “I’m in charge. I’m going to lead that way.” And so I kind of challenged myself as a husband. What are some things that I can do that actually balance the power between us and actually lower myself or humble myself or empower my wife?

Ann:That’s good, Jim.

Jim:I just wanted to see if I could think of some and actually came up with some questions. You already mentioned two of them. How can I help? And then I think this article mentioned, what can I do better? So that sort of empowers her to speak. And then I thought of three more that I think give her power and release it from me. What am I missing?

Ann:Oh, that’s a good one.

Jim:Ask “What am I missing?” just in, any occasion just to kind of acknowledge, I might have some blind spots. Another one was, “”What do you think?” and then just pause. You have a thought. You’re smart. So many times, just me simply acknowledging my wife is super smart, what do you think about this? And then, “What should we do?” Along the same lines, “What do you think we should do, sweetheart?” So those are some questions. I think that they’re releasing power in the relationship, which is something when that gets imbalanced, it’s hard to lead when all the power is consolidated.

Ann:Yeah, that’s good. I was thinking too, one of the things my dad did really well was he would ask those two questions to us as kids, “What do you guys think?” and then he’d ask, “What do you think we should do?” I think I was ten the first time he asked me that question and I thought, “Wait, he values what I think and feel, and he values my opinion. He must think I’m smart.” There’s something that feels really sweet, powerful and respectful, I think, when a man will ask his daughters and his even sons those questions.

Dave:First time I was at Ann’s house, and I knew Dick her dad because he was a coach, but I remember he asked me a question like that, “Hey, what do you think we should do about this?” And I remember thinking, Jim, what you just said, he just shifted power. He’s in control. He’s my girlfriend’s dad. He actually thinks I’m an adult. I’m thinking “Nobody thinks I’m an adult. This guy actually is asking, he’s not doing a nice thing. He literally wants my advice on something and he’s 30, 40 years older than me.”

I was like, “Wow, I’ve never met a man that old treat another younger man like a peer.” And it was a shift of power. “You have power too. I want you to give some back to me.” That’s a big statement in a marriage when a man, and a husband, does that.

Ann:Bruce, did you have any thoughts?

Bruce:I was going to say, when you ask a question like that, be willing to give space and time for processing because not everybody always has an answer right then.

So be willing to ask it but then let your spouse process. Because my wife Maria, she tells me often that she loves when we record FamilyLife Today because I come home a better husband. And so one of these times I came home and asked a question that I’m not used to asking, but it was really good, and I’m sure it was something we had been talking about was like, “How can I make you feel more loved?”

And so I just sprung that on her out of the blue, and she’s like, “Well, I can’t really think of anything.” Obviously, there’s ways I can do better, but she couldn’t think of anything in that moment, and it was so uncharacteristic of me to ask that. But so to give space for them to process and come back because they might not have an answer right away.

Ann:That’s really helpful.

Dave:Yeah. I remember when we were in the stage you’re in Bruce, with the little kids in the house, we would go out sometimes and I realized Ann’s not even here at the dinner table for the first 45 minutes. Her heart and soul’s still with those kids. And I’m talking away and she’s not responding. I’m like, “What’s your problem?” I realize she needs time.

Ann:Yeah, time to process.

Dave:Yeah.

Ann:Yeah, that’s good.

Dave:Here’s the second one. This is a big one. If you want to love, lead, and cherish your wife, serve your wife.

Ann:Let’s talk about this all day.

Dave:All day. I mean—

Ann:Jim mentioned it.

Dave:Yeah. The reason I think it’s so big, and I can only speak, I guess for me personally, I realize I got really lazy in our marriage and in our relationship, expecting you to do all the household stuff. I mean, I’m married to a woman that loves to mow the yard. Who gets it better than that? Loves to clean cars; I mean, manual labor brings you life.

Ann:Therapy.

Dave:And so I coasted. I was laying on the couch and going, “Hey, she’s going to go out and mow the yard and I’m going to watch the game.” And again, there’s times when that’s fine and you love doing that, but I thought, “You’re up at the kitchen and I’m laying here. I need to get off my couch. I need to get in the kitchen, do the dishes, help with the dinner, help with the kids, just stop being lazy and look for ways to serve.” Does that make a wife feel led and make a wife feel loved and cherished?

Ann:It makes us feel totally loved and cherished. Again, we’re not alone. We’re in this together. We’re raising our family or our marriage. We’re a partnership. And I think you’ve gotten a ton better at that because you’ll often ask me, “What can I do? How can I serve you? What can I do when these people come over? Do you have a list for me of things that you need to get done?” That is speaking heaven’s language to me. It’s amazing. And when you get the vacuum cleaner out and you vacuum, and that is incredible. Guys, what are your thoughts on this? Especially, I like Bruce, you have four daughters ranging from 10 to—

Bruce:Nine to zero.

Ann:So you guys are in that really busy stage of life. Do you think Maria needs your help? How can you serve her?

Bruce:Well, yeah, and I’ll do my best Dr. Gary Chapman impersonation here and just say that the struggle we’ve had is I want to show her love in the way that I receive love.

Ann:Yes.

Bruce:So I will clean, and I will do chores and things like that and think “There, I’ve shown my love for her.” And for her, she’s like, “Well, great, love that,” but what she needs is quality time and deep conversation. Me sharing my heart, me hearing her share her heart, and that will make her feel so loved.

Ann:That’s how you’re serving her. That would be the best way.

Bruce:That’s how I serve her is I give her my full attention and I share my heart. That’s serving her whereas I think serving her is, “Well, let me mop the floor. Let me organize this. Let me mow the lawn,” which is serving her, but it’s not what fills her up.

Jim:Because you’re a neat freak.

Bruce:Because I’m a normal human being with normal standards, and then it’s the opposite. She’ll sometimes think that she’s serving me by, “Oh, but I tried to make really good conversation.” I’m like, “Yeah, but the laundry’s not even done.” And so it’s knowing what fills each other up and what is received as serving from each other.

Ann:That’s a good point.

Bruce:So as husband, you need to know, what will your wife receive as serving?

Ann:So to ask your wife, what’s the best way I can serve you? I think that’s just a good simple question.

Dave:And by the way, that’s one of Brad’s other points: study your wife, be an expert on your wife. That’s being an expert, serving her, saying, “Okay, it’s different than what I would want, but it’s not about me. So if serving you is sitting down and talking and listening and deep conversation, I’m going to do that because it’s not about me.” That’s serving.

Jim:I think Bruce has a little bit of an advantage over me in that he’s got four girls and his wife. So you kind of have a range. You’ve got the possibility of having all five love languages—

Dave:Yeah, probably each one.

Jim:—over time. But as he watches his girls, he’s learning intuitively “This one’s different than that one. They’re both different than Maria. I’ve got one daughter. And so Dave, earlier in the episode, you were talking about your guitar. For me, the guitar is Grace. And this is an insight that I gained about myself and the way that I serve my daughter. Recently, we were up visiting her. She’s in her early twenties. She’s married now, and her car is, it’s not super old, but the headlights have gotten kind of, they’ve yellowed.

Dave:Yeah.

Jim:Well, I look at those and actually we drive it when we’re visiting them. I need to drive it. So I’m running an errand, and I can’t hardly see, and I’m like, “I have to fix this before the day’s over” because I’m thinking about my daughter driving around with headlights that don’t quite shine, very bright.

Ann:The protector in you.

Jim:The protector comes out; the father comes out. And so I went to the store, got the kit, did the whole thing, cleaned the headlamps and got them shining brightly. And then I realized that my wife is driving a van that’s almost ten years old. The headlamps looked pretty much like Grace’s, and it hadn’t crossed my mind to do that. And why is that?

Dave:Wow.

Jim:I had to ask myself, why is that? And I’m not saying treat my wife like I do my daughter, but why is it so natural for me to protect and serve my daughter? Shouldn’t I be sending that same signal to my wife? And I think maybe, I don’t know, I’m kind of analyzing myself, but have I spent day after day thinking of her as a peer, which she is, but as someone who serves me and serves the purpose that I have, rather than I’m here to give and invest in her. I can’t keep doing that. So I recently, I got to wash her car, wax her van, fix the headlights and treat her like she’s my guitar that needs the humidifier days.

Ann:That’s so sweet.

Jim:Instead of just, and I literally learned that because I’m a father of a daughter and realizing there’s something really natural there that resonates for my daughter. Why wouldn’t that resonate for my wife too?

Ann:That is the sweetest. It’s so good because it feels like the Holy Spirit prompted you like, “Oh, look at Lisa’s car.”

Bruce:Yeah, I was wondering why you weren’t doing that with her car. So I’m glad you picked up on that.

Jim:Yeah, you noticed that?

Bruce:Yeah.

Ann:And it can be little things too. I don’t think we’d been married that long, and I folded my towels a certain way to put them on the towel bar.

Dave:The trifold.

Ann:The trifold.

Dave:The trifold.

Ann:And it was interesting. And Dave won’t say, “Hey, I’m going to fold my towel like that,” but I was changing it, and I said something to him like, “Oh, I wish you could do the towel this way.” I only said it once. I didn’t even really notice if he did it. And for the next 40 years, he’s been folding his towels, the tri-fold method, hanging it up. He makes the bed in the morning. I don’t say anything. If I haven’t made it, or if he’s the last one out, he’ll make it. That is just sweet. And he doesn’t say, “Hey, did you notice that I”—he just does it quietly, humbly.

Dave:I didn’t even know you noticed.

Ann:I noticed all of those things.

Jim:So it’s okay that he’s got a humidifier in there by his guitars.

Dave:That’s okay.

Ann:I don’t really complain about it.

Bruce:We need an instructional video from Dave, because I don’t even know what you’re talking about. So we need a quick how to.

Jim:Origami towels.

Dave:There’s already one on YouTube. You can go look it up.

Bruce:Okay, fine.

Dave:I’m pretty world famous in the trifold area.

Ann:But those are the things though that you notice that matter to me, and he does it even if it doesn’t matter to him. That’s sweet.

Dave:Hey, we’re out time.

Ann:That was fun, guys. Thanks for joining us.

Bruce:Thanks for letting us interrupt.

Dave:That was fun. Do you feel more loved?

Ann:Yeah, I like this.

Dave:Well, here’s the deal. Words are cheap; action says it all. Guys, seriously, I would love to say to the men, the husbands listening, pick one of those—

Ann:Yeah.

Dave:—start there and don’t even tell your wife you’re going to do this. Just start doing it and watch how God works.

Ann:Let me ask you, should a wife send this podcast to her husband?

Bruce:Of course. Always send FamilyLife Today to your husband.

Dave:Exactly.

Bruce:FamilyLifeToday.com. You can get it on Spotify, Apple Podcasts.

Ann:But will he feel like, “Oh, there it is. I’m failing again.”

Bruce:No.

Dave:I think I would say, “Hey, honey, I listened to this great podcast with three guys talking about how to lead their family and their wives. I think you’ll like these guys. I think you’ll like what they say.” Don’t make it about yourself.

Ann:And I would say if you’re going to do it, tell him something that he’s doing really well and then maybe send it. But I’d pray before you send it, depending on your guy.

Bruce:Share the podcast. Also, you can go to FamilyLife.com/MarriageHelp. We’ve got some of our best stuff on marriage there. And what else was I going to say?

Jim:The phone number?

Bruce:No, we don’t need phone numbers. Just FamilyLife.com/MarriageHelp. And then we’ll have a link to the blog post that you referenced.

Ann:Oh good.

Dave:Okay.

Bruce:Who was that from?

Dave:Brad Merchant.

Bruce:Yeah, in the show notes.

Ann:Great. Awesome. Thanks guys.

FamilyLife Today is a donor-supported production of FamilyLife®, a Cru® Ministry. Helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.

If you’ve benefited from the FamilyLife Today transcripts, would you consider donating today to help defray the costs of producing them and making them available online?

Copyright © 2025 FamilyLife. All rights reserved.

www.FamilyLife.com