Are you speaking to the king or to the fool?

In 1999 I was dating this dude. He was my first real boyfriend and he was completely HOOD, but dude was DEEP, you hear me? We would sit around for hours, him talking, and me soaking up all of his street knowledge. It was from him that I leaned about being loyal in a relationship, but most importantly he gave me a nugget that stayed embedded in my brain for years after, he said "The worst thing you can do to a man is speak to him like he's a women." It wasn't until years later that I would realize the depth of that nugget.

When my husband and I first met I was coming out of a toxic relationship. While in that relationship, I learned to defend myself with my hands, but I realized that using my tongue landed more punches. See, we could get into a physical altercation and eventually it would end and all would be well, but the words that came from my mouth was ever present. Long after an argument, he was most likely replaying it in his head, and it hurt. So that's what I did. You could hurt me physically but I was going to hurt you mentally.

Unfortunately, I carried that same defense mechanism into my new relationship. When I had to deal with the judgement of the church members, I would go home and take it out on Josh. When they would make slick comments about why he was with me, I would go home and take it out on Josh. I would tell him that he never defended me, and because of that, he became the enemy.

As the years went on, I began to ask God to show me where this behavior was stemming from. Why did I talk to the man that loved me with every breathe in his body like he was poop on the bottom of my shoe? God revealed to me that I was still in defense mode. I was walking through my marriage with my hands up in fight position because I was scared to be vulnerable. I was still broken from my last relationship and I expected my husband to put me back together. I placed all of my frustrations, insecurities, and burdens on my husband with the expectation that as the "husband" he would provide me the healing that I was searching for. Of course when he couldn't, I made him feel as bad as I felt. I know he had to be miserable those first 5 years of marriage.

In year six I realized that the only man that could heal my heart and put my broken pieces back together was the man I didn't see and spent no time seeking. The man who knew me before my mother knew my father. The man who has wonder working power, who you ask?, Jesus of course!

As God began to do his cleanup work within me, he spoke to me about the wife he needed me to be. I needed to be like Esther, a wife of noble character. "Well God", I asked, "what does that look like?". This is what he told me:

"Every man has both a king and a fool in him. Which ever one is spoken to the most – the one that is nurtured and developed – is the one he will become. For years you have been speaking to him like he was a fool when in fact I made him a king."

Well dang God, you just laid me out real quick. I was quickly reminded of that little nugget that was deposited into me years before by a man who saw me heading toward destruction, I was talking to my man, like he was a women (those are Street terms, LOL). He went on to say:

Speak to the king in your husband. The more you speak to the king in him, the more he will believe it and become it. Sana, you have been graced to minister to Josh in ways that NO ONE ELSE CAN, OR SHOULD!

Let me tell you something, I changed what came out of mouth, how it came out of my mouth and WHEN it came out of my mouth real quick! I became what my sister in Christ calls me, The Husband Cheerleader. I'm the head of the Joshua E. Cotten fan club, you hear me?? I began to pray over him in his sleep. Send him sermon titles and he wasn't even preaching yet, I encouraged him when he was down but most importantly, I used that same tongue that the devil had me using as a weapon against my husband, as a way to speak life into him.

Now I am certainly not a perfect wife, in fact, I am quite the handful, but I honor my king with everything in me. If you know Sana, then you know I don't play when it comes to my Joshie (he's going to kill me, lol).

I Thank God for his grace and mercy and for sending me a husband that saw past all of my broken pieces. I Thank God for giving my husband the power to see me through the eyes of the Heavenly Father who has perfect vision.

Hear me now, it wasn't just my words that God required me to change toward my husband. There were other areas that I had to make some changes. I know, you're probably saying to yourself, "I speak to my significant other just fine", but what other areas is God nudging you to change in? Are you controlling? The Bible says in Proverbs 21, " It is better to live in a tent in the wild than with a cross and petulant spouse".

Would your significant other compare you to an irritating and unrelenting drop after drop of an unwanted and unwelcomed leaking faucet? That’s how Solomon described a nagging wife; as a source of annoyance, aggravation and frustration in Proverbs 19.

It's not to late to change your heart towards your significant other. Remember, God has created a King within him, and every King deserves a Queen.