7. I can’t ask for help or reveal my weaknesses and struggles.
Ah yes, this one. This is a modern day version of the “the pastor’s wife can’t have friends in the church” lie, birthed out of the Pinterest and Facebook era of cultivating a good exterior and being reluctant to admit to weakness.
This isn’t always the ministry wife’s fault, but instead a cyclical pattern between the church and its leaders. A ministry wife, for example, may share something with a trusted friend and either that friend has no idea of how to respond or they blab it to others, causing the ministry wife to retreat back into herself.
It’s a lie either way, this idea that a ministry wife doesn’t have struggles or that she shouldn’t be able to safely reveal them to others so as to receive the ministry of the church.
Ministry wives, the truth is that:
Your identity is as a daughter of God. You are approved and beloved by Him.
You are called to a man who is called into the ministry, therefore you are called into ministry.
God only expects you to be you and to use the specific gifts He’s given you.
You are influential and important in the work God is doing through His church.
You are serving God, not people, although you will serve people as an outflow of serving God.
It’s proper and right to set limits because you are a limited person.
You need the church because you need sanctification and community.
Which of these lies do you most often believe? What lies would you add to the list?
