There are lots of days I don't feel especially qualified to give advice to anyone, but this I DO feel I can say with confidence.
If I could give young wives/moms only one piece of advice, it would be to love your husband well.
Right NOW.
In your current season of life.
Don't wait for them to "deserve" it.
Don't wait for your children to be a little more grown or for your career/ministry to get a bit more established.
And definitely do not wait until after you have first tended to all your friendships.
Prioritize your MARRIAGE relationship above all other earthly relationships.
Very early in Scripture we find this:
“At last!” the man exclaimed. “This one is bone from my bone, and flesh from my flesh! She will be called ‘woman,’ because she was taken from ‘man.’”
This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and THE TWO ARE UNITED INTO ONE." (Genesis 2:23-24)
God's ideal is that we are ONE with our spouse.
Notice the Bible does not say that about you and your child.
Or about you and your parents.
I believe with all my heart that we are better parents, better children, better siblings, better friends, better workers, better representatives of Christ when we are truly united in our relationship with our spouse.
Wives and moms, one day you and your spouse will be old. Your health will fail. Your grown children will worry you with much bigger problems than you face now. Your aging parents will be facing serious health issues. It will likely overwhelm you.
And you will NEED your spouse.
You will need to have ALREADY laid the foundation for a strong relationship so that the two of you are working together, helping each other, there for each other, strong together as you deal with all of these common stages of growing older.
Do not wait. Love your spouse now. Start making that relationship the priority that God has always intended it to be.
Don't put it off. Don't discount the significance of God's design. You don't want to be trying to figure it all out when you are 50 and life is coming at you really hard from all directions.
You want your spouse to be your best friend as you walk through all the stuff life (and the enemy) throws at you.
You are so much stronger TOGETHER.
Trust me, our enemy knows that and that is why he works so hard attacking marriage and home.
I have not understood all this until now. But I can say that even the scariest of problems feel so much more "conquerable" when Stephen and I have each other's backs and are working as a team, not against each other.
Imagine how strong your marriage could be at age 50 if you are pouring your time, love, and attention into it at age 30.
Don’t wait! Now is the time.