I've noticed a disturbing trend on both Facebook and Pinterest lately among some of my married friends. It's been bothering me for a while now and it just seems like an issue that ought to be addressed. Several of my married friends have been posting and pinning pictures of half-naked male models talking about how attractive these men are and how attracted they are to this type of man. It's one thing for single women to drool over Greek god-like male figures, but it's quite another for a married woman to publicly talk about how attractive she finds men who are not her husband. It is flat out disrespectful, not to mention hurtful, to the husbands. In Ephesians 5, Paul is talking about marriage and how a husband and wife should treat each other. The last thing he says in chapter 5 is in regard to wives and I think it is particularly applicable to this situation. He says, "So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband" (Ephesians 5:33, NLT, emphasis added). Ladies, it isn't optional. We are told to respect our husbands. It isn't always easy when they're behaving in ways contrary to what they ought, but that doesn't exempt us from living up to the way God wants us to treat them. Posting and pinning pictures of men who are not our husbands is extremely disrespectful of our husbands and it can only do harm to our marriages.
Marriage is supposed to be sacred. Certainly, we should treat it as though it were. Once things like this start to creep in from the outside, it becomes a slippery slope. At first, it's just a picture here and there. Then perhaps it becomes going to women's clubs where men undress. And then maybe it progresses to infidelity. Ladies, it always starts small with something innocuous and once that small thing is a habit, we stop thinking of it as sin and we allow ourselves to get deeper into sin. We have to be ever vigilant so that we don't let this kind of thing creep into our lives.
Think about how your would feel if the situation was reversed. What if your husband was looking through a Playboy magazine and decided to get a subscription? How would you feel? If you're like me, you would feel betrayed, hurt, disrespected, and angry. If you don't want the man you love to make you feel that way, then you sure shouldn't make him feel that way.
Perhaps you are thinking to yourself, "but my husband doesn't see what I post on Facebook or what I pin on Pinterest." Maybe he doesn't. But other people do. People you are probably both friends with. These people see how you treat your husband. This is the example you are setting for them. Likely not all of your friends are Christians. We're supposed to be set apart from other people in this world so that others can see Jesus through us. Treating your husband with such blatant disrespect is far from the example you should be setting.
Ladies, if this is you, please pray about it and consider how your actions affect your husband and those around you. We all struggle with something, and sometimes we don't even realize how the things we do/say can be detrimental to our relationships.
