Journey to Surrender

If you missed my post, “Surrender vs. Satisfaction,” which sets the stage for this post, please go back and read it now before reading on.

Today I am addressing wives on the topic of sexual surrender. I addressed husbands in my last post, and I’ll be addressing you as a couple in my next one.

For you as a wife, sexual surrender will likely take a different course than it does for your husband, but there are many corollaries. Your sexual surrender starts by understanding that your husband’s need and desire for sex is God-inspired and God-given, even though it tends to look very different from your own. He does not have the same prerequisite of emotional connection you do. In fact, his prerequisite tends to flow in the opposite direction of yours: he wants sex first, then emotional connection.

Your sexual surrender implies that you should work to understand and cooperate with your husband’s sexual nature rather than struggling against it.

• Don’t accuse him of being a sex-fiend just because he has a high desire for sex, or because he likes to touch and look at you in a sexually explicit manner. This is how he is made to be! Instead of rejecting him, appreciate the fact that he desires you!
• Develop or enhance your sexual nature in order to satisfy your husband’s desire for sexual intimacy. It’s not acceptable to simply say “I’m not that sexual.” Find your own way of sexual expression, but find it just the same. He needs to know you desire him sexually.
• Scripturally, the “rights” to your body belong to your husband. Likewise, you have the rights to his body. (1 Cor 7:3-4). For me these verses speak more to mutual sexual fulfillment than to simply to the act of sex. Viewing these verses through the lens of surrender implies that you should not only strive to make your body available to your husband for sex, but also do so in a way that goes beyond giving him “duty sex.” Learn to delight in delighting your husband in this way.
• Sexual surrender implies respecting your husband’s sexuality, even though it is different than your own. Because the two of you are “one flesh,” enjoy the journey of learning how you two, though very different in sexual nature, can become sexually one. Honor and value your husband for who God made him to be, strong sexuality and all.
• Submitting to your husband sexually has nothing to do with the dominant/submissive or master/slave lifestyle, which is an abusive and demanding counterfeit of God’s biblical design for marriage. Sexual submission means giving yourself completely to your husband, responding to his love as Jesus desires us to respond to Him, wholeheartedly and without reservation, in an atmosphere of trust and security.
• Part of your sexual surrender includes loving your husband “as if.” While I believe he should lead the way in sexual surrender, I also believe that sometimes you need to be able to give yourself sexually even when you don’t feel the emotional connection you desire. When you are willing to give yourself to your husband “as if” you two were already emotionally fulfilled, it can lead to that becoming a reality.

How would you feel if your husband said he didn’t feel like hearing about your day, holding hands or going on a date (pick your own method of emotional connection) until you had sex? You’d likely be deeply offended and more likely think he had a screw loose. But is it really that different when you make your husband jump through certain hoops before you agree to sexual intimacy? If you think about the difference in men’s and women’s wiring, it’s not really that much of a stretch to turn it around like that. If you want an example, go back and watch the video "I Need Conversation" from my first post in this series.

Your willing and enthusiastic approach to sex says, “I love you” to your husband. And as a side benefit, it is generally true that for women the more you have sex, the more you will want it

For you sex is a way of affirming your emotional intimacy. For your husband, sex is a pathway to it.

Suggested Reading for Wives:

• Wifey Wednesday: Why Sex Matters to Your Husband
• What Your Husbands are Telling Me About Your Sex Life