Neighborhood Missional Living When My Spouse Is Not On Board

This post is part of the “Obstacles to Neighborhood Missional Living” series, and it is available on both the blog and podcast. To view all the topics in the series, including where to read or listen to the other posts/episodes, click here.

There are many things my husband and I are both on board with. Our food preferences are very similar as is our taste in furniture, décor, music, and perfume. But when we don’t agree, I am quietly stubborn and he bristles at any attempt to control him. He wants to air the conflict and I would much prefer to wish it away. He sees in black and white and I point out how the same thing could be seen from multiple angles. He is decisive, and the less important a decision is, the harder it is for me to make it. If you haven’t guessed it by now, we are in a lot of ways polar opposites. Perhaps you can relate. But what happens when you and your spouse find that you feel very differently about something that is pretty important to you? This week we are going to dive into the question of how do we live on mission in our neighborhood if our spouse is not on board.

I am not a marriage counselor, nor do I have a perfect marriage. But I do have a husband who is far more amazing than I deserve and a marriage that is stronger today because the past 10 years have not always been easy. It’s the not-so-easy things that either unravel our threads or bind us in tighter knit.

I know this is a hard topic, and if you are listening or reading, you may be in a season where there is hurt, and questions, and so much beneath the surface, and it is hard. Perhaps today you need to hear that “before [you call], [God] will answer” (Isaiah 65:24). He has not forgotten you. You are not alone. And there is a way forward. The fog can lift. The confusion and the emotions and the words you didn’t voice or wish you hadn’t spoken—He wants to reach through all it and touch the place in your heart that is hurting.

So before we continue, let’s invite Him to be with us:

Jesus, we give You our pain and accept from You the gift of Your presence.

May we have open eyes to see You, open ears to hear You, open hearts to know You.

Awaken hope deep inside us, Lord.

Fan the flame of our desire for You. Fill our wells with You so that all we communicate overflows from love pure and deep within us.

You are our guide. Would You lead us to our #nextrightthing?

Thank you for giving me the space to encourage you today. Your heart is tugged in the direction of opening your heart, home, and life to your neighbors, and I am so very excited about that. I am absolutely cheering you on!

I wish I could tell you that pursing a life on mission is straight-forward and easy answers are always available. But the truth is that missional living is often complicated and messy and takes beautifully courageous steps forward in the midst of some steps in reverse, and you learn and grow and become and keep learning and growing and becoming. There will be questions that arise that you would never have thought would need an answer until they appear. If your spouse is currently not on board with how you envision living on mission in neighborhood, take heart. The question you are currently facing at least is one that you can name, and naming your question is foundational to answering it.

So where can we start when we long to open our homes and live missionally in our neighborhoods but our spouse is not interested? Let’s walk through three action steps you can begin today:

1—Cultivate your relationship with God.

We will keep this short and sweet today, but it is so important that I wanted it to be the first point. If you would like to dig in deeper, I encourage you to check out “Cultivating a Life Worth Imitating” and “Better Than a Roller Coaster High” on the blog. I’ll include the links in the show notes.

For now, I’ll leave you with this: Missional living is an overflow of what is taking place inside our hearts so it is imperative that we foster growth and connection with Jesus. “The most important thing an everyday missionary does is to look like God . . . to fulfill His own mission,” write Ben Connelly and Bob Roberts Jr. in A Field Guide for Everyday Mission (108). Missional living looks like simultaneously drawing close to God and giving others access to our lives. In this way, discipleship is an organic ripple effect made possible through living a Holy Spirit-guided life in community with our neighbors. Yet we can’t pour out from an empty well, and there is One alone who can fill us. If we long to live on mission in our neighborhood together with our spouse, perhaps we can begin with a rhythm of time spent daily with God.

2—Talk with your spouse.

Communication is a bedrock beneath your marriage, and cultivating growth in our communication skills is a constant rhythm needed for a strong marriage. Conflicting perspectives are grace-lined hurdles that invite us to face the challenge as a team. Your spouse is not the obstacle to your family living missionally in your neighborhood. Rather, your spouse’s reservations are an opportunity for the two of you to draw closer, discuss deeper, and put your heads together as you seek what the #nextrightthing is for your family. I encourage you to stand side-by-side and approach the challenge as one worth tackling together.

God created you and your spouse different, and there is both beauty and purpose in that. Likely you and your spouse are not wired with all the same defaults. Your spouse can be your superpower, giving you vision to see what you may be blinded to alone. In his book Start With Your People, Brian Dixon urges, “Know this for sure: the influence of your spouse as your kryptonite or your superpower is largely dependent on your attitudes and actions” (72). Our way of seeing is simply one way of seeing. Let’s choose larger vision, vision augmented not inhibited by our spouse’s way of seeing.

Brian also sheds incredible insight we can apply to the question of how we pursue living on mission in our neighborhood when our spouse is not on board. He advocates for personality tests because “obviously, your spouse does not come with a manual, so you need to study them and write your own” (75).  There are four personality tests he then lists: Love Languages, Enneagram, Kolbe, and StrengthsFinder. Let’s dig into a little more of the why behind why Brian recommends utilizing personality tests to strengthen marriages:

I understand that navigating these tests can be overwhelming. But this is an investment in one of the most important relationships of your life . . . . I’m challenging you to study their manual. How? Take these four tests together and get to know how your spouse sees the world, what they are naturally good at, how they receive love, and what makes them awesome. They will feel heard, valued, and connected to you in ways you never thought possible. 77

Today let’s commit to valuing how our spouse sees differently than we do, encouraging them to grow their strengths, and giving grace for their weaknesses.

Leaning towards rather than pulling away from your spouse postures you to better listen as they share their heart. Don’t assume you know exactly why your spouse is not as interested as you are in doing life with your neighbors—ask. And listen. Seek to understand.

Perhaps one of the following objections to living on mission is one that your spouse can relate to:

• Objection: Why does it matter—missional living seems irrelevant. Truth: The call in Matthew 28:19, “Now wherever you go make disciples of all nations” (TPT) isn’t solely about going to the far ends of the earth. It is also a call to be disciple-making-disciples right where we currently are. For many of us, that means in our homes, neighborhoods, workplaces, and schools. For further reading, check out “What Is My Mission?” on the blog.

• Objection: I’m not comfortable talking about Jesus with other people. Truth: We live out lives transformed by the Holy Spirit and allow others access to our life so the things God is working out in us can ripple out to those we do life with. We are ready to explain with words when asked, but we seek to build relationships and disciple organically. You might find “When to Share Our Faith with Words” on the blog helpful.

• Objection: Money is tight—can’t share food all the time. Truth: Missional living does not necessitate you spend more money. While it may shift priorities in your heart that affect how you choose to budget your resources, there are many ways you can be relational and others-focused without burdening your finances. For example, you could offer a hand with a project, a couch to sit on and a listening ear, or a playdate with some new neighborhood friends. Potluck-styles meals are another great option. You might read “When My Offering Feels Small” on the blog for more encouragement.

• Objection: I don’t have anything in common/no relationship with any of our neighbors. Truth: We are a much stronger community when we can draw from different strengths, experiences, and ways of seeing, and some of your richest friendships may form with neighbors you initially thought you had nothing in common with. You might find “When Age Differences Bring Us Together” on the blog perspective-shifting.

• Objection: I feel we would be judged because we don’t always live Christ-like. Truth: We imperfectly represent a perfect God, but that doesn’t diminish His glory—in fact, it amplifies it! Real is relatable and refreshing. To disciple well, you want to be pressing in and allowing God to continue transforming your life, but if you present yourself as already perfect, you close off the chance to show God to be the hero of a story still being written.  For further encouragement, check out “Real Talk: What We May Not Know We Are Missing” on the blog.

• Objection: I just want space and quiet. Truth: Introverts have strengths to contribute to community that are less intuitive for extroverts. While an introvert may need more margin for alone time, it is absolutely possible to still live missionally when you have a high need for space and quiet. Perhaps “Neighborhood Missional Living When I Am an Introvert” and “The Me That Is Needed” on the blog would be some helpful reading.

• Objection: I need to finish these projects with the house first. Truth: Deep relationships thrive in real, lived in spaces where pretenses are dropped and people are valued. The things you see as unfinished in your house may actually make your neighbors feel more at ease and welcome in your home. Likewise, projects are a great way to both give and receive help, which roots deeper the friendships you are forming with your neighbors. Perhaps a peek into how I addressed my own struggle with this would be helpful. If so, check out “Befriending the Awkward” on the blog.

• Objection: We already have friends/church/small group—can’t invest relationally in another arena. Truth: The draw of proximity is that it is so much easier to truly to do life together throughout the week. Mission is no longer disconnected from the rest of our life—something we do on occasion. Instead, it is an overflow of who we are in Christ: adopted by Him and into His mission. “When My Neighbor Lives Next-Door” and “Word of the Year: Open” on the blog may shed some light on this question.

• Objection: We are just too busy! Truth: The maniac pace of our schedules is often touted as a badge of honor. But I’ve found that everything I say “yes” to means that I have to say “no” to something else, even if it is just my ability to be fully present in that something else. When it comes to margin in our schedules, less can be more. Richer. More deeply life-giving. For further encouragement on what to do when your life feels too busy to include time getting to know your neighbors, check out “Margin Meets Mission: The Gift of Availability” or “The Paradox of Rest” on the blog.

We’ve covered a lot in this section, “Talk to your spouse,” so I wanted to remind you that all the links I mentioned will be in the show notes. The full transcript of this episode is also on the blog as a post in case reading will allow you to take this in as slowly as you need.

Ready for action step #3?

3) Practice discipling in your home.

To disciple well outside our homes, we have to also lead with openness and through example inside our homes. As you prepare to reorient your schedule and priorities around God’s mission in your neighborhood, I encourage you to not overlook discipling your family as a fantastic training ground opportunity. Intentionality will help you further engage in ways you are already discipling.

We live differently because of who we are, and we invite our spouse and kids (if we have them) into conversations about what God is working out in us. We lead by being open. Humble. Vulnerable. Apologizing quickly, forgiving readily. Accepting and extending grace. Learning to build each other up with our words. Pondering aloud our questions. Reading scripture or Bible stories together. Praying together and for each other. Serving each other out love. Endeavoring to listen, and demonstrating how we value each other by seeking to understand.

Your marriage itself is a testimony to your neighbors of the way God loves each of us. I recently read in A Field Guide for Everyday Mission, by Ben Connelly and Bob Roberts Jr., that “Our marriages look different, because we know they reflect a deeper covenant. So we commit to a beauty deeper than physical, and we respect, forgive, and show grace to each other, by a power not our own” (119). If we long to live an uncommon normal in our neighborhoods and our spouse right now is not on board, we could lean into mission by living an uncommon normal within our marriages and practicing organic discipleship within our families.

I know this episode/post is longer than most. We are tackling a big question, and I wanted to pack in as much as I could because I truly don’t want you to give up on living missionally in your neighborhood. Beginning to live on mission is a journey marked often by many baby steps. The pace is less important than the direction, and the growth that can happen in your marriage as you and your spouse draw closer together and closer to God is a beautiful thread of hope that I hope you can cling to. I also want to leave you with a few resources I highly recommend as you continue to ask God what your next step is, but first, let’s recap the three action steps we’ve covered:

1. Cultivate your relationship with God.
2. Talk with your spouse.
3. Practice discipling within your home.

Recommended Resources:

The Road Back to You by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile

The Path Between Us by Suzanne Stabile

Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs

The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman

Small is Big, Slow is Fast by Caesar Kalinowski

A Field Guide for Everyday Mission by Ben Connelly and Bob Roberts, Jr.

The Turquoise Table by Kristin Shell

Start with Your People by Brian Dixon, especially chapter 6, “Spouse: From Kryptonite to Superpower”

Prayer for the mission-minded whose spouse is not yet on board:

Today, let’s end where we started—with prayer.

Father, when our hearts feel heavy or alone or busted, You are the peace that stills the storm within us.

When we don’t know the answer, help us see as blessing the reminder to turn to You.

Would you draw us closer to You, closer to our spouse, and closer to the mission You have for us right where we live?

We thank You for the desire You are stirring in our hearts to see and value our neighbors. May we not overstep seeing and noticing our spouse as we lean into mission in our neighborhood.

Cultivate uncommon rhythms as You redefine our normal.

Amen.

Connelly, Ben and Bob Roberts Jr. A Field Guide for Everyday Mission: 30 Days and 101 Ways to Demonstrate the Gospel. Moody, 2014.

Dixon, Brian. Start with Your People: The Daily Decision That Changes Everything. Zondervan, 2019.

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