For Wives Only

In my last post, I left out many unnamed women in the Bible that impacted our Bible heroes’ lives. My self-imposed word count of 400 can be constricting.  

Let’s zoom in on three more—this time, wives.

First, Mrs. Pilate. She appears in a single verse, Matthew 29:19 (NLT). As Pontius Pilate is about to proclaim Jesus guilty, she says, "Leave that innocent man alone. I suffered through a terrible nightmare about him last night."

An enlightened wife gives her husband advice or another point-of-view to help open his mind. One of our roles in this complex merger called marriage is acting as our husband's conscience, especially in crucial times.

Sadly, our husband’s decisions are beyond our control.

Second, Mrs. Potiphar (Genesis 39:6-20). A woman of leisure—rich, bored, spoiled, probably donned in fabulous clothes—she has an army of servants at her bidding. What the lady wants, she gets.

She turns her lust on her husband’s appointed head of household: Joseph. Young, handsome, well-built, like today’s heartthrobs, and yes, a mere hired hand. She seduces him, shamelessly luring him to go to bed with her day in and day out.      

Joseph says, “No.” “No.” “No.” He runs. She gets even. She cries, "Rape!" And Joseph lands in prison for a crime he didn't commit.

There are similar stories today. But as women after God's own heart, we are grateful that those stories are not ours.

Third, Mr. Noah. Although mentioned five times in the Bible, she has no name nor description. But imagine . . . a woman living with a hard-working husband who let her in on God’s order to build an ark, because God would destroy sinful Earth with water.

Not a whimper from her. Not even when, years later, she, her family, and every pair of the world’s animals stepped into the ark, where they were marooned for about a year (Genesis 6:18; 7:7, 13; 8:16, 18).

In there, she must have fostered a close family life as they moved away from everything they had; as she prepared for a time when the earth would have no one but them.  

How many Mrs. Noahs are there today?

Let’s leaf through the Bible to meet more unnamed wives—our how-to or how-not-to manuals. Consider, too, the nameless wife of Job, of Isaiah, of Ezekiel, of Lot, of Naaman, of Gilead, of Cain, etc.

In their stories, grace lies in wait for us to discover.