A wife of noble character who can find?
She is worth far more than rubies.
Her husband has full confidence in her
and lacks nothing of value.
She brings him good, not harm,
all the days of her life.Proverbs 31:10-12 from New International Version
This is the beginning of potentially the most famous, and longest, section in Proverbs. Yes, the Iron sharpening Iron verse is quoted often, but that is just one verse.
I really want to focus in on verse 11, “her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value”. Other translations end that with “she will greatly enrich his life” (NLT), “never has reason to regret it” (the message) or “he will have no lack of gain” (NASB).
What does it take to be in a relationship where you have:
- a lacking of nothing of value
- a greatly enriched life
- no regrets
- continuous gains
Or in my words “it just keeps getting better and better, both in the relationship and in your life”.
Looking through the rest of chapter 31 it has a bunch of lists of actions, but it is not the actions that causes the great results of a individual with noble character, it’s the fact that the other person within the relationship is also of noble character. Beyond that it is easy to believe that the people in the relationship have similar, if not identical and at least symbiotic, goals, vision, dreams, etc.
From there we can also determine that each individual can work on their own. Neither really needs the other participants to “manage” at least not in the day to day.
What if for this next 30 days, you take one relationship and have an ongoing conversation about the desires of your heart, the picture you would like to paint that is your life, the things you want to create, posses, purchase, and people you want to provide value to. Most importantly discuss why; that question can be later on, but with a goal that by the end of the 30 days, both you and the other person will have a deeper understanding of each other.
This is not an idea to cause you to be of “noble character”, however odds are that that byproduct will happen, but it will help that relationship to go the direction it was already heading, but faster – and hopefully in a more positive light.
Part of the Proverbs Challenge series.
