Confessions of a Not So Tender Man

            I wish that when people asked my wife what was the greatest thing about me she would immediately say “he’s such a tender guy.”  Don’t get me wrong.  I have been married almost 30 years and I know my wife well.  She’s a circle the wagons kind of gal.  If you ask, she’ll say lots of great things about me, many undeserved but that won’t be one of them.  She’ll be honest (although likely a bit subjective).

            Gag if you want, he-men, but I’m not asking that you think I’m tender.  That’s something reserved for my wife.  You see, I lack the true kind of tenderness that I really ought to have for my wife – she deserves better.  That doesn’t mean I’ve never been tender, nor does it mean I can’t be.  I just don’t do it enough.  Yet, for some reason she has stuck with me through all of our adventures.  Why?

            Certainly there is no chance it’s because I’m such a great guy.  We can wipe that out based on several missed birthdays over the years and various moments of forgetting things I should have never forgotten.  I often don’t say the right thing when I should.  I often don’t do the right thing when I should.  I have to work overtime to be really romantic.  Sure, I manage a romantic moment here and there – but overall, I’m mostly a dud.  You’d think after all this time, I’d have it figured out completely.  Nope.  Too often the word most often on the tip of my tongue is “me.”  More evidence I’m not a great guy.

            I’ve seen tenderness, so I have no excuse for claiming I don’t understand.  I’m not talking about Hollywood (forgive me for this next word – it comes from my Dad) “crapola” that says if I’m not whisking my wife off to Monte Carlo and constantly whispering new sweet nothings in her ear every day, while bringing chocolates and flowers home every night, I’m not tender.  I’m talking about watching my dad (not the most romantic guy on the earth) almost fall apart not knowing what he would do if my mom died because of a brain hemorrhage several years ago.  When he and I went into the recovery room to see her after she had brain surgery, he held her hand so carefully and stroked her face so gently, not out of fear for her life, but out of simple love for the woman he had married 43 years earlier.  Tender is inadequate, but it’s the only word I have.

            You see, my wife deserves better.  She deserves for me to hold her hand that carefully and stroke her face that gently regularly, not just when something bad is happening.  The thing is, my wife knows she can count on me for the manly stuff because that stuff is easy.  I’ll provide for her material needs.  I’ve worked three jobs at once, before, in order to help make ends meet.  If anyone says anything bad about my wife, I will make sure they hear from me about it.  If someone threatened my wife, they’d get all 5 feet 9 inches of me in their face, even if it meant me suffering a thrashing or worse.  I would die for my wife.  I’m just following Christ, right, Ephesians 5 and all that?

            But, no, I’m really not following Christ’s example at all.  We don’t know all that Jesus told his disciples, or did for them, but what we do know is that he was, above all, tender.  He cared about them, and about us, with a depth of passion that ultimately led to his death on the cross.  He didn’t die because someone forced him to do so.  He died because it was the ultimate caring act, not because it was his manly duty.  He died because his tender heart bled for those who were and are his.

            I think the words from an old hymn strike me as appropriate here:

Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling,
Calling for you and for me;
See, on the portals He’s waiting and watching,
Watching for you and for me.

            Then the refrain:

Come home, come home,
You who are weary, come home;
Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling,
Calling, O sinner, come home!

             

            How, oh how, can I honestly call myself a true Christian man, when the one person on the planet who deserves the most tenderness from me, doesn’t get enough of it?  I’ve got my theology down – I’m about two-thirds through a Master of Divinity; I’ve read the Bible for years; I’ve read lots of theology for years.  But what does it matter if I can’t show Christ-like tenderness to the one person who ought to see it in me the most?

            Why has my wife stuck with me all this time?  Because every so often she’s seen tenderness gleam through and she’s hoping, and praying, that I’ll get it figured out before she goes to meet Jesus.  While it will benefit her, she wants it as much because of how it will really and truly make me more like Jesus.  I thank God for such a wonderful wife.  I'm going to do everything I can to answer those prayers I know she has prayed.

            Even more I thank God he sent his son – my wife gets better than me through our savior – and Jesus will always call on her softly and tenderly even when I fail.