Confessions of a Preacher's Wife

Hello! My name is Nancy Phillips, and I am a preacher’s wife. I’ve been called a lot of things in my life, but in the past seven years I have been known by that title. One morning while I was drying my hair, a little thought popped into my overloaded brain. And that thought began to grow and grow until I came up with an idea—preacher’s wives need a support group. If alcoholics can have an AA and overeaters can have an OEA, then why couldn’t we preachers’ wives have a PWA!

Believe you me, I need a support group every time I get out of bed in the morning. In between the phone calls, the knocks at the back door, and church members visiting unannounced, by 11:00 AM I am in need of help and encouragement and support. So I came up with the idea that there should be a special club, a special society, kind of like AA or OEA. The PWA would meet certain nights of the week, excluding Wednesday nights, for obvious reasons, and also Tuesday nights because of the Ladies Circle Meeting. So, Monday night would probably be the best, especially since the problems from Sunday are so fresh in our minds. Or just maybe, we could call each other secretly on a 1-800 hotline that would be available 24 hours a day!!

Although this might have been a good thought, I realized I needed something greater than human support. So I went to my Bible and came up with a wonderful encouragement from God’s Word—Psalm 143:10-12:

“Teach me to do your will, for you are my God; may your good Spirit lead me on level ground. For your name’s sake O Lord, preserve my life. In your righteousness, bring me out of trouble. In your unfailing love, silence my enemies; destroy all my foes, for I am your servant.”

I learned from this Scripture that no matter what was happening in my life as a preacher’s wife, I had a God that was there for me! I learned that God could teach me to do His will, not the will of the little old white-haired saint of God in the sixth row back on the right side of the pulpit.

I learned that He was my God—a personal God who was with me to support me in my task.. I realized that I didn’t have to bow to the wishes of the member’s wives or listen necessarily to their instruction—I could listen to God’s instruction through His Word.

Then the second part of Psalm 143:10 really hit me:

“May your good Spirit lead me on level ground.”

It became a revolutionary thought that God’s good Spirit can lead me—I don’t need a 12 -step program for success in overcoming my obstacles. I don’t need a butcher’s knife to slay the dragons in the AMEN corner, I have a God whose Holy Spirit can come and lead me on “level ground”. You know, when you’re on level ground, your chance of being off-balance is much less than when the ground is slanting or bumpy or hilly.

So, as a preacher’s wife, no matter what kind of support I have, I have the most marvelous support in the world—God Almighty and His Holy Spirit. And when I have that kind of support, I don’t have to put my right hand on the Bible, or my left hand in the air, and repeat a prescribed oath. I don’t have to work through years of denial with a close associate or friend. I’ve found out that all I need is God’s Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit to “lead me on level ground”.

Now that I’ve admitted that I AM truly a preacher’s wife, I’ll get on with the story.