Long, long ago, when I was a young, young married man, I called a friend to get some informal marital counseling. My friend was Del Fehsenfeld, the founder of Life Actions Ministries in Buchanan, Michigan. I was on staff at a church nearby. As always he immediately made time for me. We met for breakfast.
Del was in intense man with a choleric temperament. After talking for a while he looked me directly in the eye and said, “Can I ask you a question? Do you love Lois?”
“O, Yes,” I said. “I do.”
Without breaking stride he said, “Do you tell her regularly that you love her?”
“Yes, I do,” I said, confidently. I felt a little smug because I know it is hard for some men to express their love. I have never had that problem.
“Good,” Del said and then, eyes on mine, he asked, “If I were to ask her today, “Do you feel loved right now? What would she say?”
After a while I said, “I don’t know.”
Del said, “It’s not just your job to love her or even to tell her regularly that you love her. It is your job to make her feel loved every day.
It’s been about twenty years and Del has long since gone to be with the Lord, but he took time one morning to give me advice that I have never forgotten. I am still working to make my wife feel loved every day. I make a study of each person in my family to discover their love language, the spiritual gifts, how God made them, and what makes them feel loved. One of the things that makes life interesting is to try different things all the time to help those you love feel loved.
It is tragic for people in this world to feel unloved, but millions do. I consider it my personal responsibility to see to it that none of them are in my family. --Ken Pierpont
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