Prayer = LOVE

My prayer partner is cute, just barely 30, funny, and (except for 17 years and male genes) a carbon copy of my husband. So when I shared with her his recent puzzling behavior, she had an immediate answer--HE'S NOT FEELING THE LOVE.

So I say, "I'll run out and pick him up a little GIFT, something to help him feel the love." ('Cause that's what a person fluent in the love language of gifts does in this circumstance.)

Nope, not gonna work. My sweet little beanpole,  pretty-as-a-picture friend says I need to speak his love languages...ACTS of SERVICE.

BooHiss. Acts of service are BIG TIME BLECH. Serious style-crampers. Acts of service require sacrifice, and, often, grime and DIRT. The likes of laundry and dishes and walking the stinky dog. Can't I hire someone to do this? Oh please oh please oh please?

By now my gentle, loving prayer partner is about to smack the living gift-of-WHINING out of me.

I listen. After all, there's a reason I chose to pray with her every week. She's just a wee bit BIG WHOLE LOT OF WISE. She gets that way from reading the Scriptures and then LIVING THEM OUT.

I surf the internet for ideas ('cause I'm so tech savvy I don't even know how to open a book anymore) and find this great little COUPON BOOKLET made out of a deck of cards. I modify it some--because really, does a 46 year old man want little red and white polka-dotted ribbons hanging from something?--and voila, a way to speak his love language.

Now I know you want to know if I really came through. Did I really write things on there that will speak to his heart? Yes. Through gritted teeth and with reluctant hands, I wrote out 52 WEEKLY GIFTS, meaning for an entire week I'll do such things as...

• Walk the dog (I hate, hate, hate walking and that mutt drives me nuts!)
• Wash the dishes (I will miss waking up to an empty sink every morning)
• Clean out and wash his car (How can I be serious?!)
• Scratch his back (which is worse than a hundred fingernails on a chalkboard, but his favorite thing in the world)
• Oh, and you'll love this one: it says JUST KEEP MY MOUTH SHUT. (I have it on authority that your husband would love that coupon as well.)

The true test will come when he tries to redeem one of these blessed cards. I'm sure I'll be on the phone to my prayer partner, asking her to pray the Holy Spirit will SHUT UP MY MOUTH and give me a SERVANT'S HEART. But I know--she's got my back.

In a few weeks, I can tell you about the rest of our Valentine's Day celebrations. But a few things have to make it through the kiln first. Literally. (hint hint)