The Qualifications of a Pastor’s Wife

This is a guest post written by Beth Spilger, my Mother and 45 year veteran of being a Pastor's wife.

I never questioned my calling as a Pastor’s Wife. I never questioned the fact that I was to help my husband fulfill the qualifications God placed on him … or at least those I could. Some are undeniably his responsibility.

So many of these qualifications are implicitly our’s together even though the qualifications are given to my husband. I, too, should keep these qualifications because they will reflect on his reputation even though I am not the pastor but his wife. Well, except the one about being the “husband of one wife”. That’s a difficult one for me as a woman. I can be the wife of one husband and that I have done and will until death. I do hope God gives us both a long life together. There is no one in this world I would rather serve the Lord with than my husband. 

How can my husband fulfill hospitality, raising our children for the glory of God and in subjection to their father, keeping our house in order, not greedy for money, not covetous, and having a good report of all men if I’m not in his corner helping him? I often think of the fact that Eve was taken from the side of Adam. A wife is a help-meet. She has a responsibility to help her husband be the man of God he needs to be whether he is a pastor or not. Even more when he is. 

I feel my job is to encourage him in his spiritual walk, as every wife should do, to be in the Word, to pray, to serve, to be faithful in all he does, etc. Not driving him but walking along-side encouraging him. I have to remember that encouraging is not encouraging wrong but the right behavior. I’m his cheerleader! 

God gave us seven children to raise for His glory. I look at each one of them as adults and observe that they honor and respect their father (he’s earned both!), they serve our Lord with joy and excitement, they live godly in Christ Jesus, they are in His Word, they are striving to raise families for His glory, etc. They are not perfect. We have never told our children they were to do anything because they were preacher’s kids. Others have told them that but not us. They were to do them because they are in our family. We do these based on the Word of God. We considered our family a team and we worked together (still do) to accomplish God’s purpose for our family and ministry. At times that meant that some of us stayed home to do the grunt work so others could serve elsewhere. At times it meant we all went to the church to clean as a team. Whatever it was we all worked to serve at the church in various areas to see the ministry move forward. There is so much to being a team and we were privileged to be one!

My husband and I have learned a lot together these 45 years and counting. We have stuck with each other through thick and thin. Sometimes more thin than thick in which we have had the privilege of seeing God meet each and every need as well as some of our wants. God has been faithful to every promise — all the time. God wants us to exercise faith. If I’m always wanting more or better and not content with what we have to the point that I will do whatever I can to get it, I will never learn faith. Faith is trusting the Lord to meet all my needs. I have so many stories of how God met needs and gave us gifts as a family as we cared for the things he had already provided. 

Pastoring is not easy. My biggest job as my husband’s wife is to pray for him. Pray that he will fulfill the qualifications listed in 1 Timothy. I pray for his walk with the Lord, his relationship with our children and the people at church, for wisdom, encouragement from other places besides me, his health spiritually, physically, and emotionally, decisions he has to make, his leadership in our home and church, etc. 

I think the hardest thing I have had to deal with is the expectations coming from those who do not understand the ministry, my husband’s position as a pastor, and that pastor’s kids are not different than their own. I encourage you to get to know your Pastor’s family and look at ways you can encourage your pastor, his wife, and their children. Study the Word to understand the great responsibility that God puts on the shoulders of your pastor. Above all, PRAY for their family and their protection.

I am blessed to be called my husband’s wife! I do not view it lightly. I am grateful that God put us in the church He did, gave us the children He did, and the experiences He has. It is a privilege to serve along-side my man-of-God.

Written by Beth Spilger for the readers of "Word Fitly Spoken."