31 Ways to Encourage a Military Wife Friend

Welcome! As the title notes, I'm a military chaplain's wife. My husband joined the reserves in 2002 and went active duty in 2006. It's been a crazy, wild adventure ever since!

When the #31Days of Blogging popped up again in my Facebook news feed last week, I began thinking of a topic, and for my writing blog I decided to share 31 Inspiring Quotations. Then my friend Teri Lynne suggested - and I read it as a challenge - that I share 31 ways of encouraging military wives.

Even though I am a military wife, I'm also in women's ministry. While I identify with this group, I don't always fit in with the group. After being a pastor's wife for 14 years, being a chaplain's wife felt easy--until my husband deployed. That even seemed easier in some ways than all the expectations that were placed upon me by well-meaning (and sometimes those who were not well-meaning) church members.

Anyway, back to Teri Lynne. She and I have known each other for a long time--she knew me when my greatest ambition was to teach high school. She knew me before I would ever agree to marry a minister. She helped me pass debate, for the love of all things! (Thanks, Teri. You still rock.)

So I did what I always do. I started a list in my notebook, and I asked the hard questions on Facebook.

A couple of days later, I had my list of 31 things.

Thank you for joining me in this journey, and I hope and pray that you will choose just a couple of things on this list to do for a military wife in your acquaintance. And if you're here and don't know anyone who is affiliated with the military, you can always take the prayer request posts and pray. Pray for our military service members. Pray for their spouses. Pray for their children. Pray for their parents and extended families.

One quick disclaimer: Because I am a woman and a wife, I am writing this specifically from my point of view, offering suggestions given to me by other military wives. Please know that I do not mean to exclude the male military spouse. Since I don't know any in my immediate acquaintance (all the ones I know are in dual-career marriages, which is a whole other experience), I had no one to ask. If you happen to know of a family where the wife is the active duty member, I still contend that the prayer requests are valid for all military families - all branches, active, Guard, and reserve. You can always pray, and you can still offer to help in ways big and small.

Part of The Nester's #31Days - click to find more fabulousness

Link to all the posts in this series

Link to my other #31Days series of Inspiring Quotations