In our book Leading from the Foundation Up, Shane and I spend a chapter emphasizing the foundation of family leadership without going deep into specifics. Good family leadership, we claim, is built on the fear of God. If a husband considers himself answerable to God and looks to God for all his needs, he will give much better headship to his family. This is why passages that speak of family headship tend to emphasize God’s headship over the husband/father (1 Cor 11:3, Eph 5:21, 25; Col 3:17). 

The book focused on the foundation; here I focus on the specifics. I spend much of my time with young men who believe in that God-fearing foundation but want to know, “What does that look like?” And I can remember the days when I was engaged, when I knew I wanted to love Emily like Christ loved the church but struggled to imagine it in the daily rhythms of a home. 

Four children later, I have good news: it’s simpler than you may think. 

Pray with her

When it comes to sweetening your friendship with your wife, earning her trust, and keeping a godly tenor in your home, few habits are more fruitful than leading her in prayer. Like everything else I’m mentioning here, it does not have to be fancy. But it must be faithful. 

Typically, a husband should set aside a certain time every day to pray with his wife and then be ready to initiate prayer any time he senses she needs it. We might call these respectively “prayer time” and “timely prayer.” A habit of prayer will reassure her with twin truths: you are willing to lead her (since you initiated prayer), but you are not all she needs (since you initiated prayer). 

To find a good moment for prayer time, look for a point in the day when you are usually alone together. This may be when you wake up, during a meal, when one of you leaves for work, or when you go to bed. It’s easiest to build a habit like this when you link prayer to one of these times, saying something like, “She’s usually upstairs when I leave for work, so every morning I’ll go pray with her before I leave.”  

On top of this, you will need to keep your eyes open for timely moments when she needs you to pray with her. To do this well, you will have to know her well. If she is pressed with worries, she will probably bring them to you. Listen to her and then lead her in prayer. Or she may get quiet when the children have been difficult or when she feels overwhelmed with the dinner she agreed to host. If you know her well, you can step in at these moments to pray with her.    

Lead family worship

Many husbands don’t lead their families in worship because they are intimidated. The blank look on so many men’s faces asks, What would I even do? 

Again, the solution is not fancy, but faithful. If all you do is read a short passage of Scripture and offer a short prayer, you have made a statement that Jesus is Lord of your home. That daily declaration will form your children over the years and set the spiritual  tone for your home. 

These times will look different at different phases of family life. In the early and empty-nester years, you’re much freer to do robust Bible study with your wife. When the children are small, you might spend more time singing, let them dance, and use an instrument if you play one. My children are old enough to interact with the Scriptures now. So at breakfast, we read a passage and talk about it until we’ve found something it says about God and some way it impacts our lives. Then they each choose one thing to pray for and take turns praying out loud. We usually close with a hymn of their choice.  

Don’t worry if they groan over it. Just keep it simple and stay faithful. The point isn’t to show them how good a father you are, but to recognize Jesus’s lordship over this day and all of life. 

Encourage her

If you go through a few crises or painful years together where she sees your faith stay steady and hears your words of God’s goodness, over time her own faith will be strengthened. Your faithfulness and words set a tone. 

You will need her to encourage you, too. But as head of the home, you’re the chief pointer-to-God. This encouraging role is inherent in leadership. We see it in a football coach’s rousing locker-room speech. And we hear it when the war general gathers the troops the night before the battle. The leader is giving them courage. You don’t have to give your wife movie-worthy speeches, but you should point to the Lord’s goodness consistently and in timely moments so that she has all she needs to say, “I don’t have to be afraid.” 

Know the Word and teach it

Another inherent part of leadership is teaching. That, of course, requires a sound knowledge of God’s word. You don’t have to know more than she does about the Bible, but you do need to know your way around it well enough to talk about it with her and help her find answers to her questions. 

To get there, you need to study it daily, know the basics, and know where to look for answers. This is so important that I counsel young men in most cases not to seek a wife until they know their way around the Scriptures and have a good daily reading habit. 

Bring them to church

Another hallmark of a husband who fears the Lord is a love for the Lord’s Day. Like family worship, this is another of those habits that whispers Jesus’s lordship over all of life. You can hear this in an adult who looks back and says, “Dad made sure we were in church every Sunday.”

We often miss the biggest reason why. Yes, our families need to be fed the Word of God by faithful preachers and teachers. They need to be formed by the songs and singing. And they need fellowship with other Christians. But none of these are the primary reason they should be in church on Sunday. That reason is because Jesus is worthy of their worship on his Day. Above the lessons, sermons, and songs, they need to see their father treat the Lord and his Day with reverence. 

In the States, we tend to emphasize that worship is good for us and forget that worship is something we owe to Jesus. A father who says, “It’s my responsibility to take you there” helps to balance that scale. 

Not fancy, just faithful

We men, our pride can make us dream of being overwhelmingly good at whatever we set ourselves to next. But leading a family takes something else: a humility that stays faithful when you know you aren’t enough for them. They need a meek man who loves them and loves the Lord. With God’s help, you can be that. So, husband, look to God, give your family the best leadership you can give them, and leave them in his hands.