How to Deal With a Messy Spouse

FIRSTLY, review principles:

1. The Lord in His mercy, saved you from sin and gave you new life! Let us be grateful and keep that perspective!

2. Love your spouse with Christ's love: The Lord is incredibly patient and laid down His life for us.

3. Don't be a Martha! Cleanliness, as nice as it is, does not have eternal significance. Focus rather on the love and person of the Holy Spirit, and set your sights on heaven and eternal treasure.

4. Remember your blessings! He who finds a wife finds a good thing. Husbands, remember your wife is a gift from God to give you love, companionship, children, and a home. She's not perfect, but she is good. Sorry ladies, I don't know of an equivalent verse that says a husband is a good thing 😂 -- but jokes aside the principle still applies -- your spouse is a blessing.

TECHNIQUES

As always, when early in marriage, it is good to discuss things openly in a calm and loving way. Tell your spouse once, maybe twice, how you really appreciate it when things are kept tidy (this is of course assuming you yourself are tidy and cleaning up after yourself). If they are receptive and work with you, great. If not, depending on your relationship, that might be about it and you may have to adapt and learn to live in a messy house.

1. Learn to live in a mess: Probably the most important adaptive technique you will have to do -- with God's help you can do it. See above the Martha problem, cleanliness is not of eternal significance, so you will have to let it go if your spouse refuses to keep things tidy. 

2. Keep your corner secure: Remember how in Proverbs it's better to live in the corner of a rooftop than in a big house with a loud woman? Well, if you're spending more time than you'd like looking for stuff, and getting frustrated, secure a corner of your house with stuff that you need and use. A locked room, a locked cabinet, etc.

3. Eat out / order in: An expensive proposition, but it is better to spend money and live well than to work against the flow on non-essential matters and struggle with bitterness and anger! Just remember to try to keep it healthy.

4. Don't clean up after them: Unless you have the bandwidth to clean up after your spouse AND stay loving, kind, and patient, then don't do it! Don't do unreasonable tidying up after a messy spouse unless you can do it with a cheerful heart. Let the mess pile up!

4. Guerrilla cleaning tactics: If you can't take it, or you can't even do some basic functions around the house, use guerrilla cleaning tactics, or strategic damage-control cleaning tactics. Do not aim for perfection, let go of the OCD tendencies. Take some boxes or bags, gather up all the stuff and put it in a corner, get it out of the way, or throw things out that you know they won't miss. Do what you need to do in a fast, efficient way so that you can do what you need to do without spending a ton of energy and time cleaning up just for it to get messed up again.

CONCLUSION

Remember, in all things give thanks to God, work like you're working for Him, keep your eyes on Him, and be wise, don't do stuff that doesn't matter, don't fight over things that don't matter, and do your job. In all things have charity (that is love), and let God work in your marriage as you are faithful.