The following post is contributed by my beautiful wife, Dana Schmoyer (pictured to the left, holding me shortly after I proposed). She often blogs about youth ministry from the perspective of a youth pastor’s wife at DanaSchmoyer.com and is pretty active on Twitter.. She put a lot of thought into this post for you all. If you have questions, she’d love to answer them in the comments below.

4. Set boundaries.

Make sure the two of you are clear on how many nights a week your husband is going to be out. (Tim and I try to keep it to 3 nights a week.) Some weeks we have had something every night, but then we make sure the following week is close to empty. Also protect your home. I have known people to open their house to youth, letting them drop in at any time of the day or night. I highly recommend against this. Your house should be your own private sanctuary. By protecting your house you are protecting your family and spouse time. It’s probably cheaper too if they feel like they have open access to your fridge!

3. Speak carefully.

Yesterday in #6 I mentioned that it is important to surround yourself by godly women. When you do, and feel comfortable around these women sharing everything, that is great, but watch what you say. You can be close and open with friends without sharing intimate details of your marriage and personal issues in ministry. Find a godly woman outside of your church circle who you can share these things with about your life and ministry. If you are dating a youth pastor, don’t share details of your relationship with others in the church. I made that mistake and speak from experience — it can quickly turn into gossip. With this I have also learned that it’s probably wise to hold the same standard in a marriage relationship.

2. Always support your husband publicly.

No matter what, support him in public. If you disagree with something, tell your husband when no one is around. If someone comes to you with a complaint, you can listen, but do not try to fix the problem, they need to go to him with their issue. God put you here to support your husband, not to carry him.

1. Be sexually active with your husband.

Sex is a good stress reliever and fulfills his needs, which helps prevent temptation for him. It shocked me to hear this out of Doug Field’s mouth at NYWC at the marriage seminar with his wife, but it really is important. He said, “The number one job for my wife is to sleep with the youth pastor.”

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This post was written and contributed by my wife, Dana Schmoyer. See Part 1 from yesterday.

Posted on December 2, 2008