# Adam and Ashley Mesa on Temper, Protection and Respect in Marriage Pastor Adam Mesa and his wife, Ashley, talk about quick tempers, strangers who confront women, and why equal does not have to mean identical. Source: Pray.com — https://www.pray.com/articles/adam-and-ashley-mesa-on-temper-protection-and-respect-in-marriage Author: Adam Mesa Category: Love & Relationships Published: 2026-10-22 Last revised: 2026-10-22 --- ## Key takeaways - **Temperament has a source.** Adam traced Ashley's quick voice partly to a father who got angry fast, and his own calm to a pastor father who leaned toward compassion. - **Protection is part of a husband's role.** Adam said he must cover and understand his wife, and he noticed that men who confronted her backed down once they saw him. - **Good motives still need good timing.** He affirmed Ashley's wish to speak up for what is fair, and he also taught her when to walk away. - **A pastor's family is always watched.** The Mesas try to remember that a stranger may know who they are. - **Anger can be personality or pain.** Adam separated people who are comfortable with confrontation from people whose outbursts point to something that needs counseling. - **Equal does not mean identical.** Adam argued that men and women are equal and different, and that this should shape how sons are raised. ## Two homes, two ways of handling conflict On this episode of the Beyond I Do podcast, Ashley Mesa raised a viral road rage video she had seen the night before. Then she asked her husband, Pastor Adam Mesa, how annoyed he gets when she voices her opinion. Her kids had laughed at her that weekend for going off on a TSA agent. Adam said that overall he does not mind. He explained that her personality is shaped partly by her upbringing: her dad was a bit of a hothead who got angry fast, at home and in public. His own father, a pastor, leaned toward compassion, and as a younger man Adam sometimes thought of him as a pushover. His parents also argued behind closed doors, so he never saw healthy disagreement and had to figure it out himself. As a husband, he said, the Bible tells him to cover his wife, and he also needs to understand what pushes her buttons and how she communicates when she is upset. ## When strangers thought Ashley was alone Adam gave several examples. On a cruise ship during COVID, a woman shushed Ashley, and the woman's husband ended up with his finger in Ashley's face. Adam stepped in front of her and told the man never to put his finger in a woman's face. He said it ended with the man apologizing profusely. At LAX, a man whose family had taken about twenty minutes to pack a car cussed Ashley out after she asked politely several times for them to move up. Adam put his head in the car window. In a museum in Israel, an older man told the couple to shut their baby up, and Adam walked up and asked whether he was talking to his son. The man apologized. Adam's observation was that each man seemed to think Ashley was by herself. He said he does not believe their demeanor would have been the same with him standing beside her. He called it weak when men speak that way to a woman alone, and he said he would step in for another man's wife in the same situation. ## Wisdom about timing and risk Adam does not treat every conflict as a chance to let anger out. He said he has told Ashley she was wrong when she was, and that he will apologize on her behalf and walk away. He also told her to stay out of road rage after hearing of a shooting in a nearby city that began with a honk. One day on the freeway he slapped her hand away from the horn because the car that cut them off was a lowered Nissan Altima. When Ashley spotted a shoplifter at Target while pregnant with Thomas and alerted security, Adam told her she was not responsible for protecting the store. She should have left after reporting it, he said, because the young man might remember her face. Her motive was honorable, and Adam summed it up as "right motive, just wrong time." Ashley told her side of the TSA story too. Their flight had been canceled because of snow in Colorado, and the checkpoint demanded a separate container for every item. When an officer stacked and slammed her containers before she was finished, she told him so. Her sons cheered her on, and Adam sent all three away. She admitted that was probably not the conversation to have in front of the boys. ## Someone always knows who you are Adam said he grew up knowing that people are watching a pastor's family. In an altercation, his first thought is often that someone may recognize him, and he does not want the story to be that he is a Christian but a hothead. Ashley did not grow up with that expectation, he said, and has done much better at it over time. They shared a recent restaurant visit when a drink refill took forty minutes after six requests. As they were about to ask for the manager, the server told them the staff had recognized Adam. The server then shared that she had just given her life to Christ. His reaction was plain: "Don't ruin your witness." The couple believe the Holy Spirit has kept them from speaking in moments like that. They also asked listeners to say hello when they recognize them, so the Mesas can be on their best behavior. ## Personality or pain? Ashley asked how a spouse should raise the subject of anger. Adam said men carry this too, and that there is a difference between someone comfortable with confrontation and someone with pain and trauma looking for any excuse to be heard. He described Ashley's pattern as consistent with her personality: she wants things to be fair and will go to a school office for a friend's child or a nephew. Someone who lives at a ten all the time, he said, needs counseling. In dating, he advised ending a relationship if a partner is rude to people and answers correction with "this is just who I am." In marriage, he said, the covenant makes it harder, so the work is long: invest in dates and in your spouse's love language, book the counseling if your spouse has asked for it, and raise the issue months later with care. He suggested framing it around her wellbeing, because "cussing everyone out every day is not healthy for you." He also warned that staying together in an unhealthy marriage does not protect children. ## Equal, and still different Adam recalled a conversation with a woman who held a more feminist view. She argued that no man should get in anyone's face, man or woman, because respect is the issue. Adam disagreed, saying women should be approached differently and with respect. He said he and Ashley disciplined one of their sons harder than ever after he hit a girl while wrestling. They want their sons to understand that girls are different from their buddies. "Women are equal to us, but, also, we respect them," Adam said, and he sees opening doors for women, grandmothers and elderly men as mutual respect. He said the Bible calls women weaker vessels, and he takes that to mean physically, since "they are not weaker in thought or capability." He believes a culture that treats the sexes as the same leaves some men thinking no one will stop them. He holds that a Christian view of equality means treating women as created by God, with honor. ## What this means for you Many of us explain our reactions with "this is just who I am." This conversation invites you to ask where your reactions come from, whether a home you grew up in or something that still hurts, and what they cost the people around you. It also shows a married couple laughing together while telling the truth. Ashley asked for honest feedback and Adam gave it, with affection, and she walked away working toward a better grade. You might ask your spouse or a close friend the same question she asked, and listen without defending yourself.