14 Week Small Group Guide (Download)

You have to become proactive, rather than just trying to stop the reactive.

Your hunger for God can create an appetite in your children.

The heart of my communication means the other person cannot get my heart to be unkind, unloving, or disrespectful. Instead, I have made a decision about who I will be independent of the other person. I won’t blame my unkindness on someone else.

Marital researchers agree that a huge percentage of communication problems between husband and wife are due not to what is said but to how it is said – the attitude and tone of voice.

Respect for the husband is just as important as love for the wife.

You speak lovingly or respectfully no matter how your spouse may speak to you in return. Your spouse is not the reason--good or bad--why you speak unconditional words of love or respect. God is the reason, and as you depend on Him, you will become increasingly able to speak lovingly and respectfully to your spouse.

When you look to God and His Word as your ultimate source of significance and security, you don’t demand that your spouse take that role in your life. And as you draw strength from the Lord individually, He draws you closer together as a couple.

“With eyes of faith, envision Jesus standing just beyond the shoulder of your spouse and listening to every word you speak in every conversation, pleasant or tense. When you speak lovingly or respectfully to your spouse, you are speaking to Christ. Your spouse just happens to be there too.” This truth has sanctified the lips of many. Instead of giving their spouse a verbal whipping or choking on the idea of saying anything positive, now some spouses are motivated to speak words of unconditional love or respect.

His love motivates her respect. Her respect motivates his love.

At the very bottom of things, in every case and in every conversation, you can do your marriage a huge favor by assuming she is seeking to feel loved or he is seeking to feel respected and give your spouse some grace!

No matter how difficult your spouse may be at the moment, your spouse does not have control over your reaction; you do. You may be experiencing disappointment, frustration, or anger, but you always have a choice.

Do not live by the standards of Hollywood; trust what God says in His Holy Word.

Your wife will feel esteemed when you speak highly of her in front of others.

Husbands primarily want to hear ‘respect” talk during conflict. Wives primarily want to hear “love” talk during conflict.

As a husband, if you can grasp that you don’t always have to solve your wife’s problems, you will take a giant step toward showing her empathy and understanding.

The Crazy Cycle is, indeed “the evil of folly and the foolishness of madness” (Ecclesiastes 7:25)

Knowing my spouse will not be able to love or respect me perfectly, I commit to having a forgiving spirit so that I may never speak hatefully or contemptuously.

Trusting and obeying God’s Word because we love and reverence God never, ever makes us a hypocrite! When the alarm goes off in the morning, we get up, even when we don’t feel like it getting up. Because we do what we don’t feel like doing, does that make us hypocrites? No, it’s a sign we are responsible people. Showing respectful behavior when we don’t “feel respectful” is evidence of maturity.

Your spouse may meet many of your needs, but your deepest dependency should be on your Lord.

I have concluded that those of us in the church who believe we have the Truth are not using the whole truth. A crucial part of God’s Word has been completely ignored, or perhaps simply gone unnoticed, when it has been there right under our noses the whole time! Many Christian spouses know Ephesians 5:33 and can at least paraphrase it. The Apostle Paul tells husbands to love their wives as much as they love themselves, and wives are to respect their husbands. But is anyone really listening? Perhaps the first step to better communication between husband and wife is to hear what God’s Word clearly says. --Emerson

Your spouse has a need that you don’t have. Are you going to say there is something seriously wrong with them or will you say “Viva la Difference”?

We are either going to give in the darkness or we are going to give into the darkness.

Your husband knows you value his friendship when you tell him you like him and you show it (he knows you love him, but he often wonders if you really like him).

[Husbands] do you realize the power of just holding your wife’s hand?

When parents genuinely trust and follow the Lord and His ways, their faith spills over onto the children.

Mistakes can’t be undone, but they can be forgiven.

Here is the secret to marriage that every couple seeks and yet few find: Unconditional respect is as powerful for him as unconditional love is for her. It’s the secret that will help you achieve a brand new level of intimacy.

Do you understand that God feels compassion for you, no matter what you have done or what your circumstances may be?

Holding back your love or respect will just keep the Crazy Cycle spinning away, but being mature and making the first move could slow it down.

If you want your wife to express appreciation for your attempts to be loving, you must use thankful words when she tries to speak or act respectfully.

In your marriage be the first to “seek peace and pursue it” (1 Peter 3:11)

Your husband knows you appreciate his desire to protect and provide when you praise his commitment to provide for you. You empathize when he reveals his male mindset about position, status, or rank at work.

Money squabbles don’t undermine love and respect; they simply reveal unloving and disrespectful attitudes, which are the real reason why a marriage can start to wobble on the Crazy Cycle.

No one can really practice Love and Respect unless he or she does it as unto Jesus Christ.

A wife has one driving need: to feel loved. When that need is met, she is happy. A husband has one driving need: to feel respected. When that need is met, he is happy. When either of these needs isn’t met, things get crazy with conflict.

If you are seeking positive change in your marriage, you will need to make a positive change in your attitude and actions.

Can you begin to trust that God feels love for you even when you don’t feel that love?

“Living happily ever after” means knowing how to deal with the imperfect parts of life.

When others do not respond to our communication, we need to look first at our communication style. Is the other person incapable of hearing what we have to say? Or are we abrupt, brusque, and curt?

Just because you’re offended doesn’t mean the other person is offensive.

Be a part of the solution, not part of the problem.

It’s so easy to dismiss our spouse as childish because we don’t have the same vulnerabilities they do.

The woman absolutely needs love, and the man absolutely needs respect. It’s as simple- and as difficult- as that.

Could you be facing a crisis in faith more than a crisis in your marriage?

Men are solution oriented, they love to solve problems. They want to be helpful.

Clearly, in the marriage, in the family and in the household, when you speak words of blessing, you are speaking to the Lord, and for this you will be rewarded.

Husbands, even Jesus Himself was asked by a woman, “Do you not care?” (Luke 10:40) When your wife accuses you of not caring, decode her deeper meaning.

Your wife feels you are open with her when you discuss financial concerns, possible job changes or ideas for your future.

The Lord made women (Pink) and men (Blue) with differences, and He expects us to recognize and deal with those differences in a loving and respectful way.

God is good and wants what is best for us.

His love blesses regardless of her respect; her respect blesses regardless of his love.

Through Jesus and Peter, God set forth His standard for living in the unconditional dimension: choose to be loving even when the other person is not; do what is right regardless of the treatment you receive. I believe this standard applies directly to marriage. A husband who speaks lovingly to his disrespectful wife will be rewarded; and a wife who speaks respectfully to her unloving, not-worthy-of-respect husband will be rewarded. Whether you are husband or wife, the reward is what can keep you going in the midst of the craziness: knowing that God commends you, knowing that you have found his favor for your words and actions.

Let the Lord change you, but don’t try to change each other.

We all need to wrestle with the spiritual truth that God is good. If you don’t believe God is good, you won’t trust His word. If you don’t trust His word, you will find excuses to ignore His commands.

Every marriage includes trouble some of the time. Do not let the 20% leaven all the rest.

When a husband feels disrespected, he has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel unloving to his wife. (Perhaps the command to love was given to him precisely for this reason!) When a wife feels unloved, she has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel disrespectful to her husband. (Perhaps the command to respect was given to her precisely for this reason!)

We have discovered that as women motivate their man God’s way, men are energized to love them better. It doesn’t matter if your marriage is good or seems like there is no hope. We have seen God move in powerful ways even when things looked hopeless.

We all need love and respect equally. But, during conflict our felt needs are as different as pink is from blue.

Do you bow to the influence of Hollywood or God’s Holy Word?

When confronting your spouse, attack the behavior, not the person.

Refuse to let evil turn you into a contemptuous and hateful person.

The key to motivating another person is meeting their deepest need, especially during conflict.

We are equal but we are not the same.

When evil comes at you, you’re the one who makes the choice of whether or not it is going to go into you.

Before hitting send, ask yourself, "Have I listened carefully and understand the exact issue on the table?"

The more we are upset at something, the wiser it is to let twenty-four hours pass before responding.

Research and experience prove that men and women see and hear differently. Recognizing these differences and adjusting to them is absolutely necessary for reaching mutual understanding and better communication.

Accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative with lots of love and respect in between.

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

A strong woman of dignity puts on respect out of her love and reverence for Jesus Christ. She trusts that His word not only protects and empowers her, but also rewards her with incomprehensible eternal blessings.

No matter how difficult your spouse may be at the moment, your spouse does not have control over your reaction; you do. You may be experiencing disappointment, frustration or anger, but you always have a choice. A wife can choose to be disrespectful or respectful. A husband can choose to be unloving or loving.

Be quick to listen and understand and you have a much better chance of being understood.

A woman needs love like she needs air to breathe. A man needs respect like he needs air to breathe.

Fight like a loving man and a respectful woman. Fight fair.

A wife has one driving need--to feel loved. When that need is met she is happy. A husband has one driving need--to feel respected. When that need is met he is happy. When either of these needs isn’t met, things get crazy. Love and Respect reveals why spouses react negatively to each other, and how they can deal with such conflict quickly, easily and biblically.

There is a plan to parent God’s way, even when our children may seek to go their own way at time. The secret is to follow this plan regardless. When you do, I believe you succeed in His eyes.

A husband may deserve contempt, but that doesn’t win him any more than harshness and anger wins the heart of a woman.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

Both Judas and Peter denied Jesus Christ, but there is a huge difference between a Judas and a Peter.

A man has a natural, inborn desire to go out and “conquer” the challenges of his world – to work and achieve.

If you want your husband to express appreciation for your attempts to be respectful, you must speak thankfully when he tries to be loving.

Life is too short to fuss and fret over trivial irritations.

When we speak before we think, we widen the chances the other person(s) will be notably hurt, frustrated, confused, angry, fearful, or offended by something we’ve communicated.

Always remember that Pink and Blue have different wiring, different preferences. Assume your spouse has goodwill toward you, no matter what. Both of you can be right, while being different.

Ladies, be careful. “A nagging wife goes on and on like the drip, drip, drip of the rain” (Proverbs 19:13).

No matter what your struggle- criticism, constant conflict, sex, money, parenting, harsh words- learning to communicate the Love and Respect way can help you make crucial changes and build the kind of relationship that God blesses.

We have to step back as Christ followers and ask, “Do I have false expectations that my relationship should be romantic 99% of the time?”

Negative actions rarely produce positive results.

Though the end can be worthy (to be loved and respected), when each uses unholy means (unloving and disrespectful words and actions), it will not achieve those ends. We must treat others as we expect them to treat us. To deny this makes us arrogant or fools, or both.

I had often asked God to compensate for my mistakes, but in return had I thought He would give me perfect children?

There is a discrepancy between who we want to be and see ourselves to be and how we actually sound in voice and writing. But with self-reflection and honesty, we can turn the corner and improve our communication. We need only evaluate what we are about to communicate.

When Jesus said “turn the other cheek,” He wasn’t saying to be passive wimps. He was teaching that physically people can control you but if you turn and give the other cheek, suddenly you’re in control and you’re making the choices.

Don’t pressure yourself with perfection. We are going to fail. A righteous man falls 7 times but gets back up.

[Husbands] as the church places her burdens on Christ, so a woman needs to place her burdens on her husband. When she shares with you, don’t assume she is asking you to solve the problem. Ask your wife, “Do you want a solution or a listening ear?”

We can all have moments of anger, but this does not mean we have to lose control and sin.

Your spouse can affect you, but your spouse does not control you.

Trust God when the “why’s” of life threaten to overwhelm you.

You’re the only person in the world who can meet your spouse’s deepest need for love and respect. After all, you alone are married to your spouse.

Being a person who communicates what is true frequently demands tact, and at times it can feel like sidestepping land mines. It takes work to be both truthful and tactful.

A marriage relationship will be energized when couples learn how to motivate each other God’s way.