Love & Respect in the Family (Audiobook)

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

Accidental sparks (unwise remarks) ignite and fuel a fire, and vroom goes the Crazy Cycle.

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

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.

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.

Marriage is a test of how you unconditionally love and respect your spouse as you obey, honor, and please the Lord.

We send each other messages in “code” based on gender, even though we don’t intend to. What I say is not what you hear, and what you think you heard is not what I meant at all.

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

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

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

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

A major step toward a happy marriage is accepting differences and working them out with love and respect.

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

Most marriages will succeed when obeying the command to Love and Respect.

Just because you may feel unloved or disrespected does not mean your spouse is sending that message.

We get on the Crazy Cycle because without love a wife reacts without respect, and without respect a husband reacts without love.

When you possess a forgiving spirit, words of Love and Respect will flow authentically from your lips- and realize that the Lord Himself is listening to you at moments like these. He knows you are not powerless, but actually full of power that He has granted you.

Thank God for His forgiveness of your mistakes. In trying to be a loving man or a respectful woman, we blow it. Owning up to mistakes is never easy, but it is always the way to move forward. Take good care not to accuse your spouse of mistakes as you pray. Also, pray about any forgiving to be done in the family, any forgiveness that needs to be asked. Children may need forgiveness (and what about Mom and Dad?). “There is no one on earth who does what is right all the time and never makes a mistake.” (Ecclesiastes 7:20)

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.

We might say that every negative action in the family has an equal and opposite negative reaction.

Mutual submission is the only way to live fairly together with mutual authority.

The parent-child relationship is as easy, and as difficult, as love and respect.

Marriage is a tool and a test to deepen and demonstrate your love and your reverence for Jesus Christ.

Research shows that 70% of the couples who were extremely unhappy in their marriage, but hung in there and worked through the tough time, identified themselves as being very happy five years later.

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.

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

Share what God is saying to your heart, not what you think He needs to say to your mate.

There is power and freedom that comes in understanding that no one can cause you to react in a certain way. It is your choice.

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

Don’t conclude that your spouse is wrong when he/she is seeking to do the right and righteous thing.

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

When you’re truly Christ-centered, instead of child-centered, you will be a more effective parent in the long run.

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

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.

One thing to remember in this culture is if we say something complimentary towards one gender, we aren’t saying something against the other.

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

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?”

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

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.

It’s hard to realize that we would never act around our business associates the way we act around our spouse.

Suppressing negative feelings is not loving, respectful or very wise. Speak up tactfully.

You both forgive for one simple but profound reason: because you know Christ has forgiven you!

Focus on the positive in the midst of the negative, and the Energizing Cycle will keep right on humming.

Unconditional love or respect is never wasted. Hang onto this promise: “Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary” (Galatians 6:9).

“You can be right, but wrong at the top of your voice.”

When one of you makes a mistake, control any anger you may feel and trust God completely, no matter what happens.

So I encourage every husband and wife to commit to the Jesus Way of Talking. Instead of allowing the stress of the situation to control you, you can say to yourself, “Because I love the Lord and I know that He rewards every good word, I am going to be truthful even if my spouse is not. I will also be uplifting, forgiving, thankful and scriptural in my speech because my ultimate goal is to please the Lord. Whatever my spouse’s weaknesses or bad habits might be, I will not let them cause me to sin with my lips.”

Thank the Lord for all the trouble-free moments in which you and your spouse enjoy Him, each other, your family, your ministry and life as a whole. Ask Him for the strength to accept your measure of trouble, and the wisdom to deal with the annoyances and irritations by loving and respecting each other with new commitment. (You may also want to pray about troubles at work, at church, with the children…) “But those who marry will have trouble in this life” (1 Corinthians 7:28)

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.

Words of Love and Respect must include thankfulness spoken to or about your spouse; don’t fixate on weaknesses and faults.

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

Pink and Blue perceptions not only affect seeing, they affect hearing as well. Women hear with pink hearing aids and men hear with blue hearing aids. Even more important to understand as you and your spouse seek to gain better communication, you can hear the very same words, but each of you will hear different messages.

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

When you come home after you have been apart, the first few moments of reconnecting will set the tone for the rest of the evening.

It is crucial for a husband and wife to see that neither one is wrong, but both of them are very different--in body function, outlook and perspective.

Your marriage is a tool and a test to deepen and demonstrate your love and reverence for Jesus Christ. God is using your spouse to bring you an eternal reward.

You can be right in the argument, but wrong in your approach.

You can experience hurt, but it is your choice to hate.

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

God’s commands are not burdensome, but are given to us to spare us from more pain. Why would God command you to do something that doesn’t work?

When a husband chooses to do or say something loving, and that includes saying, ‘I’m sorry for coming across in an unloving way,’ he energizes his wife. When a wife decides to express herself respectfully, and that includes apologizing for her disrespectful attitude, she energizes her husband.

She’s not wrong for not being male. He is not wrong for not being female. When you put pink and blue together, you get purple, the color of royalty; the color of God. Together, a husband and wife reflect God’s image.

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.

[Women], your self-love cannot be derived from your husband’s love. It can affect it, but it does not determine it.

To build a lasting legacy, use proven wisdom that you glean from the Lord.

This is the Rewarded Cycle: His love blesses regardless of her respect and her respect blesses regardless of his love.

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.

Your spouse deserves the truth from you. Do your best to tell it with love and respect.

If a husband is commanded to agape- love his wife, then she truly needs love.

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

Responding to offensive words or actions with your own offensive words and actions is damaging and unproductive.

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

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.

In the ultimate sense you marriage has nothing to do with your spouse. It has everything to do with your relationship with Jesus Christ.

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

As a wife, if you can start to understand how important your husband’s work is to him, you will take a giant step toward communicating respect and honor, two things that he values even more than your love.

When we feel crippling discouragement by the sinful choices and outcomes of our kids, we must not let this permanently deter us from parenting God’s way.

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”?

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.

When a wife asks, “Do you love me?” She is not trying to put her husband on the spot. She is simply looking for reassurance.

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.

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

The moment we cry to Him for help, He is already pleased. He gives us strength to love our children.

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

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

As you pray together, you will truly learn to love and respect together.

Although the Crazy Cycle is not what God intends for any marriage, all couples get on it at times from one degree to another.

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.

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

Don’t label each other as bad because you differ on how you solve your troubles.

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

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

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.

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.

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

Our research shows that couples who pray together are more apt to reap all kinds of benefits, including better and more frequent communication, going on “dates” more frequently and having sex more frequently.

To stay the course in speaking words of Love and Respect, keep your heart in Scripture, trusting in and talking about His promises to help you.

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.

It’s crucial to communicate with the right tone of voice and the right expression on your face.