The Illumination Project Journal (10 Pack)

Whether visiting a prison, feeding the hungry, giving the thirsty a drink or speaking a word of love or respect, everything is to be done to and for Christ.

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.

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.

Be friendly. Be friendly. Be friendly. Watch what happens.

We can communicate the truth in the best of manners, but the person may be so insecure he or she can only react and attack like a wounded bear.

Women give a report to build rapport. Men bond through shoulder-to-shoulder activities without talking.

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

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.

Since it is easy to focus on the negative, focus on your mate’s good qualities and express thanks with positive words of Love or Respect.

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.

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.

[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?”

With a better understanding of God’s promises, you will be on your way to a renewed mind and a changed life.

Always see your mate as an ally. Feedback is of little use if you see your spouse as an enemy. Giving and receiving constructive feedback is based on feelings of goodwill in both partners. Both of you need to remember that, even if you don’t always agree and even if you become irritated or angry, you are friends, and neither of you means to hurt the 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.

Always try to look at your spouse the way Jesus does.

Your spouse can have a need that you don’t have and that’s okay.

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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

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

Your words reveal your heart.

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

Each of you must focus on what God is calling you to do toward your spouse. Do not focus on what you think God is calling your spouse to do toward you.

We must bring our identity in Christ to our parenting—we must not derive our identity from our children.

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

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)

Positive changes flood a relationship immediately when both husband and wife cancel the blame game!

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

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

Truth will carry its own weight if delivered respectfully and lovingly.

Never give up. If you want to have a strong marriage, you need to accept temporary setbacks as part of the game.

We easily see what is done to us before we see what we are doing to our mate.

Wives, to energize your husband do an activity with him, shoulder-to-shoulder, without talking.

Often the apparent issue isn’t the real issue; the real issue is always a matter of love or respect.

Thank God for joining you together and for allowing you to trust Him to help you, whatever the issue. God is there for you and expects you to look to Him to keep you together as a team, so ask Him for His help in the smallest of concerns. “So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.” (Matthew 19:6)

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.

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 we subscribe to the belief that because we are equal we are the same, then we’re going to expect our spouse to respond the way we do.

Negative actions rarely produce positive results.

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.

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

God rewards your obedience to love and respect, even if your spouse does not respond!

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

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

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.

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

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.

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!

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

God designed the woman to love. He’s not going to command her to agape her husband when He created her to do that in the first place. God is not into redundancy.

When you relinquish an offense, you need to send that offense somewhere. So follow Jesus’ example and release it to your heavenly Father.

Self-interest should never come ahead of your spouse’s interests.

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.

As mature men, we need to take leadership and put this out on the table. We must acknowledge our feelings- we need to feel respected. However, as we do this we must acknowledge our wife’s feelings- she needs to feel loved!

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

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

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

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

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

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.

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.

When the wife flatly says her husband will have to earn her respect before she gives him any, she leaves the husband in a lose-lose situation. Now he is responsible for both love and respect in the relationship. He must unconditionally love his wife and earn her respect.

Clarifying is what you do before you step on your mate’s air hose and deflate his or her spirit. For example, you are having a typical conversation, but you can tell there is a misunderstanding. One of you isn’t being clear or isn’t hearing correctly. Then and there you clarify the misunderstanding before your spouse’s spirit deflates. You lovingly or respectfully clarify matters so that your spouse will not feel unloved or disrespected. The reason you take pains to clarify a seemingly small matter is to prevent the situation from becoming a love and respect issue that needs decoding. Clarifying is what you do to stay off the Crazy Cycle and keep positive, energetic feelings flowing between the two of you, to keep yourselves on the Energizing Cycle.

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

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

Marriage is a tool and a test to allow God’s will to be revealed in our lives.

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.

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.

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

Recognize your different gifts--how each of you (Pink and Blue) functions according to God’s perfect design.

Love and Respect is a faith venture, not a formula.

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.

Often both spouses have goodwill but are not deciphering each other’s code. She criticizes out of love, but he “hears” only disrespect. He distances himself to prevent feelings from escalating, which is the honorable thing to do, but she “sees” only his failure to be loving!

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

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

He will feel appreciated when you disagree with him only in private and honor his authority in front of the kids.

She’ll feel at peace with you when you let her vent your frustrations and hurts and don’t get angry and close her off.

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

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

We are equal but we are not the same.

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

Your spouse has a need only you can fill.

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

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

We have different vulnerabilities. We can pass judgment on one another all day long or we can say God made us different and that’s ok.

Getting married reveals, usually sooner than later, an incontestable fact: your spouse cannot possibly meet all your needs and desires

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.

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

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.

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

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

I often stress that one of the greatest rewards any persevering spouse can have is being a good example and influence on the children in the family.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

It’s true that women have intuition and that men should listen to them. It’s also true that women have blind spots and need the insight of their husbands.

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

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

God is good and wants what is best for us.

“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.

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.