Amor y Respeto - Cuaderno De Trabajo: Videoconferencia

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.

Your spouse has a need only you can fill.

You may believe that the careless, unloving or disrespectful words you speak are because your spouse is causing you to speak this way, but Jesus says that it is coming out of your heart.

Words of Love or Respect must uplift your spouse, edifying- never manipulating him or her.

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

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

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.

When a husband chooses to come across lovingly even though he feels disrespected, he can prevent the Crazy Cycle from spinning and possibly getting out of control.

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

God’s commands are there to help us, not to hinder us or hold us back as male and female.

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

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

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

You must “ask God from the wealth of his glory to give you power through his Spirit to be strong in your inner selves.”

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

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

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

Avoid like the plague trying to punish each other as a means of “motivation.” Christ-followers instinctively know that this destroys any opportunity to act out of reverence for Christ. In all marital issues, love and reverence for Christ must be our primary motivation.

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.

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.

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!

To not forgive is to shoot yourself in the foot and put extra gas in the Crazy Cycle.

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

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.”

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

Unconditional respect, like unconditional love, is all about how one sounds (tone of voice and word choice) and appears (facial expressions and physical actions).

It is hard to be negative while being thankful.

How we react to a situation reveals more about us than about the other person.

Assume goodwill about the person you are in conflict with.

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)

You have two ears and one mouth; use them proportionately.

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

Feeling unloved, a wife gets defensive and acts offensively without respect. Feeling disrespected, a husband gets defensive and acts offensively without love.

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

Words of wisdom for all husbands and wives are these: We easily see what is done to us before we see what we are doing to our mate.

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

If husbands and wives are to understand the Love and Respect Connection, they must realize that they communicate in code. And the problem is, they don’t know how to decipher the messages they send to one another.

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?

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

Thank the Lord that in the very beginning He created them male and female – Blue and Pink. Ask Him for patience and ever-growing understanding of how men and women see and hear differently. “He created them male and female, and He blessed them.” (Genesis 5:2)

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

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

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.

As strong and powerful as marriage bonds can become, our deepest dependency must be on the Lord, not another human being.

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

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

God is not pink. God is not blue. God is purple. When two become one, they have the potential of displaying God’s attributes and character.

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

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

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.

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

Your marriage is really a tool and a test to deepen and demonstrate your love and reverence for your Lord.

When a wife feels unloved, it can be such a shock to her heart that she is oblivious to her disrespectful reactions toward her husband, though any man watching could see it plainly.

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.

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

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

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

Do you believe that there is a God who really loves you and wants to help you?

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

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

Optimism or pessimism? It is always a choice, no matter what your natural temperament.

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

It is so easy to draw wrong conclusions about a spouse’s character and motives due to an occasional flare-up or silly comment.

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.

The Love and Respect message is not about a husband earning his wife’s respect by being more loving any more than it is about a wife earning her husband’s love by being more respectful. Always love or respect is given unconditionally according to God’s commands.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

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.

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

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

“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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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)

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.

Christian maturity involves a lot of things, but surely it includes knowing how to process your anger.

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

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