Love and Respect Coaster (6) Set

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!)

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!

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)

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

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

He will feel appreciated when you recognize his problem-solving approach as his male brand of empathy.

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

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

Above all trust God when the “whys” of life threaten to overwhelm you.

We fool ourselves into thinking the other person causes us to be the way we are. They really don’t! But if we lock into that idea, we become helpless, hopeless victims.

When there is confusion, I try to refrain from attacking another for not listening carefully (which may not be the case). Instead, I take a run at communicating again, but more clearly.

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

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

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.

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.

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

We are equal but we are not the same.

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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

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

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”?

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

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

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

Whose voice are you listening to: Hollywood or God’s Holy Word?

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

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

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

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

Stay the course regardless of the child’s respect and obedience. This is the Family Rewarded Cycle: a parents love unto Christ regardless of the child.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

[Husbands] the most powerful weapons you have are your ears. Just listen to your wife, and she is much more likely to feel understood.

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

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

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.

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

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

If a husband loves his wife as he should, she will feel honored and respected. If a wife respects her husband as she should, he will feel loved and appreciated. It’s a win-win.

God is not trying to trick you or mess with you. Trust that He wants to reveal Himself to you just as much as He wants to reveal Himself to the world.

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.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

You must distinguish between “I can’t” and “I won’t.”

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

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.

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

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

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

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!

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

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

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

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?”

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

“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.

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

If a husband chooses to be a peacemaker--taking the needs and concerns of his wife totally into account during any kind of argument or conflict--his wife will be motivated in turn to respond to his authority during stalemates.

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

Parenting is a faith venture. As we parent “unto Christ” we reap God’s reward, “knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord” (Eph. 6:8 NKJV)

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.

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.

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.

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

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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?

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

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

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.