Husband & Wife Mug Set and Coaster

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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?

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)

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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 your wife comes to talk to you, listen to her. Realize she is coming to you because you matter more to her than anyone else. She has certain emotional needs and only you can meet them. Sometimes she may say things that don’t make sense to you and she is apt to misspeak and exaggerate when she is upset, but don’t put her down. Instead, listen to her heart. Give her a chance to express her concerns and, as she does so, don’t try to fix her. Don’t give her your solutions unless she asks for them.

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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)

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

When a husband feels disrespected, it is especially hard to love his wife. When a wife feels unloved, it is especially hard to respect her husband.

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.

When a wife insists that her husband earn her respect, she puts him in a lose-lose situation.

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

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.

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

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.

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

When sorting out how to slow down the Crazy Cycle, it helps to remember that men are commanded to love because they don’t love naturally, and on the other side, women are commanded to respect because they don’t respect naturally.

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.

Mutual understanding, not communication, is the key to a healthy marriage relationship.

Thank the Lord for the goodwill each of you has toward the other. Ask Him for strength to give each other the benefit of the doubt during moments when someone’s goodwill seems to be lacking. “He who seeks good finds goodwill, but evil comes to him who searches for it.” (Proverbs 11:27)

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Husbands, to energize your wife give her face-to-face time, allowing her to talk and share her feelings.

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.

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

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

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

“Respect is a man’s deepest value. I have had numerous men tell me, ‘I would rather live with a wife who respected me but did not love me than live with a wife who loved me but did not respect me.’ These men are not saying that they are indifferent to love. They know they need love, but they need to feel respected even more than they need to feel loved.“

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

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

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

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?”

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

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.”

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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!)

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

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.

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 most significant point of this book is this: If what we think is true, kind, necessary, and clear, we need to have the courage to hit send. This isn’t about refraining from speaking; this is about speaking.

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