Love and Respect Husband and Wife + Logo Mug Set

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

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

Assuming goodwill can be revolutionary in relationships.

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

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.

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?

[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?”

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

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

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

When confronting your spouse, attack the behavior, not the person.

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

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)

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.

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

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.

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

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

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.

Will we decide how we see God based on our circumstances, or will we see our circumstances in light of how we view God?

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

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.

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

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.

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

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 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)

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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 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.

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.

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

It is hard to be negative while being thankful.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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.

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

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

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.

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

Unconditional respect is as powerful to him as unconditional love is to her.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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?”

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)

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.

Your words reveal your heart.

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

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

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

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.

Life is too short to fuss and fret over trivial irritations.

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

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.

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.

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

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

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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

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)

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.

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

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

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”?

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

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)

We are equal but we are not the same.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

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

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

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.

Assume goodwill about the person you are in conflict with.