Respectfully Yours - Study Guide (10 pack)

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

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

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.

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.

To get offended is easy, but to forgive is within your power as you walk in His steps.

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.

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)

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

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

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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!

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

The difference between successful couples and unsuccessful couples is that successful ones keep getting up and dealing with the issues.

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.

[Women], as you enter quiet dignity, not preaching at your husband or scolding him as though you were his mother, something happens in his soul as a male.

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

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.

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.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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.

If you want your wife to express appreciation for your attempts to be loving, you must use thankful words when she tries to speak or act respectfully.

Don’t label each other as bad because you differ on how you solve your troubles.

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

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

“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.“

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

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

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.

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

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”?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

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.

We blame people for the bad things we do, but take credit for the good things we do.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

Mutual submission is the only way to live fairly together with mutual authority.

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

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.

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

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.

Fight like a loving man and a respectful woman. Fight fair.

Words of love from a husband are like good medicine that brings life to the marriage.

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.

It’s crucial to communicate with the right tone of voice and the right expression on your face.

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

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

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?

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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)

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.

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.

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

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

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)

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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