Motivating Your Man God’s Way (Book Set and Free CD)

[Husbands] do you realize the power of just holding your wife’s hand?

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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?”

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).

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

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.

It is hard to be negative while being thankful.

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

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)

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.

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 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.

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

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.

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

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

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

Your spouse has a need only you can fill.

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

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

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

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

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.

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?

“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.

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

If you want your husband to express appreciation for your attempts to be respectful, you must speak thankfully when he tries to be loving.

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

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.

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

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.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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 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.

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

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.

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

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

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

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

Your husband knows you value his friendship when you tell him you like him and you show it (he knows you love him, but he often wonders if you really like him).

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.

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.

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.

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

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 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.“

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

Love and Respect is a faith venture, not a formula.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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

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

Money squabbles don’t undermine love and respect; they simply reveal unloving and disrespectful attitudes, which are the real reason why a marriage can start to wobble on the Crazy Cycle.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

In your marriage be the first to “seek peace and pursue it” (1 Peter 3:11)

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

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.

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

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

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

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.