Amor y Respeto - Cuaderno De Trabajo: Videoconferencia

Your spouse has a need only you can fill.

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

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.

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

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.

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)

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.

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.

Always try to look at your spouse the way Jesus does.

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

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

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

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.

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

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?

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.

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

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)

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

Share what God is saying to your heart, not what you think He needs to say to your mate.

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

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

Before hitting send, ask yourself, "Have I listened carefully and understand the exact issue on the table?"

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

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)

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.

How we react to a situation reveals more about us than about the other person.

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

We are either going to give in the darkness or we are going to give into the darkness.

Self-interest should never come ahead of your spouse’s interests.

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

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

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

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

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.

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.”

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

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

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.

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?”

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

Unconditional respect means we confront their wrongdoings respectfully. We do not become uncivil because they are. Who they fail to be does not determine who we will be.

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!

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

[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?”

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

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

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

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

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

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

Here is the secret to marriage that every couple seeks and yet few find: Unconditional respect is as powerful for him as unconditional love is for her. It’s the secret that will help you achieve a brand new level of intimacy.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

[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.

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.

Your spouse deserves the truth from you. Do your best to tell it with love and respect.

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

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.

Clearly, in the marriage, in the family and in the household, when you speak words of blessing, you are speaking to the Lord, and for this you will be rewarded.

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

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.

I had often asked God to compensate for my mistakes, but in return had I thought He would give me perfect children?

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.

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.