The 4 Wills of God

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

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

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

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.

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. Love and Respect reveals why spouses react negatively to each other, and how they can deal with such conflict quickly, easily and biblically.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

Your position in Christ is what counts, not your less-than-perfect performance.

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

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

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).

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

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

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.

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.

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

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

“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.

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

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.

Your words reveal your heart.

A parent needs to feel respected, especially during conflicts...A child need to feel loved, especially during disputes.

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

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

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.

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

Getting married reveals, usually sooner than later, an incontestable fact: your spouse cannot possibly meet all your needs and desires

When parents genuinely trust and follow the Lord and His ways, their faith spills over onto the children.

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.

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

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

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.

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

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

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

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.

Negative actions rarely produce positive results.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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

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?

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

We get on the Crazy Cycle because without love a wife reacts without respect, and without respect a husband reacts without love.

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

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.

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

[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?”

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.”

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

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

A strong woman of dignity puts on respect out of her love and reverence for Jesus Christ. She trusts that His word not only protects and empowers her, but also rewards her with incomprehensible eternal blessings.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

When you love or respect unconditionally regardless of the outcome, you are following God and His will for you.

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.

Although the Crazy Cycle is not what God intends for any marriage, all couples get on it at times from one degree to another.

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

Trust God when the “why’s” of life threaten to overwhelm you.

He will feel appreciated when you recognize his problem-solving approach as his male brand of empathy.

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

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

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.

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

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?”

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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!

“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.“