Respectfully Yours - Leader's Kit

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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?

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.

When a wife insists that her husband earn her respect, she puts him in a lose-lose situation.

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

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.

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.

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)

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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 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 are worth Jesus to the Father.

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

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

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

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

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

At the very bottom of things, in every case and in every conversation, you can do your marriage a huge favor by assuming she is seeking to feel loved or he is seeking to feel respected and give your spouse some grace!

Since it is easy to focus on the negative, focus on your mate’s good qualities and express thanks with positive words of Love or Respect.

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

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.

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.

It is hard to be negative while being thankful.

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.

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

You can be right in the argument, but wrong in your approach.

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

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

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

Don’t pressure yourself with perfection. We are going to fail. A righteous man falls 7 times but gets back up.

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

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

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)

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

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

I have concluded that those of us in the church who believe we have the Truth are not using the whole truth. A crucial part of God’s Word has been completely ignored, or perhaps simply gone unnoticed, when it has been there right under our noses the whole time! Many Christian spouses know Ephesians 5:33 and can at least paraphrase it. The Apostle Paul tells husbands to love their wives as much as they love themselves, and wives are to respect their husbands. But is anyone really listening? Perhaps the first step to better communication between husband and wife is to hear what God’s Word clearly says. --Emerson

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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

“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.“

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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.

You’re the only person in the world who can meet your spouse’s deepest need for love and respect. After all, you alone are married to your spouse.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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.

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

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

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

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

Negative actions rarely produce positive results.

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

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?”

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

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.

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

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.

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

Recognize your different gifts--how each of you (Pink and Blue) functions according to God’s perfect design.

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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”?

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

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.

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

We are equal but we are not the same.

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

“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.

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