Amor y Respeto - Cuaderno De Trabajo: Videoconferencia

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.

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

Being friendly to her man is one of the most effective things a woman can do to strengthen her marriage.

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)

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

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

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.

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.

To stay the course in speaking words of Love and Respect, keep your heart in Scripture, trusting in and talking about His promises to help you.

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

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

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

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

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).

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

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

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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

When you’re truly Christ-centered, instead of child-centered, you will be a more effective parent in the long run.

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

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

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

There is power and freedom that comes in understanding that no one can cause you to react in a certain way. It is your choice.

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

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.”

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

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.

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

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

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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.

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

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.

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

We are equal but we are not the same.

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

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

[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.

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

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

“Living happily ever after” means knowing how to deal with the imperfect parts of life.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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 in the argument, but wrong in your approach.

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.

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

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

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 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”?

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

It is crucial for a husband and wife to see that neither one is wrong, but both of them are very different--in body function, outlook and perspective.

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

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.

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!

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.

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.

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

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

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.

Assuming goodwill can be revolutionary in relationships.

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)

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

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

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.

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

When a husband chooses to come across lovingly even though he feels disrespected, he can prevent the Crazy Cycle from spinning and possibly getting out of control.

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.

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