Love and Respect Husband + Logo Mug

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

Knowing my spouse will not be able to love or respect me perfectly, I commit to having a forgiving spirit so that I may never speak hatefully or contemptuously.

Your husband knows you appreciate his desire to protect and provide when you praise his commitment to provide for you. You empathize when he reveals his male mindset about position, status, or rank at work.

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.

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

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

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.

God is good and wants what is best for us.

Assume goodwill about the person you are in conflict with.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

Troubles over sex and money do not cause a marriage to go under. The lack of love and respect during conflict cause the marriage to go under.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

God is not trying to trick you or mess with you. Trust that He wants to reveal Himself to you just as much as He wants to reveal Himself to the world.

“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.“

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

You speak lovingly or respectfully no matter how your spouse may speak to you in return. Your spouse is not the reason--good or bad--why you speak unconditional words of love or respect. God is the reason, and as you depend on Him, you will become increasingly able to speak lovingly and respectfully to your spouse.

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)

We are equal but we are not the same.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

Wives, to energize your husband do an activity with him, shoulder-to-shoulder, without talking.

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

To get offended is easy, but to forgive is within your power as you walk in His steps.

As you pray together, you will truly learn to love and respect together.

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.

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.

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.

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

When the wife flatly says her husband will have to earn her respect before she gives him any, she leaves the husband in a lose-lose situation. Now he is responsible for both love and respect in the relationship. He must unconditionally love his wife and earn her respect.

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

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

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 a husband is commanded to agape- love his wife, then she truly needs love.

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?

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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”?

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

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 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.

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

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

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

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

Wives, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your husband not only back to you, but to God. Husbands, you never know: The way you handle this [conflict] might bring your wife not only back to you, but to God. (1 Corinthians 7:16)

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

When a husband feels disrespected, he has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel unloving to his wife. (Perhaps the command to love was given to him precisely for this reason!) When a wife feels unloved, she has a natural tendency to react in ways that feel disrespectful to her husband. (Perhaps the command to respect was given to her precisely for this reason!)

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

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.

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

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.

Don’t label each other as bad because you differ on how you solve your troubles.

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

With a better understanding of God’s promises, you will be on your way to a renewed mind and a changed life.

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.

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.

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

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

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