14 Week Small Group Guide (Download)

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

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

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

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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

Words of wisdom for all husbands and wives are these: We easily see what is done to us before we see what we are doing to our mate.

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.

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

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.”

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

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)

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

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

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

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.

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

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

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

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

When you play the blame game your marriage never wins.

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

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

Your words reveal your heart.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

Your wife feels you are open with her when you discuss financial concerns, possible job changes or ideas for your future.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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.

Parenting is a faith venture. As we parent “unto Christ” we reap God’s reward, “knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord” (Eph. 6:8 NKJV)

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

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)

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

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.

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!

Mistakes can’t be undone, but they can be forgiven.

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

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

We send each other messages in “code” based on gender, even though we don’t intend to. What I say is not what you hear, and what you think you heard is not what I meant at all.

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!)

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.

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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.

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

Unconditional respect is as powerful to him as unconditional love is to her.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

“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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

When confronting your spouse, attack the behavior, not the person.

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.

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.

As a husband, if you can grasp that you don’t always have to solve your wife’s problems, you will take a giant step toward showing her empathy and understanding.

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.

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

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