Motivating Your Man God’s Way: Applying One Word That Energizes Him to Love

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

She’ll feel at peace with you when you let her vent your frustrations and hurts and don’t get angry and close her off.

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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)

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

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

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.

“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.“

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

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

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.

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.

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

Your marriage is a test of your devotion to Christ.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

When we feel crippling discouragement by the sinful choices and outcomes of our kids, we must not let this permanently deter us from parenting God’s way.

Assuming goodwill can be revolutionary in relationships.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

Unconditional love or respect is never wasted. Hang onto this promise: “Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary” (Galatians 6:9).

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

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

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

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.

As mature men, we need to take leadership and put this out on the table. We must acknowledge our feelings- we need to feel respected. However, as we do this we must acknowledge our wife’s feelings- she needs to feel loved!

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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?”

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.

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.

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

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

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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.

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

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!

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

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.

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.

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

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

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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.

Share what God is saying to your heart, not what you think He needs to say to your mate.

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

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

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

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

Life is too short to fuss and fret over trivial irritations.

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

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

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

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

Both Judas and Peter denied Jesus Christ, but there is a huge difference between a Judas and a Peter.

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.

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!

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

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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

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.

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

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

When sorting out how to slow down the Crazy Cycle, it helps to remember that men are commanded to love because they don’t love naturally, and on the other side, women are commanded to respect because they don’t respect naturally.