Respectfully Yours - Participant Study Guide (Download)

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

Do you seek to understand or only to be understood?

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

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?

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?

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

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

Your words reveal your heart.

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

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

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)

Be friendly. Be friendly. Be friendly. Watch what happens.

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

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

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

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

“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.“

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

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

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.

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

God designed the woman to love. He’s not going to command her to agape her husband when He created her to do that in the first place. God is not into redundancy.

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.

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

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

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.

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

Words of Love and Respect must include thankfulness spoken to or about your spouse; don’t fixate on weaknesses and faults.

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.

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

Holding back your love or respect will just keep the Crazy Cycle spinning away, but being mature and making the first move could slow it down.

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.

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

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.

Your spouse may meet many of your needs, but your deepest dependency should be on your Lord.

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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

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.

Focus on the positive in the midst of the negative, and the Energizing Cycle will keep right on humming.

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

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

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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?”

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

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.

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 a wife asks, “Do you love me?” She is not trying to put her husband on the spot. She is simply looking for reassurance.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

Good intentions do not always produce good words or outcomes.

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

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.”

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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