Respectfully Yours - Participant Study Guide (Download)

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?

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

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.

[Husbands] as the church places her burdens on Christ, so a woman needs to place her burdens on her husband. When she shares with you, don’t assume she is asking you to solve the problem. Ask your wife, “Do you want a solution or a listening ear?”

No one can really practice Love and Respect unless he or she does it as unto Jesus Christ.

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

Husbands primarily want to hear ‘respect” talk during conflict. Wives primarily want to hear “love” talk during conflict.

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).

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

God is good and wants what is best for us.

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.

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

When evil comes at you, you’re the one who makes the choice of whether or not it is going to go into you.

Fight like a loving man and a respectful woman. Fight fair.

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

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.

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)

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

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

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

Assuming goodwill can be revolutionary in relationships.

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!

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

“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.“

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

Negative actions rarely produce positive results.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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

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

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

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

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.

The mature one in the marriage seldom moves second.

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.

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

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)

Thank the Lord for all the trouble-free moments in which you and your spouse enjoy Him, each other, your family, your ministry and life as a whole. Ask Him for the strength to accept your measure of trouble, and the wisdom to deal with the annoyances and irritations by loving and respecting each other with new commitment. (You may also want to pray about troubles at work, at church, with the children…) “But those who marry will have trouble in this life” (1 Corinthians 7:28)

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!

[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.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.

Assume goodwill about the person you are in conflict with.

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