Love and Respect Wife + Logo Mug

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

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.

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

A man has a natural, inborn desire to go out and “conquer” the challenges of his world – to work and achieve.

Do you give yourself grace and your spouse judgment?

We are equal but we are not the same.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

Getting married reveals, usually sooner than later, an incontestable fact: your spouse cannot possibly meet all your needs and desires

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

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

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

You cannot use unholy means to achieve a worthy end.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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)

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.

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

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

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.

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

When one of you makes a mistake, control any anger you may feel and trust God completely, no matter what happens.

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

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.

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

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.

Mutual understanding, not communication, is the key to a healthy marriage relationship.

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

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

We are worth Jesus to the Father.

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

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

Each of you must focus on what God is calling you to do toward your spouse. Do not focus on what you think God is calling your spouse to do toward you.

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

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

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!

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!

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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)

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

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

I had often asked God to compensate for my mistakes, but in return had I thought He would give me perfect children?

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.

Mutual submission is the only way to live fairly together with mutual authority.

There is a discrepancy between who we want to be and see ourselves to be and how we actually sound in voice and writing. But with self-reflection and honesty, we can turn the corner and improve our communication. We need only evaluate what we are about to communicate.

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

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

Our trustworthiness rests on our truthfulness.

It is so easy to draw wrong conclusions about a spouse’s character and motives due to an occasional flare-up or silly comment.

We have discovered that as women motivate their man God’s way, men are energized to love them better. It doesn’t matter if your marriage is good or seems like there is no hope. We have seen God move in powerful ways even when things looked hopeless.

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

[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.

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.

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

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

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.

Marital researchers agree that a huge percentage of communication problems between husband and wife are due not to what is said but to how it is said – the attitude and tone of voice.

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

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.