As we disciples of Jesus look forward to a new year of opportunities to grow in Him and serve Him, it seemed prudent to me to address our human relationships for a bit. All of our human relationships either stimulate and encourage our growth in Christ, or they discourage and hinder it. There is no middle ground. God’s design and intention/will is that as “Iron sharpens iron, So one man (or woman) sharpens another.” (Prov. 27:17. But that sharpening is not guaranteed or automatic.
So it is imperative that we allow the Holy Spirit to help us navigate the landscape of all human relationships – looking to the scriptures for the necessary guardrails along the way.
Jesus Christ said to the crowds following and listening to Him these foundational words for fruitfulness, “….If any one wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.”Luke 9:23. It is impossible to follow Jesus and operate in self will and entitlement.
One of the reasons our relationships often bring us emotional pain rather than spiritual gain is because there is a lot of self initiative in who we spend time with on a given day. Denying ourselves in terms of human relationships means among other things that we daily look to Christ our Lord and King and Master for how He would have us pursue such. Taking up our cross daily in terms of human relationships means we daily die to our rights to relate to whomever we want to.
Because He is always good, loves us and is very much for us, He deeply cares about our relationships. But He sees things about those relationships and things about the hearts of those we are pursuing relationship with that we can’t see unless He reveals it to us (not to mention what needs to be revealed in our own hearts). Some of us have engaged in human relationships for decades based more on affinity and cultural norms than we have according to kingdom principles and according to the specific leading of the Holy Spirit. My prayer is that the following principles will help shed some needed light and lead us all into more fruitfulness and God pleasing relationships in 2025.
My first principle or observation is: King David, the man after God’s own heart, was very careful about who he related to. One of the best examples of that is his vows in Psalm 101. Let’s listen in:
“A perverse heart shall depart from me; I will know no evil.” Vs. 4
“Whoever secretly slanders his neighbor, him I will destroy; No one who has a haughty look and an arrogant heart will I endure.” Vs. 5
“My eyes shall be upon the faithful of the land, that they may dwell with me; He who walks in a blameless way is the one who will minister to me.” Vs. 6
“He who practices deceit shall not dwell within my house; He who speaks falsehood shall not maintain his position before me.” Vs. 7
King David knew any compromise in whom he allowed himself to hang around with or serve alongside him would have serious consequences. He was very black and white. Some today would say he was “legalistic”.
Similar comments can be found in Psalm 119, such as this one:
“I am a companion of all those who fear You, And of those who keep Your precepts.” Vs. 63 The Psalmist watched how people lived, how they responded to God’s will and word. And he chose his companions accordingly.
King Solomon clearly saw the effect friends or companions have on our ability to walk in godly character. For instance in Proverbs 13:20 he declared,
“He who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will suffer
harm.” A wise man of course has to be defined by Scripture, not by our culture. True biblical wisdom is more precious than gold but comes at a cost.
So the first principle or truth could be restated as, Who we run around with will either make us more godly or more ungodly. All relationships have an effect – either good or bad – on our pursuit of godliness and holiness.
A second principle seen in Proverbs 18:24 is this: Because relationships require significant relational energy, fewer is better. Here’s the verse: “A man of too many friends comes to ruin (to be broken in pieces - lit.), But there is a friend (or lover) who sticks closer than a brother.” One of the lies of the enemy in terms of relationships is “the more the merrier”. Or in spiritual terms many of us mistakenly think that the more people we relate to, the more influence we will have. I now realize that this is not true at all. Every relationship I have requires time and energy and prayer. I only have so much time and energy and can only pray effectively and faithfully for so many people/relationships. It took me a while to admit my relational bandwidth was just not that wide.
A person who has many friends seems successful or effective. But the reality is those relationships will eventually suck the life out of us. Is it easy to cut off relationships that we have formerly pursued? No it is not. But it is crucial for our spiritual health to obey the Lord on this and trust Him with potential hurt feelings of those we can no longer pursue relationship with.
A third principle from the prophet Jeremiah and Jesus is that while God does want to do in and through us more than we can ask or think (Eph. 3:20), it is best we not seek great things for ourselves. Best we leave it in God's hands.
God said through the prophet Jeremiah to a discouraged and burned out Baruch these words, “But you, are you seeking great things for yourself? Do not seek them…”. Baruch did not have the maturity and wisdom and self control at that time in his life to handle the grand aspirations floating around in his brain. Few of us grasp adequately the foundation necessary to build some of the relational structures or opportunities we find ourselves aspiring to. Jesus speaks to this in Luke 14:7-15, regarding both where we choose to sit at social events held at others’ homes or put on by others, and who we invite to gatherings at our own homes. In both cases His main point is it is much better that we leave to God our being exalted and promoted and sought after and not pursue it ourselves. “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” is the guiding principle in the middle of that passage (vs. 11).
I want to touch on some more principles or truths from the New Testament on our subject, but I’ll leave that for next time. May the Holy Spirit give you great faith and confidence and expectation for all of your human relationships in 2025 as you learn to depend on and submit to His great goodness and wisdom.
Комментарии