Relationships: A Mess Worth Making

by Timothy S. Lane

This side of heaven, relationships and ministry are always shaped in the forge of struggle.

What is certain is that we all have been shaped significantly by relationships that are full of both sorrow and joy.

Take a moment to reflect on the relationships in your life. Think about the relationships in your family while you were growing up.

The fatal flaw of human wisdom is that it promises that you can change your relationships without needing to change yourself.

Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased. 1

God wants to bring us to the end of ourselves so that we would see our need for a relationship with him as well as with others. Every painful thing we experience in relationships is meant to remind us of our need for him. And every good thing we experience is meant to be a metaphor of what we can only find in him.

If you want to enjoy any progress or blessing in your relationships, it will require you to admit your sin humbly and commit yourself to the work they require. Each of us is tempted to make relationships the end rather than the means

We settle for the satisfaction of human relationships when they were meant to point us to the perfect relational satisfaction found only with God.

Skills and techniques appeal to us because they promise that relational problems can be fixed by tweaking our behavior without altering the bent of our hearts. But the Bible says something very different. It says that Christ is the only real hope for relationships because only he can dig deep enough to address the core motivations and desires of our hearts.

The health and maturity of a relationship are not measured by an absence of problems, but by the way the inevitable problems are handled. From birth to death, we are sinners living with other sinners. A good relationship involves honestly identifying the sin patterns that tend to trouble it.

I loved my family, but that night in the car I hit the wall of the reality of relationships in a fallen world. Everyone has hit that wall called, “Why bother with other people?” We reach points in our relationships where we wonder if they are worth it.

whatever problems we have in relationships tend to fit one of three relational profiles.

Read on: frustrated, enmeshed, & isolated

The interesting point about each profile is that each is an unbalanced relationship because each person tends to make too much or too little of the relationship. Isolationists conclude that relationships are too difficult; they are not necessary and the effort is not worth it. (“I don’t need relationships to be me.”) On the other hand, immersionists are convinced that relationships are everything. (“Without relationships, I am nobody.”) These conclusions are rooted in people’s hearts and expectations.

Does it surprise you that God presents himself as a model for human community? It can be surprising because we tend to think of God as an individual. While God is one, the Bible also says that he exists in three persons. The biblical teaching of the Trinity is very practical for relationships since God himself is a model of loving, cooperative, unified community where diversity is an asset, not a liability. If God is making us into his likeness, we can be encouraged that he will give us the grace to live like this in community with one another. People made in God’s likeness were made for community

As Jesus looks to the cross and the ultimate defeat of sin, he knows that his death and resurrection will not only reconcile individual sinners to God, but also individual sinners to one another. Jesus’ death and resurrection create an entirely new community that will come to full expression in eternity. (See Ephesians 2:11—22.)

John 17:22 is significant because the glory Jesus is talking about is the glory of the Holy Spirit, which allowed him to minister in a fallen world. He gives this same glory-Spirit to us because without the Spirit we can do nothing.

Despite the fact that we are selfish people in a fallen world, our lives still reveal God’s likeness. God is a community and we as his creation reflect this quality. Moreover, he brings us into community and places the desire for community within us. Ultimately, we can never escape our essential nature—who and what God designed us to be. This relational characteristic is central to who we are; it leads us to do great good and great evil.

Your best relationship—no matter who it’s with—is messy! Stop and think about your most satisfying relationship. (If you are having difficulty, we have proven our point.) Ask yourself these simple questions about this relationship:  Have you ever felt misunderstood?  Have you ever been hurt by what the other person said?  Have you ever felt like you haven’t been heard?  Have you ever been betrayed?  Have you ever had to work through a misunderstanding?  Have you ever disagreed on a decision?  Have you or the other person ever held a grudge?  Have you ever experienced loneliness even when things were going well?  Have you ever been let down?  Have you ever doubted the other person’s love?  Has the other person ever doubted your commitment?  Have you ever struggled to resolve a conflict?  Have you ever wished you didn’t have to give or serve?  Have you ever felt used?  Have you ever thought, If I had only known!

These four words mean that our biggest problem is inside us and we can’t fix it on our own. Paul’s evaluation of the struggle with sin is sobering, as it calls our attention to its impact on our relationships. Sin affects us in six basic ways.

4 words: law, war, prisoner, and rescue 6 sin affectz: self-centered, self-rule, self-sufficiency, self-righteousness, self-satisfaction, and self-taught.

Paul grounds our unity in the unity of the Trinity, not in our ability to get along.

Because it is grounded in the Trinity, our unity also allows us to celebrate our diversity in the body of Christ. There is one God, but three persons. God uses our diversity to accomplish his purpose—our growth in grace. Diversity is not an obstacle, but a very significant means to this end.

For example, if you quit at the first sign of fatigue when you exercise, you miss the chance to become more fit. Exercise after exhaustion is the most efficient and productive time for physical fitness. This is true of relationships as well. God has designed our relationships to function as both a diagnosis and a cure. When we are frustrated and ready to give up, God is at work, revealing the places where we have given in to a selfish agenda (the diagnosis). He then uses that new awareness to help us grow precisely where we have struggled (the cure).

When I live out of a biblical sense of who I am (identity) and rest in who God is (worship), I will be able to build a healthy relationship with you. These are not abstract theological concepts. We’re talking about the content and character of our hearts.

The theology you live out is much more important to your daily life than the theology you claim to believe.

What is a relationship? The intersection of the stories of two people. The problem is that an awful lot of carnage takes place at this intersection.

We simply are not the same because God decided to write different stories for us. And he has placed us next to one another because that is exactly where he knew we needed to be for our good and for the fulfillment of his loving purposes on earth.

When you are sinned against, you will be impacted by the weaknesses and failures of that other person. When this happens, you need to allow God to use you as an instrument in his redemptive hands, rather than seeking to make changes in the other person yourself.

Because our communication largely takes place in the inconsequential moments of everyday life, it is easy to underestimate its significance. The moments are rare when what you say will literally be life changing. What sets the course of a person’s life are the ways he responds to the little moments. The character developed in a thousand little moments is what you carry into the big, important moments.

Because our words have power and direction, they always produce some kind of harvest. It will be a life harvest of comfort, encouragement, hope, insight, unity, and joy, or a death harvest of fear, discouragement, falsehood, division, and sadness.

The gift of words calls us to live and speak in a God-focused manner. One of our greatest mistakes in communication is to take words as our own to use as we please.

An ambassador does one thing only—represent. His job is to incarnate a king who is not present. Every word he speaks is directed by the king’s interests and will. This is exactly what God is calling us to do.

Here is the point: Your words are always in pursuit of some kind of kingdom. You are either speaking as a mini-king, seeking to establish your will in your relationships and circumstances; or you are speaking as an ambassador, seeking to be part of what the King is doing.

The words of an ambassador are always other-centered.

Here is where we all must remember that our relationships have been designed as workrooms for redemption, not shelters for human happiness.

Question 1: Why do we fight with one another? Good question. James asks the same question. We can be thankful that he answers it as well. What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. (James 4:1—3)

The word “desire” that James uses here is a word that would better be translated as “selfish desire.” All desires are not wrong. But a selfish desire is.

We divorced our service from God’s glory and the other’s good and turned it into self-service: “I’ll serve when I want to and I want to be appreciated when I do.”

Consider how the following good things morph into something sinful: Comfort. I want, must have, and deserve comfort and you’d better not get in the way of me getting it! I fear hard work. Pleasure. I want, must have, and deserve pleasure and you’d better give it to me! I fear pain. Recognition. I want, must have, and deserve recognition or I will be devastated. I fear being overlooked. Power. I want, must have, and deserve power and you’d better do what I say! I fear being told what to do. Control. I want, must have, and deserve control and you will feel the brunt of my disappointment if you mess up my tidy little universe! I fear unpredictability. Acceptance. I want, must have, and deserve acceptance and you are responsible to give it to me. I fear rejection.

As James says we are guilty of adultery, he uses two metaphors to describe the relationship we have with God. The image of adultery means we are married to God. When he says we are guilty of friendship with the world, he implies that God is our only rightful friend. For anyone who knows the Bible, this is wonderfully shocking! An absolutely holy God, who will not and cannot tolerate sin, has made us his bride and friend through Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection!

Like the person whose spouse has been unfaithful, God is zealous to do whatever it takes to regain the affection of our hearts. He doesn’t do this because he needs us; he does it because he loves us. When he pursues us and we humble ourselves and return to him, he then pours out even more grace!

When you fail to forgive someone, you break these three promises. Rather than canceling the debt, you keep the person’s indebtedness before him, others, and yourself. Your desire to make the person pay for what he has done outweighs your desire to forgive.

3 promises: will not bring up the debt to use it as leverage, will not bring up the offense to others and slander the person who sinned against you, and you promise not to dwell on the offense yourself.

the parable shows us that not forgiving also has a price, and it is higher than the price forgiveness demands. This is where we must let the truth override our feelings since it often feels good to hold onto an offense.

This is why forgiveness is both a past event and an ongoing process into the future. It is a past promise you keep in the future.

The king in the parable is none other than King Jesus. He came to absorb the cost of your sin—a sin debt that makes millions of dollars look like chump change. Jesus came and shed his blood for you. The Father emptied heaven of its greatest treasure so that you could be forgiven.

It takes humility to live with a sinner in a world of difficulty. It takes gentleness to be part of what God is doing in someone’s life and not get in the way. It takes patience to deal with the sin and weakness of those around you. It takes perseverance to be part of change in a relationship because that change is most often a process and rarely an event. It takes forgiveness to move beyond the times you have been mistreated by another. It takes forbearance to continue to love a person, even when you are being provoked. It is hard to respond in kindness when you are treated unkindly. It takes remarkable love to serve the good of the other person and not be distracted by daily needs. (Notice that these character qualities are mentioned throughout the New Testament: Galatians 5:22—26; Ephesians 4:1—3; Philippians 2:1—11; Colossians 3:12—14.)

When you think about your relationships, how many of them ultimately revolve around making sure your concerns are heard and your self-defined “needs” are met? Start with those you love the most. I am married and have four children, and most of the time I am committed to thinking about how they can make my life more fulfilling. I know this is true because of how easily I get irritated when I have to give up personal comfort to serve them. This is with people I say I love; I haven’t even begun to think about the difficult people. And let’s not even bring up our enemies!

Jesus is calling you to move into people’s lives and become vulnerable. He does not say it will be easy, but he does say that this is the only place to find life. You find your life by dying to yourself and caring for others in risky ways.

Jesus knows that, unless these proud men humble themselves to receive grace, they will never be able to give grace in the way Jesus has served them. Proud sinners who can’t receive grace as a gift from God will not be likely to offer it. You can’t serve other sinners if you don’t receive Jesus’ service for you. There is no way you will be up for the task.

But Jesus says that a bath, as important as it is, must be accompanied by daily cleansing. They need the daily grace of sanctification. You and I need the cleansing work of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection applied to our lives daily. You can’t live on past grace. You need present grace.

the service Jesus rendered for us in his life, death, and resurrection is not just for forgiveness of sins or a future in heaven; it is also for the daily power to change in the present. We are not just promised life after death, but life before death! You can remember this as you face the realities of life in a broken world.