Caring for One Another: 8 Ways to Cultivate Meaningful Relationships

by Edward T. Welch

Counseling and Psychotherapy: A Christian Perspective

Apparently, the Lord is pleased to use ordinary people, through seemingly ordinary acts of love, to be the prime contributors to the maturing of his people.

Our helpfulness—our care for souls—starts with our need for care. We need God, and we need other people. Maturity through dependence is our goal.

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. (Eph. 4:1–3)

humility does not precede our wisdom and help, our efforts are meaningless.

Humility simply acknowledges our many sins and limitations, and it responds with, “I need Jesus, and I need other people.”

This self-protective strategy might seem effective in the short run. It is not, however, how God created us to be with each other, so it will eventually lead to misery rather than safety.

It is God’s will that we say “help” both to him and to others.

And along the way, we will bless our community and induce others toward being needy, open, and vulnerable.

Jesus Pursues Us, We Pursue Each Other

He says “I love you” first, even when we respond with an indifferent shrug or the equivalent of a passing, “Oh, thanks.” And in this we discover why it might be hard for us to move toward others: the one taking the initiative in the relationship—the one who loves most—is the one who risks humiliation.

Too often we are silent when we know of someone’s trouble. Silence is the same as turning away.

But loving pursuit is neither easy nor natural to anyone. All of us need both humility and help from Scripture in order to navigate the early stages of a helpful conversation. Those initial steps might look like this: The Lord calls us family, so we greet warmly. The Lord knows our name, so we learn someone’s name. The Lord knows seemingly irrelevant details about us, such as the number of hairs on our heads, so we take an interest in details. Is the person new to your gathering? Where does he or she live? Who does she live with? Does she work, go to school, manage a home? What we hear might surprise us. After all, most people are not often asked about themselves, so we might hear much more than basic information.

In response, we listen. This means we are undistracted, engaged, and affected by what they say.

The purpose in a man’s heart is like deep water, but a man of understanding will draw it out. (Prov. 20:5) We hope to be that person of understanding.

The heart can be veiled and difficult to know. We prefer to hide its less attractive thoughts and some of its hurts. But when we are willing to be a little more vulnerable, and others handle our hearts with care, we discover that knowing and being known are part of our design.

Think of the heart as having layers and depth. It is compared to the roots of a tree (Jer. 17:5–8), waters that run deep (Prov. 20:5), and a treasure for which we must search (Matt. 6:20). Since it is quite busy, there is always more to discover, though sometimes it will take time, and trust, to draw it out.

We want rest and health for our bodies, the best for friends and family, protection from enemies, work that is meaningful, lives that contribute, peace, love.

These desires of the heart are important to the Lord, and he invites us to pour out our hearts to him (Ps. 62:8). That’s how his love works. He shares in the pleasures and pains of his beloved. The Lord hears us in the fullest sense. He hears and is moved.

A friend asked me, “How is your heart?” Notice how he was reaching further in. He was especially interested in how my desires set a moral or spiritual course for my life.

We usually give access to these places only in more seasoned relationships marked by love.

We all live before the face of God, whether we are consciously aware of that or not. Life is intensely personal.

As we grow in understanding of how our heart works, we can learn to move more deeply into someone else’s life.

Our hearts are always up to something.

The sheer number of influences on the heart is impossible to fully know. Our goal is to identify those influences that have been most important.

Among those that consistently top the list are the impact of other people and the effects of body and brain weakness.

Psalm 133 extols the blessing of unity. Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity!

Helpers walk carefully here. These responses reveal important matters, but when we care for others, we rarely rush into the heart’s responses first. Instead, we linger on the relationships that have been painful.

This does not mean that we postpone speaking about the Lord, but only that we walk with care toward another person’s heart.

Recent study into the connection between the brain and behavior has given more insight into challenging problems such as dementing adults and the learning differences of children. Recent advances in modern psychiatry have alerted us to the interdependence of our thinking, emotions, and brain functioning. We don’t have to be experts in these areas of study, but we do want to learn as we can, receive help from those with more experience, and be humble in the face of human complexity.

There are endless depths and recesses within any person. We have the privilege of sharing and knowing some of these places. Though we can never know each other exhaustively, we can know each other accurately and truly.

We “rejoice with those who rejoice, [and] weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15) because doing so reflects the character of God.

For example, it is almost always unhelpful to give advice to someone who is troubled unless the troubled one asks. Advice is what we would do in another’s situation, even though we might never have been in that situation. It typically sounds teacher-like, and it bypasses compassion. It is rarely personal. So hold back your advice unless it is requested.

Talking about yourself might also be unhelpful, at least initially:

You don’t have to know all the answers. Humility and love want to know more, so you ask for more. You ask what has been helpful and unhelpful.

The wilderness is hard, and we respond with compassion.

More is happening in the wilderness than hardships.

It is also where the Lord tests and trains his royal children so they can see what is actually in their hearts and can ascend with maturity and wisdom to the royal courts (Deut. 8:1–3; James 1:2–5). The test goes to the depths of our souls: will we believe and trust him when our circumstances seem dire?

So often we replicate their journey, and when life is hard we trust what our senses tell us more than what God says.

The wilderness is an opportunity for faith.

Now we enter into the wilderness story knowing that Jesus has already been victorious and has given us the Spirit to do what we could not do before. We can turn to the Lord rather than away from him during intense troubles.

How would you pray for someone, using the wilderness story? Here are some of the spiritual realities gleaned from the exodus master story that can guide you:

Keep this general rule in mind: we talk about the hard things and good things before we talk about the bad.

Our goal is to contribute to a community in which it is increasingly natural to talk about sin and ask each other for help.

“We are in this together.” That might mean you don’t fully understand the nature of another’s sin, but you will be right next to him, with patience and kindness, in the battle. It can also mean that you do understand his sin because you too struggle with a variant of it.