Why Relationships are Important – Part 1

There are two reasons why relationships are important when it comes to the Body of Christ.  The first one I would like to discuss in this chapter and the second one I will discuss in the next.

Relationships are important because of the Body of Christ.  Consider some of these verses:

1 Corinthians 12:12  “The body is a unit, though it is made up of  many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.”

Ephesians 4:14-16  “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”

John 17:22-23  (Jesus says) “I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one.”

If I understand Scripture properly, the Body of Christ functions according to how the interpersonal relationships are working.  If our relationships are not right with each other then the Body of Christ is not right. Broken relationships hinder growth more than anything else.

If one member is in disagreement with another so that they separate from one another, the Body hurts.  The analogy that Paul uses is that of a human body.  If one member of the body (let it be an arm, leg, foot, toe, finger, etc.) is hurting or not functioning the way it should, it hurts the entire body.

According to John 17:23,  Jesus said, “I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

The word “complete” brings out the idea of perfecting one another.  In other words, I need my brother to help me to become complete in Christ. This is not something that I can do on my own.

Every day you and I allow evil things to come into our hearts. God brings this out through what the prophet Jeremiah spoke: “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” (17:9) I need my brother to help me see what is deceiving me so that it does not begin to produce any actions of evil.

For many years after I was saved I thought that I could personally push for maturity on my own since it seemed that the Body in Christ, in general, was not interested. It wasn’t until I got more involved with the O.M. ships’ ministry that I began to change my thinking and recognize that I needed my brothers and sisters in Christ in order to grow up in the Lord. If I am not growing then the Body of Christ is not growing. If the Body of Christ is not growing then I am not growing as a part of the Body.  Realizing this truth made me work harder using my spiritual gifts which have been given from God – for the common good of the Body of Christ; that it matures in Christ.

What They Are Not

One of the things for this New Year that the Lord has laid upon my heart is the subject THE IMPORTANCE OF RELATIONSHIPS.  I told my daughters that they will succeed in life if they learn how to build and maintain relationships.  Relationships are something that we all face in our families, churches, jobs, professions, etc.  Learning to build and maintain relationships will spell success or disaster in everything we do, and especially when it comes to the work of God.

When we talk about relationships we need to define what we are talking about.  Often there has been a lot of confusion and misunderstanding when it comes to relationships. Often people think that to have a right relationship we must all think alike.  Isn’t this what the Scripture teaches that if we are in Christ we will have the same mind? But, this is not the same as everyone thinking alike. I do not believe that this is what that Scripture teaches. 

God has made each of us unique.  There are no two humans alike.  We are all different. And because we are different we all have different ways through our senses of sorting through information that comes to us throughout the day. I look at my wife and two daughters.  They receive the same information that I receive, but they respond differently.  When my two daughters were teen-agers they really thought differently.  But, we all had a right relationship with one another.

Although we do not think alike we are to think together.  In fact, to have a good relationship with someone means we are thinking together, or sharing our thoughts.  We see the importance of this coming out with the different nationalities; that to have right relationships with people of other cultures we need to think together even though we think differently.  

Having right relationships does not mean that there will be no differences of opinions on issues.  It is only natural that if we think differently that there will be differences of opinions.

What I have discovered over the years is that we actually need our different thinking on issues.  This is the beauty of the Body of Christ and why we need one another with our different aspects of thinking.  There is no one person who has all the truth, who has all the wisdom, etc. When we come to together to think together we can begin to see a bigger picture of who Christ really is through His Body.

Some people think that to have right relationships means that there will be no more conflicts.  How untrue this is. It is true that in a maturing marriage over the years conflicts will become less and less.  We will see later on that conflicts are not always bad, but often even necessary for spiritual growth. Having conflicts is not necessarily a bad sign as far as relationships are concerned.  In any relationship maturity comes by not avoiding conflicts, but rather by working them out and through. 

One last thing that we need to understand about relationships is the mistake in thinking that everything should be perfect in the relationship.  I find people who think that if something does not feel right to them then there must be something wrong with the relationship. There are two things I would like to mention about this.  First, when it comes to developing relationships as well as maintaining them it will take discipline, working at it every day. The time spent working on good relationships is time well spent.  Secondly, we need to understand that we are all sinners in need of God’s grace.

I remember one brother mentioning that when things came up between him and his wife he remembered that he married a sinner and so did his wife.  We want to push towards perfection, but at the same time we need to keep in mind that we will not achieve perfection on this side of eternity.

The Word of God – Part 6

2 Timothy 2:15 “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.”

Our attitude toward Scripture depends upon whether we really believe that Scripture is inspired. If not, then any system of truth it contains cannot be relied upon.  It is imperative to understand their claims to divine inspiration, infallibility and integrity. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

One of the great truths about the Word of God is its symmetry. The Bible contains 66 books, written by 39 human authors (although we know that the main author is the Holy Spirit moving upon these men as He so chose) and over a period of 1500 years. Separate any one of the 66 books and it makes no sense, but together they proclaim a unity of the whole will and plan of God.

We talk about the revealed Word of God. What does that mean? The dictionary definition of the word revelation is: “A revelation is that which is revealed by God to man.” The word itself means “flinging or drawing back the veil,” which would indicate the removing of a veil or obstacle that hinders complete vision.

The Bible is not primarily a record of man’s thoughts about God, but a record of what God has done and revealed of Himself to man. Its basis is not, “Thus and thus man thinks,” but rather, “Thus and thus saith Jehovah,” or “Thus and thus hath Jehovah done.” 

We also talk about the inspired Word of God. It is important to grasp what we mean by this often used word. There is a difference between revelation and inspiration. 

Revelation is the subject matter of the message, what God imparts to man, but inspiration is the power or method by which man communicates his God-given message to man. We may therefore regard inspiration as a special gift of the Holy Spirit, by which prophets of the Old Testament and the apostles and their companions in the New Testament transmitted the revelation of God as they received it. These two facts are combined by Peter: “For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” 2 Peter 1:21

Here the word signifies “breath,” thus showing that God is the Author of man’s intelligence.  In 2 Timothy 3:16 “All scripture is given by inspiration of God.” The particular word used by Paul means “God-breathed,” that is, God Himself, or, through His Holy Spirit – told the writers of the Bible just the very things to record. 

The Bible not only contains God’s words, but is, from beginning to end, the Word of God. If anyone has reason to doubt the inspiration of the Bible, the certain yet simple test to apply is to yield oneself to its power; strive faithfully to follow its commands, acting as it suggests, and as a result, the conviction will irresistibly grow upon the mind seeking proof in this way – that its claim to be inspired of God is not to be questioned, but reverently received as just and undeniable.  After all, it is personal experience that counts, and our Lord said: “If any man will do…..he shall know.” (John 7:17)

Another word that we often use is ‘illumination.’  Clarence Larkin observes that: “Spiritual illumination is different either from Bible inspiration or revelation. It is the work of the Holy Spirit in the believer, by which he has his ‘spiritual understanding’ opened to understand the Scriptures. (John 16:12,15)

“I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you.” I Corinthians 2:11

“The natural man cannot receive the teachings of the Spirit of God; neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned.” I Corinthians 2:14

He goes on to say, “The work, then, of the Holy Spirit in these days is not to impart some new revelation to men, or to inspire them to write or speak as the prophets and apostles of old, but so to illuminate men’s minds and open up their understanding of the Scriptures that their heart will burn within them as they compare Scripture with Scripture, in having revealed to them God’s plan and purpose in the ages, as disclosed in His Holy Word.” 

Reformation brings us back to the realization that God’s Word is just that: GOD’S WORD, and it is reliable “for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17

The Word of God – Part 5

Psalms 119:98-100 “Your commands make me wiser than my enemies, for they are ever with me. I have more insight than all my teachers, for I meditate on your statutes. I have more understanding than the elders, for I obey your precepts.”

We read that when the resurrected Jesus was in the midst of the 12 disciples that “he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.” Luke 24:45

We will not understand Scripture by intellect alone. It will take the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit to open Scripture. One man of God rightly said: “The Bible is burglar proof against all unsanctified learning. The Holy Spirit alone holds the key to it.” In other words, if we are going to understand the Word of God then it is going to be the Holy Spirit teaching us. It was Augustine who said: “I would affirm that the sufficiency of our learning is to discover that our learning is insufficient.”

Just as we need the Holy Spirit for the work, so we need Him to fit us for the work.  Jesus told His disciples to stay in Jerusalem until they received the Holy Spirit. It could have been easy for the 12 disciples to think that because they had been with Jesus for three years (three years of Bible School) that they were prepared to go out.

This, I believe, is a mistake that we are making today; that somehow a biblical education fits us for the work of the ministry. I am not saying that this is not important, but if we do not have the Holy Spirit leading in this then we are doomed to failure.

Often what we call “sacred” learning is nothing more than ‘secular’ because so often there is the absence of the Spirit’s anointing and illuminating power as well as dependence upon the Holy Spirit.

 
What we have found out throughout the history of the church is that studies about God when there is not a humble dependence upon the Holy Spirit to illuminate – do not help but are actually harmful. We have too many preachers preaching about God; preachers who do not know the Lord in an intimate way. They know about Him, but they do not know Him in truth and Spirit.

In Psalms 103:7 “He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel.” This is what I am referring to. There is a difference between knowing the ways of God and actually seeing His them, in His deeds. Moses knew the ways of God and through Moses God could act and show His ways/deeds to the children of Israel. I believe that this brings out the difference between a person who has been fitted by the Holy Spirit for the work, and those who have not.

It was professor Beck who said: “Gentlemen remember that without the illumination of the Spirit theology is not only a cold stone, it is deadly poison.” The Psalmist said: “If the foundation is being destroyed what can the righteous do?” What is our foundation? The Scriptures! Who have been the ones tearing down the Scriptures? It has been our so-called theological professors.

One of the reasons for this is that they think that they can understand the Scriptures by microscopic exegesis and by philosophical analysis. However, we read in 1 Corinthians 2:11 “For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.” This seems to be a truth that today has been forgotten by many of our Bible Schools and Seminaries. We read about the two disciples on the Emmaus road that when they were walking with Jesus and Jesus opened the Scripture to them, their hearts burned within them.

Reformation will bring us back to a simple reliance upon the Holy Spirit to understand Scripture and to see Scripture become flesh in us.