According to Andy Stanley, these verses from 1 Corinthians 13 are historically used for marriage vows; yet they were established as a guideline for us to love people.
I want to share the points he made which are critical for us to understand to know what this looks like and how to apply it!
The health of all relationships flows out of how we trust people! This will be determined on two things:
1. What we see
2. Who we are
Trust verses from this scripture
Verses 5-6 “Love delights in those doing the right thing”
verse 7 “Love always protects, hopes and perseveres”
1. Love protects the relationship – when it is the hardest, do everything to trust
2. Hope is the explanation of that
3. Love believes and endures all things Summary is LOVE BENDS!
1.It gives the other person the benefit of the doubt
2. It always looks for the most generous explanation
3. Love chooses trust over suspicion
The core of great relationships is TRUST
WE all have expectations and experiences. But what is in the middle of those?
I love how Andy put it that there is a gap there and WE CHOOSE what to do in that gap
When we find ourselves seeing behavior that causes a gap, what do we do? WE CHOOSE–If we CHOOSE TRUST (Believing the Best) that is love. LOVE BENDS!
Andy shared much more . . .
Summary – LOVE BENDS – DO UNTO OTHERS AS YOU WOULD HAVE THEM DO TO YOU. Luke 6:31
When you can’t choose to trust, LOVE CONFRONTS, but not in a mean way. Only through a loving, respectful, kind and gentle way!
Go to the person, share that you want to trust them, you want to understand and you keep the door open to the relationship.
If we do nothing, anger develops internally and becomes embedded to the point the relationship is severed. A wise man will BEND!
Five points Jesus asks us to commit to:
1. When you see the gap – I will believe the best
2. When Others assume the worst about you- I will come to your defense
3. If trust is eroding by experience – I will come directly to you
4. When I cant keep a promise – I will let you know ahead of time
5. When you confront me about gaps I have created – I’m going to tell you the truth!
These are great commitments for each of us to make.
It wasn’t anything I did. It was not from my strength or my effort at all. I had no control over what was happening to my life and me anymore. This time I would not win the battle of being in control over myself. I had chosen before not to be involved in certain activities I believed were bad for me, but mostly because I didn’t want to be out of control of my life. I had a long history of making sure I made decisions ensuring I would be in control of my life.
My part of this was over. I would no longer be the one making the decisions for my life. It looked awful, I left everything I had and the one man I thought loved me more than life itself. I had no idea what was happening and it was very scary. I traveled more than ten thousand miles alone, hoping to get where I was going in safety, knowing that I was deeply suffering a takeover in my life. In retrospect, four years later, I see that I was brought to my knees. I was being hotly pursued by God, who would not take no for an answer. He was drawing me to Him and the closer I got, even though I did not understand, the more I wanted to be closer!
I will never forget that day and the freedom that washed over me. I had lived the past with so much guilt and shame and such a deep sense of unworthiness that when I received this amazing gift of freedom, I knew that it had to be something greater than myself. It was like every weight that had held me back was lifted off of me. I did not have the stress and anxiety from all the circumstances surrounding my life. It really was like a miracle to me. I was going through one of the hardest times in my life and I had this sense of peace I cannot describe in words.
I became so thirsty too. You know the commercials they used to run for Bounty® paper towels? They would pour two pools of water on the counter and use Bounty® paper towels and another leading brand to show how much more absorbent bounty towels were. It was like I was a Bounty® paper towel on speed! I was so thirsty to learn about God. I spent hours, months, years buried in the Bible, seeking to know Him on a deeper level.
I wanted to be around other people who had gone through the same experience that I did and I prayed that God would bring those people into my life. He blessed my life immensely by bringing people into my life that had received this same gift. We all began to study together, sing together, praise and show love toward God together. The more I read God’s Word, the more I knew me. Knowing more about myself helped me to understand why I had gone through the circumstances that I had and even more so, why God had chosen to rescue me from the life that brought me such pain. Through learning about Him, I learned my life’s purpose.
Though I grew up attending church a minimum of three days a week, had the privilege of going to a Christian school and college and I married those who professed to be Christians, I never knew what the true meaning of being a Christian was until God rescued me from myself. Really, to me that is what it is all about. He is the One who created us, He knows everything about us, our needs, our thoughts, our desires; but we think we know better, so guess what? Because God offers free will, He allows us to walk this path of destruction until one day we are at such a low point and in such a state of desperation that we fall on our knees and say, okay Lord . . . Enough, I’m yours, take me, I can’t do this anymore, I surrender, I’m sorry, please just help me!
Our life continues, but this part of the journey is now with God at the helm as we choose to follow His lead. The gift of freedom from the life of our past is great, and we are amazed by it, but we soon realize that what we did against God was so hurtful to Him and we go through a metamorphic sense of remorse turning us from all the things we used to do out of a heart of love for Him! This time we have this super strength that we did not have before because we are depending on Christ for our strength, not ourselves.
As God’s children, the promises to us are many. The biggest part of those promises being fulfilled is believing God! Many believe in Him, but those who believe Him for who He is, what He can do, who we are in Him, that He is our strength, and His words truly become alive and active in us, will see God’s faithfulness to His promises.
Through reading His word, we become wiser and are able to share the love He gives us with a confidence that is once again indescribable. It is not an arrogance; it is actually a confidence with humility! We are able to determine a better and more fulfilling way to live and our eyes are opened to a new perspective that only God can provide to us.
The most amazing and faith-building part of it is that everything we have done that was opposed to Him is taken and used for good so others may see how Almighty, Magnificent and Glorious He is. He does it all in such a beautiful way that the finger points to Him through our lives! That is how He then uses us as tools for Him!
Salvation is freedom. Salvation is assurance that we will live in communion with God forever. Salvation is knowing that God loves us without reservation and there is nothing we can do to earn that love. It is a free gift! We learn to accept His gifts and His love. From that love, He heals our wounds, the wounds of those in our families, our neighbors and those who are in our circle of influence. We begin to have a passion to know His heart and desire only to be filled with His desires, not our own. He has brought us home and we receive what is a glimpse of the promise of remaining with him eternally, knowing we are always a work in progress. We know that all things in our lives are perfectly orchestrated by the Creator of this world. We know that with Him we can overcome. We know that there is nothing that can stop us if God is for us and we have a confidence, a peace, and a wisdom that others desire deeply. This is the salvation I have received.
I work now for God each day in all I do. It is the most amazing life I have ever had and I look forward to the day when I can ask why I had to go through almost 40 years of stubbornness, arrogance and self-righteousness before I would let Him take control of my life.
The experiences I had in my past life are now turned around working for God. I offer a support group for women going through relationship brokenness that stems from abuse and addiction. I write and speak to share the truth about Jesus Christ and I am a Certified Christian Life Coach. I do all this out of a heart of love, knowing that there are others out there just like me, who need someone to keep them focused while holding them accountable. In this way many others will know Him deeper and grow to be all that God created them to be!
Our God is great, He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow and I am a living, walking, breathing example of one of His true miracles!
I have been weary lately. I have begun to feel the hardship of the circumstances around me, yet I know deep in my heart that there is One in me that will not fail me. Even knowing this I begin to lose the stillness that my soul so thirsts for and I start to see things from a different perspective. I lose the sense of thankfulness that was so prevalent in my heart, soul and mind as I begin to whine about my circumstances. I lose touch with what is truly important, not only for my own life but those around me. I begin to think that I have lost the battle and I start floundering as a fish does when out of water. I lose the precious sense of peace that it was once there and I am left wondering how it has been possible that I have lost what was the cornerstone of my life.
I stop, I let things go, I release whatever is not working in my life to God and allow Him to take control. Slowly I begin to feel a sense of inner peace and I suddenly have more time to dedicate to the things that are genuinely important in this life. I get back into my quiet time, I am in prayer with the Almighty One and instantly I begin to see Him in my life again. It was never He who left me; it was me that left Him. I begin to realize how no matter what the circumstances are around my life, He has so strategically planned and designed them all. Nothing is by coincidence. Everything is in place to prune me, to eliminate the things that no longer are a source of true life and will hinder me from intimately knowing His love. I begin to see prayers being answered again, I see how people in my life are supposed to be there and I realize without any doubt that each one is placed here for a purpose. Though I am not God and cannot be one-hundred percent certain of the path I am on, I have great confidence and hope that He is leading me because of seeing His promises and faithfulness come alive in my life and the lives of those I love. I can see my life is different and it is better than it has ever been.
I begin to pray in the back of my mind softly, like a whisper that is ever-present. It is the Spirit of God that lives in me and gives me life. I am so thankful for each of the circumstances. Though I have walked this earth for more than 50 years, it took me half a century to realize that God loves me infinitely, He has plans for my life and no matter what tries to thwart His plan, He will not allow it. He will consistently bring me back to where He wants me to be! Yes, it is my choice to surrender all I have and am to Jesus Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of my life, but if I do not choose Him, over time He will allow things in my life to cause me to turn to Him. This is clear in the way He vengefully pursued me. I lost everything that was important to me and I was left with nothing but God to turn to for comfort and rescue. He brought people into my life each step of the journey before and after He revealed Himself to me. He opens doors and closes doors along the way for me to realize that He is in control of all things. Why shouldn’t He be? He created them all and also each of us.
My prayer today is one of immense gratitude and thankfulness that each and every circumstance in my life has been and is an opportunity for me to love another. In professing to be so in love with Jesus Christ, I too have a responsibility to Him out of that deep love to love others in the same way I am loved by Him. He is a merciful, forgiving, loving and just God and He wants nothing more than for us to love Him and one another the same.
