God's Design For Relationships

By Lee Eddy

One of the most complex problems in the church today is interpersonal relationships. Ministries are brought low because of a lack of understanding of how these things work. The bible is not silent concerning these issues, but there seems to be a great confusion in how they are applied. This study is focused on that issue. Let's explore the vast world of relationships the way God designed them and learn to walk in the power and peace the way He intended.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 2, 2018
• ISBN: 9781641144001

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God's Design For Relationships

Lee E. Eddy

Copyright © 2018 Lee E. Eddy

All rights reserved

First Edition

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc

New York, NY

First originally published by Christian Faith Publishing, Inc 2018

ISBN 978-1-64114-399-8 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64114-400-1 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication

My incredible wife, Roxanne, has been my partner, my critic, my sounding board, the one who has stood with me through all the circumstances in life that taught me about relationships, and the one who has loved me through it all. Between you and Jesus, I am above all men most blessed.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to all who patiently walked with me and believed in what Jesus was doing in my life. Thanks to Bruce and Nancy for your editing and input. Thanks to Jesus for putting up with me in all the relationship missteps. No one learns this with clean hands. I am so grateful.

Introduction

Come down and teach on relationships.

That was the email request I received while my family and I were missionaries in Russia.

The Youth With A Mission (YWAM) base in the southern part of Russia had written to request that I come and teach the Discipleship Training School. The students needed to know how to survive ministry out in the world for the first time.

That is a little vague, I wrote back. What relationships do you want me to teach about?

All.

Imagine trying to prepare teaching for a week-long class which included all forms of relationships. What I found out later was that they wanted teachings on how to handle the opposite sex. Too late. I had already developed a firm understanding on all relationships.

What transpired next was beyond my highest expectations. I found out that Christians have very little understanding of what the Bible says about conducting relationships. We are often just as susceptible as the world about how to treat our fellow man and we will fight to the end to defend our position regardless how much damage it causes.

As I was teaching this in various places, people would come up to me and thank me for helping them understand for the first time how they are to interact with others in their lives.

I also had many people try to pick a fight with me! They didn’t like me meddling in their spats and telling them how they should have responded. They felt I made them look foolish.

The reality is this: it isn’t easy to live like the Lord tells us to live. The very fabric of our Christianity is shown by the way we treat one another. When we don’t live correctly, it shows and we look foolish. It takes real courage to humble ourselves and respond the way God would have us respond.

Relationships form the very center of our lives. How we get along with people is of far greater importance than we think. Other people give us insight into different perspectives. We are very concerned with how people treat us but are not often that concerned with how we treat others. The Golden Rule, Do unto others as you would have them do unto you sounds good. It just isn’t all that easy to do, nor does it feel good to us. We want to treat others a lot worse than how we want them to treat us.

Our human interaction is the focal point of whether we are fulfilled in life or not. Damaged relationships shape the way we live and how we react when others touch our lives. How are we supposed to do things? If we could only learn how to handle the relationships in our lives, wouldn’t life be a lot easier? Shouldn’t we be able to see Christ work through us in every situation we encounter? The answer to this last question is a resounding Yes!

That is what this book is all about. My goal is to give you all that you will need to respond in relationships correctly. The Bible has a lot to say about how we are to treat people and how we should relate to them. There is a lot to say on each subject, but I have tried to slim it down to the essentials. Each chapter is tied in to the others. This is a package deal. Soon the principles you see in one chapter will show up as pertinent building blocks in each new area.

Welcome to the great adventure: living on this planet with the six billion other people. Seems like a good idea to learn how to relate to them, doesn’t it?

Chapter One

How to See Yourself

If a person doesn’t know how to see himself correctly, he will never learn how to see other people correctly. If I have a skewed view of myself, I will act in ways detrimental to myself and others.

This concept can get very complex. As you can see in figure one on page 14, my view of myself in the natural realm alone gets very complicated.

First of all, my father sees me as a son. When I am with him, I act like a son to him. I treat him with respect and honor him, even though we joke around a lot. I am still his son, no matter how old I am or what else is true about me.

My brother, however, sees me as a brother with all the disrespect that being siblings might generate. We have a good relationship, but we treat each other as if we were brothers because we are. I don’t treat anyone like I treat him because he is the only brother I have. We are very comfortable with those parameters.

Then along comes my son. He sees me as his father and I respond in that manner. I treat him according to what this relationship requires. I am in a leadership role and have a wonderful relationship with him. We have a wonderful time together. We know our positions and live that way.

On the other hand, my wife has a unique way of seeing me. She and I have entered into a marriage covenant together and that qualifies everything. I am her husband only. I am not in the role of husband to anyone else on the planet (Praise God!). Our views of each other and the positions we hold are very strong and not to be discounted.

Now, to really make things interesting, let’s throw in a very different relationship—friendship. My friend sees me as a friend and I see myself as a friend. We have a great time and love to hang around with each other. We prefer to be with each other and have many adventures. I am not a son, brother, father, or husband to him. I act completely different when I am around him than anyone else.

This all makes me very complex. I am a son, brother, father, husband, and friend. But that isn’t all I am. I am also the pastor of a church and have many other complex relationships. I am in spiritual authority and yet submitted to higher authority. I can be a friend and yet in an instant be the one in charge. I can flop back and forth. I can be the pastor overseeing what happens in the church service and still be totally submitted to the worship leader as the bass player in his band.

If at any time I act differently than the position I am truly in, I can hurt people, mess up an entire function at the church, or even cause damage that may take months to bring about reconciliation. All that pressure is on me because people are tender because of the pain they have received in relationships.

We are now going to look at several hats we all wear as Christians. Each hat of relationship we wear is true, but each one has with it both responsibilities and benefits. We can see each one in a good way or in a bad way. We can use these hats to help people or hurt people. It is very important that we see them for what they truly are based upon the scripture that gives us the insight.

The Father

The Father God of the universe sees me as His son. I see myself as the son of the Most High God. I didn’t always see myself that way. I saw the Father as a source of wrath and condemnation. Imagine my surprise and wonder when I was praying one day and I saw something I had never seen before. I saw two doors that were at least twenty feet tall opening by themselves. Inside was a crowd that couldn’t be counted and a red carpet that stretched from the door into the center of the room. I started running down that carpet with an intense desire to go all the way. I saw the Father sitting on a throne with everyone watching Him and intently listening to everything He said. As I ran toward Him, everyone got quiet. They were smiling. The Father saw me coming and sat there beaming at me. I realized I was just a child and I ran up and climbed on His lap. He was huge and just enveloped me in His arms. I was welcome on the lap of the King and all business stopped as I was welcomed onto His lap. It was the first time I had seen myself as the son of the Most High God. All I could do was weep in joy. I have never lost that view. Having this view is both very good and very bad. Why is that? Let’s look at the scripture.

Romans 8:12-16

So, then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to flesh, for if you live according to flesh, you are going to die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the practices of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery again to fear; but you received a Spirit of adoption by which we cry, Abba! Father! The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God.

We received a Spirit of Adoption! By that Spirit we cry out to the Father the very familiar term, daddy. The Holy Spirit of God tells us that we are the very children of God. What a wonderful thing that God has done in our lives to actually give us birth into His family. When we were born again, we received exactly that new birth into a new family that just happens to have the God of the Universe as the Father! We are His children and have all the benefits of that relationship. This is totally true and not to be denied. This also produces a few problems, however.

If we didn’t have a good relationship with our earthly father, we will probably impose those same problems on our Heavenly Father. So many see God as someone who is just waiting to strike them in His wrath, or even mess them up like a mean little kid messes with ants with his magnifying glass. That is how I used to think about Him even though I had a good relationship with my dad. It was how I was taught about the Father that messed me up. Some may think He is an absentee father or a distant, unfeeling one. Many people have no idea what a good relationship with a male figure looks like and that makes it very hard to figure out how to relate to Father God. If their earthly father shamed them, they figure their Heavenly one will too. If you can’t please one, you can’t please the other.

All that must be done away with. The Heavenly Father wants us to see what a perfect father is supposed to look like. He has so much more in store for us than we have ever allowed ourselves to see, but the revelation of it must be done His way and in His timing.

Galatians 3:26

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

It is by faith that we get to become the sons of God. Faith is trust in a relationship, trusting a person. It is in our relationship with the Lord that we have the faith to become the sons of God. There is no difference between faith and trust. Faith isn’t some kind of new age mystery force. It is only the words we have heard from Him personally that give us faith and the great power that comes with it. We have to hear the promise before we can believe in it. Otherwise it becomes a religious teaching instead of a relationship with Him. The promise manifests when I approach Him and listen, trusting in the relationship. This word shows us that He fulfills His promises.

John 1:12-13

But as many as received Him, to them He gave authority to become children of God, to the ones believing into His name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but were born of God.

We have been given the authority to become the children of God by believing into His name. We were once outside His name. Once we died to ourselves and believed into the new name, we entered into our new family. It was the will of the Father to give me that salvation and to bring me into His family. He chose me and wanted me. The same is true for you. You are so greatly loved and favored by this new Father you have.

1 John 3:1-2

See what manner of love the Father has given us, that we may be called children of God. For this reason, the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are the children of God, and it was not yet revealed what we shall be. But we know that if He is revealed, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is.

Everything is completely based on how much He loves us. He loves us in the way a father should love us. We now have the opportunity to have what we have never had before. We can have the father relationship that our souls have cried out for all our lives.

That said, there is something else that must be stated. Many preachers and teachers have promoted how much we should see ourselves as the sons of God. They teach many things about the Father heart of God and that we should stand in the relationship we have in that capacity. They are not wrong. The outcome has often resulted in a major problem.

So many Christians have seen themselves exclusively as the sons of God to the extent that they lord it over other people and have become puffed up and obnoxious. Their pride has caused so much damage that those who don’t have this revelation are beaten down and classified as second-class by themselves or others. This is the greatest danger. When we relate to others, we need to see ourselves correctly. When I am in the presence of the Father, then I can see myself as the son. It isn’t something to use for my soulish benefit, however.

To see myself as the son is very good, but I need to realize that I don’t have that position to coerce the Father into doing what I want Him to do. It isn’t a position of pressure to apply to the throne. As a son, I must have the attitude of humility and respect. I must walk in it as a relationship with Him and know the extent of His love for me. This isn’t about anyone else, it is about how the Father and I relate. I can’t use it over anyone else because they are also sons of God and I must respect that in them also. We are all equal in the sight of God; therefore, no favorites. The view of myself as a son should produce in me the desire to help my brothers and sisters rather than looking down on them.

The view of the Father to see me as a son is His point of view. I should bask in it and receive it with all the humility that grace should elicit in me. I have been given a huge gift and massive responsibility to walk in it. What should my attitude be?

Jesus

My relationship with Jesus is different than my relationship with the Father. How does He see me? He is my Savior, Lord, and King. That is my view of Him, but how does He see me?

It is our relationship with Jesus that brings God to the natural man. He became a man so that we could have personal relationship with the God of the universe. He purchased our lives and, therefore, all that we are or ever will be. Our response to Him is to be one of submission and worship. We shouldn’t be flippant or overly casual in His presence.

But we are also free to say to Him anything that is on our hearts. He already knows and is very pleased with openness and honesty. He cares for us and what is happening in our lives matters to Him.

1 Peter 5:6-7

Then be humbled under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in time; ‘casting all your anxiety onto Him,’ because it matters to Him concerning you.

Having His concern as part of our lives is amazing. He really cares what is going on with us. He is actively involved in every aspect of our lives and is concerned which way we are going.

How does He see us? Let’s look at what the scripture says regarding this.

Romans 8:16-17

The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God. And if children, also heirs; truly heirs of God, and joint-heirs of Christ, if indeed we suffer together, that we may also be glorified together.

The Spirit witnesses with our spirit that we are the children of the Father. Since we are His children, we are also heirs; joint heirs with Jesus. Jesus sees us as the ones who are inheriting what the Father has for us.

Jesus is the firstborn among many brothers (Romans 8:29) so that gives Him a double portion, the law designates. But that just means that He is the one responsible to look over the dispersing of the inheritance among all the other children. Jesus is working hard to make sure we get all that is coming to us from the Father. The only thing that stops that entire process is our not receiving it or not being in the position to receive.

As a loving big brother/executor, He is making sure we don’t get what will be harmful to us, but all the things that we are able to receive. Timing is very important and so is our walk with Him in determining our ability to receive.

Faith is not some kind of mystical power that we have inherently. It is trust in a person, listening to personal promises and resting on what was said. Faith comes by hearing the exact, specifically spoken word from God. We can believe what He speaks to us personally. When we have trust in Him, then He can bring to us what is needed in our lives. When we don’t receive, it is because we are not in the position of receiving. We ask amiss or want to spend what we get on our own lusts (James 4:2-3). God is too good of an administrator to allow us to blow our inheritance. He wants us to be good sons who know the Father’s business and are going about doing it.

Galatians 4:1-7

But I say, Over so long a time the heir is an infant, he being lord of all, does not differ from a slave, but is under guardians and housemasters until the term set before by the father. So we also, when we were infants, we were under the elements of the world, being enslaved. But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, having come into being out of a woman, having come under Law, that He might redeem the ones under Law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because you are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba! Father! So that you no more are a slave, but a son, and if a son, also an heir of God through Christ.

In our immaturity, we are treated as if we aren’t inheriting everything. We have it all legally, but aren’t given everything until we can handle it responsibly. Even then, we