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From years of endeavoring to encourage many sisters in the Lord to continue in faith regarding their desire to marry, I have learned a few things. One of them is that we don’t let go of our burdens as easily as we should, especially when it comes to relationships of the past and those we are trying to establish for the future. Women tend to be nurturers at the core, and relationships are very important to us. When it comes to the significant person in our lives, many of us allow those relationships to become our primary focus and everything else takes a back seat. The reality is that any time we do this, without fail, the relationship we’re striving to nurture will become a burden. To prevent this, we must learn to nurture our relationships through the strength and power of Jesus Christ.

“Come to Me”
In Matthew 11:28-30(NLT), Jesus Christ said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” This is an invitation from our Lord and Master. He knew we’d need deliverance, so he invites us to let him teach us how to maneuver through all the hardships that life presents. Relationships, as many of us can attest, can be very challenging to maneuver at times. We desperately need his help to keep them flourishing in God’s love.

Heavenly Father wants us to be sharp, wise, and guarded when it pertains to matters of the heart. Some of us have done some things in our past relationships that didn’t fall in line with this. We did things that weren’t wise. We put our hearts out there too soon and gave them to the wrong person. We got our hearts broken, and yet, we have continued to do some of the same things we’ve done before. Instead of breaking those patterns, we’re poised to carry the same attitudes and behaviors into our next significant relationship. This is not a good move, and before we do this, Jesus Christ invites us to check in and hang out with him a while. He wants to teach us.

Personal Relationship Standard
As we’ve matured into fully grown adults, most of us have adopted our own way of communicating and behaving in relationships, but God tells us in Proverbs 21:2(NLT), “People may be right in their own eyes, but the Lord examines their heart.” Our Heavenly Father is a Righteous Judge, and every thought, deed, feeling, and action we have in this life will be judged by Him. God has set the standard for how we should behave in relationships, and He tells us that our actions must be based on His love. In other words, His love must be the number one motive for pursuing, building, and interacting in a relationship. If our only motive is to have someone in our lives for our own personal or physical satisfaction, the relationship will become a burden. It will become a burden because our motive towards the other person isn’t anchored in the solid foundation of Christ.

Our personal relationship standard ought to be ‘do no harm.’ No matter what we desire or what we feel we need from the other person, the highest priority should be to not cause harm to anyone’s relationship with God. We must do our very best to help them grow in Christ, to pray for them continually, and to not cause any impediment to them. In and of ourselves, we can’t make this happen. Many of us have a prior history of not only causing the man to sin but hurting our own relationship with God as well. We must repent, ask for God’s forgiveness and not continue to engage this practice. So, we don’t have it in ourselves to make any guarantees that we won’t mess up. But if we will give ourselves fully to God and be taught by Christ and led by the Spirit, we can begin to nurture relationships in a powerful way. God will then help us to be the greatest blessing in the life of someone special.

It is not God’s plan for us to change someone’s life for the worse or for them to do this to us. Significant relationships are meant to be a vehicle for God to get blessings to the ones we care about. Philippians 1:27(NIV) tells us, “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.” We were not called so we could act and behave in relationships any way we like. Again, God blesses the other person through us, and we must do our very best to learn of Christ and listen to him as he instructs us how to make the greatest impact. We love through Christ, period! He will keep us constantly infused with his love and light if we will be obedient to his voice and follow his instruction.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

“Let Me Him You!” written by Kim Times, edited by Reverend Fran Mack, for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2019.   All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging Christian Women through the Word of God.

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