Y'all put your hands together for Jesus. Here we are at Grace church. We love him. Good to see you.
Good to see you. Uh, we really did have a wonderful Easter. And it's great to celebrate our, uh, risen Lord. And we do do that, uh, every single week as Lisa let us in in worship. I love the fact that Easter is not a one day. It's every day. And he is the risen Lord. So, like going on a Grace church right now. Uh, our small group expo is today. So all of our spring small groups are going to be launching in the next week or so. And I want to encourage you, it's such a great way to grow spiritually, build relationships, and really see the Lord work in your life. And I know it takes some intentionality to do that. You know, you have to kind of like, lean in a little bit and think, how do I want to grow and how could I connect? And we have 111 groups for you, uh, here in Chapel Hill and in Alamance for you to connect with? And so a lot of opportunities and, you know, it's just for a set times to say, hey, I'm going to take 4 to 8 weeks and I'm going to find a group, plug in, grow spiritually, build some relationships.
It really is a blessing. We have people with lanyards that would be glad to answer any questions for you. Maybe there's a certain day of the week that works for you, or a certain topic you're interested in, and so it's amazing. I also want to mention this. Six weeks from today, Grace church will be celebrating our 40th anniversary. How about that? Isn't that pretty cool, y'all? Let's go. So what do we have? 39 years and 46 weeks. And so Memorial Day weekend was our first service. And we're going to tell some stories and we're going to celebrate and all that God's done as well as look forward. Our founding pastor, Jerry Daley and his wife Nan will be here. So it's going to be a lot of fun. What we want to do though, is this. We'd like to collect some stories, some thoughts. You may have been here for two weeks or you might have been here for 40 years. We do have people who are part of our church now that were here the opening weekend. Isn't that kind of cool? Uh, but if you have a story to tell, uh, a thought, uh, of what God's done in your life, maybe a word of gratitude. Uh, we'd love to have you. If you can. Go ahead and pull that up. Um, you can just get online at Grace. Um, ideally, you could grab your phone and just do a selfie low.
Um, you know, production value, just, you know, and tell us a little story. Or you can just, you know, type it in either way. We'd love to hear from you. We're going to compile a bunch of stuff that would be a real blessing for us. And we're going to have a fun weekend Celebrating 40 years, as well as looking forward to all that God has for us. So all right, we're launching a new series called Let's Talk Family. I do want to mention for those of you taking the five week challenge, I want to say welcome. So glad you're here. I'm praying that these five weeks will really be meaningful. Life giving will build your life in a truly helpful way for you. Each week we're going to talk, you know, tackle a different topic that will be along the lines of family and relationships. Now, let me just say this before we dive in. I know when we say let's talk family, it can be kind of wading into some areas that are a little difficult to navigate. Maybe family has been painful for you. Uh, maybe you are not happy where things are at. Or maybe you've gone through a tough season. Um, maybe some walls are, uh. Maybe you've been through a divorce and blended families. Maybe you're single and thinking I'd like to have a family. Thanks a lot, pastor. And I and I get some people are like, oh, great, let's talk family. You know, they're like, all right, I'll just endure these five weeks and get through it, you know? And let me start off by giving you some reasons why I think all of us should really lean in. I really believe that these weeks can be helpful for every one of us. And if we show up with a hungry, humble heart, it could really be a blessing. Let me give you a couple of reasons why all of us should lean in. Number one, we all have family, okay? We are family. We all have family. And let me say this to two things. In that past, we were all deeply impacted and shaped by our family, and our experience with family sets us on a trajectory for our lives. And you can sort of as we go through this, you go, okay, what did I receive that was positive?
What was lacking? Or maybe what was negative? Those three questions apply to every one of us. What was positive? What was lacking? What was negative? And let me encourage you. You don't have to be defined by your past, that you can set a new course. You can build something fresh and new in your generation, in your life. But if you're not aware of what was positive, what was lacking, what was negative, you'll tend to do 1 or 2 things. Either repeat what you experienced or live in reaction to it. Okay? And neither are healthy. If we repeat something that's negative, that's not healthy, and that does happen. Like we say, I'll never be like my family in some negative way if we experience any negative, but we tend to do it, or we live in reaction to swing the pendulum the other way. And often those reactions to, um, what was lacking, what was negative, can often be just as unhealthy. So I think for these reasons, again, number one, we all have family and we can learn from what was positive, what was lacking, what was negative to the principles are transferable. What we're going to be talking about in this aspect of family is also applicable to all your relationships. You can apply it to a friend. You can take these principles to work to the team you lead to the small group you're in.
And again, we're going to be speaking to the context of family, but it is applicable in all your relationships. And lastly, this is important. You can get a clear vision for the future. What do you want to build if you want to get married one day? What are you looking for? If you have clarity on what you want to build with a healthy family, then you'll know also who to look for. And you go, aunt, you're out. Okay. Oh possibilities here. Okay. All right. So my prayer is that God will give all of us ears to hear. And may the Holy Spirit really work supernaturally in all of our hearts and lives, and I pray each week. You may have some wisdom, some inspiration, but also some practical application. Every week you're going to have like something where you can put it into play, put it into action and make a difference. So today we're going to talk about this how to have God's blessing on your home, how to have God's blessings in your relationship. And and what I want to do today is this kind of zoom back, give you a big picture, a perspective, uh, a way to look at this. Each week we're going to build specific areas. But this is kind of a, a a broader view that I think can get our head in our heart in a good place to really help us because we want and need God's blessing in our family, in our relationship. Because doing family and relationships without God is hard. Like family isn't easy, all right? If it was easy, it would. We'd all have these, you know, really healthy, life giving, problem free families. But let me say this without God involved in the middle of our family, we may be able to survive.
But you won't survive. You won't thrive. You won't really experience all that God has for you. And we need to invite God into our family relationships. We need his supernatural help, favor, blessing, peace, his work in our hearts and in our relationships. And when God is working, it really makes a difference. Our communication is better.
Our relationships are deeper. Our brokenness from our past is healed. The walls come down, encouragement and understanding flows with God. No family is ever perfect, but part of what we're going to be talking about is, is we can have a healthy family and healthy families build healthy communities. Again, kind of big picture, uh, part of why I'm passionate about families is, you know, if you look at segments of society, the family is the foundation of our culture. And when families thrive, it impacts every aspect of society. When families do not thrive, when families are under attack or weaken, it also impacts everything. And there are a lot of forces out there that work against building a healthy family. And I'll say this some of the things out there, philosophies and things are well intentioned, but they aren't God's ways. And unintentionally, they don't produce what was intended to be produced. And God has wisdom for us on how to build our families and our relationships. So how do we have God's blessing on your home? I want to give you one big idea that we're going to start with, and we're going to kind of make some applications. Here's the first thing that I believe is so important is to pursue unity. Pursue unity again. Our families will never be perfect because we have imperfect people. Anytime you put imperfect people together in a relationships, at work, at church. In a family, it's never perfect. But we can experience unity.
Unity is oneness being won in our hearts, understanding in our love for one another.
And as a former math teacher, let me give you a simple math equation. Unity equals God's blessing. When you have unity, you have God's blessing that that those two really go together. And when we focus on building unity, it's going to bring God's blessing.
We're talking about how to get God's blessing on your home. Well, it's a simple equation. We get unity and God shows up. Look at some 133 verse one. How good and pleasant it is. It's good, it's pleasant, it's delightful. It's enjoyable when God's people live together in unity. And again, that applies to God's people and all of our relationships. But in this situation, if we take just a moment ago, here's a little subset that we're kind of applying it to. How good and pleasant it is when God's families live together in unity, when my family has unity, for there the Lord has commanded the blessing life forevermore. See there?
Where's there? Where there's unity? Wherever there's unity, God commands a blessing and there's life. There's encouragement. There's strength. There's hope that that that that flows from heaven. It's. It's something supernatural. It's life evermore. It's not just natural, it's supernatural.
And so here's the motivation from the Lord is that as you build unity, God gets involved, God moves and God created family and marriage and relationships for unity. You see, you know, family is built upon the supernatural union in marriage of two becoming one.
Genesis 224 God said, this is why a man leaves his father and mother and his look. Here's our word. United to his wife and they become one flesh. They become one flesh. United become one. Y'all, this is very important. That marriage is not just an agreement between two people. It's like, well, hey, we love each other. We'll just let the government know. Actually, when you say I do and get married, I took, uh, marriage and family as a sociology class. You know, I had to take a sociology class in college. And I tell you one thing that really stuck with my head. I wasn't a believer. I wasn't following Christ at the time.
But in that class, I just remember this being taught that in every single culture on planet Earth for all time. As far as we know, every single culture has marriage. Every culture has marriage. It's it's from God, and it's hardwired into human beings and into our culture. And let me say this, it doesn't matter if you're Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, atheist, or whatever, you believe that God does something, that God the creator and the maker of heaven and earth, that when you see I do in any language, in any religion, at the justice of peace, God does something, the two become one. There's something supernatural that happens. It's absolutely amazing that that that that two people become one in spirit, they become one. It's not just an agreement that we're letting the government know about. It's a supernatural thing that God does. Now there's a well-known verse where Jesus talks about it's usually thought of in the context of divorce. Um, he says this. What God has joined together. Let no one separate. We usually talk about the no and separate and all that. But let me just look at the first part. What? God has joined together. That's a big deal. Y'all need to understand that that two become one in spirit when there's marriage. By the way, that's why divorce is so painful, is because two became one become separated. This is different than breaking up with your boyfriend or girlfriend. And if you've been through a separation divorce, you know the pain.
It's very, very, very, very real. Now we can be won in spirit. But when we're talking about building unity. Because that's a fact that just happens. Bam! God does that. But being one in our souls, in our emotions, in our hearts flowing together in life and our love together. That's the challenge. That's the challenge. Now, let me clear up some things before we talk about building unity. Let's talk about what unity is not. Number one, unity is not uniformity. Sometimes I think if we have unity, we're going to think exactly the same. We're going to be the same. We're going to, you know. But the truth is, unity is not uniformity. We have different backgrounds, preferences, uh, that that come together. Two.
Unity is not the absence of conflict. Well, if we have unity, we're not going to have misunderstandings or hurt feelings or conflict. And the truth is, that's inevitable in every marriage, in every family, in relationships. You're going to misunderstand each other. You're going to say things that aren't kind or whatever. We're going to have conflict. And the truth is, this unity helps us process and face these challenges that are inevitable for all of us. And here's the key. You can get stronger and closer and better when you go through those things. I always think of it as danger, opportunity. The fact that in your family there's some issues. I like to say we all have dysfunctional families. It's just a matter of how dysfunctional or what dysfunction you have. We all got issues. But, but, but here's the key. Does this cause us to drift and become further apart and put up walls? Or can we learn to process some of the pain and the difficulty and the misunderstandings and get closer and stronger.
You're not going to get closer and stronger and deeper with somebody by being shallow and not going through stuff. But when you learn to go through stuff, that's where you can really get stronger and better. All right. One more unity is also not everything comes easy. If we have unity, then it'll be easy, right? No, actually, unity is not easy. And family and relationships aren't easy.
Marriage is not easy. There are real challenges to unity. Why are there challenges to unity?
Well, let me give you a couple of thoughts. Challenges to unity. One. Opposites attract.
When you start a family and when you get married, it's amazing how God takes two very different people. And he means them to complement one another with the beauty of how different they are. And it tends to be not always, but usually it's like fruit to pretty different people like my wife Nan and I just in some ways couldn't be more different in our personality profile and our gifting and how we look at things and our differences can become where we have problems, where we have conflict, where we compete or there can be, you know, pain, or we can learn to compliment one another and really honor and respect the differences. But that's one of the challenges. Second challenge is learning healthy conflict resolution. Many of us did not grow up having a model of how to work through tough stuff in a healthy way, and neither we buried it. We didn't talk about it. People went silent, got shuffled under the rug, or in some families. Oh, we're Italian. We fight like cats and dogs. We just let them, like, let it rip, you know? Uh, and either way, one of the challenges to building unity is, is maybe we've not had an understanding of how to learn to, you know, process and do healthy conflict resolution. Another one is this we hurt each other.
We say things we shouldn't. We get angry. We unintentionally maybe neglect or speak words that when we're weak or having a tough day, it's interesting. We tend to be more free with our words, with our family, like at work or whatever. At church we're like, Will you bite your tongue? But sometimes at home you don't bite your tongue, you let it rip, and then you say things to each other or to your kids, whatever that, that, that we end up intentionally or unintentionally hurting one another and it makes it hard. And that's part of the challenge of building unity. Let me give you one more. Culture prioritizes our individual happiness. Part of the messaging out there isn't build unity as a team, as a unit. It's take care of number one. It's more about me than we, and it's about my happiness and my needs. And let me just say this bringing a healthy you to your family is super important, and you need to take care of yourself, and you need to be healthy. That's 100% true. It's not like we neglect ourselves or have a not a healthy thing, but the the that can be taken to an extreme and have a perspective where it's all about me and what I'm getting out of this relationship. And so marriage is learning to understand someone else, build the other person up, care for them deeply, help them succeed. That's what marriage and family are all about. So here's my question for you. How unified is your family? If you're married, how unified is your marriage? How unified are your relationships in general? Where are you at? I want to show you a little marriage unity continuum, and maybe just take a moment and assess. Okay. Where are we at?
Where am I at? Where, you know, in these relationships, you may be way over in the happy end and say, hey, that's your. We're closer than we've ever been. We're closer than we've ever been. Or we've got strong unity. Maybe you'd say, well, we're connected most days. We're doing pretty well. Maybe you'd say we love each other, but we don't really feel connected. I love him, she loves me. But we're not that connected. Really? Maybe you'd say we've drifted apart. We've drifted apart and we're not doing well. Maybe you'd say we fight like cats and dogs. Or we bury everything and go quiet. And we've just sort of given up. And we don't talk about it. Maybe you'd say we're separated. Maybe you'd say we have irreconcilable differences.
Wherever you may be at on the marriage continuum. The unity continuum. Let me just say this. We can grow. We can pursue unity. And God can work and build our connection with our family members, with people in our lives. And we can move the needle. The enemy strategy is to separate us and to divide us when we're unified. There's power. There's a commanded blessing.
So I want to give you some thoughts. Big picture here. How do we actually build unity? If we're supposed to pursue unity, if it will bring God's blessing and God get God involved and he's going to work, what can we do to participate with God to see that happen? I'm going to give you five thoughts that I hope speak to you and again, paint this kind of big picture. Number one, start with God's vision of marriage and family. Start with God's vision, God's picture. We need to see a clear picture of what's possible. Without vision, people perish. What is God desire? We're all imperfect. We have imperfect families. We grew up in imperfect families with, you know, the example we experienced. But let me tell you this to the degree that you can see and experience a healthy marriage, it will help you. Now, there's been a movement in our culture. Y'all know this away from marriage in terms of delaying marriage or even getting married. And part of it is I am very empathetic because I, you know, if if you've never seen or experienced a healthy marriage and you look at your experience growing up, what you've seen and and it's been painful, it's been difficult, hasn't been healthy. You know, like if that's marriage, I don't know. Makes me hesitant. Thanks, but no thanks. I think I'd rather play it safe. I think I'd rather just, you know, hang back here and there can be some hesitancy, some fear of failure. And that's just very common. And again, part of me really understands it because our our human response is I don't want to go through that pain. Or what if my marriage doesn't work out? Maybe I saw someone in a marriage or experienced a previously where that person wasn't trustworthy and it melted down and they weren't the person that they Portrayed themselves to be. And so now I met this person, and now I'm not sure. And what's going to happen, I. The picture we've seen and experienced can really leave us hesitant. And what I'm saying is this we need to allow God to paint in our minds, eyes a vision, a picture not of being perfect, of having our you know it all together and everything is always great. But let me just tell you again, you can have a healthy version, God's version, like I think, I think there's a good way of saying this. My family, it is what it is, baby.
These are my family. And I got the crazy uncle. I mean, I should tell y'all some more stories during this series. I got I got them all, baby. And I got the uncle I got like, whatever, we have them all. Let me say this. If you do romance and marriage and family like the world, then you're going to get the world's results, right. So what we need is this approach of I want to see what God has for family. Now, this part's important. That's going to take some humility and hunger in our hearts to do that because of our experience. And let me just say this, all of us have a belief system and thoughts and perspectives, which we should. But here's my point.
I want to encourage you to have a humility and even a hunger desire to say, God, I want you. Not Kendrick, not Grace church. I want God, you and he, you know, through your word, maybe through the pastor, through what you're saying to me. Okay. I want you to be willing to change what I see, what I believe, what I think. Because our past gets us into a rut and a routine. And it is what it is. And it takes some humility to be like, hey, Lord, I'm willing to think differently. I'm willing to have a different perspective. I want to see this the way you see this, Lord. In fact, I'm even willing for you to change what I believe.
I'm willing for you to to cross my will and what I want and what I believed.
In order that I could see. Like you see. To experience what you experience. Because if I just stay where I'm at, I'm going to get what I have. And I can assure you this, if you really start seeing what God is saying for every single person, it will cross your will a little bit. It will expose areas that you need to grow in. It'll change you. It'll it'll expose your selfishness. And you go, oh, gulp. You mean she doesn't just need to change? I need to change. He doesn't just need to change. I need to change. You know what I'm saying? And, Lord, I want to be humble. Oh, Lord, I want to lean in. I want to learn. I want to get God's vision for my relationships, for my marriage, for my family. Let me just give you an example how the Lord will kind of get us. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church.
Lay down your life for your wife just like Christ laid down his life. I don't know about you all, man, but I go gulp. Oh, you want me to lay down my life in the same way Christ laid down his life for the church and to love and to serve and hears. I love these two verbs.
Nourish and cherish. Take care of spiritually. Cherish.
Value. Honor. Serve. Esteem her as a co-heir that will get you a little bit.
Wives. When your husband's without a word, give him unconditional honor and respect and he goes, no, no, no, no, no. I'll unconditionally love him. But I'm not going to unconditionally respect him. I'll respect him when he's respectable. Honor him when he's honorable.
Okay, but let me just tell you. God teaches us to give honor where honor is in all of our relationships. For all of us. Actually, you can give unconditional honor and respect. Draw out his wisdom now. Two simple. You know, I've mentioned one two ways to get God's vision for your family. Is one I said this look into God's Word and let him paint a picture. Let his words speak to your heart. Be humble. Be hungry.
That's first and most importantly, but let me give you one more. Here's the second one is, is is to spend time with couples or families, people that have a healthy marriage, family relationships. Some of this is more caught than taught. And if we haven't seen it and experienced it, let me just speak to you. If you go, there's something in me that wants to build something different. Then let me just tell you. Look into God's word. Let it teach you. Coach you up. Change your thinking. Change your heart. Grow you to. I'm just telling you. He walks with the wise will be wise. He walks with the health. He will be healthy. Go find someone that you respect and you look up to. You know what I'm saying? Like if you want better. Like I want to be a better parent. I want to have a better marriage. Go find someone with a healthy marriage and hang out with them. You're like, I want to be a better parent. Well, find someone. You go like, I want my kids to turn out like that. Go hang out. Ask some questions. Be humble and be teachable. Listen, we're humble and teachable. I wouldn't got a golf lesson on Friday. I had no problems. My feelings didn't get hurt. I'm getting a little open at the top. You know, I it didn't hurt my feelings. Okay.
But somehow family and relationships is so personal.
It steps on our toes and we think we're supposed to know it all. But I want to say this.
Go and find a good model and a mentor. See it. Experience. I'm telling you, that's what really helped me when I first started following Christ. I just hadn't seen God's ways in my family and I was like, I's this big and actually lived with a couple families, rented their room in the basement, and, you know, got to sit at the dinner table and learn and watch and observe and and let me say this often it is more caught than taught. It's a spirit. There's an impartation. You learn, you grow. And and those two things can really help us get God's vision, um, for marriage, for family, for relationships. Number two is this believe the best, believe the best, believe the best for your spouse, your marriage, your family. Believe that God, who began a good work in your marriage, will bring it out to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. God is changing. He. God is working. God is transforming. Believe that things can really get better. I think kind of the beauty and the trap, a little bit of family is that we know them best and they know us best, and that's because we're close to them now. I know sometimes maybe there's been difficulty or walls up or, you know, and maybe they don't know us best, but generally speaking, our families know us best. The problem with that is we can unconsciously put people into a box because we think we already know them, and then we lack faith that they can grow or change. And we we don't have faith that our families can grow or change, or our relationships can grow and change and and unconsciously we end up with a lack of faith. We end up with a lack of faith and we don't believe the best. Check this out, y'all. Jesus experience that Jesus experienced that. Listen to this. Matthew 1354 coming to his hometown, which was Nazareth, by the way. You know, he was born in Bethlehem, went to Egypt, came up, but he grew up in Nazareth. That's where he was a carpenter and all that. Coming to his hometown, he began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. This guy's incredible. Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? His teaching is incredible. And he heals the sick like this is. Where did he get this? Like this next thing he says, isn't this the carpenter's son? Like, I remember I went and got our chair fixed because that leg was off, and he, you know, the carpenter fixed it. That kid was sitting over in the corner helping out the gofer. He was the gofer. Go for this, go for that. And he got the. He's not the carpenter's son, is it? His mother's name? Mary aren't his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas like? We know these people like she. See, this is hometown, y'all. Small town. Hometown. They know everyone's names.
Aren't all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things? Check this out. And they took offense at him. They took offense at him. So interesting. Because if it had been someone else, not from Nazareth, then they would have been like, that's amazing. You're amazing. I mean, that's what happened when Jesus went to all these other places. But when he came to his hometown, they ended up taking offense at him. Sometimes we can hear others better than our family members. But Jesus said to them, A prophet is not without honor, except in his own town and in his own home and his own family.
There's a lack of honor. Because we know you. We know your name. We know your background. We know what you do. Now look at this. And he did not do many miracles there because their lack of faith. So God couldn't work there much because they lack faith because of the familiarity. I'm just throwing this out there. What if at times God doesn't work in our families to the degree that he could?
Because we lack faith, because we know Jim and Sally and Lisa and Bill whatever. See what I'm saying? And we know people so well.
We don't see them the way God sees them. Now check this out.
Let me give you the positive. Now, I don't know if. Does that inspire you a little bit? I go like, I want to have faith. I want to have faith for my family. I want Jesus to have honor in his hometown.
I want to believe that Jesus can work in my family, in my relationships, from those closest to me. I want to believe the best about them and not just about other people. Like, you know, I can believe for you, but like, I don't know, like, okay, so here we go. What what could we what should we do? How do we believe the best? This is so good. Y'all check this out okay. Second Corinthians 516. So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view, the ones we regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. So what are we? And again we're going to apply this to family, to our relation. We don't view our family anymore from a worldly point of view that we used to. And look at the parallel. It's saying this how you see each other in your family, in your relationships. There's a parallel says, here's the parallel on how we used to view Christ, to how we view Christ now, how we used to view one another, to versus how we view one another. Now, is this cool? This is this is what it's teaching us. So how do we use to view Christ? Well, before you came to Christ, you probably had a view of like, well, Jesus, he's all right. He was a good teacher. He's a good dude. I mean, the Bible probably has some good things. What love your neighbor do unto others is they do unto you or something, you know, like, but you weren't that inspired. You weren't that moved. And let me just tell you what happened one day through the preaching of Christ that the Bible says, The God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so they don't see the glory of Christ, but through the preaching of Jesus one day, God supernaturally open your eyes and you saw Jesus and you went, oh my goodness, Jesus, he's the Son of God, God Himself, Emmanuel, who came to live with us. He walked. He lived a sinless life, though he did not deserve it.
He was crucified on a cross. He died, was buried, rose on the third day. Even he loves me. He paid the price for me. He offered me a free gift of salvation. I don't have to try to earn God's approval. I'm loved. I'm accept. There's nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, oh. And you view Christ very differently. Because your eyes were open to his glories and his beauty and his goodness and his heart and his character.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come. The old has gone. The new is here. Pretty well known verse. Maybe you've heard of it before. Maybe not. But did y'all know the context of that verse? The context of that verse is how you used to see Jesus. Huh? How you see Jesus now, huh? How you used to see one another from a worldly point of view. The old how you see one another now, huh?
It's Nana, my wife. She's beautiful. She's stunning. She's a new creation. She's called by God.
God opens your eyes supernaturally to see the calling, the destiny, the potential. Let me tell you, if I could impart something to you today, I would impart this spiritual eyes to see those around you, in your relationships, in your family, with your spouse, those that are closest to you, that we. That we wouldn't lack faith for them because we think we know them so well, according to the flesh, according to the worldly point of view, according to the external, according to their past, according to their attitude this week.
But rather I want to see my family the way God sees them.
In fact, I would like to give you, if I may, a little pastoral encouragement.
I know you're not supposed to come to church to get, like, to do's and a working assignment, but I'm going to give you an assignment here. What if this if you're married with your spouse? Or let's say there's a person in your family or any relationship where you're struggling a little bit right now. There's some walls up. There's some difficulty. What if this week you got out your journal, you got out a piece of paper and a pen and you said, Lord, I want to see this person. The old is gone, the new is come the new creation in Christ. How do you see my spouse? How do you see my son or my daughter? How do you see my mother in law?
I have a wonderful mother in law. And just see what comes to your mind. Pray. Lord, help me see him or her the way you do. What's their God given potential? What's their new creation in Christ. Start writing it down and just see what comes to you. Let me just tell you this. I believe God might really meet you, and you might have some things come to your head, in your heart that you didn't see coming. And you could you could see something where you went. Oh. I saw remember this we said before I used to go when I saw Jesus. Huh? Now I. Go.
I saw his beauty, his character, his heart. What if you saw the beauty, the character in the heart of someone in your family, and you go according to the outside, according to the natural, according to the flesh, according to a worldly point of view. I don't quite see it yet, but I'm going to believe the best. I'm going to have faith for those in my hometown, and I'm going to see God do something. Here's number three is this speak life. Speak life. When you see the best you can, speak the best. We don't relate to someone to hear where they're at. We speak and we relate to them, and we believe. Because now we've seen and we believe the best. We have our words. Bring. People up to their. And your words can bring people up or can push people down.
Proverbs 14 one says, the wise woman builds her house. Here's the negative, but with her own hands, the foolish one tears her down. Now do you think the foolish woman, like, literally tears down? Like she gets out like a hammer and a sledge hammer and starts, like whacking her house down? No, no, no. It's with her actions. In her words. Let me say this. The exact same thing is true for husbands and for men. The wise man builds his house with his actions, with his words, though the foolish man tears it down.
And here's my point is, once we've seen it, we can start speaking to it. And we we relate from here where it's at to where we believe it's to be. Instead of having this negative perspective and lens and tearing stuff down. And let me just tell you, we often get the relationships, the marriage, the family that we speak. In fact, we're going to spend a whole week on this diving into this important topic because our words shape people and our relationships and our families. So more on that coming. We have a whole week on that. Number four, forgive and build trust. Forgive and build trust. Forgive and build trust. Okay, first Corinthians 13. Love keeps no record of wrong. But we do. We tend to keep files. Remember the hurt. We let the sun go down in our anger and it settles into our hearts. Maybe a bitter root takes root and starts growing up. Our walls go up, we put her glasses on and we see everything through those glasses. Forgive, forgive, forgive. Let me tell you this. Great marriages are built upon great for givers. Great families are built upon great givers. Great relationships are built upon great givers. You have to be good at forgiving if you're going to be good at relationships. Period. That's not like.
Negotiable. Like, you. Just have to do that. You have to do that. Forgive. Believe the best.
Don't take it personally. It usually isn't your spouse, your son, or your daughter who's acting like a teenager, is struggling, is learning, is growing.
Give some grace. Forgive. Be hard to offend instead of easily offended. Love covers a multitude of sins. Don't return evil with evil. Return. Overcome evil with good. A gentle answer turns away. Wrath can change a conversation in a moment, but a harsh word stirs up dissension and difficulty.
Now, um, you know it's forgive and then build trust. How do you build trust? Let me just say this. You can give a gift of trust to your family. Maybe you've never thought of it that way. I'm going to give a gift of trust.
And you go. I can't do that. This is what we often say. I don't trust him. I don't trust her. And it's this sort of thing that's a statement of like, they've got to fix it and become trustworthy for me to trust them. And so I don't trust them. And it's almost like you can't change it. Have you ever heard someone say that? Like, I don't trust him. I don't trust her. Wow. I'm stuck.
Let me tell you this. You can give a gift of trust. Now, I know there's places for healthy boundaries and where you do need to rebuild trust. And you forgive. But it takes a while to rebuild trust. That's 100% true. And trust can take a while. But let me let me encourage challenge you that you can give a gift of trust to someone even who isn't, hasn't acted in a trustworthy way, and you give them that gift and believe that they can rise to that. And at some point, if it all melts down or whatever, like, I get it, I get it, I get it, I get it. But let me tell you this. If you sit and make them try to earn your trust.
You're putting the relationship in a really hard place. And when trust is broken down, and when trust is lacking in a relationship, it's basically lights out and over. That's why the way speaking truth is so important. As soon as someone is dishonest and lies, it undermines the relationship in such a significant way. But you can give the person that you want to have a healthy relationship with a gift of trust proactively and believe the best and trust them. How many times do you forgive? Seven.
70 times seven. You forgive and you build trust. You choose to trust. You choose to trust. Here's the last one. Embrace God's growth plan. This 1st May be most significant that God gave us. Relationships. Marriage for married family. Not to make you happy, but to help you grow like we do.
Experience fulfillment and happiness and joy. But let me tell you this part of the whole equation is marriage and family is God's growth plan. And when you flip the script in your head that they're supposed to be meeting my needs and thinking, actually, God put these people and these relationships in my life in order to grow me. You go from a victim to a victor. You go from fix my spouse, fix my kids to change me and grow me. Lord, maybe even for the series. You're kind of thinking like, oh Lord Jesus, I pray he's listening right now. I pray she's listening. I wish my kids were here for this. No, no, no, let me say this. Flip the script. Lord, work in me. Lord change me, Lord grow me. When you fall into blaming and finger pointing, you fall into the plan of the enemy and you're missing out on God's growth. Plan for yourself. But when you lean in, Lord, work in me, change me, grow me. Over these five weeks, Lord, you're going to do something to change me and transform me. You're going to take a huge step towards unity and receiving God's blessing on your home. Philippians 213 says this For God is working in you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. I love that God's going to work in you over these weeks to desire and the power to actually do, to step out, to make changes, to start interacting, to get some tools that will please him, that will bring unity, that will bring his activity and blessing to our families.
And I just want to pray over you today that the Lord would help all of us have maybe a fresh perspective, a fresh faith that today maybe you say, okay. Pastor Guy, I got. A little picture. I got a little vision. I want to pursue unity, I want to, I want to, I want unity continue, I want to, I want to move this needle in the right direction. I want to get God's vision, God's perspective on marriage, family, relationships. I'm open to growing and learning and changing what I think and what I believe. I'm willing for you to cross my will, expose my heart where it needs to change, And I want to believe the best. I'm going to go home and I'm going to write down how you see that person. I want to speak life. I want to forgive him. Build trust.
Maybe trust has been broken. And he go, you know what? I can't maybe fully trust, but I'm going to give him a gift. I'm going to embrace God's growth plan.
Father, we thank you today, Lord, each of us, we all got family. I want to pray, Lord, that that. You. Would work. We want to open the door to our hearts, to our thinking. We want to open the door to our relationships, to our families, to our marriage, that you would do what only you could do. Lord, would you say that apart from you, we can do nothing. We need God. We need you to work. We need you to move. We need you to grow us. Change us. We need to bring breakthrough. We need walls to come down. We need pain from the past to be healed. And today we're making a decision to. To see like you see, to see, like you see big picture with your principles, your ways to see how you see with other people. And I pray you would begin to work on forgiveness in our hearts. Lord, first of all, we need to receive forgiveness. We need to have our relationship right with you. See, the most important thing you'll ever do is get your relationship right with the Lord, and then you can work on your relationships with people. I want to say today, maybe you want need to make a decision to surrender your life to Jesus and ask him for forgiveness. We forgive as we've been forgiven.
And maybe today is your day to say I have decided to follow Jesus. I've been trying to do relationships, people, life, marriage, maybe parenting on my own. And I'm tired and it hasn't always worked well. And I need God in my life.
I need God in my life. Working, moving. But I'm going to. It begins by asking Christ into your heart to cleanse you, to heal you, to forgive you. Today you can receive that. Lord, we embrace your growth plan. I do pray that over these five weeks you would do something deep, that you would grow us. You would change us, you would work, you would move. We would see something supernatural happen as we put into practice, not just being hearers of word, but doers in Jesus name, Amen.