relationallychallenged

Tuesday May 10, 2011

There were two things I said I would never do because of my fear of them–bungy jumping and ski diving. To jump off a bridge or out of an airplane seemed crazy for anyone to do, let alone me. I remember flying and looking out the plane window and feeling fear of falling out of the plane. I have stood on top of bridges or buildings and felt the fear of falling off and the feeling I would experience. On my fiftieth birthday my wife had a surprise for me. We got up early on my birthday with Krispy Kreme donuts and headed for our destination and you guessed it–Desert Ski Diving School. Fear gripped me as we entered the hanger to prepare for my first tandem ski diving jump. Facing my worst fear of falling out of an airplane intensified with each part of the preparation. Getting into the airplane and leaving my family as we headed to the 12,000+ altitude just intensified my fear. The door of the airplane opened when we were over the jump site and caused my body to begin to shake all over. It was the worst fear I have ever experienced in my entire life as I put my right foot on the strut of the airplane ready to jump–to my death. And then. And then! The most exhillerating feeling I have ever had. Free falling for 45 seconds. Falling at 120 miles per second. Hands out and feet out. Suspended in air. I had no feeling of falling because there was nothing moving by you to cause you to feel that you were falling, yet the wind beating on your glasses gave you the sensation that you were moving fast. The shoot came out and we had a perfect landing. My fear of ski diving was conquered.

Fear can get us off the track of God’s call. Nehemiah experienced this problem in rebuilding the wall. “They were all trying to frighten us, thinking, ‘Their hands will get too weak for the work, and it will not be completed.’ But I prayed, “Now strengthen my hands.” (Neh. 6:9). How often has fear of a person or that they might do or say gotten us off the track of what God wants for us? When we back away from our fears, they just get bigger, because the fear you had before is added to the fear you are presently experiencing and the fear is multiplied. Jesus was aware of what fear does to a person and spoke about fear in Matthew 6:19-34. He saw that fear stops us from growing. Fear stops us from enjoying the best in life. Fear stops us from having the best possible relationships. It causes us to stop the journey.

On this journey it is important to identify what fears are stopping us and confront them to experience all that God has for us. As Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10)

Monday May 9, 2011

One of the more difficult issues to deal with in relationships today is lies. In fact of all the factors that break down trust more, it is lies. If you can’t believe the person you are trying to cultivate a relationship with, you won’t trust them and won’t go deep with them. When someone lies and the lie is found out, it creates a kind of microscopic interaction. You begin to question everything that the person has to say and wonder if the person is telling you the truth. Lies create suspicion and suspicion creates mistrust and mistrust leads to relationship breakdown.

But what happens when someone is lying about us or our motives? What happens when they have our intentions all messed up and are saying we have done such and such when in fact we have done no such thing? What happens when we have the best intentions, yet they are saying that we are out only for ourselves and only want our own needs met? Doesn’t that make you crazy in trying to set them straight? We want to be right and when someone is lying about our motives or what we are doing, there is a natural tendency to set the record straight.

Nehemiah had that experience as he was rebuilding the wall. Sanballat was using lies to get Nehemiah to stop the work. “It is reported among the nations—and Geshem says it is true—that you and the Jews are plotting to revolt, and therefore you are building the wall. Moreover, according to these reports you are about to become their king, and have even appointed prophets to make this proclamation about you in Jerusalem: ‘There is a king in Judah!’ Now this report will get back to the king; so come, let us meet together.” (Neh. 6:6-7). This was not Nehemiah’s motive or intentions, but when we seek to set the record straight, we get off the path of what the Lord has in mind. Trying to set the record straight will lead the person telling the lies to only jump to another lie and another lie and a cause us to lose our way.

Nehemiah responded by writing a letter and saying, “Nothing like what you are saying is happening; you are just making it up out of your head.” (Neh. 6:8). Nehemiah then proceeded to pray to the Lord for strength. There is a pattern beginning to emerge on how Nehemiah responded to the opposition of what God had called him to do–PRAY.

On this journey there will be opposition and one area we will need to deal with is lies. Be careful not to go to far off the track in defending yourself because lies are used as a smokescreen to divert your attention off God’s call.

Friday May 6, 2011

I believe that all of us have an innate desire to please when we come into this world. We have a desire to please our parents, our first grade teacher, our boyfriend or girlfriend, our employer, our employees, our spouse, our children, God, etc. We all want to be affirmed for what we do and the gifts we bring to the table. We want to be appreciated for doing good things like providing financially, cooking and cleaning, shopping, fixing things, outside chores, etc. When we get stroked positively, it gives us encouragement to continue to do those good things.

Unfortunately, the opposite is true when we continually hear the negative things we are doing or are not meeting up to someone’s expectation. Negativity and criticism causes us to feel disappointed and after a time to feel hopeless that we can ever get it right. Most give up and have the attitude of, “What’s the use, no matter what I do it is never good enough so why try.” Some people who use negativity would say that they are just trying to help the person do their best. Unfortunately right intentions usually end up in unhealthy end results of the person giving up.

Nehemiah experienced this opposition of negativity as he was seeking to build the Jerusalem wall from his own people. “Meanwhile, the people in Judah said, ‘The strength of the laborers is giving out, and there is so much rubble that we cannot rebuild the wall.'” (Neh. 4:10). In one sentence they said three negative things. The work of the laborers is losing steam. There is too much rubble to clean out. We cannot rebuild the wall. I don’t know about you, but hearing those things wouldn’t be too motivating for me to continue. Negative messages cause demotivation to occur and can stop a job from being completed entirely depending upon the response of the leader.

Nehemiah responded by saying, “After I looked things over, I stood up and said to the nobles, the officials and the rest of the people, “Don’t be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome. . .” (Neh. 4:14). After every opposition Nehemiah encountered, he went to the Lord or communicated with the people who had been discouraged and had feelings of wanting to give up. He encouraged them about the power of the Lord they were serving.

On this journey, there will be times you encounter negativity and criticism. How you respond to the negativity and criticism will determine victory or defeat.

Thursday May 5, 2011

I was a pastor in a multi-staff church and was in charge of marriage and family ministry. I was young at the time and had all kinds of energy and vision about how we could reach out to married couples and couples with children. I had come off the college campus where I was the director of a ministry that discipled christians in their faith. Basically whatever we wanted to do, we did. Of course, we had to make sure that the University of South Florida administration guidelines were followed. We did some crazy things and carried out God’s call in central Florida.

Being a pastor was a totally different experience. Each ministry had a committee of lay persons who had a burden for the ministry, and had different ideas of how the ministry was to be run. Problems surfaced when statements surfaced in the committee, “We’ve never done it that way before.” “We tried that and it didn’t work.” “That will never work.” “That will be too much work.” “That’s a bad idea.” I’m sure the people who raised these statements had good intentions, but they were motivational killers to those who heard them. Some of the statements stifled people in the group from giving further advice for fear of being shot down.

There are also people who seek to make trouble and then come along and seek to solve the trouble they make. These are people who are uncomfortable with smooth relationships and need chaos to feel valued and worthwhile. Nehemiah comes across one such person who sought to create chaos for those who were seeking to rebuild the Jerusalem wall. “They all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and stir up trouble against it.” (Neh. 4:8). When you begin to seek to follow God’s call on your life, you will be faced with people who come into your life that want you to fail, not succeed. They thrive on making your life miserable so that they can subconsciously compare themselves with your life and feel better about themselves when you are struggling. You can either allow them to cause trouble in your life, or do what Nehemiah and the exiles did, “But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat.” (Neh. 4:9) It is interesting to note that they prayed, but they also acted by preparing for the trouble by posting a guard day and night. Sometimes we need to do more than just pray when trouble is on the horizon.

In this journey, there will be trouble, and when it comes we need to pray and put action to our prayers.

Wednesday May 4, 2011

Did you ever have a sibling who didn’t seem to have to do as much work as you did or got by with doing less than you had to do? Do you ever remember working on a group project in school and you seem to be the only one putting energy on the project? Have you ever experienced a work environment where not all the workers were pulling their weight? How about playing for a competitive team and finding that there were some on the team that were loafing off (now that is an ancient term) and others were busting their butts? Have you ever been in a situation where people feel entitled and want recognition, but don’t want to have to do any of the hard work? As I pondered these questions, I could easily put myself in the hard worker category, but I am sure that others may at times put me into the loafing off category. Don’t we all think that we are the right ones and everyone else is messing up.

I came across an interesting verse as I was reading Nehemiah this morning. Nehemiah had told the exiles why he came and they with one accord said “let’s arise and build.” He was masterful in having each family build the wall in front of his own house. If I am building the wall in front of someone’s house that I don’t know, I am less likely to do as good a job as when the wall I am building is right in front of my house. I sure don’t want the enemy coming and breaking down the wall in front of my house. There were also groups of families building certain sections of the wall. Then I read this passage, “The next section was repaired by the men of Tekoa, but their nobles would not put their shoulders to the work under their supervisors.” (Neh.3:5). The men of Tekoa were putting their backs to the work of repairing the wall, but the leaders of their clan would not work. It didn’t say they couldn’t work, but they wouldn’t work. The work did get done and the wall was finished, but not because of the nobles of Tekoa. They refused to work. They defied God’s call to rebuild the wall.

In life there will be people who when challenged to a task will not put their shoulders to the work no matter how convincing a leader is. In every group, there will be people you would bet your life on that they would help, but they don’t for whatever reason. That shouldn’t deter you from doing what God has called you to do.

On this journey there are going to be individuals you have been with for a long time that will drop out of the race because they decide that they don’t want to be a part of God’s call. Don’t let their choices influence yours.