Relationships RULE Part 3
The quality of your life will be greatly determined by the quality of your relationships. Every relationship in your life is an asset or liability. If relationships RULE then what are the rules for relationships?
Ephesians 4:10-16 (NLT)
10 And the same one who descended is the one who ascended higher than all the heavens, so that he might fill the entire universe with himself.
11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.
12 Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.
13 This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.
14 Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth.
15 Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church.
16 He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.
Healthy, growing and full of love are the results of a life-giving Church; they are also the rules for life giving relationships. When we measure our relationships by these standards, we are able to discern what each relationship requires to be life giving.
First what is love? Love is more than a
Galatians 5:22-23 (NKJV)
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
23 gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.
Romans 5:5 (NLT)
And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
God’s love is the
Colossians 3:14 (NLT)
14 Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.
So, what does it mean for a relationship to be
1 Corinthians 12:29-31 (NLT)
29 Are we all apostles? Are we all prophets? Are we all teachers? Do we all have the power to do miracles?
30 Do we all have the gift of healing? Do we all have the ability to speak in unknown languages? Do we all have the ability to interpret unknown languages? Of course not!
31 So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts. But now let me show you a way of life that is best of all.
1 Corinthians 13:4-13 (NLT)
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.
6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.
7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever!
9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture!
10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.
12 now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but the I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever–faith, hope, and love–and the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 14:1 (NLT)
1 Let love be your highest goal…
A life-giving relationship filled with love is
A life-giving relationship filled with love is
A life-giving relationship filled with love does
A life-giving relationship filled with love does
A life-giving relationship filled with love never
A life-giving relationship is