Flowers and bees work together to ensure each other’s reproduction. Wolves hunt in packs to efficiently kill their prey. Humans come together and form families, communities, and nations. Achievement through relationships is clearly life’s modus operandi, ordained by God. Men succeed in loving God and each other through relationships. How then, can we seek God through our relationships? Human relationships are part of God’s creative design. When God made man, He made him in His image. God is a Trinitarian being—a unified relationship in itself. Then, once God made Adam, he created Eve as his companion. God made men and women to serve, love, and protect each other. We see this relational imperative throughout Scripture.
In a clear extension of this call, Christ established His Body, the church, and called all men to the free gift of new life in Him and as part of the Body. We have incredible accounts in the early church of men and women going out, sharing their faith, and bringing people closer to God. Much of this depended on the forming of caring relationships. For anyone to come to faith in Christ, someone must care enough to share the good news that God has loved and saved them in Christ. Tim Keller comments on faith’s role in relationships, “We don’t love people in order to share our faith with them. Rather, we share our faith and ourselves with them in order to love them.” Sharing our faith allows us to form strong God-seeking relationships.
On a more personal level, God has also given men and women the grace to form multiple kinds of powerful relationships: both through friendship and marriage. Marriage is the lifelong bond between a man and woman that, among other benefits, is best suited for ensuring children grow up with their stop-ed-meds.com. The integrity of society depends on the flourishing of healthy friendships and the integrity of marriage as an institution. It is of paramount importance that men and women have a variety of relationships, including strong, healthy friendships and deeply committed marriages. Valuing the similarities and differences between these forms of relationship will help to protect and provide for children and society as a whole.
Good relationships require several things. First, one must recognize that since God created us out of love and in His image, we must live in a way that fulfills that image. We must try to love our neighbor as God loved us by investing time in our neighbor and praying for him. We must know ourselves—how we can be of service to those around us, what our unique gifts are—and act accordingly. Finally, we must follow Christ’s example in all things. Christ had the perfect relationship; not only is He part of the Trinity, a divine union, but He also gave His life so that the whole world might obtain salvation. Ultimately, Christ must be our model in all of our relationships.
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