Transforming our Relationships

Relationships are hard

Relationships can be hard. Whether your talking intimate relationship, friendships, relationships with your family members, working with colleagues at work, or even just casual acquaintances.

Whatever the type of relationship, if you spend enough time with them, inevitably some sort of difference is going to come up, whether its a difference of belief, or difference in the way you approach a certain issue, or whatever. Sometimes we can overlook these differences, but at times, it becomes a bit much. Perhaps you’re just tired… perhaps the frustrations of life have just built up a bit too much… but that difference just pushes you over the top.... And you snap.

The more time you spend with someone, the more likely these difficulties are going to appear.

Now, to a degree, these difficulties are just a reality that we have to live with. We’re flawed people, and we’re going to fail.

And even though I’m about to argue that God is doing something special in us so that we can manage these relationships better, let me just recognise straight up, that even with Jesus in our lives, we’re still going to mess up relationships.

But I am going to argue that Christians have a special advantages in relationships - but it’s also something that we need to work hard at.

The reality is that having good healthy relationships is both quite simple, but also extraordinarily difficult.

It’s simple in that, if we accept the love of Jesus, then we will find a paradigm where relationships work.

But it’s hard in that our sinful nature persists.

Link to Romans

Well, today, we’re starting a series that will conclude our walk through the book of Romans. It was actually about this time last year when we started way back in Romans 1, and we went through to Romans 8.

You may remember that I then came back to Romans in February this year when I tackled Romans 9-11.

Well, those three chapters I looked at in February, they were a bit of an interlude - an important interlude, but it was the first eight chapters that really set the scene.

Well, all of that discussion is what sets the scene for what we are going to talk about today.

We can talk all we like about how to improve relationships - and believe me, there’s a lot of information out there, some of it great… some of it… well, lets just say some might miss the point.

But understanding this from a Biblical perspective, well, we really need to understand the background of what God has done through Jesus Christ, a background that we got in those earlier chapters.

Romans 1-8

So, given that it’s been such a long time since we did the first eight chapters, lets remind ourselves now what they were all about.

Well, this is a letter written by Paul and addressed to the Christians in Rome.

He opens the letter with some comments about the gospel - literally the good news about Jesus Christ.

But then, after talking in big terms about the gospel, he then moves into one of the most power pieces of writing in spelling out what the gospel is.

And it starts with sin. From half way through chapter 1, to about half way through chapter 3, Paul systematically lays out the case why everyone is a sinner. Starting with those who suppress the truth and disregard God’s law, then moving to the self-righteous, and then hitting it home with the Jews - those who were entrusted with the law. He convincingly makes the case that we’re all sinners and no one deserves God’s love.

But half way through chapter 3, we see a shift. Though all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, yet all are justified freely be the grace of God through the redemption that comes through Jesus Christ.

And this is why the gospel is so powerful. We don’t deserve it, but God draws us back to him… and this changes everything.

Paul continues, describing the means by which we accept this redemption - something which is really so very simple. It accept it simply by faith and faith alone.

From chapters 5 to 7, Paul continues to describe various aspects of how this process of justification plays out in our life - but we get the great climax in chapter 8 - a chapter that would have to rate as one of the most powerful chapters of the entire Bible.

It’s a chapter that starts with the words: “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”. And ends with the words: “[nothing] will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord”.

If you’re a believer, and you are ever unsure about your place in God’s kingdom - please… I urge you… read Romans 8. Paul so beautifully captures the essence of all that is good about the gospel.

I won’t go through chapter 9 to 11 in as much detail, but in those chapters, Paul essentially gives greater consideration to the place of the Jewish people in the whole salvation scheme.

Why this is important

But at this point in time, what I want to highlight is just how important it is to keep in mind what we’ve learnt in this earlier chapters. Because, to be honest, without this background, the advice we’re going to encounter in chapter 12 becomes rather hollow.

In fact, about half way through chapter 12, we’ll find Paul shooting off one piece of advice after the next. And to be frank, without an understanding of what Jesus has done, it would actually seem like quite foolish advice. For example - it even says to bless those who persecute you.

This is only ever going to make sense in the context of a God who has done this for us already - but I’m getting ahead of myself, we’ll come to this section in good time.

But what we’ll find throughout this chapter, is that the change in paradigm that Paul is trying to get us to have with regards to how we relate to others, well, that can only occur with a proper understanding of what God has already done.

Four types of relationships

Okay, well I’m actually going to break up this chapter by considering four different types of relationships.

We’re first going to look at a transformation that needs to occur in our relationship with God.

Secondly we’ll look at a transformation that needs to occur in our relationship with our self - and believe me, this can sometimes be one of our biggest struggles.

And it is once these two relationships are transformed, that we’ll actually see our relationship with others transformed - which is the third one I’ll look at.

And the fourth is really a subset of the third - and that is our relationship to our enemies - something that really won’t make sense if we don’t understand what Jesus has done.

Relationship with God

Okay, so let’s start with our relationship with God.

The chapter starts with a “therefore”, indicating that what’s to follow needs to be read in light of what Paul’s already spoken about.

And in case you missed it, for good measure he reminds us that this is in view of God’s mercy...

…He then tells us to offer our bodies as a “living sacrifice”.

Now that image right there is actually quite profound. We could spend sometime unpacking it. It links us with the Old Testament system of sacrifices, but in such a way that we’re reminded of Jesus who was a literal sacrifice but is now living.

It’s essentially an oxymoron - a contradiction in terms - but a contradiction that is of such great importance. Because the Christian life is both simultaneously a matter of laying down your life, and raising to a new life.

This statement of Paul will only make sense if you understand what Jesus has done.

And as yo begin to get a grasp of what this means, then and only then will you begin to start to live a life that will be pleasing to God.

This indeed will be our true and proper worship.

Now, what I’m saying may all sound rather abstract at the moment - but as we keep going, it will become much more clear what this actually means in practice.

But for now, if you really want to truly worship God -understand that this will be done as we offer our bodies as living sacrifices - being sacrificial in our actions, but coming alive in Christ.

Do not conform to this world

I mentioned that this will become less abstract soon, but in verse 2 Paul gives us another conceptual idea - don’t conform to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

To not conform to the patterns of this world - we first need to be aware of the ways in which the worldly patterns differ from the patterns God gives us.

Now I suspect when you think about such differences, perhaps the first thing that comes to mind are the ethics surrounding sexual activity. That may be very much true, but there are actually a lot of other far more subtle differences that we are far less adept at noticing. For example, we live in a world that celebrates greed. We also live in a world that encourages selfishness. Are we conforming to these patterns of the world?

The trick, Paul tells us, is actually in the renewing of your mind. This can only be done by focussing on Jesus - the author and perfecter of the faith.

These first two verses of the chapter are helping us to consider how we can transform in such a way that we can be pleasing to God - that we can be worshipping him in the most true and proper way.

Working on this relationship with the Father is going to be the first step in the process of transforming our relationship with others.

Relationship to ourselves

But before we move onto relating to others, Paul helps us think about our relationship to ourselves.

Verse 3 says: “For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgement”.

Now depending on your own personality traits, this might be easier or harder.

Interestingly though, in my experience, sometimes even those who struggle with poor self-worth, can almost paradoxically think higher of themselves than they ought. I can’t say for sure whether this is universally the case or not, but I’ve noticed for some people who are down on themselves, you start talking to them and they’ll start talking about how they’re the only ones who can do things a certain way, and if they don’t do it, it’ll be done wrong.

Now let’s just first check what Paul’s not saying. He’s not saying that the opposite of thinking highly of yourself is to have poor self-worth.

Rather, instead of thinking that this is all about you, recognise your place in God’s kingdom.

Member of Christ’s body

You see, in verses 4 through to 8, Paul draws on a theme he uses in a number of his letters… the theme of us being members of the body of Christ. In fact, it was back in March this year that we went through 1 Corinthians 12 in our series on Spiritual Gifts - and we saw the dominant picture of the body of Christ being described.

Here in Romans 12, Paul again describes a list of gifts, although it is quite a different list than what we saw in his letter to the Corinthians. But while we could spend considerable time exploring these gifts listed here, I think the bigger point that Paul is trying to make is that your worth is not in your amazing ability to be amazing - rather your worth is in being chosen by God to be part of his kingdom, and you have a very special place in His kingdom.

When we place our view of ourselves in the context of what God is doing, suddenly everything changes. We don’t think of ourselves more highly than we ought, but we also don’t think poorly of ourselves, because God is doing something very special with you.

So if we understand our relationship with God in the right way, and we keep a healthy understanding of our self… it is now that we are in the right place to transform our relationship to others.... and that’s we’re we turn as we move to verse 9.

Relationship with others

Now it’s from verse 9, almost to the end of the chapter that Paul almost goes into rapid fire, just shooting one piece of advice after the next.

I think it would be profitable to dwell on each piece of advice and we’d be wiser for the effort, but this message might double in length, and you probably want to get home before lunch. So let me just pick up some of the big ideas.

In fact, the first piece of advice is a good place to start - “Love must be sincere”.

If you want to fix your relationships with others - learn what love is. Many of you will be familiar with the idea that in Greek we have a variety of words which translate as love.

When it says first that “Love must be sincere”, this is actually the Greek word agape. This is used of the love of God. The type of love that know no boundary. The deep love that loves even when you get nothing in return.

Interestingly, in verse 10 when it says: “be devoted to one another in love” - this time the word love is actually the Greek word “philadelphia”. We’re talking now of brotherly love. It seems clear that Paul is using this word here because he’s trying to talk about the connection that we have with one another.

You see, it is as we understand the richness of what love is that we’ll see relationships changed. But love cannot be superficial. Unfortunately, too often this is the type of love that is so prevalent in our world.

To understand love as it should be understood - you need to understand what Jesus has done. And once we do that - much of the remainder of the advice will actually just fall into place.

Now I said earlier when I spoke of being a living sacrifice that it all sounded very abstract. Well, as you look through this advice now, you start to see what is actually means. (Verse 12) “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer”. (or verse 16) “…be willing to associate with people of low position”.

There really is so much here that helps us understand what it means to be a living sacrifice - to be a person who can live for others and please God.

Relationship with enemies

But this all gets particular hard when we come to the fourth type of relationship that I’m going to talk about today. I’ve already looked at our relationship with God, our relationship with ourselves and our relationship to other. But relating to other is usually fine, even if we might have the odd clash here or there. But what about those who are just really nasty to us? What do we do with those who actively go out of their way to make our lives difficult?

I could give some examples. What about the people who are actively pushing to remove Scripture from schools? Or what about the new atheists, those who forcefully advocate that Christianity is dangerous and should be removed?

Surely we would be in the right to go after them with a bit of force… wouldn’t we?

Well, if that’s what you think, perhaps don’t read the end of this chapter. You see, if we understand what God has done and is doing in this world, then this can’t be your conclusion. Paul tells us to “bless those who persecute you”.

In verse 17 he then says: “Do not repay anyone evil for evil”.

In verse 19, again he says: “Do not take revenge”.

Interestingly, verse 19 expands this idea. You see, while we don’t take revenge, there is a place for God’s wrath.

It’s as we understand our place in the world that we’ll get this in the right sort of focus.

You see, this whole idea of turning the other cheek… of not taking revenge… well it’s not to say that the injustice of what the other person is doing doesn’t matter. In fact, it matters very much. God hates injustice. In fact, back in verse 9 Paul even tells us to hate what is evil.

But there is a bigger picture in play. You see, it is so important that we remember that Jesus transformed us, while we were still sinners, by his great love.

When we’re all about revenge, we’re not allowing God the room to transform others with his love.

Imagine if instead of revenge, our focus was on transformation.

You might say - it will never work - but it worked on you didn’t it?

“If you enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink”.

Actually, you might notice that verse 20 ends with this really weird thing about heaping burning coals on the enemies head. It’s something that commentators have a variety of theories about. But in the context I’ll like the idea that the burning coals represent a refining process.

In showing love to those who persecute you, you have the possibility that you could really transform a life.

Conclusion

There is so much in this chapter. I would really have loved to spend much more time unpacking much of what Paul says in this chapter.

But the message I want you to take from all of this is that because of the work of Jesus Christ, our relationship to God, ourselves and others must fundamentally change.

We can’t carry on as the world does, being totally obsessed with ourselves… with loving others only when it suits us… with taking offence when anybody says something that we disagree with. And rather realise that God’s kingdom has come on this earth and we are a part of this kingdom.

When we become a living sacrifice… people who honour one another above ourselves… being patient in affliction and faithful in prayer - then we will see all of our relationships change.

This won’t be easy. Our sinful nature does persist, and so we will fall back into the old patterns. But keep the process of renewing your mind in play, and you will see change occur.

God is changing you.

Let me pray...