I'm excited today because we are starting a new series that we just called, Let's Talk About Relationships.
Let's talk about relationships. And we all have relationships, don't we?
I mean, you know, you do, whether you like to or not, you have relationships.
I think we all have relationships. Life goes well when our relationships are going well.
Life can really be difficult when our relationships are not going well.
And so relationships are just a big part of our lives.
And when we approach this series, I really, you know, I wanted to not just talk about marriage relationships.
We do that. In fact, we have a marriage weekend coming up, and it's full.
I'm sorry if you missed it. We'll do another one, but it's full.
And we talk about marriages a lot. I want to talk about that. But there's also a lot of relationships.
There's friends, right? There's kids. There's parents. I mean, there are a lot of relationships.
So I kind of want to look at it on what are some things that I could offer you that would probably help all relationships.
There's plenty of principles and ideas. And what I want to talk about today, to me,
is probably the most important element of relationships in any relationship that you have.
In fact, I would say what we're going to talk about today will determine the depth of the relationships
and how long those relationships last. And so that's this is where I want to start.
It sounds pretty heavy. It's not that heavy, but I think it's a huge key.
And I don't really hear anyone talk about what I want to talk about today.
So how many of you know sometimes I just talk about my own stuff, right? And so I haven't heard this a lot.
So grab your Bibles. Hopefully you have your Bibles and a notepad, right?
Because we're disciples and we learn and we grow. And turn with me to the book of Hebrews.
Probably no one would think about teaching a relationship series out of Hebrews chapter 8,
but that's exactly what I'm about to do. So Hebrews chapter 8. The book of Hebrews, you know,
because I always like to give you a little information about the book.
We call it hermeneutics, which is just to understand the context and the culture and those things.
And obviously there are books written on this and commentary, so I'm not going to spend all that time.
I love Hebrews. Hebrews is a little bit of an anomaly in that no one really knows who wrote it.
There are theories. Early church, in fact, is kind of interesting.
Hebrews was recognized as part of sacred scripture, so it was canonized under really the idea.
Remember all the books were canonized based on apostles authority, the authority of the apostles.
And so there's kind of a test they all had to go through. Usually you can kind of describe it as a threefold test.
I won't go into all that to determine what was recognized.
So the books of the Bible, by the way, if you've ever heard the books of the Bible were all picked by
the emperor Constantine, the council of Nicaea, that's actually a lie.
There's nothing even true about that, but it sounds good on TikTok.
The council of Nicaea had nothing to do with the books of the Bible, had everything to do with who Jesus was.
And it's really about Christology ultimately, meaning who is Jesus.
And so the books of the canon were recognized over time by the early church, first century church, second century church.
And in fact, we have lists of canonized scripture or books of the Bible as early as the second, early second century.
And so anyways, I just like to debunk TikTok sometimes.
Anyway, so Hebrews is anomaly because it was included because it really people thought Paul wrote it.
But truthfully, there's no actual proof of that.
There's a church father. He's actually later.
So he's like late second, early third century, Clement of Alexandria, who is very different than Clement of Rome.
So if you study church fathers, that makes sense to you.
And if you don't, don't worry about it. Clement of Rome was first century, second century.
Clement of Alexandria, second century, third century.
Anyways, Clement of Alexandria thought Paul wrote it and and possibly Luke translated into Greek because it's a very technical Greek.
And whoever wrote it was very Hebrew. Right.
And it is written to Hebrews. And so there's a theory as Paul.
Some people say Paul, there are other theories. I mean, Aquila, Apollo's Barnabas is one.
But the bottom line and here's what's the anomaly.
While it was included because they thought it was Pauline, even though today the consensus of scholars would tell you it's probably not Paul at all.
But none of them would argue that it should be excluded because of the theology and the authority from which it it is written.
It's also written not like a letter. It's more like a sermon, like a homily.
And so but the big idea, the big idea of Hebrews is it's written to first century Hebrews.
Thus, the name wasn't actually a coffee shop.
In church, we do silly things. Holy grounds come to our coffee shop. Holy grounds.
Hebrews. Right. So anyways, all right. Some men had coffee today because she she brews.
Anyway, she brews, not Hebrews. Anyways.
But the point is the point is that it was written to Hebrews who were living in Rome.
So they're Jews, obviously, and they're also Christians, which means they're being persecuted and discriminated against.
And it cost them a lot to follow Jesus because, again, they're in Gentile, they're in Greek territory, right?
They're in Rome, the Greco-Roman world.
And and so if they become a Christian, it costs them their businesses.
Sometimes it costs them their homes, it costs them friends, relationships, family, all of those things.
And so this is probably I think personally Hebrews is written prior to 70 A.D.
because it doesn't mention the end of animal sacrifices, so it's still kind of in that before the end of the Second Temple.
And so I think it's probably on the eve of Emperor Nero.
So if you know Emperor Nero came to power in the mid 60s and then he's the one that starts persecuting Christians.
And it's really, really bad. So I think it's probably on the eve of that.
So these Christians are feeling a lot of pressure.
And so they're considering just going back to practice in Judaism, which is trying to relate to God through the law and through the sacrifices and through those practices.
So the whole book of Hebrews in one sentence is don't turn away from Jesus.
Dear Christian brother, don't turn away from Jesus. Right.
And so that's why he's trying to make an argument throughout the scripture.
Whoever writes it was very educated. They were they were obviously Jewish, but also understood Greek are Gentiles are Greek culture.
And they're making the argument like Jesus is higher than the angels.
Jesus is greater than the temple. Jesus is the high priest. Right.
Jesus is greater than the law. I mean, it's all about better, greater, better. New covenant is better. New covenant is better. New covenant is greater.
And so it's this kind of contrasting, if you will, the old covenant and the new covenant.
And that's what gets us to Hebrews, chapter eight. So why don't you stand with me? We're going to read a good portion of scripture.
We always love to stand to honor the word of God because this is the word of God.
And so Hebrews, chapter eight, we're going to start at verse six.
It says, But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is much more excellent than as the old covenant he mediates is better.
Since is it's enacted on better promises, for if the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion to look for a second.
But he finds fault with it when he says now he's about to quote from Jeremiah.
Jeremiah writes kind of on the eve of the exile of Judah, kind of six hundred six oh nine.
Somewhere in there is probably where he's writing this. It says, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, for they did not continue in my covenant.
And so I showed no concern for them. Now, by the way, that doesn't mean that God didn't love them or didn't show concern.
That's just the way it's translated.
Basically, it says I couldn't honor them. I couldn't favor them the way that I wanted to.
OK, and so I showed them no concern declares the Lord, for this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel.
After those days, declares the Lord, I will put my laws into their minds and write them on their hearts.
And I will be their God and they will be my people and they will not teach each other or his neighbor and each one is brother saying no, the Lord, for they shall all know me from the latest from the least of them to the greatest, for I will be merciful toward their iniquities and I will remember their sins no more.
I remember their sins.
No more. Now we're in a relationship series and we just read that text and you might be a little bit confused, but it's all going to make sense in a minute.
Today I want to talk to you about this. I want to talk to you about the foundation of lasting relationships.
The foundation, and I would say it this way, the foundation of all lasting relationships.
And I would say if you have relationships today, this is a part of the foundation, whether you understand it or not.
And if your relationships are going to last, you'll have to keep this as the foundation for them to last.
So we're going to talk about it.
Foundation of all lasting relationships. Let's pray.
God, thank you so much for the word of God.
Thank you God that you're relational and you greatly care about us and our relationships.
And so help us, Lord, to do relationships well.
Help us today to learn and grow in our relationships with you and with all those around us.
In Jesus name and everybody said Amen.
You can be seated. Thank you so much.
The foundation of lasting relationships.
So let's talk about what the writer of Hebrews is talking about here.
Here he's contrasting the old covenant.
Everybody say old covenant with the new covenant.
Everybody say new covenant.
Now, if you don't know, let me catch you up.
So essentially the old covenant was enacted until essentially really the resurrection.
I mean, it's really Jesus comes.
The resurrection is what really begins the new covenant.
Are you with me?
So it's not necessarily the New Testament and the Old Testament.
It's really the resurrection is where the new covenant is enacted.
It's really in the life of Jesus.
OK, and so the old covenant, if you remember, was a set of rules, sacrifices, practices that are all outlined throughout the law and the prophets, but really mostly throughout the law.
It's, you know, the Ten Commandments.
But we start seeing it in Exodus, obviously, Deuteronomy and Numbers more more clearly, whereas all these laws and that God's people had to keep to have a relationship with him.
And he said, hey, if you do all these things, it'll go well with you.
Right. So there's all these laws.
What Jesus did, by the way, was he didn't do away with the law.
In fact, Jesus said I didn't come to do away with the law.
But what did Jesus do?
Well, Jesus fulfilled the law that we could not fulfill.
He was perfect.
He was sinless.
And we are not.
So he came as man.
Right.
He fulfilled the law and then he took the punishment that we were owed because we did not fulfill the law and could not keep the law.
Right.
And so he came and took our place.
We call it substitutionary atonement.
So he took our place, our judgment for not keeping the law, our judgment for sin.
In fact, not just ours, the whole world's judgment for sin was placed upon him.
He was condemned and he was penalized in that he was crucified for the sin of the world, for my sin and for your sin.
And then we know on the third day he arose.
And now we don't have a relationship with God through performance.
We have a relationship with God through grace, meaning we believe Jesus was enough.
We believe what Jesus did was enough to save us, to forgive us, to cleanse us.
The Old Covenant didn't do away with sin.
It just covered sin in a way.
Jesus, though, the writer of Hebrews would tell you, he washes away sin like he does what the animal sacrifices could not do.
And so now the relationship we have with God is not through the Old Covenant of obeying laws and rituals and offering sacrifices.
But it's in the New Covenant where we have a relationship that is secured by Christ, mediated by Christ, and held by Christ.
And my faith in Christ is what brings me into relationship with God.
And now I can go boldly to the throne of grace, not because I'm good enough, not because I kept all the rules,
but because Christ was good enough and Christ kept all the rules and Christ paid for my sin.
Is everybody tracking?
So there's two paradigms of relationship with God.
This is what the writer of Hebrews is saying.
Now that you've experienced grace, don't go back to law.
Are you with me?
Now that you've experienced grace, don't go back to this performance-based mentality with God.
That's why we have to be taught grace.
Everybody understands law.
We understand if you do something bad, you should get punished.
We understand typically that many times because we're fallen, we think actually law is the currency of relationship.
In other words, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
You be nice to me, I'll be nice to you.
Are you with me?
But the writer of Hebrews is saying, no, there's a better relationship.
Don't go back to that.
Don't try to serve God under the law and under all the rules,
but go back to serving God in the freedom that is Christ, where you can know him through Christ by the Spirit.
So here are the two paradigms.
The two paradigms are relationship based on performance.
That's the old covenant.
The new covenant is a relationship that's based on grace, unmerited favor, freely given, not earned.
Are you with me?
I would argue that most relationships exist in one of these two paradigms.
And I would argue that the foundation, so I'll give you the whole sermon and then we'll unpack it.
I would argue that the foundation of any lasting relationship is grace.
And the foundation of most failed relationships is performance.
Right?
Either grace is the currency or performance is the currency.
And typically when performance is the currency, relationships break down.
And when grace is the currency, they can last.
So I just have two points.
We're going to unpack this together.
All right. So two points.
Write this down.
The first one is this, is that relationships are determined by connection or you could say connectedness.
Relationships are determined by connection.
In other words, the relationships you have, think about it this way, the relationships you have in your life,
whatever they are, it's people that you feel connected to.
Right?
I mean, this is how we determine our friends a lot of times in school.
It's, man, I just have a connection.
We like similar things.
I don't know. We just hit it off.
These are phrases that we use.
Right?
The people that you end up dating, I just felt a connection, just since the connection with them.
And we just really hit it off.
And so I asked them out and they said yes or whatever the case may be.
The person that you eventually married is hopefully you felt a very strong connection with that individual.
Right?
And so really relationships are all about connection.
So we need to understand how to have connection if we want to have relationships.
In fact, I would back up and say it this way.
You are actually created for connection.
You're created by a God who wants to connect with you.
And God made Adam and Eve, who were generally one, and then he kind of broke them apart into two,
but they were still one because they had a connection.
There was a connectedness that existed.
And so really the base of relationships, if you will, is connectedness.
Then the foundation has to be grace.
And we'll get into how that works.
But the bottom line is you need to understand if you have a relationship with someone,
it's because you have a connection with them.
And sometimes those connections are, you know, I just met them connected.
And sometimes I have to have a relationship with someone.
Maybe it's a business or work or whatever the case may be.
But there's still a connectedness that exists there.
Your deepest relationships, though, are the people you're most connected with.
Your deepest relationships are the people you feel most connected with.
So we have to understand that relationships are really determined by connectedness.
Now, the law, this paradigm, if you will, of law and grace,
or you could say performance and grace, is about how to establish connectedness.
So what is lost in the garden when Adam sins, right, is connectedness with God.
The next thing that suffers is connectedness with Eve.
The next thing that suffers is connectedness between siblings, Cain and Abel.
So are you seeing here that once sin entered in, we started to lose connectedness, right?
So God is all about connection with you.
And so God began, in fact, we have really the first messianic,
I would call it a messianic prophecy, in Genesis chapter 3,
where God kind of says, hey, man's going to bruise the head of,
or Satan's going to bruise the heel of man.
Man's going to bruise the head of Satan.
That's the first scripture really we have pointing to Jesus.
It's in Genesis chapter 3.
Because at that moment, God said, I lost connectedness with you,
and I want to reestablish connectedness,
and now I'm going to work all through history to bring about the Messiah, the Christ,
who's going to bring in and usher in this new paradigm of grace.
Because see, the grace existed, right?
But when sin entered, grace was lost.
God institutes a legal system, if you will, to maintain a sense of connectedness,
but it's not genuine connectedness.
It's not heart-to-heart connectedness.
In fact, in Hebrews 8, what did Jeremiah prophesy?
God said, I'm going to come and I'm going to ride on your heart.
Ezekiel says, I'm going to give you a heart of flesh.
Now we're talking about a connectedness that is not through performance,
but a connectedness that's through grace.
Are you with me?
So these are two paradigms.
So relationships can exist in a performance paradigm,
or they can exist in a grace-filled relational paradigm.
And so I actually want to talk about what those look like.
So let's talk about performance versus grace, if you will.
A relationship that is in this kind of performance paradigm,
okay, write this down.
If it's in a performance paradigm, its goal is satisfactory behavior from another person.
So in a performance paradigm, I'm trying to get good behavior out of other people.
I'm trying to get the kind of behavior that I want to relate to.
I'm trying to get the kind of behavior I want to be married to.
I'm trying to get the kind of behavior that makes me happy,
the kind of behavior that meets my needs.
Let me just time out in case I never get back to this in this series.
Lovingly, and when I speak, I have a lot of world experience.
I have a lot of relational experience,
and I've been through lots and lots of counseling for lots and lots of reasons.
So I would say my counselor, and I love him dearly, I still talk to him.
I think every senior pastor, I think every pastor, but every senior pastor should have a counselor,
because you need some place to talk about stuff, right?
But he would say that I probably at this point could have an honorary master's degree in counseling.
But I want you to understand, what that gum, and I forgot what I wanted you to understand.
Oh yeah, here it is, got it.
Here it is.
In relationships a lot of times, and I've heard this pastor,
they're not meeting my needs, they're not meeting my needs, it's my needs, my needs, my needs, my needs, my needs.
Let me explain something to you very quickly.
Someone doesn't have to meet your needs for you to have a thriving and happy life.
You don't have needs, you have desires.
Food is a need, air is a need.
Someone doing the dishes is not a need.
Okay, let me say where it gets real plain for the married people.
Men, sex is a great thing, but you can live without it.
And you can be happy without it.
I'm not saying that's God's plan, I'm not saying that's God's intent.
I've had a man sit here and say, I need you to tell her I have a need for sex, and she needs to give me sex.
And I'm like, how long has this been going on?
All a few years, and I'm like, and how's that working out for you, sir?
Demanding sex like a five-year-old demands his toy back.
How's that working out?
So I do think if we love people, we desire to meet their needs, right?
Like I want to meet Jana's needs, and she can ask me pretty much anything.
I want to meet those needs, and she's the same way.
I'm just saying there's a lot of this, well, my needs aren't being met.
Okay, well, then, okay, let's work at it.
Instead of just continuing to try to get your needs met, why don't we try to figure out what's going on
and try to find a place of harmony and unity and work together to fulfill one another
and keep trying to extract out of each other what makes you happy?
I said a mouthful there, but it would be worth listening to again?
Or, well, he just doesn't connect with me emotionally.
I understand that's a need.
I do think women, listen, most, and there are different relationships and some relationships.
I don't know how, this is not in my notes, so I'm going to take a quick sidebar
because I'm helping somebody because I've learned when the Holy Spirit's talking
when it's not Marty because there's nothing I studied.
But bottom line is it is true.
In relationships, typically one person will desire sex more than the other.
And about 70 to 80% of the time it's the men that want sex more than the women, right?
There are times where women seem to have more of a desire for sex than men.
Okay, and so if you're in a relationship where somebody wants sex more than you, welcome to being normal.
If you're in a relationship with somebody that wants sex less than you, welcome to being in a normal relationship.
Are you with me?
That being said, you know, we'll just use the stereotype of men versus women.
Women, you have a gift of sex, right, and men have a desire for sex, okay?
And so there's a way that you can, if you love your husband, then you can meet their need for that, right?
Now, husbands, let me just say this, and hopefully we'll get back to this
because I'm not giving enough time because I don't have enough time.
Women have a need for an actual connection, emotional connection, and you have the gift,
meaning God has put you in that relationship to meet that need.
And so a lot of times when men are wanting sex, what I say is, well, go home and connect with your wife emotionally.
You would be amazed, men, at how sexual they can become when you connect with them emotionally.
Janet will tell you the most sexy thing I do is vacuum.
Right?
And men, you're all, I'm at the gym, vacuum, man.
Like if you want sex, vacuum.
Okay, this is my tip for today, all right?
If you want sex, go home and sweep the floor, okay?
Do some dishes, all right?
Fold your laundry.
You know, those are things.
Why?
Because you step into her world.
I need to preach this.
I don't have time.
Galatians talks about husbands and wives and Christ in the church,
and the number one principle was Christ stepped into the world of his bride.
Men, men.
If you want to connect with your wife, right, step into her world.
I'm helping you.
I know you're not going to, amen, but your wife's about to lose her mind,
and she is saying, say it again, Pastor Marty.
Now I'm going to say something to the women.
Women, if you want your husband to emotionally connect with you, have sex with him.
Women get to sex through emotional connection.
Men get to emotional connection through sex.
I don't know why God made it that way.
Probably because if he made us all like men, we'd never get out of the house, would we?
But here's my point is we don't have needs, we have desires, and in relationships,
really we have the ability to meet someone else's need,
and that's really what establishes connection.
So if you're unhappy, try to focus on meeting the need of the spouse that you have,
and just see where that goes.
I didn't do that a lot of time.
I didn't really have time.
I want to talk about this right here.
I want to talk about this.
So what we're talking about is the paradigm of performance and grace.
In the paradigm of performance, the goal is behavior.
In other words, I want people to behave in a way where I feel safe,
or I feel loved, or I feel affirmed, so I'm trying to get from them behavior.
And when I try to get from them behavior, then ultimately,
without saying it in a way, I'm trying to manipulate behavior,
so this can be a form of manipulation.
In other words, to have a relationship with me, here's the standard you have to meet,
and for me to get the behavior I want, I set a standard, hoops you have to jump through,
things you have to do. I'm not talking about boundaries,
so I understand there's a lot of dynamics in the relationship.
I'm just talking about a basic principle.
And so ultimately, in this principle, it's aimed at behavior.
So if it's with kids, I'm trying to get the kids to behave the way I want them to behave, right?
If it's with a spouse, I'm trying to get her to behave the way,
or him to behave the way.
I want sex. I want emotional connection, or whatever it is.
I'm trying to get this behavior.
And so I'm setting up a set of rules whereby we maintain.
So the bottom line you need to see is performance becomes the currency.
Are you with me? Performance becomes the currency.
When you perform well, we have good relationship.
When you don't perform well, our relationship is strained.
And you can apply that to your best friend, you can apply that to your aunt and uncle,
you can apply that to your kid, and you can apply that to your spouse.
The bottom line is performance becomes the currency.
And when I don't get the performance I want,
then I try to create leverage to get the performance that I want.
So the mode of relatedness now is about creating enough leverage
to get you to perform the way that I want you to perform.
Alright? This is easy when you have a five-year-old, right?
Do it or I'm going to punish you.
And by the way, you don't, side tip, I shouldn't have used the word punish.
You don't punish, you correct.
Alright? God doesn't punish.
All of our punishment was placed on Jesus.
But God does chastise, the Bible says, the disciplines He corrects.
What's the difference?
Punishment is about making them feel pain.
Correction is about helping them learn and understand.
Are you with me? Those are not the same thing, parents.
Punishment is typically done in anger.
Correction is done in love.
I understand you can have kids that make you angry.
Just don't punish them.
Don't do anything when you're angry.
Go for a walk. Walk the dog.
Think about how much you love that little rascal or that child.
And then come back and say, well, how can I correct them?
Are you with me? Parents, are you with me?
Right?
So, but you know, as a five year old, I can create some leverage, right?
With a ten year old, I can create some leverage.
Right? What happens when they're 25?
Man, I still want a relationship with my kid, but I don't have leverage anymore.
Right? So this doesn't really work.
Well, what about, you say, well, as a spouse, you know, how can I create some leverage as a spouse?
Well, there's a lot of ways.
How about I just don't have sex with you anymore?
Alright, guys, how about I just stonewall you and I just don't talk?
I'm just going to be quiet.
You want me to talk? I'm not going to talk.
Right? It's interesting.
We revert to some way of leverage to get behavior that we want
because we're over on this paradigm where connectedness is trying to be achieved through performance.
And according to God, he said, this doesn't work.
That's what we just read in Hebrews 8.
He found fault with this system.
He said, this system doesn't work.
There's a better system.
So in this system, right?
So in the grace system, grace is now not performance is the currency, grace is the currency.
Right?
So now I'm trying to create a heart connection.
He said, I'll write on your hearts.
Right? As he will give you a heart of flesh.
So over here, the aim is not behavior under grace.
The aim is not behavior.
The aim is connection.
I'm not trying to get you to act a certain way.
I'm trying to build a bond with you.
I'm trying to form a bond with you.
Right?
So in this system, listen, let me say this.
When we value, think about this, when we value performance over connection, we can confuse compliance as an actual relationship.
You can make someone miserable enough to do what you want.
But do you have a relationship or did you just have more leverage?
Here's one I hear talking to married couples.
Well, he's only nice to me when he wants to have sex with me.
Okay. I know that doesn't work.
But bottom line, did you train him that way?
Did you train him?
If you perform a certain way, our relationship will feel good to me and I will have sex with you.
Because if you train him in performance and reward him with sex, you created a paradigm where when he performs well, he gets sex.
Well, what happens when he doesn't want sex?
There's no need to perform well because you have a relationship built on compliance, not connection.
Are you with me?
I'll just give you a minute to think about it.
It's all right. You don't have to clap.
I can tell everybody's like, oh my God, yes, okay.
Right?
Same thing with your kids.
What you really want is when your kid leaves your house, you want them to still want to be connected to you.
But you lose leverage when they leave your house.
Right?
And so what do I have to do then?
Well, I can't have a relationship based on performance.
I have to have a relationship that's based on connection because then connection is not about proximity.
So when they, for instance, moved to Arizona to become a child counselor, a Christian child counselor,
when they move there, it's nice when they call you and tell you how they're doing in their church and how they're teaching and students.
My son, obviously I'm talking about Luke, my oldest, but he will send me his outline for when he's going to talk to high school students at his church
that he found by himself in Phoenix, Arizona and how he teaches once a month in high school.
So he's like, Dad, here's my outline.
Would you just look over it and tell me what you think?
I'm going to be speaking in students this week.
Or when he calls, say, hey, Dad, our text, you know, usually it's a text first.
Dad, can we talk? I just got some things going on.
I'd like to hear your perspective.
See, that's really nice to have, but you don't get that if you're if you're trying if you're in the performance paradigm
and you're just trying to get them to comply with you and behave a certain way.
Right. Because over here, leverage is how we get the behavior. Right.
When I step over here into grace, now it's about establishing connectedness with them.
What's the leverage here then?
You could say if if if the leverage over there is is what I say the leverage was over here for compliance or performance.
That's what the leverage or the leverage is how you get compliance over here.
Love is how you get connection.
That's why I want to leverage and love. That's how I had it in my mind.
So it makes sense. So this is a loving relationship.
I'm not saying you don't love someone if you're stuck in this paradigm and just saying we've got some work to do.
But if you're over here in this grace paradigm, my goal is connectedness with the individual.
So parents, how does this look?
Well, it's you know, essentially we I believe in discipline.
All my kids were disciplined. They were all trained. Right.
Are you with me? You can arrest me.
But I believe when the Bible says spare the rod and spoil the child that there's even a time for corporal discipline.
Right. If it's aimed at the right thing, if it's done the right way.
Are you tracking what I'm saying?
And so so I understand that. But what I started in very early with my kids is I didn't wait until there was a transgression that necessitated a, you know, discipline.
Right. I started looking for attitudes because their attitude goes bad before their behavior.
OK. And so when I started seeing an attitude that looked out of Kelter, I started having a conversation based on their age.
Right. Now, I understand this. You can't do this with a two year old.
You know, well, little Johnny, it seems you're really upset because you threw the firetruck.
Just wondering what's going on. How do you feel on the inside?
I understand that may not be possible with a two year old. Right.
I understand that.
But you have a sense of bondedness with a two year old. Right. Because they need you to feed them. Right.
If they're not potty trained, almost said housebroken. If they're not potty trained yet, you can tell I have dogs and I haven't had little ones in a while.
If they're not potty trained yet, you got to change them. Right. And you got to feed them and you got to clothe them.
And so all those things establish a caretaking and caregiving kind of bond already.
But when they start changing themselves, clothing themselves, feeding themselves, right, they get into adolescence.
Those things don't create a bond. So you have to create a bond.
So when you see a bad attitude or bad behavior, you know, before you see bad behavior, I would pull mine aside and say, hey, let's talk about what's going on with you.
Help dad understand what you're dealing with. Right.
Now, a lot of times you have to work, you know, if they're nine, this takes a little bit of work because it's hard for them always to articulate their feelings.
But there's a lot of different things you can do.
So like right now, if you were drawing, drawing a face of you, would you draw a frowny face or a happy face?
What would that what's causing that frowny face? What's causing that happy face?
There's a way parents, if you just give a little time, you can work them through things and then help with the attitude and create a sense of connectedness.
Before even a discipline is needed.
Are you tracking what I'm saying? OK.
In other words, my aim is connectedness. Listen, in marriage, in friendships, whatever it is, your aim is connectedness, not compliance.
Listen to me very carefully that the new covenant of grace tells me that God values connection above compliance.
So in in marriage, this is where we learn to have some attunement toward one another to where I can tell if something seems a little off,
then I can say, hey, it seems like you're a little off today and I'm not put out by that because my goal isn't to get you to behave happy for me.
So I can be happy. We call that codependency.
I need you to be happy so I can be happy. Right.
That's that's that's codependency, not healthy. Right.
So I don't need you to be happy so I can be happy. I'm just concerned about you.
I just like to know what's going on in your world.
I just like to know it seems like you're thinking about something, seems like something's going on. Right.
And my goal now is connection.
You know, go back to sex because everybody likes it or most people do.
You know, he won't have sex with you or she won't have sex with you, whichever way it is.
Well, you can keep trying to leverage some sort of performance or, you know, some sort of punishment, if you will,
to try to get that behavior. But that's not going to work.
Connection would work. So sit down and talk, say, talk to me about sex.
Why are you not enjoying sex? We can talk about sex.
Yeah, you can talk about positions. You can talk about times a day.
You can talk about what makes you happy, what makes them happy.
You can actually have conversations about sex, believe it or not.
It's interesting how we'll have sex and never talk about it with each other.
Like, I want to do it. I just don't want to talk about it.
Like, if you're in a married relationship, hey, sex is, you know, yes, it's for procreation,
but it's also for pleasure, but it's also for connection.
I mean, those are all reasons for it. But if it's not working well,
and in many relationships sex doesn't work exactly well, right, then it's OK to have conversations.
It's even OK to talk to a counselor.
Say, hey, sex is not working well for us and we'd like for it to work well for us.
Right? Some of you are looking at me like, some guy in here sitting here,
oh, God, we're going to go home and she's going to want to talk about sex.
Well, listen, she talks to all of her girlfriends about sex.
She might as well talk to her husband about sex.
Girls, you all think I don't know.
Guys never get together and talk about sex with their spouses.
Like, we talk about killing stuff or playing golf, right?
Women, if you get them along for much more than an hour with a group of women,
sooner or later they're going to be talking about sex.
I don't know why it is. It's really weird.
It's just different. Are you with me?
But my point is, we talk about it with each other. I don't even know how I got off on this.
But the point is, we want to establish a connection. Well, if sex isn't working,
well, let's talk about why. Let's get some help.
Let's, hey, why is this not working?
You know, like, guys, if you really want to have sex,
I'm telling you, go at it from the angle of connection.
Same thing with your kids. If kids' relationships aren't going well,
how can we reestablish or establish healthy connection?
I want to give you a principle here that I've already talked about,
but just so you know, there's a scripture to go along with any of this.
1 John 4, 18 says this, it says,
There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.
For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.
I'm going to probably do a whole message on this,
but this is what you need to understand.
Many times a performance paradigm is based on fear,
and fear always wants to control someone else.
Because fear is scared, you're going to hurt me,
you're not going to give me what I want, I'm not going to be happy.
So just like, you know, there's a famous neuroscientist,
or should say renowned neuroscientist, Dr. Caroline Leath,
and she did a lot of study. All thoughts, listen to this,
all thoughts are based in one of two things, fear or love.
Fear or love, right?
And I would say relationship thoughts are part of the all thoughts.
And so over here, if I have fear as the basis,
then I'm going to always move for compliance or performance,
because I need you to do what I need you to do,
because I'm scared you won't.
A lot of times we do this with kids, right?
Because what we do with kids is we try to control them,
because we don't want them to make mistakes, right?
We try to control them, because we don't want them to embarrass us, right?
But you need to understand that in a loving relationship,
here's what a loving relationship requires.
It requires freedom.
Yes.
If they can't choose relationship on their terms,
it's not a relationship.
It's coerced.
It's compliance.
Are you with me?
Relationships happen when two powerful people can choose relationship with each other.
That also means they have to be able to choose not to relate to each other.
And when I try to make someone choose me,
because I'm scared they want, it's really manipulation.
And then even if I get compliance, I still don't know if I have a relationship.
Right?
Listen, ma'am, you can make him so miserable that he'll take you on a date,
and you'll sit there the whole time wondering,
would he really take me on a date because he wants to take me on a date,
or is he just taking me on a date because I made his life hell?
I can't remember the episode.
It was some sitcom years ago,
but it was one of those conversations where it's like,
my analogy would be like, you know, she's saying, I want you,
she want him to do the dishes,
and he said, I did the dishes,
and she said, I didn't want you to do the dishes, I wanted you,
guys, this won't make sense to you, women, this will.
I wanted you to want to do the dishes.
See? Did you see all the women? They're like, yeah.
Look, I didn't, and he's like, you have made my life hell over these dishes.
When am I ever going to want to do the dishes?
I didn't want you to do the dishes. I wanted you to want,
I'm never going to want to want to do the dishes.
I'm a man.
Right? And here's the problem.
When I had to coerce, right, underperformance,
I use leverage, I get compliance, but I still don't have a relationship.
The same thing with kids. I can get compliance,
but compliance is still, because why?
In relationship, you have to have a choice.
This is why God put the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden.
You ever wondered why did God put the bad tree in the garden?
Because there's no way for Adam and Eve to choose him
unless they have the freedom to not choose him.
By the way, you want to be in a relationship, if you're dating,
you want to be in a relationship where they choose you,
not where you coerce them.
Like if you need somebody to be okay, you need to be single
until you get that fixed. Are you with me?
So we have to have, they have to have the ability to choose a relationship with us,
because this is the power of being human, right, and to not.
So God actually says, you can have a relationship with me,
or you cannot have a relationship with me.
You can connect with me, or you cannot connect with me.
So in this parrotsy over here, we're trying to force a connection,
but we don't get connection, we get compliance.
Under grace, we're saying, you can connect with me,
or you cannot connect with me.
Like I love you, and I want to connect with you,
and if you choose not to connect with me, I can't do anything about that.
I can't actually control you.
I can make your life hell, but I can't control you.
And making your life hell is not going to get a true connectedness from you,
because ultimately it will be coerced or manipulated,
and you might comply, but I'll still be there for you.
I might comply, but I'll still be sitting here like,
I don't know if they actually chose me,
or they just got tired of sleeping on the couch.
Yeah.
You tracking with me?
Yes.
And so we have to create this heart connection.
Well, how do we do that?
Well, I have to give them freedom, and also did you notice,
he said fear has to do with punishment.
I have to remove the leverage of punishment.
Okay, now I'll talk about this with kids and talk about this other relationship.
In other words, if I want to have a genuine heart connection,
what I have to do is I have to make that my goal,
and so through everything that I do,
and I'm just trying to establish a connection with them heart to heart
and saying I'm available for that, and then I have to let them choose that.
And I understand it can be very hard if you're in a marriage
where someone is emotionally unavailable, emotionally detached,
and there isn't a sense of connectedness,
and they don't seem to be able to get there, and I understand,
but that's where you can have a conversation in a loving way to say,
hey, I'd really love for us maybe to get some help
because I really want to connect with you, and I really want to know you.
Now remember, the goal of connection is not to get what you want,
it's to get to know them, it's to bond with them, it's to love them.
Women, I need to tell you, your husband can sniff out
when you're trying to connect with him to get something,
and men, your wife can sniff out when you're trying to connect with her to get something.
We all kind of have that meter that's like,
I know ultimately this is a backdoor manipulation, right?
But when I say, hey, connection's my goal, and you say,
well, what if he won't connect with me?
Then you go to the Lord.
You don't become the bringer-upper.
A lot of times relationships will develop a bringer-upper,
and a bringer-upper is just someone that does that.
They keep bringing up the same stuff over and over and over again.
Every chance they get, they want to remind their spouse
that they're not meeting their need or they're not doing something correctly,
and they just keep bringing it up, bringing it up, bringing it up.
My rule is you can bring it up about two times lovingly and respectfully,
and if they're still not responding, then it's probably not going to matter
how many times you bring it up, but if you keep bringing it up,
they won't hear you at all.
And so there are times you have to go to God and say, God, I need help.
And you really have to trust the Lord, kind of like Peter says,
hey, women, you can actually win your man over without a word.
That's what Peter says.
Right?
Well, how do you do that?
Because you go talk to God.
Stop talking to him about that.
Stop talking to her about that.
Go to the Lord.
Are you with me?
Are you tracking?
But I can't have true connectedness if it's based in fear
and if punishment then is an application.
Again, remember my example with kids.
I'm trying to establish a heart connection with them,
not just threaten them with punishment.
Are you understanding what I'm saying?
So relationships really are built on connectedness.
So here's this point.
It's very simple.
I know I'm a little bit long, but I had to take a detour
because apparently you all needed it.
But here's the second thing.
Grace makes connection possible.
Right?
So grace is the currency.
You've heard me say this.
Grace is the currency of connectedness.
What does grace mean?
It's freely given.
It's freely chosen.
It's based in love.
You can choose it.
You cannot.
Right?
But ultimately, here's the big idea here.
If you want connection and you want it to last,
then you have to maintain grace as the currency
and you're in a relationship with someone
that's not always going to deserve grace.
Grace, by definition, is undeserved.
So if you want to maintain a relationship,
you've got to give them what they don't deserve.
Are you hearing what I'm saying?
So to me, I feel like the way you make relationships work
and how you have lasting relationships really comes down
to when can you be gracious with the other person.
Now, if I had people in here that have been married
30, 40, 50 years, and I'm sure we do,
I think they would tell you, yep, you have to maintain,
no matter how much, I've been loving on mama for 54 years.
And I have as much grace for her today as I did 54 years ago.
See, we think it's about love, and it is,
but really it's about grace.
Here's kind of the key ideas of this,
and then we'll pray that somehow God uses
what all of this I just said.
In Hebrews chapter 8, God said,
hey, when this new covenant of grace comes,
you're not going to have to teach each other
to know one another or to know me,
but everyone from at least the greatest will know me.
And then verse 11, he says,
for I will be merciful toward their iniquities,
and I will remember their sins no more.
Please underline, I will remember their sins no more.
If you're married, please underline this verse
and say, I want to be like God.
I want to not remember my spouse's sins anymore.
We could not have a relationship with God
if every time we tried to connect with Him,
He brought up our sins.
Right, it would be hard to have a connection with God
if every time I got near Him, He said,
let me tell you what you did last week.
And I don't know why it is.
Women, y'all don't fight fair in this regard
because men, we can't remember anything.
And apparently, y'all can remember things
from a millennia ago.
And you get in a fight, and you're like,
you know, this reminds me, this reminds me of 2003.
You remember, we were at your uncle's house,
and your aunt said, you know, you were wearing this,
and I was wearing this, and your hair was done this way.
And remember, you had that one watch,
and this is what you did.
And you're like, I can't remember what I ate
for dinner yesterday.
I don't even know.
Let me remind you, 1 Corinthians says,
love keeps no record of wrongs.
Love keeps no record of wrongs.
I think the key in giving grace in relationship,
this is what you need to write it down,
is the fact that you need grace.
If I forget that the other person has to have
as much grace with me as I have to have with them,
my relationship will begin to struggle.
Right?
This is greatly because we judge ourselves
by our best intentions,
and we judge them by their worst actions.
Right, let me just read a couple of verses
just so we're all on the same page.
Romans 3 10, there is none righteous, no not one.
Let me read that again.
There is none.
Anybody want to guess what none means?
I like the fact that Paul didn't start with
there is none righteous.
That's a very complete sentence.
But he actually puts what could be two complete sentences
together to emphasize that there is none.
He says there is none righteous,
and there are some people, yeah but, nope, not one.
Put your hand out.
Then he writes 13 verses later,
for all of sin and fallen short of the glory of God.
What enables sinful people to have relationships?
Well, what enables a sinful person
to come into a relationship with a holy God?
Grace.
Well, what enables two sinful people
to have and maintain a lasting relationship?
Grace.
But in order for that relationship
to have a currency of grace,
for the things we talk about,
for the shift to take place that we talked about,
then I need to understand that number one,
I need grace, because until I understand I need grace,
I won't receive grace, until I understand,
and until I receive grace, I won't have grace to give.
Are you with me?
And so I want you to think about the fact that
if you have a relationship,
we want grace to be the currency,
which means that other person doesn't deserve
the goodness that you're going to give them.
But you're going to give it.
And conversely, they're going to give you
the goodness that you don't deserve either.
And if that becomes the basis of all relationship,
now I understand there's boundaries,
I understand people hurt you, unhealthy people,
I can talk for days about all those things.
I'm just saying in a simplistic, basic world,
in a good relationship,
or you can have a good relationship with a healthy person,
or a mostly healthy person, if grace is the basis of it.
Are you with me?
Alright, homework, write this down,
because I want to give you homework for the series.
Some will do it, it will change your lives,
other people are already checking Instagram,
and you will miss out.
But homework, three things, write this down.
Number one, evaluate, and I'll put this on social media today,
so if you're on my social media account
and you don't write it down, I'll put it on my social media.
Evaluate your relationships with God,
asking the question, am I confident in my connection
with God through grace,
or am I trying to perform well enough for God to accept me?
So you have to apply it to God first.
In other words, my relationship with God,
is it still under performance,
where I'm trying to be good enough for Him,
or is it under grace,
where I just know I'm accepted through love?
The second thing is evaluate your relationships,
and on a scale of performance to grace,
so put performance on one side and grace to another,
put a mark on where your relationships are,
and you can do this, different relationships may have different places,
but you put performance on one side, grace on the other,
and then you might, well, where's my marriage?
Well, where's my relationship with one kid?
Where's my relationship with the other kid?
In other words, I want to chart out,
where do I really think these are, and how are they going?
And then, thirdly, if you have a strained relationship,
I'd be asking, do I need to be more gracious in that relationship?
Many times when we have a strained relationship,
we're more focused on what we need the other person to do.
My question, though, in a strained relationship,
is I can't control what they do, I can't control what I am and what I do,
and so the question then is, well, what do I need to do?
Maybe I just need to give more grace.
And grace does not mean relaxing boundaries, by the way.
If you understand boundaries, I'll talk about it later in the series.
If you understand boundaries, giving grace doesn't mean I let someone hurt me.
That's not what giving grace means.
It means I find a healthy boundary and a healthy place where I can give grace in a safe way.
Are you with me?
All right. Can you thank God today for the Word of God?
Hey, Pastor Marty here from Pathway Church.
I just want to say thank you for joining us,
and I want to encourage you to get connected and stay connected.
And there's several ways you can do that.
Number one, you can download the Pathway app
that we are all the time offering resources and information on that app for you.
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Look, our hope and heart for you is that you walk in the purpose
for which God made and created and redeemed you for.
We love to connect people to purpose.
We thank you for giving us this opportunity.
And if you're ever at Longview or you are at Longview,
I'd love to invite you to join us in person each weekend.
Listen, I pray God's best for your life.
I believe if you follow Jesus, your best is ahead.