Introduction to Relationships

Up until now we have been looking at the blessing of the Lord in the three areas of life, which are health, wealth and relationships.

I have been spending a lot of time on health and wealth because they are quite important. I have left relationships for last, because it is one of those things that quite honestly, I didn't know enough about yet.

I feel I have still been living it myself, and I can't preach anything until I have lived it a little bit. So, I said,

"Lord, you will need to help me here. I need to teach on a subject that I can't consider myself an expert on."

I love people and can build bridges to people very quickly and easily. But I would not say that I have a huge number of people following me, or that I have a huge ever-growing circle of relationships.

I think probably a lot of us could say the same thing. Sometimes we live a lonely life. You will know this one especially if you are a prophet. So, in this section I am going to share on how to build relationships God's way.

I believe God has given me revelation. I didn't realize it, but I already preached some of this a while back in a series called Overcoming Evil.

If you have ever looked at our Overcoming Evil series, you will see that there are three volumes. We have never really promoted the one volume which is called Overcoming Sickness, Poverty and Loneliness.

I covered all three areas of health, health, wealth and relationships in a book on its own. So, as I came to putting my outline together, I asked the Lord,

"What do I teach on relationships?"

He said, "You have already taught some on it."

I said, "Have I?"

You might think, "Do you mean to say you don't even know what you have taught?"

I have taught so many things that God has given to me; I can't even remember all of them. Sometimes I need to go afterwards and watch what I taught. Then I think,

"Oh, is that what I taught?"

I often don't remember stuff because I get revelation as I am teaching. So, I went back and discovered that God had given me a revelation back there that I had forgotten. Then the Lord told me to take the teaching, pick up where I left off, and now move ahead and go further.

If you have not read that volume of Overcoming Evil, I would sincerely recommend you buy it. Would you believe it is available in a printed book? It is one of our few printed books that is available. It is quite detailed and a very good teaching.

In this section however, I am going to zero in just on the one area, which is how to build relationships.

I have one Scripture that I want to share with you. Ephesians 1:6 says,

Leading to the praise of the glory of his grace, in which he has made us highly favored in the Beloved [one].

Meet Peoples' Needs

How do you build relationships with other people? How do you get them to want to follow you and be with you? Here are some simple things you need to take into account.

Firstly, find out what people want, then try to help them get what they want. Try and do this without sinning, and without having any selfish or wrong motives.

That kind of messes it up a little bit doesn't it? Well I'm going to show you from God's Word how you can do this.

Every one of us as human beings has some basic needs. We all have two basic needs in life.

You have heard me talk about this many times. And sometimes I may have come across as implying that because you have these needs it is a problem.

The truth of the matter is these needs are built into us. God has made us this way, and every single human being has those same needs.

What are they? They are the need to be accepted and the need to be recognized. Every one of us has those inherent needs.

People Never See Their Own Failures

Do you know that no human being ever sees bad in themselves? The most hardened criminals are known to have said,

"I'm not such a bad guy you know. I have a good heart. I just kill people for fun, but I have a good heart."

It is amazing how nobody ever sees bad in themselves. We always try and make excuses for our failures, don't we? If somebody should accuse us, we have 10 reasons why we did it. We say things like,

"Please excuse me, because I have had a tough time in life, and if you were in my position you would do that as well."

Or, "I couldn't help it. And it was Johnny's fault."

It starts in childhood already doesn't it? It is human nature for us to justify ourselves.

Some years ago, there was a system of evangelism created by a man named D. James Kennedy called Evangelism Explosion.

I personally think it was one of the best evangelistic methods that has ever been taught. In fact, I have included some of the principles in our own teaching on evangelism.

James Kennedy's method always started with two questions. They were designed to try and bring a person into the place where you could share the gospel with them.

His first question was, Are you sure that if you were to die right now that you would go to heaven?

The second question was a very powerful one that went like this. If you were to die right now and stand before God, and He was to say to you, "Why should I let you into heaven?" What would you say to Him?

Do you know what everybody would say?

"Well I've never really done anybody any harm. I'm a pretty good guy. I read my Bible, I pray occasionally, and I go to church twice a year."

People will always find something in themselves to point to that says,

"For this reason, God should let me into heaven, because of what I have done because I am inherently good you see."

We Want to Feel Important

We will never see the bad in ourselves. Is that a bad thing? Well it is human nature and it is the way God has made us.

You see it is natural to put yourself first. We want people to notice us, so we do many different things to try and get people to notice us. This is because we are important.

Often as I am driving down the road, walking or just sitting watching people, I see people with so many different shapes and sizes. I look at a person and think,

"I don't know that person and will probably never get to meet them. But to that person they are the most important person in the world."

We Want to Talk About Ourselves

Each person feels that way about themselves. It is the way God has made us. And when we speak to a person, we want them to listen to us first. We have so much to say and so much to tell. We love talking about ourselves.

Somebody once said,

"Speak to a person about himself and he will listen for hours."

We can't wait for the other person to shut up, so that we can say what we want to say. We kind of suffer and tolerate all their babbling.

We can't wait for them to get finished. Then we get in, take our chance and say what we wanted to say. Don't we do that? It is human nature.

Unfortunately, if you want to build a relationship between two people who both think they are the most important person in the world, someone will need to give. If that doesn't happen it becomes a competition.

That is why so many of us don't have relationships, because we go in competing. We want to impress people with what we have and who we are. We really don't take the time, or care enough to even listen to what they think is important.

Let Go of Your Needs

This is a basic fact of human nature. If you want to build a relationship with somebody else, the first thing you will need to do is to put your own needs and desires aside. In other words, it will cost you.

Then you need to try to meet the needs and desires of that other person. If you can do that, they will think you are the most wonderful person in the world.

They will want to talk to you for hours. In fact, they will start clinging to you and won't want to let go, because nobody in the world has ever cared before. Nobody has taken the time to listen. And even if they did, it would just go in one ear and out the other.

People don't care about anybody except themselves. So, the first step towards developing a relationship with another person is to let go of your need for acceptance and recognition. Then start giving that to the other person to meet their need.

We need grace to be able to do this, because it doesn't come naturally.