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On Godly Relationships

Dear Friends,

The inky blackness that spills so early over the countryside in winter had crept upon us before we reached our house, finding me in the back seat of the van, between a sleeping baby and a wakeful one. I held the soft hand of my little brother, stroking his fingers, listening to his sweet baby songs, and in the peaceful darkness marveling at it all.

Two babies keep a house lively. Very lively. Perhaps that’s why the quiet moments, when the chaos settles into babbling baby song or drowsy storytime or a soft hand to hold in the car, touch so deeply. Love for little ones is so pure… so simple… and rendered all the more beautiful in its innocence. For with any of us, but especially a baby, the future is vague and filled with uncertainties. Even as we love these dear little ones we can’t know what the outcome of that love will be—yet for today we can only love, committing tomorrow to the tender care of the Author of that love, trusting Him to draw them to Himself and make our loved ones ours forever.

Somehow, such love clarifies our vision. Complexities often cloud other relationships, but looking at my baby brother and sister, I see true brotherly love, and its clear desire: that its object have the best. That realization clears the clouds away. How can what shows so plainly with my brothers and sisters be so obscure with brothers and sisters in Christ? Relationships compose all that endures of this life—relationships with God and with others. Maybe that’s why so much of our thought, our conversation, and our learning is geared toward trying to understand and strengthen them. In the late-night discussions that leave us bleary-eyed in the morning, I’ve many times explored with a friend or sister the facets of relationships: why they work or don’t work, problems with them and how they could be improved. And more than once, spurred by our own wonderings and watching people around us, these conversations lead to a question about one particular facet: How would God have us as Christian young ladies relate to young men?

Much has been written about courtship and betrothal, and I trust you’re familiar with the principles behind them. That’s not what I mean to write about here, anyway. We range into territory less explored: What guidelines has God given us for the everyday associations, for the casual acquaintances? Even—or perhaps I should say especially—when we’ve determined to avoid dating and its problems, we have a lot to sort out about other guy/girl relationships.

We never have to discuss the matter for long before someone brings up the passage that exhorts us to treat “younger men as brothers… and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.”* (1 Timothy 5:1-2)NIV

Just as quickly, someone always points out, “But a lot of things you can do with your brother that you can’t properly do with some other young man.” Admittedly. “There must be more to it than that.”

There is. And there isn’t. At least, in a concept God showed me in that passage recently.

I remember our love for our babies, my brother and sister. What does brotherly love inspire, but to desire the best for them? And what is best, but a close relationship with the Lord, seeking and doing His perfect will?

Then I realize that perhaps the real question we should each ask about interactions with brothers in Christ is, “Will my words, actions, dress, and attitude build them up in their relationship to Christ?” If what we do or say or think would in anyway sidetrack or stall them, it doesn’t show Christian love. Yet how easy it is to relate in a way that seeks to further human relationships more than the relationship of man to his Maker!

Granted, it’s a simple thought. Further study could no doubt yield a wealth of formulas, principles, and applications; probably someone somewhere has thought them up already. Still, at the moment this idea captures me perhaps even more in its freshness and simplicity.

The challenge will come in living it out, for I see at once that the new picture it paints leaves no room for some things.

Curiously, even as we’ve turned away from the usual teenage activities (which for girls seem often to involve young men in one sense or another, whether flirting with them, looking beautiful for them, talking about them, or spending time with them), even as we endeavor to learn skills and build character fitting for our future, we too often seem to stumble into a trap we never expected.

We distort an esteem of marriage and homemaking as an honorable, God-given pursuit into seeking marriage rather than seeking God.

We forget that the path we esteem was meant as a way to honor and serve God, and begin to see it as an end unto itself.

We don’t realize that we need to seek the Lord first and always, and that in Him and only in Him—not in any man, however godly and God-given—will we find “fulness of joy.”* (Psalm 16:11)

So we panic. I know; I’ve seen it, heard it, even done it. (The soppy books about girls who have had ten proposals by the time they’re sixteen probably don’t help much, either!) And, in case God’s forgotten the impossibility of becoming a godly homemaker without a husband with whom to establish that home (not to mention our own frightening visions of becoming old maids, as if no fate could be worse), we wonder if maybe we should—er—no, we don’t want to think of it that way, but maybe, um, help God a little bit? We fear to leave the matter solely in His hands; moreover, we remain concerned about the matter, as if we cannot be entirely satisfied and fulfilled with only God.

No wonder wisdom exhorts us, “Above all else, guard your heart.”* (Proverbs 4:23)NIV What deception our hearts can unwittingly nurture!

Yet distracted though we may be at times by fears or doubts or confusions—consumed as we may be by our own lives and struggles—we are not freed from our responsibility to others. As brothers and sisters in Christ, we are supposed to esteem others as more than ourselves and look out for their interests before our own…. We not only need to guard our own hearts; we also need to watch for the condition of others. To the extent that our actions or attitudes can make a difference, we are responsible for our effect on others.

The thought sobers me. How then could I even in unguarded moments entertain a thought of attracting a young man’s attention? Do I really desire him to turn his eyes away from the Lord and toward me? Dare I make his Christian walk harder, and throw distractions in the way? In those terms, I couldn’t want that!

And why worry that I somehow need to help God to make His will plain? Yes, in the proper time a woman can be a good and God-given addition to a man’s life—but only when the match and timing align with the Lord’s will. Until then it can only be a distraction, diverting his gaze from that will. And when the right time comes, if he’s looking only for God’s guidance as He lays the path before him, will not that Guide be both a surer and purer one than the efforts of some female to attract the fellow’s attention?

It keeps our responsibility toward the young men we know in clear focus. We dare not let ourselves become diversions to them; in all our interactions we must have clearly in mind their relationship with Christ and how we can help and not hinder that. Our conduct based on that may vary from situation to situation—but we won’t wrong our brothers if we seek to further their relationship with Christ rather than with us. And if in God’s time and His plan He weaves together the details that bring each of us together with our lifetime companion, won’t it be far more beautiful than anything we could have authored?

The thought brings with it another sobering reminder: if we allow our thoughts and emotions to stray toward young men outside of the right time and the right one, we, too, glance away from God’s path.

This perspective on relationships will take much work to learn, but we have numerous opportunities to practice it. For although I saw this principle first in the picture I’ve shared of relating to young men, that’s only a small part of it. The concept goes much further, touching how we relate to everyone we know: family members, friends, strangers. Through its lens I see what trouble I could have avoided in some relationships, what benefit could have been gained by it in others. If only I had understood!

Dimly now I recognize that this idea of Christ-centered relationships is not a new one, but one often spoken of—indeed, I know people who relate in this way, and I admired them for it even while blind to the pattern they followed. Yet seeds that had lain in my mind as mere words and vague concepts before suddenly burst into bloom now.

All this is fresh to me yet. It’s easy to see in theory the importance of centering our relationships on Christ; it’s much more difficult to actually do it. I sense that progress will be slow—that it will require constant reminders, much prayer, more than a few fumbles. Problems plague real-life relationships, not the smallest of which is the little time we have to consider what we say and do beforehand. Still, I see what a difference this mindset could make in all my relationships—what blessed relief it spells from the smothering confines of self—and I want to strive for it. And working on perspective must come first; for although face-to-face encounters with others leave us little time to examine what we do, except in retrospect, “Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?”* (James 3:11)NIV—even a drop? Yet we cannot seem to help doing so, unless we be filled with His thoughts and His attitudes. Perhaps I should have waited to share these things with you until I have more experience applying them to lend credence to my words. Then again, perhaps I need the accountability. As I seek to make Christ the center of all my relationships, if you have done or are doing the same, would you share with me what you learn?

O Lord, give us purity and clarity of focus in our relationships, that our lives may honor You!

For His glory,
Fairlight