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Previous lesson on Identity by Keeley

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I. Introduction

So far in our study on identity, we’ve identity as relates to us as individuals.  Here, we’re going to look at how our identity then plays out in the relationships with have with other people.

I want to start with asking you some questions about relationships:

“Have you ever felt misunderstood?
Have you ever been hurt by what the other person said?
Have you ever had to work through a misunderstanding?
Have you ever felt like you haven’t been heard?
Have you or the other person ever held a grudge?
Have you ever experienced loneliness even when things were going well?
Have you ever been let down?
Have you ever thought, If I had only known!”
(Lane and Tripp, Relationships: A Mess Worth Making, 31)

I’m sure most of you answered yes to at least one of these questions.  That’s because relationships are hard and can be messy.  But, the fact is that we are all in relationships, whether it’s with our families, with our coworkers, with roommates, with a spouse, with friends, even with the other women in your small group.  In fact, we were created to be in relationships.

We actually are to move towards relationships, but because they are hard, we need to understand them better and our roles in them.

So here, I want to present a biblical view of relationships.  We’ll look at what a biblical relationship is meant to look like, what hope there is for us to have biblical relationships, and then how your identity forms who you are in relationships.

II. What A Biblical Relationship Is Meant To Look Like

I want us to start by looking the purest and truest biblical relationship there is.  It’s found within God as the Trinity.  The Trinity is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, 3 persons in 1 God.  God exists in perfect relationship.  The Father, Son and Holy spirit are intimately one, they are united in substance, in deity, in purpose, in mission.  They are the ultimate example of what it means to be in relationship.

A. The First Relationship: Trinity

Let’s look at 2 passages in the book of John that help us understand this a little better.

Turn to John 5:19-20–

“¹⁹…I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. ²⁰ For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does…”

We see in this passage the unity that exists between the Father and the Son.  The son can do nothing by himself, only what he sees his Father doing.  Because the Father loves Jesus perfectly, he shows him all he does, so that Jesus can perfectly follow the Father.  Jesus and the Father are united in purpose, and Jesus does what his Father is doing in the world.  He makes known to us what God is doing.

The second passage is in John 16:13-15. Here Jesus says,

“¹³ But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. ¹⁴ He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. ¹⁵ All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you.”

Here now, we see that the Holy Spirit is also in this same relationship with the Father and the Son.  The Spirit does not speak on his own, but speaks what he hears from Jesus.  Look at verse 15.  We see this perfect unity here.  It says that all that belongs to the Father, is Jesus’, and Jesus takes from that and gives it to the Spirit to make it known to us.  Each person of the Trinity has a role that they function in, but they do so in perfect unity of purpose and in perfect relationship.  It is this relationship that then provides the foundation for all other relationships.

B. Second Relationship: Us to God

Because God exists in community and in relationship, when he created us, he created us to be in community as well.

Turn to Genesis 1:26-27.  Here in verse 26, God says,

“²⁶ “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness”

Then in verse 27,

“ ²⁷ So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.”

So when God created humanity, he made us in his own image.  Because we are in his image, we too are meant to be in relationship.  We are meant to exist in community just as God does in the Trinity.

C. Third Relationship: Us to Each Other

This is why after man was created, that God said it was not good for him to be alone.  Man should exist in community.  This goes far beyond the marriage relationship though.  We are all meant to be in community and relationship with others, rather than alone.  God wants there to be other people who share in our lives with us, whether it’s family, friends, our church community, or marriage.

D. Brokenness of Relationships

So we see that in the beginning, Adam and Eve walked in the garden with God in perfect fellowship.  The relationship between humanity and God was perfect in that there were no problems.  And the relationship between persons was also as intended to be, with no problems.

It wasn’t until Genesis 3, what’s known as the fall of mankind, that we see these relationships ruptured.  First, the relationship between God and man is broken, then the relationship between man and woman:

Look at Genesis 3:8-10 says

“ ⁸ Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. ⁹ But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?”  ¹⁰ He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.””

Man is now hiding from God and afraid that God will see what he has done after he’s eaten the forbidden fruit.

Next, we see in the following verses, in Genesis 3:11-13, that the relationship between the man and woman, or between humanity, is also broken.  These verses say:

“¹¹ And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”

¹² The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

¹³ Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”

The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.””

This relationship between humans is also ruptured at the fall.  The man and woman have both eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and they are now blaming each other, refusing to take any responsibility in their role.  The man blames the woman and the woman blames the serpent.

It’s at this point that the perfect relationship that we saw existing between God and mankind, then among mankind, is broken.  As a result, the Bible tells us that all relationships have been broken.  We are all alienated from God and from each other.

QUESTION: What are some ways in which we see this brokenness in our relationships? (What are some ways our relationships with God are broken?  What are some ways our relationships with each other are broken?)

Our relationship with God is the primary relationship in our lives.  All other relationships will flow out of what your relationship to God is like.

III. What Hope There Is For Us to Have Biblical Relationships

Let’s look then at what hope there is for us to have biblical relationships.  If our relationship with God is broken, and the Bible tells us that all our relationships with God do start out broken, then what hope is there for us to have biblical relationships?

A. Christ Reconciles Us to God

Well, let’s turn to 2 Corinthians 5:17-20.  It says:

“¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ”

First off, this tells us that if you are in Christ, you are a new creation.  God has reconciled us back to him through Jesus Christ.  We have been given back that access to God, that fellowship of and relationship with God.

B. Christ Separated from the Father and Holy Spirit on Cross- Psalm 22

It’s through Christ then, that we have this reconciliation back to God.  How? Well, when Christ was dying on the cross, he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  Christ was separated from God on the cross.  When he died, he took the weight of all the brokenness of the world onto himself.  He took all of our brokenness, all of our sin, with him.  So then, when he was resurrected, and restored to fellowship with God, he brought all of his people back with him into that perfect fellowship with the Trinity.  So Christ’s death and resurrection actually allowed you and me to have restored relationship with God, and then restored relationships with others. 

C. Christ Charges Us with Reconciliation to Each Other

The passage goes on to say that Christ

“gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹ that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.”

Once you have been made a new creation, by accepting Christ, you are then given this same ministry of reconciliation.  We are then charged as Christ followers to go out and share with more people about what Christ has done.  We have been reconciled to God, so we are called to show that same reconciliation to others through our relationships with them.  The point is that because Christ has reconciled you to God, you are to then be reconciling yourself to others.  This is our identity in Christ in relationships.  We are reconcilers, meaning that we are to show people the peace, harmony, unity of purpose with God, to others that God has already shown us.  We are not to count people’s sins against them, but to forgive them and point them to Christ with our words and our actions.

The final verse, 20, says

“²⁰ We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.”

So we are ambassadors on Christ’s behalf.  Think of a modern day ambassador.  He or she is a representative of one government in the country of another.  He goes to a foreign land and represents his home country.  The dictionary says that an ambassador is “an authorized representative or messenger.”  This is what Christ says we are.  We live among a world that doesn’t know or love Christ, but we are to go and make him known and to represent Christ through our relationships with others.  But to do this, we must be reconciled to God.

IV. How Your Identity Forms Who You Are in Biblical Relationships- Practical Wisdom

So the last point is how your identity forms who you are in biblical relationships.

I’m going to give you 5 thoughts on how our identity in Christ matters for relating to other people.  This is not an exhaustive list, but it is the starting point.

1. Know who you are in Christ.

First, you have to know who you are, before you can truly function well in a relationship.  You have to know your identity in Christ.  We have lived in the broken messiness of life, but in Christ, we have been restored. Christ has freely and completely restored us to relationship with him.  And because of this, Christ has given us the ability to have restored relationships with others.

2. Know who God has gifted you to be.

You also need to know what God has gifted you for.  Who are you specifically?  What are your gifts, your talents, your spiritual gifts.  Who have you been uniquely created to be?  Unless you know who you are, you will look to other people to tell you or you will try and be who they want you to be, rather than who you are meant to be.

3. Be a Whole Person

You also need to be a complete and whole person because of God’s work in your life.  This means not looking to your mother’s approval of you to feel like you have any worth.  It means not looking to a guy to make you feel loved or good about yourself.  You have to look to God, to Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit, to find your wholeness.  That means finding your strength, your encouragement, your love, all of your identity from God and not from the person you’re relating to.  This is hard.  It takes a lot of work to understand and know yourself.  Often it requires help too, either through counseling, or seeking wisdom from a trusted Christian mentor.

4. Remember your purpose of reconciling to God.

All relationships will be difficult, because we do live in a broken and fallen world.  They will require hard work; they will not all be easy.  But we should not fear this, we should not run from conflict, we should not be afraid of losing people.  We have confidence because of our identity in Christ and what he has done for us.

Because of this, we then recognize our purpose of reconciling others to God.  That means that if the person we are relating to is not a Christian, we have to show them God’s love, be forgiving, recognize that they do not have Christ and therefore have no identity other than the one they are creating for themselves.  We must show them Christ’s love with the hope of reconciling them to God.  But we must do so within limits.  We know that until they are reconciled with God, we will not be able to have a biblical relationship with them.

On the other hand, if the person is a Christian, we must be pointing them to the reconciling work of God, in their own lives, and in your relationship.  That means bearing patiently with them, loving them in the midst of hardship, holding them accountable, and being humble and gentle with them.  This is hard and will be a constant struggle.  We must do so through Christ and the Holy Spirit.  As Christians, we are called to unity in the body of Christ, which means that there will be times that you will have to seek out a brother or sister in Christ whom you have offended or whom has offended you.  You will have to go to them in Christ’s name, and seek reconciliation.  You will be called to attempt to bring wholeness to your relationships.  It is by God’s strength that you attempt the work of reconciliation.  It is by his power, that we are called to seek the peace and health of relationships.

5. A word about dating relationships.

The last thing I want to say is about dating relationships.  We are called to have biblical dating relationships as well.  That means not dating a non-Christian.  I know, this is a hard message.  I rebelled against this for years, but God intends it for our own good.  Do not being afraid to ask a man, on the first date even, to tell you about their relationship with God. 

If you are afraid to ask, or if they don’t want to tell you, then you know that there is and will be a problem and that you will not be able to have a biblical relationship with them.  Again, seek wise counsel from a trusted Christian friend or mentor. 

Remember that you have a Christian community who is there to support you and encourage you in your pursuit of relationships with others.  They should be involved in your process of dating.  They should meet who you are dating, before you’ve already fallen in love with him and no longer want to hear other people’s thoughts on him.  They are also called as reconcilers to hold you accountable to being faithful to the calling you have in Christ.

V. Conclusion

To wrap it up, please know that I haven’t been able to cover everything in this short lesson.  If you have questions or concerns, or you’re struggling in your relationships, leave a message below.  We would love to talk with you, to meet with you, to pray with you, or to recommend further help to you.  I also want to recommend the book: Relationships: A Mess Worth Making by Tim Lane and Paul Tripp.  It’s an excellent resource and tool for helping you to understand relationships better.

In conclusion, biblical relationships are the foundation of the Christian life.  They stem from the God himself and flow to us, because we are created in God’s image and because we have been reconciled to God through Christ.  We are called to move toward biblical relationships in all of our life, showing others who God is through our actions and words.

Questions for Discussion and Application

1. In which relationships do you struggle to maintain your identity? How?
2. How does knowing about God’s true design and hope for relationships help you think about those relationships?

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