trust God with our relationships

I heard a wise man say recently that every relationship worth something to us much have some forgiveness in it.  Surely you have learned as I have that relationships take work.  Relationships that we don't work at just don't work.  Unless the 2 people in the relationship want to make it work it won't work still.

In the last week or so I have had to have some tough conversations.  Some in my personal relationships.  Others were in counseling.  Yet everyone was something that needed to be prayed over and given to God.  Some still have a long way to God, and even then, we are praying that God shows up.

Thinking about relationships 2 things come to mind:

Proverbs 3:5 (NLT) 
Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding.

On our own, we fail.  One friend I have been talking with knows what failure is all about.  Yet as we have talked and prayed, we are believing God for a miracle.  That means we have to trust God and not trust what we know or think.

Ephesians 4:15 (NLT)
Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church.

Speaking the truth is always right.  Some of the time, the truth hurts.  Yet when we fail to speak or fail to speak in love, our relationships are destined for failure. That means we are destined for more pain and more heart ache.  None of us want to go their.

Be the first.  Step up.  Don't let somebody else take your place.  You be the first one to forgive.  Seek to restore your relationship.  Stop living with and putting up with severed, stressful and sick relationships.  Trust God.  Speak the truth in love.  And forgive.  Jesus taught us how.  Now, go live it out as you and I trust God with our relationships.

Colossians 3:13 (NLT)
Make allowance for each other's faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.