“Pain is inevitable and suffering is optional.”

-Dr. James B. Richards 

Whether you are single or married, relationships are the center to all of our lives. God is so interested in relationships that he sent his only son to create a bridge for us to have a relationship with Him. Once this relationship is established He then turns our focus to others around us- this begins the process of change. The Lord often uses relationships to change us - but we often use relationships to try to change others. Focusing on other’s faults helps us to feel better about who we are. Doing this makes the search for peace incredibly elusive. Concentration on others never brings peace to us, only continued discontentment.

Whoever believes “Love means to never have to say your sorry” obviously has never had a meaningful relationship in their life. Relationships are filled with everlasting possibilities of forgiveness. Few couples understandhow to process through disagreements to achieve an attitude of forgiveness. Most arguments bog down in the middle, never finding the happy ending. Disagreements begin with an initial point of contention. As voices grow louder and louder, the argument spreads to several differing issues which usually never have anything to do with the first misunderstanding. Now the argument is about three subjects instead of just one.

Eventually someone is ready to say “ok, yea I’m always the one that is wrong, well I’m sorry, I’m just real sorry”. By now the argument has carried the couple through the kitchen to the living room back to the bedroom and once again to the kitchen. This process continues until there is the final crescendo scream “well everything is my fault, I’m just sorry.” “Well fine you just be sorry!” as the door comes crashing closed. Next there are blaring thoughts bouncing off the rafters of the house of how unfairly and unjustly accused you are once again. You have just become the victim of this tyranny of dictatorship once more.

Who we are is determined by the choices that we make every day. Our greatest challenge is to make choices which nurture better relationships with others and with Christ; yet, somehow, we continue to make the same recurring, self-destructing decisions. It is astounding how easily such poisonous and detrimental patterns can so skillfully permeate one’s rational thinking. All of us wrestle with making these types of choices in some area of our life, so no one is alone in this battle. Lord, thank You for Your ever present love, and the reminder that as we battle with the daily choices we must make in this imperfect world, that Your grace is sufficient for us.

We are all very quick to criticize the choices of others. We think such thoughts as “Why does he still smoke when he has been diagnosed with lung cancer? Why does she continue to eat sweets when she is a diabetic? Why can’t he see that his alcoholism is destroying him, his family, and his career?” Blaming others, even those we are closest to, and whom we love the most, is very easy. It removes the microscope from our own life, and focuses it on someone else. Jesus teaches us by saying, “How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? “ (Matthew 7:4 NIV)