Recap on relationships/ with speaker Lindsey

To begin relationships with Psalm 34:8, where it says "Taste and see that the Lord is good" is a very good start to accepting and understand relationships.
Relationships are defined as the way we connect and interact with others. This was our foundational day to this topic.
The Bible points out relationships as very important. This caught me off gaurd. I always have thoughts about if I just knew that I wasn't to be married or have a boyfriend in my life, then I can just get rid of all those thoughts and desires and questions and worry about and concern my thoughts on bigger and better things. Yes call it a nun. But I learned it's not enough and even healthy to be alone. I think about monks and what they do and almost aspire because it just seems so hard to seperate yourself from the world. I mean I can't say I understand them and their philosophy since I've not been a monk, but I do know taking yourself into captivity withyourself and God to just be at most peace and follow him isn't the way. We were created to be relational. To interact. The way we reflect God in our lives is shined through the way we treat others.
This is so CLEAR when we look at the way we treat our families. This was the hardest for me because it's completely true. Perhaps you feel this way too. You treat others kindly. You get into your house with your family who knows you best and you know them best, and you start saying, "Dad I don't want to do that why don't you make Kale do that?" When if someone outside my family asked I probably would just serve them no problem. Can anyone else relate? Especially as teenagers, there's this distance you feel you must keep from your parents and rebel, and you really have no clue why. In fact you get into a bigger pit of pain because you feel terrible and see the sorry but you can't explain or understand why you feel and act this way. Mom, Dad, I can never say I'm sorry enough.
Anyways, Genesis says that All of life is centered around relationships. PEOPLE. Think about the trinity, 3 in 1. That was the first. Then the relationship between man and God. God and Adam. Then God saw that Adam wasn't healthy enough to be with just himself. God saw that Adam was lonely and created a partner: Eve. Yes deceiving Eve. Then that created the the 3rd relationship, man between man.
I want to write this RULE, I wrote down from Lindsey.
You must love God. You must love others. God's relationship with Adam is perfect, but God says it's not enough. It's not GOOD. God is not enough for us. He will be sufficient to US, through people. We need relationships!
Loneliness...leads to Guilt...leads to needing more of GOD? No! God says you need people!
You need people to grow in your relationship with God. Think about this: How many of the 10 commandments can you keep without others?
This love in relationships, is not levels either. I have had this discussion many of times with Jeff Baxter. He claims I am a better 'person' than he is. Therefore he values me over himself. No one is valued more than another. God created you. God created your neighbor. God created all of us so how can you say that he created one thing better than another? We're all in his image and if you don't value parts of his image, then you're not lifting ALL of him up. Right Jeff? :) You never know when that little face of a child who is tugging on your clothes begging you for money or that prince on his throne overseaing his kingdom, which is better? You can't put more value on one than the other.
This goes then to our values.
In order to know your value system, look at the choices in your life. What do you spend time/money on? Looking into my life, it's very clearly that I value health and fitness which could correlate with image and not even in the sense that I want to look good physically but perhaps also on the playing soccer field. I can attest yes to that.
We must let God realign our value system, then our actions will act out of that. If you want to change your behaviors, change your values! Rich vs Poor. Educated vs non-educated.
I had a heart in thinking about this with my new friend Grace here. When she did her DTS, her team was going to Thailand. She said we had to really pray about it before we went because we were going to go against many of our values we thought were true to us. She said that in Thailand, they serve food to westerners as a good sign. They love to heap more and more food and it's a sign of graciousness and thankfulness and it's actually rude not to eat as much as you can. Grace said that the food they have to serve, of course is rice and greasy chicken. The girls who were going on this outreach to Thailand had to accept that they were going to gain weight. For 3 months, not able to eat healthily and workout whenever they pleased, they were going to gain weight. BUT, what was the reason they were going? What was more important? Spreading the bread of the Lord to them to have everlasting life, or maintain their image outwardly? That hit me hard, because that would really be one of the hardest things for me. Grace said that through the 3 months, they gained a bit, but realizing the purpose made you get through it with a new value and with God's purpose as the light at the end. She had said, we knew that we could take a month or 2 to burn off those calories later. But God's value was to come first.
Now to shift to another day Lindsey spoke we learned about Grace and Love. I've heard this now more than once and I think I'll hear it much more, but she said that no other religion out there has GRACE. Christianity is the only religion where we have grace. We don't earn our way to be saved, we just are saved as we are. Our originiality with God.
To be brief, we looked into the Ephesians. We looked at their struggle and then who they were. One side said their struggles were all the sins we ALL have. Stealing, Lying, Anger and more and more and then the type of people Paul said they were, he called them blessed, chosen, holy, blameless, loved and on and on these wonderful things. So even though they sinned and sinned and forever will continue to miss the mark, he still had grace. This means he loved them unconditionally. Paul saw in the Ephesians what God sees in us, this unconditional LOVE!
I must go and do some work for my local outreach, which is creating bulliten boards for WC 2010, I also am checking on Kosie's bike, Matty I just read your email and I at least will see if there's pain in my knee. If not I'll be in the pool again. Went on long walk this morning with Justine before worship and it's off and on with my pain. I think I shall look into sports physio. Oh man. Anyways, I still have Lindsey's talk about sex to come. Also my book report and journal to share. Hope you're having peace in your day. Rejoice in His name always, and again I say, rejoice. With my pain, I must still lift Him up. Good luck All Whites! :)