Relational Success: Taking Relational Responsibility (Stewarding a Relational Revolution Pt. 3) | 08-02-26

Thank you, Lord.

Thank you, Lord.

Father, we pray as we approach your word today that you would speak, that you would change our minds, that there would be metanoia would happen, that repentance would happen, that we would change what we believe to be true about relationships, about you, about ourselves, and about others.

Change us today by your word, by your truth in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Thank you guys so much.

Thank y'all.

Are they amazing?

Let's give our worship team a hand, the Levites leading us into the presence of God.

What a blessing they are.

You guys are blessed.

Y'all are blessed.

We're continuing our series on relational success.

Today is the third message in the series: Relational Success Part Three, Stewarding a Relational Revolution.

But the title of today's message is Taking Relational Responsibility.

And it may be the most important message that you will ever hear on relational health.

This message that you're about to hear today may be the most important message that I ever communicate on relational health.

As a pastor and as a counselor, a licensed clinical Christian counselor, I spend a lot of time helping people repair relationships, helping them repair their relationship with God and their relationship with others.

And essentially, all the pain in life comes from broken relationship with God and broken relationship with people.

Therefore, all the blessings in life come from the reconciliation of our relationship with God and the reconciliation of our relationship with people.

Matthew 22, verse 36.

Matthew 22:36

Teacher, Jesus was asked, which is the great commandment in the law?

One translation said, What is the greatest commandment in the law?

Jesus said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and with all your mind.

This is the first and great commandment.

And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

In other words, Jesus was saying the entire old covenant can be summed up with this, and we know he was introducing the new covenant.

Jesus' ministry introduced the new covenant as we talked about during communion this morning.

But true success is relational success.

True success in life is relational success.

There is no other success that is legitimate outside of great relationship with God and great relationship with people.

Have great quality if you can have great quality of relationship with God, with people, and with yourself, you will have accomplished the whole goal of the Bible and consequently will have achieved ultimate success in life.

And so, in light of this truth, I believe that the principles that govern lasting and healthy relationships have to be the most important principles that we can ever know and learn and apply to our life, right?

And I believe that what I'm gonna begin for the next few weeks communicating to you is the following things, if consistently applied, will lead to guaranteed relational success.

So I'm gonna share, like I said, over the next month or so, five different things, what I believe five different governing principles of relational success are.

Number one, the first one is take relational responsibility.

One of the most important things you can ever understand is that your relational health is your responsibility.

Your relational health is your responsibility.

To believe otherwise is to be a relational victim.

Your lack of relational health is always everyone else's fault, never your own.

Your isolation is due to the rejection and the disinterest of others.

And as long as that is our attitude, we will be relational victims.

If you don't currently have deep and meaningful relationships with healthy people, then you are the only one to blame.

Let me say it like this.

If I don't have deep, meaningful relationships with healthy people, I am the only one that can be blamed for that.

Either you are violating the principles that govern relational health, or you are so personally unhealthy that no one can afford to be your close friend, except, of course, for other unhealthy people.

And that's basically just trauma bonding.

Your personal health is also your responsibility, okay?

Your relational health is your responsibility, and your personal health is your responsibility.

Nobody else can be blamed for the condition of your relational health or your personal health.

The fact that anybody on the planet has healthy relationships proves that.

The fact that anybody on the planet has a healthy soul proves that.

Life is hard for everybody.

Everybody has been abused, everybody has been rejected, everybody has personality uh shortcomings and temperament weaknesses, like being introverted or extremely shy, all of those things, none of those, none of those things can stop you from building healthy relationships and being a healthy soul.

And the fact that Jesus sat thousands of years ago around a table with disciples and held up that bread that we remembered today and held up that cup, he said, I'm handling the business here.

The brokenness between you and God and the brokenness between you and each other, it ends today.

The rules and all of that, the performance is over.

The new covenant begins today.

And as long as he is Lord, nobody has any excuse for broken relationship with God or broken relationship with other people.

Romans 14, 7 says, For we don't live for ourselves or die for ourselves.

If we live, it's to honor the Lord, and if we die, it's to honor the Lord.

So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.

Christ died and rose again for this very purpose.

Listen to this.

You want to know why Christ died and rose again?

You're about to find out.

The Bible's gonna tell you the very reason Christ died and rose again for this very purpose to be Lord both of the living and of the dead.

He died and rose again to be Lord.

Lord of who?

Lord of you.

So why do you condemn another believer?

Why do you look down on another believer?

Remember, we will all stand before the judgment seat of God, for the scriptures say, as surely as I live, says the Lord, every knee will bend to me and every tongue will confess and give me uh praise, give praise to God.

Yes, each one of us, listen, will give a personal account to God.

So we stand on our own before God, and that's a good thing.

What he's saying is nobody, nobody has enough power to keep you from me.

Nobody has enough power to keep you unhealthy.

You are personally accountable to God, you have all the power that is available to you in this new covenant.

And he says, your personal health and your relational health, it's up to you.

It's up to you.

And so I wanted to start it off with that truth because over the years I've seen a lot of people feel like they just got dealt a bad hand, and they got, you know, they started from such a deficit that they just can't bridge the gap.

Let me tell you something.

It's even ground at the cross.

It's even ground.

And we all start from the same place at the cross of Jesus Christ, and that is why we have to be born again.

And so from that place of even ground, we all get the same opportunities, we all have the same ability to make these choices that lead, to operate by these principles that lead to relational success with God and with others.

If you haven't heard the previous messages, go back and listen to that because we covered a lot of ground so far.

A lot of ground.

But now we're going to get into, I've talked a lot of kind of principle and let me say like this spiritual principle stuff.

And now we're going to talk biblical principle, which is still spiritual, but we're going to get very practical.

We're going to get very practical.

And so as I share these five governing principles of relational success, there's going to be some very practical things that you can take and begin to immediately apply to your life and to your relationships, and you will get immediate results.

How many of you like immediate results?

Four, so here's four essential elements of relational responsibility.

We're talking about taking relational responsibility.

So what does that look like?

I don't just want to say you need to take relational responsibility.

Now go do it in Jesus' name.

I could do that, and that would be enough.

But I'm going to give you four essential elements of relational responsibility.

Number one, initiation.

Initiation.

This means to cause or facilitate the beginning of something, to take the lead, to pioneer, to signal desire, interest, and priority.

Now, let me tell you something.

You will not have healthy relationships if you do not become a person of initiation.

You have to initiate.

The second is this reciprocation.

I'm going to go through these and explain these in more detail, but I'm going to hit these four right now.

Reciprocation is a response, mutual or equivalent exchange of what was received.

A response, mutual or equivalent exchange of what was received.

The next one is communication.

This is the successful conveying or sharing of thoughts, ideas, information, and feelings.

A process by which information is exchanged between individuals through a common system of language, communication.

And then the fourth one is this evaluation.

This is periodically examining the fruit of a relationship to ensure its health, alignment, and purpose and making adjustments as needed.

Okay, initiation, reciprocation, communication, and evaluation.

These are four essential elements of relational responsibility.

We're going to unpack those.

But let me throw this out there, and I was feeling this even during our communion moment.

What is relationship?

What is it?

It's communion.

It's communion according to the new covenant that Jesus instituted.

We have communion with him and we have communion with other believers.

It's koininea or fellowship, the word for fellowship in the Greek, and it means an interchange or sharing of thoughts, emotions, or feelings.

It means intimacy or intimate communication or fellowship.

So here's what I want to say: communion is connection.

So relational health is all about connection.

Communication is about connection.

Connection, connection, connection.

Come on, say connection.

Communion is about connection.

Communication makes connection possible.

You cannot have connection without communication.

And you can't have a healthy relationship without initiation.

You have to initiate.

Let me read you some scriptures and I think you'll see some of these principles in there.

James 4, 7.

Says, therefore, submit to God.

Okay?

What is that?

Initiation.

We're coming before the Lord.

We're bringing ourselves before the Lord and we're submitting to Him.

We're initiating.

And what's going to happen?

Then He says, resist the devil and he will flee from you.

Draw near to God.

What is that?

More initiation.

And he will do what?

He will draw near to you.

What is that?

Reciprocation.

You have initiation and reciprocation.

It's what makes our relationship with God work, and it's what makes our relationships with other people work.

Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

What is that?

Evaluation, right?

Being aware that you have some faults and you have some things that might hurt and tear up and destroy a relationship, and you need to get that right.

And so we initiate, God reciprocates, and then we evaluate.

Jeremiah 29.

This is what the Lord says.

What's he saying?

I'll initiate with you.

It's not just us initiating with him, I'll initiate with you.

I will come to you and fulfill my good promise, bringing you back to this place.

Listen, for I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord.

Plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you a hope in a future, then you will call on me.

God's saying, I'll initiate with you, and then what do I expect from you?

Reciprocation.

We initiate with God, He reciprocates with us, we communicate, we evaluate.

God initiates with us, we reciprocate with Him.

Listen, you will come and you will pray to me.

What does that mean?

You will initiate and you'll communicate.

And then He says this, and I will listen to you, because how many of you know communication isn't just talking?

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Okay?

Again, Matthew 7, verse 7.

Matthew 7:7

Keep on asking and you will receive what you ask for.

What is that?

Initiate.

Jesus says, initiate and keep on initiating.

Keep on initiating.

Don't just initiate once, initiate over and over and over and over and over again.

And what does he promise for those who will initiate?

You will receive what you ask for.

Listen again, keep on seeking.

What is that?

Initiate.

And what'll happen?

You will find.

Keep on knocking.

Keep on knocking.

What is knocking?

When you're knocking at someone's door, what are you doing?

You are initiating.

You're saying, I'm here and I want to talk to you.

I'm here and I want to meet with you.

Keep on initiating and the door will be open to you.

That's a promise from Jesus.

For everyone who asks, receives, everyone who seeks finds, and everyone who knocks, the door will be open to you.

But again, if we're relational victims, then we just sit back and we wait on everybody else to knock on our door.

We sit on our couch and we wait on our phone to ring and our door to get knocked on, and we sit there and complain that nobody loves me, nobody likes me, they're all doing all this other stuff out there, and look how close they are, and look at them, and we sit there, and he and Jesus is going, What are you doing?

Do you know how this works?

Let me show you how the kingdom of God operates.

You know, Jesus would illustrate the kingdom of God.

He would come to people and go, the kingdom of God is like, and he would share a story.

In other words, like if you want in on it, you got to know how it operates, and you have to align yourself with it.

Or what he said is, or you're gonna miss the kingdom.

Revelation 3 20, Jesus says, Look, behold, get a picture of this, visualize this.

I stand at the door and knock.

What's he doing?

He's initiating.

Listen to what he says.

And if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in.

He initiates.

If you reciprocate, then he will come in and we will share a meal as friends.

What is that?

Communion.

We'll have fellowship.

We'll have fellowship.

It'll be glorious.

Matthew 11, verse 28.

Matthew 11:28

Then Jesus said, Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

What's he saying?

Initiate with me.

Even the invitation is actually him initiating with you.

But then he's saying, Come to me, right?

In other words, I'm initiating with you, but I need you to initiate with me.

And then what will happen, Jesus, if I do that?

And who's he talking to?

Those who are weary and carry heavy burdens.

How insensitive of Jesus to not come to you.

What an insensitive Savior we have who gave his life for us.

No.

He says, if you're hurting, if you've got trauma, if you're wounded emotionally, mentally, your heart is heavy, you've carry, you've got burdens from the past, you've got relational abuse and rejection and trauma, all of that stuff.

What does he say?

He says, get up and come to me.

Come on.

Get up and come to me.

You who are weary and carry hairy burdens, I and what happens?

I will give you rest.

Take my yoke.

In other words, receive from me.

Take my yoke upon you.

Let me teach you, there's communication, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

For your souls.

For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.

What he's saying is this is how the kingdom of God works.

Matthew 5, 23.

So if you are presenting a sacrifice at the altar in the temple, and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you.

In other words, there's a relational issue.

Leave your sacrifice there at the altar.

Go and be reconciled to that person, then come and offer your sacrifice to God.

Isn't that crazy?

He says, literally, it's more important than worshiping him at his altar.

If you realize there's a fracture in an important relationship, okay, the context there is this is a relationship that matters.

This is a relationship that doesn't need to be stressed or fractured.

It says if something's not right relationally, it interrupts your worship.

Leave, go take care of it, go and be reconciled to that person.

That's always God's heart.

Then come and offer your sacrifice.

To God.

Initiation.

Initiation is the way that you sow seed into a relationship.

It's also the way that you bring balanced effort into a relationship, relational responsibility.

What happens if you sow?

Law of the kingdom.

Jesus said the kingdom of God is like this.

What happens if you sow?

You reap.

What happens if you don't sow?

You don't reap.

There's no harvest.

Initiation is the way you sow seed into a relationship.

It's also the way that you bring balanced effort into the relationship.

One-sided relationships are never healthy.

They will only always be half of what they could be.

The harvest of that relationship will be thin and it will allow weeds of frustration and resentment to grow.

All you have to do is fail to initiate enough relationally to handicap a relationship.

So listen to me, listen to me.

If you have someone in your life that you know God brought to you and you know that it is an important relationship, initiate, initiate, initiate.

I really feel like this is the one thing that people are really bad at.

Unless people just don't like me.

Unless people just don't like you.

Right?

Have you ever noticed that?

It's like initiate, initiate, initiate.

It's as simple as a text message, a phone call, a gift, a prayer, followed by a text message.

Like it's not this big thing.

It's like a seed of faith.

It's just a mustard seed is all it takes.

But it's gotta be something.

Because again, initiation communicates, it signals something.

And he and here's why it's so vital.

Because to initiate relationally is to signal desire.

What you're saying is, I desire relationship with you.

When you initiate communication, that is telling that person, I'm thinking about you.

You crossed my mind, and I stopped what I was doing to initiate relationally with you.

It's to signal interest.

When you initiate relationally, you're telling that person, I am interested in you.

I'm interested in you, I'm interested in who you are as a person, I'm interested in what's going on in your life, I'm interested.

And it also is signals priority when you initiate.

We're all busy, right?

Everybody's busy.

Everybody's busy.

And so when someone initiates relation with me, it energizes the relationship and oxygenates the relationship, and I go, oh, okay.

This person desires relationship with me.

Uh, they're interested in relationship with me, and I'm prior, they're willing to prioritize the relationship with me.

So let me say it like this: a lack of initiation communicates that you don't desire a relationship, that you really aren't that interested, and that it's certainly not a priority.

And so hear me, hear me, hear me.

It doesn't matter why you aren't initiating.

And many of you know we're all feel justified in the fact that we don't initiate relationally.

And again, this is only relationships you desire to be in.

I'm not telling you to relationship to initiate with people you don't desire relationship with.

You have to initiate people you do desire relationship with.

So it doesn't matter why you're not, there's really no excuse like personality, temperament, whether you're introverted or extroverted, there's no excuse.

Uh this is a law like gravity, right?

If you climb up on the top of this building and you jump off or you fall off, it doesn't matter, you know, how great of a person you are, how bad of a person you are.

Like it doesn't, there's nothing that's gonna trump that law of gravity.

This is a law of relationships.

Nothing's gonna trump it.

It doesn't matter what what the issue is.

And so I'm um there's a reason I'm going hard at this right now, okay?

Because as a pastor and as a counselor, I'm telling you, this is an area that people aren't doing well.

They're not doing well, they're failing in this area.

I give everybody a big F in this area, okay?

You've failed, all of you.

There's no exceptions.

None of you are good at this, okay?

Including myself.

We all need to grow in this area.

And if, listen to me, if the quality of your relationships improve, the quality of your life will improve.

And it depends on you initiating relationally with people.

Come on, say initiate.

Everybody's busy, we're all busy.

I've seen another thing, I've seen people say, Well, I just don't want to bother you.

I know you're busy, I know you got a lot going on.

I'm like, you don't want to bother me.

Are we friends?

What, like, are we aren't you my uh mom?

You know, like what do you mean?

You're my mom.

Call me, text me.

And so always assume, listen, this is this is key here.

I think one of the reasons we we fail to initiate is because we don't assume that the health of the relationship is our responsibility.

Somehow, somehow, we've let ourselves off the hook and we put the other person on the hook.

Some way, somehow, we believe it's their responsibility to carry the weight of the relationship.

It's their responsibility to initiate with me.

Why would we do that?

Why would we take ourselves off the hook and put somebody else on the hook?

Why would we do that?

Because we are sinful and we're irresponsible by nature.

And we have to fight against that thing in us.

We have to fight against every single thing that would cause us to shut down and isolate and stay quiet and stay silent and not initiate relationally with people.

Okay.

So there are some relationships that it is appropriate to be the primary initiator with.

In other words, let me say it the other way around.

There's some relationships where it's appropriate that maybe there's not an equal balance.

I believe the healthiest relationships, there's an equal balance of initiation.

If you go back and look at your text thread, right, it's they text you, hey, thinking about you today, love you.

I was reading this scripture and I thought about you.

Thank you for this, thank you for that.

Hey, you want to grab coffee?

Want to grab lunch, right?

Yeah, you can go through your text thread and you can see if people ever text you and initiate with you.

And it used to, you know, you had to call the home phone or knock on the door.

You ever get a knock on your door and and and you're not expecting somebody?

You're like, I'm not answering that.

You just sit there, I just sit there.

I'm like, if that was anybody that I wanted to answer the door for, they would have texted me first, right?

Nowadays, you if your phone rings and they didn't text you, you're like, I'm not answering that.

I'm not expecting a call.

Texting is like knocking on the door, letting someone know.

So there are some times where there it doesn't have to be evil.

Let me let me share some examples.

Um leaders in your life.

Uh, for me, my pastors, I was always the primary initiator with my pastors, with my bosses that I, people I worked for, people that were in authority in my life, my parents.

Um, I I looked at part of my responsibility as the person under their authority is to is to help help them carry the weight of their responsibility by taking some of that off of them, right?

And being the primary initiator.

But if I never got communication from them, that would that would hurt.

That would be like, what's the deal?

Like, I never get a text, I never get a phone call, I never get initiation from them.

So again, balance, what you're looking for is balance, but in some situations, it's okay if you're the primary initiator.

Um, also, friends that are going through a rough patch in life, okay?

And let me let me put this disclaimer out there that's temporary, okay?

Friends that are hurting, friends that are going through a rough patch.

Someone had a baby, somebody's sick, somebody's going through a hard time just personally, um, relationally, that that there is times where you go, you know what?

I'm putting this principle aside.

I'm going to come meet them where they are.

I'm going to initiate with them.

I'm going to pray for them.

I'm going to call.

I'm going to have a prophetic word for them.

Like I'm going to initiate.

I know that they don't, they're worn out right now.

Now, if they're always going through a rough patch and never walking in victory, that is chronic unhealth, and you will never be able to have a healthy relationship with that person.

You'll never be able to.

I'm not saying don't love on them.

I'm just saying understand if they're always in a situation where they can't put in effort and make sacrifices, um, that's a chronically unhealthy person, and a healthy relationship is not possible.

And so we have to have what I call relational grace.

You have to have relational grace.

All right, now let's talk about reciprocation.

Did I hammer initiation enough?

I can keep going.

Steve says yes, so I'll stop.

Steve's squirming in his seat over there.

I'm gonna get a lot of text messages this week, I have a feeling.

All right.

You can text me.

Text me your comment.

All right, hang on.

Let me let me get through this.

Reciprocation.

I have a lot of content here because we haven't even gotten to communication, and that's the biggest one of the day.

Um reciprocation, be responsive.

Like reciprocation is someone initiated with you, right?

If it's someone you want a relationship with.

If you don't want a relationship with that person, don't respond.

That's the best, fastest way you can get a relationship to die is be unresponsive.

But one of the most frustrating things to me is unresponsiveness.

In medical terms, if someone is unresponsive, that's a code red.

Like they're getting the paddles out.

If you want the relationship to die, be unresponsive.

And once the other person picks up on it and they stop initiating, then the relationship will die.

But anytime someone sends you a message of any level of importance, message back in some way letting them know you got it.

I told you this was going to get practical.

Feedback is a sign of vitality.

You know the little blip thing they hook you up to?

What's it called?

Heart rate monitor.

Or it's flatlined, right?

If you initiate with somebody or you communicate something to somebody, you are looking for feedback.

You're looking for some indicator that they got your message and that they understand.

Feedback is a vital sign.

I call it I call it closing the communication loop.

If you don't close the loop, everything just keeps on going, right?

Close the communication loop is a vital sign of healthy relational connection.

And today it's never been easier.

It's never been easier to do this.

Um reactions on text messages, social media, uh, something like a Slack app or any kind of communication tool, group me or whatever, anytime someone's communicating, there should be some sort of a response.

Um, so a reaction, a thumbs up, a like, or a simple, okay, got it.

Those things are part of healthy interchange, healthy relationships, responsibility in relationships.

Every vehicle for communication is vital, and you cannot afford to be bad at any of them.

You have to prioritize figuring it out.

So now for the older generation, that is a challenge because one of the biggest tools for communication now is technology.

Technology is incredible.

Communication has never been uh able to be stronger and better in the history of the world than the season that we're living in.

And you have to have to learn how to use these tools.

And so if you struggle with that, talk to somebody who can help and teach you how to figure that kind of stuff out.

I feel sorry uh for my parents' generation because they struggle and it's hard.

It's hard.

And because life moves on, life just goes on, it's not gonna wait for you.

Um, and so uh communication, I mean reciprocation is vitally important.

Shows somebody that you're engaged.

All right, now let's talk about communication.

Communication is the lifeblood and oxygen of any healthy relationship.

Okay, listen to this.

And relation and and uh uh communication is the lifeblood and oxygen of any healthy relationship, and relationships oxygenate your life, and healthy communication oxygenates your relationships.

So it's incredibly important, okay?

You can we can't have a relationship with God without communicating.

You can't have a relationship with a person without communication.

Koininea, fellowship, an interchange.

Remember our definition: an interchange of deep personal information, desires, um, thoughts, emotions, uh, expectations.

Isolation and broken relationships deplete and suffocate people.

So relationships, healthy relationships, oxygenate.

Isolation and broken relationships deplete and suffocate.

It cuts the oxygen off of our soul.

So I remember one time I was um doing some counseling and I was dealing with some people who just had some wounds that wouldn't heal.

And I remember going, Lord, help me help these people.

They just, there's wounds, they're not healing.

I don't, I don't know what it is.

Um, and he said, he gave this term, he said, soul circulation.

They need soul circulation.

They're isolated and they're sitting at home alone with just them and their thoughts, right?

And so the enemy can just lie to this person, can berade this person, can speak all kinds of negative, heavy things to this person, and there's nobody that can contest the lies of the enemy in that person's life.

They're just isolated.

So they're getting worn out by lies, and they can't get out of it.

And God said they need soul circulation.

So let me liken it to our physical body.

God created our physical bodies to heal itself when there's a wound.

But how does it do that?

So if you have a wound on your on your ankle, and it your body, if it has what it needs, was created to send to that wound what it needs to heal, and to be completely healed like it never happened, right?

And all it has to have is circulation because the blood carries the oxygen, carries the white blood cells, the red blood cells, everything that's needed for our body to do what God created it to do.

And so if we don't have that, that wound won't heal.

I had a spot like that on my ankle and it wouldn't heal.

My brother had the same thing.

He had a spot on his ankle that wouldn't heal, wouldn't close up, no matter what he did, wouldn't heal, wouldn't heal, wouldn't heal.

Doctor said, you're not getting enough circulation, and so we got to do, we got to fix some stuff and reroute some stuff to get blood flow to that area.

And as soon as they did that, the thing was healed in days.

And God said, our souls are the same way.

And talking, communicating is the circulatory system of our soul.

In John, the Bible says that if you confess your sins to God, if you talk to God about your sins, right?

If you communicate to God about your sins, confess, communicate.

He is faithful and just to forgive you of all unrighteousness.

James says, if you confess your sins one to another and pray for each other, you will be healed.

So one principle talks about forgiveness, the other one talks about healing.

Both involve communicating.

One, we communicate to God, confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us.

But then if we sit down with another human being and we confess our sins and pray for each other, he's faithful and just to heal us, right?

Well, it doesn't say that.

It says we'll be healed.

Both require talking, communicating with God and communicating with people.

Let me say, here's the reality: you can be forgiven and not healed.

There's a lot of believers like that.

They're forgiven, but they're not healed.

And it's because they're not communicating.

They have to talk through.

You ever paid to go to a counselor?

That counselor can't fix any of your problems.

They'd have no power to fix your problems.

The only thing a good counselor can do is get you talking.

They get you talking.

They get you talking, they get you communicating, right?

And communication is a two-way street.

It's not just talking, it's also what?

Listening, right?

So you go to counselor and you talk, and they get you talking, and they ask you a bunch of questions.

And a lot of times you leave feeling better.

You ever had a moment like that where you were struggling and you just went and talked to somebody and you felt better?

The problem wasn't fixed, but you felt strength, you felt vitality, you felt soul circulation.

Souls, you oxygenated yourself, you oxygenated your soul.

Unresolved hurt and trauma will fester and cause infections in your soul.

And so we have to talk.

We have to how and what does that mean?

We have to initiate and we have to communicate.

We have to initiate, and then once we initiate and you're sitting down in front of somebody, you have to communicate.

Can't have relationships without that.

George Bernard Shaw says the single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has actually taken place.

Communication is the responsibility that rests on the person who has the opportunity to be in a certain relationship.

And not just communicate, but let's learn how to communicate good.

Let's learn how to communicate well.

Let's learn how to communicate thoroughly and accurately.

Communication is especially important if you are offended or disappointed.

The other person probably has no clue, and it is your responsibility to communicate.

So I always say this communication is the responsibility.

Initiation and communication is the responsibility of the person who needs clarity.

So if you are frustrated, if you're disappointed, if you are offended, the responsibility to initiate and communicate is yours.

You say, well, shouldn't it be the responsibility of the person that offended me?

The other person probably has no clue that they offended you.

It's your responsibility.

Nobody can read your mind or know what assumptions that you are making, including your husband.

Pray for me for my car ride home today.

Including your wife, all right?

Including your spouse.

Nobody has the ability to read your mind, or no, some guy's going, you don't know my wife.

My wife can read my mind.

She knows, she knows everything.

Frustration, listen, is always the result of unmet expectations.

Frustration is always the real let me say like this.

There's other things that lead to frustration, but unmet expectations always leads to frustration.

And frustration that isn't dealt with leads to futility.

So, Ben, how do I deal with frustration?

I think you know already.

Come on.

Communicate.

Initiate.

Communicate.

Frustration is always the result of unmet expectations, or unmet expectations always lead to frustration.

And frustration leads to futility.

And when you get to a place of futility in a relationship, it's bad.

It's hard.

Unmet desires lead to disappointment.

Unmet desires lead to disappointment.

And disappointment that isn't resolved leads to discouragement and even depression.

And so if you're disappointed, what do you need to do?

Communicate.

You need to communicate.

Why are you disappointed?

What disappointed you?

Communication is always the responsibility of the one who needs clarity or resolution.

Communication is always two-way.

It involves talking and clearly expressing your thoughts, feelings, desires, expectations, and emotions.

Then it requires listening and listening with a heart to understand.

Some people actually do communicate, but that's only half of communication.

They'll communicate, and then as soon as you start talking back to them, there's a filter on their ear, and they are hearing you talk, but there's another voice that is speaking for you in their mind.

They're not listening to what you are saying to them with a heart to understand, and it too can uh thwart the relationship.

It can hinder progress in a relationship.

Remember, listen to me.

Remember, relationships are spiritual, but they are carried out super practical.

Relationships are spiritual.

These are eternal.

You realize that?

Eternal life and abundant life are all eternal life.

Our relationships are eternal.

They will continue for eternity.

Relationships are spiritual, but they're carried out super practical.

Regardless of temperament, personality, healthy relationships are only possible when there is initiation, reciprocation, honest, and honest communication from both people.

So if you're in a relationship that is constantly one-sided, then it's an unhealthy relationship.

And you can switch it to life support.

Okay.

Put that thing on a ventilator and just let it play out.

Who knows?

They may come around and snap out of it, and then the relationship might survive.

But that's one of those things.

If you take evaluation and you realize, man, this is a super unhealthy relationship or super one-sided, have the conversations that need to be had, but put that thing on a ventilator, put it on life support, and focus on the people who are initiating and communicating and reciprocating with you.

If you stop initiating, communicating, here's a question.

This is part of evaluation.

Okay, I'm in, sorry, I'm in valuation now.

So initiation, reciprocation, communication, now evaluation.

Evaluate your relationships.

If you stopped initiating and communicating, would the relationship die?

If so, you should probably back off a bit and see what happens.

If it is an important relationship, then you need to pray and get wisdom from God on how to communicate your concerns.

And hear me out here.

We are filled with the spirit that invented communication.

Nobody should be better communicators than Christians.

Nobody on the planet should be better communicators.

Let me say it like this: nobody on the planet should be better at relationships than Christians.

The same spirit that communicating created communication is the spirit that fills our life.

And so we understand that one of the greatest attacks against our life and our purpose will be against our ability to communicate.

The enemy knows that if he can hinder you in that area, every relationship you have will suffer and you will struggle in life.

Here's something super practical.

How do you build relationships as an adult?

I got in a season of life where I realized when we moved here, and I left, you know, I grew up in Treeport.

I evolved into every relationship I ever had.

My family, my school friends, you know, every relationship in the community I ever had, I just evolved into them.

I didn't have to build them.

I just was alive and had these relationships, and I inherited relationships from my parents and my siblings.

But when we moved here and we moved to a city where we didn't know a single human being, I had to learn something.

And I didn't realize I was going to need to learn it.

Because then even when I was born again into uh when I was born again at Shreeport Community Church, I was born into this family.

I just evolved into all these relationships.

It was amazing.

But when I moved here as an adult, I had to figure out how to build relationships from scratch.

And this is what a lot of this teaching is what I'm what I learned in that season.

God taught me this initiate, reciprocate, communicate, evaluate.

God taught me that in this season.

And so here's how you do it.

If you're trying to build a relationship with somebody that you don't know, that you don't have a good relationship with, maybe you're an acquaintance, you initiate, number one.

Then you watch, do they reciprocate?

If they do, then great.

Then you communicate.

And you communicate.

You have fellowship with that person.

And then you ask yourself, what am I feeling during this conversation?

What am I feeling during this coffee?

What am I feeling during this line?

Is there life on this?

Or is it heavy?

Is it is it you know not good?

Or is there life on this?

Are they drawing stuff out of me?

Am I drawing stuff out of them?

And you evaluate.

That's what you're doing.

You're evaluating.

So you initiate, reciprocate, communicate, evaluate.

And then you can decide, okay, I feel like I know this person well enough to know whether I want a deeper relationship, a closer relationship with them or not.

And that's when you, how do you do it?

You start initiating more with that.

If you want to send a signal that you desire a relationship, that it's important to you, that you're willing to prioritize it, you initiate more with that person.

And then as you initiate, reciprocate, communicate, and evaluate, you're gonna have a great friendship.

You're gonna have a great relationship with that person.

And then we just continue to do those things and continue to evaluate.

Um, evaluate.

Here's one thing you need to evaluate.

Evaluate uh elevated relationships versus ground level relationships.

That's an evaluation.

Elevated relationships?

In other words, am I building relationships with people who can help me get somewhere?

Am I building relationships with people who can lead me, who can help me, who I can learn from and grow from?

Or am I building ground level relationships with people who get me?

Right?

You can be friends with people who get you, or you can be friends with people who will take you somewhere.

And it's okay to have ground level relationships, but you that's not all you can have.

I call this you need 360 degrees of healthy relationships.

Okay, here it is.

You need a healthy relationship with yourself.

That's the first thing.

Jesus said, love your neighbor as you love yourself.

In other words, you need to love yourself.

You need to have a good relationship with yourself.

You have your identity issues in order, you need to have your trauma healed, you need you need to be personally healthy, a good relationship with yourself.

Then you need leaders.

Okay, this is 360 degrees.

You need yourself, then you need leaders in your life that you build relationships with.

That could be in business, that could be spiritual, that could be your, I mean, obviously our parents or older siblings and things like that if they're healthy.

Then you need followers.

I'll say it like that.

Followers, or Jesus would say disciples.

You need people that are you're leading in some capacity.

If you don't, and this is evaluation.

We're evaluating.

Do you have good relationships with yourself?

Do you have good relationships with leaders?

Do you have people that you are leading?

You have to have people that you are leading, leading them in business, lead them spiritually, leading them in some way.

You need people that are under you, if you will, not under you in sense of like value or importance, but you're leading them.

And then you need friends, you need peers.

These, these, this would be some of those people that they're just they're in the same season of life that you're in.

They're edifying.

Iron sharpens iron, but they're your peers, okay?

They're not your leaders, they're not your followers, they're just your friends.

Now, you can be friends with yourself, you can be friends with your leaders, you can be friends with your followers, and uh obviously you can be friends with your friends.

But if God called us friends, we can be friends with anybody.

You can be friends with your boss, you can be friends with your pastor, you can be friends with a leader.

Don't believe the lie that you can't be friends with those people because God Himself calls us His friends.

So evaluate how built out are you in each one of those areas?

360 degree.

What is the fruit of your relationships and your friendships?

What is the fruit of them?

Evaluate.

And so, and again, I'll close with this.

If we're taking relational responsibility and we want the important relationships, and we want important relationships, we have to be healthy, and personal health will need to be a major focus in our life.

Okay, I got all that out.

Say praise God and amen.

That was a lot.

I know that was a lot of content.

And as I said, this is something I'm passionate about.

This is something I believe is the most important thing you'll hear about relational health.

All the other ones we're gonna talk about are are incredibly, incredibly important as well.

I guess what I mean is this is the one I feel most people need the most help with is this message.

Take relational responsibility.

Amen.