Connection & Relationships | Shawn Bolz | Expression 58

okay so today we're going to talk about connection again and if you have heard me talk over the last six months I've talked a lot about connection and I want to talk about relationship and how God intended relationship because relationship is inherently a multiplier to our lives it was something that God designed to multiply himself because we are part of him we're his sons and daughters but also so that we would be multiplied and I want to talk about in our society and hopefully give you guys some biblical and psychological tools for connection because it's one of the most powerful gifts God ever gave us and I just think I'm gonna start with Genesis 2:18 where he says it wasn't it's not good for a man to be alone and this wasn't just in context to marriage this was in context of humanity God made us to not be alone he made us to do life with someone else he made us do life of the community and right now one-fourth of people in Los Angeles are lonely they're categorize themselves as a lonely according to this year surveys that means that we have the opposite spirit moving in our city then what God intended and God created us to not only have connection but to have a thriving connection a life a community that would help us to come into our fullness and I love first Thessalonians 5:23 says now may God a peace himself sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit body and soul be preserved blameless until the coming of Lord Jesus Christ and if you marry that to what Jesus said in Luke 10:27 he's answered them saying love the Lord God with all your heart with all your soul with all your strength and with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself now here's what's an intense is that we have mind body emotions and spirit and that God has these four facets that we're supposed to have relationship with others in our community with and I think a lot of times when were growing up we are in a church or a school or even a job and we have all kinds of connection that's that's built around performance its transactional it means that the more we give the more like the more we serve the more we do the more we get back but it's not necessarily the type of connection that God made us for that actually moves our community forward it's more of a transactional relationship like at college you have friends you study with most of us have one or less real friends from college unless you had a really good college experience like Lori you always talk about USC in your experience I love it but most of us have very few real friends from college most of us have very real few friends from each job we've transitioned from because they're transactional type of relationships and yet we spend the majority building or community with those types of people and it's important to note that because there's a Christian God's giving you friendships not based on transactional relationship even with him but on covenant relationship or on connected relationship to these four issues mind body emotions and spirit when God said it's not good for a man to be alone he meant it's not good for the humans mind spirit body and emotions to be alone the whole point of partnership was connection and keeping us thriving which we can't do in a state of loneliness so you can't thrive in any of these areas in a state of oneness and each one of these areas as part of your gatekeeper form in your own life to make sure you're thriving and each one of those and many people and if thriving just one or two of them and live a mediocre life thinking that's enough they convince themselves that's enough because maybe they were hurt in one area or maybe it's in marriage that there's one or two areas that they've had to sacrifice to be with their partner that they're with and yet God wants to give us a vision in our community for fullness in our connections when we think about connection and friendships we can think about what it would look like to be practically connected in our mind emotions body and spirit that is the foundation of a relationship and that's what we want to build on that's that's how we want to build our relationships with friends whether it's a home group whether it's somebody you're serving on a team with whether it's in the friend outside of church you want to actually think about these areas now here's something interesting I was reading the Great Divorce how many of you read the Great Divorce with CS Lewis this is one of my favorite themes or theories that he had which he characterized Hell as a place where whenever people disagreed they simply moved away from each other that's what he'll look like and many people are living that kind of Hell on earth right now they're just moving away from others and they're not getting connected and he talked about this this book is such a beautiful description of what I'm talking about today instead of finding ways to communicate relate finding ways to keep each other from feeling alone when we move away from connection we die a slow death and our life around us becomes a living hell so connection not only is important but the lack of connection is what hell looks like on earth now I believe we're calling live a type of heaven on earth meaning we're called a living culture of what Jesus had in his relationships with the father and his relationships with his disciples which was so connected that even though they were only three years with him it was still very fulfilling these are immature you know fishermen they were in their teens you know these are tax collectors people that you wouldn't normally like if God picked your social circle in some of you he has not all the people in your social circle we are people you would have picked personally you want to relate to that so some people God picked for me I'm like I don't know anything about Guatemalans I don't know I don't know what happened but God picked hona for me and I'm so grateful he did because I would have never picked hold on I wouldn't and he would have never picked me it's true we would have never picked each other and I'm God I told them at Jennifer's birthday party that I won the friendship lottery because God picked my friends and there's this place where when when God picks the people that you're called to do life with and walk with it multiplies you and it creates a level of connection that you're always working at it's always it's always something you're always having to build but it's something that's so beautiful that the world looks at it and begins to trust you because of your relational equity so I'm gonna read this verse John 17:20 and I'll stop at some point and this is the passionate translation and I ask not only this is Jesus praying and John hears this prayer and writes it down for us and I asked not only for these disciples but also for all those who will one day believe in me through their message I pray for them all to be joined together as one even as you and I Father are joined together as one I pray for them to become one with us so the world will recognize that you sent me for the glory you have given me I've given them so they will be joined together as one and experience the same unity that we enjoy you live fully in me now and I live fully in them so we can experience perfect unity now jesus prayed that we would have this kind of connection and he described it as a oneness of mind a oneness of thought when you're really connected to somebody you can represent them fully in a court of law when you're really connected to somebody you can represent their full opinion if somebody asks you you know them the person who leaves you in charge of their medical condition if they let go comatose that person they're hoping can fully represent what what you would ask them to do you know even if you're not present I know for me personally I'm like Sri and I I know what Cherie thinks when I'm buying stuff from the grocery store I'd like literally go down almost like we're telepathically talking even though we're not of course but I'm like just going through and I know like if I want to buy some junk food for the girls like some junk food cereal I know what she would say don't bring that into my house you know like I know with my wife but I also know like if there's something that she wants it to make nachos with because that's her secret pleasure I better get it because that's also gonna make her happy and I want to keep a happy wife you know but I could walk right know what she's thinking about in a store I know if I'm gonna go get coffee I could hear my wife's voice go I love coffee you know like there's a oneness that we have even though she's not really doing those things but I'm treasuring her and she helps to occupy my spiritual space and so I'm sympathizing or empathizing with who she is all the time and I do that for other friends too I can think about how they would think about situations and I'm often not wrong with my closest friends because there's a connection and Jesus was praying even more than that that we would have a spiritual connection to the bond of unity that God had intended in the first place now here's the next principle which is when he talked to Adam and Eve and he said be fruitful and multiply this is what's cool is that it wasn't just for the married couple to be fruitful multiply it was actually the principle of relationship he designed us to operate out of that when we come together were fruitful and we Bowl to apply our efforts he says it again you know later on in the Old Testament he says one can take a thousand but two can take 10,000 that's weird why can't you take 10,000 because there's a multiplication in our efforts when they come into real relationship and we have to understand this because some of us are stuck we have barriers up we have we need breakthrough we need something to move forward and part of the problem is that you've disconnected somewhere no one can make you connect it and no one can choose connection for you but you can listen to the Holy Spirit and the beautiful thing about the Holy Spirit is Jesus spoke about him several times the New Testament in four times and for the God or three the Gospels he called him friend so Holy Spirit comes and sits on you as the friend of heaven and he brings not guilt but conviction about things you've done that would disconnect you or connect you he brings conviction do more of this this is this is what's good he brings conviction when it's something that's breaking down the relationship and if you have the Holy Spirit work with you because we live in a very narcissistic generation so it's hard for us to introspect with the Lord because we're not looking for what's wrong we're looking to show what's beautiful even more but there's a time where we have to look at both and say God I'm open to you changed me and bring course-correction to me and Holy Spirit says the way you treated that person today I actually shut their heart down and actually facing that and figuring out the course correction with the Holy Spirit because friends actually do maintenance confrontation all the time friends actually aren't waiting for a ball jaw to drop or aren't going I'm waiting for the perfect time to talk to him about this I've waited for three months now that's not friendship that's not mature French if it's friendship but it's not mature friendship but friends actually say I'm actually just gonna bring it up because it's just we have that kind of friendship I can bring up stuff but also friends know how to encourage each other and keep each other connected and this is this is hugely important I personally you know I've been I've been married only since I was 37 and I'm 44 now so it's about almost seven years in and straight and I before we were married we both live very successful single lives and although I have good friends you know from lifelong good friends and even friends that I've worked with our real friends not just working partners there's there's a lot of decisions I didn't make with friends and so I was used to making internal decisions by myself or with God which is really easy to put a god card go what God told me God showed me God did this I'm doing it and not including me but in that process so Sheree and I were talking we were dating and we're almost engaged and she goes hey and she bought kind of like a challenging observation to something I was doing and one of the ministry spheres I was in and I was like well that won't work we're t two years into trying to figure out a solution I see that problem too but BA and I just shut her down and she immediately was like mm-hmm she gave me them the look that only a woman who loves you can look at you with and you know you're in trouble so she's like hey just so you know like I don't want to be shut down I'm actually an asset to him coming as an asset in our relationship and I'm gonna challenge things that don't need to be challenged sometimes just because I'm learning your process and how you think but I need to know that I can come and bring this up without you getting defensive and weird otherwise I don't see this relationship going anywhere because I need to be part of your internal dialogue with you at times and I'm like I don't know if I want that because it's so much easier to not do that but it's so much less fruitful to not do that and so I mean it's like okay so let's start this again so we you know went back around at it and I was like it's really hard to allow someone into your inner process to help guide your inner journey with you you know Matthew 5 verse 8 and the passion translation says bless it or maybe it's the message version sorry blessed are you when you get your inside world right then you'll see God in your outside world what it gets your inside world right it takes relationship the proof that you love God well is in your relationships that's what the Bible says over and over and over and so connection is not only something that God's given us as a gift but it's actually the proving ground of our faith if we don't have deeply committed connected relationships we actually have weak faith or immature relationship with God and so God wants to mature he wants to strengthen he wants to bring about a maturity to our relational process so uh God wanted Adams work physically spiritually emotionally and mentally too he had his well-being in stake and so he wanted him to fruit be fruitful and multiply in all those areas so he set up a beautiful plan between man and woman and marriage is a reflection of all other types of relationships we can have marriage as the ultimate and then all other relationships can be a form of that which is beautiful a famous psychologist Carl Roger said three things are needed to help people feel safe and connected as well as create an optimal environment for their growth these three things naturally make a flourishing connection in the same way water soil and Sun make a flourishing tree so this is one of the most famous psychologists on the issue of connection and he says these are the three things and this is like you can bank on this number one is genuineness meaning being your true self and includes vulnerability this is hard because a lot of times for us as Christians we're trying to present our best self or the spiritual stuff we see in the vision of who we're supposed to be and we present that to each other we don't often just start where we're at and go yeah this is me I'm unfinished Hey because it's uncomfortable to be vulnerable but the people who are the most successful critic Brene brown are the people who are the most conscientious of their vulnerability not conscious of their issues people who are saying you know the people are the most connected are people who are saying I'm enough even though I'm not there yet and so when you present yourself if you want to be connected you have to be genuine number two empathy to be with another and an empathetic way means that for the time beating you lay aside your own views and values in order to enter the other person's world without prejudice this kind of input the exists in the church I talked to a number of psychologists about this but I was reading in Christianity today a psychologist part of reports that he hates counseling Christians because they have a whole construct built around religious principles where they can't be empathetic to themselves the world around them because it's all about transactional it's about right and wrong it's about performance and so they're scared to actually admit their problems or weaknesses without having a solution already attached in their mind even though they don't have real solutions that are guiding them and so it's really hard for a lot of us as Christians we're we're back at the the knowledge of good and evil versus the knowledge of the Tree of Life and God put two trees in the garden because the garden of the knowledge of good and evil he wanted to show people that there's a truth that's not presented in its fullness and then there's a truth that's presented relationally there's a truth that might be all-knowing but it doesn't have the relational connection to all-knowing and this is what that would be like I met this guy who was I was with pastor Bill Johnson last week in Jakarta and Bethel we went all over the world that was great and if you know pastor bill John sees from Redding California he leads Bethel Church and so I was with them but right for is with him this man came up to me and introduced himself as one of Bill's best friends and they said I'm really close to the Johnson family and I took it at face value and just tell me something about their grandkids and whatever in I kind of got a little weird cuz it felt like very name-drop it felt very like I'm gay and he knew a lot about them and I'm actually pretty good friends with them and I didn't know like half of what he knew but I still felt connected without knowing everything I just I bet I felt like I know more about them like a you know have you ever had that experience like sho know what's going on here like someone came up to me one time for ho and I was like did you know this and this and this and this because they had spent time with people around hona and maybe was home himself and they just they cared a lot about what they knew but they didn't know like I mean if I called honah I'd get a different conversation than they would but at the same time I was like I should know more about honing right now you know and and when I talked to Bill the next week when I was with him I said hey i met your friend so-and-so he goes who's that because oh I think I know I kind of know him and I'm like no really this has to be someone closer than that because they're like claiming to know all kinds of things about your family and everything else so basically they raised this person is knowledge brokering getting as much knowledge as I can because they don't have connection they're substituting connection for the knowledge because they're disappointed and that's safe because then you don't have to have connection if you have knowledge that's what the knowledge of good and evil versus connected life The Tree of Life where God's giving you what you need as you go look at this part of me this is this is look at this part of creation look at this part we're on a guided journey with a father not not a master or Lord necessarily although those could be names for him at times but you're on a guided journey with a father who's giving you what you need can you imagine sitting your child down and telling them all about rape culture at five that's what Adam and Eve got when they bit the Apple they got all kinds of knowledge and information that they just didn't need because it wasn't relationally put in the context of their maturity or who they were in connection doesn't come necessarily with information it comes because of those areas that are being bonded together of mind spirit body and soul okay so so empathy part of the reason why we don't have empathy right now is because we have again I'm gonna use or transactional Christianity where we have we believe that if people are doing something wrong then they deserve bad things and if people are doing something good then they deserve good things so if somebody shares something with you you feel a responsibility to fix them because you're connected to him as a Christian you don't have a responsibility to listen with empathy you have a responsibility to listen with being a change agent even if they haven't invited you to be one and that's really hard because that actually defeats real connection we're trying to answer questions people aren't asking it actually breaks relationship down and so we can only do what people give us authority for in their hearts and we can only be what people will give us authority to be in their lives and we can't take authority they have free will and God never violates our free will yet the church constantly violates each other's free will have you ever talked to somebody and you're sharing something a problem you're going through they got oh I've been through that once like five years ago and you're like I don't think you have been through this but okay tell me what happened and they tell you a story that has nothing to do with what you're talking about and they think they're building empathy but they've run over you they've run over your real problem and there's something about I'm spiritually mature now let me give you my maturity verse is actually listening and saying I'm so sorry I'm so sorry you're going through that I can't relate to that I mean can you imagine you know how many pastors tell women who are having pregnancy issues and the women will share it with a male pastor and okay well I know what you're going through my wife went through that does that ever help anybody have you ever had a man as a woman who's pregnant tell you something that you don't need to hear it doesn't help it's the same way with our spiritual faith journey when we can't all relate to each other and that's part of empathy as recognizing I can't necessarily relate to what you're going through but I'm trying in my empathy to say I'm trying to be here emotionally and present for you even though I can't relate on the same level and I love you anyways and I love you no matter what and this is something that the church has not got good at especially with some of the the hot-button issues that are out there right now where the church goes you know we need to have a solution before we have a relationship we have to have a relationship that provides solutions and that's a completely different process that builds connection the number three is unconditional positive regard and this is Jesus unconditional positive regard does not mean that you have to think everything your spouse or friend does is right or positive it means you have grace which covers a multitude of sin so you start out in a position of grace that says no matter what you do I'm gonna fight for connection doesn't mean I feel connected if you tell me something if you tell me you had an affair it doesn't mean I'm gonna say oh we're still connected I'm gonna have to fight for the connection but I'm gonna give you unconditional positive regard that you'd still become a god originally intended for your life and again this is one that's really hard even if people are wrong many times as Christians we don't want to lend unconditional positive regard yet Jesus knew people prophetically people were gonna betray him and he let them live in the condition of an unconditional positive regard the whole time man the church has a lot to learn about this because if this is one of the top three things that make you feel connected how can you think of anybody who didn't treat you this way that made you back away from the relationship how many of you can think of just one person that treated you wrongly because they didn't treat you to unconditional positive regard and that caused you to say I I can't I don't feel safe with you right with what you're saying is you don't connect to me and this if you don't have these three basic things it's gonna be really hard to call them true friend you know if you can't provide these as well another way to foster connection comes from the psychologist John Bowlby and he talks about being a healthy safe haven and this means you internalize the safety you feel from a significant loving person in your life and take that secure feeling with you even when they're not physically present with you it means you can provide comfort in times of fear emotional spiritual physical and intellectual comfort safety and so that means that they can come to you with their mistakes fears shortcomings and sadness as well as their joys hope success and victories and why is this important if we don't feel safe we often become avoiders and run away emotionally or spiritually or even physically or become a needy pursuer and feel if we do not have maximum connection at all time our world will fall apart neither is healthy for us and both are based in fear so basically what this means is that when you have a healthy connection have you ever had a friend who you have really healthy connection they haven't seen each other for a year cuz it's been a long time you get together with them and no time has passed have you ever been on a trip away from your family and you feel them the whole time you feel their love and support the whole time one-fourth of society is lonely because they don't know how to borrow that place of affection and take it with them so there's a lot of people who I don't feel connected to because we didn't talk three times this week in my life I can't talk to my friends most of my friends three times this week because I don't have time because we're in a push season we're in the busiest season of our lives again we thought we're getting out of it busier and so I don't have time so someone needs me to be that that close to them and connected to him that means they can't borrow the safe-haven rule psychologically and spiritually to say I'm with you even though I'm not with you and we have to be able to build connection to where you feel my connection even if we're a world apart right now and you can have long-distance relationships internet friends all kinds of relationships based on this principle that are real but God's looking for connection and communities has given us the gift to multiply interconnection but many of us misunderstand what connection means by thinking it's overindulgence meaning we have to be together all the time or thinking that or thinking that it's okay to be not connected and then all of a sudden go oh I've showed up in your life I can tell you everything again real connection happens when you pick one two three people and you pour all of your celebration stories into them and you also go through all your painful trials with them I remember there was one season where I was traveling so much I was traveling to about five different places often and I'd get with different people and I was single and I had because I was traveling so much I was just kind of just combated and I was sharing those stories of breakthrough and success and I was sharing those stories of you know frustrations and things that was having to grow through with like five different groups of people none of which were my close friends and I remember coming home going my close friends that are at home don't even know where my heart is because I've been taking the time to invest into him and then I realized a young man who was living with me at the time I weigh like five young guys there and he was doing the same thing he whoever he was with he would share the deepest part of his heart with but it could be 25 people at a time I mean like 25 people in a month so no one person was tracking with him and God made us to be with the you know Jesus had John the Beloved he had the three he had the twelve and then they had the twenty you know I just went there Spears and if we don't build our connection around Spears and we just spread it then we'll look at 1.5 years into it will break down and go I don't know who loves me because I haven't built a connect deep connection with the right sphere I built with too many or I built with none or whichever one you are whichever end of the spectrum you were in and we realized that we're alone or lonely again so again God created us for connection but we have to be in deliberate in this connection mark 10 verse 8 it talks about the two becoming one flesh what does that look like you have to love yourself and your oneness before you bring someone into your oneness now again this is marriage but it also comes into relationships where you start to love the friendship that's closer than a brother you start to love people as those are won in your heart the way that Jesus did in John 17 that's real connection it's not BFFs forever in the yearbook this is actually like I'm choosing you and then you're starting to become one with my heart I can't imagine my life without you you know this is this is so direly important to me that we're involved in I'm gonna do everything it takes to build this healthy mark 3 24 and 25 we're told that the kingdom's in a house divided against themselves can't stand oftentimes we think the right thing to do is try and be right even if that means division and this is one that the church is really responsible for through the ages that we try and be right more than we try and actually build connection and marriage if you're gonna have a healthy marriage you're gonna realize right away it's not about being right wrong because when you're right and then the person is wrong it means that there's a war that's one where you're opposed to each other and you're not going to bed happy neither one of you you might have temporary joy in saying I was writing that one but you're not going to bed happy you have to find win-win situations all the time any relationships and uh I love this that your marriage is either a construction site or a demolition zone how do you keep building your relationships and this is true of all relationships you're either a construction site or a demolition zone and when you have to be right all the time you're actually destroying the construct that God's building in your life the desire to be right is the desire that the church has right now when we come into the desire to love well we'll come in a revival but we have a desire to be known in our information and to be right and this really comes back to us wanting to wanting to look right and more than we want to be right which is really sad okay Galatians 5:22 but the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness we talk about this all the time you know this is when you have real relationships you actually think about that person you think peace you think joy you know I think of like I joked around this first service that when hona sends me a text message I'm devastated cuz it's always an audio message and I hate the phone and I don't want to listen I love reading but I hate audio and he doesn't type very fast I think so he just sends audio it's easier for him but I love when I hear his voice like I absolutely love it it's a love-hate relationship cuz I don't wanna I literally like I had friends in my life send me an audio I'll text back I don't time to listen I'm so sorry but Hohner that's the only way it communicates if it's not face-to-face so I'm like yeah it's hona I brings me joy and peace even though it stresses me out to have an audio message those of you are friends with hone I understand what I'm saying so having knowledge and even being right or wrong without connection actually brings death and the Garden of Eden God told Adam Eve not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil it was not the truest kind of knowledge nor the best way of knowing it actually brought death pain destruction the relationship with God and actually in their relationship to each other we need to go back to the thinking of connection is winning that means we both win connection is not right and wrong as our goal that is God's best for relationships that we were created for going into just disagree with a belief that the best scenario God has for us is not to find out who's right or wrong but we're storing and creating a stronger relationship I mean this is like marriage course 101 type stuff you know like this is what we have to do to actually build relationships but how many friends have you seen who can blow up and blow out of a relationship circle based on they're mad at a principal or they don't feel heard or they want to be right or they want to be connected I mean how many people I've had people come to this church when I was the senior pastor and tell me God has told me to come here I'm so excited they get into one relational tip with someone in their life group for their home group and and all of a sudden they're like I I just feel like I have to go somewhere else doors tell me to go over this other church I'm like oh wow the Lord drops a lot of God cards on you you know because we have a desire to be right and then we spiritualize it which is the worst how many of you have had someone spiritual eyes something that should have been normal for you like they've used God's name on it right it's not the worst it's like the worst when someone throws it down cuz they're saying I don't want to have relationship with you so I'm using God as an excuse to get out of it and the church has done this to the world over and over the church has done this to the poor to Hollywood to business I don't want to do this with you anymore so God told me not to God show me to do this other thing instead wait weren't we doing where's the commitment I don't know and what happens is we live out of that tree of knowledge of good and evil verses that the tree of life in relationship which stinks a lot of work it's a construction zone it's not easy at all which is hard okay proverbs 14:12 there's a way that appears right but in the end it leads to death this is again when we have to feel right more than we have to have relationship it leads to death well you know Sheree and I have had a few fights sometimes where she was right sometimes where I was right I'll call them nice little arguments but you know if we go to bed on those things you know like when we're frustrated with each other like you know if I go to bed good I was so right she got it she got it man she knows I'm right or vice-versa if we do that couple times in our first couple years of marriage you know one wins you might feel good for a second but you don't feel good like 15 minutes later with the person thing you know with their back towards your bed you're like well this sucks and it's the same way in friendship if I'm if I'm having to be right the next time you see your friend you start off where you left off in conflict so if you're building healthy conflict models then you start off going we good we okay what's going on how are you you know my my wife person whenever we have any any conflicts she would harbor healthy conflict models she at the very end of whatever we're working through she always makes a joke out of it and it's not bad it's not passive-aggressive but she's always like you know she says something that makes me laugh so hard she's very funny and she makes it you know I'm like I don't want to laugh at that time and especially if I'm the one who's like frustrated and I don't want to laugh and then she says something it makes me laugh and I'm just like I love this woman so much because she's trying to build connection more than even work through the conflict and it's been such an example of me of someone who's like choosing love even if you know she's there even if she's frustrated she'll still choose love she'll still choose to say this is who we are this is just a moment but this is who we are we laugh together we love each other we love playing we love deep intimacy we this is who we are she pulls me back into that and I think it's such a great example of not that you have to make someone laugh who's fighting with you but but it's just a good example of someone who's reminding you the big picture of who you are starting out with this is who I believe us to be now let's work through something so that the stakes aren't so high because you know when the stakes are high in a conflict you're a demolition zone I got to talk to this person I have to go I have to go tell im we had a joke years ago on staff Jen said if said one more person asked me to go out to lunch with them which means I'm gonna tell you something I don't like about the church or about leadership or about with something else can I go to lunch with you and it's super intense like it's not like hey let's go I'm gonna take you out to lunch it's like can we got someone Chinese talking about a food things if I told my wife hey on date night next Thursday well we're gonna have to have a big talk and I'm really frustrated with a lot of things than you see I'm not gonna talk to you until then that's a demolition zone you know what that does to her heart what did I do she's gonna retrace every conversation she's gonna start to be a detective over the negative in a relationship versus healthy relationship the conflict management that comes up and says hey you know what is this now a good time can I just have 15 minutes I was really frustrated when that person said this and they it felt like you agreed with him how do you feel and you just you just kind of go there real fast you'd go there in a real way and I love when DNA soap came and taught us how to do a relational conflict management he said there's no conflict that should last 15 more than 15 minutes and then if it last one in 15 minutes it's because they're such brokenness and the relationship there's been a wrong foundation and I so agree with that not that you can't talk things through but we need to tell each other what we need more than what we did wrong that's a construction zone instead of saying I need you to hear why you're wrong I need you to hear like what I need from you and that builds connection I need you to hear there's some things you've been doing that have not been my style of relationship and have affected me and so here's what I need from you I don't need to rehash all those but here's what I need from you I need you to not talk to other people but my secrets it's really important about me being private like if you talk to other people with my secrets one more time we're gonna have a real conflict like right now I feel like I can forgive the past and just move on but that's all I need from you and the person goes to tell me everything that I did wrong that's not good conflict they should be able to say oh thank you if it turns into like if you're six months after you should have confronted them then you have a destruction zone not a construction zone right so so even in this connection one of the things that the church I believe is going to model in the future it's a healthy conflict resolution that happens quickly because the nations are in conflict with each other races are in conflict with each other sexes are in convo with each other all these kinds of people groups are uncomfortable to each other and marriage is our conflict zone right now and they should be actually a support place it's one of God's greatest gifts he gave us his relationship and we should be winning not Charlie Sheen's version so we know that God says it's not good for us to be alone but what happens when we are alone or feel alone in relationships we can't function at our best as humans and in 2018 Prime Minister of the UK Teresa may this is cool she appointed a minister of loneliness to help work towards creating solutions for social isolation the reason why is because it's detrimental to health as a matter of fact our u.s. former US Surgeon General in April 2017 said that loneliness is the major driving force behind violence and addiction and that the mortality effect associated loneliness is similar to a life shortening that we see with smoking 15 cigarettes a day this is dr. Vivek Murthy can you imagine so 1/4 of our city is lonely which means their their life is being cut short as if they're smoking cigarettes every day cancer causing 15 cigarettes a day cigarettes and we're just kind of throwing our hands up going if they would just get spiritual just gonna go to the worship time and sit before Jesus you know that doesn't work we have to actually be in a relationship with people in with Jesus there has to be community there has to be connection 50% of Christians right now don't go to church because a relational pain and turmoil they felt in the organized church that's super and healthy now I have hope because if God gave us relationships to multiply us you know I think it would happen with me and hona and Jennifer when we started this church and we've been friends out well before the church but how it multiplied our efforts it multiplied who we were as people when I went into my new season is you know from senior pastoring in to launching all what we've done and I married Cherie and then also we launched all the stuff I multiplied it again like there's a multiplication here and you're you're calling the greater things you're called to that happen when you're in real relationship with people now there's always good things you're gonna do so like you can do things isolated but think about it one can take a thousand two can take 10,000 if I had been doing this alone this church alone before they took over if I had been doing it without them the whole time we would have stopped at year three it's true you guys know it it's true we would have stopped at your three but because of hone and Jennifer and sometimes I wasn't as going let's keep going guys most of time is hona Jennifer and I could try to quit a few times and uh most time home is like no guys it's gonna be good still like especially the year it was the worst here's like I love this church so we're like why this just being real it was like five years ago but friendship keeps you accountable to love and to the purpose on your life and it multiplies you into the efforts to stay faithful and loyal all the way through if you break down loyalty in a company or if you break down loyalty in a ministry you break down loyalty and a friendship peer group you start to see a decline that the purpose of the individuals in that group but when you keep it strong you start to see a multiplication because of that connection it's the same in marriage marriage should be a multiplier for you if it hasn't multiplied who you are as a person individually and then some of the efforts you've made in life towards your career towards whatever you feel called to then then there's there's more for you to have that's available for you and your marriage if you feel like your marriage can do that for you because there's something wrong with it then you have to go back to this unconditional regard for the person to where you start to see them for God's original intention even if they're far away from that you know I've got a few friends in my life that I wish they were further in a few areas just like I'm sure a few friends wish I was further in a few areas there's always something you're gonna see that will disqualify part of the person you love because they're called human high human being you're not perfect shoot dang it but you have the perfect God living inside of you and it means that I get to look at you as though you're him as though you're like him though you have capabilities to become like him and I get to trust Holy Spirit in you and not try and be your Holy Spirit when I was little I was went through a period when I was like 13 where I started bossing everybody around spiritually including my parents and my mom looked at me one day he goes I do not need a second holy spirit I have one and that's enough don't try and be it and I'm like you need to listen to me you know we should be do it you know and we're gonna season like if you think about Halloween we probably have a good portion of you in here who think it's Satan's birthday and then a good portion of you in here who are gonna go trick-or-treating and have fun as a family like you're and and and if we just brought it up and said let's do a debate we might lose relational ground on right and wrong and there's a thing called the way certain things affect some of us don't affect all of us and dualism came about it's the belief that everything that's not inherently spiritual is evil and there's a type of charismatic or Pentecostal dualism which is everything that might look like an opposite spirit is the devil which means Lord of the Rings even though J or Tolkien led CS Lewis to the Lord Laura the ring says evil because it has who Gandalf the White who's a wizard in it and so a lot of people go well that's evil for a history that's been like for ever since has been written there's a lot of people who think it's evil and there's some people are like this is my favorite book series in the world and it's so much volume of who Christ is to me and so we have you know Harry Potter could be the same thing it's a good versus evil using witchcraft and some of you in here going that is satanic and so you're in here going that's my favorite series and I ride the ride at Universal you know and so we have these things that each person has a subjective relationship to media to the arts to creativity and to even other people's choices that they would make because some of the things that someone else has permission to do you don't because Holy Spirit said please don't do that because that's gonna affect you a certain way my sister who's sitting here on the first row last service there's some spooky movies that I love I love spooky movies I don't like horror movies I don't like straight-up like torture horror but there's some spooky movies and I like and Jennifer if she watches one of those for three weeks four weeks she feels like those spooks don't go away from her they like stay in her room and her mind her imagination I can't watch certain war movies like World War One World War two I've never seen save it for Saving Private Ryan I've never seen because I started watching it and it it stayed with me it like horrified me so if I took that principle and said you cannot watch anything that's World War one and World War two because it's evil because of how it affects me and that's what the church has done is you've had leaders who've decided what's good and bad for you versus having your own relationship with God and we've become each other's priesthood versus each other's friends and if we understand you are your own priesthood that's what we believe is Protestants that were our own priesthood then that means we have to come with a lot more empathy oh you don't get affected that way weird I totally get affected by Halloween you don't I trust God in you I trust you to lead yourself with God unless you're in full-out flat-out immorality if it's if it's a gray area I trust God to lead you know if it's for immorality I might as a friend have to talk to you and say hey you know what I know you think this is okay but can we talk about it can i is it something you wanna talk about no okay we won't talk about it makes me feel a little unsafe but that's okay oh we can't talk about thank you so much for at least hearing me out that's such a different conversation that most Christians have I need to talk to you about something you believe this and because you like Kanye West this he went to trumpet oh okay let's wrap this up on a Kanye I love Kanye I want to meet Kanye I believe in emotional health I just think that you know God is giving us an emphasis as a people group but I hear from Jennifer when she preaches I hear from hanno and he shares and preaches and I hear from our guests who come in there's something about being an advocate for social justice and change that can't come out of an disconnected life and if you see from the past a lot of people who became psychologists it's because they were going to going on a journey of trying to figure out how to fix her own mess a lot of people who became missionaries are so messy that they had to go somewhere else because in feel comfortable here anymore their relationships her life was so broken like I wanted to talk up all the biggest missions organizations that I know of and I went to their bases I was like oh this is like the island of misfit toys because they went there because they felt like a misfit so they can relate to the orphans of the misfits but God is raising something up now when I say that a god bless all those people who went after psychology to get heal thank God people emissions people wouldn't have gone but God's raising something up from holistically from people who actually have a level of health emotional health inside of them spiritual health inside of them physical health you know mental health these these things are important to God and he's raising people who will go like I love Alex and Shana you guys are great examples they're healthy and they go to places out of it they don't need to go to orphans and you know Uganda they don't need to be the ones to go there they're not the island of misfit toys these people are like cool like they have swagger but because of their place of health they can't help but give away family so when you have healthy family it multiplies and that's why we see some of the times when missions organizations or some psychologists or sometimes it's even I've seen it with the prophetic with people who go after prophetic ministry I've seen it with some worship leaders they'll go after something and they don't get multiplied in it because they don't have a place of emotional health they don't have a place of spiritual health they break down physically they break down mentally and if we go after these areas and community because you can't say I'm mentally healthy unless you have relationships that prove it it's true I'm the mental you know Miss Lee the most healthy person I know that's cuz you don't know anyone I used to think it was a lot more emotionally healthy until I got married that was like oh I have some stuff to work on I then had kids and I was like where's this anger come from I am not an angry person and they cry like and do stupid things I'm like are you serious and I'm like who is that and family and relationship causes you to mature and x-ray eyes muscles that you can't do alone and I say that because we live in a land here one fourth isolated in industry is like entrepreneurship tech industries movie industry music industry that are completely isolating and God's calling us from this place to establish healthy connection and export it through our church to the world around us so that means you have a journey to go on if you don't feel like you're very far in that journey the good news is God multiplies you he makes what would take 10 years happen in three years he makes what would happen a lifetime and family happen in just a few years and spiritual family so I want you to stand up we're gonna pray I want you to just put out your hands and I'm gonna pray for you I want you to think about relational deficiencies but not a negative way I don't want you think about like I'm so sad I don't want you to think about that even if you are I want you to think about relational places that you want to grow in but you want to see relationships come and meet a need in those places and then I'm I'm gonna pray some things about it so Holy Spirit show us in some areas that you want to grow us in relationally show us where we've substituted occupation or calling or or gifting to develop our relationships versus actual heart mind soul and strength god I pray that you would help us to be going a relationally healthy journey if we've been a destruction zone or if we've had a lot of destroyed relationships make us a construction zone God it starts with us we're the ones who choose so that's going to be construction or destruction I pray that you would help us God to eat from the tree of life not from knowledge of good and evil in our relationships we can have all the discernment in the world about who's good and who's bad and miss it relationally completely because we're not eating from life which goes beyond good and bad helps us to see who you are in the world regardless of who the world is god I pray that you would help us in our our spirit to take on some principles even today that would make us curious to change Lord and I thank you that the areas that we feel deficient in that the world around us is very deficient in as well and you're gonna heal us and then you're gonna show us people that we get to have authority to help heal if one fourth of LA is lonely that means one fourth of this church potentially could be lonely so when I pray that you would heal the spirit of loneliness over our congregation bring it spirit of adoption which isn't just setting orphans and family it's setting friends and real order give us the friends we never knew we wanted God that's a real thing God do you pick our Friendship Circle we just give you all of our relationships we give you our potential spouse if we're single well just like we can't pick our kids you pick them for us so we pray that you would pick our friendships but we also pray that we know that our Pickers aren't supposed to be broken so I pray that even the people we pursue that you'd help us to have long-term covenant connected relationships that multiply them and multiply us let us be an example not that we're trying to be performing an example but let us be an example of what love looks like what a tree of life looks like god and jesus name amen [Music] you

Channel: Expression 58

Views: 37,347

Rating: 4.8766313 out of 5

Keywords: shawn bolz, jen toledo, jennifer toledo, jona toledo, expression 58, expression58, e58, connection, relationships, prophetic, los angeles, church, glendale, revival, justice, cherie bolz

Id: TKr9Pli16Fg

Length: 47min 9sec (2829 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 16 2018