What do a hula-hoop, a board, a splinter, and the Bible all have in common?
They are all central to fixing the broken relationships you find yourself living in, accepting, and tolerating. More importantly, they are the key to your own self growth.
James 4:1 asks one of my favorite questions in the Bible, “What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?”
From the time we take our first breath, we are programmed to expect the world to bow down to our selfish desires. We cry when we are hungry, need our diaper changed, and want to be left alone to sleep. As babies, we learn survival comes in crying to get our needs met.
That instinct follows us the rest of our lives. We are insisting on our own way. 1 Corinthians 13:5 reminds us, “(love) does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking,” yet we love most people with a sinful and self-seeking desire at our core.
THE HULA-HOOP
The single best piece of advice I was ever given about relationships came from the “Brokenness” Lesson in our ReEngage Curriculum. The author of the program, John McGee wrote, “One of the best ways to improve your marriage is to draw a circle around yourself and begin changing everyone inside of the circle.”
That’s hard to do.
THE BOARD AND SPLINTER
It is so much easier to focus on all the ways the other person has hurt you, has faults, annoys you, and doesn’t live up to your standards.
In Matthew 7:3 (NIV), the questions is asked, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?”
There was a time in my life when I wanted everyone to see me as perfect. I found it was easier to point out the flaws in others because it felt like it deflected from my own flaws. But it didn’t.
I had a friend tell me once as we were working through our own broken relationship together, “I often see the world through broken lenses, and I can see how those lenses caused me to see things in the wrong light. Now that I know your heart, I’m sorry.”
We all have broken lenses from our past that cloud our ability to see the real heart behind people. When we stand within our own circle wearing those lenses but trying to fix the specks of sawdust in others or deciding to cast them out of our lives because of those specks, we lose something.
We lose the ability to find the beauty they have inside of them. When focus on the flaws of others instead of the blessings they can bring to our lives, we will destroy the relationship. When we focus on our own faults and how we can overcome them, we will grow.
In marriages, especially marriages where spouses have grown apart over time, the other thing that happens is we keep score. We keep a record of all of the wrongs someone has done over the years, and eventually that’s all we can focus on … THEIR WRONGS. We forget, if they’re also keeping score, they have a list of wrongs against us, too. And no one wants to be judged by their WRONGS. So drop the list and change your focus.
THE BIBLE & THE PUNCH LINE
If you find yourself unable to hula-hoop through repairing your broken relationship, ask God to help you stay in your circle. When you find yourself in the middle of an argument, or if you’re living with malice in your heart towards someone, STOP! Ask God to help you find the good inside of that person instead. Make a list of at least 10 things you adore about them. Focus on their good.
Then, pray Psalm 139:23-24 (NIV), which reads, “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
You can’t fix other people. Only God has the ability to do that. But you can fix YOU. You can fix how YOU see other people. You can fix how YOU love other people. You can fix how YOU serve other people. You can fix how YOU define feeling loved by other people. You can fix how YOU respond to other people. You can fix the broken lenses and let go of the baggage from your past. YOU CAN HULA-HOOP!