Broken relationships don’t have a place in God’s kingdom.

They happen, obviously. All the time, unfortunately.

Disconnection is from the enemy’s team. Their demonic objective is to steal, kill and destroy. From us, God’s kids.

The enemy of our soul is consumed with stealing our joy and peace. Killing our hope and love. And destroying our trust in God and people.

The enemy is a devourer of connectedness.

If he can trip us into offense, keep us in the pride that justifies our stance, and then feed unforgiveness and bitterness…the branch of relationship grows brittle and breaks.

If we don’t take our stuff to God—–whether our pain or our fury, the wounds will either fester or harden.

Infected wounds make us sensitive to the manipulation of the enemy. We interpret actions and motives through the grid of our unhealed emotional injuries. Over time, the connections we do create will be slightly malformed. We may put other people in charge of our happiness, or blame them for not meeting our needs the way we want them met.

Hardened wounds develop in us a grid of cynicism and suspicion. We don’t extend grace easily and negativity becomes our default.

Speed Bumps

The other day, my life hit a speed bump and I disconnected from God’s Spirit and my middle son received the brunt of it.

I didn’t recognize at the time that I’d come down hard on him. We usually don’t when we are walking in truth without the love. I felt justified in handling it the way I did.

So I left to go to the gym. As I stepped onto the treadmill, I set my iPod to shuffle. In my self-justification, I apparently wasn’t listening to the flow of the Spirit, so God had to get creative. The first song that played was Toby Mac’s Suddenly.

Here are the words from the first stanza:

She blew everything to pieces.
He’s there hanging on to Jesus.
She broke everything about him down.
He said he never saw it coming,
Until the day she dropped the bomb
And she broke everything about him down.

Every word penetrated my heart and I nearly shot off the treadmill in shock.

I had an instant revelation of what my sharp tone had done to my son. After a long day at school, he walked in the door to a mini-rant directed completely at him. So I repented and asked God to heal his heart. Could hardly wait to get home to apologize and hug that boy.

In my frustration, I forgot to hold onto the relationship. My need to be right trumped love.

We aren’t to separate truth from grace. Nor grace from truth. They are inseparable in God’s kingdom and lead to loving correction.

Prayer

Father, show me where I’ve tripped into withholding love from others. Show me how I’ve applied truth without grace, or grace without truth. Teach me what they look like in Your kingdom, and teach me how to walk in them with You. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Showing the strain photo by Brian Smithson via Flickr – no changes made

Iron Chain via Pixabay