When I was younger, I used to believe a relationship would save me. I thought if I could only find someone to love me enough then I would feel better about myself, have a better outlook on life, maybe even create a family that would be more solid than the one I grew up in. But anyone who has ever been in a relationship, knows that’s not exactly how this all works. We don’t come to a relationship with all our brokenness, add another broken human, and suddenly become whole. The truth is, the brokenness inside of us is only further exposed in the pressures of our relationships, and this certainly makes things complicated.
I’m wondering if you’ve ever fallen prey to a similar lie?
Maybe you hoped that taking a dating relationship to the next step with marriage would make you feel more loved and accepted by others.
Or perhaps you believed that once you finally caved to the pressure your boyfriend placed on you to have sex, he would stay with you.
Or maybe like younger me, you hop from relationship to relationship because the idea of being single makes you feel alone and unworthy of love.
No matter what variation of this lie we may be believing, we have to realize the root of the issue.
If we don’t know who we are, we will always struggle in our relationships.
Our identity is not suddenly discovered in our relationship status or lack thereof.
But where do we pick up these beliefs in the first place? And how do we rid ourselves of them so that we can have healthy relationships?
This is not new news for those of us who are familiar with the Bible. But if you need a refresher or have never dove into the Scriptures for yourself, let’s look at what Scripture has to say about this enemy.
Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman sad t the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die’” But the serpent said to the woman, “ You will not surely die’”. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Genesis 3:1-5, ESV
Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.
John 8:43-44, ESV
The thief comes to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
John 10:10, ESV
We have an enemy who is the absolute counterfeit of God.
God wants to sow seeds of truth to bear good fruit in our lives, and the enemy wants to plant lies that grow into chaos and destruction.
God wants us to follow Him and walk in truth and love, and the enemy wants to distract us and lead us away from God.
God wants us to know we are perfectly loved, chosen, valuable, adopted, cherished, and the enemy wants us to believe we are unloved, unworthy, abandoned, and useless.
I know this may come as a surprise. What does the enemy lying to us have to do with our complicated relationships?
Our enemy distracts us into looking for the perfect love we were created to desire that only comes from a relationship with our Savior, in imperfect human relationships that will ultimately fail us and leave us feeling defeated.
Because our earthly relationships were never meant to sustain us like our relationship with God does. These relationships are only dim and warped reflections of the love and intimacy we were created to experience with God.
The good news is we can work to uncomplicate our earthly relationships by understanding who God says we are. When we do this, we can love people from a place of being perfectly loved. Instead of coming to a relationship looking to be filled up, we can overflow the love we’ve already received from God.
So let’s wrap up with a few places in the Bible that tell us about our identity in Christ and how much we are already loved by God.
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
1 Peter 2:9, ESV
You didn’t choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.
John 15:16, ESV
For in Christ Jesus, you are all sons (and daughters) of God, through faith.
Galatians 3:26, ESV
What God desperately wants us to understand is that every need and desire we have to be loved and cared for in a relationship He has fulfilled for us. He is our loving Father who adopts us into His forever family (Ephesians 1:5). He pursues us relentlessly to bring us into this family (Luke 15:4-7). He loved us so much that He gave His son to pay for our sin, the one thing that stood in the way of our access to Him. (Romans 5:8; John 3:16-17).
When we do understand these truths and allow them to inform the way we live and love others, we will have better relationships. We will know how loved we are and how much God loves the other person as well. And while this won’t completely eradicate every conflict in our relationships, we will no longer look to the status of our relationships as an indication of our value or worth. Rather we can allow the imperfect moments to root us deeper in the hope of eternity, where we will finally be reunited to God and experience perfect unity, without sin, with Him and our brothers and sisters in Christ. And we can praise God for the good moments in our relationships that remind us of how perfectly we are loved by God.
Our marital status doesn’t make us more lovable. Rather marriage exists to point to a greater picture of how Christ has betrothed Himself to an imperfect Bride (the church aka God’s people) and He is going to redeem and restore her to perfection for all eternity (Revelation 19:7-8).
Our sexual purity or the brokenness of our experience with sexual intimacy will never be what gives us security in our relationships. Rather sex, when in the context of a loving and safe marriage, is a picture of God’s desire to be completely connected to us and how much pleasure that brings to both Him and us. Although even in the setting of marriage, sex still falls short of the glory of God. Sex was created to point to a greater moment in eternity when God’s people are joined to Him in perfect union with nothing separating them ever again, and how satisfying that will be for everyone involved.
Finally, singleness or loneliness do not define you. Your identity was secured before any human ever decided you were or were not worth their time and attention. God loves you so much. He thinks you are to die for, literally. Let His perfect love determine your worth and not your relationship status.
Relationships don’t make us whole, and they certainly are not satisfying enough to fill the God-sized void inside of each of us. Fight these lies that ever-complicate our earthly relationships with what God’s Word says about who He is, what He has done, and what this means for our identity. When we do so, we can love others from a place of overflow rather than looking to another imperfect human to fill a deficit created in us meant to be satisfied with God’s perfect love.
In the words of Hosanna Wong, you have a new name and you are more than you’ve been told.
