[Faith-talk] FW: IBGN~NEWSLETTER~ Relationships: Your Infusion or Poison

Mon May 5 15:06:12 CDT 2008

Original Message: 
From: Momsooky <momsooky at yahoo.com>
To: momsooky at yahoo.com
Subject: IBGN~NEWSLETTER~ Relationships: Your Infusion or Poison
Date: 
Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:16:59 -0700 (PDT)

Relationships: Your Infusion or Poison

Fresh Manna
by Pastor Tim Burt

  Relationships: Your Infusion or Poison

  Psalm 119:63 ?Anyone who fears You is my friend-- anyone who obeys your
commandments? 

  Is your life a product of "well everyone else is doing it, why can?t
I?"  Any parent of a teen has heard this justification of reasoning. To
what degree have we unknowingly become its victim?  Peer pressure is real
and surrounds each and every one of our lives in more ways than we care to
admit.  

  Ted and Susie are in love. Their best friends Jack and Mary are in
love, engaged, and planning their wedding. It has influenced Ted and Susie
to think harder about getting married. No one is putting pressure on them,
yet just the events leading up to Jack and Mary?s wedding is making them
think more about it. 

  Bill and Sandy spend a great deal of time with their best friends Perry
and Angela. Perry and Angela's new little baby girl Kristine now goes
everywhere with the foursome. In some ways, Bill and Sandy fill like an
aunt and uncle. Just being around this new beautiful little girl has begun
to influence their thoughts toward having a baby. 

  We all know of peer pressures by association. It affects how we think
and what we do. Many of us have seen children who were once focused and on
a good path, become distracted and headed for trouble simply by a new
friend or friends they've begun to associate with. As parents, there were
times when it was appropriate for Renee and I to discourage or stop the
development of a relationship in one of our children?s lives if their new
friend  clearly displayed an ongoing pattern of poor behavior and or
attitude. We encouraged godly influences but discouraged the development of
negative close relationships. 

  When what others do begins to lead us outside of God's ways or water
down our standard for godliness and integrity, it's time to take a look at
the relationship and decide if that is a relationship ordained by God. 2
Corinthians 6:14-18 (NLT) speaks with great authority to us, "Don't team up
with those who are unbelievers. How can goodness be a partner with
wickedness? How can light live with darkness? What harmony can there be
between Christ and the Devil? How can a believer be a partner with an
unbeliever? ?For we are the temple of the living God. As God said: "I will
live in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they will be my
people. Therefore, come out from them and separate yourselves from them,
says the Lord. Don't touch their filthy things, and I will welcome you. And
I will be your Father, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord
Almighty." 

  As an adult, you may believe you can manage the ungodly behavior of
someone you have befriended. If relationships begin to negatively affect
your thinking, perspectives, or your behavior and you don?t deal with it,
you are absolutely wrong and in denial. You have put your confidence -
false confidence - in thinking that you are stronger than the forces of
evil that God warns us be flee or stay away from. 

  God paints us a picture in Haggai 2:12-14(Amplified Bible.) "If one
carries in the skirt of his garment, flesh that is holy? and with his skirt
or the flaps of his garment he touches bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil,
or any kind of food, does what he touches become holy?? And the priests
answered, No! [Holiness is not infectious.] Then said Haggai, If one who is
[ceremonially] unclean because he has come in contact with a dead body
should touch any of these articles of food, shall it be [ceremonially]
unclean? And the priests answered, It shall be unclean. [Unholiness is
infectious.]

  If we are living for God and work to influence others toward His love,
that is our directive. At the same time we need to understand that our
right living is not infectious ? it?s not just going to automatically cause
someone else to live for God just by our association.  If we hang around
and/or take in ungodly influences, it will automatically dilute and
negatively affect us and our influence. Unholiness is infectious! 

  It isn't just people that we associate with that can drag us down and
away from God. It's what ever we let in our sense gates - primarily our
hearing and seeing. The filth the media surrounds us with - the large
majority being immorally sexual - is now the humor and focal point of most
things produced by Hollywood. Without developing a standard against it, you
will become the victim of it. It will drag you down and away from God. 

  Until you yield to God's exhortation and step away from relationships
that are unequally yoked, you won't be able to see your deception and how
it's influenced you. 

  I've seen far too many Christian men and women think they can convert
the unbelieving person they have allowed themselves to fall in love with
only to later be disappointed and heartbroken. That will always be the
result of disregarding God's instructions. 

  King David was one who from a boy realized the power of association and
guarded his heart carefully. He esteemed God's heart, His standard, His
laws, and all His ways, as more critical to his life than any other thing.
David said in Psalm 119:72 (NLT) "Your law is more valuable to me than
millions in gold and silver!"  He went on to say how the standard of God's
Word determined who he'd develop relationships with. We see this in Psalm
119:59-61 (NLT) "I pondered the direction of my life, and I turned to
follow your statutes. I will hurry, without lingering, to obey your
commands. Evil people try to drag me into sin, but I am firmly anchored to
your law... v.63 "Anyone who fears you is my friend-- anyone who obeys your
commandments?" 

  When it comes to ungodly influences, whether its people or what we take
in, there is pressure that comes from those associations.  Jesus said we
don't hide from the world. We live in it. We work to influence it. But,
when it comes to the relationships that we become close friends in, follow
David?s example ? today?s Fresh Manna verse ? "Anyone who fears you is my
friend-- anyone who obeys your commandments?" 

In His Love, 
  Pastor Tim Burt 
http://readfreshmanna.blogspot.com/  

"a merry heart doeth good like a medicine" Prov 17:22

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