Relationships

The core of every single person's life consists of one thing. Relationship. We have relationship with everything and everybody. From family, to friends, to the weird neighbors that seem to yell at each other for no apparent reason and seem to think the louder you yell the more influence you have over your victim, to the perfect stranger, to the person halfway across the world that you are never going to meet. We have some sort of relationship with each and every person on the planet. Depending on the level of intimacy of said relationship, depends on how much access they have to your time and resources. 

Some people are great at the various different types of relationships. I happened to attend a ministry school where the main thing I learned from my time there was how to relate to people better. I have learned that as long as you maintain your status as a student of relationship your entire life, you will always have a mindset that will be able to grow and learn from your successes, mistakes, and to also glean from others their experiences to make your life easier and better in the long run. On the other hand, some people are horrible at relationships. I'm sure each and every one of you know someone that would fit that bill. Maybe it is yourself and you are growing. Kudos to you for growing. 

The church that I attend has a set of core values and principles in regards to relationships. We believe that character, integrity, honesty, sticking to your guns in face of opposition even when the masses are opposed to you, are noble and we seek these qualities out in our leaders as well as cultivating them in our lives. We believe that loving and honoring your fellow man are one of the most important things you will ever do. We have been taught countless hours exactly what that means. Honoring someone isn't about title or position or culture, it has everything to do with the fact that the person you are looking at is also made in the image of God and that when you honor and respect and love the creation, you love the Creator. We believe that you can't love someone else until you know how to love yourself. We all seek to have healthiest boundaries in every aspect of relations. We believe that there are different levels of intimacy and how you have more of an obligation towards your spouse and kids than lets say towards your work or ministry. We believe that controlling others is a completely wrong way to go about relating. When you think about it, we can barely control ourselves on a good day, so why would controling someone else even be an option. We believe that freedom in all  relationships is the way God intends us to live our lives. We are also aware that freedom can most definitely cause messes. Proverbs 14:4 - "Without oxen a stable stays clean, but you need a strong ox for a large harvest."  We are told that the oxen are like freedom. Whenever there is no freedom, there is no messes. But there is a problem. You don't get any fruit or harvest without the oxen. Basically without freedom, nothing flourishes, nobody is setup for success, and you don't have healthy relationships with anybody. We believe that we should continue to grow in our leadership skills  because everybody is a leader is some way or aspect and has influence somewhere. The list can go on and on about what we believe concerning relating to people. I believe every bit of this with all my being. These principles are truth that I will forever attempt to live out of the rest of my life. 

We also believe that society is composed of 7 mountains, or areas of influence. Family, religion, business, media, arts and entertainment, education, and government. Within these mountains, it again all boils down to relationships. Family is relations between husband/wife, parents/kids, and You/crazy Uncle Jon. We expect all of these principles of relationship to be cultivated and nurtured and grown in the Family. Religious relations are either between You/God, You/Spiritual parents or mentors. Again, the principles are expected to flourish here. Business relationships are between several things the biggest one being the Business/customer relationship. Character, honesty, and integrity are a must for the business to flourish and be successful for very long. We even champion businesses like Guinness that are a model for how to not only treat their employees and customers, but how business can actually shape and mold the society. We call for honesty and integrity in the media and arts and entertainment. We are believing that God will raise up people who will be able to invade these mountains and bring Heaven down. Education the same.

Then comes government. Government is also a relationship. In the United States of America, it is a relationship between 'We the People' and the elected and nonelected officials. There is an even greater set of relationships that exist in this world. These are the relationships between each individual country. In political speech this is referred to as foreign policy or foreign relations. 

There are many different aspects of foreign relations. Diplomatic and militaristic being probably the two biggest ones. The United States tends be really good at diplomacy whenever other countries have formitable militaries. On the other hand, whenever there are countries that do not have a strong military, we tend to have horrible foreign relations, especially in the Middle East. We try and bribe some countries. We give some money and then think that gives us the right to tell them how to operate their country. We then bomb others. The sanctions we place on the countries result in the deaths of innocent civilians. We do this in hopes that the civilians will turn on their own government, but instead it galvinizes thier sense of national pride and support for their leaders, and focusing their hatred on us. We invade others. We have wars that last multiple years with others. We then try and tell a culture who is 1000s of years old that we know how to run their lives and civilization better than they do.  Yes, I'll admit that we have brought some good to the region. But how can we justify our actions? The ends NEVER justify the means.  

So after all this, I pose this question.

Why do we hold true to these principles in every relationship from family to business, but somehow whenever foreign policy and our country relating to other countries is concerned, we completely throw these principles out the window and support politicians who do not abide by these principles??

Personally, I believe that principles should be able to be applied to every aspect of life and relationship.