Faithbase

Hey Faith-Based Friends and Family. This is part two of Paul. I just want to address components I feel like are neglected about his character in his life. Again, we think of Paul as this great orator and theologian, but I want to just stress the importance of relationships in Paul's life. We see this throughout his letters as he addresses people specifically. In Acts chapter 20, we see this beautiful thing where he's leaving and the people just weep as they embrace him, knowing that they're not gonna see him again. There's just such a depth of love and connection. If you look in Romans 16, you see this long list of personal greetings to people. And I just want to stress that yes, Paul was a man after God's heart, and that he he believed in the power of the Holy Spirit, and feigning the flame, and the truth, and doctrine, and the teaching of the Word, and addressing false teaching. But he had such a high value for relationships. He had people who were above him in the Lord, who were colleagues. He had his Timothy spiritual sons. But I just want to make sure we're really valuing relationships, just like Paul did. Let's really value truth and make sure that we have an accurate picture of the Lord. The more of Scripture and theology that we study, the goal would be that we know him more, we're in greater awe of him, we love him more deeply, we're more grateful for his grace and his mercies, but we're also just like captivated by his beauty, by his majesty and his sovereignty. But also that we would really just value people. I'm an introvert by nature. I do really value relationships, but I'm definitely not the life of the party, we'll say, just to understate it. But I encourage you to be intentional about pursuing relationships. If we think that we can thrive and flourish without relationships, then we're fooling ourselves. We're either naive or we're just missing the truth, because we're designed for relationships. So I encourage you, just like Paul, build healthy relationships. It takes time, it takes effort, it takes pressing into hard things, but pursue people to offer encouragement, to offer love, to offer hope, just to point them to the Lord, and just to be a faithful friend. Friendship is such a beautiful gift from the Lord. Blessings to you today as you build healthy relationships.