It’s a new year. Perhaps you make resolutions. Here’s one more to consider —Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm. Proverbs 13:20
Resolve to honor God with your relationships.
Your family.
Your close friends.
Those you lean on or who lean on you.
Those you listen to or who listen to you.
How do we honor God with those relationships?
Consider the following questions.
Do we connect with others in a way that honors God?
Are we encouraging, kind, gracious?
Do we pray for God to work in the lives of our friends?
Do we help them see His hand in their lives?
Do we apply ourselves to loving others like Christ does?
Or do we distance ourselves from those who don’t conform?
Do we look for opportunities to reach out to those society ignores
Or do we hope someone else will step in?
Do we look for friends who challenge us?
Are we offended when they tell us hard truth?
Are we easily provoked?
Do we look at others with smugness or self-righteousness?
Do we measure ourselves against others
And thank God we’re not like them?
Do we long to mentor and be mentored?
Do we serve without the hope of recognition?
Do we seek peace and justice and reconciliation?
Are our prayers full of intercession?
Or are we more focused on our needs and desires?
Do we look to culture for the definition of friendship or guidance in our families?
Do we surround ourselves with those who strengthen our faith or with those who tear it down?
Do others see the love of Jesus in us and through us?
Resolve to have the kind of love Jesus had, the kind that would “lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13