Every relationship we have with other people consists of choices and actions: we either work to build bridges to others, sharing in relationship with them and building intimacy, or we put up bricks and barriers that become a wall between us.
As followers of Christ, we must realize that other people will invariably disappoint us (because we are fallen human beings and because only God can satisfy our deepest need for relationship), but those disappointments should not stop us from loving others well. The first and second greatest commandments Jesus taught were to love God and to love others. Because Jesus had a perfect relationship with the Father, he could love other people well.
John 2:24-25 says that “Jesus did not entrust himself to them…because he knew what was in man.”
Jesus loved people without entrusting himself completely to them because he was secure in his relationship with the Father. Look at what Oswald Chambers writes about Jesus’ relationships with people and how we can learn from his grace:
“Disillusionment means having no more misconceptions, false impressions, and false judgments in life…but the disillusionment that comes from God brings us to the point where we see people as they really are, yet without any cynicism or any stinging or bitter criticism…
…if we love someone but do not love God, we demand total perfection and righteousness from that person and when we do not get it we become cruel and vindictive; yet we are demanding of a human being what he or she cannot possibly give…
…Our Lord trusted no one, and never placed his faith in people, yet he was never suspicious or bitter. Our Lord’s confidence on God, and in what God;s grace could do for anyone, was so perfect that he never despaired, never giving up hope in any person.”
The call every day before us is to depend upon God’s Spirit and to love God and to love others well, continuing to build bridges to relationship with them- even when we perceive they have put a brick in the wall between us.