Ten Ways to Love part V: Share without pretending

Ephesians 4.15 says, ‘Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.’

Ah, i get it now! When i read ‘Share without pretending’ i had no idea what this was going to be about, but the verse link cleared it up. We are talking about speaking the truth in Love.

And i would add in Proverbs 27.6 for sure – ‘Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.’

Many people feel like Love is telling someone what they want to hear so that they feel good. Especially when it is the answer to question like ‘Do these jeans make me look fat?’ or ‘What do you think of my new hairstyle?’ [altho, to be honest, sometimes answering those questions ‘right’ are a matter of survival] but even with those, if you go for the self-preservation option, you might feel good about yourself for giving a favourable opinion, but if you are sending your special person out into the crowds looking ridiculous or with everyone else thinking, ‘my, she looks fat’, then it may not have been the most Loving response to give.

But those are very superficial examples. What about things that run deeper like behaviour or character issues?

I don’t know many people who enjoy conflict. Even when you are speaking the Truth in Love, in the moment you can leave feeling crappy and unloved. Later when the person has considered it, they may come back and thank you, but often it is a thankless role. But do it anyway!

Look at that verse, ‘Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.’ – later on, in Paul’s letter to Timothy, you read this: ‘For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.’ [2 Timothy 4.3]

An enemy is someone who gives you a big thumbs up “Yes!” when they know full well that the answer they should be giving is a “No!” Someone who celebrates when you get drunk and hit on some girl, even though you have a girlfriend who is not with you. Someone who looks the other way with you when you tell them about the shady business deal you are contemplating. Kiss. Kiss. Kiss.

i have one friend [and only one, so don’t you try it] who used to be able to come up to me when i would hang out with him at a coffee shop and say, “Bud, you’re looking fat!” and i would dig it. well, not a lot, cos i know it would mean a lot of work of being careful what i ate and upping the exercise and so on, but we had such a strong relationship that he felt the freedom to be able to wound me [in Love] and i would receive it as an act of friendship. i would probably receive that word well from a lot of other people, but they would HAVE to be a lot more careful with their wording.

when a good friend says something or does something to wound you, you should be able to step back from the wounding and focus on the fact that you know the heart and character of this person and are secure in their Love and friendship and so why did they do that thing? i need to really hear what they were saying and honestly evaluate whether it is true or not. [because sometimes friends will get it wrong, i certainly have a lot… but if the wounding is done in Love and with the best of intentions and heart it becomes something that will quickly be healed]

this is about TRUST and ACCOUNTABILITY and INVITING PEOPLE TO SPEAK INTO YOUR LIFE and STRONG RELATIONSHIP. and it is such a powerful thing. when you know that you have friends who will risk themselves to speak Truth to you in Love [because they see your bigger picture character and life as more important than the immediate response you might have to it] then you have a powerful thing.

as i seek to be someone who speaks Truth to my friends in Love, i need to constantly be asking myself, ‘Am i willing to receive the same kind of treatment from others?’ and ‘Who are the people who i have invited to hold me accountable with their Love-filled woundings?’

What has been your experience in this area?

to look at enjoying without complaint, go here.

Ten Ways to Love: Intro

i saw this as a typical Facebook post, like, share piece and so can not claim that it is original, but also do not know what the original source is, so please be gentle plagurism police…

and while i am not a huge fan of “the 7 keys to financial success” or “118 ways to a better waistline”, this list feels like a good thing to give consideration to not as THE ONLY 10 WAYS TO LOVE or the TEN WAYS TO ACHIEVE LOVE PERFECTION or anything silly and conclusive like that, but more a sense of, ‘Hey, here are some good ways to improve the way that you love people’ – this is not exclusively how to love your husband/wife better, but i imagine they apply on an even deeper level then.

so walk with me through these ten not-all-so-easy suggestions of ways in which you can do better at doing one of the most important things of life… and i would LOVE to hear your thoughts and stories and examples as we work our way through these:

1. Listen without interrupting.
2. Speak without accusing.
3. Give without sparing.
4. Answer without arguing.
5. Share without pretending.
6. Enjoy without complaint.
7. Trust without wavering.
8. Forgive without punishing.
9. Promise without forgetting.
10. Pray without ceasing.

i will be dealing with each one specifically and in time each point above will be the link to it’s own post.

let the commentary begin…

Dangerous Things You Can Most Promote.

so there are now 13 videos in the ‘Dangerous Things You Can Least Expect’ series of humorousfilled warning videos highlighting average every day things that we might not have considered the potential lurking dangers thereof… the first one of these has received the most hits and is only 999333 hits away from going viral [if ‘going viral’ means a million hits] – once i achieve that then rebecca black and i can be facebook friends apparently…

but while that seems a long way off i would love to expand the audience of the shows a little and for that i need people to like and share the videos and i have divided this into two categories:

firstly, if you hate the videos and think they suck that is fine and you can read no further, thank you for your time – i would never want anyone to promote something they thought was not worth promoting and i try to do that myself…

second firstly is for those of you who love them or at least like them a bunch and i know there are at leas 15 of you but would guess closer to 100 – if you are able to post on your socialnetworking networks that this is a thing you really dig and people should check it out then some people probably will – just a share is great but if you give it a one line punt that works even better, even a simple ‘hey, check this out!’ and for that i will be muchly appreciative.

first secondly is for those who don’t particularly find them overly funny or amazing but you don’t hate them or think the world will be a worse off place for seeing them – i would completely appreciate a share with words to the effect of ‘this is something my buddy did and he finds them quite amusing’ or something like that because there is no personal buy-in but it still gets a punt

i suppose a third category would be if you are richard branson and you find them completely hilarious and would love to buy the rights to my character to advertise your range of products then call me. [altho maybe not on my virgin phone, the reception is terrible!]

this would be the link to the latest video which i think is one of the strongest and would be a good one to promote but otherwise you can go here for the whole series.

thank you for your time and energy on this – a simple click on share and a one line statement…

and if you really want to invest then commenting on the video or i guess hitting like on You Tube is also something that helps it get found…

love brett fish and No_bob but mostly brett fish cos No_bob is still not real…

Dangerous Things You Can Least Expect part 6

so by now you may have watched one of my Dangerous Things You Can Least Expect videos or perhaps you have even watched all of them from the first one which was warning us about the dangers of paper to the one i recorded today on the many potential calamaties associated with wool – or if you have not caught any of them the whole collection can be found here… i appreciate all the facebook shares and twittery tweets as that is how more people get exposure so if they made you smile, laugh or chuckle in any decent way, please spread the love…