Week 6 | Covenant Relationships | Chris

Giving and receiving counsel requires humility and openess to be able to hear advice that you may not like.  Choosing covenant friends that are trusted and will give advice good to follow is one of the most important factors in choosing friends in general.  The first chapter on friends and counsel really underlined the basic requirements that a person should look for in a friendship.  Friends should be able to counsel you in the right direction and should be strong enough to tell you things that you need to hear.  The most interesting thing in this chapter was the portion about free will and how Paul reacted to his friends not telling him to go to Jerusalem.  God respects free will but hates sin.  Friends are good for counseling about decisions that you have to make, but  God ultimately gives you the free will to decide whatever you choose to do.  In Paul's case, his friends were looking out for him, but it wasn't wrong that he was willing to undergo hardships to minister.

The next chapter about having faith in the decisions of your counselors was very interesting.  I do believe that trusted counselors under the church have the right thing to tell you, and this chapter clearly confirms it by saying not to doubt or ask for second opinions.  Covenant relationships are all about trust and building a strong bond with the other person.  Under the right counsel, a person can work together to find the direction and God's wisdom.

Confrontation is a very tough subject for me personally.  Being an introvert, I'm not likely to tell someone straight up things that might offend them.  But at the same time, it may be something that I really wish to say.  I've always had a hard time confronting people, but when it came to apologizing or taking responsibility, I've never had a hard time doing that.  But since I need to develop the prior part of confrontation I've explained, this chapter was very informative.

"First remove the plank from your eye and then you will see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother's eye".  Reading this was hilarious to me.  The imagery was so exaggerated.  Anyways, I totally get what is happening here.  We must judge ourselves and fix any problems or inconsistencies that we have before we tell others what to fix.  Totally agree.  It's like the saying, if you don't walk the walk, don't talk the talk.

I really like this chapter because it really outlines how you should act in telling people advice that may come off a little offending.  The chapter really describes how we need to almost gently and sincerely come about these topics and have complete discretion.  But the juicy part starts when the book describes what to do when the person isn't responding to your counsel.  I'm going to be honest, the chapter was really harsh and blunt about how to deal with people who consistently break covenant.  But at the same time I totally agree.  Dis-fellowship in the sake of reconciliation may be the only way to get someone on the right path.  Just like raising a child, you need to discipline them to understand the correct mannerisms.