by Rick Warren

  “Look out for one another’s interests, not just our own.” Philippians 2:4 (GNT)

The second principle for connecting with people is to be considerate of other people’s needs.

In other words, if you want to connect with people, you’ve got to start with their needs, not your own. That’s how you make that initial connection.  There’s an old Chinese proverb that says, “Seek to understand before seeking to be understood.”

The Bible talks about this in Philippians 2:4: “Look out for one another’s interests not just your own.” That is such a counter-cultural verse. Everything in our culture—from the moment we’re born – tends to train us to think ‘me first.’ As a result, we’re all disconnected because we’re all thinking about ourselves and not thinking about the needs of other people.

Yet, as I wrote in The Purpose Driven Life, “It’s not about you!” The world doesn’t revolve around you just as it doesn’t revolve around me. You’re very special in God’s eyes. You were created for a purpose … but the world does not revolve around you.

Here’s another truth—If you want your needs to be met, first start focusing on meeting the needs of other people. Why? Because God wants you to learn to be unselfish. He wants you to learn to love, to be generous like Him. Colossians 3:13 says, “You must make allowances for each other’s faults and forgive the person who offends you. Remember God forgave you so you must forgive others” (NLT). Part of being considerate of other people’s needs is making allowances for their faults.

Dear Abby once ran a letter from a divorced woman. She wrote, “I’m 44 years old. I’d like to find a man my age with no bad habits.” Abby wrote back, “So would I.” There simply aren’t any people with no bad habits or faults. We have to make allowance for each other’s faults.

Proverbs 17:9 says, “Love forgets mistakes.” It’s not that you are blind to someone else’s faults; rather, you choose to overlook them. Great friends are good forgetters. They forget the bad stuff intentionally. They don’t rub it in, they rub it out.

by Rick Warren

“For the Holy Spirit, God’s gift, does not want you to be afraid of people, but to be wise and strong, and to love them and enjoy being with them.” 2 Timothy 1:7 (LB)

The first principle for connecting with people is this: Be courageous and take the initiative!

Don’t wait on somebody else to connect with you. You must take the initiative to connect with them. This often takes courage. Why? Because when we’re full of fear and anxiety, we don’t get close to each other. In fact, we back off from each other. We’re afraid of being rejected, manipulated, hurt, or used.

This fear is as old as mankind. When Adam and Eve sinned and God came looking for Adam, Adam said, “I was afraid … and I hid” (Genesis 3:10 ESV). We hide our true selves. We don’t let people know what we’re really like. Why? Because we think, “If I tell you who I am and you don’t like me, I have no alternative.” So we wear masks and we pretend.

Fear does three terrible things to relationships:

  * Our fears make us defensive. We’re afraid to reveal ourselves. When people point out weaknesses we retaliate and defend ourselves.

  * Our fears keep us distant. We don’t let people get close to us. We want to withdraw and hide our emotions. We don’t want to be open and honest.

  * Our fears make us demanding. The more insecure we are the more we try to control or dominate things. We try to have the last word in a relationship. It’s always a symptom of fear and insecurity.

Where do you get the courage for taking the first step in connecting with someone? You get it from God’s Spirit in your life: “For the Holy Spirit, God’s gift, does not want you to be afraid of people but to be wise and strong [courageous] and to love them and enjoy being with them” (2 Timothy 1:7 LB).

How do you know when you’re filled with God’s Spirit? You’re more courageous in your relationships. You love people. You enjoy being with them. You’re not afraid of them because God’s Spirit is in your life. The Bible says “God is love” (1 John 4:16 NLT) and “Love casts out all fear” (1 John 4:18 NASB). The more of God you have in your life the less fear you’ll have.

So the starting point in connecting with anybody is to pause and pray and say, “God, give me the courage to take the first step.”

by Rick Warren

  … That you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Deuteronomy 30:20 (NIV)

The birth of Jesus reflects the truth that love is a choice and a commitment.  You choose to love or you choose not to love.

Today we’ve bought into this myth that love is uncontrollable, that it’s something that just happens to us; it’s not something we control. In fact, even the language we use implies the uncontrollability of love. We say, “I fell in love,” as if love is some kind of a ditch. It’s like I’m walking along one day and bam! – I fell in love. I couldn’t help myself.

But I have to tell you the truth – that’s not love. Love doesn’t just happen to you. Love is a choice and it represents a commitment.

There’s no doubt about it, attraction is uncontrollable and arousal is uncontrollable. But attraction and arousal are not love. They can lead to love, but they are not love. Love is a choice.

You must choose to love God; he won’t force you to love him (Deuteronomy 30:20). You can thumb your nose at God and go a totally different way. You can destroy your life if you choose to do that. God still won’t force you to love him. Because he knows love can’t be forced.

And this same principle is true about your relationships: you can choose to love others, but God won’t force you to love anyone. 

by Rick Warren

  “Look straight ahead with honest confidence; don’t hang your head in shame” (Proverbs 4:25 TEV).

You don’t need to walk around carrying a load of guilt. The Apostle Paul says, “Yes, all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious ideal; yet now God declares us ‘not guilty’ of offending him if we trust in Jesus Christ, who in his kindness freely takes away our sins” (Romans 3:23-24 TLB).

God wants to forgive you. Imagine a giant blackboard with all of your sins written across it and God comes along with a giant eraser and erases it all. It’s like an etch-a-sketch. You turn it upside down and shake it, turn it back up and the slate is clean. That’s good news, isn’t it?

But we need to accept God’s forgiveness. We may know about God’s forgiveness intellectually, but to believe it, deep down inside, accepting, in faith, that it is true. Because it is!

And one thing that often blocks us from accepting forgiveness from God is that we are unable to forgive ourselves. You need to forgive yourself for your past failures and sins, for the habits and hang-ups that led you to sin. Forgive yourself!

God wants you to forgive yourself. He teaches us to “Look straight ahead with honest confidence; don’t hang your head in shame” (Proverbs 4:25 TEV).

Have you ever committed a sin and asked God to forgive you, and even though you know He’s forgiven you, you still feel lousy? What do you do in that situation? Do you go back and ask Him to forgive you again? Confess it again, over and over?

No. You only have to confess a sin one time and it’s forgiven. But you may have to forgive yourself a hundred times and say it over and over until it sinks in: “God’s forgiven me. It’s over.”

Our problem is, we want to keep reminding God of things He’s already forgotten. It’s forgiven and forgotten. You’ve already dealt with it. Someone once asked Eleanor Roosevelt, “How did you accomplish so much with your life?” She said, “I never waste time with regrets.”

Don’t waste time with your regrets: accept God’s forgiveness and forgive yourself.

by Rick Warren

“And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith?” (Matthew 6:30 NLT).

Do you tend to expect the worst? Do you panic when you get a letter with IRS stamped on the envelope or when you hear a rumor about layoffs at work?

The word worry comes from an old English word meaning “to choke or strangle.” Of course, that’s exactly what worry does to your productivity and happiness. It’s a self-defeating waste of time.

In his famous Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:25–34), Jesus gave four reasons for not worrying and the secrets of overcoming it:

1. Worry is unreasonable. To worry about something you can’t change is useless. To worry about something you can change is foolish! And every time you review a worry in your mind, it just gets bigger. Worry amplifies problems out of proportion.

2. Worry is unnatural. You weren’t born a worrier. It is a learned response to life. In fact, you have to practice to get good at it. Fortunately worry can be unlearned. The only species in God’s creation that worries is human beings. We don’t think God will take care of us.

3. Worry is unhelpful. It doesn’t work. It can’t change the past. It can’t control the future. It only makes you miserable today. Worrying about a problem never solves the problem.

4. Worry is unnecessary. God has promised to take care of you if you’ll trust him with the details of your life. As a child, if you asked your father for lunch money you never worried about where it would come from. That was his problem. Let God be God in your life! “God will take care of you, just have faith.”

How can I break the worry habit?

First, trust God with every area of your life: “But your heavenly Father already knows perfectly well that you need them, and he will give them to you if you give him first place in your life and live as he wants you to” (Matthew 6:32 LB).

Second, live just one day at a time: “So don’t be anxious about tomorrow. God will take care of your tomorrow too. Live one day at a time” (Matthew 6:34 LB).