It has been a difficult Summer. It started in May just days after my birthday. But the lesson this year is; Relationships Take Work! So, through it all my heart is brought to rest in this ideal. Real relationship takes effort.

I was thinking on this idea this morning. I would rather return to my slumber its just after 4 am. But, oh well.

I thought about all the ways and people I have had contact with since the first of May. I can see my studied efforts to disengage with those who have arrived with more negativity than help. But, this morning I think my heart points to the misdirect of my behavior.

If we do not accept, understand, and respect the humanity of one another; you can spend a lifetime playing ‘do-si-do’ with heartache, disappointment, and cynicism. We don’t like it when ‘stupid’ rises in the morning with other people. We discount our own stupid. So, once we brush our teeth, we move out into our day with confidence unearned and undeserved.

We must believe in ourselves! This we are told in most mediums of communication today. That’s the joke that we play on ourselves. We were not made to navigate alone. We were not created with the ability to exist in a cone of self-sufficiency.

Even in the Garden of Eden relationship with our Creator was a big part of the package. Why are we surprised that navigating a fallen world ladens us with a greater need for our Father, Creator?

There is an animal instinctiveness that drops me into immediate flee or retreat position whenever encountering the humanity within others. I mean, for goodness sake! You think someone else’s shortfall can’t be mean, painful, and feel completely unnecessary? Then you have never loved anyone, or raised a child, or loved your parents. If you had, then you would know, that shortfall is part of living.

Did GOD make a mistake. No. The mistake has always been ours. From the beginning, whether you believe in the Creative narrative or the Big Bang Theory, the failure has always rested in the seed of Creation, not the Seeder.

So, what is our hope? Certainly not in one another. Love someone enough to not place that burden upon them. Even if they feel they can handle it. Just love that dummy anyway.

Don’t you see, that is the absolute need and logic of the Cross. GOD did not ask any of us to fix the problem. Though we are ultimately responsible for the problem(s), GOD provided the only gap-step available.

Through His Son he provided the bridge that allows us to successfully navigate our world. GOD, himself, goes the extra mile and takes every incident and individual we encounter, and makes it all a seed for healing and prosperity. The seed that reunites us to the one relationship we must have, if we are to be sincerely successful in our living. But we get to choose. Everyday.

Will we submit all circumstances and relationships to the security of the first and most important relationship? Or will we continue to choose to go it alone?

Its your dime, you get to choose the tune. But the dancing is required. I am learning to leap about with joy through my living. Relationship takes work, but I am walking in the footsteps of the Great Work Out Master. I remain grateful and filled with thanksgiving for His presence.