I’m amazed at the effectiveness of pop psychology. For years we’ve been told that people need to be complete in themselves (i.e., independent) before they can find a meaningful relationship. It reminds me of what my son said to me when he was a teenager looking for his first part-time job:
Mom, they all want to hire someone “with experience.” How can I get “experience” if no one will hire me?
As Christians, we do that, too. It’s like trying to get it all together before we come to God for help, which, by the way, is a very unbiblical approach. How can he supply our needs if we deny that we have any?
In sum, our culture (both inside and outside the Church) tells us that we need to not need anything before our needs can be met. Does that sound as crazy to you as it does to me?
The truth is that we all need. It’s a big part of what makes us human and, therefore, not God. As a friend once put it, “Saying someone is ‘too needy’ is like saying they’re ‘too human’!”
The truth is we need relationships because we are needy people. We’re dependent whether we’re willing to admit it or not. It’s as certain as the Law of Gravity! Even if you don’t buy the whole “gravity thing,” every time you leap into the air, you will still end up on the ground!
Like gravity, our neediness is part of our God-given human nature. We need, and we must depend on others (God and people) to meet our needs.
The question, then, becomes whether we have learned to be “effectively dependent” or to be “ineffectively dependent” on one another. In our upcoming posts, we’ll be exploring the varied ways we are “ineffectively dependent” on one another.
