A Relationship Manifesto - Part 3

EMOTIONAL NEEDS

A Tale of Two Ticks

What happens when two ticks feed off each other? They both end up dying because they drain the life out of each other. Two ticks can only survive together if they are seeking their nourishment from a third party rather than from each other.

The same is true in human relationships.

When a person expects their significant other to make them happy, content, secure, or significant, not only are they setting themselves up for supreme disappointment but they are expecting an imperfect human to do what only God can provide. And as with the two ticks, it will kill the relationship.

Take a Lesson from Leah

Jacob
In Genesis 29, Jacob has escaped his brother's wrath by heading to his mother's family in the east to find a bride. Behind him in Canaan was a life of serious family dysfunction. His brother, Esau, was seeking to kill him for taking his birthright (Genesis 27:41-45). He grew up knowing that his father favored Esau over him (Genesis 25:28). And because he was on the lam, he was separated from the one person (his mother) who did love and care for him. Talk about a man with an emotionally empty tank! In fact, his tank was so low that he kissed Rachel the first time that he met her - before even speaking to her (Genesis 29:11), which was totally taboo in that culture. But he wanted love. He wanted fulfillment. And he thought Rachel was his answer.

Jacob asked Rachel's father for her hand in marriage and committed to work seven years as a bride price. When the seven years were up, Jacob actually went to his soon-to-be father-in-law and actually said to him, "'Give me my wife that I may go in to her,'" (Genesis 29:21). Now, can you imagine a guy having the chutzpah to say such a thing to your dad?

For seven years, Jacob toiled thinking "If I can just get Rachel, then everything will be okay." His life was empty, and although God had appeared to him on his journey east, he was seeking a relationship and sex to fulfill him. And this later caused him and his family a tremendous amount of pain.

Leah
After the wedding feast, Jacob went into his tent to consummate his marriage, but he woke up to find that he had married the wrong girl! His father-in-law had switched Rachel with the older daughter Leah (Genesis 29:22-25)! Can you imagine the pain that Leah felt, especially when Jacob realized the truth that morning?

Although Leah was the older sister, she had spent her entire life in the shadow of her beautiful younger sister Rachel. Scripture contains this description of the two sisters: "Leah's eyes were weak, but Rachel was beautiful in form and appearance" (Genesis 29:17). Whether she was cross-eyed or had some other disfiguration, she was not Rachel. She was not "the beautiful sister." Furthermore, she did not have the love of her husband Jacob, for "he loved Rachel more than Leah" (Genesis 29:30), and seven years later, he married her and became a polygamist. Spending her whole life being the girl nobody wanted - I'm guessing Leah's emotional tank was also running on fumes!

She did have Jacob's body, though, and she used sex and childbirth as an attempt to win her husband's attention and love. She was trying to find happiness and love through her husband and children. But neither marriage or family can substitute for God.

Take a look at this:

Leah's 1st Son: Reuben
"And Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Reuben, for she said, 'Because the LORD has looked upon my affliction; for now my husband will love me'" (Genesis 29:32).

Leah's 2nd Son: Simeon
"She conceived again and bore a son, and said, 'Because the LORD has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son also'" (Genesis 29:33).

Leah's 3rd Son: Levi
"Again she conceived and bore a son, and said, 'Now this time my husband will be attached to me, because I have born him three sons'" (Genesis 29:34).

Leah's 4th Son: Judah
"And she conceived again and bore a son, and said, 'This time I will praise the LORD'" (Genesis 29:35).

With the birth of her first three sons, Leah was hoping that their births would finally secure Jacob's affections. She ardently desired for him to love her, but, alas, she was not Rachel. But with her last son, Judah, Leah makes no mention of Jacob or of her marital relationship. Instead, we see a determination to praise God. No longer were children or her spouse where she sought hope and acceptance. Leah finally found in God what only He could provide - true love and security.

Now let me tell you something really awesome that God did. He took the ugly duckling sister, the wife of a loveless marriage, the girl whom nobody wanted, and He blessed her. How? It was through Judah's line - through Leah - that God sent Christ (Matthew 1:2-3). How cool is that?!

Human Emotional Needs

We all have emotional needs. Essentially, every person has a need to feel secure and a need to feel significant. Typically, women have a greater need for security while men have a greater need for significance. These needs drive many of the decisions that we make, particularly in our relationships with others because we are seeking that person to make us feel valuable, cared for, protected, or important. We're looking to a relationship to make us feel complete and satisfied. We're making a person or a relationship our god, and it's a counterfeit.

The core issue is that we're sinners.

We have emotional needs, but because of the Fall, we have developed ways of meeting our needs that are defective. We expect people, things, or even piety to fulfill us. But when we do this, we are not worshipping God - we are worshipping our needs. And only God can ultimately meet our needs.

Why can't two ticks survive together? Because each is preeminently interested in his own self-interest and not in the good of the other person and because they are seeking from each other what neither of them can provide.

"If you get married as Jacob did, putting the weight of all your deepest hopes and longings on the person you are marrying, you are going to crush him or her with your expectations. It will distort your life and your spouse's life in a hundred ways. No person, not even the best one, can give your soul all it needs. You are going to think you have gone to bed with Rachel, and you will get up and it will always be Leah" (Tim Keller, Counterfeit Gods).

Only God can meet your needs. Only He can satisfy. Only He can truly love you.

"For He satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul He fills with good things" (Psalm 107:9).