WEDNESDAY WEEKLY WORD...do you understand?

We enjoy discovering as much as we can about the things that we truly care about. If we have a favorite football team, we keep up with every stat, the wins, the losses, who got traded and who didn't by reading every article that we can pick up about them. If it is cooking that we love, we will watch all of the cooking shows on TV to see how the "pro's" do it or search thru recipe book after recipe book to find that unique, interesting recipe to try.

If something appeals to us, we go out of our way to become knowledgeable about it. This is an awesome way to understand this "thing" that has attracted our attention, whether it is football, cooking or something else. Why is it so easy to understand these kind of things, but when it comes to relationships, we really don't take the time to understand people?

When a man is trying to win the heart of a woman, he studies her. He learns all about her, what she likes, what she dislikes. He learns her habits and her hobbies. The more he learns about her, the more he understands her. The problem with some marriages that are falling apart today is that couples cease to keep learning about each other.

People are always changing. When my husband and I got married 29 years ago, my husband could not stand seafood. He could never understand how I could eat shrimp, which is my favorite! After several years, I'm not sure how or when the change took place, but all of a sudden my husband took a liking to shrimp. And now he eats it and enjoys it. I don't understand how this change took place, but I am glad that it did!

In last week's YOUR OPINION MATTERS POLL, I polled the readers the following question: "Who do you have the hardest time understanding?" The top 2 answers were...

1. 31% voted and said who really understands anyone!
2. 26% of those polled said they have a hard time understanding politicians!

I chuckled at the #1 poll answer, sometimes it is very difficult to understand people. But in our relationships, some of the problems that we have is simply because we do not take the time to understand those closest to us. Most often disagreements pop up when someone reacts differently than us to a situation and we simply cannot figure out why.

Some of the problems that we have with people is simply the fact that we do not understand them. Some differences that we have with each other are relatively insignificant but yet it is the cause of many fights and conflicts. The Bible says that we tend to "revile" the things that we do not understand. (Jude 10)

Consider for a moment, the reasons for the things that you like or prefer. There is also a reason for those you come in contact with as to why they like the things that they like, or a reason they act the way that they act. Every nuisance behaviour in the character of others has a back story. Every element of who that person is, how they think, how they act and how they react has a story that has formed that person to be who they are, how they are.

PROVERBS 2:6 "The Lord gives wisdom; from His mouth come knowledge and understanding."

Understanding people may not be easy to do, but with God's discernment, it is possible!