Transactional vs. Transformational

If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. - Luke 6:32-36

Yesterday the message was about how so many of our relationships are transactional (“I will do this for you if you do that for me”). Tongue in cheek he mentions “sinners” three times - as if we all don’t know we struggle with selfishness - emphasizing that the transaction approach is the standard in our world today.

Jesus instead invites into a new way of living, and he himself embodied transformational relationships, where he went the extra mile, he turned the other cheek, and he regularly turned those who might be called enemies into his friends. He used what Brenna called “Disruptive Kindness” to shake people loose from the rigidity of their thinking.

We had the privilege of hearing from Ellie Dote in the message as well about what it’s meant for her to enter into remarkably unwelcoming spaces to remind people that people who are transgender like her are real people. By her mere presence in those spaces she invites transformation. (HERE is a bit of her story if you missed it).

What is a relationship that you experience as primarily transactional? What might it look to infuse disruptive kindness into that relationship “without expecting to get anything back” (Luke 6:35)