Sometimes we have to go back into these wounds that we've covered up our whole life
and we have to kind of cut. We got to let the Word of God cut it into that area
and we have to open it up and get the cancer out, get the infection out, the
bitterness, the hiddenness, and let the light of Christ shine in there to bring
healing. That's what our passage is saying.
I'm talking about five qualities of a blood-stained ally. And after years of
ministering to men, doing conferences, doing retreats with men, we have one
particular retreat we do almost every year. Sometimes we're at a different
state where we do it, but it's called Whole Heart Advance. And at the Whole
Heart Advance, this is where we take about a hundred, 130 guys up into the
mountains. And one of the talks that I give there is being a blood-stained ally.
We also have another conference we do on the off year called Wilderness Encounter
and we go off into the wilderness and there we also talk about blood-stained
allies. So the blood-stained ally message is really key to your maturity and
growth in Christ. So through all these years and these experiences, I see five
qualities. There's more than five, but I'm going to say there's five qualities
that are the irreducible minimum that someone needs to have. So I'm hoping this
is helpful for you as you think about your own life. And the passage that I'm
going to kind of teach from on the qualities of a blood-stained ally is
2 Corinthians 4. And we're going to run through about 10 verses here in
understanding what I think are the qualities of a blood-stained ally. So in
2 Corinthians, Paul is really talking about suffering. He's talking about
relationships with other people. He's talking about shame. And so the
environment here is leading up to how do we break the power of shame in our
life? How do we break the power of sin over our lives that debilitates us, that
handicaps us, that paralyzes our faith in Christ? So we pick it up in 2
Corinthians 4. Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy,
we do not lose heart. The thing about blood-stained allies is it's all about
not losing heart. These are relationships in your life that are going to pick up
your heart. They're going to strengthen your heart. Verse 2, but we have renounced
the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of
God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every
man's conscience in the sight of God. If you're one of those people that
underlines the Bible, like I am, underline by manifestation of the truth,
commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. So the
number one quality, the first quality here is vulnerability. You need
relationships, men with other men, women with other women, marriage couples where
there's a vulnerability that you can share your heart. You can manifest truth
commending yourself to every man's conscience. So the first quality of a
blood-stained ally is they're vulnerable. It's not teacher-student, it's a mutual
teaching and a mutual learning together. So vulnerability is number one. And if you
look at this, it says we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the hidden
things of shame. So it's someone you can name the shame with. So if you were
sexually abused as a kid, this is someone you can share. I was sexually
abused as a kid. If you grew up in a home where there was a divorce and you
just never gotten over that, you can talk about that. You talk about the divorce.
It's naming the shame. It's naming what's holding you back. It's learning to quit
posing and acting like, oh, everything's just fine and you just have this great
Christian life. Everybody knows you don't, but you think you do. Well, you're
not going to have blood-stained allies if you're going to be a poser and a
pretender your whole life.
Number one is someone who you can really be real with and the word I would use is
vulnerability. Second quality that I see in this these two verses is a patient
love. Someone who has a patient love for you who even as you manifest truth you
talk about the truth of the hurt and pain that you've been through in your
life. There's a patient love. They're not judging you. Judgmental people are not
going to be the best people to be blood-stained allies and so patient love. So first is
vulnerability. Second is patient love. That means that they understand. It's not
just that you can share or that they can share but they understand your
brokenness. They understand and like I said in the last episode they may not
have been through exactly what you've been through but there's an empathy.
There's an understanding and that's actually another probably key word here
for patient love. They have empathy for you and they don't judge but actually
they show mercy and they extend grace to you. Verse three, but even if our gospel
is veiled it is veiled to those who are perishing whose minds the God of this
age is blinded who do not believe lest the light of the gospel of the glory of
Christ who is the image of God should shine on them for it is the God who
commanded light to shine out of darkness who is shown in our hearts to give the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. So
number three I would say truth and compassion together. So this is this is
someone who's a Jesus follower who can be a part of shining the light of Christ
on those wounded areas but also with compassion. So one time I was on a elk
hunt. I hunt big game in the Rockies here and and I cut myself when I was
butchering this elk and a snowstorm moved in and I needed to get back to
camp pretty quick because it was snowing really the snow buildup was accumulating
really fast so I grabbed a quarter of this elk put it on my back and I went
back into camp and I totally forgot that I had cut myself pretty sharp
blade that I use and so the next morning I woke up and it was infected it was
aching and hurting and I looked down and it was all pussy because it was getting
infected because I had not treated it you know what I had to do so I had to go
in with a blade again I had to cut it open again squeeze out the poison the
infection put some ointment on it but also to get air and sunshine into that
wound so that it would begin to take care of itself and heal itself and
that's the way things work with our hearts too that sometimes we have to go
back into these wounds that we've covered up our whole life and we have to
kind of cut we got to let the Word of God cut it into that area and we have to
open it up and get the cancer out get the infection out the bitterness the
hiddenness and let the light of Christ shine in there to bring healing that's
what our passage is saying having someone with you as a partner someone
with you as a blood-stained allies as a blood-stained ally is huge here because
that relationship means that you have accountability it also someone who's got
just love and affection for you even though it's super duper hard it's really
painful to open up your heart that way that's the third quality is truth and
compassion having the ability to let's have someone in your life who gives you
truth and compassion and then I would say quality number four under that
rubric is a prayer partner someone who will pray with you over that someone who
will pray into the pain pray into the situation and and love you and and pray
for the power of God to continue to come into that wounded area then look at
verse 7 but we have this treasure and earthen vessels that the excellence of
the power may be of God and not of us we are hard-pressed on every side yet not
crushed we are perplexed but not in despair we are struck down but not
destroyed
always caring about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life of
Jesus also may be manifested in our bodies for we who live are always being
delivered up to death for Jesus sake so I think lastly it's the word I like to
use is stick to itiveness stick to it it is I mean endurance this is a friend
this is a blessed ally that's gonna stick closer than a brother stick closer
than a sister even through hard times they don't quit one of the things that I
really really loved about Lord of the Rings all the different episodes of Lord
of the Rings was the relationship that Sam and Frodo had these guys I mean that
the Fellowship of the Ring definitely had it but Frodo and Sam really had this
relationship of endurance and if you watch all of the movies you see how
Frodo is is increasingly wanting to quit he just wants to get out of this thing
and he and he's starting to actually get better at times about having to carry
the weight of this ring but Sam is is right there beside him Sam won't quit
Sam is the key to Frodo's courage that's a blessed and ally without Sam
Frodo never would have made it without Sam Frodo would have quit but he's there
even to the very end even as they have to release that ring into the fire Sam
is like right there so that's a beautiful example of a blessed and ally
so endurance I have the same the same guys are my blessed and allies ten years
ago so after a decade together man we've been through a lot we trust each other
man if we had disagreements holy cow yes have we gone through even deeper harder
stuff than we did in the beginning absolutely but we stick closer than a
brother and so endurance is key so the five qualities of a blessed and ally are
vulnerability patient love or empathy truth with compassion prayer partnership
and lastly endurance so look for someone like that I want to challenge you men
and women to look for blessed and ally ask God to give you wisdom to find some
blessed and allies for your life it'll change your life it'll be one of the
best decisions you ever made because your growth will just be exponential
because you're no longer holding on to the past you're moving out with the
future and you've got some brothers and sisters that all stand with you as you
go through all the issues that go with life so God bless you I hope this is
helpful to you