Wisdom from a Friend… Dan Glaze on Relational Investing

Dan Glaze knows how to love on and invest in people. This is his job at National Christian Foundation where he’s a National Relationship Manager. Rita and I love him and his wife Donna. Below are three questions I asked him regarding relational investments…

1. What does it mean to invest in others relationally?

Investing in others relationally is sharing life upon life. Today’s culture is driving us toward isolation. We are spending more time looking at a computer screen than being face-to-face with people. I am confident that life cannot exist outside the context of relationships. We have limited time and energy and thus the most important use of our time is in the lives of others. Investing in others relationally means laying aside our desires for self and giving our life to someone else. (BTW – this is what Jesus did)

2. Why do you invest in others relationally?

There is a saying that only two things will last eternally – God’s Word and People. What then is worthy of our investment? Transformation (life change) takes place in relationships, not in isolation. I desire to be God’s touch into people’s lives. There is nothing more important than sharing life together. Someone said; “Shared joy is a double joy and shared sorrow is half a sorrow.” People are lonely today because they are building walls instead of bridges. But the main reason I invest in others is because this was God’s strategy for bringing life to a dead world. Emmanuel (God with us) selected purposeful proximity as His strategy. He could have come as an idea or a light, but He came as one of us and walked with us. The word relationship comes from the Latin relationem meaning “a bringing back, restoring.” So many, including ourselves, have the tendency to get off track to who God desires us to be. Relationships bring us back and restore us to who God created us to be. Having an intimate relationship with HIM.

3. How do you invest in others relationally?

I pour my life into the lives of others. I care for them. I invest in others by being more concerned with their needs than my own needs. I take a keen interest in their lives, their relationship with Christ, their families, their businesses, and their hobbies. There is one couple Donna and I met back in 1994. That year Donna and I intentionally decided to invest in this couple’s lives. What an amazing journey over the last 13 years. Each year, we spend 4 days together at their lake house laughing, eating, praying, crying, fishing and loving on each other. Chuck and Joanne have become almost as close as family. As I seek to serve and give to others, I end up receiving far more than I give. God’s economy is upside down from today’s culture. As I invest in the lives of others, God gives my life a huge return. There is no greater ministry than investing in others. Anthony D’Angelo states – “Treasure your relationships, not your possessions”. Relationships will give a greater return. “You have given us a new commandment to love one another even as You have loved us; so we must love one another. By this all men will know that we are Your disciples, if we have love for one another.” (John 13:34)