Musings on Spiritual Matters

A Elder has made me cry.  Members have yelled at me in my home.  Deacons have rebuked me for reaching out to inner-city children.  And not one of these people are an enemy to me or I to them.  The elder that caused me to cry in the lobby area is a dear friend and supporter of me.  The member that “let me have it” in my home is a friend who I did visiting with on numerous occasions.  He cried when I left the work I was at.  The deacon became one of my biggest fans during my time at that church.

Why have so many negative times turned into so many positive times?  Because this is the will of God.  God does not want Christian relationships to end on a sore note.

So how do you turn a negative interaction into a positive one.  Here are three ways that might work.

1. Look for how you might have caused this?  Yes, you can blame them, but this will not restore the relationship.  There is always something that you could have done differently that might have helped.  Be humble, and be first to eat the humble pie.

2. Stay connected with the person.  In conflict, it is so easy for the “fight or flight” response to kick in.  You must not.  Stay in relationship, even though it is hard.  Hang in there.

3. Use Phil. 4:2-10 as your meditation text.  This is not a feel good section from Paul, it is a section on how to maintain the bond of unity.  Read it everyday during the conflict, until the conflict is resolved.

These are hard suggests to life by in the face of conflict.  But if you do, there will be a positive result as far as you are concerned.

Related posts:

1. Preacher-Elder Relationships
2. Reflections on A Year With Castle Rock
3. One Elder and the Hiring Process
4. Review of “Guiding People Through Conflict”
5. Rules to Handle Criticism

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This entry was posted by Matthew on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 at 11:57 am and is filed under Church News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.