"Voice of the Counselor" Podcast

Episode 1: “God’s Children in Conflict”

“What happens when “Spiritual siblings” fall out with each other?”

“So, what can you do when there is a conflict between Christians?”

Let’s face it, humans are a contentious lot, so it goes with out saying that as we go through life there are going to be conflicts with others. But what happens when that conflict is with another spirit filled believer like yourself? After all they are both professing children of God surely neither of them can be wrong, right? Prov 21: 2  Every way of a man is right in his own eyes:

But the LORD pondereth the hearts.

Q: How does God decide who’s right in a conflict between believers? A: He doesn’t, as the writer of Proverbs put it, The Lord Ponders the heart.” When he is Pondering those hearts in is not interested in who’s right but rather “What” is right. The writer of Hebrews said it like this in Hebrews 4:12

Hebrews 4:12 KJV 1900

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

So you see God is not at all interested in “Who’s right” but rather What is right.” The way that he does that is he searches the heart for intent. Was it the intent of either of them to defraud the other in some way or other. In order to determine this, the Lord examines each of their motives to see if there any “Malice of forethought committed here. How does he do that? He does that by looking at the cause of the conflict and what brought that to fruition.

example: Believer A sold believer B a Corvette on Monday, but on Thursday of the same week the transmission blew and now the car is useless Believer A refuses to give B a refund or fix the vette.” So God looks to see if A, knew the car was bad but sold it to B any way. God also looks at B to make sure they did their due diligence in checking out the vehicle before buying it. Getting back on track, the car with the bad transmission is the culprit that caused this conflict. Now that we have the cause we can go forward in working on a solution to solve the problem and settle the conflict.

We are going to introduce some steps here that always aid in settling a Conflict. We will call them Conflict settling tools. 1. Address the problem forthright, Name the issue that is causing this situation. “Fight the Problem, not the person.”

2. Be Transparent with both parties while being careful in not taking sides or coming to a preconceived conclusion in your mind.

3. Listen intently and ask questions if there is any doubt about what is being presented. 4.Put each party in the problem solving mode: “What will it take to get this situation resolved?” 5. Stay Positive and continue pointing out the upside of putting this conflict to rest.

6. Share with both parties the impact of having such a conflict between Christian and the negative effects it has and will have on every service or event at the Church until it is properly resolved.

7. Remind them of the power of forgiveness, making a point to remind them of how God forgave Peter for denying him and lastly how God forgave them. Encourage them to forgive each other and focus on the problem rather than the person.

8. If after going through the above steps and neither party is willing to relent or compromise, ask each of them how keeping the conflict going would benefit either of them. Then ask how hanging on to the hostility would aid in fixing the problem. Words of wisdom to the appointed (or drafted) Peacemaker.

“Never fight the ones your fighting for!” Some Do’s and don’t of settling a conflict.

The Holy Bible: King James Version, Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version. (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 2009), Pr 21:2.