Conflict...Dread it or Use it? 5 Points to Ponder

Many times Christians are portrayed as meek and mild individuals who can be walked all over. Nothing could be further from the truth! The gospel is a radical and dangerous tool! Christians set precedents, start movements, and shake people up. We are speakers of truth, seekers of the light, and champions of the downtrodden. With all of that on a grand scale, sometimes we don't know what to do when we encounter conflict with our brothers and sisters in our church family. 

Not everyone will see the world as you do. Shocker, I know! God has uniquely gifted you with that sight through your life experiences, His revelations to you through the study of His word, and through learning to love like Him. Because of those differing views, conflict can arise, especially during times of change. We need to be very guarded of our responses to conflict and not give the enemy a chance to step into the work God has planned. 

Here are some of the things I have learned in dealing with conflict within the body of Christ:

1. Always take it to God. Now you may be thinking, "That's well and fine, Karen, but sometimes I have to deal with it immediately." Yep, you do at times! So what do you do? That's where I go for my "Hail Mary prayer." No, that isn't the beloved Catholic prayer of intercession, but rather a football term. According to Wikipedia, a Hail Mary is "a very long forward pass in American football, made in desperation with only a small chance of success, especially at or near the end of a half." Now, in this usage, let me clarify how I feel about that. I am desperate for God to intervene in the situation and take control of my words and reactions. Now, the difference here is that I believe my "Hail Mary prayer" will be answered, not that there is a slim chance of success. So what does that look like? I simply cry out to God in my mind and say, "Your words Father, not mine." Check out Matthew 10:19-20. Sometimes, I have to do this numerous times in a conversation; not because God didn't answer the first prayer, but because I can feel my emotions and myself getting in the way. 
2. Change is hard and people react differently to it. Some people shut down, disconnect, and try to pretend it isn't happening. Some people get confrontational. Some feel personally singled out or some feel totally ignored. When your church is going through a major change that you may be involved in, it is your job to LISTEN! Regardless of how invested in that change you are, you must always consider your brother's or sister's feelings. Sometimes, that listening ear is all it takes to resolve the conflict issue. Other times, God may have placed that person in opposition to what you are trying to do for a reason. Perhaps there is a facet of the change that needs fine tuned and God is using this individual to point that out. This is where you need to pray for discernment and wisdom as you consider what is being said to you. Don't discount something because you might think that the person doesn't know what he is talking about. Rather, prayerfully consider the statement and see if God is redirecting an area of change. 
3. Don't take conflict personally. This one is a hard one for me. Until recently, when someone disagreed with something I said, I felt that he was rejecting me and my whole point of view. I think this is a trap that women fall into numerous times. We are relational creatures and we sometimes forget that we can separate our relationship out of the issue of disagreement. This is where you need to pray that God teaches you to love like Jesus and that your worth is found only in Him. We get caught up in the moment and we forget that it isn't about who is right or who is wrong, or what side of the argument you fall on. Rather we should be thinking if we need to agree to disagree and still love one another. Conflict can be a beautiful tool of change if you remember that you love and respect the other individual. 
4. And oh yeah, if you haven't seen it yet- PRAY! Remember that "agree to disagree" that you just read in the last point? If the conflict has come to that, be sure that you are bathing it in prayer. If you are open and honest with God, you can humbly pray, "Father, I don't know if I'm right or if he is; please either change his way of thinking or change mine." Now, it's God's issue. You will find that emotions run high, but when you let God take over, He redirects those emotions and gives you the Spirit's peace. Now here is the kicker: when you start realizing you are having a conversation in your head with this person (you know the one I mean, "he's gonna say this and I'm gonna zing him with this!"), you have to remember to turn it back over to God! The enemy is trying to stir up your emotions again and you cannot perform good conflict resolution when your emotions are running high and likely biased. 
5. Remember to choose your words carefully. James 3:5-10 tells us that raging fires can be set ablaze by our words. When conflict arises, it is your job not to add fuel to the fire, but to be a peacemaker. It is not our job to change a person's heart, that's up to God. It is our job to speak life, love, and respect into another's life and viewpoint.

I hope that these things I have learned (many times the hard way) have helped you. Do you have points to add? Be sure to share them in the comments. Until next time, <3 you all!  

I'm Baaaack!

A ton has changed in my life since my last post back in December. Just after the holidays, life got hard. Chad and I entered a season of prayer, fasting, and counseling. We had a huge choice to make and it was gut wrenching!

Over the past two years, God has really been growing us and feeding our faith immensely. I can't think of another period in my life when I could actually see the changes God was making in me and my family at such an incredible rate. My husband's walk with the Lord became personal and intimate. I am so proud of all he has done, changed, and become in this period of time! I can only attribute the changes in him to the Lord. How do I know, you wonder. Sometimes when he is giving me advice or talking on a spiritual or church issue, the words coming out of his mouth are so deeply rooted in God's will and word that I know the Spirit is guiding him.

Our daughter continues to grow in her love of the Lord and brings joy to our lives daily! She constantly shines with love for Jesus and those around her. Then there's me.

God has done some tough work in me. I know He hasn't finished and I'm anxious to see what will become of me next. At the beginning of the year, I chose to take time off from blogging. If you know me and my quest to lead transparently, you may feel a little slighted by that time off. Perhaps, you are thinking to yourself that I should have shared with you as I walked through that wilderness. Well sister, let me tell you that I really feel God didn't want me to. I may have said things that were hurtful to some because I felt hurt. I may have lashed out at people, when it wasn't people that deserved my ire. I'm not perfect (earth shattering revelation there!). Thankfully, my Lord knows this and He knows in my heart, I never want to hurt anyone with my words or actions. So during this time, I felt my hands were tied when it came to blogging. Then recently, one of my brothers in Christ asked me if I was still writing. I waited it out a bit and felt the call back to write, so here I am.

To give you the gist of the change in our world, Chad and I decided to switch churches. Now, some of you might be thinking, "so what? People do it every day." Not us! Our home church was the place I had grown up in since my freshman year of high school. When we married, I told my husband if he wanted to go somewhere else I would, but he chose to stay at our church. This church was our home, our family, and the place we cut our spiritual teeth. It was filled with people we loved (including several of my family members). However, we began to feel conflicted. It seemed like nothing we were doing was working right. Initially, that made us want to push harder. We felt that we were fighting a spiritual battle. We later came to find out we were, but not in the way we thought!

One evening, after another round of sobbing my heart out to God, I told Chad I felt like we needed to seek some outside help. Through our daycare, I had connected with Brian Richard, the lead minister of Brownstown Christian Church. I reached out to him and he graciously offered to talk with us. We spoke with him several times over several months and each time he urged us to prayer, fasting, and listening to what the Spirit was telling us. He guided us with wisdom and truth and through that experience we learned so much! Never once did he tell us we should up and leave our home church. He was very sensitive to our feelings. He constantly reminded me (specifically) that, "it is not about you." He was right, it was never about my feelings, but about what God made me to do.

I now realize we were going through a time of mourning. We didn't want to leave what we knew and loved, but God had different plans for us! Many tears were shed, but looking back, I feel that was entirely appropriate.

Over my time at my home church, I had been blessed with 3 different lead ministers. Each one taught me how to grow in my spiritual walk. Each one imparted something of himself into my formative spiritual growth. They challenged me, influenced me, and loved me. I learned so many lessons from each man and am so appreciative of the teaching each one poured into my life! I also grew very close to other ministry members through the years, especially the women. My voice and growth were influenced by devout women of God. Their love and guidance helped me to lead confidently as I walk out my faith. What I didn't want to see, was God leading us away from there! I was comfortable. I was useful. I was growing.

After several months, Chad decided we were moving our membership to Brownstown Christian Church. While I was totally on board, I won't say it was easy. However, after being at BCC for 3 months now, I feel like we have been there forever! I now know God was trying to get me to let go of the tight grip I had on my home church in order for us to grow in new ways. We are so excited by the opportunities and potential at BCC!

I share all of this with you so that you will understand our journey. I now know what some ministers and their families must feel when they are being called to a new location. We didn't take this decision lightly and would never encourage anyone else to. It was a hard struggle! We loved where we were at and still love our church family there! I hinted that I felt that this time of decision was a wilderness. It was because the enemy was working on us constantly! We had to speak to each other constantly and work to make sure that we didn't allow our perceptions to be tainted. Boy that was a hard one! While I now know, God was leading us away, I was so overly sensitive and emotional during this time that the enemy was having a heyday and it was only through constant prayer and reliance on the Father that I was able to keep myself under control. Well, I may have had some "out of control" times, but thankfully, I had some strong brothers and a fabulous husband to help me!

Do you feel the Father leading you away from something you are comfortable with? Sometimes, God has to make us let go of something we cherish in order to bring us something that we will learn to cherish. While we may think we know what we are doing, or where we are at is great (and it most likely is), God may have a use for you in another place. Even if you were to only make a difference in one life for the Kingdom, it is a job only you can do because He made you that way! Change is hard, but God always has your best interest at heart! <3 ya all!