“Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.”
Philippians 2:4-5 (NLT) When you meet someone to resolve a conflict, you first have to confess your part of the problem. Then you need to listen for the other person’s hurt and perspective. In every conflict—from our personal relationships to politics—we think we argue over ideas. But we actually argue over emotion. Anytime there’s a conflict, someone’s feelings were hurt; somebody felt abused or slighted. It’s not the idea that causes the conflict. It’s the emotion behind the idea. Hurt people hurt people. The more someone is experiencing hurt, the more likely they are to lash out at everyone else. People who aren’t experiencing hurt don’t hurt others. People who are filled with love are loving toward others. People who are filled with joy are joyful toward others. People who are filled with peace are at peace with everybody else. But people who are filled with hurt are going to hurt others. They’re going to lash out. If you want to connect with people, you must start with their hurts, their needs, and their interests. If you want to be a good salesperson, you don’t start with your product. You start with your customer’s hurts, needs, and interests. If you want to be a good professor or pastor or anything else, you start with people’s needs, hurts, and interests. Philippians 2:4-5 says, “Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had” (NLT). In times of conflict, are you often so busy trying to get others to see your position that you don’t listen to theirs? When each person is just speaking and not listening, you move further and further away from each other emotionally. Instead, you need to intentionally switch your focus from your needs to their needs. Conflict resolution starts with the way you look at the situation. The word “look” in Philippians 2:4 is the Greek word scopos. It’s where we get our words “microscope” and “telescope.” Scopos means “to focus.” The passage goes on to say that you should have the same attitude Jesus had. And you are most like Jesus when you’re focusing on the hurts of somebody else rather than your own. There’s an old proverb that says, “Seek to understand before seeking to be understood.” When you’re focused on the other person’s needs and not your own, you’ll be able to get a better understanding of the situation and move forward with resolving your conflict.
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“Why do you notice the little piece of dust in your friend’s eye, but you don’t notice the big piece of wood in your own eye? . . . You hypocrite! First, take the wood out of your own eye. Then you will see clearly to take the dust out of your friend’s eye.”
Matthew 7:3, 5 (NCV) One of the most important life skills you need to learn is conflict resolution. If you don’t learn it, you’ll spend much of your life miserable—because we’re imperfect people and we have conflict almost every day of our lives. To resolve conflict, you’re going to have to make the first move. And to do that, you’re going to have to ask for God’s help. It takes courage to approach someone you are in conflict with and tell them you want to sit down and work it out. Once you’ve taken that step, you don’t start with what the other person has done wrong; you don’t make accusations or list ways you’ve been hurt. You start with what you’ve done wrong. You can always find something to confess. Even if the conflict is 99.99 percent the other person’s fault, you can admit your part. Maybe it was your poor response or your attitude. Maybe it was the way you walked away. You have weaknesses in your life that others see clearly but you’ve never seen. Those are your blind spots. That’s why you need to come to conflict resolution with a humble heart and begin with your own faults. Jesus said, “Why do you notice the little piece of dust in your friend’s eye, but you don’t notice the big piece of wood in your own eye? . . . You hypocrite! First, take the wood out of your own eye. Then you will see clearly to take the dust out of your friend’s eye” (Matthew 7:3, 5 NCV). What’s the piece of wood in your eye that is keeping you from seeing the situation clearly? Don’t start with all the ways the other person has hurt you until you’ve confessed your part of the conflict first. Did you cause conflict by being insensitive? Or were you overly sensitive? Did you not show compassion for the person who was hurting? Were you being overly demanding? What are your blind spots? Once you figure them out and confess them, you’ll be ready for the next step in conflict resolution. “In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you.”
Matthew 7:12 (NIV) There are many ways to earn the respect of others during times of conflict. Here are three of those ways: Pause before you speak, resolve conflict privately, and appeal to the best in people. But the very first thing you should do is this: Empathize with the feelings of others. If you want people to respect you, you must respect their feelings. What you sow, you will reap. The Bible says, “In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you” (Matthew 7:12 NIV). This is especially true when people are hurting, grieving, fearful, or feel there’s been an injustice against them. People want to know that you understand what they’re going through. They don’t care what you know until they first know that you care. By the way, you don’t have to agree with someone to empathize with their emotions. When you see people protesting, for example, you may not agree with their conclusions, but you can still try to understand why they’re doing what they’re doing. When Nehemiah was faced with conflict, the first thing he did was this: He empathized with the feelings of the people who were complaining and criticizing. He said, “When I heard their outcry and these charges, I was very angry” (Nehemiah 5:6 NIV). He didn’t say he was just angry. He said he was very angry. What was he doing? He was mirroring the mood of the people who were upset. He was validating their feelings by feeling their feelings too. Instead of minimizing their emotions by saying, “Well, don’t be angry,” he showed understanding by saying, “I’m upset too.” You might be thinking, “Isn’t anger a sin?” No, not always. Sometimes anger is an expression of love. If a person hurts someone in your family and you're apathetic instead of angry, then it suggests you don’t love my family. In Scripture, God distinguishes between righteous anger and unrighteous anger, good anger and bad anger. Ephesians 4:26 says, “Be angry, yet do not sin” (BSB). Even Jesus got angry when the leaders around him weren’t helping someone in need. Mark 3:5 says that Jesus looked at them angrily and “was deeply disturbed by their indifference to human need” (TLB). Do you get “deeply disturbed” when you see people being mistreated? If you want to be respected, be like Nehemiah and like Jesus. Empathize with people’s feelings. You don’t have to agree with them, but if you listen empathetically to their feelings, you’ll earn their respect. “I’m not trying to win the approval of people, but of God. If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ’s servant.”
Galatians 1:10 (NLT) In life, you have to please only one person: your Creator. You only have to please the Lord, the one who made you and has a purpose for your life. That simplifies life enormously! Jesus said, “I don’t try to please myself, but I try to please the One who sent me” (John 5:30 NCV). He’s saying, in effect, “I’m living for an audience of one.” Did you know that people pleasing is a form of idolatry? The first commandment in the Ten Commandments says, “You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3 NIV). Anything you put before God becomes a god. So a boat could be a god. A career could be a god. A girlfriend could be a god. Golf could be a god. Anything that becomes number one in your life that isn’t God becomes your god. The second commandment is, “You must not make for yourself an idol” (Exodus 20:4 NLT). Anything that replaces God in your life is an idol. Success can be an idol. Money can be an idol. Sex can be an idol. A relationship can become an idol. If that relationship to your spouse, boss, or friend is more important than God, it’s an idol. People pleasers allow other people’s opinions to take first place in their lives. Those opinions become a god because they matter more than God’s opinion. You don’t want to tell people you’re a Christian because they might think less of you. You don’t want them to know you go to church because they may not like you. At that point, you have another god in your life. You have made an idol of people pleasing. Paul says in Galatians 1:10, “I’m not trying to win the approval of people, but of God. If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ’s servant” (NLT). Almost everyone wants to be liked. It’s tempting to want to please other people. But don’t do it at the expense of pleasing God. As a servant of Christ, you have an audience of one. You need to only please God. “There is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus.”
1 Timothy 2:5 (NIV) When you have conflict, focus on reconciliation, not resolution. There’s a big difference between those two words. Reconciliation means re-establishing the relationship. Resolution means resolving every issue. In most cases, resolution isn’t going to happen—there are some things you’ll just never agree on. Can you have a loving relationship without agreeing on everything? Absolutely. But it takes wisdom. When you’re wise, you learn to disagree without being disagreeable; you learn to walk hand in hand without having to see eye to eye. One of the greatest things you can do with your life is be a bridge builder, not a wall builder. You are most like Jesus Christ when you are reconciling people. That’s exactly what Jesus came to do! God sent Jesus to Earth to reconcile humanity with God. Jesus is the great reconciler. The Bible says, “There is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 2:5 NIV). But you cannot make peace with other people until you make peace with God. If you find yourself in constant conflict, ask yourself whether you’ve made peace with God. You can make peace with God by repenting of your sins and dedicating your life to serving him (see the prayer below). The Bible calls Jesus the Prince of Peace. Peace with God leads to peace with yourself, which leads to peace with others. |
AuthorTaken from Daily Hope by Rick Warren. Categories
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