How to Deal With Conflict (Untying Knots: Real Relationships, Part 1)

Matthew 18:15-20

Let’s suppose that after services this morning there is a group of you talking out in the narthex.  And when I walk up I overhear the group saying some very negative things about how terrible the sermon was that day.  Just as I come within range of the group, I hear one person say, “A third grader could put together a better sermon!”  Another person laughs and adds, “Good thing I slept through it today!”

Of course my feelings are hurt.  It wouldn’t have been so bad if the group didn’t include my own wife and children!  There are three things I might do in response.  First, I might go on the attack.  They hurt me and so I’m going to hurt them.  Second, I might slink away and never say anything to anyone.  But I’ll get them back by never speaking to them again!  Third, I might wait until later, then gather some people who would support me, so I can complain about the hurtful things said about me to get some sympathy.  But notice, all three of those responses would allow the hurt feelings and the conflict to permanently damage relationships. 

 

That made-up scenario was a rather minor form of conflict.  But even small conflicts can ruin relationships.  Some of you have dealt with situations where someone has wronged you in a much more serious and damaging way.  Our reading today asks us to imagine something serious happening between two parties who are members of the same congregation.  The offense is not named, but the scale of the wrongdoing is damaging enough that if the offending party fails to make things right, the leaders of the congregation are to ban them from the fellowship until their heart softens and they are ready to repair the relationship.

The Bible is not a fairytale where everyone gets along.  It begins with the Cain and Abel story, one brother deceiving and murdering another in a jealous rage.  And we know of some specific situations of real conflict in the early church.  Some involved money -  In I Cor. 6:1-8 church members were suing one another in the public courts for damages.  In 2 Thess. 3:6-15 some people were refusing to work, freeloading off of others, and thus putting great strain on the community’s sustainability.  Some situations involve sexual habits -  In I Cor. 5:1-5 a man became romantically involved with his step-mother.  Some conflicts were about leadership – take for example the feud between two women named Euodia and Syntyche in Philippians 4:2.

So as we look for guidance about how to deal with conflict, the first thing I want you to know is that Scripture makes no effort to conceal how frequently and how deeply we can hurt one another.  So part of growing up in our faith involves giving up our naïve dream of an easy life where everyone just gets along, and learning to face instead that life and relationships will always involve struggle and conflict.  But here’s the thing I really want to get to today.  The new way forward for all of us involves taking responsibility for how we handle conflict and hurt feelings. 

Now let’s take a look at our reading today.  Obviously, during Jesus’ ministry, there was no “church,” only a small band of disciples and curious crowds.  But by the time Matthew’s gospel was written in the late first century, the Christians recording Jesus’ teaching framed his teaching about how to deal with conflict in the context of their church life.

The first thing you’ll notice is that Jesus’ teaches that conflict resolution will likely be a process.  The process outlined here will require gentleness and patience.  It lays out an intentional, multi-step process for getting along with each other in the midst conflict.  It requires practices of courageous confrontation, of attentive listening, and of deliberate efforts at reconciliation.  It is about mending relationships when things go wrong.  So this process is a fresh alternative to our usual habits of responding to conflict by attack, by sulking, and by complaining to third parties.

Built into this process of dealing with conflict are assumptions that will surprise and confuse many of us.  We have been trained to think about conflict in rather individualistic terms.  So when others confront us about our behavior, our first instinct is -- “Keep your nose out my business.”  But when we sin against one another we imperil the health of the community at all levels.  Just think about it: the wrongdoing of parents have wide ramifications within the family; the misdeeds of civic leaders or executives have wide significance for cities and businesses; and the harms that can happen in a congregation affect the whole congregation.

So the first assumption of this process aimed at healing relationships is that when one person harms another, or wounds another, or breaks trust, or sins against another person – this is a matter of wide importance to the health of the whole community.

The process begins with a timely, direct and honest engagement with the person who has harmed you.  You do this discreetly, so as not to embarrass or shame the other person.  You have to summon the courage to say, “here’s what you did, and here’s how it made me feel.”  We often avoid this first step in the process because it’s hard to approach someone who has hurt you with a heart open to a renewed relationship.  But remember, it’s not your job to convince the other party to apologize.  That’s up to them.  But in this direct confrontation you allow them the opportunity to take responsibility for how they’ve harmed you, to ask for forgiveness, and to begin re-building the relationship.

(Now I do think there are some exceptions to this first step of engaging directly with the person who harmed or hurt you.  If you are a child and the person who hurt you is an adult, skip this step.  Get some other adults involved right away.  And If there is any fear of further harm or abuse, skip this step and involve some others who can make sure you will be safe). 

Now will this first step towards re-building a relationship work?  Will those who have harmed us always hear us out and then tell us they’re genuinely sorry?  No.  That’s why there are more steps in the process.  But I do want to encourage you today by pointing out that the risen Christ promises to be near us especially when we are working at re-building our relationships.  “If two or three agree about anything they ask” is not a generic promise about praying in groups.  It is a promise that renewal and reconciliation can happen when both parties agree to work things out.  And when Jesus promises that wherever “two or three” have gathered in his name, he means that whenever people come together to practice the hard work of peacemaking, he will be in the middle of that work.  So if you are worried about a difficult conversation you may need to have after today’s sermon, know that the risen Christ promises to be with you.

But even so, the process may well need to continue through more stages.  If the first conversation does not work, we’re to take one or two other people we trust into another engagement.  If step two doesn’t work, the third step is that you share with the wider community what has happened.  You do not share the story in order to punish the other person.  You share it in order that the larger community can play a role in re-establishing the relationship.  But even if the influence of the larger community or congregation cannot break through the situation, you are still not to give up. 

Here’s what Matthew’s gospel says, “And if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.”  Now that might sound harsh, as if you are to exclude the offender from the community, to write them off as hopeless, to cut them off for good.  But in Matthew’s gospel, the “pagans and tax collectors” were the people the church was called to love and serve.  So when we are hurt by others, we are to be firm in our expectations for their behavior, even as we continue to pray and work for the healing of the relationship.  God doesn’t ever give up on us.  And we’re not to give up on others.  If God has given us the time and space we need to get our act together, why can’t we practice that same determined patience with others?

What becomes clear in this teaching is that the quality of our relationships matter.  Becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ means that you pledge to get better at handling the ways other people hurt you.  Becoming the person that God has called you to become involves learning to be a peacemaker.

When Jesus teaches, “Blessed are the peacemakers” (Matthew 5:9), many of us refuse to hear the firmness and courage that peacemaking requires.  We turn his call to “peacemaking” into an excuse for our own elaborate schemes for avoiding conflict.  Pete Scazzzero puts it this way, “Most people think that Jesus calls us to be pacifiers and appeasers who ensure that nobody gets upset.  We are to keep the peace, ignoring difficult issues and problems, making sure things remain stable and serene” (EHS, p. 184).  No, peacemaking involves loving confrontation that aims not at revenge or winning, but aims instead at the re-building of a relationship on healthier terms.

When I think of family confict, I think of Chicken Annie’s and Chicken Mary’s, two identical restaurants side-by-side because of a family fall-out.  That’s a pretty good picture of how bad things can become when families fight.  I think of an episode of Seinfeld where George Kostanza’s family celebrates the holiday of Festivus, which involves “feats of strength” but also the annual “airing of the grievances” around the dinner table.  I’ve told you before about a person I know whose last name is Jones.  But he hates his family so much his email is notjones@gmail.com.

Some of you are living with relationship conflicts that began online through social media.  Young people especially have to navigate nasty things said online.  But I have seen adults say nasty and hurtful things to others online and so have you.  Some of you live with unhealthy relationships at work due to hurt feelings.  Many of our workplaces wind up fracturing into partisan groups or tribes that make the workplace a kind of battleground of group loyalties.

But the kind of peacemaking that Jesus models and teaches involves a willingness to be honest and say what needs to be said.  And telling the truth sometimes involves conflict and confrontation.  Here’s a little advice I would give.  If you need to say something to someone who has wronged or hurt you, say it up front.  Say it and get it out there.  Because I am a people pleaser, I have often tip-toed into what needed to be said.  I’d make small talk, butter up the other person, affirm them seven different ways, and then just before I needed to be somewhere else, I’d say, “Oh, yeah, again, you’re great, really, super great, and I so appreciate you, and look, who’s perfect, I’m not perfect, but anyway, you’re kind of a bully and you dominate conversations and don’t let other people talk – okay let’s get together soon, see you!”

I try not to do that anymore.  I begin with what needs to be said.  “Look, I need to talk to you about what happened last week. . . “  It’s a little awkward to begin that way.  But it’s the only way to clearly communicate with other people.  It’s the only way they’ll hear it.  If you need to have a difficult conversation with someone, start with the difficult part.

I could go on and on, multiplying examples of conflict and relational breakdowns.  But I don’t need to.  You have people and situations in your mind right now of places in your life where there is tension, hard feelings, and animosity.  But let’s look at the silver lining of these difficulties.  There are countless opportunities for us to leave here today and put this wise but difficult teaching into practice.  We can start to become peacemakers.  We can allow ourselves to be pulled into a new perspective that is shaped by God’s way of making peace with us.

All of us have some long-standing habits when it comes to conflict.  Who are you?  Are you the one who attacks back?  Jesus calls you to become a peacemaker.  Are you the one who silently withdraws and holds a grudge?  Jesus calls you to become a peacemaker.  Are you the one who triangulates, pulling others into your complaints?  Jesus calls you to become a peacemaker.

I want you to call to mind the person who causes you the most trouble right now, the most difficult person in your life.  (They may be sitting near you.)  Now I want you to ask yourself, “Could this enemy, this opponent, be an angel sent from God to show me something about myself that I couldn’t learn any other way?  Could this difficult person and difficult situation be an opportunity to practice peacemaking?”

Our sign out front says “Safe. Open. Real.”  At our best, that describes who we want to become.  But I realize that we don’t always live out those values.  Living together doesn’t always feel safe, open, and real.  Our family life, our work life, our friendships don’t always feel that way either.  But we can only move towards relationships that are safe, open, and real by becoming peacemakers who move through conflict with loving confrontations that aim at re-building our relationships.