How To Face Conflict Without Losing Your Faith Or Your Relationships | Sunday, April 26

Conflict is unavoidable, but the way we handle it reveals who’s leading our life. We get honest about the state of the church and the state of our hearts, because if Jesus is Lord of us, He has to be Lord of our disagreements too. That means we stop treating comfort like a virtue and start seeing loving correction as one of the ways God protects, heals, and matures His people. Along the way we lean on practical, biblical wisdom that can reshape marriages, families, friendships, and church relationships. 

We dig into a core Scripture for Christian communication: be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. Then we wrestle with Jesus’ “log and speck” picture and why the real issue isn’t correction, it’s hypocrisy. When we minimize our sin and maximize someone else’s, we lose clarity and we lose credibility. But when God deals with us first, our posture changes: humility replaces pride, restoration replaces revenge, and we confront to heal instead of confronting to win. 

We also draw a bright line between peacekeeping and peacemaking. Peacekeeping avoids tension and calls it “peace,” while peacemaking works for peace and brings righteousness into hard spaces. We talk about why gossip feels easy but spreads poison, why private conversations are the biblical path, and how fear of rejection can keep us trapped in resentment. If you’ve been avoiding a conversation, nursing distance as punishment, or waiting for the other person to move first, this message will challenge you with clarity and hope. 

If this helps you, subscribe, share it with someone who cares about healthy relationships, and leave a review so more people can find it. What’s one conflict you know you need to address with humility and truth?

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello, this is Jamie Bridges, and thank you so much for joining us for this week's podcast. All of our services are inspired and built straight from the Bible. Let's get into this week's message recorded at Life Community Church.

March Madness Banter And Announcements

Praying For A Family Moving Away

Comfort Versus Correction In Church

Conflict As A Discipleship Issue

Quick To Listen Slow To Speak

Remove The Log Before Correcting

Hypocrisy And The Church’s Credibility

Private Confrontation Over Gossip

Fear Of Rejection And People Pleasing

Peacekeeping Versus Peacemaking

Truth And Love In Hard Talks

Gossip Poison And A Real Story

Pride Silence And Confession For Healing

Who God Is Calling You To Face

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Can we just tell them that right now? God, thank you. There is no other name but the name of Jesus, the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through the Son. And that is Jesus. You save, you heal, you forgive, you deliver. God, thank you for the freedom. Your promise that whom the Son sets free is free indeed. God, there's freedom found in you and you alone. In the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. Amen. Greet somebody next to you, say hi to them. Nine a.m. How are we feeling? Good to see you. Um you know, a couple weeks ago, um March Mattis happened. Congratulations to Illinois for making the the final four. That was a huge, huge thing. Always think of Jerry Lynz when I see Illinois lose. But uh, so I mean, win. I mean, final four is a big deal. Uh, but I have to I have to mention this up front because uh um, you know, my wife's not competitive and unless she wins. And uh then all of a sudden, here she comes, right? And uh we do an office pool and and she won it this year. And so, yeah, yeah. So I have a I have a national championship sweatshirt for you. Uh just prove, yeah, that's just for you. Oh yeah, there you go. There you go. It's for you. Is it too small? Is it too white? Is it I mean, listen, sometimes well, never mind. I'm not gonna say that. I'm I'm getting away. Like, here's here's my wife's a different person. Like, I you know, she wakes, she was she was really funny. And uh she said, I said, babe, you were so funny. And she said, Yeah, a lot of people told me that. And I said, you know, I've I've lived with Jamie for 26 years. I'm like, babe, we've been married 28, but that's cool. That's cool. That's cool. It's been the best 26 years of her life. Uh I don't know where those other two years went, but it's what it is. It's all good. It's all good. You won. Congratulations. Me, Caleb, Sean. Just proves all you gotta do is pick the colors on the mascots, and you're gonna probably win. So annoying. Oh, yeah, you know, I'm sure. What mascot did you no? I forgot. That was like, wow, you actually knew. No, I knew you never mind. We're not we don't we don't need to banter right now. It's okay. Welcome to church, everybody. Thanks so much for being here. Uh, if you're first time guests, thanks for checking us out. I'd love to connect with you in the in the well or the tent afterwards if you have any questions uh for us. I do want to pray. You know, one of the things I think is super important, and uh we we've done this from day one. I can tell you uh a majority of the time when we pray for people who are leaving Life Community Church, like uh when when people allow us to have that conversation, like, hey, we're leaving and we like talk about it. Uh I usually say to this, these individuals, like, hey, we'd love to we'd love to pray for you before you leave, wherever it is that you're going. And most people don't take me up on that, uh, nor do most people tell me if they're leaving. Usually I hear it from a friend of a friend and then an enemy, you know what I mean? And so uh, but it is important when people move away that that happens. And and so I'm gonna pray for my my sister's family. Uh, my sister uh and her husband, Jeff, are moving to Carlinville on Tuesday. And so I do I think it's important. The last two years have been pretty sweet that my family has been uh here at church uh with my parents moving to Columbia, and then my sister and her family being here, uh foster family, so it's been very sweet for us. And uh now they're going to Carlinville, moving to that small town. And uh so uh so I do want to pray for them uh and then we pray for the message today. Amen. Can we agree together? Jesus, I thank you for this day. God, your word says today is the day the Lord has made, and we rejoice in it. That's what we were singing about today, the joy of the Lord. And God, I know there are a lot of feelings in this room, a lot of emotions that we've brought. And God, I I just pray that you would help us uh today, wherever it is that we're at. And God, I thank you for Jeff and Angie. I thank you for their kids. I thank you for uh who they are, I thank you for what the last two years have been for them and just being here, being a part of this church, but not just that. Uh healing and uh family being together. So, God, I'm so thankful for this sweet time. I pray as their kids transition in schools and new community, new church, all the things that are going on uh with a move and all that, I pray it goes smoothly. I pray that you continue to bless their lives. I pray healing over chance. God, that you continue to heal his body. God, we're standing on your promises we have uh from day one uh over his life. And I continue to pray healing over him in the mighty name of Jesus, because your word says you're a healing God. And so, God, if there's anybody in this room uh that doubts whether you're a God that heals, or doubts whether you're a God that saves, or doubts the one that you're the one that forgives, God, I pray that we our mindsets would shift today. They would change because you are a God that moves mountains, you are a God that goes to great lengths to get our attention, and we're here not by accident, but for a purpose and a reason. So I pray in the name of Jesus that you would meet us exactly where we are in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Well, I don't anticipate um with some of the things I'm saying to us today that I will receive a lot of amens. Uh I don't say that because it's 9 a.m. and you're the middle service, and I know how everybody feels about the middle child. Um, I say that because I'm bringing some heavy things up that I think is important as we talk about the state of the church, specifically how we deal with things that I think are important that we deal with. Um, I'm talking to believers today, people that desire to follow Jesus, people who are intrigued about Jesus. I think it's important that there's an expectation that people understand when it comes to following Jesus, that you don't just follow Jesus and say it by word, and then everything becomes easy, or as he everything becomes comfortable. In fact, I would argue the opposite happens. When you say yes to Jesus, I think you're now uh an enemy of the devil and that he will go to great lengths to do to uh change your identity, to think your identity is something different, to think your purpose is something different. And these are things that we must address and talk about. Um, some might even say that today is um, I I know what it was like when I was a kid. You know what I mean? Like when I was in a class where I didn't want the teacher to call on me, I would look down. I would make sure you don't make eye contact as as if you disappeared somehow just because you couldn't see the teacher. Um, I'm asking you to to engage. I'm asking you that no matter what I say, that might be hard for where you currently are, that we understand that we're asking Jesus for help today. We're asking him to lead us and to guide us. That's what I'm asking of you is not to do something on your own. I'm not asking you to be a better you, a better version of you. I'm not asking you to go out and win the world by yourself. I'm telling you, apart from Christ, you can do nothing. Apart from Christ, your marriage will probably be ruined. Apart from Christ, your workplace is going to be chaos. Apart from Christ, our relationship. So I'm asking us to lean in to what the Holy Spirit is saying to us with regards to how we talk and handle things. And unless we go with the Lord, we're going to labor in vain. Okay? All right. So I already got one amen. You're better than 7:30 already. And I know, I understand that most of us we love comfort more than we do correction. I recognize most of you probably did not pray on your way to church today. Lord, I pray that you would wreck my excuses. I pray that you would wreck my world. I pray that you would make me uncomfortable. Might not have been your prayer. I don't know what your prayer was. Maybe it was just to get here on time. Maybe it was to not have an argument on the way here. Maybe it was to get coffee. Maybe it was to get what? I don't know what it was. Maybe it's Lord Jesus, I'm here. And that's just the statement, right? I don't know what it was, but I know that God does not love some of the things and the mindsets that we have carried. And as the church, we have to address these things. We have to have conversations about them. In a couple weeks, we're gonna we're gonna spend the whole summer in the book of Corinthians, from podcasts to small groups to discussions to messages on the weekend. And I think this is important because I want us to be on the same page. These are the things I'm addressing today. I want us to be on the same page as far as as a church, how we handle these things, what we do with these things. I think this is important so that we understand that when conversations happen, we understand how we move forward. And here's what I know some of the most loving words that we can hear are correction. They're correcting words. In fact, the Bible says this in Revelation chapter 3. I correct and I discipline, Jesus says, Everyone I love. I know a good coach corrects, I know a good parent disciplines, I know a good doctor tells you the truth. He doesn't tell you what you want to hear, he tells you the truth, right? A good shepherd doesn't just comfort, he protects, and sometimes that looks a little different. And so if God corrects us because he loves us, then hear this. Then today is just a message on love. Okay? It's just a message on love. But we have to talk about something that I think every single one of us deal with in this room, and that that is conflict. There's conflict in marriage, there's conflict in family, there's conflict at the workplace, there's conflict everywhere that we go. And if the Lord is the Lord of our life, then we He has to be the Lord of our disagreements. If he's Lord of our life and we're following Jesus, then when it comes to disagreements and conflict, we need to start acting like it. I'm not speaking to you because I've mastered something. In fact, I'm rarely sharing my opinion today. I'm sharing what the Bible says about this as followers of Jesus on how we're to move forward. So whether you're married in this room or you're a parent in this room, or you're single in this room, or you're an employee, or you're an employer, or you're a child. It doesn't matter. Every single one of us, at some point, probably by the end of the day, is gonna have some sort of conflict. And so we should know how do we move forward with this. And James says, here's how, here's a big thing that we need to know. Be quick to listen. Fast to what? Listen, slow to speak. Kind of sounds sounds like a an oxymoron, doesn't it? You're gonna be fast here, slow here. And then slow to what? Get angry. Quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to react in a negative way. That's the definition of angry. I think this is probably the number one verse that would save relationships if we listened to it. Listen, some of you wouldn't be divorced if we if we listened to this. Some of you, you you would have parented different, right? You would have been a better boss, a better employee. Because here's the problem conflict is not like conflict is normal. Sinful conflict is not. You are so foolish. What are you doing right now? You're arguing about things you should not argue about. You're making things main things that should never be the main thing. How we how we respond reveals maturity. Immature people avoid conflict, fleshly people escalate conflict, godly people redeem conflict. So, what do we do? Well, we start with us first. Matthew chapter 7 says, hypocrite. First get rid of the log in your own eye, then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your brother's eye. And we understand this. This probably should be bigger, it should look like a beam. We understand Jesus uses hyperboles. We understand Jesus uses extreme, exaggerated illustrations to make points. Jesus understands no one's walking around with a log in their eye. Like he understands that. Who would if they did this? If I duct tape this and I just walked around like this, this was my understanding. Number one, I look silly. This will never be a fashion trend, I'm sure of it. Secondly, how how I respond to the people around me would depend on how fast I turn my head. I'm probably knocking some people out, which gives this illustration of what Jesus is really talking about. He's saying, Listen, you have this obvious thing in front of you, yet you're seeing past this well enough to know that someone has something in their own eye, which we all can relate to. We've all had a gnat, a speck, piece of wood, something from work. We've all had something in our eye to feel that irritation. Jesus isn't going against that, nor is he ignoring sin. He says, remove the log from your own eye first, then you can help remove the speck from someone else's eye. He's saying up front, this is not a question of right and wrong. This is a question of are you recognizing what you have going on first? Up front, Jesus is not banning correction, he's banning hypocrisy. And there's a difference between judging to condemn and helping to restore. And Jesus condemns the first and he can commands the second. He says, Listen, Jesus again uses this exaggeration. Why? Because you and I, we we minimize our sin by saying things like, We're busy, I'm stressed out, as if it's an excuse to sin away, to say whatever we want, to do whatever we want. So we we minimize ours and then we maximize others. They always do this, they're always that way. You're always saying these things, which is a bit dramatic because they don't always say it, they don't always do it. So we minimize ours, we maximize theirs. This is the point. You're minimizing this, and you're maximizing the something that you have to be so close to see someone else's speck in their own eye. How Jesus is saying, and here's what I found self-examination is painful. It's much more easier to criticize your parenting, to criticize your marriage, criticize your job, how you spend your money, who you hang out with, the hobbies you post, the things they the places you get to go. I get to easier to sit back and be like, my God, how much money they actually make? He's in Hawaii again. It's much easier to do that than to then to ask, why am I angry? Why am I so insecure? What happened to me? Why am I distant from God? Why do I keep repeating this pattern? You see the easier statements versus questions? It's so much easier to make a statement about people than it is to question my own. So much easier. And it's often easier criticism is than repentance. In fact, mostly. And Jesus says, hey, before confronting, pray first, repent first, examine your motives first, ask if love or ego is driving you, let God search your heart. Because here's what I know when God deals with you, when God deals with me, I approach others differently. When God deals with me, instead of pride, it's humility, grace instead of superiority, tears instead of arrogance, restoration instead of revenge. Why? Because you can see clearly. The log is gone, vision changes. Now you don't confront to win, you confront to heal. Now you don't expose them, you restore them. Now you don't attack, you serve. Healthy correction can only come from a healthy heart. Because Jesus said in Matthew, out of the abundance of what is inside of here, that's what comes out. I'm less consumed by what we do than by what's going on inside of here. We try to band-aid by saying, like, well, I'm no longer gonna talk like that, or I'm gonna change my attitude, or I'm I'm not gonna react anymore. Until you change what's going on inside the heart, you're always gonna talk that way. It's always gonna come back to that. It's always that's the pattern thing. You're always gonna come back to sarcasm, to this, to that, because you've never dealt with this. It's coming out of this, it's the root problem. And I'll probably, this is not a parenting fail, but I'll most likely can guarantee it came from your childhood. It came from something that you did not deal with at some point. It's not your mom's fault, it's not your dad's fault, it's it's the fault of never dealing with something. Because I think we get into that mindset, like, well, I was raised this way. Oh, well, who else do you want to blame without making or taking responsibility? I think this is the message to the church today that the church loses credibility when we point fingers publicly but ignore sin privately. We're losing credibility. People don't just reject correction because correction is wrong, they reject hypocrisy because hypocrisy is fake. People want authenticity. Real. Tell me something real. You know why the most people that are coming to Jesus are in their 20s because they're tired of AI and fake crap. They're tired of they're tired of of going through the motions. They've tried everything, it didn't fix anything. So people in their 20s are going, this is real. I want this. And you could be a generation 40, 30, 20 years older, that miss out on the greatest revival of a generation giving their lives to Jesus, all because you never fixed whatever was going on, and now you're giving them something fake. I don't want to give them something fake, I want to give them something that is continually real. Real. So that that generation continues and in their 30s and their 40s and on and on. That's the generations that are giving their lives to Christ. I think the world can handle truth. I think it struggles with truth with. I think before you talk about people, we need to talk to God about you. About you. I think before what Jesus is saying, before you can expose their speck, we gotta expose our log. Before you can correct their life, you gotta surrender ours before the clearest eyes belong to the most humblest of hearts. I mean, I think if everyone fixed themselves as aggressively as we fix others, every church would be full. Jesus said, if another believer sins against you, go privately and point out the offense. If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back. Notice Jesus didn't say to gossip about it. So why why don't why don't why don't we confront people? I think the biggest thing is we fear rejection. I think for a lot of people, we fear rejection. So we think, what if they get mad? What if they leave? What if they don't like me anymore? What if what if this happens? Instead of risking rejection, we choose resentment. We choose resentment, but rejection for honesty is healthier than acceptance built on fake people. So Paul says to the Galatian church, obviously, I'm not trying to win the approval of people, I'm trying to win the approval of God. Like that's what that's my aim, that's my goal. And sometimes obedience means risking discomfort. So, what does that mean in this scenario? That means in this scenario, I'm willing to make this uncomfortable in talking about you because I'm being obedient to the Lord versus letting this thing go and pretending that I'm okay. That's the biggest thing. Most of us were not okay. We're pretending we're okay until we're not. So we say to other people, oh no, no, no, no. I know they hurt me, but I'm I'm I'm totally fine. I got over it. Okay, so why did you unfriend them? Well, I mean, I'm setting healthy boundaries. We spiritualize everything. Healthy boundaries. I just didn't want the hurt anymore. Proverbs says fearing people is a dangerous trap, but trusting the Lord means safety. Many people are trapped because they fear reactions more than they do trust to trust God. You cannot lead, you cannot love, you cannot grow if you are controlled by people's opinions. It's impossible, actually. I think the biggest mistake outside of fearing people and rejection is I think we mistake or confuse peacekeeping with peacemaking. Peacekeepers avoid tension, peacemakers walk into tension and bring healing. Matthew 5 says, God blesses those who work for peace. You know what working for peace means? I gotta work. What's the opposite? Doing nothing. So instead of working for peace, I'm gonna do nothing. And I'm gonna tell a story inside my head. I'm gonna pretend that everything is okay when it's not. Ignoring issues is not peace. Silence is not peace. Passive aggression is not peace. Some people think peace means no tension. Biblical peace is not the absence of conflict, it is the presence of righteousness. You can have a quiet house full of bitterness, you can have a silent church full of resentment, you can have a calm marriage full of distance. James says, and those who are peacemakers, what are they doing? They're planting seeds of peace. And they reap a harvest of righteousness. Peacemakers make peace, peacekeepers avoid problems. I think some people would rather be right than to be reconciled. And that's the most scary part of all the things that we're talking about. Because reconciliation means we gotta, we gotta, we gotta deal with some things. You know how reconciliation happens? Two people come together. That's different than forgiveness. I can start the process of forgiving Mike Plain for what Mike Plain did. I can start the process. That does not mean we're reconciled. Reconciliation happens only when I stop ignoring Mike Plain for what he did to me and I address the situation. That doesn't mean angels show up and hallelujah starts playing. That means we've started the process and the work now begins. I told you you wouldn't amen a lot. How many times have you won the argument but lost the relationship? Congratulations. Ask myself, this is what I'm asking myself. Do I want to prove a point or do I want to protect what matters? I heard this illustration a long time ago about two goats that were on a bridge and neither one of them were budging, and so they hit each other and they both fell off, and no one won. That I think is sometimes how the church approaches relationships. We both fell, and nothing changed. I think some of us are asking for breakthrough while ignoring the broken relationship that God asked us to address. And I'm just telling you right now, you will not experience breakthrough until you address that. I think this is a big part. There's the third one. I don't think we know how. I don't think we know how. Some of you are the most awkward people in the world, and you just don't know how because you grew up in homes where confrontation meant yelling, just constant yelling, manipulation, maybe even violence. So now any disagreement feels dangerous. I think some of you, you grew up where conflict was shutting down. And because of that, when issues arise, we either explode or we disappear. Biblical confrontation is not screaming, it is loving truth spoken with humility. Paul told the Ephesian church, we speak the truth in love. Truth without love is brutality, love without truth is hypocrisy. This is not us going, I'm a truth seeker and I'm just gonna spew truth. This is not, we're gonna love and we're gonna, we're gonna overlook and we're not gonna talk through, we're just gonna love one another. Kumbaya style. Bring some food. He's saying both of those are wrong. If you don't marry those, if you don't do what the Bible says Jesus was full of grace, full of love. If those two aren't married, then we're bringing into a relationship. Well, let's just forgive them. Let's just give them grace like God gave us. It's not grace, it's enabling. Grace is empowering. There's a big difference. Big difference. I think the other thing is if I could be real, we like gossip more than we do courage. And what I'm talking about takes courage. But it is so much easier to gossip. It's easier to talk about someone than it is to someone. Gossip gives temporary relief without requiring courage. But gossip spreads poison. Well, confrontation can bring healing. Proverbs says, a troublemaker plants seeds of strife. Gossip separates the best of friends. If you could talk to everyone else about it, you could probably talk to them about it. The issue usually isn't how I feel about Mike Plain. The issue becomes Mike Plain has told so many people that now those people have a problem with me, even though those people aren't involved in it. And me and Mike Plain can reconcile, but it doesn't mean all the people that I talked to reconcile. This was probably one of the biggest issues 16 years ago when I left Destiny Church. But there was a group of people offended for us. Even though the conversation was, guys, we're good. Look what's coming out of this. We're planting, we're doing what God wants. Nope, it was wrong. And the night before we launched on April 22nd, I felt the Lord tell me, Jamie, I'm asking you tomorrow, when you give your first offering, I'm asking you to give it to Destiny Church. I said, Absolutely. No qualms about it. When I presented that to some of our leadership at that moment, they said, Absolutely not. We're not gonna do that. Not for the way they treated you, how they treated us. They're not supporting this. Said, guys, this is not about this. This is about are we good? And I'm good. I'll never forget delivering that check to Mike Plain, who was still at Destiny Church, and getting a phone call from Jim Stern. Hey, and we're not talking about a lot of money, talking like$3,100. Hey, I got a check for$3,100. What am I supposed to do with it? You do with it whatever you want. To me, it showed I'm good. And I don't say that because to pat myself on the back. I say that because I worked at peace. I worked through something. It wasn't always like that. I worked through it because I would rather live at peace with everyone, like Peter tells the church, than to have hate in my heart and avoid people. That's what gossip does. Gossip doesn't destroy the direct, it destroys the future relationship of who it could have been. That's what it does. So we have to be very careful in what this is saying before because we understand gossip separates the best of friends. Not only that, I would say this. Pride oftentimes is the reason we stay silent. Proverbs says, To learn, you must love discipline. It is stupid to hate correction. Sometimes we don't confront because we want to punish them with distance. Listen to me. That is pride speaking. God is a reconciler, God is a restorer. God's heartbeat in who He is is that men and women would live in unity. And the only way that that can happen is we might have to lay down some of our logs, some of our armory, some of our, some of our weapons of choice that we've been shooting at people. And we might need to lay that thing down so that we can understand. When the Bible says in James that Jesus has come and he's faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. And then he says, confess your sins one to another so that you might experience healing. Hear me. Some of you aren't healed right now, not because you didn't confess it, you confessed it to someone who couldn't handle it. And you saw the wrong way. Someone took what you confessed and they ran with it, man. You were in every prayer chain, you were talked about in every circle, everyone was talking about, and so now you don't do it because of what happened to you. Not everyone can handle your confession. This isn't a moment where James is saying, stand in front of the church and confess it to everyone. My goodness, we'd be the talk of the town. You'd be in the Colombians before you even made it to the parking lot. Probably the Waterlooans and Monroe County News and all the all the talk. You'd be there so fast. Not everybody can handle it. Doesn't mean you're not going back to another restaurant. It just means you might want to check how they cooked it first. Why? Because you were throwing up all night from that burger, and now all of a sudden you've stopped confessing and bringing people into your circle because you've been so affected by how people have treated you when that has happened. Don't stop doing that because this is where healing takes place. Paul says, here's what our uh James says, this is what's happening in the church. Everyone's walking around forgiven, but everybody's still wounded. There's not healing. There's no healing. There's no healing. The goal is to be healed. So what James is saying is, church, this is uncomfortable. This is awkward. But staying in the state that you are for the sake of rights, for the sake of pride, for the sake of I'll show them is destroying not just you, but everybody around you who's affected and have concussions. Concussion protocol is a lot different than it used to be. And it's taking people out. It's taking people out. My encouragement. What I said in the very beginning. God, what are you asking me to do with this? Because here's what's happened the last 30 minutes. You thought of someone, and that wasn't by accident. You have animosity towards someone, and you're waiting on that someone to say sorry, to say they wronged you. But the Bible never says that. That means you might need to initiate the bad that somebody else did. That's a whole nother message. That's Psalm 69 right there. That's a different kind of message.