ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS A LITTLE NORMALCY
My Life is Not a Hallmark Movie – Part 3
Springcreek Church | Senior Pastor Keith Stewart
December 17, 2023
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Do you know difficult people, sandpaper people or extra-grace-required people? These are people who spin off hurricanes in our emotions. They get to us in ways others don’t. They’re hard to be around. At Christmas, when we most want happy and special memories, they often throw a wet blanket on everyone’s good time. This year can be different. Let's walk us through practical steps in dealing with the most challenging relationships you have. Consider this an essential guide to holiday survival.
SERIES: My Life is Not a Hallmark Movie
In this series, we’ll rediscover how the true meaning of Christmas speaks into our less-than-perfect world and relationships. Christmas is the birth of hope in an imperfect world.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Difficult people get to you like few others ever will. They seem to know how to push your buttons and get reactions out of you that others don’t. Have you ever had a relationship with a difficult person? Without naming names, who were they in relation to you? Why do you put them in the difficult category? What sorts of things did they do or say that were bothersome? How do you or did you manage that relationship? Was your approach successful? Why or why not?
2. Pastor Keith listed four non-starters when it comes to dealing with difficult people; reasoning with them, excusing them, threatening them, or blasting them. He gave examples of as to why these approaches seldom if ever work. Do you remember why he said they were seldom effective in bringing about change in the relationship? What has been your experience with them?
3. Discuss the following quotes by Dr. Mark Rosen (author of Thank You for Being Such a Pain):
“In the school of life, difficult people are the faculty. They teach us our most important spiritual lessons, the lessons that we would be most unlikely to learn on our own.”
“The teacher would have to be someone who would shatter our incorrect beliefs, frozen feelings, and self-delusion. Someone who would help us to break free of our current, limited understanding. Someone who could uproot the very things in life that we are most invested in holding onto and keeping the same. Someone who causes us so much pain that we finally out of desperation must begin the necessary changes that we have resisted so long. It would have to be a difficult person.”
4. It is absolutely essential that we learn to have good boundaries in place when it comes to our relationship with those who are difficult. What sort of boundaries are important to protect yourself in the presence of someone who easily offends or creates havoc in the lives of others?
5. Learning to love as Jesus loves does not necessarily involve warm, fuzzy feelings. In fact, quite the opposite. The way Jesus taught us to love is to seek someone’s highest and best good. Which sometimes means having to draw a clear boundary, confronting someone over disordered behavior, or allowing them to fully reap the consequence for their own bad behavior. None of those things are unloving. They are all done in hopes that the person you’re dealing with becomes what they were meant to be rather than continuing with destructive communication or behavior. Why do people struggle so much with understanding why limits express love? When Jesus corrected the Pharisees, it was as loving as it was when He welcomed the outcast. Both were done with the individual’s best interests at heart. Why