from The Donelson Fellowship
Message 5 Conflict Management: How To Iron Out Your Differences W/o Being Burned Romans 12:16 says, "Live in harmony with one another." The word harmony is very interesting. Our English word arm comes from the same Greek root. You can easily see that the letters a-r-m are right in the middle of h-a-r-m-o-n-y. The stem word is the Greek harmos, which means joint. Your arm is attached to your body at its joint, joined to you at the shoulder. In the same way, when you have a soprano, a tenor, a base, and an alto, all singing the proper notes, their voices join together to create one sound, one song. So the harmony occurs when various, different parts join together to make a whole. If everyone sang alto, it wouldn't sound very good. If everyone sang tenor, we'd miss the melody. If everyone sang exactly the same notes, we'd have boring unison without any fuller, more harmonious sound. In a marriage, you have a bass and an alto. That is, you have a two people with different perspectives, different backgrounds, and different ways of looking at things. One of the partners is in a man's body, the other is in a woman's body. One has the mind of a man, the other the mind of a woman. There will never be boring unison, but neither should there be continually discord. Perhaps the greatest challenge of marriage is learning how to manage conflicts and overcome differences so as to have harmony rather than discord in your home. It can be done. In fact, it isn't an option, it is a commandment. Romans 12:16 says: Live in harmony with one another. But the commandment also contains the seed of a promise, for the Lord has never given us a commandment without also providing the grace for us to fulfill it. In a sense, every command is a promise in disguise. When God gives us the command to live in harmony with each other, the implied promise is, "I will give you the grace necessary as you look to me to have a harmonious home, a melodious marriage." But how do we maintain harmony when conflicts arise? Put differently, how can we iron out our differences without being burned? Claming Up There are three ways of responding to marital conflict, and I'd like to illustrate them using characters from an little-visited book in the Old Testament - 1 Kings. The first response to conflict is - claming up. This seems to have been the preferred method of immature and immoral King Ahab. Look in 1 Kings 21: Some time later there was an incident involving a vineyard belonging to Naboth the Jezeelite. The vineyard was in Jezeel, close to the palace of Ahab king of Samaria. Ahab said to Naboth, "Let me have your vineyard to use for a vegetable garden, since it is close to my palace. In exchange I will give you a better vineyard or, if you prefer, I will pay you whatever it is worth." But Naboth replied, "The Lord forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers." So Ahab went home, sullen and angry because Naboth the Jezreelite had said, "I will not give you the inheritance of my fathers." He lay on his bed sulking and refused to eat. His wife Jezebel came in and asked him, "Why are you so sullen? Why won't you eat?" The argument here isn't between Ahab and Jezebel; in fact, they went on to become partners in crime. But the thing to notice is how Ahab reacted to conflict. Notice the words here: sullen, angry, sulking, refusing to eat. Ahab just clamed up and moped around, lower lip jutted out like a school child who didn't get his way. Earlier in my marriage, this was my primary method of responding to potential conflict. Katrina and I have only had three fights in our twenty years of marriage. One was over hot chocolate, another was over canning tomatoes, and the third was an argument that broke out while we were vacationing once in Maine (that one was altogether and completely my fault). But the fact that we've had only three fights isn't necessarily commendable. It indicates that sometimes I've just clamed up, refused to fight, refused to talk, and the problems have lingered on. Katrina has often commented about how frustrated she was during our early years because I wouldn't be drawn into discussions over disagreements. I avoided them. Sometimes I just shrugged and ignored the disagreements. Other times, I engaged the kind of games that young couples often play with each other. I'd send a barrage of non-verbal signals and hope she would get the message. I'd sulk or mope around or not talk with her. And I would secretly hope that she would come and ask me about it, draw me out, and eventually give in. It was a thinly veiled attempt to manipulate her by non-verbal means. I realize now how immature that is, and thankfully we're past that point in our marriage (for the most part). I can hardly think of any good that comes from the claming up. But the second way of responding to conflict is even worse - blowing up. Blowing Up And that was the preferred method Ahab's wife, Jezebel. Look at 1 Kings 19: Now Ahab told Jezebel everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. So Jezebel sent a message to Elijah to say, "May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like one of them." Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. He wasn't the first or last man who ran for his life from an angry woman. Jezebel was on a murderous rampage, and it proved very destructive. Blowing up - loud, angry arguments - are almost always destructive. They can torpedo a marriage faster than anything else. We lose our tempers and say more than we should, and in the process we inflict wounds on the other person and wounds on the marriage. I want to tell you a story from the days of sixteenth century France that shows how we can often sink our own arguments by saying too much. The Protestant movement initially found fertile ground in France. Several preachers, sympathetic to reform, mounted pulpits in Paris, and the king himself showed interest. But on October 10, 1533, Nicolas Cop was elected Rector of the University of Paris and his inaugural address, prepared by a 24-year old firebrand named John Calvin, was a declaration of war on the Catholic Church. The speech demanded reformation on the basis of the New Testament and attacked the theologians of the church who "teach nothing of faith, nothing of the love of God, nothing of remission of sins, nothing of grace, nothing of justification." The speech so inflamed Paris that Cop fled to Basel, and Calvin reportedly escaped his room from a window by means of sheets, fleeing disguised as a vine-dresser with a hoe on his shoulder. The ensuing months saw so many posters and tracts on Parisian streets that 1534 became known as "the year of the placards." The tension exploded into violence over a scathing placard by an over-zealous Protestant named Feret. He attacked "the horrible, great, intolerable abuses of the popish mass." On the night of October 18, 1534, Feret's placard was found nailed to the king's bedroom door, and that did it. Protestants soon filled Parisian jails. And on January 29, 1535, to purge the city from the defilement caused by Feret's placards, an immense torch-lit procession traveled in silence from the Louvre to Notre Dame. The image of St. Genevieve, patroness of Paris, was accompanied by the royal family, princes, cardinals and church officials, ambassadors, and officers from State and University. Solemn mass was performed in the cathedral. The king declared he would behead even his own children if they embraced the "new heresies." The day ended with six Protestants being suspended by ropes to a great machine that lowered and raised them into burning flames, slowly roasting them to death. In the coming months, many more Protestants were fined, imprisoned, tortured, and burned. The French Reformation miscarried. All because the Reformers were young, immature, and they said a few words too many. The Bible says, "Stop being bitter and angry and mad at others. Don't yell at one another or curse each other or ever be rude. Instead, be kind and merciful, and forgive others, just as God forgave you because of Christ" (Ephesians 4:31-32, CEV). Scott Stanley is part of a research team at the University of Denver that has identified factors that accurately predict whether a marriage will survive or fail. Two of them are especially dangerous. The first is Escalation. Escalation occurs when a person says something negative and his or her spouse responds in kind, with an even harsher statement. This leads to an argument that spirals to greater levels of anger and frustration. In some ways, this is very natural for us. Whenever we're criticized, our first impulse is to defend ourselves by turning the tables on the one attacking us. We lash back, and our words can be harsh. It's especially dangerous when one of the partners says something like, "If that's the way you feel, maybe I should just move out." The other might respond with: "Don't let me stand in your way!" Stanley refers to one couple he counseled who began discussing household chores, but in no time they were threatening divorce. He said, "They made the mistake of threatening their very commitment to the relationship - a very common and very destructive battle strategy. Now matter how angry you become or how much pain you're feeling, it's never appropriate to punish your mate by threatening divorce. Rather than helping your spouse see things your way, it only causes him or her to question your commitment to the relationship." The second deadly factor in a marriage, according to Dr. Scott Stanley, is Invalidation. In simplest terms, this means putting each other down, calling one another names, or making personal comments or insults about the other. It includes ridiculing one another and being sarcastic. You invalidate the other person. You belittle them and attack their self-worth. This is no way to deal with conflict; it only hurts the marriage and the mate. Instead of claming up and blowing up, I'd like to recommend a third response to problems in your marriage. I suggest that you wise up. Wise Up We have an example of this response also in 1 Kings, in chapter 3. Here the Lord appeared to the young king Solomon and told him to ask for anything he wished. Solomon asked for wisdom. The Lord was pleased with Solomon's request, and said in verse 12: I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be again. Out of this wisdom, Solomon wrote the book of Proverbs, and I'd like to show you two verses there. These are verses to clamp onto the refrigerator of your home, to write on your doorposts, and to memorize as personal rules of your heart: Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing - Proverbs 12:18 Losing your temper causes a lot of trouble, but staying calm settles arguments - Proverbs 15:18 (CEV). How can we stay calm and turn a troubled marriage into a harmonious home? Here are eight ideas: First, make a conscious decision to keep your anger under control. It is possible, with God's help, to control your temper. You do not have to lose it. Proverbs 30:11 says, "A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control." Second, learn to call a cease-fire. When you're in a heated discussion and you sense that you are losing your temper and the argument is escalating into a lose-lose situation, call a cease-fire. An escalating argument very quickly reaches a point of diminishing returns, and you're better off just to say, "I've got to cool down before I say something damaging. Let's go out to dinner Saturday night and try to talk through this issue with civility, and I'm going to pray that the Lord will give us the sense and the patience to work through it." Third, apologize. Whenever you do go too far and say too much, apologize as quickly as possible. Fourth, don't let problems simmer. Learn to be mature enough to sit down and talk through things openly, with a minimum of excess emotion. Ephesians 4 tells us to speak truthfully to each other. It's harder on the front end to deal with problems forthrightly, but it's much easier in the long run. Fifth, remember that you don't have to say everything you think. Proverbs 29:11 in the King James Version reads, "A fool uttereth all his mind." I read an article recently by a woman named Mary Robins Clark. She said she once had a constant need to tell everyone what to do and how to do everything. She said, "I thought my husband needed my advice in every area of his life, including and especially in his driving." But one day on a radio broadcast she heard Christian author Elizabeth Elliot advise, "Never pass up an opportunity to keep your mouth shut." Mary Clark took those words to heart. That doesn't mean that she clamed up; she just realized that she didn't always have to be giving directions. For example, she and her husband Al had been married 2 years. She was a neatnik and Al was... well, he was more laid back. She had lectured him since their wedding day about leaving clothes and magazines lying around. "If you leave these magazines on the floor, pretty soon there'll be nowhere to walk," she would say. "Why can't you just pick these clothes off the bathroom floor and put them in the hamper?" she complained morning after morning. Al ignored her. Occasionally if she acted really angry, he would pick things up, but it required increasing amounts of pressure from her. So, having heard Elizabeth Elliot say "Never pass up an opportunity to keep your mouth shut," she decided to work on it. The next morning without saying a word, she picked up Al's dirty clothes and put them in the hamper. She was surprised that it didn't hurt worse than it did. In fact, she said that a biblical feeling came over her as she thought of herself as a servant. After a few days, she noticed a change in Al, too. He began wanting to do things for her. He did yard work that he had been neglecting, and helped her sand some old chairs. She seemed to sense that his whole attitude toward her had changed, and would you believe that soon he even began to pick up his clothes! Proverbs 17:27-28 says, "It makes a lot of sense to be a person of few words and to stay calm. Even fools seem smart when they are quiet" (CEV). Proverbs 12:16 says, "A fool shows his annoyance at once, but a prudent man overlooks an insult." Proverbs 10:12 says, "Hatred stirs up trouble, but love overlooks the wrongs that others do" (CEV). Six, be willing to agree to disagree. Katrina and I have very different opinions about some things. We often disagree about some of our theological beliefs. But I've always been proud to have a wife who knew her own mind. I often say that if two people agree on everything, they double their chances of being wrong. Seven, pick up a good book about marriage. Any Christian book store has a wide assortment of books on marriage, and it's surprising how they can help. Or attend a marriage retreat, or sign up for some simple marriage counseling from a Christian counselor. Eight, keep tight accounts with the Lord. Most of the conflicts we have with other people are not fundamentally horizontal but vertical. In other words, if my heart isn't right with the Lord, it probably isn't going to be very positive toward my mate. The reason Ahab was bitter toward Naboth and Jezebel was furious with Elijah was that their own hearts were out of fellowship with God. Most of the time, if I become angry or irritable or out-of-sorts with Katrina it's because my heart is out of tune with the Lord in some way. I suppose that eighty or ninety percent of our conflicts would be minimized if we really got on our knees and in His word and let the Lord have fuller access to our hearts. We're either going to harm or harmonize. If we're going to enjoy healthy relationships, we can't clam up or blow up. We've got to wise up. If we do that we can iron out our differences without being burned. We can live in harmony with one another. And if we live in harmony with each other, we can make beautiful music together all our lives.
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