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Conflict Resolution in Marriage Part 2 By Wayne Mack

It's very clear that we're going to have conflicts, but the Bible not only tells us that we're going to have conflicts, it tells us how we can handle those conflicts in a proper way.
There is much in the Word of God by way of illustration, by way of example, by way of admonition, by way of exhortation concerning the way that we should properly handle conflicts.
God not only says that we're going to have conflicts, He also indicates that there is a proper, yes, a successful way of handling those conflicts so that after the conflict our relationship, as well as our own individual lives, will be stronger than it was before.
Now last week we began to look at the first step of God's program of conflict resolution in Ephesians 2 verses 13 through 17.
And we saw there that the first step, as far as the Word of God is concerned, in this matter of conflict resolution is to have a real relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ, according to Ephesians 2, is the great reconciler.
He reconciles us through His death, through His resurrection to God, and by the power of His Spirit He reconciles us to one another.
He makes it possible for divided people, for people in conflict, to have a tremendous unity in Himself.
So we want to go on this morning and notice two or three other passages which describe for us something about God's way of conflict resolution.
Turn with me, if you will, to Ephesians chapter 4 verses 1 through 3.
Ephesians chapter 4 verses 1 through 3.
The Apostle Paul says, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, and treat you to walk in a manner
worthy of the calling with which you've been called, with all humility and gentleness,
with patience, showing forbearance to one another in love, being diligent to preserve
the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Now the first three chapters of the book of Ephesians are devoted to great doctrinal themes,
wherein Paul describes the tremendous spiritual blessings that we have in Jesus Christ.
The key text of the first three chapters is Ephesians 1 and verse 3 where Paul says, Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
And then throughout the next three chapters he begins to unpack those spiritual blessings
that we have in Christ Jesus.
Now at chapter 4 and verse 1, he turns from these great doctrinal themes and he begins
to press home the implications of the blessings and the fantastic things that we receive from
God.
He says, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord and treat you.
And he tells us in the light of what we have in Jesus Christ, this is how we ought to live.
Now notice in verse 1 he tells us what we should do in the light of our tremendous blessings.
He says we're to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which we've been called.
And then in verse 3 he tells us how we can walk worthy of our high calling.
He says we should be diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
In the light of the tremendous resources and blessings we have in Christ, Paul says
we ought to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Now that's putting it positively.
When we state that in the negative form, what Paul is saying is that we should resolve our
conflicts because the only way to preserve the unity is by resolving our conflicts.
So he tells us what we're to do, we're to walk worthy of our calling.
He tells us how we're to do that, we're to do it by preserving the unity of the Spirit
And then he tells us how to preserve the unity of the Spirit in verses 2 and 3.
In verses 2 and 3 he gives us some suggestions concerning conflict resolution.
He says first of all, if you're going to resolve your conflicts, you're going to have to have
all humility.
Conflicts are solved in a context where people are humble.
Conflicts are solved where you have humble people.
Conflicts remain unresolved because of pride.
Proverbs 13 and verse 10 says only by pride comes contention, but with the person who
is willing to listen to counsel, there is wisdom.
If you want to solve conflicts, you've got to have humility.
Now humility means that a person is willing to examine himself.
Very frequently when we have conflicts, we spend a lot of time examining the other person.
What the other person is doing wrong, how the other person should change.
But humility means that instead of looking across the fence, we'll look at ourselves.
We'll say, now what did I do wrong?
We'll do what Jesus said in Matthew 7.
He said that before you fiddle around with a speck of dust in your brother's eye, first
of all, take the log out of your own eye.
And so we've got to be willing to say, what am I doing to increase this conflict?
What am I doing to cause us to be separated?
That's where conflict resolution begins.
It begins with myself examining what I'm doing wrong in this situation.
Humility means that I'll be willing to admit it when I'm wrong.
Now there are many times when even though we may know that we said something wrong,
we may know that we've done something wrong, we may know that we've had a wrong attitude
toward the other person, but we'll never admit it.
We're too proud to do that.
And as long as we're too proud to say, please forgive me, I said something wrong.
Please forgive me, I did something wrong.
Please forgive me, I manifested a wrong attitude toward you.
I was stubborn.
I was obstinate.
Until we're willing to do that, the conflict probably will not be resolved.
It only means we'll admit it when we're wrong.
Some time ago, I was in a counseling situation where I was dealing with a husband and wife
who were in tremendous conflict, and I asked the woman if her husband had ever asked her
for forgiveness.
And the woman said no.
Now they'd been married for 22 years and I thought she was exaggerating because it's
very common for people to exaggerate.
And so I turned to the husband and I said, is that true?
That in 22 years of marriage you have never asked her for forgiveness?
And I expected him to say, oh, that's not true.
But he said, yes, that's true.
I've never asked her for forgiveness in 22 years.
I said, well, why not?
He said, you don't have to ask for forgiveness unless you've done something wrong.
Twenty-two years.
Never done anything wrong.
Well, you can't solve conflict unless a person is willing to admit it when they've done wrong.
And all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
Humility means that I'll be willing to listen to the other person.
Very frequently when a conflict arises, what I want to do is preach to the other person.
I want to let the other person know where he's wrong.
I want to give the other person the truth.
After all, I know what's right and I know what should be done.
And so instead of listening, I talk.
But humility means I will put a zipper on my mouth and I will be swift to hear, slow
to speak, and slow to wrath because the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness
of God.
That's 1, 19, and 20.
Humility means I'll really listen to the other person.
Now, listening involves at least three things.
Listening involves listening to the other person without interruption.
I sit in the counseling room and I watch a husband and wife.
I'll ask the husband a question and he gets about halfway through what he's saying and
the wife is interrupting him.
And I begin to pick up a pattern that she does that quite frequently.
And already I have an idea of one reason why this family is having problems.
She is an interrupter.
She doesn't really listen to her husband.
She picks up on picky old little details and straightens him out about things that don't
matter at all.
Listening involves listening without interruption until the other person has finished.
Now that takes grace sometimes because it takes some people a long time to finish.
But we need to ask God for his grace to wait and to listen.
Listening involves listening with undivided attention.
You see, it's possible to sit there and be quiet, but while you're quiet your mind can
be a thousand miles away.
Just this past week in a counseling situation I was asking the people there to examine themselves,
to look at the log in their own eyes.
So we went through some of the logs in the eyes of the husband.
He acknowledged them.
And then I turned to the wife and I said, now where are you at fault in this marriage?
And she began to talk about some of the ways in which she had failed.
And as she was talking I noticed her husband looking down and I suspected he wasn't paying
attention.
Right there she's acknowledging her faults.
They're there for marriage counseling.
And in the marriage counseling context his mind is elsewhere, at least I think.
But love is not suspicious so I decided I'd check it out.
She says, you know, one of my faults is that I don't allow him privacy.
He likes some things to be very personal and I've not allowed him the freedom to have that
privacy.
And so I turned to him and I said, do you know what she's talking about?
You understand what she's saying?
And he looks down and he says, hmm, hmm, hmm.
Let's see.
He wasn't listening at all.
And so I asked her to repeat it.
Well you see, he was there.
He wasn't interrupting her but he wasn't paying attention.
And his wife knows that.
You don't have to live with somebody very long before you discover that you're doing
a lot of talking but they're not doing much listening.
They tuned you out.
And when you sense that somebody is tuned out there is a tremendous temptation for bitterness
and resentment to form.
You begin to think that person doesn't think I'm very important.
That person doesn't think I'm saying anything worthwhile.
That person is looking down on me.
And when you have the idea that the other person doesn't respect you, doesn't really
listen to you, it's very difficult to maintain the right kind of attitude toward that other
person.
And in that context, it's very difficult to solve conflicts.
So good listening means that you listen with undivided attention.
Well, it also means that you make sure that you understand what the other person has said
and what the other person really meant.
Now many times when we're listening to someone else, what we're doing is thinking about what
we're going to say in return.
We're giving about 25% of our attention to what the other person is saying and 75% of
our attention to how we're going to show them they're wrong.
And so when they finish, we really haven't heard what the other person is saying and
certainly we haven't understood what the other person has meant.
And so frequently we're responding to what we think the other person has said rather
than what the other person has said.
And in that kind of a context, you just can't solve conflicts.
And so listening, which involves humility, doesn't take much humility to talk in most
cases.
It takes a lot of humility to just listen.
And good listening means you listen to make sure that you really understand what the other
person has said.
Well, conflict resolution demands humility.
It also demands gentleness.
Many conflicts are not resolved because there is a lack of gentleness.
It may very frequently be that the one person is right in what he says.
It may be that he has right views and right perspective, but he is not gentle in the way
that he deals with the other person.
He's like a bull in a china shop.
And because of his lack of gentleness, the conflict is never resolved.
Gentleness means that we'll be thoughtful.
Gentleness means that we'll be considerate of the other person's feelings and opinions
and values and cultural standards.
I was talking with one of the brethren here who has just come back from a trip to another
land.
And he told me something about the way people in that land handle problems.
Now a person going to that land could say, well, they shouldn't be that way.
That's not the way to handle problems.
And consequently, he could come in and just completely blow the situation because he wouldn't
take into consideration the feelings, the opinions, the background, the cultural standards
of those other people.
Well, gentleness means that we'll take all of those things into consideration.
Gentleness means we'll be sensitive.
Gentleness means we won't be overbearing.
Gentleness means we won't be domineering.
Gentleness means we won't be pushy or quarrelsome or contentious.
Scripture says the servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle, patient, apt to
teach in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves.
If peradventure, God will grant them repentance unto the acknowledgment of the truth.
Ecclesiastes 10 and verse 4 says, if the ruler's temper rises against you, don't abandon your
position because composure allays great offenses.
Now you can abandon your position in a lot of ways.
You can abandon your position by giving up and running away, or you can abandon your
position by losing control of yourself and starting to rant and rave and flail.
But the Scripture says it's composure that allays great offenses.
If you want to resolve conflicts, you need composure.
And composure speaks of gentleness, the way in which you deal with the other person as
well as what you say and what you do.
Thirdly, Paul says if you're going to resolve conflicts, you're going to have to have all
patience.
Now patience means at least two things.
Patience in the word of God means continuance under pressure.
Patience always involves pressure.
You don't have to have much patience if you don't have pressure.
But here's a conflict, here's a tremendous amount of pressure, and under that pressure
you continue steadfast.
The word patience means endurance, it means perseverance, it means steadfastness, it means
you hang in there.
Hebrews 10 and verse 36 says, you have need of patience that after you have done the will
of God you might receive the promise.
The same Greek word is found in Hebrews 12 and verse 1 which says we are to run with
patience, or we are to run with endurance, the race that is set before us, looking unto
Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.
And to solve conflicts, what this text is saying will involve hanging in there, it will
involve steadfastness and perseverance.
Conflicts are usually not resolved with a snap of a finger.
Now most of us want to resolve conflicts yesterday.
We want some magical solution, we want some instantaneous solution, we want some miraculous
solution.
And if we don't get a miraculous, magical, instantaneous solution, if the other person
doesn't agree immediately, we give up, we quit, we run away.
God says no, you're going to have to have patience, you're going to have to hang in
there, gently and humbly persevering.
But patience not only means that I must hang in there, and let me say I've seen a lot of
husbands who have run away, they've run away to the golf course, they've run away to their
work, they've run away to the lake where they fish, they've run away to golf, they've run
away from problems, they stay away from the home, they stay away from their wives, they
stay away from their children because they're frustrated.
God says you'll never solve those conflicts unless you have patience.
Patience not only means that I'll hang in there, patience means that I'll give the other
person time to change, time to think, time to pray.
Back in Matthew chapter 18, Jesus told the story of a certain king who had a great debtor,
and this debtor owed him a lot of money, so one day the king came to him to collect.
And the man said to him, have patience with me, and I'll repay you all.
Now what was the man asking for?
He was asking for some time.
He was saying, give me some time and I'll repay you everything I owe.
Now if we're going to resolve conflicts, we've got to be patient with the other people, or
with the other person.
We've got to be willing to give the other person time to change.
Now last week I mentioned the fact that my wife and I tried to plant a garden at the
beginning of our marriage, and it didn't work out that well.
But when I was a boy, my father and mother had big gardens, and I had to work in the
garden, and maybe that's why I don't like gardens now.
But at any rate, we had gardens, and I remember this much about gardens.
We put the seed in in the spring, and we wouldn't expect to harvest the crop the next week.
We'd be willing to wait, and wait, and wait, and in some cases the crop came after 120
days or longer than that.
We were patient to receive the harvest.
In fact, James picks up that metaphor in James chapter 5 as he's exhorting us to be
patient.
He says, Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord.
Behold, the farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it,
until it gets the early and late rains.
And in reference to our wives, or husband, or children, or other people, we've got to
be willing to be patient, to give them time to change, rather than to push them or force
them into changing.
Because frequently what happens when we have a conflict with somebody else?
We begin to push them, and when we push them, they push back.
And we push a little harder, they push a little harder, and it becomes a pushing match to
see who can push the most.
Whereas if we drop the seed in, if we explain our position, pray about it, and let the Lord
send the early and the latter rains, and let the Lord do the changing, and let the Lord
do the working, many times God will work out those conflicts beautifully.
But it's because we're trying to force the fruit.
We're trying to force the issue, that the issue frequently is never resolved.
So God says if you're going to resolve your conflicts, you're going to have to have patience.
But then fourthly, God says if you're going to resolve conflicts, you're going to have
to have forbearance.
You're going to have to forbear one another in love.
Now forbearance means that we're willing to allow the other person to be different than
we are.
Forbearance means we're going to be willing to allow the other person to make mistakes.
Forbearance means we're going to be willing to allow the other person to fail.
Forbearance means that we'll overlook transgressions.
Proverbs 25 and verse 15 scripture says by forbearance a ruler may be persuaded
and it's a soft tongue that breaks the bones. We've got to learn to distinguish
between swing issues and fire issues in our relationships with other people. We've
got to allow people to be different from us in swing issues. Now in many cases
there are husbands who are so insecure, so emotionally immature, that if their
wives disagree with them about anything, they make a federal case out of it. Unless
their wives say to them, honey that's great, that's the best idea I've
ever heard, yeah you're wonderful, you're terrific, you're a great idea man, about
everything, the husbands become upset. They're threatened by any disagreement.
They think that disagreement with an idea means rejection of them as persons
and they will not allow their wives to disagree with them about anything, about
the way they cook their food, about the way they clean the house, about what
color furniture you should buy, about what color drapes you should get. I mean
their wives have to listen to them and agree with them about anything and
everything and I've seen that so frequently in marriage counseling
situations. But you never resolve the big issues unless you can allow the person
to disagree with you on the minor issues. You've got to learn how to distinguish
between swing issues and fire issues. You say, what's a swing issue? What's a fire
issue? Well a swing issue is this, you've got a little two or three year old,
maybe a little younger than that or a little older than that, he's out on the
playground and he sees some of the children over there on the swing and
your little guy has never been on swing before and you have a good idea that
since he isn't very big, never been on swings before, that if he gets on a swing
this time he's gonna fall off and he's gonna hurt himself. Now at that point you
have a choice to make. Either you say, well I want to protect him, I don't want
this little darling to get hurt and so you keep him from the swings or you put
him on and you stand there and hug him and hold him and he doesn't really have
much fun because mother's smothering him. Or you say, oh well he's gonna fall off
and he's gonna scratch his legs and maybe he's gonna get some bruises but
it's not gonna kill him. And so you put him on and tell him hang on tight and you
give him a little push and then you step back and you wait for him to fall
off and begin to cry and then you run over and pick him up and hug him and
love him and comfort him. You see you allow him to get hurt in a minimal way
by the swing issues. You allow him to have some freedom to make mistakes and
to fail in areas where he won't destroy himself. But you're out in the backyard
with the same little guy and it's fall and you live in one of those areas where
you can actually rake your leaves and burn your leaves in the backyard. And so
you've raked your leaves and you're burning your leaves and your little old
guy begins to be attracted by the fire over there. Hey that's bright, boy that
looks great, it looks interesting and he begins to run over toward the fire. Now
at that point you don't just step back and say huh there he goes. He's got to
burn. You don't just step back and wait for him to jump into the fire and say
well after he starts to burn I'll put the fire up. No this is no longer a swing
issue. This is no longer a minor issue. This is a fatal issue. This is a lethal
issue. This is an important issue. And so you grab him and you explained him about
the dangers of fire and if he doesn't listen to you then you do even more than
that because this is really important. And friends in our relationships with
people we've got to be willing to allow our children, our wives, our husbands, our
neighbors, our fellow church members to be different than we are in many areas.
We've got to distinguish between swing issues and fire issues and in family
conflicts, in marriage conflicts, in interpersonal conflicts as I deal with
them on a daily basis. I have discovered that most people who are having serious
problems in this area are having these problems because they don't know how to
distinguish between swing issues and fire issues. Everything for them has
become a major issue. And Paul says you'll never solve these conflicts
unless you can distinguish between swing issues. You need forbearance. But notice
he also says that if you're going to resolve your conflicts you need love.
Conflicts are resolved in an atmosphere of love and it's because love is lacking
that conflicts are not resolved. Now what is love? Well the Bible tells us that
love is God giving his only begotten Son. The Bible tells us that love is Christ
giving himself up for us. The Bible tells us that love is not a good feeling that
runs up and down my spine. It's not butterflies in my stomach. It's not she
turns me on. I dream about her night after night. Oh wow, I can't live without
her. That's not love. That's infatuation. The Bible's love is not so much emotion
as it is motion. The Bible's love is giving. It's doing. It's acting. It's
serving. It's reaching out to the needs of other people and laying down our
lives for the sake of other people. It's sacrificing for them. It's yielding to
them. It's meeting their needs. In Luke chapter 10 Jesus said you shall love
your neighbor as yourself and then he goes on to describe what it means to
love our neighbors. He didn't say love for my neighbor means that I have heart
palpitations. He didn't say it means that I have butterflies. He didn't say it
means that the bells ring and the bands play. He said to love your neighbor means
that you see a man who's been beaten and robbed and bloody. He's lying there on
the ground and even though you've got a schedule to keep you've got
responsibilities. You've got your own desires. You've got your own wants. You've
got your own opinions. You've got your own needs. Even though you've got all of
these things you'll deny yourself. You'll stop whatever you're doing. You'll get
your hands dirty. You'll get dirt under your fingernails. You'll take money out
of your pocket. You'll pick up that man. You'll bind up his wounds. You'll put him
on your beast. You'll take him to an inn. You will meet his needs whatever they
are even if you don't feel like doing it. That's Bible love. A few weeks ago I
realized I hadn't spent some time with my five-year-old guy for a while and so
I decided it was time for Josh and I to spend some time together and I asked him
what he wanted to do. I suggested the zoo. He said no daddy I don't want to go to
the zoo. I suggested a couple other things that I would like to do. Said no
daddy I don't want to do those. I said Josh what do you want to do? He said I
want to go out for a bicycle ride at Tyler Park. I've been to Tyler Park. Big
hills. I said are you sure Josh? He said yeah. I said how about the zoo? You sure you
don't think all those wonderful animals down? He said no daddy I want to go to
the zoo. Love means I'll go out to the park. So I bought a bicycle rack. We put
the bicycles on the back of the car. We went out. We rode for 40 minutes and
little old five-year-old Josh hadn't begun to pant yet but I had and I said
Joshua don't you think we better go back? You know let's go on. I said you know we
gotta go just as far back as we've come. He said no let's go on. Love means I'll go
on. So I went on and finally finally he said let's go back and we went around
turned around and went back. Well love means that I'll yield to Josh. Love means
that I want to please Josh even if I don't feel like doing anything. Everything in me
cried out against it. I didn't want to do it. I wanted to do something else but
that's what Josh wanted to do and it wasn't sinful or immoral. He wasn't asking
me to do something wrong. He was asking me to do something that was alright. You
know in an atmosphere where you know somebody loves you. Somebody's sacrificing
for you. Somebody will give their very lives for it's not hard to solve
conflicts with that kind of a person and it's because that kind of love is
absent. It's because people don't sense we love them in that way. That we really
have their best interest at heart. That we're willing to die for them. That we
yield to them in practical matters is because that's lacking. That frequently
we don't solve our conflicts. Oh Paul says if you want to preserve the unity
of the Spirit and resolve your conflict you've got to have love. Yes my friends
when it comes to this matter of interpersonal relationships conflicts
are inevitable but thank God they can be resolved. God says they can in an
atmosphere where there's humility. Where there's gentleness. Where there's patience.
Where there's forbearance and where there's love. This morning if you have a
conflict with somebody I want you to evaluate your own humility. Is it because
there's a lack of humility you're not listening you don't really respect that
other person? Is it because there's been a lack of gentleness? Is it because you
really haven't been patient you've given up too easily on yourself or on the
other person? Is it because you lack forbearance? Is it because you really
haven't been loving that other person? Well in most cases friends I have seen
conflicts resolve when people begin to get serious about these qualities. When
they come to God confessing their sins and asking the Holy Spirit to help and
the determining by the grace of God they're going to react and act toward
that other person in humility, patience, gentleness, forbearance and love. May God
help us then to examine ourselves, confess our sins where we need to
confess our sins and by the power of the Spirit of God to change.