Video Transcript: Dealing with Conflict

So we've looked at change theory and the reality that if you're going to reach a vision of a  preferable future, it's going to involve some changes. And even some of those changes will  impact your core values of the organization that you're working with, and maybe your own  that some things have to change in order to reach that preferable future. Now, in this session, you'll notice I put the title as dealing with conflict, because that is going to be an inevitable  conclusion to the change process, that there are going to be people who don't like change. We are people who create certain status quo around us right so that we do things in the way we  do them. And culture is defined, by the way we do things here. As soon as you present the  idea of doing something differently, there are going to be those who are very unhappy about  it. And that is where we're going to deal with conflict. Now. If you think that you can get away  because you're such a good person without conflict in your situation, and yet be a leader.  Think again. One of the passages that really confuses me and makes me ask questions as this Acts 15:36-40. Listen to these words. "Sometime later, Paul said to Barnabas, let us go back  and visit the brothers in all the towns where we preach the word of the Lord and see how they are doing. Barnabas wanted to take John also called Mark with them. But Paul did not think it  wise to take him because he had deserted them and Pamphylia and have not continued with  them in the work. They had such a sharp disagreement that they parted company. Barnabas  took Mark and sailed for Cyprus. But Paul chose Silas and left commended by the brothers to  the grace of the Lord. He went through Syria and Cilicia strengthening the churches." Picture  this, Barnabas is somebody who was called the Son of Encouragement. He was somebody  who always looked at the best of a person who's somebody who had encourage, the church  early on and in its history, he was somebody who got Paul involved in ministry, when when he saw what was happening at Antioch, Barnabas was the one who went and found Saul and  took him back though a man who was going to become named Paul took him back there to  become one of the main teachers in that new church in Antioch. And so he's had a  tremendous role. And then there's, there's Paul, somebody who has met Jesus Christ on the  road to Damascus, and yet they can have such a sharp disagreement. The words there are  really quite powerful, sharp disagreement, this is a conflict that leads to them going their  separate ways. It's hard to imagine now the issue is John Mark, we read about the first  missionary journey that he went along as kind of their servant. In other words, he made  various arrangements for them, he made sure that they had a place to stay that the tickets  for the ship were in place, he took care of those details. And apparently, whether he got  homesick or not, we don't know. But apparently, there was some reason that caused him to  leave them in Pamphylia. And so Paul isn't willing to take that risk. Again, he says that the  cause of the kingdom is too great. We're not going to take that risk. But Barnabas as the Son  of Encouragement takes Mark along. Now, if Paul and Barnabas can get into that level of  conflict, don't think that you're going to get away with not having conflict in your ministry,  especially when you start changing things that the church or the organization have found  precious and have become part of their values. Now, conflict is not always bad. When you  read books on conflict, they will note several things. One, it introduces opportunity for  change. When I was talking about change theory, I said, you know, the old description of  change was you unfreeze the status quo and abolish unfrozen and malleable you begin to  change things until it refreezes in the new system. Well, you know, that's a way that  sometimes can cause conflict. But when conflict opens up in an organization, it creates the  opportunity for change, because you've got to go back to what you want to do. And you've  got to go back to the vision. Sometimes conflict, some people would say is God's plan. Peter  Wagner was a professor of mine when I was working on a doctorate in church growth at Fuller, Theological Seminary in Pasadena. I was in a class with him and he was talking about church  planting. In the United States, it's been proven over and over again, that the most effective  way of evangelism is to start a new church, that people will come to a new church that the  people who start the new church are motivated to be out there inviting people to church, that  new churches are the way to start a revival in a community because they will reach people for Jesus Christ better than any other method that exists. And then he said, You know, sometimes God in order to get us going in new churches will will cause conflict and He gave the example  of the Southern Baptist churches now for Southern Baptist, nothing against you. I'm just 

quoting Peter Wagner here. What he said was, is that "what happens at the Baptist churches  Southern Baptist in particular is that they'll have a church, First Baptist Church, they said,  there'll be conflict, and people will leave, and they'll start Second Baptist Church, and they'll  have a conflict. And people will leave and start Trinity Baptist or All Saints, Baptists, or  whatever Baptist Church." And I found it very humorous because I was serving the small  community at that time, where, sure enough, there were three Baptist churches Plainwell,  Michigan is 5000, some people and they have three Baptist churches in the history was  exactly what he described. Now, did God plan that? I don't know. But I do know Scripture does indicate that God allows certain levels of conflict in order to get God's people moving. When  you read through the book of Acts, you'll find that God gives them a commission, "you're  going to be my witnesses in Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." That's this  wonderful commission that God gives them. And Jesus gives His disciples, the ones who have  been with him. So you're gonna go to the ends of the earth and, and you know, the Great  Commission ends with, I'll be with you, even to the end of the age. So that's the commission,  but you get to chapter two, Pentecost happens. And while they have this wonderful revival, all these people in Jerusalem would come to faith. But then you get to chapter three, and they're  still in Jerusalem. And chapter four, they're still in Jerusalem, chapter five, they're still in  Jerusalem, chapter six, they're still in Jerusalem. It's not till chapter seven that we read that  they began to scatter with the good news. Why did they scatter, because Steven was  arrested, and he was stoned, because he would not recant his testimony about Jesus Christ,  and His testimony that Jesus was raised from the dead, and invites people into this  relationship with God. Now, did God cause the death of Steven so that people would be  scattered with the message. And now, now begin that process of going to the ends of the  earth. I don't know. But I do know that God will allow that kind of conflict. And one of the  benefits of it is it gets God's people moving. It gets God's people doing what I say last there,  clarify vision and values. Clarify what am I really about what's really important to me what's  really important to this church. I've shared with you my good friend of mine, who sat there  and said, you know, I get to choose my pain. I want to clarify my values. But as the values of  the Church changed, people left in droves, but new people began to come. And so he got to  choose his pain. So conflict will come in various ways to you ways as a leader that you're  going to have to deal with a one is personal conflict. My first church had a situation when I  came there, that there were two families in conflict, the daughter of this family had married  the son of this family, the son of this family turned out to be a real jerk. He had done some  things, he'd been unfaithful, he had really hurt the daughter in this situation, and they had a  young child as well. Well, this family, the family of the young woman, turned bitter. And they  were angry. And they they raised the conflict from between these two married young adults,  to a conflict between these two people. And then it got raised even further, I began to notice  as I was early on, in my tenure in that church, that the woman who was the mother of the  injured daughter, on Sunday mornings, would would corner any newcomer to the church and  tell them just how rotten things were, you know, how bad she had been treated, and how bad  the church had dealt with it. And so I tried to deal with that conflict. And I tried to deal with it  in all the wrong ways. In that I listened. I listened to this couple, I went to this couple and  listened to them. I visited the young man, the young woman I listened to them, I tried to find  solutions to the conflict by putting myself in the middle of it. And lo and behold, turns out if  you're in the middle of conflict, you're often the one that gets shocked. But that's one level of  conflict where you can get personal conflict that that people are at each other, but you can  also get organizational conflict. When I think of organization conflict, I think of the person in  my second church, the one in California, where we had a gathering of elders, we had reached  a plateau and growth that often happens in growing systems that they'll reach a plateau for a  while. And so something has to be done differently to break through that plateau and reach a  new level while I would reached that plateau, and I came to the elders with a plan to break  into the new level of growth. And part of that plan about adding a third morning service. And  it was going to be early it was going to be 7:45. And then we're going to have 9 and 10:30 are going to be our times of worship and we discussed that at length as elders and we voted. Now to my great surprise, a one of the elders recorded his negative vote Now in parliamentary 

procedure that says something very important to me, because when you record your negative votes, you are reserving the right to speak against this motion or against this plan. And so we  have, after the meeting, I went to this man and I said, what what does this mean? So will you  come into my office, I want to talk with you about this a little bit. What what does this mean?  

man's name was John, what does it mean? And he, does this mean, you're going to be out  speaking against this? And he assured me that no, that wasn't the case at all. But rather that  he was simply saying he didn't think this was the right approach. And indeed, it turned out to  be right many years later. But my great concern was that he might be somebody who was  going to start advocating conflict, that he'd be out there and saying, hey, you know what, the  elders made this decision to go to that third service, I'm opposed to how about you. And when that if that would have happened, we would have had a major issue on our hearts and minds,  because this meant people would have to change their times of worship. And people would  have to change their attitudes toward other people coming in. And it would cause an  upheaval and and, and then if there's conflict around that, it could very easily and sometimes  does lead to split in the church. And so you've got to judge what's the level of conflict here.  Now, another person who has talked about levels of conflict doesn't put them in those terms.  But a man named Speed Leas many years ago, I came up with this five levels of conflict. And  he said, some are healthy and some are not, you'll notice the first level is a problem to solve  that there is a problem. And this can be a very healthy thing when people are coming  together, and they are trying to solve a problem. The second level can be healthy, but can  become unhealthy very quickly. And that is where not only you have a problem to solve, but  now it becomes about the person. In fact, in premarital counseling, I used to years ago, create three circles on a paper. And I'd say, you know, here's what often happens when couples get  in conflict. That is they start shooting at each other, and I draw arrows at each other, instead  of shooting at the problem and trying to solve the problem. That's level two. People now have  an issue with another person, they have a disagreement with this person that's causing them  to reflect on the problem in a whole different way, or even to set the problem aside because  the person becomes the problem. Level three, when you start entering unhealthy conflict is  when you have a contest. In other words, I'm going to win, I'm going to win at all costs. And  level four is fight or flight that now we're in it, you know, it's not just a contest that I'm going  to win. But but I'm going to inflict damage in the process. And then an intractable situation,  some of the books about this call it World War. And that is that people now are trying to  destroy the other person or they're trying to destroy the organization, even there will be those as well going to talk about spiritual warfare in the near future. So you've got these levels of  conflict? How do people handle conflict in general, I show this graph sometimes to premarital  couples, as I work with them as well preparing for marriage. And you'll notice, on the left hand side here, the importance of achieving own goals or being selfish that that the strategies on  that side for handling conflict are about winning, that I want to get my way. And the bottom  one and the ones that move toward the right are the ones that are more concerned about the  relationship and wanting to restore a relationship. So you'll notice on the left hand side  competing, would be that, you know, that idea of hey, we're now in this, we're in this contest,  and I'm going to win. And that means you're going to lose that would be highly satisfactory to  me, but it would be very destructive to the relationship. On the other side, collaborating,  trying to find a win win is very, a highly satisfactory to the relationship but also to my own  personal needs. In the middle is compromising win, lose, win, lose that, that okay, we each  get something that we can come out of this with that that has a medium concern for my  needs, but also a concern for the relationship. Avoiding or withdrawing on the bottom left  hand side is lose, lose that I'm just, I'm just not going to fight because I'm just gonna walk  away from it. And then on the bottom lower side to accommodate somebody that is I'm going  to choose to lose because the relationship is so important to me. You can win but I'm not  going to get what I need. Now. What astounds me in the Christian church, is that people most  often choose to avoid or withdraw. I live in a community there are 40 Some churches there,  our church, we are a very well churched organization, a very well churched community. And  yet I see conflict happening between people what they do, instead of trying to solve the  conflict and trying to address the problem trying to address the issues, they'll withdraw they'll

take off And I find that deeply saddening. Because it's hard. It's hard, hard, hard work to do to deal with conflict. But it's very rewarding on the other side, and in fact, can push you toward  your vision if you learn how to deal with conflict well. And so, you know, what are we moving  

toward? We're moving toward collaboration, how do we find a win win? That's, that's one of.  Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, we look for a win win. That's what  we're trying to do. If we can't do that, we're going to do compromise, where we each get a  little something but within the church organization, within Christian organizations within the  organizations that you are part of, we're looking for Win, win, or compromise. And how can we find that? Somebody who has helped me understand this a little better about my role in the  conflict is a woman named Lyssa Adkins. She is a coach. She is a consultant for a large group  and based in New York, and she has taken the the five levels of conflict of Speed Leas he  wrote way back in the 1950s, I think it was, and and describe what you need to do in each  level of conflict. And here is her table sorry about the small print, but you can look at that a  little more closely level one that you've got a problem to solve. Now, what you seek, as  somebody who's trying to solve this conflict is collaboration, you're seeking a win win  situation, or you're seeking consensus learning where every team members head is in regard  to the issue. And in time arriving at the decision, everyone can back. So you got a problem.  And the team comes around and says, How do we find this solution to this problem there  where everybody can be happy. I think of a, you know, some of the things we did in trying to  promote ministry at the beginning launch of the year in September, that's a launch of our  church here. And we had some members who had tried some things and they felt abandoned  by the other church members. But but one of our big problems was that we were losing an  opportunity to give information about programs to get people involved in programs. And what we had done hadn't worked and some people were accusing there was conflict, because okay, what it was your idea it was your dumb idea that did that, that sort of that sort of conflict? So  we got together as a team and talked about it, you know, what are our goals here? What are  we trying to accomplish? What's the best way to accomplish that? We came up with a  wonderful plan. And that cemented the team together in powerful ways, because we were  focused on the problem. And we solved the problem in a creative way where everybody was  involved. Everybody had a job to do, and they did it. And it was a delightful time together. So  when you got the problem level of conflict, you simply addressed the problem. Now level two,  you'll notice disagreement, that's where things move from focusing on the problem to people  focusing on each other, that the problem is only a small part of it now, because it's it's that  person that's irritating me, it's that person with whom I'm in conflict. And what do you do  there? Well, you provide support to the people in conflict, you empower them to resolve the  problem. You provide safety, anything that restores a sense of safety, such as collaborative  games, or re grounding in the team shared values, anything that brings people back to wait a  minute, remember what we're about here. And the problem is not the person the problem is  the problem. So what is the problem? Let's define the problem. And let's get off that idea of,  of, it's the person. Now, sometimes a conflict between people can get highly destructive to  your organization. Now, I look back to when I left the church in California, I shared this story in the introductory class for CLI. But when I left there, I had a major level of conflict with a  partner in ministry, we'd been partners for 20 years, we had a relationship that was one of  trust and, and I felt like he had broken my trust. Of course, he felt the same way. And so we  began to point at each other. I remember speaking to my counselor back then, and being just  so angry, just so angry at him. And he said, You got to find a way to physically express your  anger. And so I would take a sledge hammer in the backyard and just pounded on the ground, developed tendinitis in my shoulders as a result, but just trying to find a way to express my  anger. I had a good friend that allowed me to dump my anger on him toward this other  person. Now, by God's grace, we were able to reestablish a relationship. It's a wounded  relationship, but we still we see each other now 12 years later, after that experience, we do  see each other we encounter each other. We have good time together, we make time  together to talk we sometimes talk about ministry, we remember things together. We try to  avoid that period talking about it. I'm just saying that this is difficult stuff, but it can be  handled and it can be handled well. If both people are committed to doing it with both groups 

are committed to finding a solution. Now when it gets to be organizational conflict at this level where people are saying No, they're the problem. That's going to take some preaching and  prayer. And it's going to take some some real challenge. In fact we're going to talk about that  later when we talk about spiritual warfare. That that is one of the strategies of Satan. It's  schism. And you're going to need spiritual weapons to fight that with. So disagreement, that's when you're providing support, and you're trying to lead people back to what is the real  problem? And how do we develop it? Level three, the contest. That's where somebody says,  I'm going to win, I'm not going to look for win win situation, I'm not going to look for a  compromise, I am going to win this. Now, if you've got little kids, you may have been in one of these situations. I had this with one of my daughters who refused to eat some of her food  sometimes. So she had peas one night and refused to eat them. And our rule was you eat  what's on your plate. And so I said before you leave the table, you've got to eat your peas.  Well, she was stubborn, 10 minutes later, she's still sitting there refusing to eat her peas. And  I said, you know, I made a mistake. Dear daughter, I made a mistake, I should not have gotten in a conflict over this, this shouldn't have risen this level. But now that I'm in it, I'm not going  to lose. I'm the adult here. I'm the parent. And I was relieved when she took a spoonful of  peas, which was a compromise, and then she could get down that that's a crazy example. The bigger ones are when it's a contest, sometimes in the church, it can rip things apart. In many  churches in the past in the United States would be conflict when the worship style changed. A worship style could change that would introduce contemporary worship, and those who said  no, we want to, we want the hymns. And so you'd have these two parts of the church that  would come in conflict and they wouldn't compromise. But were out to win. And sometimes  those conflicts could go up for years. And sometimes you find out that the pastor is removed,  the leader is removed, the one who's arranged maybe some compromise or at least agreed  not to talk about it agreed to avoid it. When they leave it, it springs up again that some of  these contests can go underground. I remember listening to a missionary years ago speak on  tape. And he was somebody who was flying relief into Bosnia after the war there Bosnia  Herzegovina. And he came back and he said he was amazed as he was supplying two  missionaries there who were trying to care for people who were impacted by that war. Civil  War said he was amazed that people are fighting about stuff that were 300 years old  grievances against their ancestors years before by another group, these things can go  underground. And the best thing you can do is surface the issues. We'll talk about that in just  a moment. Level three, contest. It can I use the put down use of rooms, there was a conflict  our staff had where we have built a new building for children's ministry and open up area for  adult ministry. And they got a conflict when somebody from children's ministry had an idea  that would involve taking a room for the parents of our Special Treasure children and parents  of people who had adopted children and parents of people who were foster care that they  would meet in the adult section. But the woman who was in charge of the adult section said,  Well, no, no, that's my room. And it could get that crazy, but but they they neither would  bend. And so there's a conflict that involved the team coming around and trying to find a  solution, which we did. It was a compromise. It wasn't a win win situation. But that's kind of  the level of conflict that can just start feeding into the destruction of your church. Level four is a crusade you use, the person is now going to fight and injure other people in Level Five is  World War at level four, you get a counselor involved. What's the pastor's role? Well, you  teach Matthew 18 says something about conflict in this regard, says you know, if your brother sins against you go to him, show him his fault. Try to gain your brother the relationship is  important. And if he doesn't listen to you take someone else along if it doesn't listen to them,  get the church involved. Paul did that with Syntyche and Eudias, got them engaged in the  whole process, got the church engaged saying help these people, they but these two women  have been faithful workers would be helped them, make sure all sides are heard, you may  have to take the side of that you are on that you don't want to see but you've got to make  sure all the issues are addressed. Avoid trend, triangulation. triangulation is something I've  been subject to more times than I care to admit and I fallen for it. And that is where the  conversation if the two people in conflict or the two groups in conflict, have a break in their  relationship. They'll start turning to you and they'll come to you and try to get you on their 

side. They'll talk about so and so and. They'll talk about so and so in a staff team. This can be  very destructive, and the other person comes in they try to put you in the middle and win you to their side. I began a practice with staff people if they came and complained about another  staff person what they were doing, and so are they are they in their office let's go there right  now. Because otherwise, you're triangulated. They try to get you on their side and see you as  

a force. And so that you avoid triangulation. You define the issues you surface them, you  explore assumptions, even ask what are you assuming here? What are you assuming about  these other people? Because sometimes there's false assumptions. And the other person will  say, No, no, no, that's not what I'm thinking or feeling. explore alternatives, that scenario of  choice we went through earlier, and you always push toward reconciliation. But with conflict,  you have to keep something else in mind. And that is sometimes it's not just the people. But  there is a very real enemy. And that enemy has a mission. And that mission is to destroy the  things of Jesus Christ, and especially his church. So in the next sessions, we're going to look at spiritual warfare. And we're going to look at how it can affect you in your leadership and how  it can affect your organization, your church, your ministry, and and also the weapons we have in order to fight against those times when we sense that it's the enemy that's causing this  conflict. So we'll see you next time.