Video Transcript: Pursuing a Healthy Perspective on Conflict (Part 3)

The Bible tells us that even if we have the desire to please God, we are not able to please God unless we have faith.  Hebrews 11:6 reads, “Without faith, it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.”  Like Humility and a Desire to please God, Faith is a gift from God.  Ephesians 28:9 reads, “For it is by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, not by work so that no one can boast.”

Faith is produced by hearing God's word.  Romans 10:17 says that consequently, “Faith comes from hearing the message and the message is heard through the word about Christ.”  God's Word, the Bible, declares God's truth.  Hearing God's truth produces faith, the faith that it takes to please God.  

But Ian Thomas said, the truth that God's Word declares will not profit you unless you mix it with the faith that the Word of God produces.  Hebrews 4:2 says, “For indeed, the gospel was preached to us as well as to them.  But the word which they heard did not profit them not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.”  

So what do I mean by mixing faith with God's Word and the truth that it declares?  It essentially means putting into practice, doing what the Word of God says, not just to be a hearer only, but a doer of the Word.  That's mixing faith with the Word of God.  This kind of faith impacts our words.  It impacts the way we talk.  It impacts our actions, and what we do, and how we treat people.  James 2:17 says, “In the same way faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”

A faith in Jesus Christ is like a shield of protection in that spiritual war between the wildfire and the Peacefire.  In Ephesians 6:16, “We’re to take up the shield of faith with which we can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.”  Our faith in Jesus Christ is in him, not in worldly wisdom or man's abilities and talents.  It's not in our own abilities and talents.  It's in Jesus Christ.  

The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2, “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God's power.”  The conflict wildfires that we encounter sometimes test and refine our faith.  In 1 Peter 1:6-7 we read, “In all this, you greatly rejoice though now for a little while, you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.  These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith - of greater worth than , which perishes even though refined by fire, may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.”

When we focus on the wildfire rather than seek the Lord's presence, the things in the wildfire can lead us away from the faith.  First Timothy 6:10 reads, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.”  Some people eager for money have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.  

We've all experienced conflicts where the things involved in the conflict might have been money, maybe some other kinds of property, maybe a relationship at stake.  But that thing became like an idol to us, more important than seeking God and pursuing his purpose in the conflict, and we walked through that conflict without walking by faith, without experiencing the Lord's transforming peace, and ultimately, not restoring any relationships.  

Seeking the Lord's presence encourages us to respond to conflict by making faith choices.  It changes our perspective on the conflict.  We make restorative choices, transformational choices, grounded in our relationship with Jesus Christ rather than making shallow choices motivated by the circumstances or emotions generated in the wildfire.  

Let's review this lecture.  

• The third attribute of a person God can use in conflict is Faith.  

• It is impossible to please God without faith.  

• And faith grows by hearing and applying God's Word in our lives.  

• Faith influences our words and actions in conflict.  At the Peacefire, our faith is in Jesus Christ, not in worldly wisdom or our abilities and talents

• Conflict wildfires, sometimes test our faith.  

• And seeking the Lord's Presence encourages us to respond to conflict by making faith choices that are grounded in our relationship with Jesus Christ, rather than choices based on wildfire circumstances.  

We've talked about Humility.  We've talked about a Desire to please God.  And we've talked about Faith.  All three are gifts that God gives freely to us as we seek him at the Peacefire.  

In the next lecture, we'll talk about the fourth attribute of a person God can use in the midst of conflict.  

Thanks for watching.  We'll see you then.