Somehow, He loves us both

Somehow God loves both people in Conflict.  He doesn’t take sides, doesn’t have favorites.  He gently corrects each individual person, guides and protects us all, in the midst of conflicts.  We need to give up our desire for control, our need to be “right,” and all listen closely to what Our Master and Lord in Heaven is saying, to each one of us, in a disagreement.  Sometimes there is no right or wrong in a conflict.  There really is just a difference of opinion, and since God is not a God of opinion, but truth, we must ask for His resolution on an issue; His preference, and yield to His decree.  So much pain, conflict and misunderstanding could be completely avoided, or worked out much more quickly, if we would forsake ourselves, and yield to the Lord’s leading and preferences on an issue.  I believe that this is a huge part of  ” ¹⁰ always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. ¹¹ For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. ”  (2 Cor. 4)

I have needed God’s correction so many times.  God has shown me His perspective so often.  When I see that I have been deceived by my own perspective, then I go to the individual that I am in conflict with, and share what God has shown me, and I ask forgiveness.   Why is that so hard for people sometimes?  It’s just part of being a Follower of Jesus.  I came across a verse in Proverbs once, during an especially trying time of conflict, and  it truly brought me to my knees seeking God’s Perspective:

A man who hardens his neck after much reproof
Will suddenly be broken beyond remedy.  (Proverbs 29:11)

I hope that is a sobering verse for each and every one of us.  God is patient, kind and tenderhearted.  He is merciful beyond compare, but there comes a time, if we keep resisting His correction, that the Hammer of God will fall on us.  There was a time in my life, where my heart was so hardened, that God gave me a stern warning about the penalty for  my stiffened neck:

⁴³ Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it. ⁴⁴ And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.”

⁴⁵ When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them.”  (Matthew 21)

I did not recognize the warning when it came.  I did not fall upon the Rock of Christ, so He could break me to pieces gently, and restore me.  He had to fall on me, in His kindness, and scatter me like dust.  In another version it says, grind him to powder.  God mercifully ground me to powder with the tremendous waves of correction He brought into my life.  I thought these waves would kill me, and in a way they did.  The waves of God killed in me the things that needed to die, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. ”  (2 Cor. 4)

Dear Believer, are you in conflict right now with other believers.  Have you harmed or been harmed by a brother/sister in Christ.  Seek God’s Perspective, You may both be wrong.  Somehow, when in conflict with one another, Somehow He loves us both.  God’s love will crush you to powder, as He mercifully did to me, but please, spare yourselves the agony of this act of God.  Seek reconciliation with One Another.  I thought my life was ruined, but God mixed the Powder of this crushed life with His living water.  He made new clay and a new vessel for His Glory.  Amen and Amen