November 24, 1999
COMMENTARY:
No conflict, you say?
___By Ken Coffee
___Recently, a pastor said: "Our church has no conflict. Our people love each other and our fellowship is sweet." When the response was, "I'm sorry to hear that," the pastor said: "What do you mean you're sorry. Are you sorry that we have no conflict?"
___Of course, we weren't sorry the church has no conflict. We were sorry the church was so unlike any of the New Testament churches, all of which had conflict so severe the writers of the New Testament spent a lot of pages and words to deal with it. It probably isn't too far-fetched to say that if your church has no conflict, maybe it isn't a New Testament church.
___In a follow-up, we offered to spend three hours on that pastor's church field talking to his members, guaranteeing we would find conflict. Then his tone began to change. "Well, what I mean is we have no conflict that is visible and threatening," he explained.
___ "That could be even worse," I said. Sub-surface conflict, conflict not being dealt with, can escalate dangerously and will then surely threaten the peace and harmony of the body.
___ Just because we stifle conflict or refuse to acknowledge it doesn't mean it isn't there.
___ For there to be no conflict there would need to be agreement 100 percent of the time among 100 percent of the people. The presence of even the slightest disagreement has within it the seeds of conflict. Even so, unity in a church is not merely the absence of disagreement. In fact, while unanimity may periodically occur in a church body, there could still be a lack of unity.
___ Simple disagreement is a low level of conflict. The secret to unity in the church is having the skills to keep any kind of simple disagreement from exploding into a full-fledged war.
___ Some church leaders do not wish to admit the presence of conflict in their fellowship because they think it somehow diminishes them as leaders. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, good leaders always will admit and address conflict.
___ Leaders understand the difference in healthy conflict and unhealthy conflict. There usually will be no movement forward without some conflict. Just as an automobile's tires conflict with the pavement on which they ride to cause the vehicle to move, healthy conflict can be a facilitator of progress in a church body.
___ Leaders earn their leadership spurs by helping a church deal effectively with issues and problems. Issues and problems exist everywhere. Some of us may not know the difference in an issue and a problem. Issues tend to be temporary. They go away. Problems will stay around until they are dealt with and solved. As long as the problem exists, there will always be an issue to expose it.
___ Healthy disagreement is normal. Not only that; it is desirable. It is only as we learn to value differences of opinion that we can, as a church, begin to experience Biblical unity.
___ Unity comes from knowing how to deal effectively with disagreement.
___ Ken Coffee and Blake Coffee of San Antonio operate K/B Consultations, which specializes in church conflict mediation
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