“If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.” ~ Matthew 18:15
Many years ago, when I was still doing pastoral ministry, I did fair amount of premarital counseling and marriage counseling. Often when doing premarital counseling, we would cover a handful of topics to try to put the couple into as beneficial a position as possible for marital success. Those topics that I would cover with every couple, no matter what the background, history, or mindset were: future plans/career, religion, children, finances, extended family/healthy boundaries, and communication/conflict resolution. That last one happens to be probably one of the trickiest, yet one of the most important. The ability to communicate through conflict is an essential skill to make a marriage work. If ever a couple tells me that they have never had a fight, it is a warning signal in the back of my mind.
One of the single most important skills for any relationship must be conflict resolution. Unfortunately, our culture has quickly devolved into a passive aggressive swamp false niceties and passive aggressive masks designed to avoid conflict and discomfort by keeping everyone happy. Unfortunately, it simply does not work. I love the music of the Beatles, but the idea that “all you need is love” is a wonderfully optimistic idea, but it does not really work in practical application.
Now, to begin with, perhaps part of the problem has to do with our understanding of love. There are no shortage of romantic movies and stories out there in which love conquers all obstacles because of how two people feel love for each other. It is poetic, but what those movies often do not show you is what happens when those feelings change. Here is the thing that we must get into our heads: love is as much an act of will as it is a feeling, perhaps even more so. I can love my children, even when they are doing something that drives me up the wall, even if I do not “feel” very loving.
Here is the thing that we need to understand about love, and I am talking about real, tangible love: love is not a feeling, because feelings can come and go. Love is that commitment that compels you to work through those issues and problems when they arise, rather than running away. It may be hard for us to realize, but anger, arguments, the discomfort of conflict, does not mean that love is not in the relationship.
Unfortunately, Christians must accept some responsibility for this misconception. For years and years, churches have taught about the love we are supposed to have for people, but unfortunately the way we describe that love is usually always pleasant, smiling, comfortable, and even downright passive. We have taught a mindset of conflict avoidance, which can only result in shallow, surface-level relationships that avoid the uncomfortable and messy work of true intimacy. But ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
The real love of God is not love that avoids those conversations that might make us uncomfortable, but rather a love that is willing to face those conflicts and wounds head on, to walk with us through the pain and struggle of true intimacy, only to come out on the other side in a deeper and more meaningful relationship. In other words, true love is not the love that says, “I will never hurt you.” We are fallen and broken people, with all kinds of jagged edges and sharp corners, and there is no way to truly let people into our lives without some of that brokenness causing pain. True love is the love that says, “I know that my brokenness is going to cause you pain, just as much as your brokenness is going to cause me pain. But, instead of running away from that pain, I am willing to endure the pain and discomfort, so that together we might face those broken places in our lives and find healing and redemption.”
Over the next several weeks, I am going to be writing more on the topic of relationships, communication, and conflict resolution. But, as we prepare to explore the hardships and difficulties of relationships together, I want to begin with a single, crucial, and essential principle.
The most important thing that any person can do to bring healing into any relationship is to first find healing in being reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. Too many relationships fail and fall apart because one or both people in the relationship are looking to the other person to bring healing and redemption into their life. That kind of healing that we so desperately need and desire can not come from any person or human relationship. Bringing that level of unreasonable expectation into any relationship is a recipe for failure. If what you are truly seeking is healing and redemption, there is only one place where you can find it, that is in the arms of the Savior Jesus Christ. If we are willing to allow God to bring healing into our lives, then healing in other relationships becomes ever more possible as well.
So, stay tuned as we explore more about the realities of communication, relationships, and the role God plays in it all.