OPEN: A preacher told of how his family would spend weekends at his grandparents when he was a boy. In winter, they’d slide down a grassy hill on an old car hood. In the spring, before the fields were plowed, they’d play football in those fields, and when the fields were plowed they’d have dirt clod fights. And in the summer, they’d fish for catfish in the creek. It was a fun time to be alive.
But he said he remembered one thing that was all out of whack in those days at the farm. He had two aunts who had gotten into a spat and they refused to speak to each other or be in the same house with each other. So on those days when they were both there at the farm one of his aunts would sit in the car while the other was in house having a good time. Then at a specified time the aunt who was in the house would go out to her car and sit while the other aunt went inside. (Monty Newton, sermoncentral.com)
Now, how bizarre is that? The preacher went on to say that eventually his aunts made up and everything was OK… but that’s a truly odd way to live life. And yet, when Paul is writing to the church at Philippi it seems they have a couple of quarreling aunts at that church too. Paul writes: “I entreat Euodia and I entreat Syntyche to agree in the Lord. Yes, I ask you also, true companion, help these women, who have labored side by side with me in the gospel …” Philippians 2:2-3
What’s going on here? You’d think in a church that Paul started (a man who’d written half your New Testament and who’d been instrumental in the spread of Christianity throughout the known world) everything would be sweetness and light. Everyone would love everyone else. But not so with Euodia and Syntyche. Something was definitely wrong there.
And what makes this even more troubling was that these two ladies had been personal helpers of Paul’s. They had “labored side by side” with him. Now, why would these 2 girls (who were obviously strong Christians) not be "agreeing in the Lord"?
Well, it seems they got mad at each other.
It happens, you know. People get mad at each other all the time in a lot of churches. But the question is why? I thought, once you became a Christian God REMADE you. In fact in Revelation 21:5 God said just that: “Behold, I make all things new.”
And that is true. God has changed us: He’s forgiven us all of our sins; He’s healed all our past; He’s given us a NEW destination (Heaven)
But still this quarreling happens even in churches.
Well, maybe it’s just the NEW Christians that have that problem. I mean seasoned saints would never behave like that would they? Well, no – even older Christians sometimes blow a gasket. Euodia and Syntyche had been around for quite a while when their spat blew up.
So what’s wrong here? Why do even Christians get mad at each other? Well, here’s the deal. You can write it down; you can take it to the bank; and you had best underline in your Bible: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) If you understand that one little verse all kinds of conflicts and disagreements suddenly make sense.
Yes, God HAS remade us and He HAS changed us. But every once in a while the old ways of thinking pop up… and things blow up.
That’s why God tells us He’s called us to relearn how we THINK. Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus and he told them: “So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.”
Now notice what he says next: “You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. Surely you heard of him and were TAUGHT in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were TAUGHT, with regard to your former way of life, to PUT OFF your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to PUT ON the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” Ephesians 4:17-24
In other words, Christianity isn’t so much CAUGHT as it’s TAUGHT. When we come up out of the baptistery we Christians don’t suddenly lose all our bad habits and traits. We’ve spent years living a life that’s foreign to how God wants us to live, and we’re not going to change that way of thinking overnight. So, we have to relearn how to think. And part of that relearning is us “being taught” how to put off our old self and put on new self (see Ephesians 4:22 & 24 above).
ILLUS: Just to illustrate this concept, let’s say you go out into the garden and you work for a couple hours. You want to go out on the town that night, but working in the garden gets you all hot and sweaty and dirty. So what do you do? Well, you TAKE OFF all your old gardening clothes and hop in the shower. You wash your hair and clean yourself up, and then you get out of the shower and towel down… and you’re all cleaned up. Now that you’re all clean, can you go out to a restaurant now? Of course not! Why not? Because you’re still naked!!! They arrest you for doing stuff like that. In order to leave the house, you gotta put something ON.
In the same way, it’s not enough to take OFF the old way of life with all its sin and selfishness. Now you need to put ON the new way of life and learn to walk the way God wants you to. And that’s part of what Paul is telling the church in Philippi here in Philippians 4.
Euodia and Syntyche have gotten mad at each other because they’d forgotten what they’d learned. And so (it seems) Paul is taking this opportunity to do a refresher course. He’s going to RETEACH the whole church what they need to remember.
Just before he addresses this conflict between these 2 dear ladies, Paul writes:
“… our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved.” Philippians 3:20-4:1
When Christians get mad at each other, they need to remember WHO they are.
Well, WHO are WE? We’re citizens of heaven. We’re servants of the most High God. We’re Christians who belong to Jesus. “Therefore (Paul writes) stand firm in the Lord.” (Philippians 4:1). Why stand firm? Because now that we belong to Jesus and have our citizenship in heaven, there’s something bigger at stake than just you and me.
ILLUS: Back in the 1700s there was a war between Britain and France. A major part of that conflict took place at sea between the navies of these two great nations. Lord Nelson was the admiral of the British fleet, and just before an impending conflict with the French, he discovered that there were a couple of officers who were angry at each other and weren’t speaking to one another. Nelson ordered both officers up to the deck of the ship and pointed over at the French fleet. Then he said: “Gentlemen… THERE is the enemy!”
In other words: “QUIT IT! We’re not supposed to be fighting each other. We’re here to fight THEM.
You see: Our fellow Christians are not the enemy. WHO is our enemy??? That’s right – our enemy is Satan. WE are supposed to be on the same side, but when we end up quarreling with each other… Satan wins.
And when we fight each other/ get mad at each other/ argue with each other, it shows that we’ve forgotten WHO we are and what we’ve been called to do.
So 1st - remember WHO you are. Then remember WHAT you have.
One of my favorite verses in Scripture is Philippians 4:4 “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I’ll say rejoice.” Conflicts in the church start when people forget to do that, because conflicts start with a sense of entitlement. Entitled people are rarely grateful people (they have trouble rejoicing), and that’s because they believe that what they have …they DESERVE (they are “entitled”). What they have is theirs by RIGHT. Therefore, when someone annoys/irritates/frustrates them they feel as if they’re RIGHTS have been trampled on. In fact, they’ll say something like: “That person had no RIGHT to do that to me”, or “I DESERVED to be treated better than that.”
Now, let’s get something straight here from the get-go. If you got what you deserved from God, do you know what would happen to you? You’d Go To Hell!!! (and so would I). Now frankly, I’d just as soon NOT get what I deserve.
In Ephesians 2:3-4 & 8 Paul told the church there that before they became Christians, they “were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind (you deserve to go to hell). But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ — by grace you have been saved … it is the GIFT of God.”
God gave us something we did not deserve. It was a gift. So…act like you believe you’ve received a gift. Be grateful God didn’t toss into the dustbin of history and walk away. Rejoice In The Lord!!!
But that’s not all - not only did you receive mercy YOU didn’t deserve… so did the person in Church that you may be ticked off at. They didn’t deserve to be saved either. And of course, running through our minds is the thought: “Well yeah! Obviously they don’t deserve to be saved. I mean they’re such jerks anyway… that’s why I’m so mad at them!!!
But God says: Don’t go there! REJOICE that they’re in church; REJOICE that they gave themselves to Jesus; REJOICE that God has promised to convict them of the things they do wrong… just like he has done for you!!!!
ILLUS: If we don’t remember that, we risk becoming really nasty folks. A preacher named Ron Rose told of a woman who came into office. She was complaining his sermons were always about forgiveness and grace. She said he needed to come down harder on the sinners, and in her words, "nail them."
After her rant, he asked her, "So, you've got forgiveness & grace all worked out in your own life?"
She replied: "Well, Ron, there are some things you can't turn loose of things that don't deserve grace, or forgiveness. That's just the way it is. I know it's that way in my family." And he said “she leaned over my desk and revealed a heart hardened by resentment and said ‘Forgiveness is not an option. I've been hurt too much.’”
Ron said that because her heart had been warped by bitterness, she wanted me to make everyone else as miserable as she was. As long as she was in charge, of course. A year later she left the church ... looking for harder preaching. (Ron Rose heartlight.org 7/8/08)
Now, that’s an extreme case of a woman who never learned to be grateful. She never learned to rejoice for what God had given her. We don’t want to be like her, so to avoid that we need to remember WHO we are, and remember WHAT God has given us.
And lastly – we need to remember WHO WE SERVE!!!
“Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand.” Philippians 4:5 NKJV
We need to be gentle with each other. Paul wrote to Timothy about this: “… the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but KIND to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with GENTLENESS. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.” II Timothy 2:24-26
Did you see what God’s telling us here? He’s saying “TRUST ME! I’m RIGHT HERE! And if you let me (God says) I can take care of this conflict.”
But the key to turning God loose on your conflicts is this: be kind and gentle with folks that upset you. If you do that then maybe God can get inside their lives and heal them. And then He can change the strained situation you find yourself in.
Don’t make the argument about YOU. Because if you make the conflict about YOU, then you’ll be getting in God’s way. And if you get in God’s way, the other person just gets madder and set in their anger.
ILLUS: Just to help you understand what’s going on here, consider this idea: If you and I were mad at each other, and I came up to you and pushed you really hard, what would you be tempted to do??? You’d be tempted to push back wouldn’t you?
I got into a fight in High School that started out that way, and I woke up in the Principal’s office. Pushing is not a good way to resolve conflict. If I pushed you, you would decide that you’re not going to let me push you around, and you’d end up focusing on what a jerk I’d been. Nothing would be resolved.
But, if we stepped back and let God do His thing … then HE GETS INSIDE that person, and it gets harder for that individual to push back.
That’s what Jesus promised when He told disciples that the Spirit would be in us. Jesus said “… when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.” (John 16:8) The Spirit would come and get inside people’s minds to bring about the conviction of their need to change. YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO THAT. Let God do it.
Now, this is where it really gets interesting. Paul gets done telling the church what they need to do, and then he explains that if they do what God wants them to do… God gives them a promise: “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding (it makes absolutely no sense, it is irrational, it is illogical), will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:7
CLOSE: Let me close with a story that illustrates what I’m trying to explain here.
How many you have ever watched “American Idol”? For those of you who may not, Simon Cowell is the man who essentially owns and runs that program… and he can be fairly nasty at times with contestants. Well, several years a woman named Mandisa Hundley came on stage (we showed a picture of her at the time). She was a heavy-set woman and when he first saw her Simon Cowell joked: “Do we have a bigger stage this year?” (He was making fun of her weight). She went on to give a powerful rendition of the song she’d prepared.
Later, when she entered the room to learn the judges' verdict of whether she would go on the next round or be cut, Mandisa looked right at Simon and she said to him:
“Simon, a lot of people want me to say a lot of things to you. But this is what I want to say: Yes, you hurt me, and I cried, and it was painful. It really was. But I want you to know that I've forgiven you, and that you don't need someone to apologize in order to forgive somebody. And I figure that if Jesus could die so that all of my wrongs could be forgiven, I can certainly extend that same grace to you. I just wanted you to know that.”
Simon got up from his chair, apologized and hugged the singer, and Mandisa discovered she had been selected to advance into the next round. Later, Mandisa lost 100 pounds of her weight (see footnote). And she went on to be a Gospel and contemporary Christian recording artist. She now has a net worth of $3 million.
Now, if you obey God in this way, I’m not saying you’ll lose weight, or become a famous singer, or make huge amounts of money (although that would be nice). What I am saying, is that when we learn to deal with conflict as she did, God rewards us. And God rewarded her because she remembered WHO she was, WHAT she’d been given, and that GOD WAS NEAR.
INVITATION
Footnote: If you use this illustration about Mandisa you’ll need to be aware that because of a personal tragedy in her life she went back into depression and gained 200 pounds of weight. It was only because of the intervention of close friends that she bounced back from her depression (https://people.com/music/mandisa-suicidal-depression-weight-gain-after-friends-death/).
