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Offenses and Conflict Resolution · CVMI Open Door Podcast

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Welcome, everyone, to another episode of the CVMI Open Door Podcast.
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This is Pastor Jamie Gizzy again, joined with Dr. Gary Garden.
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We've got an interesting subject we're going to deal with today.
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We were talking leading up to this, and first off, we want to thank everybody for their patience.
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I know we were supposed to be back here last week, and for reasons that are
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almost embarrassing for me to share, but I took a pretty nasty shot in the head from a snowball.
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They caused me about three or four days of pretty bad headaches.
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And then the schedule just kind of got away from us. So we are running a little
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bit behind with this episode.
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And we want to go ahead and put this out there before we get into the subject today.
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This is going to be our last podcast for the month of November,
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because we're going to be going into Thanksgiving next week.
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And then we're going to have two episodes we're going to do in December.
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And then that's going to be a wrap for 2025. So to begin, we want to thank everybody
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who has listened to this podcast this year, the new listeners,
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the holdovers from years past.
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And we look forward to see what
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God's going to do with this ministry in 2026. So again, thank you all.
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Those of you that are taking the time to share these episodes to your friends
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and family on social media, whatnot, we really do appreciate it.
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We found out that we actually have listeners in three countries now.
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And it's just amazing, Gary, when you sit back and think about it,
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that Jesus said in those last days that the gospel will be preached in the entire
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world. And here we are able to sit in the comfort of West Virginia.
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And I think I'm what I tell you there a few minutes ago, 39 known listeners in the United States.
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And then we got one in Spain and one in Germany, which is really cool.
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So we don't know who those folks are.
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And I don't even know who the 39 are here stateside. So we want to especially
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greet you all. So thank you guys for being a part of this.
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But we were talking here leading up to this about conflict resolution,
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the biblical way to handle conflict resolution, the biblical way to deal with offenses.
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So I'm going to turn this over to Gary, let him greet you guys,
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and then we're going to jump right in and we'll see how this goes today.
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Well, good afternoon, everyone.
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Pastor Jamie and I were talking about something that doesn't really get taught
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in the church very much, and that's how to deal with confrontation and offense.
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Because most usually what people do is they get offended and then they leave
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and they go to another church.
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But we're going to share with you today that that's most likely not biblical.
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I say most likely because the Holy Spirit could lead you, but you better be
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definitely sure that you're following the leading of the Holy Spirit.
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I want to start by talking about when Jesus taught his disciples,
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he taught his disciples in so many different areas.
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But one of the things that he was careful to teach his disciples was a lot of practical knowledge.
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And a lot of times when we have discipleship classes, we don't talk about the
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practical. We talk about a lot of spiritual things.
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And folks can't always make the jump into their practical lives unless they've seen it done.
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And so one of the things that I like to share with people is that Jesus taught
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his disciples how to deal with resources, how to be good stewards of resources.
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And one of the resources that a lot of people don't think of as a resource is confrontation.
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We live in a time, Pastor Jamie, where most people don't like confrontation.
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They avoid it. They won't even tell you something. They'll tell everybody but
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you that they have an issue. And that's wrong, according to the scriptures. church.
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But Jesus managed confrontation.
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When it served the testimony of the word of God, he wasn't afraid.
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He didn't shy off, but he confronted people as it was necessary.
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And when it did not serve the purposes of God, he avoided it.
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He just sidestepped it. And see, a lot of times the things that we get in confrontations
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about are more issues of the flesh than issues of the faith.
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Yeah. you know and,
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In those cases, confrontation isn't helpful. It makes a bigger hole.
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And so I just I wanted to quickly just share some examples. OK,
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when Jesus started his public ministry in Nazareth, he you guys know the story.
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He went and he stood up to read in the synagogue like he did routinely.
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He had them turn the scrolls to Isaiah 61 and he said, the spirit of the Lord
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is upon me. He was claiming to be the Messiah.
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And after he read the passage, the first two or three verses of Isaiah 61,
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he then told the people that the scripture was fulfilled in their hearing.
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Well, see, these folks knew Jesus after the flesh.
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They knew him as the carpenter's son.
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And I'll say that in air quotes, because I'm sure there are a lot of rumors
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about Jesus' lineage and whose son he might be.
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And so when he stood up and said that, you know, literally claiming to be the
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Messiah, the people were angry.
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And it says in Luke 4, starting at verse 29, And they rose up and they thrust
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him out of the city and they led him to the brow of the hill where on the city
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was built that they may cast him down headlong.
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They took Jesus over to a cliffside.
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Okay. But he passing through the midst of them went his way.
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See, the Holy Spirit enabled Jesus to pass through the people and just go. It was not yet his time.
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And so he didn't embrace the confrontation there. He sidestepped it because
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it did not serve the purpose of the gospel.
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Now, let's contrast this with the man with the withered hand.
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Jesus went to the synagogue purposefully to confront the religious leaders on
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their usage of the Sabbath.
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The Sabbath was sort of the focal point of their leadership because they would
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lord over the people and tell them, you don't have righteousness because you're
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not following the rules according to the Sabbath, not even understanding what the Sabbath was.
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And so in comes the Lord of the Sabbath himself.
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And on this particular day, he comes to the synagogue, and there's a man.
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Now, this isn't a random man.
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This is a person that everybody in the community knew. And he had a withered
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hand, is what the King James says.
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And so he had a deformed hand.
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He didn't hurt it in a farming accident.
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He had this hand for life. And they would have known this.
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And this guy, because he was deformed, he wouldn't have been a good choice for a husband.
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He wouldn't have been able to work to support himself or anyone else.
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And he just would have been, you know, sort of cast aside.
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And he would have only been able to get what people would give him by their good grace.
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And so here he is. He's in the synagogue. And Jesus tells him,
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stretch forth your hand.
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Okay. And the religious leaders are furious because he's doing something outside of their control.
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And this is one of the few places where we see the Lord get very angry at the
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hardness of their hearts because he couldn't believe that they were willing
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to stifle the life of this man
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that they knew this was a neighbor just because of the letter of the law,
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which wasn't their law anyway. Right.
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And here we are in Mark 3, verse 4. And he said unto them, is it lawful to do
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good on the Sabbath days or to do evil, to save life or to kill?
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But they held their peace.
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See, they didn't want to answer him because they knew that he had them.
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He didn't avoid the confrontation. In fact, he sought it out because it served the gospel. Yeah.
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And so Jesus tended to do that when it served him to have the confrontation,
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when it served the purposes of the gospel. He wasn't afraid to dig in.
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And see, we have it exactly backwards in this day, because a lot of folks will
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dig in if it's some petty issue.
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Oh, my gosh. You know, but then when it's something that really,
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really matters, they acquiesce and roll over and let the culture have its way.
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We've dealt with that. My wife and I, we've been in pastoral ministry since 2006.
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Gary, my gosh, the stuff that has come,
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the stuff that we've been confronted with, this is such an important topic,
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and I hope and pray that we get several pastor friends of ours are able to listen
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to this because I think it probably would help them because I know some of the
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past experiences they've had on top of what I've had,
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and I really think it would help them out going through this.
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And, you know, again, and same thing with, on the flip side of the coin,
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I hope people in the congregation listen to this and pay attention to it because,
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you know, no matter what, and we're going to run into this from now until Jesus
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comes back, that somebody's always want to have a better idea of how to do something.
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And, you know, as a pastor, I'm not saying that I've got the corner market on,
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you know, the best direction to go.
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I've got our elders here at the church. I've got ministry staff members that I rely on.
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You know, if I'm missing something, help me out. Right. But what I've noticed over the years is.
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And we want to avoid confrontation if I'm going to be correct.
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And I'm not saying me, I'm just saying in general. I'm just using this as a thought.
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I want to avoid confrontation if I'm going to be proven wrong.
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But if I know I can prove myself right, man, I'm ready to go headlong into this
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thing and I'll fight you tooth and toenail.
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And, I mean, we see a lot taught in Scripture. We know that God's mercies and
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His love cover these things. And, you know, I just wonder what kind of shape
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would the church be in today if people would just stop.
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Like you said, this is a way, a mechanism to feed the flesh.
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If we would forget the flesh for a moment and just do things the Bible way.
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I wonder how much better off the church would be today.
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Right. Because let me say one thing here real quick. I don't mean to cut you
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off. No worries. But look at the attitude outside of the church looking in.
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You know, people are like, man, if that's the kind of mess that I'm going to
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walk into, why would I want to be a part of that?
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You know, I see these people bickering. I see it on social media.
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Dear God, we see that all the time. You know, I'm going to one up somebody on social media.
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I mean, people read this on the outside and they're going, you know,
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I thought maybe I might try that church out.
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Well, now what reason do I have to try it out? If this is what's going on,
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if it's just this constant bickering and back and forth fighting.
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I remember a friend of ours that had a church here local, was no longer in this
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area, but they had a full-blown knock-em-down, drag-em-out argument over whether
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or not he should broadcast his messages on Facebook.
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Just a horrible fight. I'm going, what was the end goal of that?
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It served no purpose. But somebody wanted to be proven right.
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Well, and that's just it. It didn't serve the purpose of the gospel at all.
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And generally, if it's not the things of God, it's the things of the flesh.
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And we're told, Paul says, make no provision for the flesh.
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Search that scripture. I don't have the reference handy right now.
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Search that out in the King James. Make no provision for the flesh.
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Because that generally is a catch-all that will help you understand.
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Should I be doing this or shouldn't I be doing this? What does it glorify?
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If it glorifies the flesh, it's a wrong idea. Right.
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Right. You know, but to further that point,
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something we talked about before we started the podcast up today,
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this happens when you talk about people who have repented from their sin and
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folks don't want to recognize the repentance. They want to hold their past over them.
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You know, Paul said, henceforth, we know no man after the flesh.
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You know, when someone has repented and they've turned their lives to God,
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you recognize that, you honor that, and you expect there to be spiritual fruit.
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But you don't sit there with the aha finger ready to go.
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Yep. Okay. And it comes back to this wanting to be right in the flesh. Mm-hmm.
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You know, and the best we can do, church, we're not right. God's right.
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And the best we can do is agree with God. Right.
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Can't go wrong if we agree with him. I think, Gary, just so our listeners know,
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I think the reference is Romans 13, verse 14, if I'm not mistaken.
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Okay. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lust.
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Right. There you go. There's your reference, Romans 13, 14. Pastor Jamie's got my back as always.
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But I wanted to continue and talk about more examples of Jesus.
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This isn't something that Brother Gary or Brother Jamie has come up with.
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This is in the scripture. You know, the man with the withered hand,
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Jesus prevailed for him on his behalf because it was about people and it was about the gospel.
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We see the same thing in Luke 13, the woman that had the spirit of infirmity for 18 years.
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In verse 15, it said, the Lord answered him and said, you hypocrite.
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Does not each one of you on the Sabbath lose his ox or his donkey from the stall
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and lead him away to watering? See, the issue they had is that Jesus healed
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this woman. Oh, my goodness, a woman.
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But he healed a woman. For shame, right? Yeah, on the Sabbath.
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He said, I might this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound
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low these 18 years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day.
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What a day to be healed on the day of rest.
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And when he had said these things all his adversaries were ashamed and all the
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people rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by him and see this was because jesus,
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he confronted when it was proper to do so and you know something i give my dad
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credit for this one but it may not been may not have been him that taught me
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this but i think it was him he said You know,
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if you favor a weak ankle, you'll keep a weak ankle.
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And we've got a lot of weak ankles in the church because we have some folks
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that nobody will tell them, no one will confront them that they're living in
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sin, that they're doing something wrong, that they're doing things that aren't Christ-like.
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And so the church has lots of weak ankles because people won't confront.
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A lot of times it has to do with who their parents are or maybe what their last
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name is or how much they put in the pan when it's passed.
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Or maybe they have a position in ministry. But none of those things matter if your fruit's rotten.
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Right. If your fruit's rotten, then someone should confront you.
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Now, always be led by the Holy Spirit.
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Don't go say, Brother Gary told us to go around withstanding each other.
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But, you know, when the Spirit is in it and you ask, always ask the Lord.
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I always ask the Lord for a green light. Give me a green light to confront this
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situation. give me a green light to make the comment on Facebook or to send
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the text or the private message. And how many times, Gary, have we hit the delete button?
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Oh yeah. Cause I'll tell you what, the Holy Spirit has given me a lot of red
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lights, you know? All right.
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You've typed out the response that you wanted to type out.
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You got it out of your system. Now delete it because it doesn't serve the purposes
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of the gospel. Do not hit send.
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Right. And we do that, but we also want to be ready to address issues that need
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addressed, because the whole church suffers when.
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Somebody gets away with something that everybody knows is wrong,
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but nobody will confront.
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We're doing a bad job of stewarding our opportunities for confrontation.
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Yeah. Well, we live in a society, we mentioned this a little bit ago,
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and we'll talk about it more as we go on, but we live in a society where everybody
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is looking for a reason to be offended.
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We've noticed, and this is something that I'm trying to really get our people
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here at Crosshairs to understand, in this day and age especially,
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we need to come together. that we don't need to let petty differences come in the way.
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I mean, Gary, look at just over the last, what, 10 years.
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Look at the lines of division that's caused offense based on political viewpoints.
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And it's people that maybe even vote down the same line as the next person,
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but one variant causes somebody to be offended at.
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Yeah, it's mind-boggling how far is a society in the natural that we've fallen
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because this is what we're looking for.
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You know, again, conflict, as long as I win and I, I'm just,
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I wake up in the morning. How can I be offended?
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Now, what can I be mad about today? What can I be angry about?
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And again, it serves no good because folks, at the end of the day,
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we got people that are dying on a daily basis and are headed towards devil's hell.
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And, you know, we have to weigh everything against scripture.
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You know, are we going to pull those brands out of the fire or we're just going
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to let them perish because I got to be right?
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Because I got to get my way. I got to get my point across. I remember during
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COVID, we, you know, as the here in West Virginia, as we were loosening things up.
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And I mean, I've got my own opinions about that whole season and I'm not even
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going to go down that road.
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But, you know, as a precaution, we didn't know what we were dealing with.
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Nobody was that I know of at least was alive the last time there was a global
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pandemic in the early 1900s.
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I think everybody that I only knew of one person in my life that was alive at that point.
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And she passed away in 2002. And that was my great grandmother passed away in 101.
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But I don't remember anybody else being around in 1918, I think is when the
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last global pandemic was.
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So, you know, as a precaution and to try to help alleviate people's fears,
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you know, we progressed as, you know, we felt best to do.
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And I still had people in the church that, well, you're not doing it right.
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And I'm not, this wasn't unique to me. Pastor friends of mine all over this
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region were telling me some of the stories that they had, you know,
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where people were just, well, you're not doing it right this way.
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We think you need to do it.
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Oh, that's fine if that's how you think I ought to do it, but I'm going to follow
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the leading of the Holy Spirit, and I'm pretty sure I'm not going to go wrong if I do that. Right.
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Well, I remember at that time when people were talking about COVID and all the
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things that we endured with that.
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And they said, you know, Brother Gary, do you think we're getting closer to the apocalypse?
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And I said, well, actually, I think we're in the apocalypse.
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I'm not talking about being in the seven years of tribulation.
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The word apocalypsis means the revealing.
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And the season of COVID certainly had an aspect of revealing.
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It revealed a lot of hearts.
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And, you know, several years ago, when I met my friend Carlos Reyes,
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a wonderful, wonderful minister, he actually was at the beginning of the Teen
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Challenge ministry with Nicky Cruz and David Wilkerson. What a fine man of God he is.
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And when he first met me, he looked over at me.
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We were at a restaurant and he said, Brother Gary, what do you get when you
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take an orange and you squeeze it?
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I said, orange juice. And he said, what if you take that orange and then you hit it with a hammer?
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What do you get? I said, you get orange juice. And he said, you take the parts
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of the orange and you put it in a blender and he said, what do you have? I said, orange juice.
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And he said, why is that? And before I could ever get the gears in my head to
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turn, he said, because that's what's in there.
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And when everybody gets squished, what comes out is what's in there.
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And that's what happens during confrontation.
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See, some things need to get out of there. You ever got a hold of a sponge that
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you thought was clean, and just as soon as it got a little bit of water and
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you squished it, it had all kinds of yucky water and dirt and grime in there?
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What do you have to do before you use it? You got to squish it and get that stuff out of there.
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Well, you know, church, sometimes we get stuff in there that needs to be squished out.
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And sometimes we need to be confronted ourselves when we're full of dirty water.
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And this is a thing that we ought to love each other and trust each other enough.
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I know I trust Pastor Jamie.
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I've got several brothers and sisters in the faith.
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And if my glasses are smeared, I trust them to tell me, bro,
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your glasses need cleaned.
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You know, because that's what it means to love one another, you know.
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And that's going to require a confrontation.
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We've got to love each other and trust each other enough to know you're not
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trying to take me out at the knees.
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You're not trying to, you know, undermine me to advance yourself.
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You want me to succeed and you're helping me tighten up.
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And that's what it means to love one another for real.
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You know, not to play religious patty cake on Sunday morning so we all look
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good when company's here.
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We're not company, we're family. and we ought to be real with each other like family.
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So let's shift gears here a little bit now.
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So how do we resolve conflict? Biblically speaking, what's the best way to resolve conflict?
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I can promise you this, listener, it's not cutting and running and it's not
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tearing down the other person behind somebody's back. I've had so many folks
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over the years come to me and it's almost like they want Crystal and I to choose sides.
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I'm going to choose God's side. I'll choose a side, but it's not going to be
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what you think. I'm going to choose God's side. And, you know,
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like we said, we weigh everything and measure everything against the word of God.
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And there, I mean, Jesus even talks about there is a way to deal with conflict.
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There is a resolution to it.
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And, you know, I won't play that game. I'm not going to get,
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well, I'm not going to be a part of this. He said, she said stuff.
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You know, we want to do, we even have, we've got it in our church bylaws.
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Document that governs how we operate as a ministry. We got the conflict resolution
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in there, and it's not, let's go tear somebody down and see how many pieces
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on our side of the chessboard we can collect.
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So how do we do it? How do we deal with conflict?
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We got to go, Matthew 18, Jesus talks about how to deal with this stuff.
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And the very first thing he says, this is in verse number 15 of Matthew 18.
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He says, moreover, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault
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between you and him alone.
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If he hears you, you have gained your brother. There's a conflict here.
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Something was going on. There was something that needed to be resolved.
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And this individual, Jesus in this example, said that these two individuals
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went and they talked and they got it worked out.
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And if that doesn't work, he says the next thing, and Gary, I want you to expand
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on this as we go forward. Well, let's back up. Let's deal with the first one for a moment. Yeah.
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Because the first thing he says, if you've got an issue with somebody,
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you go and tell them alone.
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All right? Don't make a big production. That's the thing. You don't go and tell
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everybody else but them. Yeah. You surely don't get on social media.
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If you've done that and you haven't talked to them directly,
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you are in the wrong, brother or sister who's listening. You can't do that.
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Yeah. It says right here, directly, go to them, talk to them in private.
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So I guess now, why do people avoid that? Because it goes back to what we said
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there a little bit ago, because some people want to avoid conflict.
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And they're like, well, and then, bless our hearts, the one that is the offending
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person may not even realize what, and they may see that on social media or may
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hear something like, I didn't even know anything about it.
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Well, if you don't mind, allow me to, I know they'll say, Brother Gary,
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you just like to split hairs.
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That's not it at all. But I do like precision.
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Conflict, confrontation. The conflict is caused by the offense.
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Conflict is caused by the contradiction between light and darkness.
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There's a natural conflict there. Yeah. Okay.
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Confrontation is sometimes the medicine that's required to deal with the conflict.
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And so right here we have it in Matthew 18, verse 15.
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He says, if there's already a conflict between, you know, what should have been
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the good behavior and instead there was bad behavior in its place,
24:31
allegedly, then confrontation is indeed the medicine. Go to them in private.
24:38
Don't jack them up live on stage to try to get a lot of people to dogpile on
24:44
them. Instead, you pull them aside.
24:46
And for sure, don't start—I don't know where you attend church,
24:50
listener. I don't have a clue.
24:51
But don't start by going and trying to get the pastor or the pastor's spouse
24:55
on your side. That's not—.
24:59
That's not resolution number one. Well, that's out of order.
25:02
And we're going to get to that in just a moment.
25:04
Because that's been the thing that I've dealt with is, well,
25:06
I want you to go take care of that. No, that's not how that works.
25:10
There's a process to this. Oh, and by the way, the tithes and the offerings
25:16
and the gifts you give to the church are exactly that. They're gifts.
25:20
That does not mean that the pastor is your steward to take care of these issues.
25:24
Right. So please make sure you understand that. Just because you're somebody
25:28
who pays tithes or you serve money, you're not owed this.
25:32
You're not owed this. A lot of people will have that in their heart.
25:35
Well, you know, I tithe. I'm a trustee.
25:38
You know, okay. Yes, your pastor is your servant for good.
25:42
And what he's doing right now is he's teaching you what the Bible says about
25:45
how you can deal with conflict yourself. Right. Right.
25:50
So the second part, he says, but if this is verse 16, he says,
25:54
If he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that by the mouth of two
25:58
or three witnesses, every word may be established. So let's break that one down here.
26:02
We have it. I've got it on my computer adjacent. We pulled this directly from Matthew 18.
26:09
If that initial, and this is what I have.
26:13
As we go through this process, discuss the matter in a godly and loving manner,
26:20
with resolution, the desired objective.
26:23
We don't want people fighting. We don't, again, we're not, we don't believe
26:26
in cliques in the church.
26:27
We don't believe in, you know, the, for lack of better terms,
26:32
the union blue or the Confederate gray.
26:34
You know, we're not, we're not fighting here. We're not having this big blow up.
26:38
We want it to, the resolution at the end of the day should be godly in manner
26:43
and purpose because what kind of witness is that going to be for somebody else
26:47
that may see that or may experience that somewhere on the road?
26:50
Exactly. And I'll tell you this,
26:52
I have personal experience with using Matthew 18 the way God intended.
26:59
And I've been caught myself here on verse 16, because what you do is you go
27:04
to one or two other people, Not more than that.
27:07
Okay. Some people will want to go and get all their BFFs together.
27:10
No, you get one or two at the most. Yep.
27:13
And you tell them your side of the issue.
27:16
And I can tell you more than once, I was the one who was spun up and they said,
27:21
Brother Gary, you're the one that's in error.
27:24
Your emotions have carried you away and you just need to pray for the person,
27:29
apologize to them because you're the one who was in the wrong.
27:33
Yep. And so I don't tell you to do something. I haven't done myself.
27:36
I have found myself on the bad end of Matthew 18.
27:41
Oh, man, I was justified. I was right, Pastor Jamie.
27:45
I had two mouthfuls of stuff that I wanted to tell them, and I wanted everybody
27:50
to know that I was right, but I was wrong.
27:52
And then that comes back to you were correct in whose estimation. Right, exactly.
27:57
And you know what? I was trying to make provision for the flesh.
28:01
And instead the two that I went to They were dear brothers that I trusted They
28:07
cleaned my glasses for me And they showed me that the issue that I was holding
28:11
on to With both hands I needed to let go.
28:14
And so when you go to the person or the persons, the two at most,
28:18
you tell them your side. And this is an important thing.
28:22
Then when they go to the person with which you have the offense,
28:25
you have already surrendered your ability to plead your case because you turned it over to them.
28:31
This isn't a gang fight. You don't. And another thing. You've already handed it over.
28:37
Yeah. You've already handed it over to them. And if they think that it's worthy
28:41
for them to go speak on your behalf, then you let them speak.
28:45
So that's the second verse, the second tool that we have for offense in the body. Yeah.
28:52
Now we come to the next one in verse number 17.
28:57
So we've went through step one, go privately. Step two, go before two or three witnesses.
29:03
We come to verse 17, step three, if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church.
29:08
But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.
29:15
So, you know, I'm reading directly from our church constitutional bylaws here.
29:22
If steps two and three failed to— Okay, let me back up here.
29:26
If steps two and three failed to reach a resolution, the matter then is to be
29:29
brought before the lead pastor of the eldership who will take the matter before
29:32
the congregational membership.
29:33
That's exactly what Jesus said to do here. You know, go before the congregation and come up.
29:38
Again, the purpose is resolution. The purpose is not to hurt someone or to beat
29:43
someone up or tear someone down. It's for resolution.
29:47
How can we help restore? How can I be restored?
29:53
That's the desired resolution. We've got to get way through all the junk to get to that point.
29:58
The Lord is always about healing the body, and that means both parties. Yeah. Okay.
30:04
And in this step here, if the person won't hear the two that have gone on your
30:10
behalf, that's when it goes to the pastor.
30:13
Okay. And the pastor will rely on the Holy Spirit to let them know,
30:19
do they disseminate it to the whole body? Do they tell the trustees?
30:24
Do they decide how to do that? You know, but a lot of people,
30:28
and I'm sure you know this firsthand, they like to jump on this step and go
30:32
to the pastor with skipping the first two steps, you know.
30:36
And I'll tell you, brothers and sisters, when you come to the pastor,
30:40
you should already have done steps one and two.
30:44
If you haven't, then you've got homework to do. You're going to be referred
30:47
back to steps one and two.
30:49
My gosh, I've lost count how many times. Let's just skip ahead and people want
30:55
to drag Crystal and I into the middle of a conflict.
30:58
Well, it's almost every time. And we've had people get offended because they
31:01
said, have you done steps one or two yet? Well, no. We want you to—no.
31:04
No, we're not fighting this battle for you.
31:08
We want to see, like you said, the purpose is healing of the body.
31:11
We don't want anything scarred. We don't want anybody walking away with wounds.
31:16
We want to see the body heal.
31:17
Well, we're a group of people. who declare Jesus is Lord.
31:22
Yeah. And so Jesus is the one that calls the shots. That's what being a Lord is.
31:26
It just doesn't mean you like him a whole lot. Yeah. Being Lord means that he calls the shots.
31:31
And thank you, Lord, for spelling it out directly in the scripture.
31:36
Yeah. How we do it. And so you can't say, well, I want the Lord to bless me,
31:42
but I'm not going to do what he says.
31:43
The blessing's in doing what he says. Right.
31:46
Well, then you look at the very next verse, verse 18.
31:49
And this is one where it has been misquoted. You know, we hear,
31:52
I'll bind this thing on earth and it'll be bound in heaven.
31:55
What's he talking about? He's talking about binding up that wound.
31:58
If we bind that wound up on earth, that wound will be bound in heaven.
32:02
And whatever is loosed on earth will be loosed in heaven.
32:05
Look at the name of claimant crowd that, you know, they're binding and loosing.
32:10
You know, I'll bind poverty in the name of Jesus and I'll loose financial abundance.
32:15
That's not what that verse is talking about. And verse is talking about binding
32:19
up that wound between two brothers or two sisters or a brother and a sister,
32:24
whatever the combination is here.
32:26
And he says in verse number 19, he says, I say to you, if two of you agree on
32:31
earth concerning anything they ask, it will be done for them by my father in heaven.
32:35
For where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there in the midst of them.
32:39
What a proud papa he has to be when conflict is resolved. Right.
32:44
We handle that with our children. We handle that with a child and a friend or
32:49
whatever the combination is.
32:52
But we forget this principle that's taught how to deal with this stuff inside the church.
32:57
And it's sad because a lot of trouble that's happened over the years in the
33:01
church could have been never, never occurred.
33:05
Could have been resolved before it ever became a problem if people would have
33:08
just done things the Bible way.
33:10
Yeah. You know, he is the way, the truth, and the life.
33:15
Nobody comes to the Father except through Christ. Right.
33:18
And you got to do it his way. Now, what actually happens in real life,
33:23
most people just get offended and leave.
33:26
They leave this church, we'll go try another church. Yeah.
33:29
You know? Tumbleweeds, never growing root. And that's what I've instructed people.
33:34
We had somebody, it's been a few years back, I've had a couple somebodies that
33:38
got, one person got mad because I wouldn't allow them to stumble around and take over the service.
33:44
I'd stumble around up on the platform and just hijack the service.
33:47
They got mad. You didn't let the Holy Spirit work through me.
33:50
Well, what were you going to say? Well, the Holy Spirit was going to let me
33:53
know when I got up there. No, that's not how that works.
33:55
That was out of order, not happening. Well, what am I supposed to do about that?
34:00
Heal. That's what you, and learn. Well, I just don't think I can remain in a
34:04
church that's not going to allow me a platform. Well, then bye. See ya.
34:08
You're making a mistake, but see ya. And then right in that same season,
34:13
we had another individual.
34:14
I had to remove him from a leadership position. What am I supposed to do now?
34:18
Because I have to be behind the pulpit. I have to have the microphone in my hand.
34:21
You're not giving yourself a chance to heal from fear, from whatever your wound
34:25
is. You're not giving yourself a chance to heal from that.
34:29
So how can you be any good to somebody else? Well, I have to have that microphone.
34:32
I have to have that pulpit.
34:34
Well, I'm going to have to leave. We're going to have to find another church.
34:39
Well, now you've just taken that offense, you've taken that hurt to that church,
34:43
and this thing is just going to continue to snowball, and it's never going to
34:46
heal. It's never going to be resolved.
34:48
Yeah. It's going to be like leaving a splinter in your finger.
34:51
Well, and that's the thing. Jesus said that if you receive the word of a prophet
34:58
in the name of a prophet, you'll receive a prophet's reward.
35:01
Well, what's the reward of a prophet?
35:03
Well, a prophet is somebody who speaks on behalf of God. And so if you receive
35:08
the word of that prophet as somebody who's speaking on behalf of God,
35:12
the reward is a word from God.
35:14
And see, when we go to a church, this isn't like going to buy milk.
35:19
Okay? I really don't care who sells me milk.
35:22
You know, they have the milk. I have the money. We shake hands.
35:27
I go home with milk. You have the Oreos or the Chips Ahoy.
35:29
Exactly. Yeah. Okay. But it's different when you go to a church,
35:33
because when you go to a church, when you,
35:35
go and sit under a pastor, what you're saying is that you recognize that God
35:41
has anointed this individual to speak the word of God into your life.
35:46
Okay. And if you receive a pastor's word in the name of a pastor,
35:51
you'll get a pastor's reward. What is a pastor?
35:54
Poimen from the Greek is a shepherd. He's going to care for and feed the flock.
36:00
You're going to be cared for and you're going to be fed.
36:04
All right. So going back to our Matthew 18 example of how to handle conflict.
36:09
If you don't accept the word of the pastor concerning whatever this petty thing
36:17
is, this matter of the flesh, then you're going to go to another church.
36:23
You're not following the leading of the Holy Spirit. And Paul says in Romans
36:28
8, 14, for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God, the sons and daughters.
36:35
But in the Greek, that's the mature sons and daughters. Yeah.
36:39
Okay. So if you leave a church, you better be rock solid certain that you're
36:45
following the leading of the Holy Spirit.
36:47
Because if you don't, all you're doing is being an impetuous child,
36:52
a brat, if you will, spiritually speaking, and you're not going to learn.
36:57
You're not going to be fed and you're not going to mature.
37:01
And nothing will ever change. Right.
37:04
And, you know, it's funny, one situation that I mentioned there a few moments
37:07
ago, ended up finding out later on, and this has been within the last year,
37:10
that this was a recurring thing that has happened for 20 plus years.
37:19
Never was always finding fault in what everybody else was doing,
37:22
but would not go through the self-examination.
37:25
Did not want to hear that they were part of the offense.
37:29
Wanted to hear why I'm the offended one. And somebody that I had not known until this past year.
37:36
Filled me in on a bunch of blanks that I didn't know about and said,
37:40
I bet you heard, you bet you heard the story this way.
37:43
Well, here's the truth. Bet you heard story number two this way.
37:46
Well, here's the truth and knew everything and knew exactly verbatim what my
37:51
wife and I had heard about this one particular situation.
37:54
And again, it was no, I, I just, just as long as I get my voice to be heard.
38:00
Yeah. I'm going to walk, I'm going to spend my entire walk of life living in
38:05
offense and ended up finding out that they were the source of the offense,
38:09
but would never deal with it,
38:12
would never deal with it the biblical way, but wanted to walk through life as the victim.
38:17
Well, yeah. And you know what? We read of the 12 apostles, and one of the ones
38:22
that stands out the most is Simon Peter.
38:25
Well, his name was Simon. In the Hebrew, it's Shimon. It means to be heard.
38:31
Okay? And we see plenty of examples of Peter in the scriptures,
38:34
before he was Peter, Simon having to be heard.
38:39
And you know what happened? Jesus changed his nature.
38:42
And he changed his nature when he caught the revelation of who Jesus is.
38:47
The revelation of Jesus Christ took him from being the one who needs to be heard
38:52
to the one that's built upon the rock.
38:54
You stand upon the rock, and that rock is Christ. And that's what God wants
38:59
to do, brothers and sisters.
39:00
He wants us to stop being immature spiritual brats that need to be heard,
39:06
you know, that throw our tantrums, that throw ourselves down in the floor and
39:09
kick and scream until we get our way.
39:11
And you say, well, I don't do that. Well, spiritually, you do.
39:15
Spiritually, a lot of people do. And I tell you, I'm not saying this like I'm
39:19
above because, you know, if I'm not keeping my eyes on Jesus,
39:22
I'm just as prone to cater to the flesh as you are. We all are.
39:27
You've got to stay on the heels of Jesus to follow him. Thank you.
39:31
And, and I don't say this is somebody that hasn't taken this medicine.
39:35
I'm well acquainted with it.
39:37
I know there was a time when I messed up and my pastor rebuked me in private.
39:41
And then I was the object of the next sermon. And I sat on the front row and
39:45
I received it, you know, and, you know, afterwards I talked to him and he said, I was surprised.
39:51
This was much later. He said, I'm surprised you didn't leave the church.
39:53
I said, well, I couldn't. The Holy Spirit didn't lead me away from the church.
39:56
And you know why I was able to say that? Because I had taken my medicine.
40:00
I had matured and I realized, yeah, I was wrong on that point.
40:06
And you didn't allow the offense to be your guiding light. No,
40:08
because that wasn't who my identity was based on. My identity was based on Christ.
40:13
And so, okay, yeah, that flesh had to go. We cut that out of there and we moved on.
40:18
And that's why I can tell you this from personal experience.
40:22
I know that the scripture works. I'm a witness. Yeah.
40:26
Isn't that funny how it works? Well, actually, Jesus said this in Matthew 13.
40:32
I'll tell you this where I know our time is wrapping up today.
40:35
But in Matthew 13, if you're taking notes, and you should, Matthew 13 is the parable chapter.
40:41
Jesus told his disciples that there are seven parables listed.
40:45
And then he said, do you understand all these things? And they said, yes, Lord.
40:48
Which was probably a little optimistic on their part. And then he gave them parable number eight.
40:53
And he said that a scribe, somebody who's taking notes and writing the scriptures
40:58
down, is like a householder who broadcasts his treasures new and old.
41:05
The verb used there in Matthew 13 in the Greek, it means to broadcast, like grass seed.
41:11
Now, you wouldn't take your treasure, your well-earned money,
41:14
and then scatter it out like grass seed. But he's not talking about money.
41:19
He's talking about our experience of putting the word to work in our lives.
41:24
And it's very conspicuous.
41:25
He says treasures new and old.
41:28
The old treasure is the written word. Like Matthew 18, we shared with you today.
41:33
The new treasure is your experience with it, that you can testify and say,
41:40
I know this is the truth because I've lived it.
41:43
And so brothers and sisters, we sit here as a couple of brothers who have,
41:48
we've lived Matthew 18 and we tell you that it is bona fide.
41:52
It is better than gold and it'll help you live your life right.
41:57
And folks, we've said this in the past, we say it again, we're here to help.
42:01
And, you know, I thank God for the experiences that I have that maybe somebody
42:05
might be able to glean and learn from my shortcomings, my life lessons that,
42:12
you know, because this hasn't always been sunshine and rainbows.
42:17
It hasn't always been ticker tape parades. There's been some rough patches.
42:22
And, you know, I thank God for every one of them. There's nothing.
42:25
I told Gary a little bit ago, I said, there's things that I've experienced in
42:29
my walk with God that I don't regret.
42:32
I would not go back and change them other than I wouldn't have done it to begin
42:36
with, which I could have avoided.
42:37
But the lessons that were learned from it, I wouldn't change a thing about that.
42:40
Yeah, make no mistake. We don't have to go through bad stuff to learn good things from God.
42:47
But our God is so good and loves us so much that he's there to give us good,
42:52
even on the other side of bad things. Gary, I've said this.
42:55
If you pay attention to the ones that have been there, you can avoid a lot of headache.
43:00
You don't have to go through the bad stuff if you pay attention to the lessons
43:03
of people that have been there.
43:05
I give you a great example of this. And like Gary said, time's winding down.
43:08
I want to give him final words here today.
43:10
But I had a pastor friend of mine who passed away a few years ago and went home
43:13
to be with the Lord, Pastor Bob Wilson.
43:15
I had the privilege of doing some...
43:19
Some behind the scenes work on his autobiography and what I learned,
43:24
what that man went through.
43:25
And I knew a lot of stuff, you know, prior to, cause him and I were good friends,
43:28
but what I didn't know, I read about in his autobiography and I thought,
43:33
wow, what a, what a tool this is, you know?
43:36
Okay. He went through this. I'm on the verge of going through this.
43:39
Well, this is how not to navigate that road.
43:41
Let's instead of taking the, the little, the, the, the side access road,
43:46
how about we just stick to the, the nice smooth highway. Let's just get through
43:49
this and do it the right way.
43:51
So take the, take the advice of the people that have been there.
43:53
You know, we don't ever share anything, folks, that we've not experienced ourselves.
43:58
So, you know, don't for one second think that Gary and Jamie are sitting up
44:01
on this, their ivory tower, so to speak.
44:04
We're not on our soapbox. We just want to help you guys grow in your walk with God.
44:09
And maybe hopefully somewhere down the road, we can teach you something that's
44:12
going to change your life, want to change your walk, change your perspective,
44:16
and maybe avoid some headaches along the way.
44:19
So, Gary, I'm going to give you the opportunity here. I'll come back on in just
44:22
a few moments with the final, final words, but just close us out here today.
44:30
Well, I'll tell you what Paul told Timothy.
44:33
Paul told Timothy to fight the good fight of faith.
44:37
Every other fight's a bad fight. Every other fight is a waste of resources.
44:42
It's a waste of time. and frankly, it puts your testimony in jeopardy.
44:47
You fight the good fight of faith. That means you contend for the truth.
44:50
You contend for the word.
44:52
You contend for your brother and sister because you love them.
44:57
But sometimes the fight of faith is fighting the urge to protect your own flesh.
45:04
You don't have to be right.
45:07
God's right. Just agree with him. The good fight of faith are only on those things.
45:13
The gospel, which is loving the Lord your God with all you've got and loving
45:17
your neighbors who would love yourself.
45:20
Well, folks, we want to thank you again for listening. This has been another
45:23
episode of the CVMI Open Door podcast.
45:26
We will join you guys back here the first week of December.
45:30
So in the meantime, reach out to us, drop us a line, cvmiwv at gmail.com.
45:35
Continue to pray for us. We're using a new host for the podcast,
45:39
and we're still trying to learn some of the ins and outs and intricacies of it.
45:43
Make sure that whatever platform that you are listening to this on,
45:47
you share this, like the podcast, follow the podcast, and help us get the word out.
45:52
Let's see if we can pick up some listeners in Asia and Africa.
45:56
We're moving across Europe now, Gary, so let's keep this thing going and do
46:01
your part to help Gary and Jamie share the gospel across this globe.
46:06
But with all that said, we want to just take a moment and wish our listeners
46:10
a happy Thanksgiving. Yes, happy Thanksgiving to everyone.
46:13
Give glory to God. Give glory to God. It's not about the turkey in the meal.
46:18
We thank God for the provision, but thank God just for what he does for us.
46:23
For who he is. For who he is and what he does for us and however he's going
46:28
to handle us in the future.
46:30
Amen. So with that said, we love you guys. We appreciate you,
46:33
and we will see you back here in a couple weeks.