 Okay good morning once again good to see all of you again we are into our next class hello to all the students who are also doing the e-learning course we welcome your comments questions discussions on the board at the e-learning site yeah so we've been you know we've been having an exciting time of learning and the last week you know Charles was talking about if we could go a bit more slower and I'll do my best to keep the pace more more steady and you know so that we're all able to pick learn share as well as be blessed through our lessons so we are going to continue on with the elements of a good marriage we started off with communication as the first one now we're looking at resolving conflicts we are on we looked at the beginning of an introduction about resolving conflicts last time we spoke about how a lot of time and that conflicts happen conflicts are very common in marriages conflicts are common in every kind of a personal relationship so if you relate to people you can expect conflicts to come conflicts aren't bad and the idea is not to eliminate the conflict in itself but the understanding is to be able to handle the conflict learn how to resolve and handle these challenges that come as a result of the conflict so we so we spoke about conflicts happening due to many reasons one specific reason we focused on was because was as a result of the differences that you see between a man and a woman we saw that conflicts generally when conflicts happen there are certain responses that we may commonly get into we looked at some of the unhelpful responses of how you know sometimes when we get offended and angry there are times that our responses could be destructive to us as well as to our to our spouses so we looked at that we also looked at how do we engage maturely what are some few few tips on how we can engage maturely of which we spoke about the first important one being the importance of discussing our emotions talking about what we feel even though it may be hard to talk about our anger or our sadness or our you know those emotions that we we put under the category of a negative emotion maybe our jealousy or our pride but it is important to bring it up in a trusting relationship where it can be addressed so we looked at that so today we are going to be looking at the certain steps seven steps on resolving conflicts so I'm on page 115 in your textbook so if you'd like to follow through you could open the text there we would that is a lot of scripture that we are going to be reading today so if you can keep yourself prepared and you know when when there is a scripture being asked to be read out if you could pitch in and read it would be nice to have all of us involved so we're going to be looking at these seven steps to resolving conflicts now even as you look at these steps remember they are not they are not steps that that the book says you know it's not magical it's not something that okay I have followed these seven steps but then nothing's working right these are these have to be done I think so I think specifically let's look at you know prerequisites if I were to call that that way one of course would be a willing heart right willing heart to come to a place of looking into examining your own heart so a willingness to be able to examine your own heart the second would be taking on God's power and ability to to see the situation the way that he sees it and also to to be able to resolve it with his guidance with his ability with his love with his forgiveness okay and the third of course requires a willing partner so I'd say these are some prerequisites when they're looking at these steps so these are simple instructions that scripture gives us and this is not something that is only applied to a marriage it can be applied to any relationship whether it be a parent child a colleague family member a friend a husband wife they ask they can be used across other interpersonal relationships okay so if when we're looking at these steps I've divided this into two sets so the first three and the last four so the first three if you if you you to do a quick scan of it the first three says to pray and prepare your heart the second says to receive God's empowering to love and forgive and the third is you receiving God's wisdom to address the situation so if you look at these first three steps they are mainly individual that is it is dealt at the level of you as a person as an individual okay so before you come together as a couple or as a duo this is something that you would you would need to do it's like a precursor towards the next four steps so because the one of the as a believer as a Christian we understand that reconciliation or resolving a conflict with with another person with a brother with a spouse has to initially start with cleansing your own heart and being prepared yourself so that you can get into the dynamics of a relationship and working that out so the first three steps are focused on us as individuals so this is mainly if you're trying to resolve a conflict with someone it's for you and it's for your your spouse if they're also following these principles it's for them to do at initial to do at an individual level so we will move through look through each of these these steps one by one and you know ask the Lord to to to give us a new revelation of how we can resolve conflicts you know sometimes when we are in conflicts we are so bogged down by our thoughts our emotions our anger our need for justice our revenge we are so bogged down by that that that is what gets into the process of resolving a conflict so if I go with anger I can't expect that a conflict will be resolved in peace right or if I go with revenge I can't expect that the the conflict is going to be sorted out amicably so the first and foremost thing we need to do as individuals is come to a place of a rightness with God first and foremost because in a conflict it is true we go through very many negative emotions or things that may completely bother us and if we aren't in a place of preparing our hearts we are going to be poor representatives of God's love and forgiveness when it comes to our relationship okay so let's move through this a little in detail and something that I'm sure all of us have heard have learned but to put this in perspective and bring the the essence of it when we are resolving conflict is I think is very beautifully put in in the seven steps so let's look at the first one the first one is to pray and prepare your heart so as I said conflicts often have the potential to put us at a back footing it can it can keep us angry it could be harboring a lot of things that are unpleasant that are not a right in front of God so you know that some of the scriptures that are highlighted here is I'd like would someone please read the second scripture that's Matthew 15 19 and 20 could somebody read that please Matthew 15 19 to 20 for from your heart come the evil ideas which lead you to kill commit adultery and do other immoral things to rob lie and slander others these are the things that make you unclean amen amen thank you Charles so if you look at this it says it's from the heart that evil ideas come right from the heart so the heart is the seat of wickedness it says it says in Isaiah to you know the hearts are solely wicked and then if you look at Matthew 12 34 the worst that proceeds that it talks of how the mouth speaks what the heart is full of so when our hearts are bitter or angry or resentful on a need for justice that's exactly what is going to bear fruit from our mouths like from an apple tree you can't expect to get I'm sorry from from a bitter lemon tree you're not going to expect to get the sweet orange you're not going to write so the first and foremost thing we need to do is to get a right with God this means we come to God we we come to a place of coming and examining ourselves before God because of what we just said that because our hearts in a conflict can be filled with a lot of bitterness a lot of anger or whatever the emotion may be and we operate from that place so we we need to come to a place coming before God and confessing what we are feeling in our hearts so God already knows that but when you begin to confess when you say it as it is you are coming to a place of humility to a place where you're throwing away your pride keeping away your pride and asking the Lord saying God this is what I am feeling and I confess this to you you know when we confess we are opening our hearts to God's healing or God's cleansing power and once we are able to do that you know come to a place because we all know scripture well and the and when we sometimes we feel justified in the way that we have those bitter feelings we feel justified we feel you know I should be feeling like this I have been wrong I should be feeling like this but that's not what scripture says scripture says from your heart is what evil comes out so having recognized that God's word tells us that you need to come to a place of renouncing those feelings that you may be harboring inside and renouncing it and asking the Lord for His grace and help to cleanse us so that we can come to a place of a place of to have a pure heart as we discuss or as we come bring about this conflict so you are going up to God and and being very honest and saying Lord this hurts the fact that this person did this to me is hurtful it's painful but I know that it's not something that I can control within and I bring this out to you and asking you to cleanse me from what I am feeling and give me the ability to deal with it which we're going to be looking into our in our second second point so now this is in tune with what scripture talks about you know David says that in psalm 139 23 and 24 would somebody read that out I'm on page 116 psalm 139 23 and 24 psalm 139 23 24 examine me oh God and know my mind test me and disturb my thoughts find out if there is any way he will in me and guide me in everlasting way amen thank you thank you Dinesh thank you yeah so you know the psalmist says that he says comes to God and say Lord you're the one who knows me you know my mind so you test to be you discover what are the thoughts that I have you know see what is evil in me so what are you doing is you are presenting yourself to God not just in confession but also to help you see what you may be harboring inside what kind of change or restitution is it that you may need to do so it just does not look at how you may be feeling it's not just about a complaint where you go to God and say Lord you know like these little children who complain say God it's not fair but it's also you're allowing God to help allowing God to show you what are the crevice what what is there in the crevices of your heart what kind of impure untender thoughts they may be in so you know even in psalms 51 it says create a pure heart in me so you're taking this pain to God or whatever you're feeling and you're asking God to bring about righteousness in the way that you are experiencing this hurt so the first thing as we said is to pray and prepare your heart and this is something that you know as we as we consciously practice this we begin to see that the peace of God helps us to calm down to to just you know with all the clutter and all the anger and all that is there to bring it to rest because we've taken the time to just hand it over and give it all to God okay so that's the first one of praying and preparing your heart the second step I think there's a question yes yes Christopher please please go ahead you have a question yeah my question is just to just if you could give us a little more clear definition of the heart where I mean is this you know are these thoughts that are coming or feelings that are coming from the evil one or are these things that are actually inherent in us because we are you know we are even in nature or you know they're not we're not good in nature just want to get that clarity okay so thank you thank you Christopher for that question now the soul part of us that is our mind our will our emotions is the is the human part of us which responds when there are certain things that happen so there may be conflicts or things that go on our souls respond and some of the responses are human in nature like if you are wronged you may feel a lack you know that you need to get justice if you are you know hurt you may you may experience a sense of anger now these are natural emotions that God has given and put into us okay because it also helps us to see and understand what what is going around in our world so having these emotions is not wrong in its in itself but what happens with those emotions so so repeated anger or anger that is not dealt with turns to resentment okay anger that is not confessed could turn to bitterness sadness that is not given to God could probably lead to maybe depression or extreme sense of anxiety worry can lead to extreme sense of anxiety so some them the the initial parts of it yes it is natural but if we continue to keep hold of these emotions within us without handing it over to God there is where the entry point of the evil one comes where he uses that to to create a mess or to create a chaos within us right so the more that we dwell within these emotions and you know like for example anger you know the more that we process it and say okay how could he do that to me this is the tenth time he's doing this to me you know if I forgive him this time it's going to happen so what happens is we continue to harbor that anger we continue to dwell in it allowing the enemy to reconfirm certain things and and you know that's when probably the thoughts of the enemy comes yeah that's right why should you do that or why should you forgive you forgive in ten times there is no no need to forgive and then you have you know the voice of the Holy Spirit saying you know you you are called to forgive you are called to give boundless forgiveness so so then there becomes when after that there's an entry point in into our spirits or our souls from the evil one but then it is it is generated from within our own hearts because our hearts are you know we are of the flesh nature and this is what we do come with but then to be able to submit this part of us to the spirit so that he could work and correct us and give us a course correction so the initial emotions that you have our human in nature comes out of your soul but what you do with it really really opens up what the enemy walks in with and and and gets gets working on okay I hope I answered your question Christopher yes I just have a follow-on question so maybe just to confirm what you mentioned the initial emotions are are natural and so anger in itself is not would you say anger in itself is not is not a thing it's not it's still something that's very inherited in us and it's a very innate kind of response but what we do with the anger and how it builds up you know that could that that can lead to definitely a sin because yes you know the the sermon that we just a sermon reading that we just read you know where we talked about when we talked about Matthew 15 1920 there it mentions about you know very strong reactions just talking about feeling and even committing adultery so all those are sins but the actual initial response or the initial the emotion is not is not a sin is that correct yes so you see that in scripture in Ephesians 426 and it says it says be angry yet do not sin so it says let not the sun go down on your wrath so it's it is okay to be angry that is a normal emotion that may come but don't let it stew inside of you don't let it to go unaddressed for periods of time because that's what would lead to what it said in Matthew 15 19 it leads you know to kill to commit adultery and to do other immoral things right so that there is also a scripture in Proverbs 423 I think I I'm just opening that I think it says guard your heart because it's the wellspring of life I'm just quickly opening it yeah yeah so Proverbs 423 it says keep your heart with all diligence for out of it spring the issues of life so you are called to guard it so these emotions that come up yes are natural anger it's okay to be angry it's okay to be sad but what you do with it what how you allow it to churn to stew to to take root inside of it is what leads to these issues of life yeah yes is that clear Christopher yes thank you okay all right okay okay so um um so we were looking into the second point of it is from a place of preparation what we are doing is to come to a place of receiving from God now what do we what is it that we need to receive in a conflict it is hard to come to a place of kindness and to a place of love it's not something that we can evoke within ourselves you know think of someone who's probably so just yesterday just last night I had a call from someone who told me that you know her her husband in intoxication slapped her and attempted to strangle her you know so imagine situations like that where there isn't a place where left to okay and I'm sure each of us in some circumstance or the other having felt that we've been deeply wronged we know that we can't throw up or bring up love right and that's where we need the power of God to help us to love so that we can come to a place of agreement and this cannot be done on our own and this empowering comes from the power of the Holy Spirit okay would someone read Romans chapter five verse five I am on page 116 Romans five verse five after the second point it's the first verse there Romans five verse five this hope doesn't disappoint us for God has poured out this love into our hearts by means of the Holy Spirit with God's gift to us thank you thank you Prabhakar so what does it say it says only the Holy Spirit can empower us to love and to walk in this in this God kind of love the first Corinthians 13 the God kind of love because humanly it is just not possible because it is the Spirit the Holy Spirit within us that produces this love so when you walk in this kind of love what you're doing is you have the love of God poured out inside of you that enables you to express love to your spouse or to the person that you are attempting to show that to resolve a conflict in because when you move in the love of God what are you doing is you're walking in union with God you're walking in one God and this becomes the love of God in you becomes powerful enough for you to have victory over the situation that you may be going through so by ourselves you know we are unclothed we do not have love but when we ask for the Spirit's empowering in us to love our hearts are filled with that love of God and then we are walking with God we are in union with God and out of this is where we become patient we show kindness we show love we persevere we trust we don't judge and there is how we get our victory over these over the situation so this love in our hearts what does it do it enables us to do what like I said to be patient to be kind to put away pride to to bring bring down selfishness to not look at at wrongs not bring back a record of wrongs but being able to look forward what we see in the first Corinthians 13 that the the love that is spoken of there so when you go to God and you acknowledge that his work that the power of the Holy Spirit is there within you it helps you to walk in love and you know even as you're praying and thanking God for for his presence in you it's his love that's going to do the rest of the work it's his love that's going to help and take the the front the front row of of working through this situation ahead so knowing that you're not going alone in addressing this issue but the Holy Spirit is in you as he's promised the Holy Spirit is in you it's he's a gift that is given to us he's your helper who helps you and and as you ask for his empowering you are able you will be able to go out in a lot more of strength to relate to your spouse and this love will you know it translates in the first Corinthians 13 love so this empowering that you do is something that you know you need to come before God to ask for it and come to a place of receiving that kind of love okay now once we have done that the next thing we need to do is you need to find a way to resolve the situation to have the right understanding the right to wisdom to deal with the situation you know it that is each of us would done many things to resolve conflicts you know it can be momentary things that you know someone probably asks you something and you need to immediately you know give an answer and I think one of one of the practices that I was taught right from the time I was a child was whenever you don't know you know God is the God of wisdom you say that small price I said Lord you're the one who gives wisdom show me what to do and I found that quite useful even when I used to write exams I said God you're the God of wisdom show me what I need to write okay so even in situations that can be very messy it is wisdom that we need in knowing how to resolve a conflict okay especially those conflicts that have gone really sour or that has gone very intense or has become very very volatile it takes wisdom to look into into this situation now this wisdom is not just to resolve but it is also to help help look into what are the causes and address those causes that have given rise to these to the problem so our God is a God of wisdom okay and Proverbs 2 6 writes that and it says it is the Lord who gives wisdom from him comes knowledge and understanding so it is he who will who is there to give you the wisdom so you need to ask asking God to give you the wisdom and understanding as you resolve this now when you ask you ask an expectation you don't ask in doubt right and we've been taught in scripture that whenever you ask if you doubt you're like the wind that pushes you you know like the waves right that's that that that throw you from here to there so when you ask we ask in faith knowing that God is the one who gives us generously and graciously that's that's a verse in James 1 5 okay and the Holy Spirit is the spirit of wisdom and he's the one who imparts either those you know the revelation of what what what could be the cause what could be a solution and what could be a right way to discuss to find a solution so it is important for us to come to a place of waiting and expectation to listen to what God says now in addition to this in addition to praying in addition to asking the Holy Spirit for wisdom remember the God's word is wisdom also for us okay as it's written in Psalm 119 it says your teaching gives light and brings wisdom to the ignorant so not just the power of the Holy Spirit but looking into the word of God for wisdom said Lord in this situation what am I supposed to do because his word will give you an instruction or it will give you certain principles for our right living so in addition to just praying to praying and listening to the Holy Spirit look in to the word of God on how you can address the situation so there may be sometimes that you're not going to get the exact answer to a certain situation that you may be looking at and we may face many like that that you know you don't have a specific answer written in the word but there are principles that you can take on to help you come to a place of solution now something that even as we are looking at wisdom something that we have to differentiate is what is the wisdom of the world and what is the wisdom of God now this is bought about beautifully in James 3 14 to 18 and I'd like someone to read that we're on page 117 James 3 14 to 18 would someone kindly read that I'll read ma'am yeah sure of me go ahead James 3 14 to 18 it says but if in your heart your jealous bitter and selfish don't sin against the truth by boasting of your wisdom such wisdom does not come down from heaven it belongs to the world it is unspiritual and demonic where there is jealousy and selfishness there is also disorder and every kind of evil but the wisdom from above is pure first of all it is also peaceful gentle and friendly it is full of compassion and produces a harvest of good deeds it is free from prejudice and hypocrisy and goodness is the harvest that is produced from the seeds the peacemakers plant in peace amen amen thank you Avni so you know this scripture gives you a differentiation of what what the wisdom of the world is and what the wisdom of God is so just let's quickly look at that scripture and and define what is the wisdom of the world so the wisdom of the world is where you are held by jealousy by bitterness and selfishness that's verse 14 okay and it says this wisdom this kind of wisdom where you're operating out of jealousy bitterness or selfishness is unspiritual and is demonic which means it opens the door for more of demonic the more of the demonic activity to come in okay so it opens the door for further disorder for further issues to come when we operate or when we are stirred by these feelings and it it can the the wisdom that comes from that or the things that we do out from that is demonic and it is unspiritual and it opens the door for more of God for more of the devil's work in it just as we had mentioned earlier Christopher now this is something that will lead to every kind of evil there is also disorder and every kind of evil so anything that is motivated by a negative emotion is something that can lead to chaos and disorder and that seems to be the wisdom of the world so let's look at maybe a few examples I think I'd like maybe let me let me go to the wisdom of God and then probably I want to hear from y'all in your experience what do you see in any situation that you've seen how have people operated from the wisdom of the world and wisdom of God now let's look at the wisdom of God the wisdom of God is first of all pure okay it's peaceful it's gentle it's friendly it is full of compassion and it leads one to do good deeds okay so you see that it is totally contrary to the wisdom of the world where it comes from a pure heart it comes out of being peaceful okay and and that scripture says it it is produced from the seeds the peacemakers plant in peace so whatever the wisdom comes it is to generate peace so the way that we differentiate this is is it coming out from peace it is coming out of purity and love or is it coming out of jealousy or bitterness or selfishness or things that opens the door to more demonic work so as we pray we ask God to show us to keep us in the wisdom of God to be able to give a give in our thoughts and that's why we do this earlier you know when you pray and prepare your heart and give away these emotions you're also allowing the Holy Spirit to fill you with his thoughts and his understanding okay and then asking God to show you maybe the causes of it what are ways of how you can deal with the wrongdoing also also showing you how you can receive be willing to receive change and you know receive change or receive something for yourself so that you may need to have a heart that is different in the way that you deal with with the situation so let's remember that as we as we make the decision to understand where what is the wisdom of the world what is the wisdom wisdom of God now as a footnote it's also important to know that you know that we should be careful not to always claim everything to be demonic although you know we do know that he is the one who brings about destruction he's the father of lies he comes to kill he comes to steal he comes to destroy but understand that yes there is maybe certain responsibilities we may have but also if there is any kind of demonic work that seems to be prevalent that causes this confusion and causes this lack of peace coming to a place of renouncing it along with your spouse is also something that you may need to consider as you begin to resolve resolve your your situations okay uh someone's waiting to be in the class who's that abhishek have you come in the sister name uh one second the blessing uh in the id his name is blessing nk something like that uh okay okay okay i think that in yeah i think abhishek ma'am i think this is not for our class this is a dina's class she's uh oh she's lost her yeah i'm confused yeah okay okay no problem thank you thank you abhishek thank you okay yeah so yeah so we've uh so what i'd like to do is we've got around eight minutes and uh you know i'd i'd want you to think of situations where people have operated uh or even you you don't have to really give us what the situation is but but what kind of wisdom comes from god and what kind of wisdom comes from the world and how often we could probably get confused with the two and operate in that so i'm leaving that open for some bit of sharing so enhance our understanding and our learning also yes christopher please go ahead oh yeah so yeah in this scenario that you have just mentioned about you know last night that call you received um in that case um you know the i think the wisdom of the world basically uh you know talks about um um you know stepping out of the situation or you know getting away from and the wife basically you know not really um uh you know being with the husband at all um and kind of shutting the door uh in the sense until the husband you know dissolves his uh his alcohol issues and his his violent issues his violent issues i'm just thinking that um there is i mean that could also you know uh have have some aspect of it in in the wisdom of god also you know because in in a way it could could also be you know self-preservation and you know being able to being able to you know protect oneself uh basically at the the uh somewhere the other the wife would need to you know intervene either directly or indirectly with the husband to you know they have him seek some help um they will need to become you know separation until he resolves these issues and um uh you know uh this could this could you know lead to you know maybe two outcomes one could be uh they could come back together or it could be uh you know that this could be the pick up of the marriage also so i just wanted to get your view on that on the on this scenario okay so so that that's a very good uh observation and i think this is where you know we are in those situations of uh what does it mean to be to have the wisdom of god so um uh i one of the things i think that really differentiates the tool is the motive of the action so uh now just this example i'm just taking this example i spoke of last night and we we will really um try and see how we can work work through this so what is the motive of the the uh the action so uh to give you a brief this has been happening in this family for the last 10 years okay and it's it's a cycle addiction is a cycle and uh there is um you know this happens it peaks and then it it comes down and then it peaks and comes down so i think she's she's in her fifth or her sixth cycle at this point of time okay and but then it has become so bad this point of time but there has been violence okay so what is the wisdom of god is number one i think to understand um what is the intention of the heart now is the intention of the heart to you know the the action coming as a result of anger and bitterness and um you know you know complete hatred or is it coming as a result also of love so what what is you're also looking at now practically speaking you're looking at the safety of the wife and the children okay in an inebriated state he did try to strangle her had to call the neighbors and as a result was what uh what uh you know there came some kind of an intervention so here the wisdom is uh you know it it may be foolish to think that being in peace is keeping quiet about the situation but maybe the the wisdom is to really probably involve family to involve certain people who would take a command over the situation so that the young children the wife are in a protected environment till a point of time that there can be some some place of rehabilitation or something that you know can be actively done for the man um so it would be foolish at this point to think that you know when you act in love is to continue to forgive and to continue to um you know stay on within the situation bearing and being patient it could be foolishness here because you're putting the life of three people in stake okay but again i think what we need to look at is the motive behind the action so is her motive one to ensure that he gets help get safety for the children has people involved in it till they can come some kind of an understanding of how to move forward i would say that is wisdom that comes you know wanting to create peace in the home okay it's not peace for the moment but it is peace for for years to come or for or for the future so in situations like this we need to be careful of how uh how we we we give wisdom to because the wisdom of the world like i said you know she had many people i even her family saying you know call this let this be an end let this you know stop stop it and it's coming as a result of their anger or their disappointment in what is happening but for her to come to a place of understanding that everything comes from god even a course correction for his life comes from the power of the holy spirit okay uh yes christopher did you did you have anything to say because okay i think okay so i think prabhaka has put up a verse and says matthew 26 52 dealing with vile issues with violence lead to greater issues for all who draw the sword will die by the sword okay okay so uh it is important to use the wisdom to like i said to be careful of how we deal with this that we need to ensure that um there is no promotion of of any kinds of evil doing either it be violence or any form of abuse and help the person in question with whatever they require so that you know the family can also be helped so in this situation yes the wisdom can seem uh you know as if it's the wisdom of the world that you know you you know you're allowing someone to separate you're allowing them to stay aside you should be in love you know just just bear through it but you use the wisdom of god for a course correction and if it's coming out of a desire to keep peace and to bring peace within the home for a point of time it may be necessary to have that separation or to ensure that they get uh that he gets the help that he wants okay okay thank you anyone else quickly one more um one more sharing and i think we can close for a break one more sharing anybody a different situation or anything else come on i'm sure we all have lots of examples under us leave that we can use yes yes charles please go ahead charles you can go ahead you you can unmute yourself you muted okay all right anyone else anyone else would like to nobody no one has an example i mean we have common examples right common examples i i think i'll uh maybe an example that um yes yes charles say you have you unmuted no okay so an example especially with the kids that you would do with children right there are times that children come back home and tell you that you know such and such child hurt them or you know um set something to them uh what do you what kind of wisdom do we give them would someone like to i know there are many fathers this on the group what kind of wisdom would you like to give them okay we'll we'll start for a break and we'll come back with the answer so as you're making your coffee and tea think about it and we'll open the next up with this discussion okay so we'll we'll come back and resume in uh in 10 minutes bet i will take this when we when we come back from class okay so see you all soon