The Village Church
Sizing Up The Conflict - Audio
Amen. Thank you guys. He is coming. Are you ready for him to come? Many promises we have in the gospel and I love the promise that one day Jesus will come back One day he will come as a current king to take its people back home. And so I can't wait for that great day So until then we're gonna listen to his word. So if you have your bibles open them to Nehemiah chapter 2 Nehemiah chapter 2 Everyone is a critic It's a fact everyone in the world is against me they hate me Have you ever felt that way? Have you ever said anything like that? Mom dad, you just don't want me to be happy. That's the bottom line. You don't want me to be happy. I hate you I hate you For the love What must I do to get a break? Nothing ever goes my way Nothing All of us all of us know what those feelings are like from personal experience some of you have felt that way this week, right? Feeling like every move you make you get criticized by somebody Nothing is ever good enough You feel that you feel and you think your family and your friends are always trying to hold you back But the reality is that Everyone is not against you Every one is not against you and yet everyone is not for you either Everyone is not against you and yet everyone is not for you either What does that mean? What do you mean by the Alex? There's a balance in life Balance and many times our one-sidedness You know my way of the highway attitude blinds us From that fact because if you believe everyone is against you That you would have a negative attitude about life. You won't trust anybody If you think everyone is for you, then you'd be a very gullible person easily take advantage of balance This is the same balance that Nehemiah needs now As he gets ready to begin this new work We saw last week that he finally spoke to the people, right? He finally got them excited. He finally empowered him to participate in the work He told them How the lord has been acting on their behalf so that people rose up They got excited they were happy But let me ask you is everyone happy You think everyone in Jerusalem is happy about this You think everyone in Jerusalem is going to be on Nehemiah's side No For he will face conflict He's going to have people intentionally working against him for evil He's going to get criticized He's going to get put down He's going to have opposition that stands in the way of what the lord has called him to do And this week We're going to see Nehemiah size up the conflict He's going to size up the opposition So if you have your baubles open them Nehemiah 2 beginning with verse 10 But when some ballad the harrenite and tabaya and ammonite servant heard this It displeased him greatly that someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel Now jump down to verse 19 But when some ballad the harrenite and tabaya the ammonite servant and get them the Arab heard of it They jeered at us and despised us and said what is this thing you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king? Then I replied to them that god of heaven would make us prosper And we his servants would arise and build but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem Let us pray Father, this is your word And it's not just stories It's not just fairy tale stories that we read our kids before bed It's not a once upon a time type story. This is history And what Nehemiah and the people went through is real It's real and it's true and it happened And so I pray father that you would be able to encourage your people from what happened in this time That we can apply to our life in our time I know you can look at rebuilding walls and think where in the world is have to do with my life It has something to do with our life because all of us need restoration in some area of our life All of us have been broken at some point in my life. We're not all together And shame of us if we pretend that we are we all need to be restored So wherever we are this morning, wherever we are broken this morning, wherever we need restoration this morning I pray that your spirit would take your word and imply it there in that area of our life Plaid to my life father. I know I need it I know I need a word from you And as always pray, it's not about me It's not about who I am, but it's about my god and king And I ask you to forgive me for the ways in which I try to steal your glory If you give me for the ways I invent ways to steal your glory the lord not today Not today spirit Let it be about jesus Let it be about him and let us see him as he truly is He crashed in my pray. Amen So Nehemiah He begins to size up his opposition Sizing up the conflict He determines First That these three men are not his friends They're not for him There I get them And they have issues with him And we see that clearly in verse 10 that send ballot to herman night and tabalia to ammonite servant heard of this and it displeased them greatly That someone have come to seek the good or the people of israel and They didn't like it When wakita and I were dating We used to have these defining their relationship posts consistently. It's like every week So And one night we got into one of those conversations in my blue four arranger In the parking lot of a Barnes and Noble in Greenville, South Carolina. We had one of those talks and it did not go well I said some things She said some things I was getting upset, but she wasn't she was just sitting there all cool calm and that upset me even more that she wasn't upset too And then she said something I can't remember what she said But when she said it, I kicked her out of my truck I said get out Just get out Now that was not my final moment and our courtship, but that happened At that moment we were having relational conflict and I did not respond very well to it See wakita is not and was not my enemy But that night I treated her like she was when I kicked her out of my truck And what i've learned And i'm still am learning Is there is a big difference between the conflicts i have with my wife Who I know Without a shadow of a doubt is for me Then the conflicts i have with people who I know is against me There is a difference and how I respond to those things should be different the relationship is different Can you distinguish between the conflicts you have With people who are for you And the conflicts you have with people who are against you How you respond to those should be different because the intent is different people who are for you At times when they oppose you they oppose you for your good And those who are against you that just don't like you They're going to oppose everything you do to try to hold your back They're going to do it for your harm Everyone is not against you and yet everyone is not for you either You got to learn how to size up the conflicts in your life Learn how to size up the people who stand in opposition to you to see if they are for you are against you Can you do that? It takes great discernment to do that It takes great wisdom to do that But this is what nehemiah did in verse 10 Sam ballad and tabaya Were his foes They were not his friends See he encountered these men as he was going through this meeting meeting with the governors beyond the providence of the beyond the River remember he got these letters from the king to give to these governors so that they let him pass and at this meeting He meant tabaya and Sam ballad And at this meeting he sized the mother he saw that this meeting that these men were not going to be my friends They were not going to be for me. They were not going to help me They were going to be against me He realized they were going to be against him for not for his demise and not for his benefit But you know what is his benefit That he can put a face in the name to his foes That's a benefit, right It's awful To get shot and not know where the shots coming from It's awful not to know who is against you Right, have you ever felt that way? Have you ever been in a relationship with someone who's with you like this then when you're not around they're doing this That's an awful feeling not to know who you can trust and can't trust At least from the admire he knows his enemy is not faceless He knows where the shots are going to come from do we And He not only knows their face. He also knows the issue He also knows why they don't like him Why they're not going to be with them. Why they're going to be against him What's the issue? It displease them greatly That someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel That's their issue Personally, it wasn't against me am I but eventually it does get personal They didn't like the reason why he was there They didn't like the reason why he came to Jerusalem. They were upset about that and noticed they're upset They don't even know the true reason why he's there yet They just know he's there to help them And so me and my and knows that once they find out that he's there to rebuild the wall That they are not going they're going to be even matter They're going to be even more against him and we're going to try to stop him from doing it They were going to be they were all threat to the call Emission he received from the lord. That's the underlying issue Do you know the underlying issue and the conflicts you have right now? Every conflict has an issue Every conflict you have with a co-worker you have your spouse You have it people don't like you. There's an issue That's causing that conflict. Do you know where it is? Two weeks ago Me and a friend had a conflict right here in this church I was having a conversation with someone about a book I was reading And my friend he overheard some things I was saying about our about the church And the things we were going to do things I wanted to stop doing how I want to do things differently And so later he pulled me to this put pulled me to the side And we started talking and he came at me pretty hard Came at me real hard because he thought I was saying we just need to stop doing ministry in the community But I wasn't saying that at all. He just misunderstood what we were saying But we cleared all that up. We we got the communication straight But the issue that that created the conflict was that when he came at me hard, it hurt me But I didn't tell him that during the conversation. I sat on it It wasn't until later that day where I called him on the phone and we started talking. I said Yeah, you came at me pretty hard And it hurt and he apologized we meant later and we reconciled But there's conflict even in close relationships But how are you going to deal with it? I know this person loves me and I love him and we still had a conflict and if I were to sit on that That would affect that our relationship It would have and the enemy would have used it And so I love him enough to talk about it And as I said this morning in the members class if you love want to know that enough You would deal with the conflict that come up because they're gonna come people You're gonna have marriage conflict. You're gonna have conflict with your kids That's just life But how are you gonna respond to them? It's the question. How are you gonna respond to them? How are you? How are you doing with that? Now The good news is that conflicts then get resolved They can But what about the ones that don't What about those unresolved conflicts that you have now? What about the ones you have with family members? What about the unresolved conflicts with a friend who used to be your friend and along your friend anymore because of the conflict? Who in your life has stopped speaking to you because of conflict? Who have you stopped speaking to? Who is trying to sabotage you because of conflict? Can you put a face on it? Can you put a name to the person? And more importantly, do you know what the issue is? Do you know what it is? See like Nehemiah, he He had conflict with these two men It was gonna be unresolved conflict and they were never gonna sell it They were never gonna resolve that conflict. They were gonna be they're gonna be against him until he leaves the Jerusalem They're not they don't want to resolve it. They don't want him to do the work And so they're gonna be at his throat because of it Because they're his opposition They're his foes And guess what? They just didn't sit on it. They had a strategy as well They had tactics that they were gonna use to try to get Nehemiah to quit the job The enemy sometimes doesn't set still he intentionally works against you And this is what these men did with Nehemiah. They were beginning to work against him verse 19 But when Sam ballad the heron knight and tabalia the ammonite servant and gets him the Arab heard of it They jeered at us and despised us And said what is this thing you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king? Last week again, we saw Nehemiah reveal his true reason for coming to Jerusalem He tells the people the mission to restore the wall. He empowers them And now in verse 19 the news has finally reached the opposition Don't know how they found out but they did. I guess they have good intel They have sources as well And not only that They have got one more person on their coalition now. They ain't just tends to buy in some ballad. They don't got Get you Someone else on their side When people work against you They sometimes build a camp against you as well Try to get other people on their side of the issue on their side of the conflict Try to turn others against you and before long there's a camp You don't think this happened in churches? You don't think people build camps Against the pastor and the churches. I've seen that happen I've seen it happen in jobs I've seen it happen in families particularly when it's time to talk about the will People get in their camps They can start fighting How much stuff is mine? When am I going to get? And then they break relationship because of that How are you going to deal with those things? How? How? A second a second thing they did is that They used they scorned them. They talked bad about them. They juked at them. They despised them They derailed them They beluded them And here's the thing that that's like a school you're attacking Right, you expect that of kids to poke fun at one another, but guess what adults do it too Don't we We beluded one another And the purpose of that then in 10 of that is that they wanted to kill the morale of the jewish people They wanted to discourage them from walking from starting to work even before they began it They wanted them to crumble and feel like they couldn't do it. Just let me give up They they're just against me. They're right. We can't do it. Let's just give up right now When the person is belodled Made fun of Laugh that what does that do to a person if you ever been Subject to that. What does that do to you? It hurts. Thank you It kills a part of you devalues you I'm from a town called Swainsboro, Georgia. That's my hometown Um On one trip there to visit my family. I got into this conversation with my uncle That's my now my dad's brother And why I keep remembering this story. He this is what he said to me. He said Alex You know what you really surprised me because I never thought you were gonna do anything with your life Never It's like what thanks uncle. I don't know if that should be a compliment or what But that's what he said to me I never thought you're gonna do anything with your life and I'm 32 when he told me that They didn't still could To think that that's how my uncle saw me when I was a kid I was never gonna do anything with my life Word hurt When we sometimes use them like an ice pick and we chip away the person self-image self-image Bam, bam, bam, bam. You're nothing. You're a loser. You're sorry. You can't do it You're just like your sorry dad. Bam, bam, bam. You just chip away at it Until they start believing it. You're right I'm a nobody and I can't do it. I just crumble and give up And many of us If we are constantly attacked that way, we will crumble and give up But we just can't take it We just can't take it. It hurts too much Are you crumbling Are you under such abuse now? People who work against you for evil, they will do that to you I've experienced that. I'm pretty sure you have to I mean they seek to derail us and sometimes their words do have an effect What's the third thing that they did? Fear-tacted They try to create fear and account The question they ask, what is this thing you're doing? Are you rebelling against the king? The intent of that question is to create fear It's to create fear and the camp. Well, are we rebelling against the king by doing this? No, they're not They had the authority of the king to be there to do what they're going to do and yet the enemy Still tries to create fear and the camp with the people. Fear is powerful You know why it's powerful? Go. It can parallelize you from doing anything. I'm just too afraid I'm just too afraid It can prevent you from doing anything Many of you know a lot of you know my biggest fear is fear, man. We all struggle with that I got in this conversation with a pastor friend of mine a few weeks ago and We were talking about philosophy of ministries about about the type of work that we're doing And he was telling me his and you know what? I was so afraid of his opinion of me that I did not man up and stand my principles about what I believe God has called me to do Because I didn't want him not to like me And so I caved But the spirit didn't let me get away with that I had our eventually sent him an email and asked his forgiveness and said, you know what? You and I disagree on this issue and I didn't man up and say it Please forgive me for not being honest and he did and we recognized we talked about it And it was good because I knew I was never going to be able to benefit from meeting with this guy if I always was afraid of whether he liked me or not I had to come clean and I did and it helped the relationship So we all have our fears It's not just me. We all have them. How you would deal with them? How do you respond to them when people use fear against you? How do you respond? Do you get afraid and won't run or do you Deal with it in a healthy way See as a church we're going to have our Tobias and some ballots that come against us as a church and what God has called us to do You're going to have those in your life as well. It's unavoidable. Everyone is not going to like you Everyone is church is not going to like me I gotta accept that that's just life That's just life But keep in mind Everyone is not against you Sometimes people who oppose you oppose you for good King david Man out the guys on heart sin Had an affair Had a man murdered Right you remember the story about king david So he sinned against god and the lord said who to david Who did he sin? Nathan Was nathan gonna be opposition that david with david at this moment was he going there to be opposition with him? Yes, he was but was he going there to hurt him Was he going there to work against him? He was going there for him and yet he was going to oppose to what he has done Sometimes people in your life are going to be against you for good Because it's something you did to bring you to repentance. That's what nathan did for david King david when you did this you sin and what did david do he it broke him And he repented to god so everyone who opposes you Is not against you sometimes we need to be opposed for all good Again, there's balance There's always balance But what about again? Sam ballad and tabaya in your life How do you respond to them? I think we need to do what namaya did in verse 20 Then I replied to them the god of heaven would make us prosper and we his servants will rise up and build You have no portion right or claim in jerusalem So we saw him size up the opposition. We saw him identify who they were We saw him identify the underlying issue. He listened to their tactics and how they approached him But what does he do with the information? What does he do with it? Does he roll up in the corner and just give up and hide? Does he just does it mess up his whole day? I have a tendency people can say stuff to me that this mess up my whole day That's probably what I would have did. That this mess up my whole day. I would have went Somewhere in this sit down. I can't believe they don't like me But not from the namaya. It didn't mess up his whole day He didn't because they didn't like him No, what he did he took what they did to him and he filtered it through his faith Through his faith, which was his foreign foundation And everything else is what sinking sand You got to understand about the book of the namaya his faith is always at work Even though it might not mention the word faith, but that's what he's standing on His relationship with his god and his faith Here That's what allowed him to stand up and be bold To these guys who don't like him who are against him And his faith is not a foxhole faith, which I talked about in the members class as well It's not temporary faith that you only call on god in times of trouble I'm in trouble. Now. I need jesus. Then when trouble gone. I don't need jesus. No more. That's not true That's not saving faith. That ain't faith at all Saving faith in christ saving faith in the father is you resting and depending upon him for salvation Not you tapping in tapping out when life gets hard True faith is resting and depending upon christ. That's what namaya has is our true faith Another foxhole faith He's faith. He trusted he depended upon the lord. He had a relationship with god And so being grounded in that and being assured of that He tells the opposition that god of heaven would make us prosper and we his people will rise up and build Foxhole faith person won't say that Someone who's in and out can't say that you got to have a sure confidence in the lord's work To say that in the midst of conflict in the midst of people you know don't like you and the midst of people you know Who are going to work against you? You got to have a sure assurance that your father is solving in your life If he's called you to something he's going to work it in spite of who's against you This is what namaya believed that's why he stood for him all And no he had a king's approval to be there, but he didn't tap in he didn't use that card He used his god card It's bigger than you sandballot tabaya. It's bigger than the king. This is my god's work And he has called us to this the god of heaven What does that mean? Means god is in control over his creation He's in control. He's the boss And no man No government No organization would frustrate his plans because if they did then he wouldn't be much of a god His will will get done You got to have confidence in that Don't look at what you see We are called to live by faith not by the things we see if you live by things you see Then you are crumble fall and give up every time conflict comes living by faith Living by more than what you see is what god has called us to do And if you live by faith you can say the god of heaven will make us prosper When we his people we stand up and rise and build and fight What's the next thing he says to them he says finally He puts the opposition in that place He puts them in that place What do you tell them you have no portion No right or no claim in Jerusalem What do you tell them this is none your business basically This is none of your business You're not a Jew You have no legal claim over us You have no claim over our worship And he admired you a line in the sand here You're here. I'm there And so You have no right You don't dictate what we do our god dictates what we do He and the other Jews are servants of y'all way Tabaya some valet Gish them or not They were outside opposition Trying to oppose Were the lord were trying to do and you know what nearby is telling them? I don't negotiate with terrors That's what he's telling them I do not negotiate with terrors That's what he's telling them And my god will make us prosper Despite the many efforts you're going to put forth to try to handle the work My god will prevail Psalm 56 9 says This I know That god is for me This I know That god is for me That's the confidence that nim I had What about you? Is that can you say that And mean it not just to sit here on Sunday. So let's just show faith But do you mean it? This I know that my god is for me In spite of me in spite of what I do You won't believe that and can't believe that if you don't have a saving faith in Jesus That doesn't even make sense to you if you don't have a saving faith in Jesus If you're not groaning your faith That you are always going to doubt whether or not god is for you You're going to be like this constantly He's forming when life is good Then when life is bad he's punishing me That's not god That's not what he does He's for you in spite of your circumstances He is Everyone is not against you Everyone is not for you either Jesus does not bounce back and forth to being against you and for you He's for you even when you fall And sometimes that's how we think about Jesus We do Circumstances are good and Jesus loves me now Then when life gets hard man must have messed up somewhere Is that your view of god? Is that your view of Christ It shouldn't be because it's not that way Now he convicts us But he convicts us to repentance Not the combination there's a difference He convicts us to repentance Jesus is your greatest ally He's your greatest ally And when you see him he convicts you up so you can repent He doesn't derail you He doesn't belittle you He doesn't create camps against you He's for you Do you believe it? Do you know him? Have you came to that place where you have given your life to him? In saving faith Are you growing in him? I was driving around um town this week and I love reading church signs, you know, and they have funny saying sometimes. I think they're funny and One sign I saw this week was was really good and it was really it was kind of scary too But he said that sign says love your enemies For you made them You agree with that? Love your enemies for you made them Is that true? Love your enemies for you made them Is that a true statement? Why? Yeah, he did I thought about that question I thought about that statement and I realized it's a half true. It's a half truth We are called to love our enemies But all about enemies we did not make because people don't some people just don't not gonna like you That's the truth. I don't care what you do That's the reality. There's gonna be some people that's not gonna like you no matter what you do You're gonna get criticized by people no matter what you do We're not gonna ever be able anything right for them because why they just don't like you And you have to accept that I'm not saying they mean just got accepted. That's the reality We have to accept the fact that there may be some people in our life And we have conflict with that we might not ever be able to resolve it You might not be able to resolve it Others you will be able to reconcile others you will be able to deal with But for some you may not People will work against you for evil people will try to create a camp against you people will derail you in your face and behind your back You will have some balance into values in your life And how are you gonna deal with them when they come When it's a co-worker when it's a family member when it's a person you thought was your friend It turns out that person was not your friend How are you gonna deal with it? You gotta be standing on your face To deal with that because it does hurt when it happens because Nothing's worse than being hurt by family member co-worker church family so-called friends If you're a kind of these people and you tell them you tell them the truth my jesus would make me prosper I'm his child And I'll rise up and be faithful put my god has called me to do You tell them that you remind yourself of that and you also tell that person You have no right No claim no portion in my life We give people more power about life than they need to have Because we give them a right. We give them a portion. We give them a claim But they're not your god Jesus is your god That's the bottom line He is god Your enemies are not The people who are against you are not So know this Your god is for you in spite of you inspire your enemies inspire your failures and that's the gospel truth He's for you. Let us pray Father god, thank you that That's something I have to constantly remind myself of father that you are for me and not against me And even when you convict me you convict me to repentance And I thank you father that that I don't have to let others have so much power in my life that they just controlled me They can ruin my day That's not healthy I praise you lord that that you are not like man You're not my friend one moment in my enemy the next You're always my friend always a friend of god Because of jesus Because of his sacrifice because of his good work And my standing and our standing before you is a firm standing because of him And while I pray for all of us father none of us like to have conflict. I don't like it I don't like confrontation. I don't like to think that people don't like me, but that's reality That's reality But how do we how will we respond to it father? There's always the question Help us to respond healthy Help us to have a healthy response to conflicts in our life Give us wisdom give us discernment give us boldness father Because we need boldness to deal with those things And so I thank you father for all this fresh name. Amen [BLANK_AUDIO]