First United Methodist Church

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Resolving Conflict Resource Guide

RESOLVING CONFLICT RESOURCE GUIDE

Materials:

Our Church Family:

  • Share your prayer concerns at fumcwp.org/prayer.
  • Join the prayer group Gathered In His Name. This group meets the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of the month in the Marcy Chapel at 8:15am.
  • Join a Connect Group to grow in greater community and relationship with people in our church family! Click here to get connected.

RESOLVING CONFLICT SERMON NOTES

Week 1: Understanding Shalom and Peace

  • Jesus welcomes us and our stories in all of our mess and brokenness so that we may look at others as valued human beings whom God loves. In this truth we find a heart of peace.
  • What are some ways in which you have treated someone as an object (an issue, an agenda, a particular viewpoint, sin, etc.)? How can you move to be a peacemaker by welcoming them in the fullness of their story? What does it look like to move from trying to be right to becoming a peacemaker in your life?

Week 2: Recognizing a Heart of War

  • When we choose to see others as objects, conflict rises in our own hearts. A heart of war is created. We bring our own agenda to the situation, which makes it easy to move from misidentifying another’s issues to justifying our assumptions of them.
  • How do you change the context of the conversation from accusatory to supportive? How do you recognize when you are either vilifying or honoring others?

Week 3: Moving to a Heart of Peace

  • When we have conflicts in our relationships, defensive reactions come to the surface that act as barriers to moving us forward. This creates in us an immediate response of a heart at war. This is the way of the world. As Christians, we are called to another response in our relationships – a heart of peace, that allows the flow of God’s grace in surprising ways to bring understanding and unity.
  • Is my motivation Christ-like in bringing understanding or is my motivation to be right? How can I step away from the conflict and view it in a different, more Godly light?

Week 4: Becoming an Agent of Peace

  • We perpetuate conflict when we look at external circumstances, instead of naming our own inner turmoil. We all have passions, beliefs and needs. They can be a uniting force, by encouraging us to look for our similarities instead of letting them divide us.
  • How do I choose to love my neighbor as myself? How do I embrace unity, and not uniformity?