Matthew 18: 15 "If another believer sins against you, go privately and point out the offense. If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back. 16 But if you are unsuccessful, take one or two others with you and go back again, so that everything you say may be confirmed by two or three witnesses. 17 If the person still refuses to listen, take your case to the church. Then if he or she won't accept the church's decision, treat that person as a pagan or a corrupt tax collector.
I have never been able to understand why people hurt people, but they do. Where does it happen the most? In Church! You go to church and you are approached by someone who says "did you know that so and so is going around saying these things about you?" Someone is spreading lies about you and you might not even know this person or better yet it is someone that you thought was a friend. What do you do? Scripture is very clear on this and it is a very hard thing to do. I have had to do it and I have had people approach me as well. On an event that I went on back in 2007 we had a motto or creed you might say. It went like this. " If you have a problem with me, then come to me!" So many times it is so much easier to just run away from the problem. What does that solve? It solves nothing, but what it does do is create unforgiveness, bitterness and all that crap that goes along with running away and not facing your problem head on. Thank the Lord I have people in my life who love me enough to tell me if I have said or done something to hurt them. I would hope that you love that person enough to tell them the same.
We are suppose to love our neighbor …. Right?
1 Thessalonians 5:23 (NLT)23 Now may the God of peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.
So what is Holy Spirit telling you right now? Are you going to confront or you going to run.
We are not responsible for the circumstances we are in, but we are responsible for the way we allow those circumstances to affect us; we can either allow them to get on top of us, or we can allow them to transform us into what God wants us to be. Conformed to His Image, Oswald
