Strife

When we want to ignore the fact that a conversation has turned into an argument, we just call it a discussion. It would be easier to just ignore a conflict than observe that the nasty words were actually hateful and poisonous. In the political world, the hatred for other people has produced a new kind of strife that makes us all want to run from any news feed.

So, let’s call it what it is: STRIFE! There is actually no practical reason for not identifying conflict. One can ignore it with the hope that it will go away, but it never will. We could even recognize it and still do nothing about it. That won’t work either, because the strife will just multiply, divide people and multiply some more. Another option is to admit and identify this struggle with a healthy and yet humble admission, so as to allow that admission to serve as the starting place for a remedy. The unhealthy contrast of doing nothing only leads to an attempt to find someone to blame. Often, we wonder: Why doesn’t somebody do something? (When I say that, I am assuming that the somebody is actually “somebody else other than me”.) The admission of the conflict supposes that together we might find a solution to the “strife”. Why should I even consider a solution? The answer is actually very simple: I don’t want to live in or with strife! However, not everyone will have the same attitude. There are some who are so consumed with the creation of strife, fomenting chaos, false accusing and hatred, that strife seems to be such a way of life, that there is no hope of peace at all.

When the Bible records the relationship of Abram and his nephew Lot, it is Abram (he will later be called Abraham) that speaks: Let there be no strife between you and me. Genesis 13: 8 This personal strife was carrying over to their respective herdsmen and Abram decided to not live like that. He determined to end the strife and did so by offering a solution that would be workable to all. He humbly offered to give Lot the choice of pasture lands and he would take the other choice. If Lot shoes the East, Abram would take the West or vice versa. Notice that Abram was the most prosperous, the most notable and most powerful and yet he gave Lot the privilege of first choice. He didn’t act with the arrogance of pride or a sense of entitlement. He gave the choice to his nephew. Abram didn’t give Lot the idea that he had brought him along from the town of Ur as a favor and that somehow now Lot “owed” him something. Rather, he took the position that he just didn’t want strife. This action wound up with rich blessing coming to Abram from Almighty God. There are some lessons for us:

1. I need to be carefully alert to strife that is around me and decide that I don’t want to be a contributor to it.
2. In recognizing strife, I will need to act responsibly even if I am not to blame.
3. Strife must be recognized for the damaging impact that it has on our society and the lives of people closest to us. Anxiety and tension grows.
4. It will be that sense of responsibility that will motivate me with the courage to speak the truth, in a loving manner, in order to bring about the needed relief to the tension that strife is causing.
5. I will also have to be ready to accept the fact that my attempt at relieving strife may not be accepted by others. There is always the possibility that what is “wrong” has to be identified and that status is not a popular idea in our day.
6. Rather than other people accepting the solution, they just might turn on us with hateful accusation of our being judgmental or even suggest that we have “hate speech” in our attitude and language.

I’m guessing that you as the reader, may be just as sick as I am about the strife that is around us. We each still have a choice to do something about it.