Redeeming Conflict

As I sit here this morning, my heart is reeling in so many directions.  In the last 12 hours, I've had a mountaintop experience and then hit the valley hard, within a very short amount of time.  Tossing and turning with a very restless heart, I opted to remove myself from bed and just confront the conflict going on inside of me. 

Those that know me, know that I'm a very open book.  I want to share my life experiences with others because I truly believe we learn from each other.  We become better when we choose to become a student of life, rather than a know it all.  Don't get me wrong, there are areas where I'm well versed and have experience that affords me the opportunities to teach others.  There are also those areas in which I must look for those opportunities to find a teacher for my own life!  I believe that is how God set it up!  We are not islands unto ourselves, we were created to need others! 

My life is so different now than it was 6 months ago.  God prepared me for 2 years for the huge shift that took place in my life nearly a year ago.  What I didn't expect is the huge wounds that would come with that shift and the conflict that came into my world as a result of following God.  While I can handle conflict, I do have a very difficult time with conflict, because I'm actually quite a sensitive individual. I care very deeply for people and its hard for me at times to intentionally put up a wall because wisdom needs to be exercised.  You don't wear your heart on your sleeve for just anyone!  When you do, and betrayal takes place by those who should have known your heart better than anyone, you tend to recoil your heart in what I call self preservation.  I personally do not want to live like that!!  I don't want to live in "protection mode"  because I was designed to live with an open heart!  This is where it gets tricky though.  

Have you ever felt you're paying for someone elses character flaws?  In other words, if someone hurt you in the past, you live with a filter of that experience and then make someone else pay for that hurt.  It's like you attach that hurt to every person that comes into your life.  I'm so glad that I have partnered with God for nearly 20 years to eradicate that from my own life!  I'm not the skeptic I once was, however I am able to use wisdom and protect my heart from those who have hurt me in the past, and in the present, not make another person pay for the sins of someone else.   It's not people we need to fear, its their unresolved pain that we simply need to understand!  I'm not saying to live with an open heart with someone who has hurt you, but I am saying, seek to understand and remove the personalization from it.  When someone hurts you, its not about you, its about them!

I know conflict is a necessary part of life!  It creates growth and I also believe it creates opportunity. 

As I revisited the pages of my "Storyline" workbook this morning on "conflict." Donald Miller stated the following..."God wants us to redeem conflict. He wants us to display courage and hope in the midst of challenge. He wants us to be humble and allow conflict to change our character. And He wants us to conquer conflict, to tame it, and bring order to chaos."

 

Bringing Order To Chaos

As I enter into this next chapter of my life, I'm putting into practice the very things I became a student of for the past several years.  The page of my life has turned and I've entered into a relationship.  God prepared me for many years and surrounded me with strong relationships so I could see how they should be.  Now I get to put into practice, those very things I took the time to gain knowledge in.  See, I just didn't sit around for 20 years and not invest in my heart!  I read books on relationships, had friendships with married couples who had absolutely AMAZING marriages.  I asked questions, did research, and gained a wealth of knowledge and at the same time, worked on my heart so I could be open and prepared to embrace a relationship if that is what God had for me. 

 

While I do not know where the relationship I'm in will go, I do know that I'm incredibly fascinated with how God is showing up through this experience.  There are areas that I want to put my walls up and I force myself to take them down.  There are times I get defensive and I try to slip into "protection mode" and Father God calls me out every time!  There are times when I feel absolutely overwhelmed and I just step back to breathe and process things in my heart.  And although I've traveled "relationship" road a few times, I can say I've never built a relationship like the one I'm taking the time to build right now.  It's not clouded by pre-marital sex that can lead to mistaking lust for love.  It's the real deal!  It's taking the time to explore the heart of another individual.  It's opening your heart and living authentically before another, who you know deep down has the capacity to rip your heart out one day, and going for it anyway!  It's confronting the fear of being hurt and choosing to plow through it one step at a time.  It's allowing someone else into the sacred places of your soul and taking risk and confronting the conflict that comes with it!  It's working with God to redeem the conflict in my heart - displaying courage and hope in the midst of that incredible challenge!  It's humbling myself and allowing that conflict to change my belief system, thus changing my character for the better.  It's conquering the conflict, taming it, and bringing order to the chaos that lives deep within me!  It's beautiful and challenging and adventurous.  It's the way my life was meant to be lived!

 

TDahl