In Conflict, Grace (Sermon)

It is interesting that just a couple of days ago, a news article hit the net in a near viral moment. I saw friends reposting that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg was holding an informal work meeting with his city comptroller at a pizzeria. When he asked for a second slice, he was denied by the owner in protest to the mayor’s law banning the sale of larger sodas. You can buy smaller fountain drinks. You can buy smaller bottles, or the 2 liters, but the 1 liter and larger than 16 ounce mugs or bottles, nope. That’s against the law which the pizzeria owner was protesting. The report says that the mayor lost his cool using even vulgarity with the owner. He finally left and went to another pizzeria. Later in the day, the pizzeria’s website had so many visits that the site crashed for a 24 hour period of time. Of course, this added more to the fuel to the fire with people claiming that the mayor was so incensed that he had the pizzeria’s website and probably even wifi turned off.

Then on Friday, it was revealed that the mainstream press that picked up on this story, along with all of us net stream users, were duped by a site called “Daily Currant”.  Of course, most news sites were all saying, “we knew it was a hoax from the start.” Talk about trying to save face.

Oh the soda law is real, just not the pizzeria visit. I don’t know that the mayor would be brave enough to enter an establishment that is being forced to reduce the amount of soda it can serve or sell. And though it was a funny article, it revealed how silly some conflicts that you or I might get caught up in can be.

I can’t imagine being told, “Sir, I must cut you off because you have had your limit.” But that is just one area in which we can find conflict. There are other areas. The latest conflict on the news feed is that of Israel and Syria. Which country should Iran fear more? Syria admitted that early Friday morning, Israel launched an air strike against a military weapons factory. I thought that was awful nice of them to admit. Some countries in the past have claimed what was believed to have been such a place was really an aspirin factory. “Yeah, Israel, you got us. We admit it.” But I digress.

Topic this morning is conflict. Not just political conflict, but conflict that is more personal, that hits home. Sometimes we are blessed that conflict happens only at work, or perhaps when one fishing line crosses another. It is a blessing when the church is without that conflict. I appreciate that even now that we don’t seem to have conflict within our family here at Central.

In fact, of my 20 years now of serving churches, this is the first time that I have had the pleasure of being part of a body free of current inner turmoil and conflict. The issues of conflict are in the past, which is a good place for them. And yet, as we are together, as we seek to be about the mission of sharing God’s news to those around us, conflicts will arise. And when we do, our true character will shine through.

So the question we must ask ourselves is what is our character as a body, as a family? In a single word, I suggest that our character we commit to is grace. It is easy to love when everything seems good or even when life is ok. But when life is not so rosy, the ability to love others, or even each other, can only happen if we are a people of grace.

Until recently, I don’t think I was as much a person of grace as I thought I was. I mean, sure, I give grace where I can, and more often than I should, so I have been told. But as we were studying this morning’s passage, I learned that I have been perhaps short of grace to the Apostle Paul.

Acts 15.36 is the start of a conflict, the first conflict within a ministry team. Paul and Barnabas are fighting over giving John Mark a second chance. Then the team, being unable to reconcile, split apart. Let’s read the passage:

The focus this morning is verse 40, that they were commended to the grace of the Lord. Most scholars say that the church sided with Paul in the conflict. But Wednesday evening, it was suggested that perhaps I have fallen into the trap of seeing verse markers as thought segments. I mean that verse 40 was its own thought and verse 39 was a different thought, or event. And he was right. I was. And because so, I have short changed the grace that I should have given Paul.

With every conflict, there are two parties, unfortunately, sometimes there are more. There are two rights, and there are two wrongs. Jesus commended us that we should appear united with our brothers of the faith, at least be reconciled with them. And here they both were, arguing. Paul did not want to rely on someone who lacked the strength, perhaps. Barnabas, being that his was his nephew, being that Mark was a young man, could see that Mark was full of potential if he had the right guiding. And so the church of Antioch didn’t take a side, but commended both to the grace of the Lord. The “them” of verse 40 refers to not only Paul and Silas, but also to Barnabas and Mark. Both men, Paul and Barnabas, needed grace.

They both needed grace because when conflict comes, it can kill a spirit. It can kill a ministry. Grace, on the other hand, heals. We see later that Paul must have reconciled with Barnabas because Paul refers to him as a partner in the ministry. He wrote this to the church of Corinth, so they somehow came together in that the church knew both men. And then John Mark is mentioned as a dear partner in the ministry in a couple of Paul’s letters.

Finally, the brethren of Antioch teach us about grace is that by grace, God is glorified. Consider what we do know about this passage. Barnabas takes one team and heads out. Unfortunately, we don’t know where he’s gone other than to perhaps the churches of the first mission trip and of course to Corinth. Paul takes another team out, for he picks up Timothy in the next chapter as well as Luke not too much farther down the road. So here are two teams spreading the news of Jesus’ love and sacrifice. More people are therefore hearing the Gospel message. More people are therefore accepting this message, which means more people being saved.

Let’s further speculate in Corinth since we know that this church knew them both. How much more powerful did Paul’s message become when Barnabas came sharing the exact same message? Or how much more receptive were the people of Corinth to Barnabas because Paul had already laid the groundwork?

Now let me bring this home. We will not always avoid conflict, be it here in the body, or especially not in our daily lives. Yet what we have seen and thought about grace with Paul and Barnabas also applies to us. How much more receptive will the defying brother, the one who knows all your buttons to push, will be when he sees you respond to him with the grace of the Lord? What about with the pesky neighbor, or the overbearing boss? In every area of life, let us commend ourselves; let us commend one another to the grace of the Lord so that we might be better Christians for the world to see.