Our Perception Of God Affects How We Deal With Conflict

‘You must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh. The fundamental things apply. …”

You remember “As Time Goes By,” the wonderful theme song from the 1943 classic movie “Casablanca.” I can’t get it out of my mind, mostly because I’ll be singing it in June as part of a duet in a 1930s and ‘40s musical revue here in Sandpoint.

Do you remember the scene in which the song is introduced?

Ingrid Bergman’s character has just come into the saloon run by her old lover, Rick (Humphrey Bogart). She sees Sam the piano player, and they begin talking. Her memories of Paris and Rick make her long to hear “their” song once again.

So she persuades Sam to play and sing it. He’s just getting warmed up when Rick walks in and Sam shuts up.

Rick can’t bear to listen to the song because the memories of what he and Elsa had with one another are too painful. His emotional conflict is too strong to deal with the “fundamental things” that applied to their love.

I can’t get “the fundamental things apply …” out of my head for another reason.

To be sure, certain fundamental things apply to the romance and love developed between two people. I believe there are also fundamental things that apply to what I spoke of in my last column: conflict that can either transform or deform relationships.

It matters little whether those relationships are between individuals, within a church family, or even between a person and God. In each situation we can identify some fundamental things that help the inevitable conflict transform those relationships or deform them.

I hasten to add, we can only control what we do to heal or twist those relationships. We don’t control God’s perception of the situation or how God will work through us, around us or in spite of us to transform what needs to be reconciled.

To illustrate with a significant conflict of my own: More than two years ago, my wife and I began to make a critical decision about my ministry: Should I stay in parish ministry or do some other kind of ministry? It was very difficult to admit, but I was burning out.

My job performance was suffering. I knew it, and so did some of our church leaders. As I wondered if a change of churches might perk me up, I quickly found I had no emotional energy left to even fantasize about being in another church.

We decided a yearlong sabbatical (a rest) was what I needed. We also knew a year away from the parish just may mean I wouldn’t go back to parish ministry. But knowing that was OK.

As our transitional life unfolded, I chose to stay out of parish work and found a new ministry in our community’s nursing home. I also found our new life meant new conflicts.

To be honest, I miss some of the things I did as a parish pastor, but there are many other things I do not miss.

The challenges that face me now are different primarily on the surface - like my work context, the people I deal with, the degree of freedom I have. …

The basic issues don’t change, they only look a little different. Move below the surface of my life, and most challenges remain the same in their radical (root) essence.

Do you find that?

Fortunately, the radical hospitality of God remains the same as when I was trying to sort out the questions I tried to deal with that resulted in my leaving parish ministry after 27 years. And that’s where I choose to start identifying some of the “fundamental things” that apply to whether conflict will transform or deform who we are and what we do:

Decide whether your God is big enough to handle your conflict.

Does that sound arrogant? A wise seminary professor encouraged me to expand my understanding of God with this invitation: “If you have trouble believing in God, tell me about the God you don’t believe in. Maybe I don’t believe in that God either!”

Sometimes our perception of God shrinks to where we unconsciously can be in control. When that happens, we’ve switched places with God. And nobody wins when that happens!

Decide if your God is compassionate and strong enough to handle your conflict.

I hear too many people speak glibly - and, I might add, ignorantly - about there being two Gods in the Bible: the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. I say this as kindly as I can: If there is any definitive difference in how we see God in both testaments, that difference is primarily in our own ignorance of how the perception of God changed in those who tell the stories we know as biblical.

God doesn’t change, but our perception of God can certainly change as we experience more of the compassionate strength and less of the destructive anger available to us.

Do you know primarily an angry, judgmental god? In my lexicon, that’s a “small-g god” because it doesn’t represent the true, radical nature of our biblical God.

Nearly 20 years ago I discovered why one church member always wanted me to preach about God’s judgment. Years before, he discovered his son was homosexual, and he felt that was some kind of judgment on him as a father. He was never able to get past that point of conflict with God.

I believe he received an incredible and radically hospitable surprise from God after his death. (But that’s another column.)

Well, perhaps this sets the stage for exploring other “fundamental things that apply” in my next column. I would welcome you to share with me the basic truths you believe help you deal with conflicts in your life.

I will offer some additional fundamentals that deal mostly with the courage to find the truths in our conflicts and then face them. That can be very transforming indeed.

xxxx