Home-Front Hostility

As I was writing Friday's post on hostile environments, I couldn't help but consider that conflict and tension doesn't exist solely in the obvious places around the globe and for missionaries. We pray for pastors daily, because we know they are not immune.

And we pray for community, because we do know very well, that on a daily basis, we encounter people and personalities that are filled with emotion, tension and differences that work against us and the relationships that we have with those around us.

Whether it be at work.... uh, we'll leave that one alone; or at home... yeah, not their either. Um... in the marketplace, in our neighborhood, even as we gather as a body of believers?

Is there anywhere we can go where there is not the possibility of conflict? No. No, there is not. Not anywhere.

For even as we find our quiet place and time with God, in His Word and in prayer, there is conflict. The conviction of the Holy Spirit is alive and well. The powerful, yet delicate hand of God has yet to find rest.

He is always at work. Always moving. And wherever there is movement, there will be struggle, conflict and wear. So, then maintaining and enduring quality relationships in community begins and ends with the quality of our relationship with God.

God help us, this #communitySaturday. Pray that He would give us grace as we correct and move in the ways and places He would have for us to go in our own lives. Pray for the conflict and problems that needs to be resolved in our relationships, whether with family or with friends, both within the four walls of the church and outside them. May God give us wisdom with the words we use and the time and place and people with which we use them. Pray that He would continue to lead, guide and direct our steps that He may all the more glorified in our lives, homes and communities.

One day at time
One conversation at time
One life at a time.
One decision at a time.
For Christ and His cause.

- PNC