Cancerous Conflict
October 6, 2024
Philippians 4:2-9
Be of the same mind in the Lord.
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People bump heads, things go wrong, people disagree, feelings are hurt, anger builds, and the issue becomes the other people rather than the original problem. Listening has ceased, conversation stops, fortress walls of self-righteousness are built, and recruitment of allies begins. The primary purpose has been forgotten, and the battle is being waged over details, often in ways that defeat the original purpose.
Politics isn’t the only place this happens. It also occurs in churches and families.
In this scripture, two women are in conflict - Euodia and Syntyche. We don't know what the disagreement was about or who was right. We only know that it was a longstanding feud between two otherwise amazing women.
The Apostle Paul doesn't write to settle their dispute but to urge them to get over it. He isn't the judge or the referee. He doesn't use his Apostolic wisdom to address and settle the issue.
He urges them to look past it—to have "the same mind in the Lord," reminding them that they were part of something far more important than their disagreement.
1 John 4:10-11 puts it this way:
In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another.
