Overcoming Fights
& Feuds
From congregational readings in Genesis 16-20, Feb
4, ‘08 – bk@kluth.org
James
4:1-3 What causes fights and
quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? You
want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what
you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. When
you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may
spend what you get on your pleasures.
1 – When we don’t get what we want
we often blame and scheme
Gen
16:1-6 Now Sarai, Abram's
wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named
Hagar; so she said to Abram, "The LORD has kept me from having children.
Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her." Abram agreed to what Sarai
said. So after Abram had been living in
2 - When we get what we don’t want
we often blame and get abusive
When she knew she was pregnant, she began to
despise her mistress. Then Sarai said to Abram,
"You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in
your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the
LORD judge between you and me." "Your servant is in your hands,"
Abram said. "Do with her whatever you think best."
Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.
3 – When we get what we feel we don’t deserve
we need to experience God’s presence and
promises
Gen
16:7-14 The angel of the LORD
found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the
road to Shur. And he said, "Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you
going?" "I'm running away from
my mistress Sarai," she answered. Then the angel of the LORD told her, "Go
back to your mistress and submit to her." The angel added, "I will so
increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count." The angel of the LORD also said to her: "You
are now with child
and you will have
a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for
the LORD has heard of your misery. He
will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and
everyone's hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his
brothers." She gave this name to
the LORD who spoke to her: "You are the God who sees me (El Ro’iy)," for she said, "I have now seen the One who sees me."
Gen
17:1,19 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD
appeared to him and said, "I am God Almighty; walk before me and be
blameless…your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac.
4 – When we have fights & feuds
let God use them to help you examine your
own life
Luke
6:41 (Jesus said) “Why do you look at the speck of
sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own
eye?”
5 – When we have fights & feuds
follow God’s Word to overcome them
Rom
12:17-21 Never pay back evil
for evil to anyone. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are
honorable. Do your part to live in peace with everyone, as much as possible. Dear friends, never avenge yourselves.
Leave that to God…Instead, do what the Scriptures say: "If your enemies
are hungry, feed them. If they are
thirsty, give them something to drink, and they will be ashamed of what they
have done to you." Don't let evil get the best of you, but
conquer evil by doing good.NLT
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