02/19/17 – Let’s Get Ready to Rumble: How God Works for His Glory and Our Good in Conflict

The Song of Solomon 6:4-13 ESV
4 You are beautiful as Tirzah, my love,lovely as Jerusalem,awesome as an army with banners. 5 Turn away your eyes from me,for they overwhelm me—Your hair is like a flock of goatsleaping down the slopes of Gilead. 6 Your teeth are like a flock of ewesthat have come up from the washing;all of them bear twins;not one among them has lost its young. 7 Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranatebehind your veil. 8 There are sixty queens and eighty concubines,and virgins without number. 9 My dove, my perfect one, is the only one,the only one of her mother,pure to her who bore her.The young women saw her and called her blessed;the queens and concubines also, and they praised her. 10 “Who is this who looks down like the dawn,beautiful as the moon, bright as the sun,awesome as an army with banners?” 11 I went down to the nut orchardto look at the blossoms of the valley,to see whether the vines had budded,whether the pomegranates were in bloom. 12 Before I was aware, my desire set meamong the chariots of my kinsman, a prince. 13 Return, return, O Shulammite,return, return, that we may look upon you.Why should you look upon the Shulammite,as upon a dance before two armies?

I.RESOLVING CONFLICT OR JUST SURVIVING THE FIGHT
A.Conflicts are inevitable, resolutions to those conflicts is not.
B.Fights are the symptom of a larger conflict beneath the surface.
C.De ja vu happens in conflict when the fight ends but the conflict was not resolved.

II.PUTTING CONFLICT TO DEATH (4-13)
A.Partial forgiveness only allows conflict to resurface later, while full forgiveness puts conflict to death forever.
B.Full forgiveness leads to reconciliation, which leads to passionate reunions of our bodies and souls.

III.RECONCILIATION: ANTIDOTE TO CONFLICT (Ephesians 2:1-16)
A.Reconciliation is the reconnecting of 2 parties that started out as friends, became enemies with one another, as friends again.
B.Because we are born sinners, we are born enemies of God, which means we need reconciliation with God.
C.God has removed what separated us from Him through Jesus and in so doing, has reconciled us to Himself.
D.The Gospel does not just reconcile man to God but also man to man.

NEXT STEPS
IV.HOLY FIRST, HAPPY NEXT
A.Marriage refines our character more than another relationship we have.
B.Because it is so hard, marriage is the primary means God uses to cause us to look like Jesus (become more holy).
C.God sovereignly works in marital conflict to glorify Himself and make us happy by using conflict to make us more holy.