Pastor Rick's Daily Hope

Guest (Male): Hello and welcome to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren. We're so glad you're here with us today. We're going to continue our series called The Keys to a Blessed Life. In these messages, Rick walks through Jesus's Sermon on the Mount and shows us how to live a truly hopeful and purposeful life. We're continuing with part two of how to reconcile a relationship.

Rick Warren: The Bible says there is no fear in love. Now, God is love. If you get full of God, the fear is going to go. What motivates a normally rational person to run into a burning building? Because they know a baby's in there and the fear is overcome by their love for that child. We never change until our love exceeds our fear. We never change until the pain exceeds our fear.

So, the starting point is to say, "God, I need you to fill me with your love because perfect love casts out all fear." The Bible says this in 2nd Timothy 1:7. It says, "God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but a spirit of power and love and self-discipline." So, everything I'm going to teach you today, the steps, and they're very practical steps, cannot be done unless you get filled with God's love because it is the love of God that's going to eliminate the fear and then you have the courage to make the first step.

How do you get that love? You ask God for it. So, here's the second step: ask God for wisdom. You've made the decision that you're not going to let this thing go anymore. You're not going to let it fester. You're going to deal with this conflict that's been under the surface for so many years or months, and you're going to ask God for wisdom.

The Bible says in James chapter one that if we ask God for wisdom, God will give it to us. James 1:5 says, "If you want to know what God wants you to do, ask him, and he will gladly tell you." So, the first thing you do is make the decision. "I'm not going to go along with this unresolved anymore. I don't want to be out of fellowship with God. I don't want my prayers unanswered. I don't want to be unhappy. I don't want to be miserable. So, I'm going to take the first step. I'm not going to wait on them."

Then you say, "God, I really need your help. I need you to fill me with love because I'm scared to death. And God, I don't know what to say. I don't know when to say it. I don't know where to say it. I don't know what's the best time." You plan a peace conference. You find a time when it's good for them, not when you're tired. By the way, never have a conflict resolution while you're in bed. Save that for other things.

In bed, if you start having a conflict, about half the time you get through to a major point, you're going to hear snoring, and that kind of ruins it. So, don't use the bedroom for your conflict area. But you get where you're alone, where you're not in a public spot, where people can be real, and you say, "Okay, God, what do you want me to say? Where do I say it? When is the right time to say it?" You ask God for help. You say, "God, I don't want to be out of whack with you. I don't want to have my prayers unanswered. So, I want to deal with this issue."

I'm sure that even as I've just started talking to you about this, you're already thinking about somebody in your life that you know there's a strain in that relationship. It's likely somebody in your family or in your marriage, parents, kids, or maybe somebody at work. So, I want to stop right here and, as your pastor who loves you, I want to pray that God will give you the courage to take the next steps we're about to do. Let's bow our heads.

Father, you know that we're all scared to death of conflict. Nobody who's rational likes it. And yet, you have said that it's more important than worship that we actually go get something right with somebody that we're out of harmony with. Lord, we know you're not saying go back and remarry an ex or whatever. You're just saying bury the hatchet, make peace, bring harmony.

I pray that you would give my people, the people here in our church, the courage to reconcile, the courage to deal with tough issues that have been pushed under the carpet and swept into the corner and pretended like they were not happening. Lord, help us to face what we're pretending not to know. Help us to be real and help us to have integrity. God, give us the right place, the right time, and the right thing to say, and help us to come with the right attitude ready to reconcile. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Now, guys, men, maybe the most manly, masculine thing you do this week is man up and deal with a conflict that's been brewing that you know you need to deal with. So, after I've made the decision to make the first move and I've asked God for help, now we get to the real practical stuff, and that's number three: I begin with what's my fault.

When we get together and we have this peace conference, I don't start with what you've done wrong. I don't start with a bunch of accusations. I don't start with the ways I've been hurt. We'll get to that, but you start by beginning with what is your fault. The conflict may be 99.99% their fault, but you can find something to confess. You can find something that was your mistake, even if it was in your poor response or your defensiveness. You begin with what is your fault.

Instead of accusing, instead of excusing yourself, instead of attacking, and instead of blaming other people, I first look at what's going on inside me. I want you to listen; this is very important. The Bible says there are two causes of conflict. The first cause of conflict is self-centeredness. It's what's going on inside of me. If I'm filled with peace, almost nothing upsets me. If I'm filled with love, almost nothing irritates me. If I'm filled with Jesus, almost nothing ticks me off.

On the other hand, if I'm filled with me, ego, pride, or self-centeredness, anything can tick me off. Anything can make me mad. Anything can irritate me. You can do the smallest little thing, and if I'm full of myself, you can hurt my feelings very, very quick. So, it all depends on what's inside me. If I'm at peace with me and I'm at peace with God, other things just don't upset me because I'm at peace.

God is saying that the real source of the conflict and stress in your life is not all those jerks you work with. It's what's going on inside of you because if you were at peace, they wouldn't bother you. So, the first cause of conflict is self-centeredness. I want what I want when I want it, and you want what you want when you want it, and when my wants bump up against your wants, we've got a problem. There's conflict.

Here is what the Bible says in James chapter four, verse one: "What causes fights? What causes fights and quarrels and conflict among you? They are caused by all the jerks around you." No, it doesn't say that. It says, "They are caused by the selfish desires that are continually at war inside you." The conflict that you're having with other people is inside you. It actually starts in you. When I'm at peace inside, what's outside doesn't upset me.

It doesn't mean I agree with everything that I see. There's a lot I disagree with; it just doesn't upset me. It doesn't mean I don't think there are things that need to be changed. There's a lot that needs to be changed around me and in my relationships. It just means I don't get distressed. I can disagree without being distressed. You are distressed not by the people around you; you're distressed by what's going on inside you and that response to the people around you.

When I used to do marriage counseling, and I couldn't count the number of marriages I helped and tried to help, the number one reason people gave for divorcing was, "Pastor, we're just incompatible." That was their reason. "We're just incompatible." Friends, there's no such thing as incompatibility. It's a term made up by divorce attorneys to justify divorce. We're all incompatible because we're all different.

Nobody's going to be completely compatible with you because nobody is exactly like you. So, no matter who you're with and who you married, you're going to be incompatible. The truth is, you can get along with anybody that you choose to get along with, and you can choose to love anybody that you choose to love.

Now, if I were to summarize thousands of hours of marriage counseling in two words, this is going to save you a lot of money. Here are the two words you need to hear that will make your marriage a success: grow up. Stop being an irritating little immature—I won't say the word. It's immaturity that causes marriage to die. It's not incompatibility; it's inflexibility.

"I want what I want and I want it now, and you want what you want, and neither of us are old enough, mature enough, smart enough, or spiritual enough to change." I am willing to let this thing die rather than change. You're willing to let this thing die rather than change. It has nothing to do with incompatibility. If incompatibility was actually a concept, then Exhibit A is Rick and Kay Warren because we are the exact opposite in every DNA cell in our bodies.

We are on the opposite extremes in every area. We have different backgrounds and different ways of looking at life, with different temperaments. We are so opposite of each other. Actually, the marriages that are hardest are where people are too much alike because after a while they get bored with each other. The greater your differences in marriage, the greater your potential for growth.

The primary purpose of marriage is not to make you happy but to make you holy, to make you like Jesus. I have learned more from my wife because she's so different from me than anybody else. You can learn from anybody if you're willing to be humble. You can grow and you can love and you can learn to love anybody. It's not a matter of incompatibility; it's a matter of maturity.

Am I willing to grow up? Am I willing to be unselfish? Am I willing to be flexible and am I willing to learn, or would I rather die than do that? I want you to write this sentence down. It's always more rewarding to resolve a conflict than to dissolve a relationship. Kay and I had so many problems in our early years of marriage. We would be divorced if it weren't for Jesus.

What would have happened if we had given in to those desires to divorce in our early years? I wouldn't have the children I've got. I wouldn't have the grandchildren I've got. There would be no Saddleback Church, and many of you would still not be headed for heaven. I think of the blessings in the world that would have been missed if I had listened to my fears or Kay had listened to her fears. It's always more rewarding to resolve the conflict than to dissolve the relationship.

Our nature is naturally to be self-centered. I don't think about you; I think about me. By the way, you don't think about me. You're thinking about you. You're thinking about you right now. "What does this mean to me? Is this really helpful to me?" It's my nature to be self-centered, and it's my nature to be stubborn. If I'm going to have a good relationship—friendship, work relationship, client relationship, marriage relationship, or parenting relationship—I've got to think less about me and more about you.

So, the first cause of conflict the Bible makes very clear is self-centeredness, selfishness. The second cause of conflict is pride. In pride, I'm stubborn. In pride, I get my feelings hurt easily. Humble people don't get their feelings hurt; prideful people do. They get their feelings hurt all the time. Proverbs 13:10 says, "Pride only leads to arguments." That's such a short verse. That's going to be our memory verse this week.

Proverbs 13:10: "Pride only leads to arguments." That was the first verse that Kay and I memorized in our marriage. We memorized it on the honeymoon because we needed it on the honeymoon. We were already at each other's throats fighting on the honeymoon. We are so different. "I want to do this and I want to do that." We had to memorize that verse before a week of our marriage was up, and it has helped us many, many times.

Think of a conflict you're in right now. If you're in a logjam and maybe you've been in this conflict with your mother or your father or your wife or husband or friend for years, and you think nothing is ever happening here, there's no movement, we're not making any progress. I am going to give you a secret miracle sentence that will break any logjam in any argument. Guaranteed.

I guarantee you this. This is a secret sentence that will break a logjam in any conflict if you'll use it. Are you ready? Here it is: "I'm sorry, I was only thinking of myself." Now, when your spouse wakes up from fainting, you can say it again. "I'm sorry, I was only thinking of myself." And they'll faint again. When they wake up, then you can actually start dealing with it. When was the last time you said that to somebody? Have you ever said that in your marriage? And yet how many times were you only thinking of yourself on a daily basis?

That is a miracle phrase. You need to memorize it and get over your pride, which causes conflict, and begin to say it. When your husband or your wife says something to you and you start to get defensive about it and distant and demanding, you just say, "I'm sorry, I was only thinking of myself." You watch the air come out of that balloon, and the pride and the ego just kind of shrink down.

The reason you need to learn to say that is because you have what's called blind spots in your life. The blind spots are the weaknesses you don't see in your life. You have a lot of weaknesses that you know about. Those aren't blind spots because you can see them. The blind spots are the weaknesses you can't see. That's why they're called blind spots.

You have weaknesses in your life you have never seen. Now, we all see them. We can see them real clearly. We can see your weaknesses really clear. You don't have to defend them because you don't even know they're there. They are your blind spots. That's why you need other people in your life who can actually point out to you what you cannot see, your blind spots. Those are weaknesses you don't even have any idea about. You're clueless that you have that weakness. That's why you need to come to conflict with a humble heart.

Guest (Male): Such a great message from Pastor Rick today. I hope you were just as encouraged as I was. Once again, here's Rick.

Rick Warren: Hello everyone, this is Rick. I have just returned from Amsterdam, where I was at a conference where we had over 6,000 church leaders and pastors from all around the world. Literally 140 nations came to Amsterdam for a week of training, where we were teaching them about the good news of Jesus Christ and more importantly, how to share the good news of Jesus Christ and help finish the task around the world in the next 10 years. That is the goal, to get the gospel to every person in the world in the next 10 years by 2033, which is the 2,000th birthday of Christianity.

And you know what was most exciting to me is that people came to me from all around the world. Like I said, 140 nations, and said, "I listen to Daily Hope every day in Kazakhstan, in Bhutan, in Bolivia, in Namibia." On every continent, I heard time and time again, "Pastor Rick, the word of God is changing my life." Friends, that's what Daily Hope is all about. For me, since I get your letters and I love to read your letters and I love to hear your stories, but to be face-to-face with about 6,000 people who were listening to Daily Hope on a regular basis and hear how it's changed their lives and influenced their ministries, it just makes me want to say to all of you who pray for this ministry and all of you who support this ministry, thank you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you for your prayers, for your gifts, for your support. You're making a difference. When you get to heaven, you're going to meet people in heaven who've come to Christ because you prayed and because you gave.

Guest (Male): Be sure to join us next time as we look into God's word for our daily hope. This program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial support.