Conflicts in the church

We are in the Book of Acts chapter 15 and there in the services in English in the morning we are doing a series of sermons about the primitive Church, the first Christians, what the Holy Spirit did in the people there at the beginning of the Church and all the things that God did, because we believe that God is the same yesterday, today and forever, he is the same God, he wants to perform miracles as he did at that time.

If you read the Book of Acts you will see stories of power like you can't imagine. Dead people raised, healings, preaching to thousands of people, and you will also read the dramas of the first Christians. Today we are going to read about one, what is it called in English? a good church fight, a good salt out that took place between Pablo and Barnabas, and we are going to see that conflicts in the Church are natural, they are to be expected, and sometimes they can produce a blessing if they are handled well.

Now, some people are already thinking: Gregory, why are you talking about conflicts in the Church, is it because you know what I said to the little brother I don't know what and you're talking about that?

The truth is that no, I am not referring to any situation in particular, I am preaching this because it touches, it is the next text in a series that we are doing, but if the shoe fits you well, welcome! (laughs).

Acts 15 verse 36, we are going to see what happens between the Apostle Paul and his ministerial partner Barnabas, verse 36. "After a few days Paul said to Barnabas: let us visit the brothers again in the cities where we have announced the Word of the Lord to see how they are; Barnabas wanted them to take with them John, who was nicknamed Mark, but Paul did not think it was right to take with them the one who had strayed from them from Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work; And there was such a disagreement between them that they separated. Barnabas taking Mark sailed to Cyprus, and Paul choosing Silas left entrusted by the brothers to the grace of the Lord, and passed through Syria and Silicia confirming the churches."

Thank you Father because we are flesh and blood. Thank you Father because conflicts and disagreements have always been part of the people and of God and thank you Lord that You have wisdom like the God of peace to teach us how to manage ourselves in a Christian and anointed way so that nothing can stop the Work of the Lord. Visit us in Jesus Name.

If you, I usually say, that if you have been in the Church and you have not had to forgive anyone, it is your first day in the Church because the Church is made by human beings, and human beings are complicated. The conflict has been with Christians from the beginning. The first murder in Christian history was due to a fight that had to do with religious matters. Did you know this?

The conflict between Abel and his brother Cain, right? This was not because they wanted the same girl, nor did girls exist at this time. Even then they fought out of spiritual jealousy, right?

The conversation at the table after Jesus began the Holy Supper saying: "This is my body, which is broken for you" after that, do you know what the Apostles spoke at the table, do you know what the topic of conversation was? They talked about who was going to be the greatest of them, the greatest among them. They discussed at the table with Jesus the first Holy Supper, imagine, so that is something old, something that is always with us, the conflicts between people.

But some may ask the question: shouldn't it be different in the Church? we are christians, we should get along right? some might ask the question. We understand conflicts with outsiders, right? if there is someone attacking us or persecutions, or disagreements of belief in the Gospel but disagreements between Christians who love the Lord, are both serving in the Work?

And sometimes it is intense, ugly, strong conflicts, right? you've seen one of those maybe, maybe you're in one right now right? you know how ugly it can be. We should not be scandalized, this is to be expected.

He knows that an anointed Church that does spiritual warfare is a place of intense spirituality. It is one of passion, of strong dedication, of spiritual struggle and there is an enemy who knows that the best way to defeat us is to divide us and start fighting against each other so that we forget about him and when we fight among ourselves he takes advantage, but sometimes Sometimes it's not even that spiritual.

The Church is a family, right? Some are part of complicated families. Some will be part of a family that has, I don't know, disagreements between some of the relatives, conflicts, as it is called in the Church "family baggage", right?

The Church is a family and it is natural for there to be disagreements. In a cell that had parents and children we talked about patience and the children began to talk about patience waiting to go to the bathroom because the father outside saying: let's go, quickly, and the son saying: look at the Word says you need patience dad and we're talking about it on the cell, patience. How bad right? Using the Word of the Lord.

But that's how it is in the Church we are a family and there will be friction, there will be disagreements and this is natural. Sometimes it is good because there are theological issues and we have to be firm in what we believe and we must not let certain things go.

Now, we have to pick our battles right? Not everything is worth fighting for. The color of the blinds, if you want pink, yellow, black, is it worth fighting for? You have to choose your battle, right? The divinity of Christ, we have to fight this. The authority of the Word of God, you have to fight this.

It is that some churches it is good that they divide to define the Truth of God. At the time of the civil war, churches across the country were splitting because the Bible teaches that slavery is good and other Christians said it was a misinterpretation of the Word, and churches across the country had to split. Southern Baptists were born out of that, right? separating from the Northern Baptists and it was worth fighting for, thank God, a hundred years later the Southern Baptists formally apologized to the Northern Baptists saying: we were wrong, forgive us, and then they said: well, a hundred years ago we forgave you, but it is important to recognize that they were wrong at the time.

There are fights, there are disagreements. When organizing the Church, there are disagreements about how it is organized. I don't know if there are money conflicts at work due to business matters. The Church also has its organizational, institutional aspect. Family matters, spiritual matters are combined with money sometimes and that is a recipe for a total mess, a mess, a mess, something terrible and that happens, it is to be expected.

The question is not whether there will be disagreements or conflicts. What God wants from us is what are we going to do when there is a disagreement with a brother, how are we going to handle it, what is our attitude and posture going to be? God wants us to prepare because this is coming.

Jesus prayed for our unity. Jesus prayed: Father, I ask you for those who will believe in the Word to be one as You and I are one so that the world knows that God has sent the Son into the world. Our unit is going to preach a message to the world and our division is also giving a bad message, so we have to work on this. As Jesus says: a divided house will not survive, we have to fight for the union of the Spirit. In the Book of Ephesians it says that: "Let us be careful to maintain the union of the Spirit in the bond of peace" we have to work with that.

So we are going to see the conflict with Pablo and Barnabas, right? Who are Pablo and Barnabas? I want to start with that, because maybe some don't know who they are to begin with.

Barnabas was a super important man in the early Church, did you know this? A man of God, a man who was full of grace, famous for being generous with the Work of the Lord, a man who sought out the rejected person and who discipled people. He was such a good man that does anyone know the meaning of his name Barnabas? do you know what it means? Consolation son. A man who received people and gave them comfort.

Saul, do you know the background of Saul? a man who went around killing Christians, a man full of hatred against believers seeking to arrest men and women and take them to prison, a man jealous for God in a wrong way, in a confused way, violent, speaking threats against God's people. God met him on the way to that city that I always forget, Damascus, he was going to Damascus.

The Lord had a run-in with him, he knocked him down and "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Saul changed and as we know, some of the worst bad guys become the best good guys sometimes, right? Some of the worst bad guys end up being the best good guys.

It is that they served Satan with desire and then they serve Christ with more desire, with more passion. He who has been forgiven much loves much and Saul was like that. He decided: I am going to be the craziest for Christ before everyone else, I am going to live 100% for Jesus. An intense, passionate man, dedicated to the work and now Saul and Barnabas were friends for a long time, because at first, do you think that Peter and John and all the others welcomed Saul with open arms?

"Oh welcome little brother Saulo, we believe that you have changed and you are good and you are not going to kill me like you wanted last week." And remember that he supervised the murder of Esteban, one of his friends, and they, no one wanted anything to do with Saul but only one person who sought to form a friendship with him, guess who it was? Barnabas. It wasn't Pablo, it wasn't Juan, it was Barnabas.

He approached Saul, made friends with him, listened to his story, took him to the Apostles, gave him an opportunity and so Barnabas received him when no one else wanted to have anything to do with him. Barnabas and Saul became good militia partners, fighting for the Gospel, preaching together and after all this time they have a disagreement, a conflict between them. They were very different people, weren't they? believers are not always going to agree on things. So let's see how the conflict was, what was the problem.

It had to do with a young man named Juan who had been with them on one of their trips and during the missionary trip, this young man, maybe a teenager, 16 years old decided: well, I just don't like that. We are going through struggles and problems, people are persecuting us, the food is not like mommy's food, there is rice and beans, there is nothing here, that is hard. You're making me work, I want to go back to Mommy's house in Antioquia, we know that his mom had a big house with a servant, a privilege, he says: no more, I want to go home.

Pablo decides: no more, I'm done with you. You failed me once and as the saying goes: you are not going to make a fool out of me, once is fine, twice is not. But Barnabas, what did Barnabas do? He says: look, he is a young man, he failed us once but we are going to give him another chance, right? maybe he can do it.

Also Bernabé and Juan, Marcos were related, he was a cousin of his, imagine the difference between them. We don't know how the dialogue went but we know it was something intense. A conflict in English is sharp, acute, a strong difference between them, a disagreement, a real "get out" and they ended up divided, which is not necessarily a bad thing, right? God has His way of blessing even the mess we cause but we'll talk about that more later.

But I want to imagine the conflict between them because there are good ways to handle conflict and there are bad ways to handle it. The conflict itself is not bad; They were both right, right? Pablo was right: this young man failed us and we must not invite him again, he was right, he wanted something good, Barnabas was also right, but how the conflict is handled is what makes all the difference.

I can imagine a bad way to handle a conflict from personal experience, right? Because we've all handled a bad conflict. Who here when you are in conflict you always behave like a little angel? You always talk like Christ. These are the recordings that we don't want to be played in heaven, right? everyone, there is no one who comes clean from that.

Attacking a person's character and motivations is illegal in the Spirit. We are going to work on the problem and not attack the person, that is what has to be done. But normally what we do is attack, right?

I can imagine Barnabas, what would Paul have said to him? "Oh, Bernabé, there you go again, always wanting to be good, always wanting to look good with everyone, much more your family, never thinking about the Lord's Work" attacking.

Perhaps Barnabas could have said to Pablo: Oh, you go around again, always thinking about yours and not thinking about others, always like a truck that crushes people and you don't listen to anyone because you are the great Saul, right? the great paul Remember that if I had not given you a chance you would not be here. All that could have been said, I don't know if it was said or not.

But when it attacks you, what do you do? When someone is attacking you, your character, your motivations, you get defensive and often counterattack, right? I kill you before you kill me, and things escalate without solving the problem. The conflict is forgotten and becomes one more conflict between people attacking the motivations and character of the other.

Instead we gotta learn how to fight, we gotta learn how to have a clean fight, because if the conflict is handled in a healthy way, in a respectful way, then even if I lose the argument I won't lose the relationship. Even if we argue at the time, if it is handled well after all we can resolve the relationship between us. You have to learn how to fight well, right?

There are rules to a good fight, right? How many here took Discipleship level 3? A list of rules for a healthy fight, rules for a fair fight, read the list over and over again because if we do it right we will save ourselves a lot of problems in life, right?

First is the importance of respect. Good faith must be assumed; I hear a demon, I rebuke you. He doesn't want you to hear the Word. No, here we are (laughs).

No, first step: you have to assume good faith, assume the best of the person. What do we normally do? We assume the worst of the person, we are cynical, right? How many of us have learned from life that people are bad and you don't have to trust people, right? and we have that attitude of assuming bad things about the person. God wants us to assume the best of them, give them the benefit of the doubt, be anti-cynical and instead believe the best, hope for the best and love, respect, know that you are my brother in Christ, you are a child of God and you are worthy of hearing what you have to say. Respect, I will respect you. Although I hate you right now, I disagree with you, I'm going to respect you because you are a child of God, it's worth taking yourself seriously. I am also going to work on empathy. Learn what it's like to put myself in your shoes and see the situation from your perspective.

Did you know? We are talking a lot about conflicts in the Church, but all this applies to another context, right? It applies very well to home and marriage contexts. You arrive at the house and there you come sometimes with the gun out, right? because they treated you badly at work and well, someone has to pay the piper, someone has to pay, someone has to suffer, because I suffered someone here has to suffer.

We entered without thinking that they also had the same day and bang! we went in fighting I knew a man that I respect a lot who, before entering his house, took a moment to breathe, calm down, cast his burden on the Lord, right? He also took a moment to think about the day of his wife and children, how would their day have been at work, with the days, at school? how are they, what do they need? and enter the house looking instead of being understood, to understand. Appreciate them, empathy.

Paul could have said: Barnabas, if it weren't for you, where would I be? you are a man of compassion, of consolation, you had mercy on me. I know that you want the best for Juan, you see potential in him but I disagree, but I want to understand your side. Barnabas could have said: Pablo, I understand that you are a man devoted to work and you care about doing a job well done, and you fear that if we accept Juan again he will fail us again and cause problems, I understand that your concern is good, it is for the Work of the Lord, it is not that you lack love, right? It is not to say: oh you don't love anyone, it's not that, it's that I understand that you love the work, but I disagree with you for that, I think we should give it another chance.

Do you hear the conversation? there is still disagreement but there is understanding, there is respect, there is time to listen and not listen only to respond, right? I don't know if you've had this experience: they're talking to you and, I just want to say what I want to say, and you're waiting to interrupt, and you're thinking about your response. Forget about your answer for a moment and listen to what the person means because they are saying something important, and then make sure you understand what they said before you answer, it will be much more blessed.

This fight was not pleasant but it was necessary, mind you, because although both were right, Barnabas was more right, he was more right than Pablo, right? And I imagine, I don't think I know, but I think Pablo liked a good discussion. I imagine him like a tiger there wanting to get in, right? I visualize it like this. I imagine that for Bernabé the discussion was not so easy. Due to his natural temperament, I imagine it would have been easier for him to give in, but he couldn't because something important was at stake.

It's good that Barnabas started fighting with Pablo, very good. If it hadn't been for that we would all have lost, do you know why? This little boy, this young Juan had another nickname that is mentioned here, what is Juan's other name? Marcos, have you heard this name anywhere else? The Gospel according to Saint... the same little boy.

This boy who bothers here in the youth group, what are we going to do with this big head? He can become a deacon (laughs), a Pastor here preaching if you give him a chance, if you give him the opportunity that was given to you, right?

Many times it is those who have received more mercy who are less merciful, many times, right? those who want to cut off heads are those who should have had their heads cut off a long time ago, but they were given time.

We want to give mercy to others. If it had not been that Barnabas fought this we would only have three Gospels: Matthew, Luke and John, what a pity! It's good that he did what had to be done.

Now, there are other benefits to this. Know what? when there are discussions and everyone is looking for God, God can take the mess and draw a blessing from it, because even though Paul was wrong, I think he was wrong, God blessed him with that. Not having Marcos there, he sought new helpers: Silas and Timothy, and a new blessing was born. He was wrong but at least he was sincere and God blessed him despite; thank God that He blesses us despite everything because He looks at the heart.

And I guess it did Paul good to be the wrong one in this blessing, right? I think it was healthy for him to admit that he was wrong, that I was wrong and Barnabas was right. Bernabé was right and I was, urgh, incorrect. It's hard to say, isn't it?

In the Bible Paul says in a letter that he wrote as an old Apostle, he says: Look for Mark and bring him to me because he is useful to me in the ministry, he said that in the Word of God, he did not admit that it was wrong but Well, he sort of admitted it, right? and it did everyone good, so a necessary and healthy conflict.

I want to talk about another conflict in the Bible in the Book of Philippians chapter 4, as my translator said in the morning: the sisters are not left behind. We have fighting brothers, fighting sisters too. In the Book of Philippians chapter 4 we are going to meet two sisters in Christ called Evodia and Sintique, Evodia and Sintique.

I am going to start in verse 1 of Philippians 4: "So my brothers, beloved and longed for, my joy and crown" Paul is speaking very fondly to the Philippians "so stand firm in the Lord beloved. I pray to Evodia and Sintique that be of one mind in the Lord."

"In the same way, I also beg you faithful companion to help these who fought together with me in the gospel, with Clemente also and the other collaborators of mine whose names are in the Book of Life; Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I say "Rejoice, your kindness be known to all men. The Lord is near."

"Do not be anxious about anything, but let your requests be known before God in all prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus. For the rest, brothers, everything that is true, everything honest, everything just, everything pure, everything kind, everything that is of good name, if there is any virtue, if anything worthy of praise, think about this; What you learned and received or heard , and you saw in me, this do, and the God of peace will be with you." Amen, can you clap the Word of God? this is a good Word.

We know this Word, right? Let's not worry about anything but let's rejoice but we don't know that all this is written in the context of a conflict, these are the medicines for a conflict, for the atmosphere of tension and conflict.

Here we have two strong and feisty sisters right now, right? It seems that the region where they lived, Macedonia, says that this place was famous for having women of character, right? in English "tough cookies" who lived in that town, and it seems that two of them were militia companions for the Apostle Paul. He uses the word "these two fought with me in the gospel" they were warriors, you want them with you in the trenches. I thank God for Evodia and Sintique because they are warriors of the Lord. We need warriors of the Lord, amen? I don't know if there are any but we need them.

If it weren't for Evodia and Sintique we're bad, we're screwed, we need warriors who can fight, who don't receive the enemy's work and resist it and they were like that. Strong people who sometimes, even though they are on the same team, begin to fight among themselves and this is what is happening. They were such powerful leaders, so influential that their discussion deserved a mention in the Word of God, wanting them to calm down so that the entire Church could be healed.

It was a strong conflict, right? of everything to give, and thus it is necessary to heal it. First the Apostle Paul asks for help from a mediator. If you look at verse 3 it says: "I also beg you, faithful companion, to help these who fought with me" so we don't know who the faithful companion is that the Apostle Paul is asking for his help but he is asking this man to meddle to help them resolve their conflict.

Is there anyone here who has tried to do this, who has tried to get into a conflict between two people to seek peace? Has anyone tried to do it? Sometimes it doesn't work very well (laughs). There is a saying in the Book of Proverbs that says: "As grabbing a passing dog by the ears is meddling in someone else's lawsuit." Some say: amen, I did it (laughs).

If you grab the ear of a puppy, a puppy that is not yours, what will the puppy do? He's going to bite your hand, he's going to bite your hand alright? careful. Jesus Himself, there was a moment when a man from the crowd shouted: "Lord Jesus, Master, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." Jesus says: "Man", He uses that in the Bible, He says: "Who made me an arbitrator between you? Beware of greed" right?

Jesus himself, the King of the universe who is going to judge the living and the dead, did not get into a family inheritance conflict, right? so be careful! You want to help but sometimes you're going to do more harm than good. They are big, if they are adults.

But in this context the Apostle Paul asks someone for help, I imagine that the faithful companion was someone known and respected by both women and he asked for his intervention between both women, so this poor man had the assignment of going in and trying to get out in one piece right?

But this is good for us. If we are caught in a conflict and God sends someone who wants to help us, please do not bite him, like a dog whose ear was grabbed, especially if this person is a Shepherd who only wants to help you with good intentions; he's just trying to help so please. You have to get help, you have to get help, right?

Knowing that the person helping is not the bad guy in the movie and neither is the other person, right? the bad guy in the movie is the devil and we're both on the same team against him, we're on the same team here. We also have to be aware of ourselves, self-aware, aware of my own defects that come out in a conflict, right?

The conflict is like heating a substance and impurities, and ugly things that are inside come out like bubbles, during the conflict, and it's ugly, isn't it? I don't know how many here after getting married, you learned ugly things from yourself that you didn't even know existed before, right? Look, as a bachelor you are super good, no problem with anyone, everything calm, good people, married and you say: who is this ugly monster coming out of the inside? it is because it is there, there was no opportunity for it to come out; don't look at yourself, don't look at yourself (laughs).

We have to know my own baggage, my own problems that I have been dragging. It starts here: instead of the evil eye dust that you hate, instead look at the lever that is in your eye, right? We are going to start there because if I work on myself I will be in a better condition to work in healthcare.

There are wounds from the past that arise in a conflict. Sometimes you are not angry with the person himself, sometimes this person reminds you of someone, right? and you're mad at the person he reminds you of.

There are some who prefer to talk to me than to the Pastor because the Pastor reminds them of their dad and it makes them a little afraid, I don't know what, but Gregory he doesn't remind me of dad, no problem, no problem there (laughs), he call transfer right? Now: it's that another person hurt you and this person in this conflict is reminding you of these wounds that still hurts and wow! you give to him or her. You have to let God heal you so that you can be a man, a woman of peace, so that we don't follow patterns of conflict over and over and over again in life.

I have a friend who we had a beautiful conversation, no one here knows him, that was 25 years ago in another state and country, and planet, and continent, they don't know him; but seriously they don't know. And this person went from conflict to conflict, to conflict, losing friend after friend, after friend, he finally saw me as a ministerial figure at that time and told me: Gregory, I think I have finally come to understand the problem. , is that I enter into a friendship and then there are conflicts and I lose the friendship, and then another conflict, and again and again, and again, it has finally been revealed to me what the problem is, I finally understand that I have very bad luck with friends All my friends are bad, I have bad luck, what can be done, I don't know what can be done.

Look, it's repeating the same thing, and the same thing, and the same thing, maybe it's not always everybody else's fault, maybe there's something here that I have to work on. You have to be self-aware, you have to work on the situation.

For this reason the Apostle Paul gives them a recipe on how to detoxify impure air, how to purify the air. I don't know if you know what it's like to be in a conflictive environment, perhaps at work, at church or at home, but there is a toxic air, there is a palpable tension, right? Que feo, in English the word is you have to walk on your toes, andar de puntos. You gotta be really careful because if you say something bad it's going to explode and there's a toxic tension.

You can clear the air if I start here (pointing to the heart) right? It starts with my own heart. I studied, heh, they're going to ask me why you studied that, I don't know. I was bored one day preparing the sermon and I looked for an illustration about how air detoxifiers work, the ones that clean bad odors from the air, right? It seems that there are three ways to air refreshers.

There is one that you have here and it "masks" I probably said just some really bad, it tries to cover (applause) the ugly smell with another smell that is supposed to be a nice fragrance, right? to cover it up, you know how these work, right? not very well, they produce something even uglier. There are others that function as absorbents, they enter the air and absorb the ugly and thus try to clean the air. These work better than the others but not as well because absorbing it doesn't totally absorb it, and in conflicts we don't know that you can't cover up the conflict and put on a happy face, and everything is fine, and underneath the surface we hate each other but there's those fake smiles right? that is not Christian reconciliation, to cover up the ugly smell that exists.

Nor absorb negativity and keep it inside, right? have you tried to do that? and you carry that anger and bitterness until it explodes in an ugly way. There is another way, there is an air cleaner, an air freshener that goes on a chemical level to neutralize the smelly chemicals. I guess my science isn't very well presented, but the idea is to neutralize the ugly at its root and that works better. That can be done if we put these words into practice.

It begins with verse 4: "Rejoice in the Lord always." Again I say: "Rejoice" joy is the antidote to conflicting tension. When there is tension there is no joy, there is anger, we are focused on the ugly, on what we hate, on what bothers us. When there is joy there is freedom, there is laughter, there are jokes, we do not take ourselves very seriously, we are loose. Rejoice but how?

It says: "Your kindness be known to all men, the Lord is near." Know that God is here and can heal you. If Jesus were to come tonight, would this conflict you have have the same importance? Or if Jesus were sitting at the table, would you say what you are about to say?

"Be anxious for nothing, but let your requests be known before God in all prayer and supplication." Pray. Instead of complaining to your friend, complain to God, vent all your frustration to Him, yell at them if you have to but not throw the garbage on the person because God can take it and help you get rid of it.

If you read Moses in the Old Testament he complained to God like a madman. Sometimes she would say: God, who am I, the mother of these people to carry her in my arms? he would cast his burden on God but not leave it there, not just pray: Lord I have to pray for my enemies so I pray for this ugly, bad, malicious person, that You deal with him. The Word says: "With thanksgiving."

If you can take a moment to thank God for the blessing in your life, thank God for the very person who loves the Lord. Tell him: Lord it is bothering me but this person loves you and I thank you for her, help her, help him Lord. Give thanks, take time as a discipline and you begin to see things differently.

"The peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Breathe the peace of God.

Anger doesn't breathe right? when you're very angry it's like holding your breath. With peace you let go, right? like this song that now I want to be removed from this planet "let it go, let it go" my daughter who sings it over and over again, the first song she learned, but there is wisdom in that, right? just let it go, let it go, just let it go, breathe peace.

Think about the good, the kind, the positive, choose a different perspective of the situation, think of a person that you can see as an example in the situation. The Apostle Paul says: "What you learned and received, and heard, and saw in me this do." The God of peace will be with us.

If you don't know how to handle the situation, visualize a person of peace that you know and imitate her, imitate her, just say: wha would so and so do and then try that, and it's probably going to be better than whatever you are about to do, right? Decide: Lord, I am going to visualize what this person of peace would do and I am going to put it into practice, and the God of peace will be with me.

Brothers: we can be sons and daughters of peace, we can be peacemakers, we can detoxify the ugly air that is around us and we can be messages of light in a world of darkness. We have all been hurt in some way in conflicts. People have done things to us, they have said things to us. We have failed others, we have said ugly things to people too, but it is not too late, it is never too late to be healed, right?

You have to be self-aware like my favorite character in Discipleship, Amargalina who goes from conflict to conflict. You can say: Lord I am not perfect but I do not want to be Amargalina, I want to be a son, a daughter of peace. I forgive these people who have hurt me and breathe in Your grace, and I will humble myself, and I will take the first step. I am not going to wait for them to come to me with requests and apologies, I am going to take the first step of laying down the sword and seek peace, and even if they go in other directions it will be with clean air, right? because God is good and wants it to be so.

We pray together and we are going to stand up, we are going to give ourselves to God in that. Oh my God I thank you that you understand us Lord. Thank you Lord because You do not give up on us Lord, Your Apostles fighting at the same table with You but You Lord had patience with them, thank you Lord that You have patience with us too.

I ask you in the Name of Jesus that we all grow to be agents of peace in this world and especially in the Church Lord, that the enemy cannot divide us but that we are fighting in the same army side by side Lord.

I invite you Lord, we are going to take a moment to pray and I invite you to raise your hands to the Lord as a symbol. For me the symbol of a pardon is the opposite of a fist, it is the open hand. I encourage you and if you want to do it, you don't have to, but if you want to open your hands to the Lord and release situations to Him, and release people to Him, people who have hurt you, that you have the right to be angry but that does not nothing good, let go, let this hand be open before God.

And now I invite you to breathe the peace of the Lord. May the Peace of Christ that surpasses all understanding guard your heart and mind, may there be peace, joy, laughter and freedom Lord. Lord we are going to spend eternity together in heaven so we better reconcile here cuz we are stuck with each other. So I ask you Lord for reconciliations here, that Your Kingdom come, that Your Will be done as it is in heaven, that it be done here in León de Judá and in my life, in my house that it be so.

May Your brothers, Your children, Lord, live in harmony because there You send the blessing of the Holy Spirit and revival comes when the people of God are willing to be formed in this way, let it be done in the Name of Jesus, amen.