It is a sad reality of life that all of us will have conflict with someone. It will rarely blow up into the ridiculous war that is continuing in Ukraine, and hopefully it won’t end up in the actions of Joab we will read about in church. But you can expect to have conflict with someone at some time in your life.
What can be harder to comprehend is the reality that this will also happen in churches. Many – too many – churches have divided and been nearly destroyed because of a conflict that could not be resolved.
Is this the way of the kingdom of Jesus?
Today we will read about a bloke named Joab and a king named David. Their actions are completely different to each other. One is working to unite the kingdom and the other will show us How Not To Unite a Kingdom.
Some instructions to the church from Romans 15 will also help us to know how to deal with relationships in church.