Confrontation must be avoided at all costs … right?
Let me be very honest: I HATE confrontation. My heart begins to beat a little faster, my hands get sweaty, and my voice actually begins to shake just a little.
If I had my way, I would prefer to never have to have an issue in which I had to confront someone. But one of the things I have realized in the past 20 years of being a leader is that running from confrontation is NEVER the right thing to do.
Hey, I do the “spiritual thing” and pray about the potential issue I need to confront. I pray for God to change their heart. I pray for God to change my heart. I pray for Jesus to return so I won’t have to deal with the issue.
I am discovering more and more that God rarely brings a situation to a leader’s attention so we can “pray about it.” He wants us to do something about it.
The other day, my wife and I were discussing this, and she pointed out Acts 13:6-12 where the Apostle Paul had to make a decision: Do I confront this situation or just let it go?
If he confronted it, then he was going to have to do it right then and there, be willing to embarrass the dude, and quite possibly have people think he was a mean person who didn’t show much “grace.”
However, if he would have “prayed about it” and let it go, hundreds, if not thousands of people could have been led astray.
So he did the right thing and went off on this dude. (Please notice he wasn’t very nice!) And what was the result? People wound up receiving Jesus!
Leaders, the stakes are way too high for us to run from the situations that God clearly brings to our attention. (Most likely, the situation isn’t going to “just go away” or “solve itself.” There is a reason God brought it to your attention.)
One thing about this before I move on: Paul’s confrontation was rooted in biblical accuracy, not based on personal preferences. We cannot, as leaders, allow personal preferences to become precepts that we try to pound into people.
But when the confrontation is brought to our attention BY GOD, it has to be dealt with if we are going to continue to become the leaders He wants us to be.
