Kevin Thompson [00:00:00]:
Hey. Welcome back to Change the Odds, the podcast where marriage and family were never meant to be a game of chance. My name is Kevin Thompson. Without Blaine and Adrienne, they are still not here because today we're going to look at a talk that I gave several months ago. A church asked me to come and speak on a very specific topic, how to fight fair. It's an important topic within the field of marriage because I would say if you ask the average couple what's the one place that you need to improve, they would say communication.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:27]:
And.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:27]:
And all of fighting, all of tension within a marriage really many times comes down to this idea of communication. How do we properly communicate what we're feeling and thinking in a way that's true and honest, that we're not holding back, we're not causing our spouse to read between the lines, but at the same time, we're not coming in overbearing and in no way causing them to shut down. But instead, disconnection has occurred. Disagreement exists in some way. How can I lay my heart out on the table? How can I create a climate where Jenny can lay her heart out on the table? And then as we communicate with each other, how do we do so in a God honoring, spouse honoring and loving kind of way? To the extent that that conflict actually spurs us on to love each other better, that's kind of the surprising thing. I think whenever you look at the difference between healthy couples and unhealthy couples, it's not that they really differ in how much conflict they have. Instead, it is what happens with that conflict. And in an unhealthy couple, conflict creates disconnection that extends over a long period of time, which then begins to train many couples to actually have less conflict.
Kevin Thompson [00:01:34]:
But if you can learn how to navigate and negotiate and communicate in a very proper way, it actually brings more availability for you to share your opinion, to make changes, to communicate. I don't like something. How can we navigate not into a different direction? It empowers you to take ownership within your relationship and to transform it in many ways. So if you can learn to fight fair, it can have a dramatic impact on your relationship. So I use a very simple couple of points here to understand how we can fight in a more fair way. Now, I get that just listening to one talk isn't going to dramatically change what you're doing, but begin to pick up these points and begin to ask, alright, which of those do I need to research more? And then we have blog posts that change the odds. Obviously, you can go to kevinathompson.com or there's other resources that are out there, but if you can just make a 10% improvement on how to fight more fair with your spouse, I think it can have a great impact on your relationship. So before we go to the video, before we go to our friends down at Shelter Cove in Modesto where I got a chance to speak, don't forget, like or subscribe to Change the Odds, the podcast on Apple on Spotify.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:41]:
Leave a comment, let us know how we're doing. As we head into the next year of filming, we want to make the most engaging format that we possibly can. And don't forget, this is a part of a larger network, the Thrive Podcast family. And so look at what Leslie has going on with Morgan and Am I Doing This Right? Mark Clark Podcast.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:59]:
Listen to his old sermons.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:01]:
The Bible study podcast with Curt and Dena can deepen your spiritual life. We have a wide offering here within the Thrive Podcast family. Would love for you to connect in some way. But now inside the worship center at Modesto, California, Shelter Cove, our friends that are there and we're going to learn how to fight fair.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:18]:
Good morning, Shelter Cove. Great to see if you have your Bibles. I hope you do. Turn with me to Proverbs, chapter 12. If you don't, we have some kind ushers who are coming down. Be happy to give you a Bible. You can grab one of those and take it with you. It's great to be here.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:30]:
I'm kind of excited. You know, I've had a couple of my friends and co workers over these last few months. I know Pastor Ray Johnston was here. Brannon Shortt was here. He wrapped for you. Don't expect that from me today. Jason Caine was here as well. So I'm just thrilled that y' all got to see them.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:45]:
They got to see you. But I am a little bit possessive. So I told them, hey, those are my people. Don't mess with them like that. It's just such an honor to be here. Last time I was here was beginning of January. And I know that because I preached here on Sunday morning felt great. And by the time I got back two hours later to Auburn, I had the flu.
Kevin Thompson [00:04:02]:
And so y' all are a very giving church. And so our whole family ended up getting it. It was a great week. But so it's an honor to be back with you today. Proverbs chap 12 is where we're going to be in just a moment. A decade ago, Mark and Michelle were madly in love. What began as a chance meeting and Then a year long romance ended with them standing in front of a pastor, committing their earthly lives solely to one another. And yet a couple of kids and a decade later they are no longer standing in front of a pastor committing vows.
Kevin Thompson [00:04:34]:
Instead they're seated in front of a counselor, kind of airing grievances. And so what feels to them is so unpredictable, so uncertain to the counselor is actually extremely predictable. Michelle grew up in a great home, loving parents, all those things, a warm childhood. But in retrospect, you can actually kind of begin to see that while her parents loved her greatly, they didn't lack love, but they sometimes did lack skill in recognizing her needs, meeting her needs with an older sibling that had more demands and more needs, kind of wrapped up in their own anxiety. There were many times in which they responded to Michelle's needs properly. There are other times in which they did not, which created a Michelle kind of almost a response that you would get from a slot machine of if it hits, that's great, but you don't know if it's gonna hit or not. And so she kind of lives in a constant state of alert that even when things are going bad, she's wondering when's the other shoe gonna drop. Always afraid that somebody might leave her almost on a heightened sense of alert of anything that's wrong or bad, which is great for her in many ways, makes her very compassionate, concerning and aware for other people.
Kevin Thompson [00:05:43]:
But in relationships it can have a downside where sometimes she can actually even to some things that aren't even there, and take them personally, then be afraid that something is wrong. Mark grew up, again, great family, great parents who loved him tremendously. But as the youngest child and the youngest boy with older siblings who were girls, he kind of was raised in a home where kind of an old school, you didn't really feel much. If you were a guy, you had to buck up. You had to be more stoic. Whenever he cried, it's not that his dad said, don't cry, it's that his dad kind of wouldn't give that any attention or any affirmation. And so he kind of began to write the story that feelings aren't really that important. I just wanna be logical and I need to take care of myself.
Kevin Thompson [00:06:26]:
Which makes him a great provider, a great man in so many ways. And yet there is just a little bit of a mindset within him that relationships are kind of a drag, that they're, you know, the old ball and chain that I don't want anybody to encroach in on. Who I am and with these backgrounds that Mark and Michelle kind of were attracted to each other. Michelle was attracted to this person that was strong and stoic. And what would it be, she thought, to not really care what anybody thinks about you. And she's so driven by her emotions. She saw Mark now as a rock. And Mark was attracted to Michelle, this person that was warm and feeling and caring and compassionate.
Kevin Thompson [00:07:06]:
And so Mark kind of thought that relationships are something to be achieved, something that you gain. So he had to go out and win the girl. So he went out and won the girl, and he was a great partner in the dating process and wooed her over, and all those things happen. But the moment that that wedding happened, Mark had achieved the relationship. And from that moment, a switch took place in his brain subconsciously that now I gotta make sure that I keep my distance because I do not want to lose myself in this enmeshment of this relationship. And now they were on track for this kind of rocky concept. Michelle always on heightened alert of is he gonna leave me? Is something gonna go wrong? Mark always on heightened alert of is she gonna be too needy and encroach too much upon me? And so something would trigger, and Michelle maybe would overread that Mark was gonna distance. And she would panic, causing her to reach out emotionally to try to get closer to him.
Kevin Thompson [00:08:05]:
Because if he leaves, then who is she? Or something would trigger, and Mark would overread that Michelle's being too needy. And he would begin to run, even though she wasn't reaching out, but he would take a step away, which causes her to kind of panic and stick take a step close toward him, which causes him to begin to run, which causes her to begin to chase even more, which causes him to run even faster, which causes her to run even faster. And it's an exhausting way to live. Until finally, whatever this episode was, they would be tired of running, and they would find a way to connect. And whenever they would connect, Michelle in that moment would think, oh, finally, we've had a breakthrough. It will forever be like this. Then Mark would think, oh, finally, I appeased her. I'll never have to do that again.
Kevin Thompson [00:08:48]:
And they're actually set up for the next fight. And what happens in the midst of that type of relationship is they're actually both being solely run by their own feelings and emotions. But only she recognized that's true of her. He doesn't recognize it's true of him. Equally, they, in every case, assume the worst about the other. Michelle assumes Mark's always Going to lead Mark is assuming Michelle's always going to be too needy. And so everything is viewed through this lens of interpreting everything through the worst lens. Neither one ever really takes time out to consider the perspective of the other because they're so fixated on themselves and panicked and hurting so much inside.
Kevin Thompson [00:09:39]:
They try to communicate that hurt, but not knowing how to communicate that hurt. They literally do what hurt people do. They try to cause the same pain in the other so that the other will understand what they're going through. And the relationship is run by disrespect. If you want to handle conflict poorly, that's how you. That's how you do it. That's how you fight unfairly, let emotion drive you, but never recognize it, assume the worst about the other, never include the other person, and live in a constant state of disrespect. But that's not our assignment here today.
Kevin Thompson [00:10:18]:
Our assignment that Jo has asked me to talk about is how do you fight fairly well? That's the complete opposite. That's what we're going to see in Proverbs chapter 12 as we're in this series on words. Jeremy talked about three weeks ago that words matter. Chad talked about two weeks ago that words are an overflow of the heart. So if you want to change your words, you actually change your heart. Bob talked about last week. In our most intimate relationships, we want to build up, not tear down. And now we read as kind of the image of a father writing to a son, warning him about the things of life.
Kevin Thompson [00:10:48]:
He uses these words. Proverbs 12:18. The words of the reckless pierced like swords, but the tongue of the wise brings healing. So just from where we are in the Bible, we kind of know, understand we haven't gotten to the Gospels yet. Jesus isn't here yet. We've got the Old Testament history. So we understand Israel has proven themselves faithless, that they're in desperate need of a Savior. We cannot save ourselves.
Kevin Thompson [00:11:10]:
But here in the wisdom literature now, it's pointing to God's creative order within the world. And one day, God is gonna make wisdom abundantly clear through his Son, Jesus. And so, as so often happens in Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, you have this division now that takes place. So in Psalms, it's the righteous and the unrighteous, and the Proverbs, it's the wise and the foolish, or in this text, the wise and the reckless. And it shows us two different types of ways to live. It immediately helps us understand, even in this room right now, Are you a follower of Jesus or not? Not. Did your mama to believe or your grandmama believe, or you walk the aisle one day, or did you get baptized? Are you living your life in response to what Jesus has done for you? If so, then you can now that you are part of the righteous doesn't mean what you do is righteous. It means what God is doing through you now is righteous.
Kevin Thompson [00:11:59]:
And yet if you are not there, the Bible is gonna say that you are the unrighteous and righteous acts, wise acts lead to life, unrighteous acts, foolish acts, lead to death. And yet, even if you or I are a follower of Jesus Christ, we still have this ability to at times not choose to go the way of Jesus, the way that leads to life, but instead to go back into our old ways of life and to follow the path of death. And so even though I'm a follower of Jesus, I can still be reckless. And anytime I am reckless now, the text says what happens that the words of the reckless pierce like a sword? Have you ever had somebody say something to you that there was almost a physical response, like a gut punch, like it stung right to the heart? A careless word by a child on the playground. I just have the image and you're the teacher. It still hurts. A spouse says something, a parent, and it just pierces like a sword. That's what our careless words do.
Kevin Thompson [00:13:11]:
Proverbs 18:21 says, the power of the tongue holds life and death, that we literally can speak death into people. And what the writer of the Proverbs saying is that pierces us. The words of the reckless pierce like swords, but the tongue, interesting he uses that word there. He doesn't say words here as parallelism. It'd be words. Why does he use the word tongue? He's playing off the word sword because the shape of the tongue is like a sword. He's showing you now the power that you have that can cut through flesh and bone. And said the words now the tongue now of the wise bring healing.
Kevin Thompson [00:13:49]:
And so whenever I allow my speech to be impacted by what God has done for me, instead of bringing death, I actually bring healing. So how is it that we navigate through conflict in a way that ends in healing rather than in a way that ends in death? Well, first I think we have to come to this concept of just conflict in general. Conflict is not a bad thing. We're fallen people that live in a fallen world. We're guaranteed to experience conflict. And yet, based on our families of origin or own past experiences, it's easy for Us to write the wrong story about conflict. So some just avoid it at all costs. You've had negative experiences.
Kevin Thompson [00:14:30]:
Maybe you grew up in a home that was somewhat chaotic and you just don't wanna repeat the yelling and the shouting and the danger to your own life. Or you grew up in a home where they just avoided any issue whatsoever. You just pretended like everything was okay, so you have no idea how to deal with conflict. Others grew up in a home or a family of origin in which you're actually seeking out conflict. It was the only way you were able to ever. The only way you were ever able to be seen. If you acted right and everything was great and peaceful, you went unseen. But if you lashed out, then you were cared for.
Kevin Thompson [00:14:59]:
And so you have trained your brain now to search for conflict. And both of those are horrible ways to go about it. Yet here's the truth. No relationship has ever been broken by conflict. You say, kevin, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my entire life. But it's true. Conflict does not end relationships. An inability to navigate conflict ends relationships.
Kevin Thompson [00:15:24]:
It's a skill. It's actually a skill that we learn like anything else. And some of you were blessed enough to grow up in homes. You didn't know you were learning this skill, but your emotions were recognized and valued. And so you can properly place yourself in a situation and say, here's what I believe and here's what I think, and here's what I feel, and somebody else can do the exact same thing. And that doesn't offend you, doesn't cause you to diminish yourself or to overly lash out, and instead, both of the people can bring their concerns to the table and you can figure out a way forward, and conflict actually draws you closer together. Do you recognize that the belief is that healthy marriages have less conflict and unhealthy marriages have more conflict when the exact opposite is actually true? Healthy marriages have more conflict.
Kevin Thompson [00:16:10]:
Why?
Kevin Thompson [00:16:10]:
Because they can. They can deal with them. Unhealthy marriages, you have to avoid conflict. And so it's actually whenever you know how to navigate disagreements, that that conflict then becomes a source of growth and you can move forward. Cause the truth of the matter is no growth happens without conflict. And so if you tell me, well, in our marriage, we never have conflict, I'm not saying you never fight. I mean, based on personalities, you may never have what other people would consider a fight. But if you say you never have a disagreement, I would say there's a bunch of stuff you're Avoiding and your marriage, your relationship isn't where it could possibly be.
Kevin Thompson [00:16:51]:
And so if you didn't grow up in a family of origin where you learned this skill of conflict, you as an adult are now responsible to learn that skill. Well, how do you do it? Well, counselors can help, no question. But there are great books out there. William Ury just released a tremendous book. I just read it, and it's now in my top five favorite books of all time. It's called Possible. Just how do you negotiate in the midst of difficulty? Carrie Patterson wrote a book called Crucial Conversations, a brilliant book to tell us how we deal with our conversation. My favorite author ever wrote the book.
Kevin Thompson [00:17:20]:
Happily, it just happens to be in your bookstore. It's by Kevin A. Thompson. It's a brilliant author, and it just happens to be in the bookstore today. Coincidence. It's amazing how that happened. But I actually wrote this Toward marriage. But I had a friend who recently read it and said, hey, it didn't help my marriage at all, but it transformed my workplace.
Kevin Thompson [00:17:37]:
I'm like, well, let's talk about your marriage. But it helped the workplace. But it's this idea of taking the words of Jesus and how do we deal with conflict? If you don't know how to handle it, you need to learn it. That's a skill that you need to learn. So let's look at some of the characteristics that I kind of talk about in the book today. How do we fight fair? So we're gonna take the word fair, F A I R, and just kind of use it as an acrostic to show some characteristics of what it looks like to use our words in a way that leads to life instead of in a way that leads to death. So F A, I'm going to give you four points. I'm going to give you all of them off the top.
Kevin Thompson [00:18:11]:
And then we'll kind of go where we want to go from there. So F A I R fair. The first thing that we got to do is feel the issue. Feel the issue, assume the best, include others, specifically the other. And respectfully. F A I R. That's the extent of my Arkansas spelling ability. F A I R.
Kevin Thompson [00:18:44]:
Feel the issue, assume the best, include the other or others respectfully. Let's kind of dance around those, intermingle those where I'm Baptist. I'm not going to do literal dancing, but so feel the issue. Kerry Patterson says in his book Crucial Conversations, he gives us what he calls the pathway to action. He said every action is based on a feeling.
Kevin Thompson [00:19:08]:
Here's how it goes.
Kevin Thompson [00:19:09]:
You and I see and hear things, we take things in, we interpret them, we feel, and then we act. So Patterson is gonna say, every action is based on a feeling. If you wanna know why you're doing what you're doing, ask, what is it I'm feeling right now? Every feeling then leads to an action. Every action is actually caused by a feeling. Now, some of us object to that. We think, no, we have written the story. Logic is good, feeling is bad. And the problem with the world is that we're too emotional.
Kevin Thompson [00:19:36]:
We need to be more logical. And so we think to ourselves, if I can just get to the facts, if I can just get to the logic, get rid of the feelings, that will lead me to wisdom. But actually, that's a false dichotomy. Kirk Thompson, the Christian psychiatrist, is going to say that it is logic plus emotion that leads to wisdom. That if you take emotion out of that, if all you have is logic, Logic does not equal wisdom. Why is that? It's because that emotion allows us to properly prioritize logical facts. That without emotion, you could hear three facts and you would not have the ability to rearrange those into order of priority. Instead, you would just be stuck to deal with the order in which they were given to you.
Kevin Thompson [00:20:19]:
So if I said, hey, it's Sunday morning, I'm hungry, and your car is on fire, without emotion, you would not be able to process through and logically put the third idea up as the first idea and say, I need to take action on that. It is emotion that allows you to understand that your car on fire is more important than my hunger. And so it's logic plus emotion. Now, some of us wanna just throw logic out and go, well, whatever I feel matters. And culture kind of says that today, whatever I feel matters. But emotion does not lead to wisdom. Instead, it's logic plus emotion. We have to wed the two together, literally wedding together, integrating the left side of the brain and the right side of the brain to have a wholeness of health so that we can get to wisdom.
Kevin Thompson [00:21:03]:
Emotion matters. And yet, so often we try to operate at the surface level with what we're seeing, not getting down to what other people in ourselves are feeling, to where we end up being run by our emotions. And we never recognize that. Let me show you what this looks like. And you can take any given relationship. I deal a lot with marriage, and so I'll just use the marriage example, but you can take this as your boss, kids, whatever. So imagine this table creates kind of now a plane that's out there. And what's above the table is what's seen.
Kevin Thompson [00:21:36]:
What's below the table is what's felt. And so imagine on one side you have a wife, and on the other side, you have a husband. So the wife is gonna have feelings, and then there's gonna be actions. The husband's gonna have feelings, and then there's gonna be actions. So let's say that there's something that now triggers feelings inside of her. You can take any example that you want. I'll just go hypothetically, you know, from my own house this weekend. So let's say Jenny walks dishes everywhere in the sink.
Kevin Thompson [00:22:10]:
The feeling in that moment can be, I'm unseen, unvalued, unheard, unappreciated, taken advantage of. Now, Wisdom then says, okay, I now need to take what's underneath the table and put it on top of the table for other people to understand, because they can't see what's going on below the table in my life, just like I can't see what's going on below the table in their life. It is now my responsibility to surface that which is below. And so in wisdom, she says, hey, whenever I walk in here and I see these dishes, I feel like I'm alone in this. And I feel unseen, unvalued, unheard. How can we go about this? However, a vast majority of us do not have that type of maturity. And so we feel this. And either we know we're feeling it, but we don't have the courage to express it, or more often, we don't recognize what the trigger is causing us to feel.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:13]:
We don't even recognize it. All we know is we don't like it. And so instead of bringing our emotion to the surface, we protest in some way. And we might hypothetically say, hey, does nobody care about these dishes? Dishes which now notice this. You and I do not speak to just the surface of the other person. We speak to the heart of the other person. And so whenever you say, does anybody not care about these dishes? Then hypothetically, the husband then might feel attacked. So it's not just a failure of action.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:52]:
It's actually a failure of heart. She thinks I don't love her. She thinks, I'm not good enough. And it rises within him all these emotions of shame, of guilt, of fear. Now, wisdom brings to surface those emotions, hey, I know you don't mean it this way. I kind of feel ashamed and afraid, and let's reconnect and then deal with the issue. But most of us aren't mature enough to do that. And so instead, we have those emotions, but we surface defensiveness.
Kevin Thompson [00:24:28]:
Well, I was busy. I'd been at work all week. And then I took care of the kids, and it was really hot on the golf course. And so whenever I came home, I was tired. And he responds in defensiveness. Now, notice this. She needs to be seen, valued, heard, and loved. That's what she needs.
Kevin Thompson [00:24:52]:
He speaks about himself, which causes her to feel less seen, valued, heard, or understood or appreciated, which then surfaces a greater protest. Well, you never. You always allow this to happen. We've talked about this. And you never. Which now causes him to feel even more attacked, shamed, and afraid, which causes him either to up his defensiveness, sometimes by a verbal attack to prove that he's not the bad guy, she's the bad guy. Or he shuts down. And so let's say he shuts down.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:37]:
Well, that now makes her feel even less seen, appreciated, or valued because he has actually now stepped out of the relationship. And what you have here is what's called the infinity loop. And this just continues as they play off of each other. Because what's happening is they're having these emotions, and those emotions are so fraught with fear and danger that when we come to the surface, we pull our swords and we think we're stabbing this way, but we're actually stabbing that way into the very heart of the other person, which obviously causes this person to feel attacked. Now, if this person would have the wisdom and in the context of a healthy relationship, could be able to take the first verbal jab and not respond to it, everything would cease. But so often when this person is stabbed, they pull their swords and they stab back. And you say, ah, Kevin, I see the problem. If women would just start better, none of this would happen.
Kevin Thompson [00:26:45]:
Okay, let's flip the genders. Hypothetically. I know this never happens in your house. Let's flip the genders. The husband feels unseen, unheard, unvalued, and unwanted. And so he, instead of communicating that, he protests. I thought we were gonna have sex. Well, now she feels defensive, shamed, afraid, tired.
Kevin Thompson [00:27:08]:
That sounds exhausting to her. But instead of expressing that, instead of expressing a desire for you. But I don't feel like it right now. She gets defensive. Well, we just had it the other day. I thought you were happy with it. The other day, he. Now, because she is focused on herself, not him, feels more unseen, unheard, unvalued, protests even more.
Kevin Thompson [00:27:31]:
I don't know if we're ever going to have sex. Again, she now feels even more attacked to where either she doubles down on her defensiveness. Well, you're just perverted with how much you want it. Or she shuts down, which causes him to feel more unseen, unheard, unvalued, and unwanted. And the loop continues. And at no point is anybody recognizing wisely what's underneath the table in the life of the other person and in my life. And so they never feel the issue. And when you and I do not recognize feelings, it actually empowers them to reign over us.
Kevin Thompson [00:28:20]:
And so what happens is we then remove logic from the equation, and we're literally driven by emotion, even when half of us probably don't even know what emotion is, much less have the language communicated. You and I have to learn now to feel the issue. What's going on underneath? What's the true fear there? Why, whenever I bring this issue to the table, why is my boss so defensive? How are my words actually speaking to her heart, to his heart? What is it? Whenever I confront this issue in the house with my kids, what is it that they're feeling in this moment? If you and I never consider the feeling of the issue, we will be ruled by the feelings and have no chance at having some kind of resolution. We have to, first and foremost feel the issue for most in almost every scenario. Why is it. Why is it you can walk in the kitchen one time and there'd be full of dishes, and you think, oh, man. What man? God, thank you for this family I have. What an honor it is to be a mom and a wife, and it's so exciting.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:32]:
And now you're doing the dishes while singing praises to God. And there's other times you walk in and see the dishes, and you're like, where's the gun? Same situation. Why is it that sometimes she can say no, and you're like, fine, I'll go to sleep. I'll have some ice cream. Not a big deal. And other times, she can say no, and you're like, nobody wants me. What's the difference? I think the difference is the level of attention. You and I were created by God to be seen, heard, valued, understood, recognized.
Kevin Thompson [00:30:06]:
And when you and I are not getting the attention that we need specifically from the people who love us the most, it causes a panic within us. And so often, whenever that panic rises up, we either don't know what's going on, or we don't have the courage to say what's going on. And so we protest. And so in marriage, I call it marriage, attention deficit disorder. That's why you're mad. It's not the issue. It's the lack of attention. And so if you go all week in which you feel connected and there's a strong partnership and everything's going great, and you're navigating this crazy life together and he's serving and she's serving and everything's going well, she can walk in, see the dishes in the sink, and think, thank you, Jesus, for this family I have.
Kevin Thompson [00:30:54]:
He can hear no to sex and think, ah, that's fine. We'll have it tomorrow night. And everything is great. But the moment you feel taken advantage of, lonely, unseen, unvalued, you walk and you see something or you hear the word no, and the fight is on. Why? Because your system is crying out, somebody pay attention to me. And that's not wrong, that's not selfish. That's how God created you. And then he created a family of relationships in which we get to speak life into other people and say, I see you.
Kevin Thompson [00:31:19]:
But so often, at the very moment that we could wisely speak healing into the lives of people, we draw our swords and we try to kill them. Feel the issue. You gotta feel it now. For some. For some, you grew up in a house where feelings were never recognized. And you literally do not. Only you do not have the capability to recognize feelings within yourself. You do not have the language to even communicate that feeling.
Kevin Thompson [00:31:41]:
And then you don't have the courage to actually say, here's what I'm feeling. You're gonna have to go through some special training. Men actually have to begin to learn to pick it out, figure it out, and to have people assist you. Hey, here's maybe what you're feeling, right? And for others, we just have to begin to learn. How can I, with courage and in safety, communicate the feeling? You have to feel the issue. And then you need to assume the best. Now, in a healthy relationship, in a healthy church, you just need to assume the best. You've heard me say it before, that everything Jenny does, I evaluate through this lens of, Jenny loves me and she's for me.
Kevin Thompson [00:32:24]:
She's proven 24 years, she loves me and she's for me. She would never do anything to intentionally hurt me. When she does do things that hurt me, she's so quick to make amends, to reconcile. Jenny loves me and she's for me. So everything she does, I interpret now through that lens. What is the best interpretation of whatever it is that she just did? What is the absolute best interpretation? I can take from that? Because that is far more likely to be true. And so I'm walking out of the house and she goes, you, you wearing that? She loves me and she's for me. She wants what's best for me.
Kevin Thompson [00:32:58]:
And so when relationships get unhealthy, we tend to assume the worst. Isn't that what you do with your political opponent? Just assume the absolute worst? Whatever is the worst interpretation of what they think that describes them all. Here's what we do. We look at people who vote or think differently than us. We find the worst example among them and then say, see, that's what they're all like. But don't you hate it when people do that to you? When Christians act like fools and your lost co worker that you're friend with goes, see, that's what Christians are like. How much do I hate it when a pastor's in the headlines and I got people that say, see, that's what a pastor is like. I'm like, no, what about me? Pastors are like me.
Kevin Thompson [00:33:51]:
And they go, no, no, take the worst of who you are. And that's what you're all like. That's assuming the worst. What would it be like to assume the best? This week there was somebody I would never in a million years vote for, ever vote for. And they said something foolish. And whenever I first read it, I'm like, huh, See, that's why. Look at how horrible they are. A friend of mine had texted me, hey, did you see this statement? I'm like, yeah, that's how bad they are.
Kevin Thompson [00:34:16]:
Look at that. And then I saw the actual clip. Instead of just reading, I saw the actual clip and I noticed to stumble over some words. And then I was like, oh, I've been there. I don't think they meant it that way. And I texted my friend back and I said, hey, good news. They're not as bad as we thought they were. I don't think they meant to say that.
Kevin Thompson [00:34:39]:
And my friend said, I can't believe you're defending this person. I said, I'm not. I'm just saying in this case, I don't think they're that bad. In all these other cases, I think they are, but in this case, I don't think they are. That's what we should bring to life, to assume the best until proven otherwise. And so at work, why everybody else is assuming the worst? What would it be like if you came in and assumed the best? What's the most generous interpretation with what this person is saying in this moment? And I'm going to Assume with generosity that that is what they meant. Until proven otherwise, it would change everything. But instead, we assume the worst and we draw our swords.
Kevin Thompson [00:35:27]:
So we need to feel the issue. We need to assume the best. Then we need to include others. And specifically, if it's a marriage, include the other. In parenting, include the other, the child. And it's just this idea of, okay, we disagree here. Well, what do you know that I don't? What perspective do you have that I don't? I remember it had been a couple years ago. My mom comes in for a month at a time about three times a year from Arkansas.
Kevin Thompson [00:35:56]:
I tell my sister that we share custody with her, and so she might be watching in Arkansas right now. As a matter of fact, my sister's not, but she doesn't care what I say. But my mom might be. We were sitting on the couch. We're watching a basketball game. Duke is playing Arkansas. Duke has Mike Krzyzewski, hall of Fame coach. Right? Forever.
Kevin Thompson [00:36:12]:
All those kinds. I mean, Arkansas won, but so he makes a coaching decision. And my mom, who, by the way, earlier in the game had said, man, he looks bad. How old is he? And I said, your age. And so it was true. It was just true. She said, I can't believe he's doing that. That's wrong.
Kevin Thompson [00:36:37]:
And I thought, how fascinating is this? We've all been there. You have a Hall of Fame basketball coach making a decision. My mom disagrees with it. And my mom's first assumption is not, huh, I wonder what he knows that I don't. It was, meh, idiot. He's wrong. What causes that within us? Instead of beginning to say, hey, I haven't spent my life in basketball. I wonder what he knows that I don't know.
Kevin Thompson [00:37:06]:
Let's bring that to the table. You see, so often, whenever it comes to conflict, we are so fixated on making our point that we never are influenced by the perspective of the other person. John Gottman, the great marriage expert, says that whenever it comes to marriage that fights can be divided or conflict can be divided into resolvable issues and unresolvable issues. So resolvable issues are. There is a clear right and wrong. There's a definite of how this needs to be done. Unresolvable issues are. There's no clear right and wrong.
Kevin Thompson [00:37:39]:
These are just different perspectives. And so you wanna load the dishwasher one way, this other person wants to load the dishwasher this other way. There's no. I mean, there's the way we're gonna do it, but there's no right or wrong in all of that. It's just a different perspective, you, different backgrounds, upbringings, personalities. We just disagree. We just see life differently. And whenever you see life differently in an issue that is unresolvable, you need to learn from the other person and maybe you'll find an even better way together.
Kevin Thompson [00:38:03]:
Here's what Gottman says. Only 30% of the arguments that couples have are actually resolvable 70% of the time. The conflict that you have in marriage is not the difference between a right or wrong. It's the difference between differing perspectives. And yet notice this. If you litigate that as though there is a definite right or wrong, you are engaging in an activity that can have no resolution whatsoever and can only break the relationship. What would happen if instead you, in humility, said, here's the way I see the issue. Help me understand how you see the issue and then together recognize there's no right or wrong.
Kevin Thompson [00:38:39]:
Let's figure out together how we're going to move forward. What would it look like if we included one another instead of just proving our way right? What would it look like if we did that politically? You know, the greatest indicator of your politics is not your faith, it is your zip code. Tell me how you vote and I can in no way predict whether or not you're a Christian. Tell me your zip code and I can almost guarantee you I know your political affiliation to such an extent that I learned to preach from a white man from Nebraska and a black man from Cincinnati. They never voted in the same election the same way. They both love Jesus. What was the difference? Not their faith, it was their zip code which impacted just how they viewed issues. They both expressed their faith through their political parties.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:26]:
They just elevated different issues in different ways. And so what would it look like if we begin to recognize it's not our. It's not we're right and they're wrong. It is we have these different perspectives. What is it that we're getting right? What is it that they're getting right? What is it that maybe we're getting wrong? What is it that maybe they're getting wrong? And then how can we make move forward? That's how you have productive conflict. But if all you do is exclude others and promote your own way, you're guaranteed to just have this constant friction. So we gotta feel the issue, we gotta assume the best. We gotta include the other, specifically others, and then we gotta respect fully if my kids were here.
Kevin Thompson [00:40:12]:
This has been a core value of our family for some time. And so if they were here and you were to ask them, hey, what are the Thompson family values? They would roll their eyes and then they would quote all five things with one of them being respectfully. And if you were to ask my 18 year old daughter with down syndrome, hey, what does it mean to respect fully, she would say this. She would say, it means that we live lives worthy of respect. Our actions are not dictated by anybody else. We get to choose how we're gonna be, and we're gonna live a way that others should respect us. And then it means we're gonna treat others with respect whether they deserve it or not. At minimum, now there's an aspect of respect that's earned, but at minimum, every person you meet deserves a base level of respect because they are created in the image of God, which means in this culture where everybody is feeling afraid and uncertain and unseen and unheard and unvalued, and yet nobody has the courage to say that they will stand up and in defense of their own endangered hearts, draw their swords and stab anybody that comes their way, including us.
Kevin Thompson [00:41:33]:
And when they begin to protect themselves and stab us with a sword that pierces, we feel it and it hurts. And we experience that pain. But then we stand up and we choose not to draw our sword because Jesus has already drawn his and we keep it at our side. And having received the grace of God, we speak into the heart of the other person. Not death, but life. We defend not ourselves, but we try to defend them. And in so doing, we have an ability, the church should have this ability to add to a de escalation of all the conflict around us. You know what breaks my heart as a pastor? We've seen it, even this week, that as a lost and dying and hurting world, feels the lostness of their own hearts and souls out of fear, they stand up and they draw their swords and they strike whoever is around, including us.
Kevin Thompson [00:42:35]:
And we, receiving those hurtful wounds without thought, stand up and draw our swords by our back. And we add to the chaos of this world when Jesus has called us to be salt and light and to live in light of response of what God has done for us to such an extent that we do not treat others based on how they've treated us. We treat others based on how God himself has treated us. And so we give a grace that is not deserved to such an extent that should cause other people to begin to question, what is your motive? What is your intention? How is it that you can live in this dangerous world and never draw your sword? Which empowers us to say, oh, it's only because of Jesus. The sword, the words of the reckless pierced like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing. That's what you get to leave this place and do in this lost and dying world. Would you bow your heads in prayer with me, most gracious Heavenly Father? This isn't an easy task. I don't take it lightly, Father.
Kevin Thompson [00:43:42]:
I just pray that as people leave this room that they would not leave this message here, that they wouldn't just go out and try to do better themselves because that's going to last 20 minutes, but instead that they would be empowered by the Holy Spirit to draw closer and closer to you, to allow a transformation to take place that slowly, over time begins to build within them. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control that actually begins to impact the words they use. Use that brings life to Modesto, to California and the world. It's in Jesus name that we pray. Amen.