Dealing with the Difficult

This is not a book about dealing with difficult people, for there are many with their various personality traits.  That would be a challenge. Many of them could be helped with loving counsel and discipline, but that is not my area of expertise. There are many that have written extensively in this area of concern. As I write Dealing With the Difficult, I am dealing with difficult Bible passages, doctrines and difficult eschatology. 

      This is not a book dealing with some of the great  and dreaded  experiences of life, such as sickness, disease, death, sorrow and grief. Every Christian  can contribute to the expertise of those well trained to deal with  these experiences as we practice the ministry of comfort and understanding. We can respect the work of others, and we can also understand these experiences from what God has revealed in His Word.  And we do sorrow, but not like those who have no hope.

     Dealing with the difficult is not about dealing with the impossible. It is about facing the difficult, and seeking a reasonable, sensible, solution. It is a difficult process because the tendency in all of us is to look for an easy way out. That search ignores the possibilities, glosses over any attempt to solve the contradictions, and promotes shallow thinking. In examining the professed beliefs of Christians, we will not avoid the controversial. That is not the path to truth. Conflicting opinions are only evidence that the arguments need to be closely examined.

      My interest  in writing this book has to do with difficult passages in the scriptures, difficult doctrines where there is not always agreement, and difficult eschatology where many entertain different positions on end time events. It is amazing how many seem to know so much that just isn’t  true.

      To acquire sound doctrine from the Word of God ought to be the goal of every Christian. It should never be despaired. To revise or discard previously held beliefs, in many cases, is more difficult and painful, than to learn correctly from the start. This may occur for various  reasons. We may have been taught wrong and did not have all of the available facts. We all experience this process at different times in our lives for all of the previous mentioned reasons. But if we  stop learning and think we know it all,  then nothing seems to change. This is an unnecessary path to ignorance. I have even seen in my own ministry many Christians who feel they have learned everything they need to know about the Christian life and the  Scriptures from listening to one pastor.

     The disciples of our Lord often misunderstood the nature of His  kingdom. They did not grasp the spiritual nature of the kingdom. Paul, steeped in Judaism, misunderstood God's special love for all  believers, regardless of race or ethnicity. His conversion on the road to Damascus changed that with his regeneration experience. The disciples misunderstood God's love for the Gentiles and God made it plain to them at the house of Cornelius. The bewitched Galatian Christians evidently had not grasped the purity, finality and nature of the Gospel message. So they were susceptible to introducing Judaism into it. Paul had to set them straight. He had to even oppose Peter to his face to correct the misunderstanding being perpetuated in their midst. It is in the area of eschatology that I have had to unlearn the most.

    So the burden of my message is to rightly divide the word of truth, to explain the difficult, and perhaps to help some revise and correct a few of their strongly held opinions. I believe that this will occur when dealing with difficult doctrines. I also believe that every lover of the Lord and His Word should be open to new truths. That is a part of growing in grace and knowledge.