Introduction
This is the word of the Lord,
Colossians 3:12–17 ESV
12 Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,
13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.
16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Let us pray!
We’re nearing the end of our sermon series on The Intentional Church.
And my hope is that these next few sermons are like the gradual descent of an airplane coming in for a landing, and you begin to notice a shift in cabin pressure, strong enough to pop everyone’s ear.
That’s because in these next few sermons, I’m trying to get very practical—practical enough to push a few buttons that most of us would rather prefer left untouched.
For the Gen-Z crowd and younger, these sermons might feel more like “A Day in the Life of the Church”.
I’m doing this because we have two stubborn problems I see in the life of the Church today.
• First, there are many Christians who simply don’t know their Bibles.
They love the Lord Jesus in a vague, misty, Instagram-caption sort of way, but when it comes to actually knowing what their Lord said, they are almost entirely illiterate.
They believe in Jesus like someone believes in “good vibes.”
They are trying to fight the good fight if only they can figure out where the fight’s at.
They wage a holy war armed with nothing more than spiritual enthusiasm.
• Second, there are those Christians who do know their Bibles. They can quote verses. They have shelves sagging under the weight of their MacArthur Study Bibles.
And yet somehow, mysteriously, that knowledge has never quite makes it down into their hands and feet.
They seem bent out of shape by their weighty theological prowess, but their actions are playing hide and seek with their opinions, and the latter quite never seem to find the former.
Their heads are stuffed with doctrines they love to argue about, but their lives are strangely hollow.
And so, these final sermons are my opportunity—and your opportunity—to get gloriously, wonderfully uncomfortable.
They will address the first problem of ignorance by showing you just how much the Bible has to say about your daily lives, and they will address the second problem of our hypocrisy by showing you that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life, and there is no other side road or shortcut for sanctification.
A note. When I say, I’m getting really practical here, I’m shooting myself in the foot in this process.
None of us have this down. All of us, if we’re being honest, will see ourselves somewhere in the crosshairs. I know I do.
The real question is not “Who messed up?” — that’s obvious. The real question is, “What are we going to do about it?”
———
I’ve said throughout this series that I chose the word intentional very deliberately — because the Christian life is not an automatic life.
You don’t coast into obedience.
You don’t stumble into holiness like a man drunk in the Holy Spirit as some of our hyper-charismatic brothers would have us believe.
You don’t wake up one morning to find you’ve accidentally become selfless.
That is not what is being expressed when a godly man confesses, “Only by the grace of God have I done this.”
1 Corinthians 15:10 ESV
10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
I wouldn’t be surprised if most Christians picture Paul here sitting in front of a camera, being interview for a documentary, going, “I’ve no idea what just happened. I’ve no idea why I worked that hard. It just happened. It’s like grace possessed me and – poof – here I am.”
Christians practically expect grace to erase the fight, failing to see that it actually arms the fighter.
The fight is fought and the race is run, but so many Christians are oblivious to the location of the fight or the race.
They think the fight is out there somewhere – in the land of Jordan Peterson or on the road to Instagram.
They don’t see that the fight is everywhere, and their part is right where they stand, next to their husbands, wives and children. Next to their fathers and mothers and cousins and relatives. Next to their pastors and deacons and fellow members. Next to their colleagues and managers.
The fight is at their doorstep, in their bedrooms and in their secret closets.
Faithfulness is intentionally fighting the good fight where you are.
Part of the reason we love over spiritualising everything is because it offers us a convenient escape from our spiritual responsibility as Christians.
The piety of the Pharisees was a false piety that distracted from matters of true piety.
The Holy Spirit is not some kind of invisible energy drink that burns away your flesh without your consent or your awareness.
Sanctification is not a bait-and-switch operation. It’s not a magic trick. It’s not a sleight of hand.
It is hard work.
It is the work of grace in you — real grace — not the cheap grace you find on the lips of many professing Christians who have a lot to say about the very little they do
Sanctification is not the Holy Spirit slipping into your skin like a puppeteer and moving your arms and legs around while you binge Netflix.
Sanctification is blood-earnest discipleship.
It is falling on your face a thousand times and getting back up a thousand and one, strengthened by a grace that does not excuse your sin but empowers your obedience.
It is about training in righteousness — real sweat, real toil, real dependence.
None of this is automatic. None of it “just happens.”
In short, sanctification demands an intentional life.
But now, at last, I will clarify that intentional is not the best word. It was never the best word. Yet, it was the word we needed to hear.
There is another word – greater, heavier, truer than intentional — a word that means intentionality more than the word intentional.
And the reason I haven’t used it much until now is because the word has become so mauled, so abused, so misused by the Church today that it has almost no meaning left.
That word is faithful. The Intentional Church series may more appropriately be titled ‘The Faithful Church’ series.
You see, every human being in the world can be intentional.
Atheists are intentional.
Pagans are intentional.
Politicians are intentional.
Scammers, tyrants and dictators are all very intentional.
Intentionality alone gets no one to Heaven.
You are neither saved by the work of your hands, nor are you saved by the work of your mind.
You are saved by grace, through faith.
Faith is the currency of the Christian life, and not brute effort.
Yet, faithfulness is a kind of intentionality that is simply impossible apart from the grace of God.
Faithfulness is an intentionality exercised only by those who have been set free from the chains of sin.
The world is intentional like men chained to their cells, pacing back and forth. But the Christian is intentional like a freed man sprinting out of the prison gates, running straight into the arms of his Savior.
The world is intentional the way a dog chases its tail — frantic, determined, and going nowhere.
But the Christian is intentional like a man who has seen the gates of death burst open, and who runs like his life depends on it — because it does.
And yet, the word faithfulness has been so abused and sentimentalized that in many cases, the slaves of Satan are more “faithful” to their chains than professing Christians are to their Christ.
We have somehow baptized laziness and called it grace, praised indifference and testified of God’s faithful forbearance of our persistent unfaithfulness.
We think that grace is God’s permission slip for inactivity, or even sinful activity.
Meanwhile, the Scriptures are one long, thunderous call to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
• This is why Christian wives expect God to surprise them with the grace to submit to their husbands. “I have no idea what came over me, but suddenly I’m just such a quiet spirit – patient and kind”.
Like the Lord was a tooth fairy hiding his grace under your pillow where you otherwise pile your husbands ego that you meticulously pluck every day.
• This is why Christian husbands think that sacrificial leadership means offering their wives the great honor of sitting in their majestic presence — so they can practice the fine art of not listening.
• This is why Christian parents believe that if a lack of discipline and education didn’t completely ruin their lives, then their kids have nothing to worry about either.
“We turned out alright,” they say.
First of all — define alright.
Because from where I’m standing, anyone who has to say that out loud probably didn’t turn out as alright as they think.
And second, alright is a lazy bar set by lazy people.
• This is why we have young men who think that fighting lust means deleting an app for 48 hours, patting themselves on the back, and then reinstalling it the next weekend — because grace goes deeper still.
• This is why we have churches who believe that “discipleship” is what seminaries and Bible colleges do.
• This is why we have Christian businessmen who think that “honoring God” means slapping a fish stickers on office doors.
• This is why we have students who think that “doing all to the glory of God” means asking Him to bless their all-nighter after they wasted the week binging YouTube.
• This is why we have Christian employees who think working “heartily, as unto the Lord” means showing up late, leaving early, and hoping that the God who softens hearts would get to work on their managers.
• This is why we have Christian friendships that think “speaking the truth in love” means pretending like nothings wrong when your friend’s hair is on fire.
Or on the other end, pretending like the Bible never said that the spiritual are to restore the sinner in a spirit of gentleness.
Galatians 6:1 ESV
1 Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.
• This is why we have Christians who think “loving your neighbor” is all about the vibe, and not really any work.
We expect all of these things to work itself out automatically, instead of obeying God’s word that explicitly calls us to intentionally work these things out.
And the one who does that is said to be ‘faithful’.
———
The Substance of Christian Relationships
So, I begin these final sermons in this series by addressing the subject of anger, bitterness, strife, and frustration — because I want to shoot an arrow straight at the heart of the problem.
Having established the different roles in the church, it is time now to look at relationships.
Christians, by and large, have no idea what relationships actually are.
We have lost the ability to distinguish between the greater and the lesser, between the foundational and the peripheral.
One of the clearest signs of this confusion is how we assign value to our relationships.
Most of us value relationships primarily on the basis of personal benefit —
• Does this person encourage me?
• Does this relationship fulfill me?
• Does this connection help me achieve my goals?
In other words, we assess relationships transactionally, not covenantally.
We treat relationships like business deals – if the profit margin is good, we stay in; if not, we back out.
But Scripture presents a very different view.
Relationships are not primarily evaluated by the benefits they bring to us, but by the covenantal structures and God-ordained loyalties they require of us.
At the heart of biblical relationships is a clear understanding of biblical responsibilities.
Not just warm feelings. Not just general goodwill. But specific, God-assigned duties.
Biblical relationships are built on recognizing and embracing the roles, the relationships, and the responsibilities that God has ordained.
Here’s a quick way to remember this: the 3 R’s —
• Biblical Roles
• Biblical Relationships
• Biblical Responsibilities
The first R is usually easy enough. Everybody agrees on the roles — at least theoretically.
We know who the husbands are.
We know who the pastors are.
We know who the wives are.
We know who the children are.
We know who the members are.
The problem is not usually with recognizing roles positionally — it’s with understanding them relationally.
We know that there are fathers, but we forget what a father is called to do.
We know that there are pastors, but we forget what a pastor is responsible to be.
We recognize the existence of authority, submission, and cooperation — but we recognize them vaguely, almost sentimentally, because we have a vague understanding of the relationships themselves, and even worse, a vague grasp of the responsibilities attached to those relationships.
In other words, we have a lot of titles and very little faithful living.
• Take marriage, for example. Everyone agrees that a husband is the head of his wife (Ephesians 5:23).
But many husbands seem to think that the best way to be the head of their wives is by beheading their wives – take their heads out of the picture. Disregard their dreams, desires, and needs.
Instead of nurturing their wives, they shove them into, and then wonder why the body limps.
Meanwhile, many wives treat their husband’s headship like a delicate tiara – a fancy crown, something ceremonial, nice for display at weddings and church membership classes, but the moment they walk through the front door of the house, she makes sure to put it back in the shelf where it belongs.
When they say “he’s the head,” they mean that he can take the credit as long as does what he’s told.
Biblical headship, however, is not about tyranny, nor is it about irreverence.
The head loves the body because it is the body.
When the body hurts, the head leaps to its defense.
When the body is weary, the head plans its restoration.
To love as Christ loved the church is to bleed, to carry, and to nourish — not to abuse.
Exodus 20:12 ESV
12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
Honouring your parents is not presented as a suggestion contingent on how likable or helpful they are.
It is a covenant obligation rooted in God’s authority structure.
Ephesians 6:1 ESV
1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.
The relationship is defined not by mutual benefit but by God’s ordering of authority and responsibility.
You don’t honor your parents because they’re fun at parties.
You honor them because God says it is right.
The 3R’s of a Christian community are not defined by man, they’re defined by God.
Malachi 2:14 ESV
…Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth, … she is your companion and your wife by covenant.
Marriage is not held together by emotional satisfaction but by covenant faithfulness.
The world’s vision of marriage is built on mutual benefit (“as long as you love me”).
The Bible’s vision of marriage is built on sworn loyalty (“as long as we both shall live”).
Our marital vows are not sentimental butterflies we feel in our stomach on the day of our wedding. They’re oaths that define our responsibilities in this relationship.
This is why when feelings falter — as they inevitably do — covenant remains.
1 Corinthians 12:18 ESV
18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose.
So, God places you in a local church, not merely to assess whether you are sufficiently “fed” by the church but also to assess whether you are sufficiently faithful within it.
You are called to love, serve, bear burdens, forgive offenses, and strive for unity — even when it is costly, inconvenient, or painful.
When Christians rank relationships based on personal benefit instead of covenantal loyalty, they invert God’s design.
They elevate casual friendships over marriage covenants.
You may have friends with whom you can share much more than your own spouses. But it would be foolish to not see that something is broken here.
You may honor your boss more promptly than you honor your parents. But it would be foolish to not see that something is broken here.
You may cling to online communities, social clubs, sports teams, or hobby groups with more loyalty than you show your local church.
You may find more identity in people who share your interests than in those who share your baptism.
And it would be foolish to not see that something is broken here.
This inversion is not just impractical — it is disobedient.
It leads directly to the relational chaos, strife, and frustration that rot both families and churches from the inside out.
Galatians 6:10 ESV
10 So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.
There is an order.
There are priorities.
God commands it — and Christians must recover it.
If we do not, we will continue to see marriages unravel, families fracture, friendships sour, and churches split — not because the devil needed to attack from the outside, but because God’s own people forgot the terms of their relationships.
The Purpose of Christian Relationships
• Relational Faithfulness is Worship
Matthew 22:37–40 ESV
37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
38 This is the great and first commandment.
39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
Notice what Jesus does here.
He disallows a wedge between loving God and loving people.
Loving God and loving neighbor are not two unrelated ideas. The second commandment is “like” the first — it flows out of it.
Loving God manifests itself in loving others.
How does one love God and glorify his name?
Most Christians do this by expressing warm and fuzzy feelings toward God by singing songs and journaling prayers while all along their relationships rot with resentment and neglect.
Matthew 5:23–24 ESV
23 So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you,
24 leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.
This is Jesus saying that your relationship with your brother is not external/outside your worship of God.
It is part of the main event.
Listen to me when I tell you that you cannot have intimacy with God through relational unfaithfulness to the people in your lives. Do you know why?
Because, biblically, relational faithfulness — loving your wife, honoring your husband, obeying your parents, disciplining your children, forgiving your brother, honoring your elders — is the way you love God.
1 John 4:20 ESV
20 If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
Failing to love your brother proves you don’t love God at all. Every expression of loving God in this scenario makes you a liar.
Claiming to submit to God’s authority while neglecting your husband’s authority is a lie.
Claiming to obey God while neglecting to obey your parents is a lie.
Now, you might say, but my parents are not perfect, or that they are earthly, or even that they are pagans. It doesn’t matter because the responsibilities in that relationship are not defined by how useful your parents are to you. They’re defined by God.
“But my husband is a broken man”. That may be, but you marital vows are not a broken word.
Beloved, Jesus taught us in Luke 6:32
Luke 6:32 ESV
32 “If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.
In the same way, if you obey only when obedience is agreeable to you, or submit only when you agree with your husband, or love your wives only when she submits to you; what good is your obedience, submission or love?
You say you love God? Then that love is tested in the arena of relationships.
• Then love your spouse when they are difficult.
• Honor your parents when they are wrong.
• Discipline your children when it costs you comfort.
• Forgive your brother when it costs you pride.
• Bear with the slow, the immature, and the annoying members of Christ’s body.
• Relational Faithfulness is Covenant Keeping
You can feel all the feelings you want but covenant love is not measured by feeling; it is measured by loyalty, by obedience, by keeping promises when keeping promises costs you something.
Biblical relationships are covenants:
• Marriage is a covenant (Malachi 2:14).
• Church membership is covenantal (1 Corinthians 12:12–27).
• Parenting is covenantal (Ephesians 6:1–4).
• Friendship in Christ is covenantal (Proverbs 17:17).
Proverbs 17:17 ESV
17 A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.
When you are faithful in these relationships — especially when it is hard — you are imaging the faithfulness of the covenant-keeping God.
God keeps His covenant even when we are faithless. And He calls us to be like Him.
2 Timothy 2:13 ESV
13 if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.
When a husband refuses to cherish his wife, he is denying the gospel he claims to believe (Ephesians 5:25–32).
When a wife refuses to respect her husband, she is undermining her own witness to Christ and His church (Ephesians 5:22–24).
When children rebel against their parents, they are despising the very authority structures God designed for their good (Exodus 20:12).
When brothers in Christ harbor bitterness, they are proclaiming that Christ’s blood was not enough to purchase peace between them.
• Relational Faithfulness is the Christian Mission
Discipleship is fundamentally relational.
Evangelism is fundamentally relational.
Church life is fundamentally relational.
Christian maturity is measured not by how many podcasts you listen to or how many theological arguments you can win online — it is measured by how faithfully you live out the relationships God has given you.
• Husbands loving wives.
• Wives respecting husbands.
• Parents training children.
• Children honoring parents.
• Members bearing with one another.
• Elders shepherding the flock.
This is the mission.
When Christians live faithfully in their relationships, they display to the world what the Kingdom of God looks like in miniature.
John 13:35 ESV
35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
If we want to fulfill the mission Christ gave us, we must recover relational faithfulness — in our homes, in our churches, and in every place God has placed us.
Dealing with Anger, Bitterness, Strife & Frustration
If we don’t understand relationships, then we cannot relate to one another in a godly manner.
Matthew 16:24 NASB95
Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.
The Bible has much to say about how you must relate to yourself.
We must first understand that the battle against anger begins in the heart of the individual.
Before strife ever breaks out into a full church-wide brawl, it starts in the private, hidden corridors of a single soul.
Before there is division in the pews, there is resentment in the heart.
Matthew 15:19 NASB95
“For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders.
The problem is not “out there.”
It’s in here.
A bitter heart doesn’t stay a bitter heart.
It leaks.
It spreads.
It multiplies like mold in a damp house.
When anger is nursed privately, it becomes bitterness.
When bitterness is fed regularly, it becomes frustration.
When frustration is justified and polished, it becomes full-blown strife.
———
The first relational understanding that we need to have is how to treat with oneself.
Proverbs 26:21 NASB95
Like charcoal to hot embers and wood to fire,
So is a contentious man to kindle strife.
If you are walking around with a loaded weapon of unresolved anger, it’s only a matter of time before it goes off — and it usually won’t just wound you.
Can people make you angry? Of course.
Can people frustrate you? Certainly.
Can people sin against you, betray you, disappoint you, wrong you? Absolutely — and Scripture fully acknowledges that they will.
But when you nurse anger, when you cradle bitterness, when you marinate in frustration, you are not doing it because others are sinful.
You are doing it because you are.
Other people’s sins may tempt you toward anger, but your decision to harbor that anger is your sin, not theirs.
This is exactly what Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount.
Matthew 5:22 NASB95
“But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be 1guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be 1guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.
He does not say, “Everyone who has been wronged by his brother is justified in his anger.”
He says anger itself — cherished, justified, entertained — makes you liable to judgment.
The issue is not what others have done to you; the issue is what you are doing with what they have done.
You are not responsible for another person’s betrayal.
You are not responsible for their harsh words.
You are not responsible for their failures.
But, you are responsible for how you respond.
When you clutch onto anger like a badge of honor, you reveal that your loyalty lies closer to your own wounded pride than to the wounded Saviour who calls you to forgive.
When you rehearse your frustrations like a lawyer preparing for court, you show that you trust more in the justice of your own heart than in the justice of God’s throne.
Bitterness, resentment, festering frustration — these are not mere reactions to the sins of others.
They are rebellions of your own sinful heart.
Ephesians 4:31 NASB95
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.
All of it.
No qualifications.
No loopholes.
No “but you don’t know what they did to me.”
You may have been sinned against — grievously, painfully, repeatedly.
But Christ was sinned against more grievously, more painfully, more unjustly than anyone — and yet from the cross He prayed, “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34).
If you belong to Christ, then you are called to walk the same road.
And you cannot walk the road to Calvary while dragging a cartload of bitterness behind you
James 1:19–20 NASB95
This you know, my beloved brethren. But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger;
for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.
Let that settle in your mind for a moment.
The anger of man — your hot indignation, your sharp words, your eloquent self-defence — does not and cannot produce the righteousness of God.
———
We live in a generation that thinks venting is therapeutic.
“Get it off your chest,” they say.
“Blow off some steam,” they advise.
But Scripture does not teach you to vent. It teaches you to crucify.
Your anger is not a righteous furnace that simply needs a vent pipe; it’s a raging wildfire that needs a firebreak dug straight through the centre of your pride.
Proverbs 29:11 NASB95
A fool always loses his temper,
But a wise man holds it back.
Notice that — a fool is the one who thinks every strong feeling must be expressed.
But Christians are called to wisdom.
We are called to the slow boil of patience, not the quick flash of temper.
We are called to put to death the flesh — and anger, bitterness, frustration, and strife are simply the black sputtering fumes of a flesh that still believes it’s the emperor of the world.
Then It Infects the Family
If we do not how to relate with ourselves as Christians, we will not know how to relate with others, and the immediate collateral damage is upon the marriage, then upon the family.
If anger festers unchecked in the heart, it next metastasizes in the home.
Husbands who simmer their rage quietly become fathers who bark loudly.
Wives who simmer under disappointment become contemptuous mothers.
Children who watch this war play out learn that love is a battlefield, not a covenant.
Colossians 3:21 warns fathers:
Colossians 3:21 NASB95
Fathers, do not exasperate your children, so that they will not lose heart.
A father’s frustration doesn’t just land on his son’s homework.
It lands on his son’s heart.
It teaches him that performance matters more than grace.
And it’s not just the fathers.
Proverbs 21:19 says,
Proverbs 21:19 NASB95
It is better to live in a desert land
Than with a contentious and vexing woman.
When wives trade patience for provocation, the whole household becomes a training ground for bitterness.
Every unkind word.
Every rolled eye.
Every passive-aggressive sigh.
These are the seeds of strife, planted and watered daily.
The family — which was supposed to be a small “church” — becomes a small war zone.
And Then It Spills Over Into the Church
And of course, when bitter individuals gather into bitter families, and when bitter families gather into one congregation — the church becomes a greenhouse for strife.
Galatians 5:15 warns,
Galatians 5:15 NASB95
But if you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another.
How many churches have split, not over doctrine, not over heresy, but over the uncontrolled urges of a selfish heart?
It starts small.
A private offense.
An unspoken resentment.
But then it grows.
Whispers in the hallway.
Side glances during communion.
Long, cold stares during business meetings.
And soon enough, the church is divided — not by wolves at the door, but by termites in the pillar and buttress of truth.
Unity Is a Command, Not a Suggestion
Unity is easy if we all agree on everything. But that is not the kind of unity the church is called to exercise.
Our unity shines most glorious in our differences.
Ephesians 4:1–3 says,
Ephesians 4:1–3 NASB95
Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called,
with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love,
being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Eager to maintain the unity.
Unity is not something that just happens.
It must be fought for, protected, maintained.
The unity of the church is the visible testimony that Jesus Christ has conquered sin.
The disunity of the church is the visible testimony that pride still reigns.
We are called to kill strife, not to coddle it.
We are called to crucify bitterness, not to bottle it.
We are called to bear with one another in love — not endure one another in icy contempt.
Practical Steps to Kill Strife
1. Confess your own anger first.
Before you worry about who wronged you, confess the bitterness brewing in your own heart.
Judgment starts with the house of God, and repentance starts with the heart of the Christian.
2. Forgive before you’re asked.
If you wait until someone perfectly apologizes before you forgive them, you are not practicing gospel forgiveness — you are practicing pride.
Colossians 3:13 says,
Colossians 3:13 NASB95
bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; bjust as the Lord forgave you, so also should you.
3. Be quick to overlook offenses.
Not every bump is a war crime.
Proverbs 19:11 says,
Proverbs 19:11 NASB95
A man’s discretion makes him slow to anger,
And it is his glory to overlook a transgression.
Overlooking an offense is not weakness.
It is Christlike strength.
4. Pursue peace aggressively.
Hebrews 12:14 says,
Hebrews 12:14 NASB95
Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.
Peace is not passive.
It is something we must strive for — hunt down — grab by the collar.
Conclusion
If we tolerate anger, bitterness, and strife, it will not stay contained.
It will not stay personal.
It will not stay private.
It will bleed out into our families.
It will bleed out into our churches.
And it will bleed out into the streets.
If the church cannot model peace, the world will not hear the gospel of peace from us.
Titus 3:9–11 NASB95
But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and strife and disputes about the Law, for they are unprofitable and worthless.
Reject a factious man after a first and second warning,
knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, being self-condemned.
Strife is not a minor sin.
It is a disfellowshipping sin.
———
All of this — everything we’ve talked about — must be seen in the blazing light of the cross of Jesus Christ.
When Christ went to the cross, He didn’t just die for our abstract theological errors.
He died for our relational sins.
He died for our anger.
He died for our bitterness.
He died for our resentment, our frustration, our biting sarcasm, our cold contempt, our passive-aggressive cruelty.
He bore every drop of it in His body on the tree (1 Peter 2:24).
And when He cried out, “It is finished,” He meant that these sins had been not merely forgiven — they had been crucified.
Which means:
If you belong to Christ, you do not have permission to resurrect the sins He put to death.
You cannot cling to the very bitterness that Christ carried to Golgotha.
You cannot harbor anger in your heart like a precious jewel when Christ crushed it under His wounded heel.
Galatians 5:24 NASB95
Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
You cannot cling to your grudges and cling to the cross at the same time.
One will knock the other out of your hands.
If you are a pardoned man, you must live like a pardoned man.
If you are a forgiven woman, you must live like a forgiven woman.
You cannot be a citizen of a blood-bought Kingdom and live like a slave to your own offended ego.
Bitterness is not just a minor misstep.
It is a declaration of war against the mercy that saved you.
It is an act of mutiny against the grace that set you free.
And so — if we are to walk this hard, narrow, glorious road of relational faithfulness, we must do what every faithful Christian has learned to do:
We must begin every morning at the foot of the cross.
———
Why Morning Prayer Matters
This is why morning prayer is so important.
You are not strong enough to carry the weight of today’s frustrations, yesterday’s offenses, and tomorrow’s temptations by yourself.
You were never meant to be.
Morning prayer is not a religious box to check off.
It is the daily act of dying to yourself, again.
It is the daily act of taking up your cross, again.
It is the daily act of refusing to nurse your grievances, of refusing to sharpen your frustrations, of refusing to make peace with bitterness.
Morning prayer is where you lay down your resentments before they harden into rebellion.
It is where you confess your anger before it leaks out on your wife, your children, your brothers, and your church.
It is where you seek the strength to be cruciform — shaped by the cross — in all your relationships.
If you do not learn to kneel in the morning, you will learn to fight in the afternoon — but you’ll be fighting the wrong battles, with the wrong weapons, against the wrong people.
Lamentations 3:22–23 NASB95
The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,
For His compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
God’s mercy is new every morning —
and so your repentance must be too.
Your forgiveness must be too.
Your faithfulness must be too.
Every morning, we must crucify our anger, our pride, our resentment again —
and rise again to love as we have been loved.
———
Final Charge
And so, brothers and sisters:
Love one another.
Forgive one another.
Bear with one another.
Kill your bitterness before it kills your soul.
Crucify your pride before it crucifies your family.
Take your anger to the cross — and leave it there.
Get down on your knees tomorrow morning — and the morning after that — and every morning that God gives you breath.
Because those who belong to Christ must live like they belong to Christ —
not chained to their grievances,
but chained to the cross.
To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:21)
