Recently we had the exterior of our home painted. This is no cheap proposition. We got several recommendations and several quotes. I ended up going with a guy that I felt good about -- not necessarily the lowest price.
We had to reschedule the start, but we finally we got the pressure washing going. Then we had to wait a few days to get started with the paint. The agreement was to keep our paint color as is – in other words, do not change the paint color. Paint it the SAME color. That’s what was in the contract.
So, after they finally got painting (can you tell I was a little bit impatient?), the trim color was a different color. Not slightly different, completely different. We had what we thought were the original paint numbers from the builder. Turns out, they were wrong.
So, we stopped the painting and got on the phone. Things got a little tense. My wife said I got “firm.” That’s never good. I was thinking that we might have to part ways. I didn’t, however, lose my mind. I told him my side of the story. I listened to his. We worked it out – I think ... it’s not completed yet.
In life, we’ll have conflicts. The question isn’t if you'll have them, but how you’ll handle them. God wants us to honor him even through our conflicts. We need to consecrate our conflicts to God and remember that the other person is not the enemy.
Handling conflicts give us a window into what we’re becoming. All of our “trying” is exposed for what is really happening in our heart. When was the last time you had a conflict? What did it expose in you?
