Peacemakers Kick Off Annual Conference in Dallas
At 19,000, the figure for major church battles every year is large and unwieldy, but for Pastor Thomas Chandler, the figure is not obscure. It's personal.
"I cannot understate just how much of a need there is," the senior pastor of Rimrock Baptist Church in Billings, Mont., told The Christian Post. "There was a gentleman who had disapproved of my messages. ‘You don't have anybody at that church that can teach me,' he said. I was saying, 'You want to fight? Let's fight.' So he left the church. His previous wife left and took their kids. Their friends left and their friends' friends left. And over the course of 6-8 months I watched up to eight families walk out the door."
After bouts of conflict in his church over a two-year period, he called to ask his denominational leader, "How quickly can you get the Peacemakers here?"
A pioneering ministry in conflict resolution for churches, congregations, and Christian families since 1982, Peacemaker Ministries is hosting its annual Peacemaker Conference in Dallas from Sept. 29 - Oct. 1. Over 850 leaders are there, with many of them, being pastors.
Chandler was relieved to find the help he needed at the conference.
He said, "Everything I'm seeing now, I wish I could have seen this, and applied this."
"This conference is focused on getting past the 'he didn't say hi to me in the church' and get to the pride issues, the fear, the anger and deal with that," he said. "Let's deal with the heart issues that's going on rather than the surface issues. I was dealing with personality issues and not the heart."
Pastor Mark Langley, the church health director of the Montana Southern Baptist Convention, said his churches are experiencing revival because of the seminars, trainings, and interventions that Peacemakers has been holding in his area.
"We're finding that the church is turning around spiritually, that there is healing of relationships, re-engaging the harvest, becoming healthy enough to begin to minister to the communities. They've been restored to engage their communities again," he said.
He brought five pastors with him to the conference, including Chandler.
"Nobody thinks about it. The line of thinking is churches don't have conflict. Everybody is happy," said Heather Hatch, a spokesperson for Peacemakers. "There are some serious things going on in the church like sexual abuse."
One reason for why churches are confronted with conflict is the lack of biblical teaching on the issue.
"I think that ministers are not trained in the peacemaking principles because they don't know," said Hatch. "They don't teach about the proper ways to deal with conflict so it’s just an unknown topic that no one talks about."
Hatch points out that it's not just church conflicts that Christians need to be concerned with. While 1,500 pastors leave their church every month, there are 35 percent of American Christians who get divorced.
"It's not only churches that Peacemakers help. If you were having a conflict with your husband, and you're like, we are not settling this issue, then we could help."
The top issue for Christians are family issues, according to Executive Director of Peacemaker Ministries, Kenneth Sande.
"The number one conflict out there is the family conflict - weakening the family and estrangement of children. The next one would be conflict in congregation, competition for control, or people trying to force the pastor out. The third one is business and legal disputes among Christians. Many people do business in their congregations. Pretty soon, there is a lawsuit," he said.
Sande said there are four steps to resolve all conflicts.
"The first one is to glorify God - how can I please God? The second is to take responsibility for your own action. Third is to gently restore. If we're going to confront, we should do it gently. The fourth is to be reconciled. We want to end with a truly reconciled relationship with justice."
Speakers include Alfred Pourier, chairman of the Board of Peacemaker Ministries and senior pastor of Rocky Mountain Community Church, PCA in Billings, Mont. and Frank Thomas, CEO of Hope for Life International, Inc.. and senior pastor of Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Memphis, Tenn.
Conference tracks include the Peacemaker Church, Personal Peacemaking, Conflict Coaching, and Advanced Peacemaking.
The conference has grown from the 300s last year to 850 participants this year.
"There's just a growing interest in this field," said Sande, who is delivering his book along with a seminar on DVD and six other training items in PEACEPACKs, the new education product line that represents the culmination of twenty-three years of resolving church conflicts. The product line has a pack for churches, families, and the individual.
