Churches are not perfect. Some use that fact
as an excuse to neglect the local church. In
response to that, some pastor picked up his satirical
pen and wrote these words. He said, I quit football.
Every time I went to the stadium, someone always
asked for money. Although I went to the stadium
often, no one ever spoke to me. I was a good
fan, but the manager never came to call on me.
And the seats are too hard. With all the money
they have, one would think they could provide
more comfortable seats. The referee said things
I couldn't agree with. I suspected I was sitting
with people who were hypocrites. They seemed
more interested in soda pop and popcorn than
they were in the ballgame. I'm not about to sit
two or three hours during all those timeouts
and delays and run the risk of getting out late.
And the band always plays the same tunes. I could
find that music elsewhere, and sometimes they
play tunes I've never heard before. The game
always comes at the very time I have a trip planned
or must visit grandma's or catch up on my sleep.
And besides, I was often forced to attend games
when I was growing up. My money is all my very
own. Nobody's going to tell me how much to pledge
before I can sit down in the bleachers. All many
people go for is to see what somebody else is
wearing. I will not sit by somebody dressed better
than I. Even the players have new uniforms every
season, and that's a big waste of money. Since
buying a book on football, I stay at home and
read it or watch the game on TV. Well, I think
with his witty pen, this pastor gets to the heart
of the thinking of some people. Perhaps you have
heard some of those excuses. We're often rather
idealistic in our expectations of a local church.
We reason that after all, it is the body of Christ,
and Christ is perfect. Therefore, the church
should be perfect. We tend to feel that no problems
should ever arise in the church. And then, then
conflict occurs. And suddenly the idealism that
we possessed is gone. The balloon is burst. That
creates tension and anxiety, uncertainty. And
it can lead to disenchantment or disillusionment
altogether with the church. But even the early
church had its conflicts. Even with the strong
and godly leadership of the apostles, there were
problems in the fellowship. No ministry is immune
to conflict. I'd like you to turn in our text
today to Acts chapter 6, verses 1 through 7.
And we see conflict in the church. Now at this
time, while the disciples were increasing in
number, a complaint arose on the part of the
Hellenistic Jews against the native Hebrews because
their widows were being overlooked in the daily
serving of food. And the twelve summoned the
congregation of the disciples and said, It is
not desirable for us to neglect the word of God
in order to serve tables. But select from among
you, brethren, seven men of good reputation,
full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may
put in charge of this task. But we will devote
ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the
Word. And the statement found approval with the
whole congregation, and they chose Stephen, a
man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and
Philip, and Prochorus. and a caner, Timon, Parmenas,
and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch. And these
they brought before the apostles, and after praying
they laid their hands on them. And the word of
God kept on spreading, and the number of the
disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem,
and a great many of the priests were becoming
obedient to the faith. The thing that I want
to communicate from this passage today, and I
believe the Spirit of God would have us learn,
is that we must realize that conflict in the
church is a part of God's plan. If not, then
we must concede that there are matters that are
apparently out of His control. And that, of course,
could not be true. Conflict within the church...
is a part of God's plan for it. He does allow
it. There are three statements about conflict
that I'd like to talk about this morning that
arise out of our text in Acts 6. I'd like you
to follow along with these three statements.
They're found printed there in your worship folder.
The first statement is this, that conflict in
ministry is inevitable. Conflict in ministry
is inevitable. Why is that, you ask? Well, I
think there are at least two reasons why that
is so. The first reason is that we are humans.
And because we are humans, we are individualistic.
We have a variety of ideas, opinions, and prejudices
among us. And out of those individualisms, conflict
can arise. We are human, and therefore we are
also imperfect. We can be carnal and selfish.
We are not yet fully conformed to the image of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And out of that imperfection,
conflict can arise. Conflict can arise within
a ministry because we are humans. There is a
second reason that it can come, and that is because
we have an enemy. And, of course, that enemy
is Satan. Satan seeks to gain any foothold he
can in a ministry and will either create conflict
or take advantage of conflict that's already
there in order to accomplish his schemes. In
2 Corinthians 2, the Apostle Paul warns the Corinthians
and us regarding that. You may recall that in
the Corinthian church, there was... previously
an immoral man accepted within the fellowship.
Paul wrote in the first letter to them that that
man had to go, that they had to dismiss him from
the church with church discipline in order that
he might perhaps repent. Well, in fact, that's
exactly what happened. He repented of his immorality.
And there were some in the church who accepted
him back, but not all of them. So Paul writes
regarding his own attitude to give these people
who would not accept him back an example. He
says in chapter 2 verse 10 of 2 Corinthians,
But whom you forgive anything, I forgive also.
For indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven
anything, I did it for your sakes in the presence
of Christ, in order that no advantage be taken
of us by Satan. For we are not ignorant of his
schemes. What Paul is saying here is that Satan
was seeking to gain an advantage in the Corinthian
church over the conflict that existed between
those who had forgiven the man and wanted to
receive him back and those who had not forgiven
him and did not want to receive him back into
the fellowship. Out of that conflict, Satan was
seeking to gain a foothold in the ministry. And
Paul says, we are not ignorant of his schemes.
And so conflict is inevitable because we have
an enemy. Now back into our text in Acts chapter
6, we learn from observation that rapid growth
in a ministry compounds the possibilities for
conflict. It says that at this time, while the
disciples were increasing in number, in other
words, it was during one of these mushrooming
periods in the Jerusalem church, The word complaint
means murmur. It is the Greek word gonguzo. Even
the very word sounds that way, doesn't it? It's
a low muttering. It's a grumbling, sort of under
the breath. This complaint or murmuring had come
into the fellowship because of what was perceived
as an oversight. The complaint actually arose
on the part of the Hellenistic Jews, and it was
against the native Jews. Now, we need to talk
about that a moment. Who are these people? Well,
they're all new converts in the first place.
They're all Christians. But some of them were
Hellenistic Jewish in their background. The word
Hellen means Greek. The idea is that they came
out of a Greek culture, a Greek ideology, a Greek
way of thinking, perhaps even spoke Greek as
their major language, as Jews, rather than Aramaic,
which was the common language in Palestine. These
people apparently had moved to Palestine and
retained their own cultural identity. They were
the minority, it would seem. The majority were
those who were native Hebrews or Jews, those
whose major language was not only Hebrew but
Aramaic, the common language of that time and
in that place. These people came out of the traditional
Hebrew culture. They were in the majority. There
was prejudice between the two groups. Those who
were native -born Palestinian Jews looked down
upon the other Greek -oriented Jews as second
-class people. They were not quite as fully Jewish,
at least in the thinking of these Hebrew Jews.
Not quite as fully Jewish as were they. Now,
it was around that particular bias that the complaint
arose. It is clear that the early church practiced
social concern, at least among its members. It
is said here that there was a daily serving,
a daily ministration of some kind, and that is
further described in verse 2 as the serving of
tables. What is this? A couple of possibilities.
There's the possibility that there was formed
within the church sort of a soup kitchen, so
that those who had nothing to eat could be cared
for. As a matter of fact, that was common among
some of the Jewish sects. For example, the Essenes
and the Pharisees both had this kind of a social
ministry to their own group. Apparently, some
of the Christians, and maybe even a good number
of these early Christians, were saved out of
those groups. And when they became Christians,
they began to organize a social ministry to their
own. They were used to doing that. And so they
organized what seems to have been the serving
of food to those who could not care for themselves.
But the word tables in verse 2 can also be used
of a banking table. Jesus overturning the tables,
for example, in the temple. And so it may also
include the idea here that there was the distribution
of monies to people who did not have enough to
live on. I think rather, for myself at least,
I think that there was probably a combination
of these two ideas in this ministration or this
serving that was taking place. And you see what
happened was that those who were Greek in background
felt that their needy, and particularly the widows,
were being neglected in favor of the Palestinian
-born Jewish widows, the Hebrew widows. And so
the murmuring started around that issue. It gave
occasion for that smoldering prejudice to be
fanned into flame. Now it may be that in a smaller
situation where there was not such dynamic growth,
that this would not have occurred. But this was
an unusual situation. There was dynamic growth
taking place, and it did happen. It may be that
in a smaller ministry it wouldn't have happened,
but the fact is that in a smaller ministry they
may not have been able to provide this way either.
The larger ministry can often do greater things,
but the danger is what happened here apparently
to some degree, and that is that you lose the
personal touch. Frankly, that's something we
have fought against in our church for the last
four years and we still fight against, losing
that personal touch with people. Right now, our
adult small churches are organizing care groups.
Perhaps you heard something about that in your
small church this morning. And these care groups,
we trust, will be in place within about three
to four weeks and functioning. So that on a periodic
basis, everyone who comes to Grace Church can
be contacted by somebody else in a personal way.
And occasionally also be in the home of someone
in our church. We need that kind of interrelationship.
And I want to encourage you that if you're approached
for leadership as one of these care group leaders
or as a ministry pastor in your small church,
to seriously consider... and pray about. Being
involved in that way is so important and strategic.
Well, we see here that it's not always sin that
causes conflict. Conflicts can come out of sin,
but not necessarily is that so. Here, there was
a legitimate complaint, but it wasn't because
of a deliberate oversight, as far as we can see.
I think there's an important comment that we
need to make before we go to our second point,
and that is that when there is a conflict, such
as happens here, that we all should seek to be
a part of the solution and not a part of the
problem. Conflicts are inevitable in any ministry,
whether it be a church or a Christian organization.
They are inevitable, but they are not fun. nor
can they be thoughtlessly ignored, thinking they
will go away. What must we do when conflict does
arise? We must face it in faith. When we do that,
then we will cause our walk with the Lord and
our service for Him to be undisrupted. We must
face conflict in faith, not run from it in fear.
Because conflict is inevitable. It's a part of
God's plan. There's a second statement that I
see that we need to talk about, and that is that
conflict provides a God -given opportunity for
ministry development. Verses 2 through 6. The
ministry of the Jerusalem church actually developed
because of the conflict. That's why it's a part
of God's plan. The pressures exerted by circumstances...
Force, evaluation, and then action. Hopefully,
action that is wise and proper. We see that here,
for example. The evaluation basically was this,
that there was too much responsibility resting
on too few people. And it caused their right
priorities to be jeopardized, which was a danger
to the church's ministry. Whose fault was it?
Well, no one's. Isn't it interesting how often
we try to place fault and find out who's to blame
for this? But in fact, sometimes there's no one
to blame. And sometimes it doesn't do much good
to place blame anyway. He says, the text here
rather says that this was simply an occasion
that arose. It was not because someone purposely
did anything. It was because of the situation
itself. I think that what we see here is an action
that took place because of the evaluation which
actually caused the ministry to develop. There
was a better management system created. When
I see this, I think into the Old Testament of
what happened when Moses was judging the people
of Israel in the wilderness. There were so many
conflicts that came up. that he was working from
sunup to sunset, just hearing the cases and making
decisions. So what should they do? Well, there
was an evaluation, followed by action. The evaluation
was carried out by one Jethro, who happened to
be Moses' father -in -law. He obviously had a
vested interest in Moses' health. And so he said,
Moses, you cannot continually do this. You're
wearing yourself out. So he had a plan of action.
He said, you need to appoint 70 men to help you.
And that's what they did. Seventy elders were
chosen out of the people of Israel to hear the
complaints and the conflicts and to settle them,
to give judgment. And thus Moses was released
to lead the people. That's similar to what took
place here. When the action is carried out and
executed, it's important for it to be done in
a wise way. I'd like you to notice with me how
they did it. in this early church incident. First
of all, there was an explanation to the congregation
of the leader's perception. You see that in verse
2. The twelve summoned the congregation of the
disciples and said, now the disciples here, that's
everybody who professes faith. So it's thousands
of people who came together, probably in the
portico of Solomon. And their evaluation of the
situation is this. It is not desirable for us
to neglect the Word of God in order to serve
tables. And so the leaders perceived that the
priorities were getting out of balance. Now,
it wasn't that they were above serving tables.
That's not the point. The point is that they
had a priority that was higher than that for
their own work. And so they said it's not desirable.
The idea is not well -pleasing for us, and it
probably means not well -pleasing to God for
us to be doing this and to be neglecting the
Word of God. So there was an explanation to the
congregation of what the leaders perceived. Secondly,
there was a presentation to the congregation
of the leaders' plan. Verse 3. And that plan
seems to be carried out in five steps or phases.
First, they secured the congregation's involvement.
They said, select from among you, brethren, seven
men. They did not go outside for advice. They
did not bring in outsiders. They said, folks,
we need help. And so they secured the congregation's
involvement in the problem itself. They said,
select from among you. That was the first phase.
And when you have a conflict, it may be in your
Sunday school class or in your small church or,
for that matter, at work or in your home, when
there is a conflict, one of the first things
you need to do is to get those who are involved
in the conflict involved in the solution. Now
secondly, you'll notice that they related the
solution to what the congregation could be comfortable
with. They said, select seven men. Both of those
words are important. Seven men. They needed to
be men because the Jews were used to male leadership.
In fact, women at this time were not even considered
on the par with men. They were not asked to sit
with men in the synagogue. They were separated
out. from that. And when some of the very religious
Jews would pray, they would say, Lord, I thank
you that I'm not this and I'm not that and I'm
not a dog and I'm not a woman. That's the way
they looked at it. I'm not suggesting that some
of you men pray that way here. That's the way
they prayed it then. And so that the congregation,
which was made of converted Jews, be comfortable,
they said, we need to select men, seven of them.
Why seven? Well, first of all, to the Hebrews,
seven is the perfect number. But furthermore,
in the Jewish communities scattered throughout
the Roman Empire at that time, they would elect
seven men to lead their community. Those seven
men then were looked to to make the decisions
for that pocket of Jews within the larger city
of pagans. So the Jews were used to thinking
in terms of seven men solving conflicts. Seven
men who are going to show us what to do. That's
why I believe the apostles suggested this solution.
They related the solution to what the congregation
could be comfortable with. The third step or
phase in their plan involved... the establishing
of qualifications now for these seven men, not
just any seven men. They said, first of all,
they have to be of good reputation, which means
they had to be without blame. Men of good repute.
Secondly, that's their qualifications of character,
by the way. Secondly, they had to be full of
the Spirit. In other words, they had to be spiritual
men. their spiritual qualifications. They had
to be men who walked with God, who obeyed the
Lord, knew the empowering of the Holy Spirit.
Third, they had to be men of wisdom. This involves
their qualifications of expertise. They had to
be men who knew how to handle people and how
to handle money. That's wisdom. So the third
phase was selecting men who met certain qualifications.
The fourth step or phase in their plan involved
the outlining of their delegated responsibilities
and authority. Notice that in verse 3. He says,
And so they outlined, though Luke does it very
briefly here, what their job was. It was to take
care of this task. They were not to be out helping
the... the apostles and doing other things. It
was this task. This was their responsibility.
And they say, we're going to put them in charge
of it. And so along with the responsibility came
the authority to carry it out. Let me tell you
something. Whenever you are working with people
and delegating a job to them, when you give them
their responsibility, make it clear what the
responsibility is. and then give them the authority
to carry it out. If you don't do that, you're
going to have a frustrated person on your hands.
Good managers always delegate responsibility
and then give the commensurate authority to carry
it out. And that's what the apostles clearly
did here. And then the final step in their plan
involved their being appointed by the leaders
themselves. We see that in verse 3 when they
say, whom we may put in charge of the task. And
then in verse 6, they brought these men before
the apostles, and after praying, they laid their
hands on them. And so they officially set them
apart. Now this kind of implies an accountability.
It's not enough to delegate responsibility. There
has to be some accountability coming back so
that you know. People are carrying out what they're
supposed to do in their function. And so they
laid their hands on them. You say, what does
that mean? Well, it doesn't mean that these seven
men got something from the apostles they didn't
have before necessarily. Perhaps you've seen
hands laid on people. I've seen this done at
ordinations. When other pastors gather around
a new young pastor who's being ordained, they
put their hands on his head and pray for him.
One pastor put it this way. He says it's empty
hands on an empty head. And that's sometimes
altogether too true, I'm sure. But there's nothing
imparted except that it is symbolic of someone
being set apart. And that's what they did with
these seven individuals. And so there was an
explanation to the congregation of the leader's
perception. Things shouldn't be going this way,
folks. We're having to neglect the Word of God
and to serve tables. Secondly, they presented
a plan to the congregation. Thirdly, they clarified
to the congregation their own, that is the leader's,
priorities. Notice this in verse 4. We will devote
ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the
Word. That's what their job was. That's what
they were appointed by God to do. Prayer and
the teaching of the Word of God are the brick
and mortar of building a church. A church. The
brick is the word of God, the doctrine that must
be taught. When you're building a building, you
have to do more than stack up bricks. Those bricks
have to be put together and held together. And
prayer is the mortar that does that. Prayer is
vital to our church. The priorities of the...
leadership of our church today, and of course
we don't have apostles today, we have elders.
But the priority of the elders' ministry must
be that which is spiritual. Praying, the teaching
of the Word of God, and the effective communication
of that, and the carrying out of the teaching
of the Word of God in our church. Prayer is the
part of all of us, for that matter. That's why
we're meeting for prayer this Friday night. It's
not just so that you have something more to do
this week. It's because we need to pray as we
build the church. We need to pray together. And
so there was a clarification to the congregation
of the leader's priorities. Now, how did the
congregation respond? Well, it says the statement
found approval with the whole congregation. Some
people say that proves it was not a Baptist church
there in Jerusalem because everybody approved
of it. I don't know about that. But I do know
it says here that everybody found this acceptable.
They approved of it. They were pleased with the
plan. And they appointed seven men who are named
here. It's interesting to note that these seven
all bear Greek names. That may suggest to us
that they were a part of this minority that felt
neglected. That may also give us a little idea
as to how to handle conflict. In this particular
case, the congregation did not try to politically
stack the committee. The majority of Palestinian
Jews did not say, well, we want four of the seven
who are our stripe, so we have the majority.
Nor did they appoint three and three and then
one guy who's going to cast the deciding vote.
Poor guy. Rather, they appointed all seven of
them from the Hellenistic group, apparently.
That was really wise on their part, because they
were the very ones who apparently had the complaint
in the first place. And these seven men, being
spiritual men who met the qualifications, accepted
the responsibility. I think it was wise in another
way, too, because now these seven men are going
to bend over backwards to make sure that the
Palestinian Jewish widows are not neglected.
So everybody's going to be happy, it would seem,
in the way that... that this was done. I think
it's worth pointing out here that this is an
example not of congregational government. In
fact, the New Testament does not teach that.
The New Testament teaches that congregations
select from among themselves leaders who are
appointed the responsibility of leadership. What
we have here then is a beautiful balance of cooperation
between the God -appointed leaders and the congregation
which they serve. The leaders, on their part,
were sensitive to the problems and the concerns
of the people, which is absolutely essential.
They then formulated what they felt was an appropriate
plan and presented that to the congregation.
The congregation accepted the plan of the leaders
and carried out their part of it. They appointed
those seven men. And then the leaders instituted
the plan. By carrying out their part, they officially
set them apart by the laying on of the hands.
What we really see here, I think, is an embryonic
form of the New Testament office of deacon. A
deacon is a servant. That is the meaning of the
word. And although that word technically is not
used here, a form of it is used three times.
So I think that we're looking at... an embryonic
deacon board. These men were to assist the leaders
in the administration of the church ministry.
They were servants to help them. And that's what
we attempt to use deacons for in our own church.
I think as we back off from this for just a moment,
the lesson that all of us can learn is this,
that in our conflicts, what we need to do is
to look... for the possibilities in our problems.
The possibilities that God intends for us to
grow, to accomplish our goals in a better way,
to stretch us. We need to back off and to say,
God, what are the possibilities here? Get the
positive things out of the conflict because conflicts
are inevitable. We will always have them. And
we must recognize that God indeed provides them.
as an opportunity for ministry development. Now
there's a third and final statement that I want
us to look at, and that is that conflict properly
managed becomes the door to more effective ministry.
Now the key to that statement is properly managed.
Because conflict can destroy a church if it's
allowed to. I know of a church... hundreds of
miles from here, that is facing this at the present
moment. Conflict has been ignored for years.
It has not been faced honestly. And because that
conflict has not been managed properly, the church
is on the skids. And unless it's faced soon,
the church is going to be destroyed. Conflict
that is managed properly. however, becomes the
door not to being diminished, not to a church
languishing, but to it actually flourishing under
the blessing of God. That is what happened here.
Notice in verse 7, the word of God kept on spreading.
It was being disseminated throughout the whole
area. And it says the number of the disciples
continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem. And
it adds almost as a footnote, A great many of
the priests were becoming obedient to the faith.
Now, those were probably not Sadducees. You remember
they were the vicious opponents of Christianity.
These priests were probably out of the sect of
the Pharisees. But it says many of them were
becoming obedient to the faith. That is, they
were trusting in Jesus as their Christ who had
died for them and who had been raised from the
dead. It may be that the great object lesson,
the great illustration by God in the temple when
Jesus was crucified led them to this point. Remember
what happened? When Jesus died on the cross,
the temple veil was torn in two by the hands
of God from the top to the bottom. undoubtedly
those priests who were used to being in that
temple and seeing the curtain there separating
them from the presence of God and the Holy of
Holies were astounded when that curtain just
tore in two and laid in two parts and the Holy
of Holies was exposed to them for the first time
in their lives. That was an illustration of the
fact that out there on the cross, outside the
city wall, the Son of God was dying. And through
the offering up of his body, the veil was being
torn in two, and the way of the presence of God
was being opened up for all men. As these priests
thought about that and pondered it, and as they
heard the preaching of the apostles, it seems
that many of them became obedient to the faith.
I think it's important to note before we conclude
that It is not the job of leadership, it was
not the job of the apostles either, to avoid
conflict. That is impossible. Conflict is inevitable.
In fact, if it becomes the job of leadership
to avoid conflict, if that becomes the focus
of their thinking and their doing, then leadership
will be paralyzed out of fear. It will no longer
have a vision and be aggressive. A church will
lose its sense of mission and direction. It will
lose its effectiveness if, in fact, the leaders
begin to focus on avoiding conflict. The question
is not how to avoid conflict. It's how to handle
conflict. So don't expect that of the leaders
of our church because that will ultimately only
hinder the purpose of God. All of us need to
understand that as in the early church, and by
the way, this is but one example of many conflicts
in the early church. We need to understand that
conflict is inevitable and learn to deal with
it in a godly manner. Certainly none of us should
seek to be the tool to create conflict, but we
should seek to be a part of the solution to conflict.
We should prayerfully seek. Ask God, what is
the answer in this conflict in my class or in
this small church or in the broader church? Now,
having said these things about church conflict,
I want you to notice that these same three statements
can be used about conflict in any level. For
example, it can be said also about personal conflict
that it is inevitable. That is a part of life.
If you try to go through life avoiding conflict,
you are going to run your way through life and
be miserable. Conflict is a part of living. It's
inevitable. But realize that conflict is a God
-given opportunity for your personal development.
And that conflict properly managed in your life
opens the door to more meaningful relationships
with other people. There are some of you today
facing conflict at work with a boss. Or maybe
it's an employee. Maybe it's the neighbor across
the back fence. Hey, you're going to have conflict.
It's inevitable. But recognize that that is God's
appointment for your development. And if you
handle it right, it's actually going to open
up more meaningful relationships for you. The
same three principles are true in family conflict.
Family conflict is inevitable. It will happen
between husband and wife. It will happen between
parents and children. But these conflicts are
actually God -given opportunities for family
development. So instead of regretting them, instead
of hating them, instead of worrying over them,
what God's opportunity is. Look for the positive
in that conflict. And then handle it correctly,
properly, and it will become the door to more
effective child raising or a more satisfying
husband -wife relationship than you've had to
this point. You see how these principles apply
to conflict? So how should we respond to conflict?
Well, the way James tells us to. Count it all
joy, my brethren, when you fall into various
conflicts. Why? Because they're inevitable anyway.
And because God has a purpose in them. That purpose
is our development. And so that we can be more
effective as we learn to manage those conflicts
in a godly way. Well, we must pray. Let's close.