St. Augustine and I Share a Common Lust
November 9, 2025
I share a lust with St. Augustine. Although he was a pillar of the church, he regularly prayed, “O Lord, deliver me from this lust of always vindicating myself.” We
Introducing Relational Peacemaking™
Peacemaking is one of the highest callings in life. It involves a special set of skills that enable you to resolve most of your own conflicts personally and privately and to help others make peace in their families, churches and places of work.
Conflict is a part of life
We live in a fallen world that is often filled with conflict.
Friendships enrich our lives, but they sometimes fall apart because of misunderstandings and unmet expectations.
Marriages begin with joyful companionship, but all too often they lose their joy and sometimes end in bitter divorce.
Children are a delight, but they can break our hearts if they reject us.
Churches are places of love and unity, until they divide into bitter factions.
Coworkers make us productive, but they can also turn our jobs into a nightmare.
There is no escaping it: conflict is a part of life.
Peacemakers Breathe Grace
But amidst all the conflict in this world, there are those who make peace. There are people who resolve differences, restore broken marriages, reconcile estranged children, heal church splits and settle lawsuits.
These people are called “peacemakers.” Peacemakers are people who breathe grace. They draw continually on the goodness and power of Jesus Christ, and then they bring his love, mercy, forgiveness, strength and wisdom to the conflicts of daily life. God delights to breathe his grace through peacemakers and use them to dissipate anger, improve understanding, promote justice, and encourage forgiveness and reconciliation.
The Slippery Slope
Most people have developed automatic ways of responding to conflict, which can lead us down a slippery slope that makes conflict worse.
Some people prefer to escape from conflict through denial or by fleeing from relationships, which delays lasting solutions.
Others move into an attack mode, use gossip, harsh words, physical intimidation or lawsuits to dominate others, which destroys relationships.
Peacemakers know how to avoid impulsive reactions and instead resolve conflict through confession, forgiveness and negotiation, or by seeking outside assistance through mediation, arbitration or church intervention. By God’s grace, they excel at leading people back onto a path of peace.
The Four G's of Peacemaking
The Bible is the most powerful and effective peacemaking manual the world has ever known. In addition to showing us how to make peace with God, it provides detailed guidance on how we can restore broken relationships with the people around us. This guidance can be organized into four key principles, which are called the Four G’s of Peacemaking.
- Glorify God - How to use conflict to draw attention to God's reconciling grace
- Get the Log Out of Your Eye - How to take responsibility for your contribution to a conflict
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Gently Restore - How to help others take responsibility for their contribution to a conflict
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Go and Be Reconciled - How to reconcile relationships and reach agreement through forgiveness and interest-based negotiation
Principles that work in Every kind of conflict
Relational peacemaking has been used to resolve a wide variety of conflicts, including negligence, breach of contract, defamation, divorce, wrongful discharge, breach of fiduciary responsibility, abuse, assault, church splits and even warring tribes in Africa.
To read about real life cases and see examples of what you could accomplish as peacemaker, click on the link below.
Free eBooklet
Introducing Relational Peacemaking
This free ebooklet provides a detailed introduction to the key principles of relational peacemaking, including when to overlook minor offense, when and how to correct others, how to make a credible confession, how to forgive the way God forgives us, how to negotiate just agreements, and when and how to seek mediation assistance.
Take the Full Course
Go deeper today by enrolling in our 12-hour course on relational peacemaking, which includes detailed teaching and demonstration videos that show how you can develop skills that enable you to take hold of Jesus’ marvelous promise: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the sons of God” (Matt. 5:9).
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Frequently Asked Questions
Can anything good come from conflict?
Yes. 1 Corinthians 10:31-11:1 teaches us that conflict provides three opportunities. We can bring glory to God as we channel and reflect his reconciling grace. We can serve other people by forgiving them and helping them see ways they may need to change. And we can grow to be more like Christ when we act justly and see areas when God is calling us to grow. In addition, peacemaking allows us to show the world that we are followers of Jesus Christ, who famously said, “Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called the sons of God” (Matt. 5:9) and “Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. All people will know you that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35).
How is peacemaking related to the gospel?
Peacemaking is one of the best ways that Christians experience and display the power of the gospel. It provides opportunities to mirror God’s gracious reconciliation with a fallen world and to demonstrate the beauty of the gospel to people who not yet understand the love and mercy of Jesus (see How Can You Forgive Me, I Killed Your Baby? and RW and the Gospel).
Can peacemaking principles work when an entire church is engaged in conflict?
Yes. Large group conflicts can be very complex and demanding, but they can be successfully resolved by using the same principles used to reconcile just two people (see A Wave of Confessions Saves a Church and Defusing Explosive Meetings).
Can these principles be used to resolve legal conflicts between Christians?
Yes. 1 Corinthians 6:1-6 teaches Christians to make every reasonable effort to resolve their differences, even legal differences, in the church before they consider going into civil court. As illustrated by the cases listed on this page, biblical peacemaking principles have been used to resolve many different kinds of legal disputes, some of which included legal claims of millions of dollars.
I have many more questions about peacemaking. Where can I find more answers?
You can start digging deeper into these concepts by reading our Introducing Relational Peacemaking and Frequently Ask Questions about Peacemaking. To go even deeper, register for our Discovering Relational Wisdom Course.
RW360 Blogs Illustrate Real-Life Relational Peacemaking
Seven Benefits of a Smile
November 1, 2025
My daughter, Megan, was eighteen months old when she decided to test her smile on an angry looking biker. Just before a vacation in Jackson, Wyoming, she had learned what
Gentle Shepherding for a Pregnant Teen
October 26, 2025
Tom called me for advice on how to deal with an 18-year-old church member, Tina, who was pregnant out of wedlock (names changed). Half of his elder board thought Tina
The Golden Result
October 12, 2025
We all know the Golden Rule: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” But do you know the Golden Result? It’s a direct corollary to the
Political Strife Is an Opportunity
September 14, 2025
Our country is currently embroiled in a time of intense political and cultural conflict, which is so painfully revealed in the recent assassination of Charlie Kirk. Each of us is
Reputation vs Character
July 27, 2025
Jeff’s reputation was being trashed by people in his own church. He was respected throughout the city for his outstanding Sunday school classes, which had drawn hundreds of people to