“Fighting Fire With Fire” by Chrissy Cole

Pastor Chrissy Cole continues the Through the Fire series with “Fighting Fire With Fire,” a message on handling conflict with humility and Spirit-led self-control. Teaching from James 1 and Ephesians 4, she explains how unmanaged anger damages connection and how choosing kindness, listening, and unity leads to healthier relationships.

• (00:00) - Through the Fire series recap
• (02:30) - Fighting Fire With Fire introduction
• (05:00) - Conflict is the price of intimacy
• (07:10) - Flesh fire vs Spirit fire
• (11:00) - Conflict is inevitable, combustion is optional
• (14:45) - What anger exposes in the heart
• (18:30) - Identifying unhealthy communication styles
• (21:00) - Be quick to listen, slow to speak (James 1:19)
• (24:30) - Managing anger before it manages you
• (29:00) - Practical tools for emotional regulation
• (34:30) - Humility protects unity
• (39:00) - Choosing connection over being right
• (42:30) - Invitation, prayer & response

Creators and Guests

Host

Chrissy Cole

Chrissy’s parents moved to the U.S. from the Philippines in the late 70′s. She saw her parents both come to know the Lord at a young age. She and her family poured their lives into the local church and were changed by God. Chrissy attended Evangel University in Springfield, MO and earned a B.A. in Communications with an emphasis in Public Relations.

What is Project Church?

A life-giving Jesus community for a new generation of people in Sacramento.

Join us every Sunday
Old Sacramento: 8:30 AM, 10:00 AM & 11:45 AM @ 1200 2nd Street, Sacramento, CA 95814
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Online: https://www.youtube.com/projectchurchsac

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;24;23
Speaker 4
Good morning or good afternoon Project Church. Has everybody doing all right? I'm great. Thanks for asking. I'm excited to start the new series, our continue the new series that we're in, which is Through the Fire A relationship series. We do this every year around this time and really believe that it is not just, helping people in their homes and relationships now.

00;00;24;24 - 00;00;48;11
Speaker 4
It's helping build the kingdom of God. There's eternal ramifications, for putting intentional work into our relationships. So I want to, encourage you in that. But also this is for married couples. Engage couples. I even talked to a gal this morning. She is, long distance with her fiancé, like, across the ocean. And she's still attending without him.

00;00;48;16 - 00;01;22;28
Speaker 4
The marriage course, which starts tonight. It's an eight week course. And let me just say, this was a game changer for me and Caleb when we ourselves did it. 4 or 5 years ago. And we really just wanted to, to break that kind of barrier that we felt like we were hitting. There is a bit of a plateau and some things that we really needed to work with and through alongside our therapist, but also this course helped give some practical tools, to help us grow in our marriage and for some of you, your future marriage.

00;01;22;28 - 00;01;46;13
Speaker 4
So, make sure you sign up tonight for tonight. It starts tonight. You probably miss one. I wouldn't recommend it. But there's also childcare. We implore you, sign up for this course. We love it so much. In fact, I think we're going to get certified as a connection codes marriage course. Counselor, which I think it's going to just continue to help our congregation next this coming Wednesday.

00;01;46;13 - 00;02;14;01
Speaker 4
I know I'm giving you a couple days here, but this coming Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. And if you know anything about Ash Wednesday, it is the first day, of the 40 days leading up to Easter. So what we like to say here at Project Church is that this is 40 days of decreasing ourselves so that we can increase our connection with the Lord and increase our connection with what he did, on those days leading up to his crucifixion.

00;02;14;05 - 00;02;37;05
Speaker 4
And then, of course, we celebrate Easter. But it's important that we start off somber understanding of our own sin, see him on the cross and how that impacts us for the next 40 days so that Easter can truly be, celebration. So Ash Wednesday is this Wednesday. We normally have prayer rooms on that on Wednesday nights, but we'll turn that into a service for this special occasion.

00;02;37;10 - 00;02;57;26
Speaker 4
All right. So you ready? Ready for a fire message. See what I did there? Yeah okay. So last week we talked about having the right fire in any relationship. We need to have the right fire. That is stoked. And that's the fire that we have with a relationship with Jesus. We want to keep that on fire. That's our foundation.

00;02;57;29 - 00;03;27;07
Speaker 4
But today we are fighting fire with fire. Fire with fire. Today we're talking about connection, communication and conflict. So I know I've told a lot of stories about conflicts that Caleb and I have had, but I'm going to start actually today with a story, about an actual fire burn situation that had happened in my life. Has anybody ever been burned in relationships?

00;03;27;09 - 00;03;50;03
Speaker 4
Well, I'm actually not talking about that. I'm talking about pouring water into my oatmeal that was just heated up by a hot water kettle, and it spilled on my hand alongside of the oatmeal, and it just burned the top of my hand. If you see the people up close, they can see that mark. It's not a birthmark, it's I it's a situation of me getting burned by who knew?

00;03;50;05 - 00;04;11;23
Speaker 4
Hot water and oatmeal could really scar you. So this happened. And what? I ended up putting aloe vera on it. If you need to know if you burn yourself in this manner, put your hand under water for 20 minutes, not 2 to 3 minutes, because it actually continues to burn and the sensation of burning was so long. I only did it for a couple minutes and I kept on having to put it on.

00;04;12;00 - 00;04;32;07
Speaker 4
Anyways, it was crazy. I'm just glad it's healing. But you know what happened to my hand after I burned myself? It became narcissistic, you know I'm talking. But Charlie came and hugged me. I was like, look. And I kind of pushed her away. I was like, don't touch my hand. There's a burn on it. Caleb tried to grab my hand walking.

00;04;32;09 - 00;04;46;21
Speaker 4
I pushed him away. No, no, don't touch it. I'm wounded here and then I put aloe vera on it. But I left it open because you you don't want to, like, cover it all the time. And I don't really know where I got that science, but I just in my head, it's like if I cover it, it's not going to heal.

00;04;46;24 - 00;05;26;05
Speaker 4
So I had aloe vera on. It was kind of wet with some like scar moisturizer stuff, and I didn't want anything to touch it because it was like fuzz and threads and blankets would stick to it. So I had to keep it away from anything that would make it hurt more. And I know this is an actual burn situation, but we become a bit narcissistic when we're wounded because because we care for this wound like nothing else matters and nothing matters but us keeping this from hurting again or getting worse.

00;05;26;07 - 00;05;49;03
Speaker 4
And so how many people know what I mean by you're getting narcissistic when you're wounded? Somebody wants to talk to you about that place that kind of hurts. And you have not yet quite processed and you're like, nope, not going to talk about it. Ooh, avoid. And when I see happening is that relationship, our relationship, we start to become so convinced that we can protect ourselves from getting hurt again.

00;05;49;08 - 00;06;25;09
Speaker 4
When God actually wants to help us process some of the trauma and the wounds that we have. Because if they're if we have unprocessed trauma and we have not acknowledge the emotions that have come into wounds that we've experienced, then we start distancing ourselves from the body, and we are not willing or able to do conflict well. So this morning, what I want to talk to you about is that we would do conflict well, and, you know, you'll do conflict well when you do communication well.

00;06;25;11 - 00;06;50;10
Speaker 4
But here's the bit that I want to share is a little bit of an aside, but can we not label each other things like narcissistic? I mean, come on, you you listen to the TikTok therapists and Instagram influencers that are experts on relationships that don't know you, that benefit you from clicking and liking and sharing, and you say, oh, narcissism.

00;06;50;13 - 00;07;18;12
Speaker 4
I was using hyperbole just for the just for the, the effect of the story. But some of you are using these labels that TikTok is feeding you of these people that you don't know, and you are labeling the people in your lives. You're distancing yourselves because you have not actually gotten to relationship with people who love you, who you haven't found that therapist who is spirit filled and Bible guided.

00;07;18;15 - 00;07;47;04
Speaker 4
That's what we need before we start labeling everybody, before we start making decisions. And I did my own research and that behavior is narcissistic. Can we stop doing that? We're not going to do conflict. Well if we are attaching labels to people too quickly. Right. And so my my thought for you today is that conflict will worsen or resolve based on your communication.

00;07;47;06 - 00;08;19;28
Speaker 4
Avoidance means imminent death in your relationships. You might be thinking, that's so dramatic, Chrissy. Well, if your relationship doesn't die right away, the trust in the relationship will be eroded. And so we have to be careful that in conflict, we do communication well, and we don't just protect ourselves, we don't we don't stay out of the fire. We actually have to go through the fire.

00;08;20;00 - 00;08;44;24
Speaker 4
My encouragement for you today is that healthy relationships don't avoid conflict. They learn how to fight fire with fire and you're like fire with fire. That sounds very dangerous. And then let me talk to you about two fires that I see at work in every relationship. And I'll be using a scripture that I know is more about the temptation, that's just in man.

00;08;44;25 - 00;09;08;08
Speaker 4
During Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. You'll see here in a moment. It's not about prayer, but I want to just take a couple words from it that will help you. But Jesus says this Matthew 2641 watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. What I want to focus in on is not the angel on the left and the devil on the right.

00;09;08;08 - 00;09;39;07
Speaker 4
That's what people normally think, that when I'm coming to a decision and when I'm in a fight, I need to decide if I'm going to be the angel or if I'm going to be the the devil. No, no, we're talking about two different spirits that are at work. There's a flesh spirit or there's a flesh fire, two different fires, a flesh fire or a spirit fire that's happening that you cannot come into agreement with a spirit has something to do with the soul of a man, or the thought patterns of a man, or a mindset of all of us.

00;09;39;09 - 00;10;14;06
Speaker 4
And then the flesh has to do with your mortal and physical frailties. The flesh is weak, the spirit is willing. But here's the thing too many of us are feeding our flesh fire rather than the spirit fire. Flesh fire looks like communication that is primarily reactive, defensive, and ultimately destructive. That's flesh fire. When you're fighting just because you want to get your reaction out, you want to vent.

00;10;14;08 - 00;10;46;16
Speaker 4
You want to protect yourself. These are all moral and physical frailties that cause us to communicate this way. And then there's a spirit fire. And the spirit fire is at work. And this is the fire that we need to pick up and fight with. Right? The spirit fire is communication that is self-controlled, constructive and restorative. The spirit fire has the intention of what the spirit has.

00;10;46;18 - 00;11;12;10
Speaker 4
His intention is that we would be unified, his intention that we would have relationships because relationships build the kingdom of God. But too many of us are avoiding conflict and fight and not even fighting at all. We're just avoiding. Or we're feeding the flesh and we're fighting flesh. Fire with fire. But what I want to encourage you to do today is fight with a spirit, fire.

00;11;12;13 - 00;11;36;14
Speaker 4
I know we say this every relationship series, and we're not going to stop because it's this good. First, I want you to commit yourself to conflict resolution. Why? Because conflict is a price we pay for a deepening level of intimacy. Do you want to grow closer in your marriage with your partners? Do you want to grow closer in your friendships?

00;11;36;14 - 00;12;05;17
Speaker 4
Do you want to grow closer with your siblings? You want to grow closer with your workplace people? Do you want to grow closer in this church with others than you are going to stay committed to the conflict? Go through the fire and stop avoiding. But there's something that I want to just throw your way, because I think that there's there's there's a moment where we're like, okay, those people who are committed to fire, they're just explosive emotionally.

00;12;05;17 - 00;12;27;28
Speaker 4
Anybody know those explosive people? And then there's other people who are just the ones who are suppressing their emotions and all of us reactive people are like, they're so annoying. They're avoidance. But I want you to see what is actually happening. And it is at work. And again, this is some stuff that you can read about in connection codes, the book or the course, that we have available starting tonight.

00;12;28;00 - 00;12;52;05
Speaker 4
But when emotions are expressed explosively, in other words, that someone is yelling at you, giving, feedback with harshness and it doesn't have to be loud, it can just be hurtful and strong. Something in our brain fires and it's the threat center of our brain, which is the amygdala. Okay, I'm sounding smart, but I just read a book and took a course, right?

00;12;52;08 - 00;13;26;04
Speaker 4
Amygdala. And this is when our brain, this is where our brain perceives danger. And when there's danger perceived and cortisol and adrenaline starts to increase and the prefrontal cortex where the your emotions are firing. This is where we have reasoning and empathy in our brains. That frontal prefrontal cortex, it disconnects and it goes offline. It's like the computer just dies when there is explosive communication.

00;13;26;07 - 00;13;54;15
Speaker 4
You know what that leads to that leads to defensiveness, shame, disconnection, fight or flight reactions. And instead of solving problems in conflict, what happens is that there's just survival mode. I just need to protect myself. So I get it. I get why people disconnect. I get why people avoid. But some of you who are thinking, I'm glad I'm not reactive, I'm glad I suppress my emotions.

00;13;54;17 - 00;13;58;01
Speaker 4
I'm coming after you to.

00;13;58;03 - 00;14;26;18
Speaker 4
Some people think that when you are able to control your emotions, suppress your emotions. Oh then man, I'm mature. I'm a bigger person. This person is a child. So immature. I'm going to suppress my emotions. But what's happening is you are not processing your emotions. And neurologically what's happening is there's something called your limbic system and it's activated your internal stress levels.

00;14;26;20 - 00;14;48;22
Speaker 4
They increase, there's a lot of anxiety and there's a lot of inflammation that takes place. So if you have a lot of inflammation in your body, some of that is because of internal stress that you have carried, because you haven't processed your emotions, you just allowed the emotions to live inside of you. This reduces emotional regulation capacity over time.

00;14;48;25 - 00;15;21;19
Speaker 4
So there will come a moment where suppressing doesn't work any longer and you may just explode. So what's happening? I'm speaking to the flesh fire that looks like suppression or explosion. But we need to engage the spirit fire. The spirit fire provides safety for conversations. So we are going to fight fire with fire. And it's the spirit fire that helps us grow closer with the body of Christ.

00;15;21;22 - 00;15;39;08
Speaker 4
What happens when we grow closer? Relationship. The Spirit of God dwells with us. The Spirit of God is at work with us in us. So I have three quick points for you today. Okay? We're going to get back to what I was just talking about. But let's start with number one. I have three scriptures I'm jumping around today.

00;15;39;09 - 00;16;01;03
Speaker 4
Know normally you go through one scripture, but we're going to jump around in three different scriptures. And starting with James 119, if you're taking notes or you can go to the Church Center app and click events and you'll find Project Church on there. But number one, conflict is inevitable. But combustion is optional. What am I saying? It's inevitable.

00;16;01;03 - 00;16;16;20
Speaker 4
Conflict will happen. I mean, I literally have in my notes, pick a fight that you and Caleb had, and I ended up telling you this burn story about my hand and stuff. We all have conflict. Your pastors have conflict. Your parents have conflict. Your kids have conflicts. Everybody has conflict in the first place. There's always conflict all around.

00;16;16;27 - 00;16;49;07
Speaker 4
It is inevitable. But combustion is optional. Explosiveness is optional. Suppression is optional. What we need to do is engage. James 119. Know this my beloved brothers. Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger. Every relationship has friction, but that does not mean that you're failing. You're not failing. In fact, there's some people who come to us and they're like, oh, Chris, we want to get married.

00;16;49;10 - 00;16;56;29
Speaker 4
We just want to do some, you know, premarital counseling. And, good thing is we never fight.

00;16;57;02 - 00;17;20;01
Speaker 4
As you're laughing because, you know, you're in a relationship longer than five years, it's a really good chance that you are not getting deeper, as deep as you could. You're saying surface, or there's different communication styles are happening. And let me tell you, you want conflict. You want disagreements. They don't have to be explosive, but you want conflict.

00;17;20;03 - 00;17;37;14
Speaker 4
Why? If we should stay in this form of agreement, there's a good chance that there's a passive person and a steamroller. Ooh, I'm just saying it.

00;17;37;16 - 00;18;10;28
Speaker 4
But here's what happens. Conflict becomes combustible when we feel unheard, misunderstood, or disrespected, unheard, misunderstood or disrespected. Just look at our nation right now. Look at our nation. Why do you think we're having conflicts everywhere and all the time? Social media is littered with it. We're having so much conflict because people feel unheard. People feel most misunderstood, and there is disrespect and it's on both sides of the aisle.

00;18;11;00 - 00;18;36;23
Speaker 4
Think about the relationships that you have conflicts with. It's guarantee there's a moment where you have felt misunderstood, unheard or disrespected. So communication is going to reveal how you handle this conflict, how you're going to help somebody feel heard, how you're going to help somebody feel understood, and how you're going to start respecting people with the respect that says the image of God is on you, imprinted on you.

00;18;36;23 - 00;19;01;09
Speaker 4
I'm going to respect you and try to love you and be unified with you. But we need to identify our communication style. So there's three communication styles that I do not recommend. Number one, passive. Passive communication is saying that you matter and I don't do matter and I don't. And this is a word for some of you who are like, I'm being humble.

00;19;01;09 - 00;19;20;26
Speaker 4
I'm just taking it all in. I'm being patient. And you never give your partner an opportunity to be patient. You may be passive, right? If you're forgiving always, and you never get that from the other side, there's a chance that there might be some passivity happening there.

00;19;20;29 - 00;19;48;13
Speaker 4
Number two aggressive. I may have said that I'm aggressive at times in other messages, and I want to redact everything that I've said in the past. Now that I tell you what aggressive communication is, aggressive communication is saying I matter and you don't write. So I'm going to steamroll you because I matter. You don't. But then there's passive aggressive which says, I think you matter.

00;19;48;15 - 00;20;18;04
Speaker 4
Actually, no, not really. And it's confusing. And whether you're trying to be or not, it's a bit manipulative. It's it's confusing. I'm not sure where you actually land. Do I matter or do you just matter or. He's just kind of vacillates. Listen, the communication that we need to have is a James 119 kind of communication where we are quick to hear, we're slow to speak and we're slow to anger.

00;20;18;06 - 00;20;43;28
Speaker 4
This is saying, I matter and you matter. We both matter. We've both matter so much that we have to prioritize connection right now, because the Spirit of God wants us to be united. So what does that look like? It looks like being slow to speak, quick to here, slow to anger. If you want to master James 119 communication style, then you're going to practice listening.

00;20;44;00 - 00;21;21;23
Speaker 4
A masterful communicator is. An exceptional listener. The foundation of powerful communication is the quiet skill of listening. You know, in connection codes or the marriage course. What we learned is that there is a study called, the still face study. And what happens with still Face is that all these babies and their caretakers were in a room, and they study their behaviors and, you know, normally when you say baby, also, if you want to let me hold your baby after service, I have open arms.

00;21;21;23 - 00;21;41;28
Speaker 4
I see you back there, Shanks. Give me the baby lighter. Oh my. We we say, who are we? Who that we are. Then let me say I love you so much. Using your good boy. You said you could. And this is what's happening in the study room, right? And and the baby's engaging. And then what do you do?

00;21;41;29 - 00;22;06;22
Speaker 4
What do they do next? They still face the baby. They still face wave and they just stopped reacting. And the baby's just going like, wait, what happened? Confused. And then they'll either hit, they'll scream, they'll get irate. They get emotional because guess what? The baby doesn't know how to connect with you. If you're still facing them. And this is what is happening in our relationships, we start still facing one another.

00;22;06;23 - 00;22;29;28
Speaker 4
Maybe it doesn't look that obvious like in that study research room, but some of us are just saying, oh, I got other things to do. Oh, I'm too busy. I can't talk about these things. Oh yeah. I'm just going to get emotional and talk about something else that has nothing to do with actual conflict. We stop listening to each other when we are explosive or suppressive.

00;22;30;01 - 00;22;51;20
Speaker 4
We stop listening. We need to start doing what we say. We need to start doing. Our partners. I mean, sometimes you don't want to, but you just you have to listen if you want to. Master James 118 you're going to become a better listener. And a better listener. Doesn't mean that you just shut up and have no opinion because you matter too.

00;22;51;23 - 00;23;17;10
Speaker 4
But it means slowing your roll, listening, reflective listening. Tell me, tell me more. And so what you're saying is this we need some very practical tools in order to start becoming better listeners. The goal of communication, it doesn't always have to be said. It can also just be in your posture and in your using your eyes while your partner, while your friend is speaking.

00;23;17;12 - 00;23;40;28
Speaker 4
And the goal of communication is not being right. The goal of communication is not agreement either. The goal is connection. How many people know that there are some people who are wilding out in your life because they don't know that they're not mature enough to connect with you maturely? That was redundant. They're not mature enough to connect with you, so they act out.

00;23;41;01 - 00;24;07;28
Speaker 4
Children do this. I need attention from my parents, so I'm going to act out because they don't know how to connect with you. So parents, it's our job. It's our role to get emotionally connected with the Lord and allow the Holy Spirit to disciple us in our emotions so that our children don't have to act out, so that our spouses don't have to act out and only connect with us the way they know how.

00;24;07;28 - 00;24;45;08
Speaker 4
And it's likely negative we don't want to still face. We need better communication so that it doesn't become combustible, right? Number two anger isn't wrong. Unmanaged anger, though, is dangerous. Anger isn't wrong. Anger is one of the core eight emotions. And you've heard it. And I'm going to read Ephesians 426 to 29. If you want to know how to have unity and do conflict well in the body of Christ, Ephesians four is where you go to.

00;24;45;11 - 00;25;05;01
Speaker 4
And so I just have a snippet from here. Ephesians four 2629 be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger. And I want to skip down to verse 29. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth, but only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear.

00;25;05;09 - 00;25;37;06
Speaker 4
Anger in and of itself is not bad. Out of the eight core emotions, this one is primarily, It can be a primary emotion, but it's also a secondary emotion. So what I want you to do is when there is anger present, I want you to ask yourself what is underneath that anger? If it's a secondary emotion, there is emotion that triggers you and causes you to be angry and some of that might be a shame, a feeling of shame, an emotion of guilt, an emotion of fear, an emotion of being lonely.

00;25;37;07 - 00;25;57;02
Speaker 4
Emotion of being sad hurts. I mean, people know when you're shamed, you feel like you need to work extra hard, and then you do things in your flesh. When you fight with the flesh, fire when you feel guilty, then you either overcompensate or like, I feel guilty, might as well keep on doing because I feel so guilty. And now you're angry and it's like, oh my gosh, unmanaged.

00;25;57;09 - 00;26;14;12
Speaker 4
Not just anger, but unmanaged emotions. It's flesh. It's feeding the flesh. Oh in fear. I have no idea what's happening. I don't know what's going on. I'm going to freak out. I don't have anxiety. Well, maybe you have anxiety because you have not acknowledge that there is a fear emotion operating inside of you. We have to know what our emotions are.

00;26;14;12 - 00;26;22;06
Speaker 4
Holy spirit wants to disciple you through this. Here's what happens.

00;26;22;09 - 00;26;50;28
Speaker 4
We can start to diagnose ourselves and say like, man, I'm just really mature, like the suppressors, right? I'm just really mature. And Caleb tells this story often that he he would sometimes think that taking his emotions captive is what the the Bible told him to do. But the Bible didn't say to take your emotions captive. He said, take your thoughts captive.

00;26;51;01 - 00;27;17;21
Speaker 4
But there are emotions that you have to know that are triggering those thoughts. So what do I want to say to you today is that unmanaged anger looks like fighting with a flesh fire. You're unaware. So because you're unaware of what's actually happening internally, this is what you do. We communicate with information. You know, that sounds like it sounds like here are the facts.

00;27;17;23 - 00;27;48;22
Speaker 4
Here are the statistics. Here's how many times you text me. Here's what you said here and there and everywhere. Those are the facts. I'm right. You're wrong. Anybody informational? My my mom is always so me. You're going to be a lawyer because I always share the information, statistics or sometimes we get emotional, you know you know that you're getting emotional when you get off topic and you fight about everything and anything except for what you're actually mad at.

00;27;48;25 - 00;28;09;08
Speaker 4
Remember being annoyed, disconnected? I was like is because he didn't take out the trash. It's actually because of other things. And then you start seeing about how somebody has failed in other areas rather than the issue at hand. Right? We get emotional. We get off topic, off issue, and then we get historical. What does historical I have receipts.

00;28;09;11 - 00;28;31;16
Speaker 4
You did this in the first year of our marriage. You're never going to change when you get historical and you can start getting receipts. And that's what you're prioritizing in your communication. You inevitably start saying you always, you always done that. You're never going to do this, you're never going to get better. And we just start speaking death over our relationships.

00;28;31;19 - 00;28;58;27
Speaker 4
And, you know, when you start getting historical and then you start getting into your absolutes where you always do this, you never are doing this. I knew you would do this. When you use that kind of language, then you start math. You're just killing that relationship and you become threatening if you do that one more time. I'm telling you, don't you do that one more time.

00;28;59;00 - 00;29;23;29
Speaker 4
We get threatening, we start throwing ultimatums. Okay, fine. Then I'm not going to. I'm not going to be intimate with you. Then you did that. I'm not going to be intimate with you. Oh, you did that and you did that. Divorce papers. Right? Now, do you see that? We're breaking up? There's some threatening language that just looks like unmanaged emotions.

00;29;24;01 - 00;29;46;05
Speaker 4
And that's her flesh. I think some of us just need a heat check. Okay, a heat check real quick. Just a quick acronym to help you. It's a little less serious, but h we need to ask ourselves, am I hungry? Is what is happening inside of me just me hungry? We talked about it last week or a couple weeks ago.

00;29;46;08 - 00;30;11;10
Speaker 4
Elijah, he's just needed a snack and a nap in order to do what God asked him to do. Some of y'all are just hungry. Eat well all three meals. Enough protein. Okay, fiber H am I hungry? E what emotion am I actually feeling? Ask yourself about the emotion that's happening. Listen, Pastor Caleb and I, every Friday we go through the emotional well and we take four weeks where we just, you and I, each other.

00;30;11;10 - 00;30;34;13
Speaker 4
We can't we can't rebuttal anything that we're saying because emotions happen to you. We express with emotions are the last time we felt one of these emotions, one of these eight emotions. That's what we spend time on. What emotion am I feeling? What am I assuming a heat I run a what am I assuming we know? What assumptions do, but I won't finish that because it goes into a bad word.

00;30;34;15 - 00;30;42;25
Speaker 4
We know what. Assuming you guys come on, you know that line. Okay, okay. And T, is this the right timing? Listen.

00;30;42;27 - 00;31;05;05
Speaker 4
We need to ask and take a heat check on our relationships, on our emotions, because we need to start managing them better. We need to start managing so that the fire doesn't spread. You know what happens in verse 27 of Ephesians 4 or 29 says, let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth. This happens after we have not controlled our anger.

00;31;05;08 - 00;31;32;23
Speaker 4
And you know what happens when I seen it in the body of Christ is not just in marriages, but when something happens, there's conflict. Then we start telling so and so. Then we start saying, okay, pray for so-and-so, because this, oh, she did this to me. He did that to me. He responded that way. And we start. So we start spreading vile poison amongst the body, and we start gossiping because we have not controlled our anger, because the only thing that makes us feel better is to just vent it rather than process it.

00;31;32;23 - 00;32;11;21
Speaker 4
Healthy. So anger will lead to sin and we need to manage our emotions. Rein it in. Amen. And finally, number three kind communication is the key. Proverbs 15 one A gentle answer turns away wrath. For those of you who have been told that your gentleness is weakness, it's not weakness, it is strength under control. It is strength where we say, I know what my emotions are, but my thoughts I have to have submitted to you, Lord, you disciple me.

00;32;11;21 - 00;32;39;17
Speaker 4
You discipline me so I can discipline my emotions. If you refuse to regulate your nervous system, take a B, take a heat check. And let me just tell you this some people don't think that they should fight in front of their kids. This is for married couples. And hey, I, I'm for that to a degree. But there have been moments where Caleb and I have had disagreements in front of our kids, and they saw us work it out in front of them.

00;32;39;19 - 00;33;05;00
Speaker 4
I think some of you know that when your parents did not fight in front of you, you were disillusioned when you found out that their marriage was rough, rougher than you thought it was. And here's the thing. Caleb and I were in a little tiff one morning, and we we share a bathroom with Charlie and Charlie. Caleb took Charlie to school after that morning.

00;33;05;00 - 00;33;23;09
Speaker 4
She saw us kiss goodbye because we weren't going to let the day go by with this little tiff that has something to do with him using a toothbrush I didn't want him to use. I bought a better one for him, and he used the bad one. I mean, it was so lame. Guys, Jesus help me. And Charlie said, Charlie said, hey dad, I love you guys.

00;33;23;11 - 00;33;42;03
Speaker 4
I love you mom. And he's like, oh yeah, why? Why do you say that? I like because every time you guys fight, you kiss and make up. And are our family so happy still? And I thought that was a testimony. I mean, I could get irate and throw something at Caleb. You use the wrong toothbrush, you know? But thankfully I didn't.

00;33;42;05 - 00;34;06;06
Speaker 4
But we need to get to the place where we're not hiding things. Avoiding things, but we're actually bringing things to the surface and letting our kids model healthy conflict and healthy resolution. Here's what's happening. We try to stay nice and sweep things under the carpet, but being nice is not kind. Kindness is powerful. Kindness is a fruit of the spirit love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and gentleness.

00;34;06;13 - 00;34;31;08
Speaker 4
This is what God has called us to be. If we are going like God, it disciples with our emotions in our emotions, then that means he's going to form us closer to his likeness. So we need to stop the cycle of escalation in our relationships. The fire it getting heated up without just like chillin. You know, some people are like, oh, I just I need a break from you.

00;34;31;11 - 00;34;57;12
Speaker 4
And they have no intentions of returning. They're just avoiding the conflict. Some people are like, man, our emotions got really high, really big. Well, I understand, maybe needed to take a beat and take a heat check, but you have to come to an agreement about when you're going to reconnect. Kindness kills the cycle. I mean, you see the unhealthy cycle that takes place and our communication and our conflicts.

00;34;57;15 - 00;35;18;12
Speaker 4
Unhealthy conflicts. Looks like we're hurt. Remember, my hand was hurt. We get defensive. We protect to self protect, so we attack. And then there's an counter attack. And then how many people know there's cycles in your relationships. There's cycle with that friend. You always talk politics. Why do you keep talking politics. You don't agree. So you just go in cycles and cycles and cycles and you're like, oh, nothing's going to get through.

00;35;18;14 - 00;35;37;17
Speaker 4
Or your spouse the same fight over and over and the thing that you've been trying to tell your children, you got to get better at this. We got to go on this over and over and over. Same excuses. And it's just defensiveness attack, defensiveness attack. It's unhealthy. And this is a cycle of escalation that we have made agreement with.

00;35;37;23 - 00;36;00;07
Speaker 4
But what we need to do is make agreement with being restorative, like Christians should be. We are about unity. We're about putting love first. We're about respecting, understanding, hearing, being slow to speak, quick to hear, and slow to anger. This is what healthy conflict looks like. We're hurt. We pause. We listen. We master. James 119 right. We pause.

00;36;00;12 - 00;36;28;24
Speaker 4
We clarify. Tell me is this what you meant? Tell me more about this. Help me understand. I need some clarification so that there can be repair because our jobs as Christ followers are to reconcile to one another, reconciled to Christ. He gave his life for us to be reconciled to him. It's the least we can do in some of our relationships.

00;36;28;26 - 00;37;02;01
Speaker 4
Reconciliation. Kindness will kill unhealthy cycles. Cold communication is not to be right. It's to be connected. Are you choosing connection? Are you choosing a conflict so you can go through the fire together? United? You know, again, I can tell you all the fights that Caleb and I, I've ever had, the ones about toothbrushes, the ones about like the bigger ones about finances, the whatever.

00;37;02;04 - 00;37;34;00
Speaker 4
But you guys know how it goes. If you're if you've been in a relationship where I want to share with you today is what the Spirit of God shared with me recently. Caleb and I have gone through in transition, in our personal lives and some of our scheduling. Very practical stuff here. Pragmatic stuff. But whenever there's transition, I just want you to know this as some of you guys are facing transition right now in your lives, in your relationships, even the fact that my kids are about to be in high school, that's a transition.

00;37;34;02 - 00;37;55;10
Speaker 4
And when there's transition, there's a lot of unknowns. And when there's unknowns, there's fear. And so when this transition kind of hit for Caleb and I and our schedules and, and our the flow of our weeks and our days, I started to like, privately hyperventilate with fear, like, how is this going to go? I need to look like I got it together in front of the kids.

00;37;55;11 - 00;38;10;14
Speaker 4
I think it look like I got together room and staff, and there was fear that was just coming in and coming at me. And then for Caleb, there was a lot of overwhelm that was coming on him. And so there was a lot of, you know.

00;38;10;17 - 00;38;47;23
Speaker 4
Maybe guilt, maybe some, anxiety, nervousness. And so I had fear. He had some unknown fears overwhelm. And when that happen with us was disconnection. We choosed. We chose to disconnect with one another and thankfully was short lived, I think because the Lord wanted me to go through this, I don't know. Sometimes we had to go through some things so that we can stand in authority over it.

00;38;47;25 - 00;39;15;16
Speaker 4
And I want to speak to your relationships that are in transition. God wants you to stick it out and choose connection over disconnection. Choose to stay connected over disconnection. Don't get distanced from your partner because you can't make sense of some of the emotions inside of you. And I went to my therapist life coach and I love her because she's spirit filled and she is Bible found it.

00;39;15;19 - 00;39;50;26
Speaker 4
She's guided by the Bible. Please choose your therapist wisely. And she. In that session I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me. This question. I have that question for you guys. Do you trust the flesh of man or do you trust the spirit at work in man? And here's what when I started realizing I had all these fears and then expectations of Caleb to be certain thing for me, I needed to call I here's I need it.

00;39;51;02 - 00;40;21;11
Speaker 4
And here's the thing Caleb will fail. Here's the thing. The people you're raising relationship with your friends, they will fail. Your pastors will fail. Your parents. They will fail your children. They will fail. But do you trust the flesh and man or the spirit at work in man? So you know, if you trust the Spirit of God in someone more, if you if you fight with the spirit fire, you start praying for the Spirit of God to rise up in that person you're in conflict with.

00;40;21;13 - 00;40;49;03
Speaker 4
You. Start praying for them more. You start praying for God to change you. You start praying for God to change them. Instead of trying to change them. You start believing the best. You stop being suspicious of that, or you start expecting that they're going to just fail you start speaking life over them. You stop speaking of them. You start believing and having hope in them and having hope not in them, the flesh, but the spirit at work in them.

00;40;49;06 - 00;41;14;00
Speaker 4
And here's the thing when they fail, you trust that the spirit will cause them to repent. When you fail to, you trust, oh Lord, when may I repent quickly, may I forgive quickly? May I engage with the spirits to fight whatever is happening between us? Do you trust?

00;41;14;02 - 00;41;20;08
Speaker 4
The flesh or trust the spirit at work?

00;41;20;10 - 00;41;40;15
Speaker 4
I said it earlier that the kind of communication that we need to have is one that brings safety. I know that there's some of you who may be thinking that some of your relationships are in a burning home. The flames are firing. You're like, I'm trapped. I don't know how to get out. All I want to do is jump out of the window and get out of this fire.

00;41;40;17 - 00;41;46;05
Unknown
Get out of this heat. But I'm telling you, you need to stay in it.

00;41;46;08 - 00;42;06;13
Speaker 4
And you know how you're going to come out unscathed. You're going to start putting on the fire blanket. So to say. I wish I had a fire blanket up here that just you wrap yourself around it because here's what, here's what's going to help us. And I want you to imagine this. Imagine if we all just had more humility in our relationships.

00;42;06;16 - 00;42;29;20
Speaker 4
Imagine if we were to forgive quickly, if we were to forget offense faster, if we were to repent before somebody called you out. You can imagine if we started walking in that kind of humility, then it's like clothing ourselves with the fire blanket. You know what it says at first Peter five five, clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another.

00;42;29;23 - 00;42;56;17
Speaker 4
For God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble more. Can you imagine this church full of gracious people? Can you imagine relationships and marriages and friendships full of grace? And then Colossians 315 through 12, and let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, and clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, humility, patience and gentleness. That's what clashes the saying some of us need a cloak.

00;42;56;17 - 00;43;23;03
Speaker 4
Ourselves and humility go through the fire until you get out the front, and some of us need a cloak ourselves in humility, wrap our partner around it. Wrap our our children around with humility. Can we just douse the fire with humility? We want to fight fire with the spirit of fire. The spirit fire, not the flesh. Fire. Humility.

00;43;23;05 - 00;43;31;04
Speaker 4
Clothe yourself with humility. Today you have a choice.

00;43;31;07 - 00;44;04;13
Speaker 4
To choose reconciliation and restoration in your friendships and relationships. The same way Jesus had a choice to die on a cross and stand for everything he stands for in relationships with reconciliation. His death on the cross meant forgiveness, and that accountability he took account for every one of your sins. We can lay down our lives for him and clothe ourselves with a humility which looks a lot like the humility that he put on when he died on the cross.

00;44;04;13 - 00;44;26;04
Speaker 4
For us. How can we be sacrificial in relationships? How can we clothe ourselves in humility, die to ourselves, and have relationships that are united? You know what happens in unity? It says in Psalms 133 that it commands a blessing. Do you want your families to be blessed? Do you want your marriages stupid? Bless you, want your workplaces to be blessed?

00;44;26;09 - 00;44;53;12
Speaker 4
Do you want Project Church to be bless your community groups to be. Bless your tears to be blessed. Oh, may we clothe ourselves in humility which leads to human unity. Amen. Which about our heads in this place? I just want to pray for those of you who maybe you have been divided, maybe distance from your relationship with the Lord right now, maybe this morning.

00;44;53;12 - 00;45;16;07
Speaker 4
The Word of God and the the message today, the music today even the baby does. Indications today cause your heart to get softened and formed to receive Jesus, maybe for the first time. Or maybe you want to reconnect with him. The one man who loves you so much that he doesn't want you to stay the same. He doesn't want your relationships to stay the same.

00;45;16;12 - 00;45;35;17
Speaker 4
He died that you might have reconciliation to him first and one another, but right now, I want to pray for those who want to be reconciled to Jesus, maybe start a relationship with him or reconnect with him. If that's you in this place, would you raise your hand on the count of three? One, two, three? Yeah, I see those hands.

00;45;35;17 - 00;46;00;02
Speaker 4
Yes. Hands everywhere. 1234567. Eight. Nine. Ten. 11. That's just half an hour. I'm 12. 13. 14. Anyone else? 15. Anyone else? 16. You stand? Yeah, yeah. I want to pray for you. I don't I didn't, I couldn't see all those hands. But what you all with your heads bowed and your eyes closed. Can we all in unity pray this prayer with those who raise her hand?

00;46;00;02 - 00;46;27;21
Speaker 4
The most important decision you can make in your life is this one right here. So let's pray. Dear Jesus, thank you for bringing me here today to hear your word. I pray that it changes my heart. It changes my mind. I accept you into my life. I believe that you died and resurrected so that I can have life and freedom.

00;46;27;23 - 00;46;50;22
Speaker 4
I confess my need of you help me to stop sinning. I need the strength to live for you. I love you, Jesus. Thank you for your forgiveness. I want to be united with you. Your precious name. Amen. Amen. Come on. Can we give God a shout of praise?

00;46;50;25 - 00;46;55;15
Unknown
Thank you Lord. Thank you Jesus. Thank you Jesus.

00;46;55;22 - 00;47;16;11
Speaker 4
Would you stand to your feet? I just want to sing this one song right close up with this song and our prayer partners. They're going to make their way up front. And if you have any things that you want to pray for in your relationships, or if you just want it, if you made that commitment to the Lord, I just encourage you to come forward and have somebody pray with you.

00;47;16;14 - 00;47;33;10
Speaker 4
We actually have cards that you can fill out. We want to walk with you on this journey. You raise your hand, I really encourage you to come up to the prayer partners, fill out that card, and we have some resources that we want to give you to help you, in this next step. But come on, let's sing this blessing to the Lord.

00;47;33;10 - 00;47;34;02
Speaker 4
His whole holy.

00;47;34;05 - 00;47;44;29
Unknown
And.

00;47;45;02 - 00;47;48;11
Chrissy Cole
Thank you for being a part of our online community here at Project Church.

00;47;48;12 - 00;47;51;23
Chrissy Cole
We hope that this message and the whole service bless your life.

00;47;51;26 - 00;48;08;03
Caleb Cole
Yeah. And if it did, we want to ask that you would do something for us. First of all, if you're not already subscribed to our YouTube channel, be sure to subscribe. Like this video. But also, we would ask that you would consider financially supporting what God is doing through Project Church. You can give in a variety of ways.

00;48;08;06 - 00;48;23;12
Caleb Cole
You can text project to 97,000. Right now. You can give to our Church Center app, or you can give on our website project church.com/give. Thanks so much for being a part of our online community. And once again God bless you guys. We'll see you soon.