In our 11th episode, Aaron Prelock says he was taught a good deal about conflict, but all of it was about conflict that had already gone badly wrong. What nobody covered was the ordinary kind that gets people to that point: conflict between pastors, between elders, between the leadership and the congregation, and in his own heart on a Monday morning when he doesn't feel like being godly. He and Stephen Baker talk about how the reaction against Machen's warrior children left pastors afraid of conflict altogether, why an eldership that always votes unanimously has uniformity rather than unity, and what a senior pastor who never loses a vote teaches the men under him. The last thing they say is that you shouldn't fear conflict and shouldn't run toward it. You should sanctify it.

00:00 — What Aaron wishes he'd been told about conflict
02:21 — The marriage with no fighting in it
05:22 — Machen's warrior children and the swing away from conflict
11:38 — Jew and Greek: the conflict the apostles insisted on working through
13:58 — Luther at Worms, and the night of prayer before it
15:29 — Defining conflict: friction, from mild to disintegrating
18:30 — Battle mode at the seminary, battle mode at home
21:34 — Triaging the conflicts that aren't your fault
24:43 — Recovering backbone without losing gentleness
28:33 — Mark Dever on church discipline you've just learned
32:28 — Titus 1: certain men must be silenced
34:02 — If there's never conflict in the church, you're failing
39:23 — Students in elders' meetings, watching the mess
41:44 — The elder who raised his head over the parapet
44:49 — The sacraments and the freedom to have it out Thursday night
49:27 — Unanimity, uniformity, and unity
1:00:54 — Conflict-averse men, and the homes that made them
1:06:23 — Timothy's timidity, and Owen on grace changing nature
1:10:18 — Short-circuit conflict, short-circuit sanctification

Learn more about the Frontier Shepherds conference at newgenevaacademy.com