Sun. Aug. 26 (Henry Neufeld)

Henry Neufeld spoke on Letter Writing and Confrontation. Letter writing (like emailing) is truly a skill when done properly, and once sent, it cannot be retrieved. When it is appropriate to confront someone in writing? Paul's second surviving letter to his friends in Corinth seems to be a first draft-very long, laboriously composed (likely at the pace of a word a minute), possibly not properly edited and most likely was very personal and not intended to be read by anyone else. 2 Cor. 7:8 refers to a now-lost "letter of sorrows" which was apparently a letter of confrontation. Initially Paul regretted having sent it, but once he learned that the letter produced repentance, he was relieved and glad it worked. But what if the letter had not worked? After all, confrontation is very difficult and does not always work as hoped. We therefore have examples in scripture illustrating people seeking to find peaceful solutions by avoiding confrontation. Abraham, for instance, let Lot decide which land to use for his herds, David cut off part of Saul's robe, to make the point that he could have killed him but did not do so. Jesus frequently tried to explain himself more clearly rather than retaliating. Paul seems to have been a weak speaker but strong writer, so he preferred to confront by letter (Corinthians, Galatians). When tempted to confront someone, we might first ask ourselves whether this will hurt our relationship. How will we know? [JEK] Listen to the sermon audio MP3 recording from Sunday August 26th using your browser's preferred media player.