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It is easy for leaders to avoid becoming involved in disagreements or to overreact to staff conflicts. Neither approach is healthy. Here are some reminders for leaders who are more than just staff referees. Let’s get rid of our whistles and striped shirts and meet staff conflicts head-on.

Church staffs come in many different forms. Staff may already be in place when a pastor arrives. In other instances, one or more staff members may need to be selected. Some staffs operate as well-oiled team machines; others are the height of dysfunction and manipulation. Just thinking about them may make you want to scream and run for the hills.

JustPeace was born out of a yearning for life-giving ways of engaging conflict and a hope for conflict transformed. The needs in our world continue and we respond with confidence through the one who said, “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.”

The witness that Christians can most powerfully offer the world is not that of a perfect people, but of a people always fully engaged in the reconciliation experience.

“Finally an acknowledgement that, first, we [women] are the ones that bare the greatest brunt of all of the world’s conflicts.” – Leymah Gbowee

Faith & Leadership: A divided world does not need a church free of conflict and sin but a church that models how conflict and sin can be transformed into peace.

She saw only too clearly the fragility of peace, saying that peace needs to be nurtured as carefully as an egg. Dekha found deep fulfilment in enabling others to develop their full potential as leaders for peace and justice, never seeking the limelight for herself.

Conflict actually provides the opportunity for us to communicate, to discuss differences and similarities, to really listen to and hear each other, and to forge solutions which meet the needs of the congregation without harming each other and which actually lead to healing and reconciliation.

Shivering, he cried for forgiveness. “I come to you as a prodigal son. Please forgive me.” The two women whose materials had been stolen emerged from the congregation and gave him a big hug.

Kuany shared his story of destruction, survival and redemption with a packed auditorium at the World Methodist Council at the Lake Junaluska, (N.C.) Conference and Retreat Center.