![\"17151965178_6f5263baa9_z\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/307\/2016\/10\/17151965178_6f5263baa9_z.jpg\")
<\/a>Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because he was and is divine and human.<\/p>\n
If we do not somehow represent the various parties in a conflict, we will never work to transform a conflict so that it is beneficial to all.<\/p>\n
Beware of a person who is not invested in a conflict except to benefit from it at others\u2019 expense. Those who are most involved in a conflict have the greatest amount of motivation to resolve it. For example, beware of gun manufacturers who are not invested in resolving a conflict to the benefit of all parties, but profit from the conflict at others\u2019 expense.<\/p>\n
Jesus benefited others\u2013God and humanity\u2013 at his own expense. So, too, his servant Martin Luther King, Jr., who died seeking to bring about a double victory:\u00a0\u00a0redemption and healing to all peoples, black, white, and beyond. Here is what King wrote in a 1967 Christmas Sermon on this theme:<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve seen too much hate to want to hate, myself, and I\u2019ve seen hate on the faces of too many sheriffs, too many white citizens\u2019 councilors, and too many Klansmen of the South to want to hate, myself; and every time I see it, I say to myself, hate is too great a burden to bear. Somehow we must be able to stand up before our most bitter opponents and say: \u201cWe shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will and we will still love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws and abide by the unjust system, because non-cooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good, and so throw us in jail and we will still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and, as difficult as it is, we will still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our communities at the midnight hour and drag us out on some wayside road and leave us half-dead as you beat us, and we will still love you. Send your propaganda agents around the country, and make it appear that we are not fit, culturally and otherwise, for integration, and we\u2019ll still love you. But be assured that we\u2019ll wear you down by our capacity to suffer, and one day we will win our freedom. We will not only win freedom for ourselves; we will so appeal to your heart and conscience that we will win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In the end, my closing question is this:\u00a0How are we invested in racial conflicts today?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because he was and is divine and human. If we do not somehow represent the various parties in a conflict, we will never work to transform a conflict so that it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1284,"featured_media":4619,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Uncommon God, Common Good\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/paul.l.metzger\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-10-22T00:04:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-01-04T18:49:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/307\/2016\/10\/17151965178_6f5263baa9_z.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"427\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Paul Louis Metzger\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@paulouismetzger\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Paul Louis Metzger\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/\",\"name\":\"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2016-10-22T00:04:50+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-01-04T18:49:35+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/76d231c55ec9f60adb8597cca81f7242\"},\"description\":\"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/\",\"name\":\"Uncommon God, Common Good\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/76d231c55ec9f60adb8597cca81f7242\",\"name\":\"Paul Louis Metzger\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c3df6455c0eff6aa9d7dac387d59d4?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c3df6455c0eff6aa9d7dac387d59d4?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Paul Louis Metzger\"},\"description\":\"Dr. Paul Louis Metzger is the Founder and Director of The Institute for Cultural Engagement: New Wine, New Wineskins and Professor at Multnomah Biblical Seminary\/Multnomah University. He is the author of numerous works, including \\\"Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths\\\" and \\\"Consuming Jesus: Beyond Race and Class Divisions in a Consumer Church.\\\" These volumes and his others can be found wherever fine books are sold. Find me on: Facebook | Twitter | Google+\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/paul.l.metzger\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/paulouismetzger\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/NewWineNewWineskins\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/author\/uncommongodcommongood\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense","description":"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense","og_description":"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/","og_site_name":"Uncommon God, Common Good","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/paul.l.metzger","article_published_time":"2016-10-22T00:04:50+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-01-04T18:49:35+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":427,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/307\/2016\/10\/17151965178_6f5263baa9_z.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Paul Louis Metzger","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@paulouismetzger","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Paul Louis Metzger","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/","name":"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#website"},"datePublished":"2016-10-22T00:04:50+00:00","dateModified":"2017-01-04T18:49:35+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/76d231c55ec9f60adb8597cca81f7242"},"description":"Why did Jesus care to resolve the conflict between God and humanity? Jesus was really invested in resolving the conflict between God and humanity because","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/2016\/10\/invest-in-resolving-conflict-at-your-own-expense\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"We Need To Invest In Resolving Conflict At Our Own Expense"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/","name":"Uncommon God, Common Good","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/76d231c55ec9f60adb8597cca81f7242","name":"Paul Louis Metzger","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c3df6455c0eff6aa9d7dac387d59d4?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c3df6455c0eff6aa9d7dac387d59d4?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Paul Louis Metzger"},"description":"Dr. Paul Louis Metzger is the Founder and Director of The Institute for Cultural Engagement: New Wine, New Wineskins and Professor at Multnomah Biblical Seminary\/Multnomah University. He is the author of numerous works, including \"Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths\" and \"Consuming Jesus: Beyond Race and Class Divisions in a Consumer Church.\" These volumes and his others can be found wherever fine books are sold. Find me on: Facebook | Twitter | Google+","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/paul.l.metzger","https:\/\/twitter.com\/paulouismetzger","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/NewWineNewWineskins"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/author\/uncommongodcommongood\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/uncommongodcommongood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}