About Difficult People and the State of Your Soul

About Difficult People and the State of Your Soul

It happens in the quietest moments and the busiest places. You step into the office, join a family gathering, or stand in line at a grocery store, and suddenly the atmosphere changes. One abrasive remark, one arrogant posture, or one rebellious attitude disrupts the entire environment. It is easy to look at that individual and ask, “Why are they like this? Why must there always be someone who spoils the peace?”

Scripture reveals that this constant collision with difficult people is neither an accident nor an administrative oversight in the order of the world. In Matt.13:24-30, Jesus presents the parable of the wheat and the tares. A farmer sows good seed in his field, but while men sleep, an enemy sows weeds directly alongside the wheat. When the servants ask if they should pull up the tares immediately, the master answers in Matt.13:28-30, "He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn." While the primary, eschatological interpretation of this passage points directly to the end times—when Christ returns in His second coming to execute final judgment—the principle holds an undeniable practical truth for our daily walk.

Until that final harvest arrives, the reality of this present age is that the righteous and the unrighteous reside in the exact same spaces. You cannot escape the tares; they are intentionally left in the field until the end. But while we often view these disruptive individuals as nothing more than an unpleasant nuisance, God views these encounters through an entirely different lens. He allows them in your life not merely to test your endurance, but to expose the true condition of your own heart.

Diagnosing the Root of Strife

Right Division Isn’t the Problem — Confusion Is

Right Division Isn’t the Problem — Confusion Is

When you begin to speak about rightly dividing the word of truth, especially among sincere, well-meaning Christians, you quickly realise that the resistance isn’t always doctrinal—it’s often emotional, relational, and deeply ingrained. You’re not just introducing a new way of studying scripture; you’re challenging years of tradition, cherished assumptions, and spiritual habits that feel sacred. And while the truth of rightly dividing is clear, scriptural, and liberating, the path to sharing it is rarely smooth.

You might start with something simple—perhaps pointing out that Paul was given a unique apostleship, that his gospel was not taught by the twelve, and that the mystery revealed to him was kept hidden from ages past. But even this gentle nudge can stir discomfort. “We follow Jesus,” someone might say, with a tone that suggests you’ve somehow veered off course. And you’ll feel the weight of that statement, because it’s not just theological—it’s personal. Many believers have built their entire spiritual lives around the earthly ministry of Christ, clinging to His words in red as the highest authority, unaware that He now speaks from heaven through the apostle He appointed for this age of grace.

The moment you begin to separate Israel’s promises from the Body’s calling, the tension deepens. You’ll hear, “We’re spiritual Israel,” or “God’s promises to Israel are ours too,” and you’ll realise that the lines have been blurred for so long that clarity feels like division. But it’s not division—it’s precision. It’s the kind of clarity that Paul himself urged when he said we must rightly divide the word of truth, not blend it into a theological smoothie that tastes sweet but lacks substance. Yet for many, the idea that the Church is not Israel feels like a betrayal of the Old Testament’s richness, a denial of continuity, a loss of identity.

Let your prayers be grounded in the character of God and not in your circumstances

Let your prayers be grounded in the character of God and not in your circumstances

I recently went through a personal challenge which placed focus on much prayer and exercising of faith. I'll leave out the details of this challenge so that I can get right down to the point of this short post. 

I was looking back at this episode in my life recently and in hindsight I was able to identify something that I think we all might miss in that moment of crisis. Due to the challenge facing me, my prayers were focused on asking God to solve the crisis; to take away the cause of my suffering, to fix that which was broken. Having gone through this challenge, I have to admit that the strain and the uncertainty in that moment tended to shape my prayers into these types of requests of God, into a plea, or a petition for a resolution or a fix of the problem.