{"id":3673,"date":"2017-10-15T07:42:18","date_gmt":"2017-10-15T14:42:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/?p=3673"},"modified":"2017-11-04T21:01:28","modified_gmt":"2017-11-05T04:01:28","slug":"how-to-disagree-with-anyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/2017\/how-to-disagree-with-anyone\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Disagree With Anyone"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The young man asked to talk to me privately about church matters. He seemed to have two main things on his mind:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"margin-top:-1.2em\">\n<li>Why didn&#8217;t I go along or fall in line or be agreeable in certain matters?<\/li>\n<li>I underestimate the influence (on some people) of the opinions and perspectives of &#8220;Brother Mark.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I assured him that when I disagree, it&#8217;s <span class=\"green-back\">on principle<\/span>. I told him I don&#8217;t make such things personal. He seemed surprised. I was surprised and dismayed at his surprise. And I wondered what he had been &#8220;fed&#8221; about me.<\/p>\n<p>That was several years ago. As I recall, it was during a recess from an all-day, heavy-duty men&#8217;s meeting of our church. It may have been in that time period that I posted this on Facebook on January 26, 2014:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-tell-you-the-truth-galatians-4-16.jpg\" alt=\"Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth? (Galatians 4:16)\" width=\"519\" height=\"169\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3676\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-tell-you-the-truth-galatians-4-16.jpg 519w, https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-tell-you-the-truth-galatians-4-16-150x49.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-tell-you-the-truth-galatians-4-16-400x130.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 519px) 100vw, 519px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:center\"><span class=\"verse\">&#8220;Am I therefore become your enemy,<br \/>\nbecause I tell you the truth?&#8221;<\/span><br \/>\n(Galatians 4:16)<\/p>\n<p>More recently I posted this on Facebook<!--more--> (and <a href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/113183220526069115321\/posts\/KTEdYdRUd1z\">Google+<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/anabaptist\/status\/913871731026042880\">Twitter<\/a>):<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/showsmarkroth\/posts\/10212911949945511\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-disagree-on-principle.jpg\" alt=\"If I disagree, it's because of principle or preference.\" width=\"491\" height=\"483\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3675\" style=\"border:2px solid blue\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-disagree-on-principle.jpg 491w, https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-disagree-on-principle-150x148.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-content\/fb-disagree-on-principle-400x393.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 491px) 100vw, 491px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>If I disagree, it&#8217;s because <span class=\"green-back\">of principle<\/span> or preference.<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"margin-top:-1.2em\">\n<li>Not because of pettiness on my part<\/li>\n<li>Not because of problems between us<\/li>\n<li>Not because I want to teach you a lesson\n<li>Not because you disagreed with me on something else<\/li>\n<li>Not because of vindictiveness on my part<\/li>\n<li>Not because I have some other sort of score to settle with you<\/li>\n<li>Not because I don&#8217;t like you<\/li>\n<li>Not because I&#8217;m trying to show myself independent from you<\/li>\n<li>Not because I want you to know what it feels like<\/li>\n<li>Not because I&#8217;m mad or hurt or defensive<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When I disagree with you, I do so <span class=\"green-back\">due to principle<\/span> or preference. I don&#8217;t like politics and polemics. I&#8217;m not disagreeing because of pressure from someone else or because I want to pester you. I&#8217;m not preening or posturing. My disagreement is not because of pique or peeve.<\/p>\n<p>I endeavor to be guided <span class=\"green-back\">by principle<\/span>, not politics; by conscience, not convenience; by integrity, not intemperance.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll say it again. More likely than not, my disagreement <span class=\"green-back\">is principled<\/span>. Otherwise, it&#8217;s likely because of preference. For sure it isn&#8217;t personal &#8212; as in, disagreeing with you because it&#8217;s you. (Yes, I am human &#8212; I am not above failing to live up to these things.)<\/p>\n<p>Please don&#8217;t diminish our relationship further by writing off my disagreement as personal. It isn&#8217;t about you!<\/p>\n<p>Please don&#8217;t diminish my concerns and my perspectives by trying to make them about you. They aren&#8217;t! This isn&#8217;t personal.<\/p>\n<p>I want an honest, open, Biblical discussion of principles, ideas, and perspectives. I do not want a clash of personalities. And I certainly am not interested in the dissing of people.<\/p>\n<p style=\"color:#cccccc\">Pre-publication post title: <strong>Principled Disagreement<\/strong><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why I disagree (and why you shouldn&#8217;t take it personally)<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"How to Disagree With Anyone","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,12],"tags":[72,880,800],"class_list":["post-3673","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity-101","category-lessons-for-living","tag-christianity","tag-life-lessons","tag-relationships"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/prJUJ-Xf","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3673","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3673"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3673\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eaf.net\/mvp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}