Church Conflict Resolution & Training Services

President of Church Health Solutions, Dr. Don Hicks states,

“A healthy church has learned how to prevent and resolve conflicts before they become destructive. Conflict skills will enable, strengthen, and equip its leaders to deal with the church’s internal and external conflicts. It will free the church to accomplish Biblical unity. The best witness to a lost and hurting world is a church that has learned how to deal with conflict Biblically.”

The Peaceful Church Initiative

Church Health Solutions is a non-profit ministry that equips churches to flourish and thrive. We work with churches to address external threats and internal conflict. Our goal is to see churches more effectively share the good news of Jesus Christ and live out the implications of the Gospel in their communities.

Through our Peaceful Church Initiative, CHS works with churches, addressing conflict according to Biblical peacemaking principles.

CHS works with pastors, deacons, leaders, and churches, by providing coaching and training in Biblical peacemaking principles, Christian conciliation, mediation, binding arbitration, church staff relations, intrapersonal conflict resolution, inter-personal resolution, intragroup conflict resolution, and inter-group conflict resolution, and on-campus retreats.

CHS has partnered with some of the leading Christian attorneys to provide legal services when needed. All parties can explore and agree on conflict resolutions, with CHS being a third-party Christian Conciliator, a neutral and fair mediator to all sides. Arbitration is available and an agreed-upon binding legal agreement by all parties to enhance peacemaking, leading to an actual Biblical resolution.

Destructive internal conflict represents one of the greatest threats to the effectiveness of the church. It results in disunity, loss of members, reduction in giving, damage to ministry careers, families, deacons, and the church, which is harmful to our personal witness and church’s witness for Christ.

We recognize that conflict avoidance is unrealistic and ineffective. Instead, we see that conflict is more of an opportunity than an obstacle—when handled Biblically. CHS has a two-fold approach. First, we work proactively through the education and training of church leaders in Biblical peacemaking. Second, we provide Christian Conciliation services to promote the resolution of conflicts within churches. Our goal for the Peaceful Church Initiative is to see peaceful churches sharing the good news of Jesus Christ and living out the implications of the Gospel in their communities.

All the services can be done by in-person conference or meeting, video conference, and in the future online video training.

A Clear and Present Danger in the Church Today

A little more than two decades ago, a small group of church members targeted my family and me for destruction. I was a senior pastor of a growing Southern Baptist Church in central Florida. In just 2 ½ years, over 450 people joined the church, of which about half were from a conversion experience. It was amazing what God was doing. However, a small group of church members conspired and executed a plan to destroy me, my family, and the church during this time. I did not understand what was happening until my destruction was almost complete.

An article, entitled “Clergy Killers,” was sent to me at my church office by Jim Chaves of the Florida Baptist Convention. God used that article, written by Lloyd Rediger, to save my life, marriage, and ministry. At last, I knew what the problem was. I understood normal and abnormal conflict, but now I was faced with spiritual warfare, which required spiritual weapons of prayer, scripture, discernment, fasting, and total reliance upon the guidance of God’s Holy Spirit. I was being targeted for destruction by a small group of church members who were Clergy Killers and by those they had influenced to join them. They developed and executed a calculated plan of betrayal and destruction. But “why me?” After Jacob’s death, Joseph’s brothers, afraid of the vengeance Joseph might wreak on them for their betrayal, approached him and humbled themselves before him, placing themselves in his service. Joseph’s reply was, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives” (Gen. 50:20 NIV). From within this verse, my inspiration and motivation came to minister to churches embroiled in destructive conflict. The clergy killers intended my harm, but God intended it for good.

I learned from this experience, and over time, God healed my family and me. As a result, I have been sharing this story across the world to pastors, deacons, churches, and seminary students for the past 25 years. My goal has been and continues to be, to educate and train churches on how to prevent and resolve complex church conflict and how to identify and expose clergy killers. Please click the link and watch: A Clear and Present Danger in the Church Today:  https://vimeo.com/user57224413

Donald Quentin Hicks (2010) A Study of the Conflicts within Churches that Lead to the Termination of Pastors within the Southern Baptist Convention, Accompanied by a Proposal of Preventive and Interventional Solutions,  http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/408

Contact Church Health Solutions

If you require any of the services listed in the Church Conflict Resolution & Training area, fill out the contact form on our Contact Us page.