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How to Resolve Disputes: All it Takes is One Simple Skill (OK, Strike “Simple”) By  Christine Funk   Disputes within a company, either between two individuals or between rival teams or departments, can quickly turn into internal fights that are bad for everyone involved. If you want to help resolve them, you need to do something that is much harder than it sounds: You need to listen actively.    You can only help people resolve their conflicts if you understand the nature of those conflicts and their underlying interests and motives. This requires sound active listening skills – and as you will see, this is much more complex than you might think.   How the “active” bit in “active listening” makes all the difference Listening can take place with various levels of depth, intensity, comprehension, and empathy. And if you think you know how to listen actively, we invite you to do this little self-assessment: When you find yourself listening to someone in the ...

CHRIST IS THE KEY Written by Pastor Bankie Every puzzle has a key. We have read again and again the story of the young girl who was distracting the dad, a pastor, as he was busy preparing his sermon for the next day. He decided to solve the problem by keeping the little girl busy with a puzzle. He took a picture of the globe, tore it into small pieces and told the little girl to arrange it back into order. That should take a long time, he thought. But the little girl was done in minutes, to the astonishment of daddy. How did you manage to get it done so fast, he asked. It was pretty easy, she said. See, there's is a picture of a man on the back of the sheet. I figured that if the man is put right, the world on the other side would be right. The girl knew the parts of a man well, and so was done in a few minutes. The moral of the story? Every puzzle has a key. 'The Scriptures' is a big puzzle, and it needs a key. It is not easy at all to decode it. We easily  se...

Everything is changing all of the time – for better and for worst. Change happens continuously and consistently in each and everyone’s life, at work and at home and yet, most of us resist change. Why?    What stops us from relaxing into change and enjoying what comes next? Most of the time it is fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of failure, fear of our own potential, fear of rejection. We like to hang on to what is known and familiar. We like to stay in our comfort zone because it’s safe; it gives us security; it protects us from failure and rejection – the very things many of us fear most. While this can be a good thing, it can also leave us feeling stuck or stagnant in life, and when we suppress our inherent need to grow as a person, we can begin to experience low mood, anxiety and even depression.   Change – an intrinsic part of life The purpose of life is to  unfold our full potential , to expand our comfort zone into ever widen...

THE REDEMPTION THAT IS IN CHRIST Pastor Bankie Let me take this time to answer a question you may have been asking for a long time. ‘Born again – what does it really mean?’ You see, life is basically lived as a reward, i.e. what you are experiencing as a middle aged or older man are basically products of choices you made or did not make when you were young. Are you a young man? Then read this:  “Rejoice young man, during your childhood, and let your heart be pleasant during the days of your young manhood. And follow the impulse of your heart and the desires of your eyes, yet know that God will bring you to judgment for all these things.” Eccl 11: 9. All the things you are doing today or have done in your past have awaiting you consequences. It does not matter whether they are good or evil, hidden or open. The Bible says that “God will bring EVERY act to judgement, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil.” Many of those things you thought you got away with because n...