Pastor Rick Warren sermon How to Earn the Respect of Others: Today we’re going to talk about respect, r-e-s-p-e-c-t one of your deepest desires and one of your deepest needs is the need to feel respected, everybody needs to feel appreciated, you need to feel valued, you need to feel esteem, it’s essential to your emotional and spiritual health.
There’s nothing wrong with you having a desire to be respected, in fact, in proverbs chapter 22 verse 1 God says this, being respected is more important than having great wealth but being respected doesn’t come automatically, respect is something we earn, we earn it by the way we talk and the way we act toward others.
So today I want us to look at how to earn the respect of others, now today we’re in part eight of our study through the book of Nehemiah called building a better future, so we’re going to use Nehemiah’s life as a model for earning respect.
All the opposition to rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem was external, it came from people outside but now in, chapter 5 Nehemiah has to deal with conflict on the inside, among his own people. This is something you’re going to have to deal with in your life in building a better future, conflict.
It is inevitable because none of us are perfect, one of the ways you earn the respect of others is by the way you handle conflict and anytime there’s a disagreement about anything, just be aware that people are watching you to see how you react to conflict.
In Nehemiah chapter 5, we see four common causes of conflict and then we see how Nehemiah handled it and we’re going to learn five important principles
The First cause of conflict is when any basic need goes unmet, anytime any basic need in your life or other’s life goes unmet there’s going to be conflict
The second cause of conflict is not just when we don’t have our needs met but when we feel we’re falling behind instead of feeling like you’re making progress. When you feel like you’re going in reverse that causes you to get cranky it causes conflict.
The third cause is when we feel powerless to change our situation, when we see other people thriving around you and you’re just barely surviving, they’re thriving you’re surviving, that’s frustrating and can lead to conflict.
The fourth cause of conflict, is when leaders are insensitive to our pain, in other words when people who have the power to do something about the problem we’re facing and they don’t do anything.
It makes life easier people will listen to your ideas, people will trust you more when you’re respected, you’ll have better relationship if you’re respected. This brings us to the important question how can I earn the respect of others?
Number one to earn the respect of others, we must empathize with the feelings of others. People don’t care what you know until they first know that you care, they want to know that you care first they want to feel.
The second thing that Nehemiah did in this chapter was pause and think before I speak up pause and think before you speak up if you do that, you will be respected if you speak before you think, you’re not going to be respected this is a mark of wisdom.
The third is automatic; you will be slow to become angry because human anger can’t accomplish the righteousness of God. If you look out in the world, and you see things that are wrong, things that are sinful, things that are unjust, things that are unfair, things that you want to go that’s not right, it’s okay to get angry at those thing but you need to pause and think before you speak if you want people to respect you.
The Fourth way to earn the respect of others is to try to resolve conflicts privately. When he saw all this injustice going on he didn’t start with a boycott what he starts with first, is he tries personal reasoning, he tries to personally build a bridge with the offenders who were exploiting the poor.
According to Pastor Rick Warren The fifth way to earn the respect of others, it is to appeal to the best in people, bring out the best in others not the worst than others, don’t appeal to their worst instincts, don’t appeal to their fears.