How Do You Solve Problems?
How Do You Solve Problems?
• According to the type of personality
• Confronting the problem with betrayal
• Wrong and right methods
• Submitting to the problem and surrendering
• Escaping from the problem
• The proper spiritual approach
• The method of gloom and crying
• Prayer, fasting, and vows
• Treatment by pressure and insistence
• Wisdom in solving the problem
• The method of violence and crime
• Counsel and the experience of others
• The method of trickery and cunning
• Facing the problem with calmness
• Facing problems with nervous agitation
• Solving the problem with patience
• Meeting it with boycott and quarrel
• Leaving the matter to God
• The method of stubbornness and challenge
• Positive practical solutions
• The use of drugs and narcotics
Every person in the world encounters problems in his life. People differ in their methods of solving problems, in dealing with them, and in the extent to which they are affected by them. This depends on each person’s psychology and mentality, and also on his experience. There are types of people whom problems shatter, while others overcome them. There are wrong methods and sound methods in confronting problems.
We will attempt to review both kinds:
1- Escaping from the problem
The method of escape was followed by our father Adam together with our mother Eve after the fall into sin. Concerning this the Scripture says: “And Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden” (Gen. 3:8).
But this escape did not solve the problem… It had to be faced.
2- Gloom and crying
It is the method of the child who faces a problem by crying…
This childish behavior remains with some even after they grow up, especially with many women: facing the problem with sorrow and tears, without any practical solution.
This happened with Saint Hannah when the Lord had closed her womb. Her rival Peninnah provoked her, “So she wept and did not eat” (1 Sam. 1:7). But the sorrow of heart, the crying, and the refusal to eat did not solve her problem until she finally resorted to God.
And as happened with Saint Hannah, so also with a dangerous king like Ahab…
When Naboth the Jezreelite refused to give him the vineyard, “Ahab went into his house sullen and displeased” (1 Kings 21:4). But his gloom did not solve his problem. A solution came only when his wife Queen Jezebel intervened and offered him a practical—though sinful—course of action, as we shall see.
3- Pressure and insistence
Delilah used insistence with Samson until he revealed his secret. “She pressed him daily with her words and urged him, so that his soul was vexed to death. And he told her all his heart” (Judg. 16:15–17).
Insistence may bring agreement, but not with a willing heart.
The children of Israel insisted that God appoint a king for them. The Lord said to Samuel: “They have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me” (1 Sam. 8:7). Yet God granted them Saul. Later “the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul” (1 Sam. 16:14).
The Jews insisted before Pilate to crucify the Lord Christ. Pilate said, “I find no fault in this Man” (Luke 23:4). Yet under pressure he delivered Him to be crucified.
4- The method of violence
David intended to solve his problem with Nabal by violence (1 Sam. 25), but Abigail rebuked him wisely.
The Lord did not permit David to build the temple, saying: “You shall not build a house for My name, because you have been a man of war and have shed blood” (1 Chron. 28:3).
Moses killed the Egyptian (Exod. 2:12) and afterward spent forty years learning meekness, until it was said: “Now the man Moses was very meek, more than all men who were on the face of the earth” (Num. 12:3).
Peter drew his sword, and the Lord rebuked him: “Put your sword in its place, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword” (Matt. 26:52).
5- Trickery and cunning
Rebekah used cunning so that Jacob would obtain Isaac’s blessing (Gen. 27). Yet Jacob later reaped deception from Laban and others, and said his years were “few and evil” (Gen. 47:9).
Jezebel used deceit to obtain Naboth’s vineyard. But the Lord declared judgment upon Ahab and Jezebel (1 Kings 21; 2 Kings 9:36).
6- Crime
Cain committed murder (Gen. 4:14) and lived in fear and wandering.
7- Betrayal
Absalom betrayed his father David and died (2 Sam. 18:15).
Judas betrayed the Lord Christ and “went and hanged himself” (Matt. 27:5).
8- Nervous agitation
Shouting, anger, threats, and harsh words solve nothing. They reveal inner weakness and bring physical and psychological harm.
9- Resorting to drugs and similar means
Sedatives, alcohol, smoking, or narcotics do not solve problems; they only escape from them.
10- Boycott and quarrel
Division between Jeroboam and Rehoboam led to a split kingdom (1 Kings 12), which became a deeper problem.
11- Lying
Lies complicate problems and create distrust.
12- Stubbornness
Stubbornness results from pride and leads to collision rather than solution.
13- Fear and surrender
This is not solving the problem but submitting to it.
If all these are wrong methods, what then are the sound ways?
The Sound Ways to Confront Problems
A- First: Solve the problem with wisdom and reason.
“In the meekness of wisdom” (James 3:13). “A wise man’s eyes are in his head, but a fool walks in darkness” (Eccl. 2:14).
B- Seeking counsel and the advice of those with experience.
C- Prayer and fasting. What man cannot solve, God can easily solve. Esther and the people fasted; the people of Nineveh fasted; Nehemiah said: “When I heard these words, I sat down and wept, and mourned for many days; I was fasting and praying” (Neh. 1:4).
Prayer should be placed at the forefront of our means.
D- Patience, giving the problem time.
E- Calmness, because disturbed nerves hinder right thinking.
F- Solving the problem with positive, practical action, not mere wishes.
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