Communication and Conflict Resolution: A Biblical Perspective is by Stuart Scott, published by Focus Publishing in 2005. It is 35 pages. Scott is a professor of biblical counseling.
Read this before you buy it
This booklet is excerpted from Scott’s larger book The Exemplary Husband: A Biblical Perspective. If you already own that, you already own this material, and there is no reason to buy it twice. That fact was missing from the earlier version of this review, and it is the single most useful thing to know about the product.
It also means the orientation is marriage first. An earlier version of this review sold it as a resource for parenting and discipling children. That is not what it is. The principles carry over to any relationship, but Scott wrote them for a husband dealing with his wife.
What it covers
Four things, in order: the principles and skills of actual communication, where conflict comes from, the sinful ways people try to end conflict, and what God-honouring reconciliation looks like.
The section on where conflict comes from is the useful one. Scott’s position, standard in biblical counseling, is that conflict is a desire problem rather than a communication problem. Two people want different things badly enough to fight, and improving their listening technique without addressing the wanting just makes the fight more articulate.
His summary of what reconciliation requires is blunt: humility, real listening, and a willingness to die to self. He does not offer a technique that lets you win the argument more graciously.
Strengths and limits
The strength is compression. Thirty-five pages, no padding, and you can read it in one sitting and hand it to someone else the same evening. For a couple in a rough patch who will not commit to a full book, that is a real advantage.
The limit is also the length. There is no room for case studies, no treatment of hard cases, and nothing on situations where one party is not engaging in good faith. Scott’s approach also puts the weight on examining your own heart first, which is right as far as it goes but leaves less for a reader dealing with a genuinely unsafe or one-sided situation. For that you need counsel, not a booklet.
Who it suits
Good for a husband who knows he handles disagreement badly and wants something short and direct. Good to read alongside your wife. Reasonable for a men’s group as a one-week discussion.
Skip it if you own The Exemplary Husband, or if you need substantial help, in which case the full book or actual counseling is the better spend.
Bottom line
A tight, biblically grounded 35 pages on why conflict happens and what it costs to end it well. Genuinely useful at its length, provided you know it is an excerpt from a larger book you may already have.
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