How To Deal With Difficult People: 5 Ways Christians Should Respond to Foolish People
This post will show you 5 ways Jesus dealt with difficult people.
There is a special kind of tension that comes with dealing with a difficult or foolish person. They have a way of making you question your patience and resolve while blaming you for their shortcomings.
Have you ever dealt with such a person? Lord knows I have! In this article, we will explore five faith-filled responses to dealing with difficult people that will both honor God and help you protect yourself.
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The Bible’s Definition of a Fool
The Bible has a lot to say about difficult (foolish) people, including that these individuals lack wisdom, disregard God’s instruction, and take no pleasure in understanding. They are quick to anger, and essentially live as though there isn’t a God watching them.
They often act without considering the consequences for themselves and others, and they lack a moral compass because they reject God’s truths.
A fool talks instead of listening (Proverbs 10:18)—a babbler. Picture a group sitting at a table; one person is rattling on with their opinions without trying to understand anything (Proverbs 18:2).
A fool is unteachable, not only because they lack listening skills but also because they think they already know everything (Proverbs 12:15, 23:9). When confronted with a problem, a foolish person will minimize, deny, and do anything in their power to avoid dealing with reality.
Yet when dealing with them, it takes discernment to know how to glorify God even through these challenging interactions.
Check the bottom of this article for 15 Proverbs that describe the nature of foolish people.
Here are five practical ways you can respond to difficult or foolish people:
1. Extend Grace Extravagantly
People who live foolishly often lack the most important relationship they could possibly have—a relationship with Jesus Christ.
The truth is that these people hurt and mistreat us the way they do because they are lost, broken, and wandering through life without Him.
It doesn’t mean that we should lie down and take abuse from people who have no intention of being reasonable and kind to us. But we have an opportunity to demonstrate the radical love Christ first extended to us while we were still sinners.
Jesus tells us this: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for
those who mistreat you.” (Luke 6:27-28 NKJV)
Loving the difficult people in our lives doesn’t mean we have to remain in contact when a relationship is clearly detrimental to our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being. Loving difficult people can be as simple as loving them from a distance enough to pray for their hearts to be softened enough to change and come to Christ.
See: Forgiveness Does Not Require Reconciliation: How to Forgive From Afar
Seeing people through a lens of their humanity has helped me SO much in understanding why difficult people act the way they do.
2. Don’t Argue with Foolish People
It can be very evident when someone doesn’t have the Holy Spirit operating in their life because they tend to operate from a place of blind pride and choose to be willfully ignorant of the things of God.
1 Corinthians 2:14-16 tells us: But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
It can prove futile to try to explain spiritual things to a fool, including how to treat you respectfully, because when one doesn’t have the Holy Spirit, they are not operating from a place of pure love, which only comes from having a true relationship with Jesus Christ.
Foolish people are living from a place of fulfilling their own will and are consequently living in the spirit of the devil because they are close-minded to hearing the wisdom of God. The bible tells us:
Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit. Proverbs 26:4-5.
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3. Boldly Project Truth
When dealing with foolish people, we might be tempted to be passive and say nothing. But sometimes, the Spirit of God may want us to respond in bold truth. But many bullies are emboldened by inaction as permission to escalate their behavior. Jesus teaches us that whenever the truth is championed, it sets free. (John 8:32).
We enable bad behavior when we hide or remain quiet about the truth. In the words of Edmund Burke,
the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
Jesus didn’t hesitate to confront the Pharisees with truth. He calls them sons of hell, hypocrites and brood of vipers. They knew better but yet saw justice as an inconvenience.
4. Pray for Them
Looking back, I realize that dealing with difficult people has taught me a lot about myself. My reactions to stress and conflict were often more about me than the other person. Prayer has helped me acknowledge that God can reach even the coldest of hearts.
James 1:5 encourages us to pray for those who lack the wisdom that it may be given to them. Hurting people hurt people. God takes us as we are and works in us to become all that we should be. (Philippians 2:13)
5. Sometimes Silence is Golden
It takes real strength to hold your tongue when everything in you wants to speak up, especially when your words of truth are being ignored, and every loving action is met with resistance. In those moments, silence truly is golden.
In those cases, we must trust God to do the work in their hearts. Our only job is to extend grace, avoid pointless arguments, speak the truth in love, pray for them, and, when necessary, remain silent.
Jesus in Matthew 7:6, tells us not to cast our pearls before swine, warning us that valuable things —like love and truth— can be wasted on those who don’t value them. It’s one of the hardest lessons to learn: sometimes, a fool is a fool, and it’s not your job to change them.
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Conclusion
Sometimes holding on too long to a toxic relationship can drain us of our peace and
emotional well-being. And the truth is that some people are not ready or willing to
receive what we have to offer.
The key is remaining close to God and staying in His word so that we can thoughtfully discern how to honor Him in situations with difficult people. We need His wisdom to guide us through complex relationships and keep us rooted in how Jesus would respond to these situations if He were in our shoes. May God may be glorified even when we’re dealing with difficult people!
15 Bible verses about foolish people
1. Proverbs 23:9
“Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words.”
2. Proverbs 26:4
“Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.”
3. Proverbs 13:20
“He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.”
4. Proverbs 13:20
“He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.”
5. Proverbs 18:2
“A fool hath no delight in understanding, but that his heart may discover itself.”
6. Proverbs 12:23
“A prudent man concealeth knowledge: but the heart of fools proclaimeth foolishness.”
7. Proverbs 29:11
“A fool uttereth all his mind: but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards.”
8. Proverbs 18:6
“A fool’s lips enter into contention, and his mouth calleth for strokes.”
9. Proverbs 12:15
“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes: but he that hearkeneth unto counsel is wise.”
10. Proverbs 18:7
“A fool’s mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul.”
11. Proverbs 28:26
“He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walketh wisely, he shall be delivered.”
12. Proverbs 26:12
“He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walketh wisely, he shall be delivered.”
13. Proverbs 1:7
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.”
14. Proverbs 19:29
“Judgments are prepared for scorners, and stripes for the back of fools.”
15. Proverbs 26:5
“Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit.”
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