The first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him (Proverbs 18:17).

There are two sides to every story.  We all know this.  And yet, we continually find ourselves challenged to live it out in day-to-day life.  The truth of the matter is that it takes time and energy to hear out both sides of an issue; it's quicker and easier to just jump to conclusions from a limited amount of information.  So we end up with gossiping, factions, lying, cheating, grudges, stubbornness, and hurt feelings all around.

Have you ever thought of relational difficulties in this way -- that they all basically come back to laziness?!?  It seems outlandish to suggest such a thing:  that perhaps conflict resolution is as simple as hearing each other out, believing the best about another person until a full line of inquiry can be established, taking the time and energy required to genuinly examine both sides of an issue... but I seriously wonder -- especially in light of Proverbs 18:17 -- if there might really be something to this.

At the end of the day, it's true that sin is usually involved in our conflicts.  One side (or often both sides) happens to be at fault.  But it's typically not as random or selfishly-motivated as we might be tempted to believe.  We usually like to think of our enemies or opponents as being inherrently evil, demented, driven by Satan to curse our otherwise blessed life.  But more often, they're just following their own set of logic -- which, from their vantage point, may not be so random or selfishly-motivated as we could first believe.  A majority of the time, they actually have perfectly understandable (even if not always righteous) reasons for approaching the situation in the way they do.

We might actually get to discover this if we carefully cross-examine any assumptions that come along.  We might actually build understanding and establish greater peace.  But it'll take some work, on our part.  It's good work -- God's work, in many ways -- but it's still work.  So you just have to decide for yourself:  Are you up for the rigors of cross-examination?