Watch Your Mouth

I observed something the other day about the way people tend to interact with one another. Since then I’ve come to see that it’s much more widespread than I had originally thought, and I’m as guilty as anyone else. What I observed is that people often don’t say what they are really thinking if there’s any chance it will create conflict. However, many of those same people will then tell someone else about it in the form of a complaint. It may be something like,

• “Yes, I’d be glad to keep the nursery today…” “Why am I always stuck with the nursery?!”
• “I’ll do whatever I can to help…” “This sure is a dumb plan!”

Such superficial agreement, while intended as a peacekeeping measure, often becomes a front for grumbling and gossip. How many marriages have been broken when wives are outwardly compliant but inwardly resentful? Certainly there are times when we have to do things we’d rather not do, and times that we need to keep our opinions to ourselves, but if we’re doing it simply to avoid having a real conversation we’ve got a bigger problem. Jesus reminded His listeners, “Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil” (Matthew 5:37 ESV; see also James 5:12).

Sharon Hodde Miller commented in “Why Niceness Weakens Our Witness,”

“Niceness is concerned with the appearance of goodness and not the reality of it. It gives the facade of serving others but exists primarily to serve ourselves. In the end, niceness only makes us into ‘whitewashed tombs’ (Matt. 23:27)—pristine on the outside but empty within.”

Niceness keeps us from telling others the truth, confronting sin, or proclaiming the gospel to a lost and dying world. Miller refers to this as idolatry. It could also be called the fear of man. Somehow we’ve equated our Christian witness with always telling people what they want to hear. Elliot Clark wrote,

“For some time now, American Christians have conceived of their witness in terms of ‘sharing the gospel’… However, if by ‘sharing’ we imply a kind of charity where we only give the gospel to willing recipients, then our Christian vernacular has become a problem… Throughout the Book of Acts, we find repeated examples of authoritative witness—even in the face of suffering—from the apostles and early church. We find them proclaiming the gospel and speaking boldly.”

Although the Apostle Paul wrote that we are to be “speaking the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15), it seems like most of us prefer “veiling the truth for love.” We choose not to say something even when we know we should, just because it is easier to keep silent. There are plenty of biblical examples of people who had to say things they would rather not. In 2 Samuel 7, Nathan had to tell King David that he couldn’t build the Temple. If he had kept his mouth shut, David would have disobeyed God’s command. Then in chapter 12 Nathan had to confront David for his sin with Bathsheba. I’m sure that he did so with great trepidation. Jonah used all his ingenuity to try to avoid telling Ninevah that judgment was coming, and he suffered greatly for his choices. Peter and John had the option of keeping silent about Jesus as they had been commanded, but their response was “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20).

It may be that you’ve been reminded of times when your words haven’t agreed with your thoughts and beliefs. I know I have. We should ask ourselves why that is the case. Was it truly out of love or was it some form of niceness to avoid ruffling any feathers? Was it displaying God’s image or preserving our own image? Was it intended to build up the Body of Christ and promote peace with God, or to maintain a superficial peace among men?

“Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another” (Ephesians 4:25).

For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts” (1 Thessalonians 2:3-4).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

The Right Harvest

Have you ever read a familiar Scripture and suddenly realized you’ve never really paid attention to it before? That happened to me this week with 2 Corinthians 9:10 (ESV):

“He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.”

In the context of the chapter, it’s easy to focus on the ideas of giving and tithing and to overlook the last few words. One commentary notes, “Righteousness shall be itself the reward, even as it is the thing rewarded.” Do we really believe that righteousness is a desirable reward, or are we interested only in more tangible rewards? Are we working to cultivate righteousness? The prophet Hosea wrote, “Sow for yourselves righteousness; reap steadfast love; break up your fallow ground, for it is the time to seek the Lord, that He may come and rain righteousness upon you” (Hosea 10:12). Righteousness does not grow where it is not cultivated.

As I think about some of the challenges of life in the world today, perhaps we’ve been asking the wrong questions at times.

• Not “what is legal,” but “what would contribute to righteousness?”
• Not “how can we protect our children,” but “how can we teach them to love righteousness?”
• Not “how can I avoid sin,” but “how can I develop a greater desire for righteousness?”

If the pursuit of righteousness were our first priority, how might that influence our daily choices? I’m always convicted when I read Psalm 101:3a, “I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless.” There are plenty of worthless things all around us. We could resolve not to look at any form of media, but avoidance is not necessarily the same as seeking righteousness and holiness. (Here’s an article that differentiates these two similar terms.) We can also do all kinds of religious activities without having any real interest in righteousness. I fear that the modern church often contributes to religiosity and self-righteousness without relationship to God.

If I’m honest, most days I’m more concerned with doing my job to the best of my ability and simply surviving another day or week or year. If someone asked, “What are we here for?” I would probably say something about glorifying God, but I wouldn’t even think about cultivating righteousness. And yet Jesus said, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33). I suspect most of us are more interested in “all these things” than we are in the kingdom of God and His righteousness. For many people, the image of eternal life is more about our own hobbies and pleasures than it is about the promise of “new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:12).

The Apostle John reminded his readers, “Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as He is righteous… Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God” (1 John 3:7, 10). Thankfully, the practice of righteousness does not depend on our perfect obedience to the law, because we are incapable of doing that. We receive the righteousness of Christ (imputed righteousness), and we live it out by the power of the Holy Spirit (progressive righteousness). John Piper said,

“[We] can’t make any progress in practical, lived-out righteousness until we are accepted by God, forgiven for our sins, and declared to be perfectly righteous with the imputed righteousness of God in Christ. That’s tremendously important to see because it means that the effort that we make by faith through the Holy Spirit to put to death sins and become more and more practically righteous is not the basis of our right standing with God. It is the consequence or effect of our right standing with God.

How do we pursue righteousness? It’s not by trying harder to avoid sin, but by nurturing our relationship with God. The more we get to know and love Him, the more we will desire to please Him. We will seek His power to overcome temptation, and we’ll become more sensitive to the Spirit’s leading in our lives. None of that can happen apart from the spiritual disciplines of Bible reading, prayer, and involvement with the Body of Christ. We become Christians by simply accepting what Christ has done for us, but it takes a lifelong process to be transformed by the renewal of the mind and to be conformed to the image of Christ (see Romans 8:29 and 12:1-2).

May we never be satisfied with a faith that doesn’t cause us to change and grow, but may we seek a harvest of righteousness for the glory of God.  

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Not Just the Facts

James Clear wrote, “In many circumstances, social connection is actually more helpful to your daily life than understanding the truth of a particular fact or idea… We don't always believe things because they are correct. Sometimes we believe things because they make us look good to the people we care about… The way to change people’s minds is to become friends with them, to integrate them into your tribe, to bring them into your circle. Now, they can change their beliefs without the risk of being abandoned socially.”

Whether he intended so or not, his observations have profound implications for the Church. How often have we heard, “People don’t care what you know until they know that you care”? And yet we often don’t practice what we preach. We think that people will be won to our point of view simply because we rehearse the facts with increasing frequency and volume. For some people, this seems to be their only purpose for using social media. (Those are the ones I hide from my Facebook feed.) It doesn’t matter if the subject is politics, education, abortion, or the gospel, we’ve forgotten that relationships trump truth almost every time.

Jesus said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (Matt. 12:37-40 ESV). He didn’t say, “Love God and preach the truth.” As important as the truth of God is, “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:18-20) is subordinate to loving others. Making disciples has to flow from a heart of love for others. The Apostle Paul wrote, “So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us” (1 Thess. 2:8).

If we were to focus more effort on loving others well, more people might be drawn to believe what we believe. That’s not to say that we never state the truth, but that there’s rarely anything to be gained by hammering someone over the head with it. More hearts are changed by walking alongside others than by getting in their faces. Recently I was reading part of Jesus’ teaching, and it made a big difference when I imagined it not as a lecture, but as a friend drawing close and giving counsel to His friends. A lecture is either information that can be ignored or condemnation that puts us on the defensive. But loving counsel is something to be seriously considered and heeded.

Rosaria Butterfield has shared in her books and this video how it was “radically ordinary hospitality” from a Christian couple that led her to leave the LGBT community and become a Christian. “They didn’t see me as a project, but they saw me as a neighbor… It’s God who saves. It’s not about us being perfect, or our words being perfect. But show up, we must, in the lives of unbelievers… Hospitality, biblically speaking, takes strangers and makes them neighbors. It takes neighbors and makes them family of God.”

I think churches tend to overestimate their friendliness and underestimate the amount of time it takes to build strong relationships with people. If young adults truly felt loved and valued in their churches, they wouldn’t be nearly so quick to drift away. It really was different when the church was the center of the community and everyone knew their neighbors because they saw each other almost every day. Those relationships were a natural outgrowth of time spent together. Today we spend an hour together once or twice a week and think that is sufficient to build a strong community bond. We settle for “friending” people on Facebook rather than loving them as our neighbors, and then we wonder why no one wants to become a Christian or to join the church. Have they truly experienced the love of God through us? Have we offered them our very lives, or just the facts?

“By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.