Criticism – Part 3 — Morning Devotions

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Criticism – Part 2 — Morning Devotions

And so I think ask yourself, am I happy for the good things that other people experience, or am I so bogged down with my own problems that I can’t get beyond myself, you know, your wife, your husband, your brothers, your sisters, the people at work, when they are experiencing good things, are you genuinely happy for them? If not, if you’re not that way, I think it’s time to change because today is the day that God can change that part of you to take seriously what the Bible says and stop criticising. And rejoice with other people.

Rejoicing and mourning with others – what Jesus’ life had to say about criticising

And as we allow God, I think, to do this work through us our words will move from negativity/criticism to words of life. I guess we could become cheerleaders. There’s a great statement in Philippians 4:8 from the New Testament. Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right or pure or lovely, whatever is admirable. If anything is actually excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things. Now that’s a good starting place as far as being critical goes. They’re the things that we should be thinking about. Start cheering people on. Be excited for them. So who are you going to cheer on today? Is there someone that you can encourage?

Think about it. You’d start with your own, as I said, your own wife or your husband. Think about people that you work with. Start looking for the good things and point them out and speaking words of life, as it were. Paul says in Ephesians 4:29, Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful for the building up of others. That that means encouraging other people. Start building them up. Encourage their children. Talk about the things that they love to talk about. You can praise people. I’m sure you can do that. Do it sincerely. ‘You did really well today’. You could say to your young children or your grandchildren, ‘well, you cleaned up your room today. That was really good.’

So what are my words of criticism actually costing me? What are they costing me in the long term? Perhaps it’s friendship. We can destroy our friends by the words that we say. We can allow God, I think, to come in and to transform our life, and husbands and wives. Yes, sure, this can be an issue, can’t it? Sometimes a wife can just want to walk out because of the way we talk to our wives. So God can actually help us to do that. One of the questions is how did Jesus actually handle criticism? We say sticks and stones may break my bones. Words will never hurt me.

But actually, studies have shown that words can actually have an impact, for example, on children. There’s a story in Luke 9 when Jesus and his disciples are travelling to Jerusalem and they pass through Samaria, a part of a country where the people of that town didn’t welcome Jesus. And when James and John hear the fact that they just didn’t want Jesus around, they really got angry. They wanted to call fire down from heaven to burn them up. But Jesus said, no, that’s not the way – he rebuked them. That’s not the way to do it, he said. He shows the kingdom of God actually comes through power and not by that sort of reaction.

So when rejected by the Samaritans, Jesus refused to dole out the punishment. He keeps moving on. So Jesus was there. He understood how people tick. We don’t like criticism, but I think it’s a fact of life that we need to understand that we need to speak words of life. Let’s be honest, and ask God to help.

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Let’s Pray

Lord, there’s so much more we need to learn. Give us your grace and your understanding, I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.