In Philippians 3:10, Paul says that his greatest desire is “to know Christ, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings . . .” Here is one of the most profound of all the doctrines and the mysteries of the Christian faith, that we have a Savior, God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who has come to earth and has SUFFERED. We have a God who came TO SUFFER on a cross and to die in our place.

Not only is this truth profound, but it is also prominent in the New Testament. In Luke 22:15 Jesus says, “I earnestly desire to eat this Passover with you (His disciples) before I suffer.” Multiple times in each of the synoptic gospels Jesus foretells His suffering and His crucifixion. (Matt. 16:21; 17:12; Mark 8:31; 9:12; Luke 9:22; 17:25; 22:15; 24:26, 46) After Jesus’ resurrection, the apostles’ gospel message centers on the suffering of Jesus and His glorious rising from the dead. How can it be that God suffers? But this is the amazing truth, that our God came to earth and suffered.

And because Jesus Christ suffered, suffering is now and forever a Christian experience. Jesus Christ has made ‘suffering’ a theological term. To overstate the matter, only Christ and His followers truly suffer. Oh yes, there is misery, anguish, agony, pain, sorrow and despair throughout the world and common to all mankind, but this is not truly suffering, because of Jesus. Because Jesus suffered, suffering is redefined. No longer is suffering a common experience available to all mankind; rather, Christ’s sufferings have made suffering forever a holy experience reserved for the righteous.

Suffering is a means of fellowship with Jesus. I will never stop a storm by saying, “Hush! Be still!” I will never walk on water or call a corpse dead four days out of a tomb. But because Jesus Christ suffered, I can have fellowship with Him in my own sufferings and share an experience with Jesus. Paul wanted to know “the fellowship of His (Christ’s) sufferings.” This means that as the believer suffers for the sake of Jesus, he or she draws nearer to Jesus and experiences the same thing that the Son of God experienced. Surely this is what Peter has in mind when he says, “To the degree that you share (this verb could also be translated ‘fellowship’) the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing . . . If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed . . . If anyone suffers as a Christian, he is to glorify God in this name (1 Peter 4:13, 14, 16).” Why would anyone, Christian included, rejoice in suffering? The believer rejoices in suffering, because suffering is a direct means of fellowship with His great God and Savior. Is there anything that Jesus did that I could ever do? Yes; I can suffer as Jesus suffered. SDG rmb 8/25/2015

I have entered a new page on the site entitled “Mediations on Romans 6.” In this writing I take the theology that Paul develops in the first part of Romans 6 and meditate on the implications of this teaching in various situations. What hope does this teaching give to an alcoholic? What happens to my sins when the old man is crucified? How does the flesh relate to the old man or to the new man? What does that say about my temptations and my sins? I think that you will enjoy this writing. Check it out. rmb 8/17/2015

This is one of a series of studies from the gospel of Luke. These are intended to reveal the glory of the Lord Jesus and to show how we must respond to Him.

Luke 5:29-32. Jesus has just called Levi the tax-collector from his life of greed and thievery into a life where he will walk with the Son of God as one of the Lord’s apostles. Levi is so excited about knowing the Lord and about being called to follow Him that he throws a party for Jesus in his house. Since most of the people that Levi knew were other tax-collectors and people of low repute, it is only natural that those are the ones who are present. But the Pharisees (Who invited them, anyway? Or did they just sort of show up because they needed to harass the invited guests?) begin to grumble at Jesus’ disciples and say, “Why do you eat and drink with the tax-collectors and sinners?” And Jesus answered and said to them, “It is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call righteous men, but sinners to repentance.”

Why do the disciples of the Lord and the Lord Himself eat and drink with sinners? It is because here the Lord delights to eat with those for whom He is going to die and now today He still delights to fellowship with those who love Him (John 5:24). The Lord delights to eat with those who delight to eat with Him. The Pharisees see these people as tax-collectors and sinners, but Jesus sees them as those He has cleansed and made into saints. The unrighteous deeds of these “sinners” brought them to a place of repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus, whereas the religious works of these Pharisees brought them to a place of self-righteousness where they rejected the Son of God and despised His righteousness.

If you think that you are well, then you don’t need the Great Physician. The sick person must first see that they have a fatal disease, before they will seek a cure. Then once they realize that they are condemned for their sin, they must flee to Jesus for His rescue. The patient must come to the doctor. Just so, the condemned sinner must come to Jesus for deliverance and healing, for only Jesus can cure the fatal disease of sin.

If you believe you are already righteous (consider Phil. 3:9; consider “the works of the Law” in Romans and in Galatians; consider Paul’s pedigree of righteousness in Phil. 3:5-6, etc.) and are already in God’s favor (Luke 3:8 “We have Abraham for our father.”) because of who you are or all the good works that you have done, then you will never repent and bow before the Lord Jesus and receive His true righteousness. The filthy rags of your own works of righteousness (Isaiah 64:6) will remain wrapped around you and you will never be wrapped in His glorious robe of righteousness (Isaiah 61:10). Those who are convinced of and content with their own righteousness will never come to Jesus. “My righteousness is good enough.” And so they will perish in the judgment.

Application: Here Jesus puts His finger directly on two huge dangers for people today both inside and outside the church. Outside the church we have many people who have never been told that they have a fatal disease called sin and that, if they are not cured of this disease, they will spend eternity in hell. Believers must tell the world of the sickness and tell of Jesus Christ, the cure. As believers we must deliver the diagnosis and propose the cure to a lost world.

But there is also a potential danger that is most prevalent inside the visible church. This is the danger that, while I have been exposed to the cure and have been told of the disease, I have never actually taken the cure. Maybe a person goes to church for many years and serves in all kinds of roles in church and even gives their tithe regularly. Those might be considered doctor’s visits, but that is not the radical heart surgery required for the cure. The heart of stone must be taken out and the heart of flesh put in (Ezekiel 36:24). You must come humbled and broken to Jesus Christ and call out to Him for healing and forgiveness. Any other approach has the grave danger of falling short of true repentance. Is Jesus the Lord of your life and the one who is in control? Do you trust in Him fully? Is Christ your life?

We are sick and need Jesus, the Great Physician; and we are unrighteous and need His glorious robe. sdg

This is another one of the studies in a series from the gospel of Luke.

Luke 5:17-26. This is the well-known story of the healing of the paralytic. Four friends bring a paralyzed man to Jesus and stop at nothing until they can get their friend in front of the Lord. 5:20 Seeing their faith, Jesus said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.” 21) The scribes and Pharisees began to reason, saying, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

Briefly let’s set the stage. Jesus is teaching in a crowded house and there are scribes and Pharisees there who are trying to catch Him in some false teaching. In the midst of this teaching, four men bring their paralyzed friend to this house and drop him right down through the tiles of the roof into the crowd and in front of Jesus. Jesus acknowledges the tremendous faith displayed by these men by declaring that the paralyzed man’s sins are forgiven based on that faith. What lessons can we learn from this encounter with the Lord?

First, faith in the Lord Jesus results in forgiveness. Paul will develop this great doctrine of justification by faith in much more detail in Romans and Galatians, but a prominent theme in Luke’s gospel is the idea that Jesus responds to faith and that faith results in forgiveness and salvation. The four friends and the paralytic display a faith that moves them to radical action. “We need to get our friend to Jesus, because He can heal our friend.” They believe in Jesus and believe He can perform miracles like making their paralyzed friend walk. That is the kind of faith which results in forgiveness.

Next we see the Pharisees asking the question, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” This is a rhetorical question, because the answer is known by all. No one but God can forgive sins. Everyone present in the crowded house would agree that God alone can forgive sins. For all others to claim to forgive sins is indeed blasphemy. So here is how the stage is set: God alone can forgive sins. Jesus claims to forgive sins. Either Jesus is a false teacher and is speaking blasphemy by claiming to forgive sins or He can forgive sins and thus proves that He is God. Which option is true depends on the identity of Jesus. The possibility that Jesus might be God never occurs to the Pharisees, so they claim He is a blasphemer. When the paralytic walks out of the house at Jesus’ command, however, the conclusion is inescapable. Jesus is God and so He can forgive sins.

Now here indeed is good news. Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, has authority on earth to forgive sins (Luke 5:24). When He sees someone who believes in Him and trusts in Him, someone who calls upon His name (Romans 10:13), He will exercise His authority and will forgive the sins of the one who has faith in Him. So you and I are the paralytics. You and I need to come to Jesus for healing, but more than that, we need to come to Jesus for forgiveness, knowing that He has the authority to forgive. Jesus will heal our brokenness and allow us to rise and to walk in newness of life (Romans 5:4b). SDG

This is one of the studies in a series from the gospel of Luke.

Luke 5:12-13. While He (Jesus) was in one of the cities, behold there was a man covered with leprosy. And when he saw Jesus, he fell on his face and implored Him saying, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.” 13) And He stretched out His hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing; be cleansed.” And immediately the leprosy left him.

Here we have a very brief encounter between a leper and the Lord Jesus. A little background would be in order. A leper was unclean in Jewish society and was required not only to stay away from other people, but was also required to cry out, “Unclean!” as they traveled about. They were therefore constantly shunned and alienated from society. Also, because leprosy was contagious and because leprosy was to that society what cancer is to ours, lepers were feared and no one touched a leper for fear of being infected. And so this man comes to the Lord and falls down before Jesus, asking to be cured and cleansed of this horrible disease. In these two short verses, it is important what is revealed about the leper and, more importantly, what is revealed about Jesus.

The first thing we notice is the faith of the leper. He has heard and seen enough of Jesus to be convinced that Jesus is as powerful as God. His faith motivates him to take the outrageous action of falling down before Jesus and pleading for Jesus to do the impossible. In an act of reverence and worship, the leper asks Jesus to make him clean. Thus the leper has a strong faith that compels him to act on that faith. All true faith will be evidenced in action.

Notice that what the leper says reveals what he believed about Jesus. “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.” The leper has no doubt about Jesus’ ability to make him clean. He knows that Jesus has the power to make him clean. He does, after all, refer to Jesus as ‘Lord.’ (Romans 10:9) So what would stop the man from being cleansed? The only thing that would stop that would be if Jesus was not willing. It is not a matter of ability; it is only a matter of whether or not the Lord is willing. The leper treats Jesus as who He is, the sovereign Lord who can do whatever He pleases (Psalm 115:3).

The next thing we see is that Jesus accepts the leper’s worship and He accepts the leper’s assessment of His identity. Jesus does not correct the leper when he falls down before Him, but accepts that act of worship as appropriate. But Jesus also fully accepts the leper’s implied assertion that He has the power to do any healing He wants. The leper says, “If You are willing, You can make me clean,” and Jesus’ response basically says, “Yes, you are right about that, and in this instance I am willing to cleanse you.” In other words, Jesus believed He was sovereign over all disease. But was He?

The healing proved who Jesus was. After Jesus says He is willing, it is time to see if He is able. Jesus believes He can cleanse the leper, and the leper believes Jesus can cleanse him, but can He? What we see is this: Jesus says, “Be cleansed,” and immediately the leprosy leaves the man. In a moment this wasting disease that was evident all over the man’s body vanishes completely and he is as clean as a newborn baby. The object of the man’s faith proves to be as powerful as the man believed Him to be. Jesus proves He has the power of sovereign God and is the worthy object of faith for all who will believe.

Finally this story reveals the compassion and the power of the Lord Jesus, a unique and awesome combination in one Person. Jesus has all the power of God, for He is God in human flesh and can thus do whatever He pleases. He has the power to stop storms and to raise the dead (as we will see later), but this power is constrained by His compassion and His holiness to direct that power in righteousness. And thus we see the Lord of glory having compassion on this wretched leper and cleansing him. Unlike any other false god, the one true and living God is compassionate and gracious and has mercy on any sinner who cries out to Him.

As sojourners in this world, it is easy for the believer to become enamored by the things that the world offers us that increase our ease or comfort, position or prominence. We are in a material world and it is easy to be attracted by the material things in this world that appeal to our flesh and that delight our eyes. Against this allure of the delights of the eyes and the comforts of the flesh we must always vigorously wage war, for while these temptations appeal to our fallen flesh, there is no spiritual benefit to be had in these things.

Notice the complete absence of any commendation for these things in the New Testament. While the New Testament warns of the temptations of wealth and declares that the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil, there is not one single exhortation to acquire wealth and there is no encouragement to pursue ease or leisure or comfort. These experiences lead to self indulgence and to laziness and the experiencing of the world’s pleasures creates a dangerous desire for more of those pleasures. The New Testament warns the believer to avoid these things and to pursue righteousness instead. The world’s pleasures produce none of sanctification and none of the works demanded of the believer, but rather their pursuit wastes time and produces nothing of lasting value.

Suffering, on the other hand, is the context from which the gospel spreads. It is the suffering of the saints that proclaims to the world the infinite worth of Christ and is was the sufferings of Christ which provided the redemption needed by His followers. Suffering drives away pride and dispels indifference and replaces these things with humility and steadfastness. The temptations of the flesh are silenced and rendered impotent by suffering because the flesh itself hates the pain of suffering. But for the believer, God has provided His gift of suffering, when the believer can most closely identify with His glorious Savior and can experience what the Savior experienced. I can never know what it is like to speak to a hurricane and have the wind and the sea obey my command for a hush, for that will never happen. I cannot know the divine power of commanding a corpse dead four days and rotting to stride out of the tomb, for only God can do that. But I can know the fellowship of Jesus’ sufferings. I cannot shoulder the Cross to die for mankind, but I can willingly take up my own cross and embrace the suffering that my King has graciously allowed me to know, so that I can fully know the inestimable worth of the Lord Jesus Christ. Yes, suffering is necessary for the believer, for suffering is the furnace that hones our faith and that purifies us from our fleshly sins like hyssop. The believer, then, is not to shrink from difficulty and hardship and suffering, but is to embrace them as the cost and the reward for following Jesus Christ. Suffering makes me more Christ-like and gives me fellowship with the Lord. Embrace, then, your cross of suffering, knowing that it is a gift from the Lord that carries with it a great reward.

Jesus is the great Transformer, the one who can rescue the most hopeless and miserable of sinners and change them into useful instruments for God’s glory. The New Testament is full of stories of just these people, who were utterly lost and going nowhere until they encountered Jesus, and Jesus transformed their lives. Saul the hater of Christians is converted into the Apostle Paul and takes the gospel to the ends of the earth with an unmatched zeal and boldness. Levi leaves his tax collecting and follows Jesus until he is killed as a martyr. Peter must lay down his fishing nets and take up the fishing for men that Jesus commanded him to do.

But there is perhaps no greater picture of the transforming power of the Lord Jesus Christ than the one given by the Gerasene demoniac presented in all three synoptic gospels, but most powerfully in Mark 5:1-20 and in Luke 8:26-39. I have been fascinated by this story ever since I first read it as a new Christian, how this man, who is presented as a man beyond all decency and seemingly beyond all hope of salvation, is completely transformed in his one brief encounter with Jesus. There are many aspects of the story that could provide us with teaching insights, but let’s just consider this one aspect now, that while everyone around him saw the demoniac as a menace and a threat, Jesus saw him as an evangelist. As the man howled among the tombs and cut himself on the rocks and as he shattered chains and ran naked into the wilderness, Jesus already saw him as one of His witnesses, a man who would, by his radically transformed life, testify to the great power that He had to change lives. Jesus had already determined that this man would be saved and would be used as His witness, so He went to the other side with an appointment to keep. He was going to save the demoniac and send him on his mission, then Jesus would return to the safe side of the lake.

Consider the contrasts presented in this story:
The people saw someone who was hopelessly unclean, but Jesus saw someone whom He would cleanse of all sin.

The people saw someone who was useless, but Jesus saw someone whom He would make useful.

The people saw a demoniac, but Jesus saw a saint and an evangelist and an ambassador for Christ.

The people saw someone who was dangerous to others, but Jesus saw someone who would be dangerous to Satan and to Satan’s kingdom.

The people saw someone to be shunned and avoided, but Jesus saw someone for whom He was going to die.

Jesus Christ went through a ferocious storm to the foreign side of the lake to save one man and then to return. Jesus knew that this man was one of His elect and so He obeyed the Father’s leading and went across the lake. But now we must realize another thing, also. If you are saved, your story is similar to the demoniac’s story. In a real sense, Jesus has done whatever it took to rescue you and, just like the demoniac, He has given you a mission. The demoniac knew that he was to go out and tell others about what great things Jesus had done for him. What about you? Has Jesus found in you a witness? Are you willing to tell the people in your city what great things Jesus has done in your life? The Lord Jesus endured the cross to rescue you from eternal condemnation. Though you were dead in your sins, He came to the other side of the lake to where you were and cast out your demons and gave you a new life and put you in your right mind. Now He has gone to heaven, but He is looking to you to find out what you will do with your salvation. Will you proclaim, or will you remain silent? Many need to hear what great things Jesus has done and what great things He can do. (RMB 6/10/2015)

SUMMARY: If I resist God’s process and instead demand that God operate on my schedule, my impatience will rob me of thankfulness. Instead, thank God for His PROCESS and let His PROCESS increase your perseverance and patience.

(This series of writings, “The Enemies of Thankfulness,” was prompted by listening to an excellent sermon from Dr. John MacArthur entitled “Thanks, No Matter What” on 1 Thessalonians 5:18. The sermon was from 1995, I believe.)

“in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” 1 Thess. 5:18

Because I know that I am not as thankful as I should be, I have made a commitment to try to be thankful more often and to have vital, deep thanksgiving become a regular part of my prayers and my conversations. To help me in this endeavor, I am in the process of writing a series of blogs about what I call “the enemies of thankfulness,” prompted by John MacArthur’s excellent teaching on 1 Thessalonians 5:18 about the Christian’s responsibility to be thankful at all times and in all circumstances. One reason that Christian’s struggle with being thankful is that there are enemies to our thankfulness in our fallen world. So far in this series I have talked about the enemies of DOUBT, SELFISHNESS, WORLDLINESS and A CRITICAL SPIRIT. This blog will address the fifth and final enemy of thankfulness, the problem of IMPATIENCE.

There are two broad categories of impatience. The first category includes those things that make us spontaneously act impatiently, like traffic lights that don’t change fast enough or fast food lines that move too slowly. I am sure that you could add your own personal list of stimuli that cause you to act impatiently, things that are basically minor irritants. These irritants are trivial in the big scheme of things, but God places them in our lives to teach us patience.

There is a second category of impatience, however, which runs much deeper and wider than a mere irritation and is much more difficult to root out and vanquish. This is the profound form of impatience that at its core is a frustration with God’s process of change or of answering my prayers. The key word is PROCESS. God works through process, ordaining not only all things that come to pass, but also the timing of all that comes to pass.

We are rebels and thus we want immediate solutions to our problems. We tend to demand things from God, and one of the things we often want is an immediate end to our problems. God’s process tries our patience. The believer should realize that the process is just as important as the end, because both can produce a greater holiness. Rather than railing against the process, let the process produce in you perseverance.

It is the nature of our indwelling “flesh” to desire to be in control of both the outcomes and the timing. Even after we have been saved, our flesh cries out for control. The believer must, therefore, SUBMIT to God daily and TRUST the Lord as an act of the will. Trust God in the process.

Suffering and waiting are the instruments in God’s process which He uses to teach us perseverance. In our natural state, we are all impatient, but when God saves us, He places His Spirit inside us and gives us both the desire and the ability to increase our patience. Therefore in the midst of suffering and waiting, I should focus on the Lord Jesus and realize that He waited and He suffered perfectly (Hebrews 5:8) and He has given me an example that I should follow in His steps (1 Peter 2:21ff).

BIBLICAL EXAMPLES OF PATIENCE OR IMPATIENCE: Job, David (fleeing from Saul), Joseph, Abraham

APPLICATION: DEEPEN YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF GOD’S SOVEREIGNTY. TRUST GOD COMPLETELY. You are a creature and have a very finite perspective on how God’s process is unfolding. As a human being, you also cannot see the end that God has in mind. God is in complete control of every process and has already determined every outcome. In God’s infinitely complex order of things there are no unknowns. He is master of all things and His timing is perfect for His intended outcome.
ACCEPT THE FACT THAT YOUR DESIRED OUTCOME IS NOT NECESSARILY GOD’S DETERMINED OUTCOME.
ACCEPT THE FACT THAT YOUR TIMING IS NOT NECESSARILY GOD’S TIMING.
ALLOW THE TESTING PROCESS TO INCREASE YOUR PATIENCE AND TO INCREASE YOUR THANKFULNESS. In the midst of the deepest trial, give thanks to the Lord for His abundant goodness and praise Him for all He has done. (RMB 6/8/2015)

(For a slightly fuller treatment of this subject, see the separate page on this WordPress site called “God’s Process and Our Patience.”)

(This series of writings was prompted by listening to an excellent sermon from Dr. John MacArthur entitled “Thanks, No Matter What” on 1 Thessalonians 5:18. The sermon was from 1995, I believe.)

“in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” 1 Thess. 5:18

One of the ironic features of American Christianity is that despite living in the most affluent society in the history of the world, there is a general lack of thankfulness even among believers in America. I find this glaring flaw present in my own life, as well, and am very convicted by it. Living in great abundance and with every need supplied, there is little evidence of thanks in the prayers and the conversations of even committed, genuine believers. Listen to the prayers of American Christians and you may hear some token thanks given for general things, but sincere and heart-felt thanks for the amazing spiritual and material blessings that the Lord has showered on them is usually absent. Again, I know that I am guilty of this and so I may be projecting this on others, but I don’t think so. I think it may be a trait of fallen humanity that the more that we have materially, the less thankful we are. So I have made a commitment to be more thankful and to have vital, deep thanksgiving become a regular part of my prayers and my conversations.

To help me in this endeavor, I am in the process of writing a series of blogs about what I call “the enemies of thankfulness,” prompted by John MacArthur’s excellent teaching on 1 Thessalonians 5:18 about the Christian’s responsibility to be thankful at all times and in all circumstances. And why is not easy for the Christian to be thankful? One reason is that there are enemies to our thankfulness that we need to combat as we grow in our sanctification. So far in this series I have talked about the enemies of DOUBT, SELFISHNESS and WORLDLINESS. This blog will address the enemy of thankfulness known as “A CRITICAL SPIRIT.”

As we embark on this topic of a critical spirit, I am tempted to write a lot about this enemy, because this is the sinful pattern in my own life that most smothers my thankfulness. Of the five enemies of thankfulness that we will discuss, this is the problem that most points at me. But before I confess too much and reveal my own weaknesses, I need to define what I mean by a critical spirit. Then the behaviors of a critical person need to be identified. Next we need to see why this chokes the life out of thankfulness, and finally we need to take some action to overcome this problem.

So what is a critical spirit, exactly? A critical spirit is the tendency to have a critical response to every event in your life. The default is to say, “Yeah, but . . .” Nothing is ever good enough, but always falls short of your too-high standards. The first place your mind goes in any evaluation is to what is wrong with the situation. You identify all the things that were less than perfect and have a hard time ever getting to what was good about a performance. The one with the critical spirit is an analyzer who inspects everything to find out what is wrong with it. We see this in the children of Israel as they came out of Egypt. Gripped by a critical spirit, they liked the food in Egypt better than the manna that the Lord had given them out of heaven. The Lord satisfied them with the heavenly manna, but then they wanted quail instead. They complained about the leadership and they complained about the direction in which they were going. They were critical of everything. This is the critical spirit.

Perhaps giving some of my own personal challenges will help those with a critical spirit identify themselves so they can confess their sin to the Lord and get the Holy Spirit to help them change. My personality is that of an “ANALYZER.” This means that I automatically seek out problems by examining data or situations. I seek problems and feel a sense of victory when I have found one. “Look! Here is the problem!” So my personality orients me to feel good when I have found the flaws and the problems. Now this can be good in some contexts, but the challenge is that this orientation carries over into all areas of my life. I criticize my wife and my children because their performance is not perfect. I ‘helpfully’ tell Lisa, “O, sweetheart, here is your problem!” Rarely is my wife excited by my discovery of her flaws. And that leads to another related tendency, which is that of being a perfectionist. Everyone must live up to my expectations and all people are subject to my judgment. Can you see how arrogant and how irritating this would be? Not only that, but this critical spirit and this constant judging over time will make a person hard and cynical, since they are always disappointed by other people’s ‘failures.’ Well, this critical spirit is a sinful behavior and needs to be identified and rooted out. My desire for righteousness must drive me to change and the Holy Spirit will give me the ability to change, but I first must recognize my need to change. Is a critical spirit choking out your thankfulness?

For the one with a critical spirit, thankfulness is smothered because nothing is deemed worthy of thanksgiving. The critic sees every good gift from God as coming with flaws that need to be fixed. Why be thankful if everything is flawed and is in need of fixing? Since the critical person starts by expecting perfection and then sees all the flaws, there is no room for thankfulness.

How can this critical spirit be defeated? The first step has already been mentioned, and that is acknowledging this as a sinful behavior pattern. Not only does being critical make us unthankful, but it also causes us to view our fellow human beings with disdain and contempt. An attitude where I am the judge and everyone (including God?) has to live up to my expectations will ruin your relationships with others and will make it difficult to love those whom you are called to love. So first, acknowledge that being critical is sinful behavior. Next, change your expectations AND your perspective. Instead of viewing everything that is not perfect (according to your standards) as a failure, view everything that is done with genuine effort and that shows progress as a success. View everything that is above a zero as a success instead of seeing everything that is not perfect as a failure. Third, thank God for everything that He gives and spend time seeing all the amazing ways that God is involved in blessing every one of your days. Realize that all that God does is perfect and all His gifts are good and perfect. he does not give us what we deserve, but gives us out of His abundant goodness and limitless grace. Finally, let your expectations of others remain low and spend time encouraging others rather than criticizing and judging others, and let your expectations of what God will do remain high and pray that he will hear your voice. Praise others for what they can accomplish and praise God for what He does give. Refuse to criticize and instead practice praise and thanksgiving. (RMB 5/22/15)