James 4:11 says that we should not speak evil of another family member (brothers and sisters in Christ)
The different translations often use different words with different meanings, do not slander, do not speak evil of, do not speak against, don’t bad-mouth, do not criticize each other…
And I was thinking about this verse. We like team sports. My team is better than yours, my worship team is better than yours? Our church is more spiritual… my pastor teaches better? You do not understand this right… (but I do?!)
How quick I am to judge the road God is traveling with another.
There was a time when Luba used to hate shooting with me. I would constantly criticize and comment on her settings, her exposures, her choice of f-stops for depth, etc, etc… When we were shooting with clients, I would often try and hide comments in such a way so that she can quickly “correct” her “errors” without them knowing…
But here is the thing. She has a gift to see. Its like a prophetic gift of photography and retouching. She can see the final product long before she presses the button. And that underexposed shot, its actually on purpose to bring details back, the grunge and texture, and that overexposed shot? Needs to be there to find what is hidden in the shadows and make it beautiful. The final product was always spectacular (and few people realize that they have walked past her work in malls and shopping centers on a daily basis.)
I judged the more-or-less ok image she started with, but she had a plan from start to finish on what she wanted the end result to be. And that included what I saw as a mess and a mistake halfway through…
Felt quite a bit ashamed when this part in James 4 started clicking in my flat head… and it made me think about that part in proverbs where being kind to our enemies will heap burning coals on their heads. For the longest time, the sermons I remember was all about shame. It will shame them, the hot coals is a metaphor for their shame and burning cheeks. Its not.
Context of the time. If you had to make food in the morning, and your fire went out. You either asked your neighbor, or you walked to the town fire pit. And got some coals, and restarted your fire.
Proverbs 25:22 essentially says, don’t give your enemy a coal to restart his fire. Give him a bucket full so that he has enough coal to cook breakfast and bake bread without having to wait for his fire. It’s not: don’t judge or don’t slander, but rather be kind. And not just nice it is be kind in extreme abundance!
Each of us walks a path with God, and I have gone through some serious dank and stinky places in my life. It wasn’t a punishment, but rather a kindness, because from there I could start to learn about grace.
There is a story that Abraham Lincoln was asked why he was showing his enemies leniency instead of destroying them? His response was “Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?”
