The Antidote to Other People Bothering Us

“Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” Matthew 7:3

“Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” Luke 6:41

I think we get the picture: the antidote to other people bothering us is to look with a critical eye towards ourselves.

So how do we do it?

How do we go from obsessing over, say, a person named Fred’s "specks," to seeing our own?

How do we go from this:

“Fred bothers me. I always stew over something he said. I find it inconceivable that he could think the way he does. He is so….I can’t even explain it. I just know he and I are not on the same page.”

To this:

Willingly and unequivocally seeking out the log(s) in my own eye?

What we don't realize is that, while we’re so flummoxed over Fred, we are inoculating ourselves to our own faults, becoming immune to their very real existence. 

The amount of energy we expend on being “frustrated, consternated, angry, mistreated, slighted, misunderstood and one-upped by another person, preoccupies us from noticing when we do the exact same thing.

Because we, too, frustrate, cause consternation, make angry, mistreat, slight, misunderstand and one-up others on a regular basis. 

As Christians, the idea is that we would be made aware of these tendencies and outright dysfunctions, and go to God to curb and curtail them. 

So how do we get from obsessing about Fred to holding our own selves accountable?

What if we took the time, energy and dedication that we put into cross-examining other people and cross-examined ourselves instead? 

What if we allowed God’s conviction all of the time so that we could be purified of all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9) instead of fixating on the unrighteousness (or self-righteousness) of other individuals?

This is where I always have to put in the “It doesn’t mean” sentence. 

And I do this because so often people think that when we say, “take the log out of your own eye” that we become doormats, with all Godly discernment going right out the window. 

Examining ourselves means God’s examining of us revealed to us because we ask Him to reveal it to us (not for the feint of heart, but so rewarding!):

“Search me, O God and know my heart;

Try me and know my anxious thoughts;

And see if there be any hurtful way in me,

And lead me in the everlasting way.” Psalm 139:23-24

With this revelation of God, we quickly discover that taking the log out of our own eye does not entail remaining or becoming the brunt of all sorts of enabling and manipulations of other people, or condoning or continuing to expose ourselves to abuse of one kind or another. 

No. 

This heart-to-heart with God takes us from a place of weakness (ignorance) to strength (wisdom).

What it means is, there are always going to be people who “get our goat.” 

Figuring out why is not a bad thing, because we are bound to learn something about ourselves. Maybe we will see a sin tendency, or outright active sin in our life, or area of un-forgiveness, that can be put to bed, finally, with God. 

Trying to sincerely and objectively, with prayer for God’s insight, understand what makes another person tick can bring us to a place of very new perspective that leads to compassion and forgiveness, and maybe even a greater peace with the other person when in their company. 

Who knows, as we begin to “walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light (1 John 1:7), we may find that our fellowship with others improves—not because they behave any differently but because we and our attitudes do. 

We may find that people and situations that used to drive us crazy now only perturb us at worst, or humor us at best. We can get through these social interactions because we are monitoring ourselves instead of the other person. And we are monitoring ourselves via the Holy Spirit.

So, we may ask, “What if I do this and yet the other person still manages to get under my skin, and it takes me hours or days to recover from time spent with them?” 

This is a very good question, because for people who are more sensitive to social interactions—even wonderful interactions—and who become overwhelmed say, with several days of having to participate in hours of conversation accompanied by different people, being relational can take a mental, if not physical, toll. 

God made all of us in His image, and as we look around, we certainly see variety in his peopled creation. 

All individuals are not the same, nor does Christianity prescribe they become the same. 

In too many passages to mention, the distinction is made between those of various nationalities, skin colors and sex, as now being one with Christ. 

When we hear there is no longer male or female, Scythian or Jew, what we are hearing is that as a male, female, Scythian, Greek or Jew, we are all one in Christ, based on faith in Christ, not works (Galatians 3; Colossians 3; Ephesians 2). 

Within the uniqueness of each person the foundation of His Truth can enter in, and as we are brought into His salvation through Jesus, we maintain that uniqueness. 

God, through the working of His Spirit with us, channels our specific temperaments and talents into a refined giftedness and joy that He intends for our good and His glory. 

So, for example, if we are naturally shy—or naturally gregarious—God transforms that into a blessing instead of a curse.

If we are needing to consistently be doing something physically active, God channels that need into right activities as opposed to sinful ones. 

If we are more on the quiet side and can sit for long hours reading or working thoughtfully on a project, God guides that ability into a fulfilling redemption of time and effort. 

This is what I like to call Christian simpatico, where I, in my area of God-given and properly channeled attributes, and you, in your God-given and properly channeled attributes, make life better for us together, apart, and in the wider unbelieving world. All within the grace of knowing that I cannot adopt your attributes, nor you mine. Nor should we; nor does God expect it “in order to get along.”

Because here is what so often happens, in reality:

Many Christians translate “take the log out of your own eye” to mean “sacrifice one’s self at all costs;” and never set limits with anyone. Everybody but me comes first. All the time. 

This merely gets back to a works-based Christianity, trying to “should” our way into God’s good graces by being the most sacrificing. But in the end, something usually gives, and it is usually us collapsing in an explosion of resentment.

But if we understand taking the log out of our own eye as first getting to the bottom of why certain people rub us wrong, we may quickly get to crux of the matter so as to formulate a solution. 

Because when we honestly try to understand why a person bothers us, we often come to understand aspects of ourselves that we would never have recognized or acknowledged.

This is the sort of honest assessment we discover with God, and then give to God so that He can purify us in His truth: truth about ourselves, about others, about Jesus and His Word, and what our Christian life in Him can yet become. 

And in this time of soul-searching with God, He will reveal not only explanations about ourselves, but other people as well: why they do what they do or say what they say.

This may lead to re-evaluating how, when and where we spend time with certain people. We may find that relationships that once stressed us out begin to thrive under “new management”—healthy compromises in the form of boundaries, guidelines, and the setting and curating of all future expectations, especially with new acquaintances. 

And then there are times in which we’ve gone as far as we can in trying to find a happy medium in response to others’ attempts at dominance, control and manipulation, and we arrive at a place of peace with God about allowing distance in the relationship. 

Navigating the world of social interaction is a great challenge. 

But if we remain in the Light as He is in the Light, and trust ourselves to Him for the truth about ourselves and others, and how to proceed in those truths under the greater Truth of His Word, we will have right and wise fellowship with one another. 

Copyright Barb Harwood

The Christian Life As Time Goes On

As I approach the 20-year mark of being a Christian, I sometimes wonder, 

"What is insight groomed by age, and what is insight imbued by Christ?" 

And I believe, of course, it is both: God allows life to be the portal through which we either grow closer to, and more reliant upon, His Son, or, over time, distance ourselves.

Certainly one can obtain sage perspective without Christianity: I would posit that one who does this is in fact growing up in the basics of Christ’s ethic without having lived under Him as Lord and Savior. 

Anyone, I believe, who has found a modicum of functioning integrity in their life is, perhaps without knowing or perceiving it, founded on God’s principles. 

For me, however, the living out of an Aesop’s Fable "good" attempt at living always came up short when I thought about death—that of myself and of others. 

The secular world of actualization also never satisfied; no matter how hard I tried in work or in play, or what I accomplished, it seemed that it was never enough, be it in quantity or quality. 

So while I could perhaps fool others with an “up” persona, and yes—even myself at times—in the end I was internally disgruntled about many situations and people, and often overcome by a pervading inadequacy. 

The point I’m getting at is this: without Christ, anything legitimately good that I understood to have originated with me became the basis for pride since I didn’t have anyone else (Jesus) to credit it with. 

Any other “good” that was, in fact, not good by Jesus’ standards was deemed to be "good" by the world’s standards, or simply by the fact that I was “human.”

So if I cheated, or cursed, or partied all night: that was deemed okay because I’m a “human with human needs;” or because the majority of people in my life also cheated, cursed and partied, making these actions fine—in fact, to not do them would be weird and elicit negative judgment.

Also in the secular "good life," the norm in relationships is always to watch out for one’s self and blame everyone else. It’s what I saw modeled all around me and thus, adopted, before I was blessed to pick up the Bible and begin reading. 

That's when Christ came along with His upheaval: the beginning of the true straight and narrow. 

And straight and narrow it is, with yet a pretty wide berth of grace. And that is what I will get to in the next post.

copyright Barb Harwood

Why So Disturbed About Corporate Church?

How do we reconcile our faith, founded on love, when, in actuality, we don’t love being in traditional fellowship situations which the Christian church has historically mandated? 

How do we repent of hearts torn asunder by the conflicting “should” of gathering together while at the same time internally wishing we could solely honor Jesus’ need and modeling of going away to a quiet place (Luke 5:16; Mark 6:30-31)? 

What if we, as introverts (for lack of a better term), are committed to the lonely and thoughtful places of Christ and service, while wanting to jettison the corporate church part?

Introverts, like extroverts, love people; but unlike extroverts, we don’t love them all at once (in groups where people take it upon themselves to own us) or all of the time (meaning, we don’t love to always do everything, most things, or even a lot of things, together). 

We might get along fine one-on-one with other introverts or those who are more even-keeled, but struggle with excitedly enthusiastic or high energy individuals or crowds. 

We may take a long time to develop relationships and trust, and freak out if we sense being “glommed onto” by people who exert social expectations that make emotionally draining demands of us, and to which we lack the assertiveness to politely say “No.”  
Consistent and long-term exposure to intense and coercive eagerness, and the assumption that we want to live every aspect of life in aggregate, wears out the introspective and reserved to the point of mentally shutting down. That’s when nothing could be better than a one-way trip to the Faroe islands to find solace among the Puffins!

The opposite is true for extroverts. The more physical, exuberant, busy, impassioned and people-infused they are, the better. To spend an hour or two alone causes them physical and mental aggravation, creating a desire to go start a committee or track down members of their small group to have a picnic with.

The tragedy is that the “you-rah-rah” joined-at-the-hip church has become the predominant construct of evangelical Christian interaction, and is often set in stone as being the only “truly spiritual” way: (not to mention the “holding one another accountable” thing, which is commonly just another way of saying “be in church on Sunday and come to all of the organized events”). 

It looks something like this:

“You must get involved in multiple whirling dervish ways and come alongside and live life together laying yourself down sacrificing all the time for others so that you will never have one free minute to yourself and why would you ever want to be alone that is selfish look what Jesus did for you how could you ever not want to come to church or join a weekly small group and what is your ministry—where can we sign you up?

The above is all in fun with a large dose of truth as to the way it actually is. And to the introverted, this is how it is filtered: Now I am being forced into someone else’s idea of what “spiritual” and “community” is, and it isn’t always Biblically balanced or founded.

The thing is, introverts don’t want to be left alone; we want to be left alone to be the people we are, with the temperaments and personalities God imbued in us, and encouraged and accepted in that capacity to worship, serve and fellowship. 

Over time, for some if not many folks, the sense of being talked at (because we can never find the words, courage, assertiveness or space to verbalize our perspective—and it’s never really asked for since everything’s already been set in stone by the extroverts!) creates in a more quiet person the desperate need to take a time-out in order to rescue and salvage our Christian sanity.

For me, this has meant a lack of desire to ever set foot in a church. 

I make this admission fully aware of the push-back it elicits, because I’ve already heard it: I’m not wanting to be held accountable; I’m not willing to get out of my "comfort zone"; I must not believe in God, really, if I’m not an active member of one particular church. 

It’s as if the extroverts who make these claims against the socially awkward, subdued folks don’t know us at all, or refuse to want to know and relate to us in a manner that goes against their “shoulds.” And yet they expect introverts to interact with them on their terms all of the time.

It is the proverbial one-way street. 

I have spent oodles of time with quiet people. Somber people. Really fun when-you-get-to know-them-intimately people. 

They are some of the most committed Christians I have ever run into. 

They live their Christian life as strongly and consistently as any more effusive Christian. Not as visibly, in the traditional corporate church sense. But under the radar. Often outside of the "church."

Perhaps the corporate church will never endorse these so-called “loners” and their ways. But God has clearly created them, for no less a purpose than He created extroverts. 

And it is God, not the outspoken cajolers in the church, who will have the final say on private hearts (Psalm 139:1; Jeremiah 17:10). 

And I believe God endorses the socially less-engaged as faithful servants right along with the others, because He most of all knows we need them, and in fact, is why He created them with their gentle, behind-the-scenes, frequently-awkward natures (1 Thessalonians 4:9-11; 1 Peter 3:3-4; 15). 

Sadly, the corporate church has done a huge dis-service to many a person’s walk with Christ by taking that walk and translating it into extroverted terms, saying these are Christ’s expectations. And introverts have let it happen.

But left alone, and by that I mean, released from extroverted peer pressure and the expectation to be someone they are not—and can never pretend to be—they are free to indeed live out the being of the apple of God’s eye that they in fact are. To be who they are in Christ, with Christ setting the parameters, not the socially one-dimensional corporate church with its one-size-fits all demands of people in the name of Christ. 

Copyright Barb Harwood

What is Trust in God?

Matthew 6, I believe, contains the clearest synopsis of what it means to trust in God:

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’ For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

“So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own” (Matthew 6:25-34).



Note how this verse is prefaced by the words,

“No one can serve two masters…” (Matthew 6:24a).

When we do not trust God for present direction and future outcomes, I believe we serve the master of self: our wanting to be in control so as to ward off disappointment, frustration, failure or missing out.

This isn’t to say we don’t take a thoughtful approach to interactions and decisions. In fact, it is a more thoughtful approach, I would submit, to trust God than it is to just plunge ahead out of our own personal (or someone else’s) anxiety, impatience, excitement, fear or impulsiveness.

The Matthew verse says to trust God first, and only then…

This gets to the crux of it: our motivations.

Because if we aren’t trusting God, we are automatically trusting something else, and that something else is our motivations.

We live in the default mode of always putting our trust and faith in something or someone, be it ourselves, our friends and family, our boss or co-workers, our government, or God.

To trust parts of each of those, here and there, or to be fair-weather trusters—trusting God when things go well but taking the reigns when things get dramatic—we end up all over the map: one step forward, perhaps initially, then one or many steps back eventually.

It is true God gives us wisdom, but we often interpret that to mean,

“Look, I’ve been a mature Christian for many years now, and have advised other people and know my Bible well. I’ve overcome many sin tendencies and have mastered the art of forgiveness and loving my neighbor. I’m ‘good to go.’ I am able, in the experience and knowledge God has given me, to make these decisions on my own, certainly understanding all the while that ‘God is in control.’”

But that is not fully trusting in God, and it is a very easy mistake to make, especially for those who are used to, or in a ministry position of, providing Godly counsel on a regular basis to others.

Never forget that we all need God's counsel, all the time. No-one ever graduates from heart, mind and body reliance on God’s perspective and leading.

The Matthew verse also talks about being consternated.

“Do not worry,” it says.

Worry is the clearest indication that we have not truly put ourselves in God’s trust. And we put ourselves in God’s trust through being strong in Him; not vulnerable to our inner emotions.

This brings us to humility: submitting ourselves to God to take every thought captive unto Him (2 Corinthians 10:5), waiting on His insight, and only then going forward in the peace of all He has shown us.

This will include His warnings and corrections of wrong motivations so that we can then re-evaluate and re-consider the decision, problem or situation in front of us.

So trust in God is not “let go and let God.”

Trusting in God is active: an alignment in what's driving us so that whatever we do and say is now brought under His will, assuring us that we can then be at peace with any outcome.

This is what creates Godly confidence that in turn breeds patience and joy, whether our questions are answered and problems resolved quickly, or not.

Trust in God takes the intentional approach that we will give everything to Him, not just first, but entirely, throughout.

We will be active in continuing to live out our faith as called, staying the course of Christ in us, even when facing difficult circumstances.

As we trust God in Christ Jesus, in full awareness of His care, we can smile in satisfaction that He is, indeed, Lord of our life, and we are beyond blessed to have Him be so.



copyright Barb Harwood

TED Talks, Best Practices and the Stumbling Block of Lack of Respect

Achieving inter-personal influence and “success with people" has risen to the level of frenzy without much improvement in the decorum of the social sphere.

Buzz words of the day abound: “process,” “best practices,” “evidence-based,” and “soft skills,” not to mention the obsession with concepts such as “continuous learning,” “learner-experience,” “user adoption,” “user experience,” “user-generated content,” “personalized learning,” and “mobile learning.”

Seems everyone wants to become better at something and someone, somewhere, wants to capitalize on that.

A list of the most popular TED talks of all time include:

“Do Schools Kill Creativity?”

“Your Body Language May Shape Who You Are”

“How Great Leaders Inspire Action”

The Power of Vulnerability”

“How to Speak so that People Will Listen”

The Puzzle of Motivation”

“How to Spot a Liar”

“What Makes a Good Life”

The pathway to happiness is also a recurring topic, no surprise there.

I have to say, I don’t get it. 

Probably because I am a child of:

—"Interpersonal" grandparents, meaning old people who interacted with me and my siblings on a one-on-one basis and weren’t micro-managed by my parents.

—Gifted and dedicated public school teachers who were hired because they were competent to teach—in their own way according to their own “best practices,” which usually meant common sense coupled with mastery of the subject and a sincere love of teaching and students. 

—Parents who matter-of-factly put a roof over my head and food on the table and who subscribed to a no-nonsense parenting style (which generally agreed with 99% of all parents at the time). 

If I got in trouble at school, the way the school handled it was right. My parents sided with the teacher.

If I sassed back to my parents—attempting to stage my own little coup of family operations—I was quickly short-circuited by DAD and never attempted it again.

If I was mean to or fighting with the neighbor kid, that kid’s parents put an end to it shortly and sweetly by admonishing both of us—not calling the cops on me and not complaining to my parents. Adults in my day were the adult, and they corrected the child. As it should be. 

I could go on and on. I fear that these things I am talking about are going to become so rare as to evaporate into non-recorded history, lost forever at great social cost to people everywhere.

All the TED talks in the world cannot bring back disciplined, no-nonsense parenting. 

All the “best practices” in the world cannot steer and keep a child on the right path. 

All the "soft skills" we long for in our millennials will never take root in this new era of “every individual is right” (even if they aren’t) and "every person’s voice is a worthy one" (even if that voice is one of chronic complaint, eternal whining, and voracious victimhood that begs “look at me”). 

We have gotten to the place in time where, if there’s a TED talk on it and a “best practice” for it, then that alone makes what is said and practiced legitimate. Even if it’s pablum. Even if it’s silly. Even if it’s shallow trendiness. 

Common sense—having a gut for what is right and wrong; polite and rude; self-centered and other-centered--can only be developed into a person over time, from people willing to model and encourage it. 

We are losing the ability to own this common sense because nobody wants to follow common courtesies anymore: the common courtesy of respecting privacy, revering social protocols (like holding the door for someone, talking in a low voice and not cursing in public), and sincerely “celebrating diversity” by not having a melt-down the minute we come into contact with a person who might see things a bit different than us. 

We are so bombarded with “better” ways of living that we have lost the foundational best way: simple respect for others. 

dictionary.com defines respect as “esteem for or a sense of the worth” of a person; “deference to a right, privilege, privileged position, or someone or something considered to have certain rights or privileges; proper acceptance or courtesy; acknowledgement.”

Respect. By losing it for others through personal narcissism, we lose respect for ourselves too. 

We crave kindness but have disconnected it from the very respect necessary for it’s existence. 

We so want “love” and “inclusion” to be our personal calling card but completely miss the fact that without a foundational respect for others, we can never value them and therefore never love or include them. 

We go around saying we are all about “Kumbaya” until we run into someone who thinks and acts opposite.

Just take this quick test: how would any of us react to someone who takes a varying stance than us on the following:

Global warming

GMO’s

Organic eggs

Chickens

Meat

Electric cars

Ford Trucks

Republicans

Democrats

Vaccinations

Walmart

Black Friday holiday shopping

The saddest part of the above is the narcissism, self-righteousness, and personal identity attached to each (and just about any other topic one would encounter nowadays). 

We are so entrenched in "me" that we have completely lost our sense of “you.” 

And yet we scramble to and gobble up incessant TED talks on “kindness” and how to be happy; how to make friends; how to lead. 

How about this for a TED talk: 

Forget Yourself Long Enough to Engage with Someone Else in Humility and the Ability to Listen, Hear and Play Back What was Said. 

In this TED talk, we will decide beforehand that we don’t already hate or dislike the person we are about to converse with, and that we will withhold formulating an opinion on anything until at least we’ve done the playing back part (hearing and understanding). 

In the age of either hitting the “thumbs up” key on Facebook (or unfriending someone), and anonymously hammering out sarcasm on the internet in response to being offended, we have trained ourselves in the ugly paradigm of not thinking, not respecting, and not conversing. 

We as a people have become a bunch of noise going up to space, with nobody seriously hearing and nobody sincerely caring. 

And then we kick back at the end of the day and watch a TED talk on “What Makes a Good Life.”  

The problem is, these TED talks and “continuous learning” attempts merely bounce off of a hard heart. Which is what many of us have had. And do have. And will continue to have. 

And that’s the point. We are becoming a world of hardened hearts, cordoned off at the boundary of, and thinking only to protect, one’s self and one’s individual perspective. 

In this is the inability to ever live in any semblance of community and inclusiveness and diversity. 

The more we strive for “loving kindness” from a place of self-centeredness, the more inevitable it will be that life is hindered by an obstruction of platitude that says one thing but lives out another.

The sound bite of “nice” is swallowed up in the reality of a general lack of respect for other people. 

Copyright Barb Harwood

The Bible's Credibility Remains, Regardless

A great quote from God Under Fire contains a terrific insight about Scripture and people's reaction to it:

"Scripture never is credible or authoritative for anyone until God's Spirit has worked in that person's heart (1 Cor. 2-16; Eph. 2:1-10). The Scriptures are indeed objectively sufficient to give each of us a proper knowledge of who God actually is, but their objective sufficiency is undercut by our sin. The fact that theological Constructivists do not find the language of Scripture credible or authoritative does not tell us anything about its actual credibility or authoritativeness; instead, it tells us something about them. Thus, we should feel free, with Christians of other ages, to turn to the Scriptures to understand who God is."
Douglas S. Huffman and Eric L. Johnson, writing in God Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents God