Canceling our Critical Spirits

In today's episode, we're diving into the issue of having a critical spirit, especially as it's been absorbed into our culture and personal relationships through social media. There’s a lot of negativity out there, especially from some Christian commentators who thrive on judgment and condescension. This creates a culture where conflict and critique get the most attention, which unfortunately seeps into the Church. If we truly reflect on our own sin in light of Christ’s righteousness, we’ll stop fixating on others’ flaws. Our words should radiate grace instead of pride. 

The true enemy is Satan. He thrives on a divided church and loves to see us distracted by pointless arguments and disagreements. When our hearts are hardened, we fall right into his trap. But when we embrace God’s love and recognize our own faults, we’re much less likely to disparage others. The struggle is real, and whether we see it or not, our culture’s fixation on conflict is hardening our hearts toward each other, and creating a culture of critical spirits. 

Recommendations
Tim Mackie - Paradise Now sermon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQlH-WfmZms
Lisa Harper - Back Porch Theology, Kicking Critical Spirits to the Curb:
https://www.accessmore.com/episode/Kicking-Critical-Spirits-to-the-Curb

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Are you quick to extend critique or are you quick to extend grace? Let's be people who, like Jesus, extend grace upon grace upon grace. Welcome to Going Deeper. Hello friends, welcome back to the podcast. I am very glad that you're here and I'm super excited for today's episode. It is, so it started off as a fiery one and I actually started to record this episode a few days ago, but I was a little too fired up and I just felt convicted that I needed to push pause and take a moment and come back down to earth and humble myself a little bit and do a lot more self-reflection before I approach this topic. Because the truth is, we're going to be talking about the topic, canceling the critical spirit. We're harsh in your words and in the way that you talk to others, the way that you talk about others, and more specifically, how I have seen this really show up in our culture, especially in the Christian community, like the Christian creator community. And by that, I mean, where we're seeing stuff online, you know, whether that be like social media, you know, like Instagram or TikTok or whatever, or YouTube or podcast or what have you. I just, yeah, kind of breaking all that down. And yeah, so like I said, I had, it was really fiery when I first got the idea for this episode. And to be honest with you, like, like to be confessional in a way, the idea came originally from out of my noticing this issue in other people and there are a few people that come to mind but as I started scripting this episode and doing research for this episode and thinking on it more I just very much felt God be like hold on Justine let's you know let's look at yourself first and And let's look back over the last five years and see how far you've come in this area. So anyways, all of that being said, you know, forgive me if I do get a little bit fiery or if I get a little bit stirred up. It's a topic near and dear to my heart, probably because it's who I used to be. Yeah, so... We're not going to waste any time because we've got a lot of ground to cover. But I do want to offer up a really quick prayer for myself. So, Father, I just want to ask, Holy Spirit, I just want to ask that you would help me be humble. Help me take the plank out of my own eye before removing the speck of dust from my brother or my sister. And I just pray that you would... Remind me of your grace and your truth. Help me to help my words to be gracious and seasoned with salt and help me to encourage and exhort in a way that uplifts and edifies. We love you in Jesus name. Amen. Let's dig right in. Uh, but before we do always in a recommendation. So I have two recommendations for you today. Both of them are podcasts episodes slash podcasts that you can check out. The first one is Tim Mackey, The Bible Projects. Well, so it's Tim Mackey from The Bible Project, and it's a sermon. So I lied. I think you could probably listen to this on podcast, but it's a sermon on YouTube, and it's a sermon titled Paradise Now. And it blew my mind. Everything that Tim Mackey says kind of blows my mind and kind of makes me want to get a So highly recommend that. I will make sure that's linked below. And then this podcast episode totally goes along with what we're talking about and highly recommend listening to this right after because it's a really good, um, complimentation of this. So it's kicking critical spirits to the curb with Lisa Harper on her podcast, Back Porch Theology. And I'm just going to go ahead and share a quote with you from that podcast, just to kind of give you a little taste of where we're going today. Lisa says, when God calls you to confront a brother or sister who is in sin, that does not include disparagement, judgment, or critique. Those are not restorative. Confrontation is hard, but confrontation is not belittling or disparaging. I love the word restorative that she used, and we're going to talk about that a little bit more later on in the episode. So yeah. We're just gonna dive right in. Critical spirits. Just to give you guys a little bit of context for this episode, because like I said, when I originally had the idea and when I originally kind of started recording, I had somebody else, like I had other people in mind. Like I had the culture in mind. I had people in mind who kind of have critical spirits or have a critical spirit or publicly put out content that can be considered critical or judgmental or whatever. And I did not have my own self in mind. And, but I will give you some context for the episode. So I've actually wanted to talk about this for a while because I, I've seen this become a really prevalent issue in our culture today. And I would say it's for sure become a thing in the But even in the last 10 years, 10 to 15 years, with YouTube becoming what it has and podcasts becoming what they have become, just this explosion of digital media, the tech society and the tech culture that we live in and the information age, all of that has sort of fed into this whole thing. culture of criticism and culture of having a critical spirit. Um, and, but, but more specifically, I had received a text from my mom. She had sent it to me and her sister. So my aunt Erica, and it was links to, uh, one social media post, one YouTube video. And basically her question was, I saw this online, saw this on social media, whose side are are you on? And it was content from one creator, one influencer, podcaster, commentator, whatever you want to call them. And one side from another creator. And she wanted our opinion, our input on whose side we landed on. Like what was the big, biblically accurate, uh, approach perspective to have. And truly, um, I'm not going to name names. That would sort of nullify this entire episode if we went for naming names because that's really not my goal or my heart. But I will give you a very brief overview just so that you can have context. One of the creators, we'll call them creators. To be broad, one of the creators was the one with a really strong critical spirit who was really kind of harsh and disparaging in their communication. But this person was calling out another creator on what they were sharing as unbiblical and then enter another creator who felt the need to rebuke the creator who rebuked the other creator. So we got three people involved. And anyways, the long and short of it is I felt myself growing really frustrated by this sort of content. And I have grown really frustrated with this sort of content that I've seen online. And I, of course, really don't like it when I see it in the Christian context. Christian community, from people who are Christian, or who espouse Christian moral ethics and beliefs. But really, as I began scripting, and as I got fired up from my mom's text message, I had to remind myself that you can be angry at this issue in our culture, but you need to first be angry with yourself. And look, and see how that is you and can be you and may just not manifest itself in the same way. So let's just talk about, let's just kind of give, you know, put a name a little bit more to what I'm talking about, this whole critical spirit in our culture. So first off, it's very obvious. if you are not living under a rock, if you are online, if you are on social media, you've got these TikTok response videos. You even see these response videos on YouTube, like in the political realm or the sociocultural realm, well, realm, well, you've got a commentator or something who plays a viral video and then responds to it. So you've got that. And then you, you know, Twitter wars, 10 years ago, it would have been like Twitter wars. And now in the last couple of years, you've got hot takes. Everybody loves a good hot take. There's even clickbait, you know, clickbait on YouTube. There's just this hunger for conflict for whatever reason. Our culture loves conflict, but also the algorithm loves conflict. It loves drama and disputes and disagreements and debates because it gets views. It gets shares. It gets comments. That's obvious. Like we've seen that. We've seen that play out in the realm of social media. And then even in politics, like politics and political media, especially in the last few months, has a lot of times taken over our feeds and online and Like if you still read the newspaper, whatever news outlet you read, anywhere you look, just the political media was so loud and in our face. And there are opinion pieces and satirical bashing and election advertisements and the list goes on. And then you think from a more like high-level perspective of just like our American culture and Western society over the last however many years. And there's this theme of like tribalism, this me against you, us against them sort of attitude that, you know, it's not– It's not a secret that America is divided, that we are a divided nation. We've heard that phrase a lot. And so this, this sort of critical spirit in our culture, this sort of judgmental us against me, you against, you know what I'm saying? Like this, it's like almost like a vibe. I don't know how to describe it. It's just like a vibe that we get this. I'm right. You're wrong. I'm going to be, I'm going to fall on the right side or the left side, you know, like There's just division and conflict and the internet thrives off of that. The algorithm loves it. So it's just become more and more and more prevalent in our culture. And we get on the app, we get on social media, and it's all we see. It's all we see. And it can be exhausting. So that's kind of like just a little bit of a more specific what I'm talking about when I say the critical spirit in our culture. But then the more research that I did into this podcast episode, you have to ask the question, but is this new? And it's really not. It's like what Ecclesiastes says. There's nothing new under the sun. It's the same sin manifested in different ways, right? We've always been a sinful people. Well, ever since the fall. We've been a sinful people and we've always loved drama and conflict. Like if you read the old Testament, that's all you're going to see is a bunch of drama, a bunch of conflict, a bunch of war, a bunch of tribalism, a hunger for power. Like what we're seeing in our culture today is really no different than what we saw in, you know, the times of the Exodus, you know? So it's, It's like a little bit encouraging to think about the fact that there's really nothing new under the sun. And it's just when you take technology and you take these new, you know, developments in our like world, things just look differently than they did, of course, in Bible times. And so I kind of had to take a step back and be like, where does a critical spirit come from? Like, why do we even, why is it that that we have this inclination to want to critique, to judge, to be crude and to be harsh, or to even just have this, I'm right, you're wrong, us against them mentality. Why do we love hot takes? Why do we love Twitter wars? Why do we love a good TikTok response video where they're completely belittling somebody for being stupid or saying something stupid or being wrong? Why do we love that? Why do we crave it? Why do we love to read the comment sections on political posts when the one side that we are on is totally bashing the side that we're not on? Why do we like that? And I think there's many reasons why we like that. But at the end of the day, it's pride, right? Pride is the root of all sin. It's the root of all evil. And pride is essentially just this, it's a sense of arrogance, but also it's a sense of like, I'm better than you. I know more than you. And we saw that in the garden, right? So anyways, all that to say, and then the next step for me in and kind of answering the, like, it was this process, right? It was, I'm seeing this in our culture. It's so frustrating. I'm angry at this people for being, these people for being like this. It doesn't reflect Christianity. It isn't a good witness. And it turns people away from the faith. You know, like that was sort of my, the anger and the perspective that I had. But then the more that I kept peeling back the layers of this onion per se, the more, like when I got to the core, it was like, one, we're talking about the sin of pride, but two, I've got to look at myself. So I just kind of wanted to briefly share a little bit about that, about my experience with having a critical spirit and where that has shown up in my life, because apart from the work of Christ and the indwelling of a spirit, I can be extremely critical and judgmental and cynical. I enjoy conflict. I am very prideful, right? Like those things are so true. And I have to first take the plank out of my own eye in order to see clearly, in order to remove the speck of plank from my brother or sister's eye, right? But it's way easier to look at somebody else and to pull apart, to notice their sin and to pull apart all the ways that they're doing wrong while not looking at ourselves. So quick aside, a fun update a little bit. I applied for seminary. I had been wanting to do seminary for a while, but it sort of felt like this far-fetched, far-out thing in the future that I would maybe someday get to do. But... Long story short, I have found myself finding a seminary that I want to attend. I've gone through the process of writing the essays and getting the recommendation letters and submitting it, and I have an interview coming up, so I am very excited about that process. But one of the essays that I had to write was about diversity and diversity not only of ethnicity, but diversity of thought, like in theological perspectives and ideological perspectives. And it really got me thinking and reflecting on myself. And it was funny because I was a very combative and argumentative growing up. That's just, you know, I have, I joke, I'm a quarter Mexican. And, you know, Latinas are spicy, right? Like, I'm not a Latina in a way, but I have some of that blood in me. And so growing up, the women in my family, especially on my dad's side, they are spicy, you know? And I can't tell you a Thanksgiving or a Christmas when we were all together when a debate that caused an argument happened. did not break out, like, or a fight didn't break out or somebody had something to say, right? Like in, in that side of the family, when you're wrong, you're going to be called out for being wrong. You know what I'm saying? Like, you're not just going to get to be wrong. Somebody's going to, somebody's going to tell you why you're wrong, how you're wrong and why they're right. And I can laugh about it now, but that was, that is very much my nature. So I naturally have a combative, argumentative, critical spirit. That is natural for me. But in writing my essay for seminary, I had to sort of look back and be like, how did I go from being like that to making the progress that I've made and not being as critical or judgmental or cynical or whatever in... ideological and theological perspectives, like in diversity of thought per se, and just having an open mind and also just a lot more grace in other people's views, other people's content. So, uh, and to some of you guys found me during my YouTube days, like some of you listening, remember when five, three to five, four to three to five years ago, I was on YouTube. And the posts that I made on YouTube were very much this like discussing convictions and disputable matters and, you know, I don't even want to name specific videos because I'm that embarrassed by those videos. But I knew that they would get comments. I knew that they would get views. I knew that my ego would be fed in the comment section because people would agree with me or not agree. Who doesn't love a video like that? You know, that pulls apart an idea or pulls apart a person or pulls apart an organization and tells you everything you need to know. why it's biblical, why it's not, whatever. And not to say that those videos are wrong or that we can't have those videos or that they're not helpful or edifying, but a lot of the ones that I was watching were feeding my pride and feeding that critical spirit in me and not actually pointing me to Jesus and pointing me to the gospel and reminding me of God's grace. So how have I grown? Like, how have I grown from Having that sort of combative, argumentative, critical spirit and how I used to be, well, confession, I haven't grown as much as I would like. And one area that I've been very convicted of that needs a ton of work that is being revealed on the daily is harshness. And I'm going to talk about that a little bit later, but I will say that over time, as I practiced, because I wanted more of God, I've always just wanted more of God. And as I have practiced sort of emptying myself before God, I read the book Humble by Andrew Murray or Humility by Andrew Murray. And just that book, he talks about emptying yourself, like being this empty, broken vessel, this jar of clay, this Like this idea of emptying yourself before God in order for him to fill you up. Like you don't bring anything good to the table and yet the Lord still loves and redeems and blesses. Me and a friend just finished studying through the book of Haggai, really random book, but her and I are going to keep each other accountable by studying a book of the Bible together slowly throughout the year. different books of the Bible throughout the year. And we decided to start with a really short one, only two chapters. But even in the book of Haggai, God, through the prophet Haggai, talks to the people and to the priests and to Zerubbabel, the governor, and And he essentially says like, because your hearts, and I'm not going to give you the whole context, but essentially he's talking about the hearts of the people and rebuilding the temple. And because their hearts were unclean, the rebuilding of the temple, that was going to be unclean. But what I loved so much is that the end of that passage, he literally says, and yet I'll I'm going to bless the work that you've done. And what I took from that was just, that's the gospel right there, right? Like we come unclean, we come with nothing to really give and God blesses and he redeems and he restores. And so for me, as I began over time, right, practicing, emptying myself before God and just really allowing his gospel of grace and the good news of his kingdom to fill me up and to just wash over me, truly, I think there just wasn't any more room for puffed up opinions that could cause division. There wasn't any more room to have a critical spirit towards others because my eyes were open to my own critical spirit, my own sin, my own shortcomings. But also I think going to a gospel-centered church Because we switched churches and we started going to a new church two years ago. Now, it's been two years. Going to a gospel-centered church and hanging out with gospel-centered people changes everything. But what I love about going to a gospel-centered church is the message of the gospel of grace told every stinking Sunday. And... taking communion every Sunday, because when we look at the cross, we look at Calvary, we are reminded of exactly who Jesus is in light of who we are and what he did for us. And so the more and more we look at our own sin in light of the sinlessness of Christ, there just won't be any more room to gaze upon the sins of others. We won't want to focus on all these disagreements, the disputes, the debates, the will be laser focused on what Jesus was laser focused on, his kingdom. And there's even a quote by Milton Vincent from a gospel primer. He says, when my mind is fixed on the gospel, I have ample stimulation to show God's love to others for I am always willing to show love to others when I am freshly mindful of the love that God has shown me. End quote. And what I would say to that is it's the same is true for God's grace and his mercy. Like our words, opinions, judgments will naturally become seasoned with grace the more that we allow God's grace to be real and true and tangible in our lives. And so all kinds of people from all different backgrounds and denominations and Christian expressions, traditions, and political parties will one day be found face down at the feet of Jesus. And so, yes. I think obviously if when we look online and we see people calling out false teachers or false teaching and wanting truth to be known, I think we can oftentimes have a hard heart that if... Somebody or some organization or whatever is not living out their faith in the way that we would and the way that we believe it should be walked out. We get more concerned with what they're doing and less concerned with what we're doing. And my conviction is that, and I think that what we see in scripture, is focus... on yourself, like the more and more and more you practice repentance and confession and looking at yourself and, and praying Psalm 139, Lord, search my heart, search me and know me, reveal any grievous way in me, lead me on the path everlasting, like search me and know me, reveal the grievous ways, like reveal the sin in me. He will.

UNKNOWN: 26:09

He will.

SPEAKER_00: 26:10

And we will... So I think that sense of humility of coming to... And Andrew Murray talks about this in his book, but he essentially says that humility is the virtue by which all other virtues like grace and hope and love are experienced in our lives. That posture is absolutely... Like we cannot experience anything of God without the correct posture of humility. So that kind of is a little bit of a segue into, I wanted to share this resource, but also talk more, like just go a little step further, right? So there's a book called Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges, which I actually have not read yet. but it's on my to be read list. And I'm even more so interested in reading it now because of what I've found. But one of the chapters, one of the sort of respectable sins, and a respectable sin is a sin that is subtle, that's way more accepted in society. And one of the chapters is called the respectable sin of judgmentalism. And in it, he talks about having a critical spirit, but you know, there's, so there's two sides of the, or there's two, um, kind of, uh, bubbles that we could talk about. So you have, when you have a critical spirit and it's just you in your day-to-day life, and you are just casting judgment on someone based on your own personal opinions or convictions, like that's some, that's the critical spirit that we run into on a daily basis. But even, even to add a third one to it, where I was saying that I've struggled with harshness, I'm noticing a critical spirit with my children. Like how dare I look at somebody online who I think is being overly harsh and thinking to myself, you're not being a good witness. You're closing the door on the kingdom. And yet I'm having that same critical spirit with my kids. And that was convicting. And so What Jerry Bridges has to talk about that when we are just kind of being just really judgmental of somebody based on our own personal opinions or convictions, he says, the sin of judgmentalism is one of the most subtle of our respectable sins because it is often practiced under the guise of being zealous for what is right. There are myriads of opinions of everything from theology to conduct to lifestyle and politics, but we usually assume our opinion is correct. That's where our trouble with judgmentalism begins. And I think I get more convicted every day, especially after doing a deep dive into this topic, with that area of having a critical spirit. It's just really this naive arrogance that my opinion is correct, that I'm on the right side. of history, that I'm on the right side of morality, whatever, that my convictions and my opinions are somehow superior. And that right there is the definition of pride. That's pride. And it is scary and humbling to think about the fact that pride is the root of all sin. But then there's this other sort of sector bubble, whatever you want to call it, where there are truly and this is kind of where we see this online, when you truly want the truth to be heard, like my original initial sort of anger and idea for this episode with seeing in our culture where there is false teaching and there are people who are not representing Christ or there are people who are sharing unbiblical things online. Like when you truly want the truth to be heard, when you want... Uh, to defend Christ. You want to just defend his word. And when you're advocating for like biblical accuracy and, but, but the bubble that I'm talking about, or the sector that I'm talking about of the, of having a critical spirit is when in that process of wanting to defend scripture, your, your discernment of where somebody is wrong, where the truth is, you know, not totally the truth or where somebody there's false teaching when that discernment and that rebuke or that response or whatever leads to disparagement. And what's interesting and what I've noticed is that sometimes there is a disparagement and belittling in the actual words of the people. Our pastor says it best. He says, you can be right and still be wrong. Essentially saying that you might be saying the truth. You may be right in your biblical exegesis of whatever that person is saying, but yet you could still be wrong in your approach to that person and the way that you communicate the truth. wrongness of what they're saying, right? Like you can be right and still be wrong. And I found a quote that was talking about this book, Respectable Sins. And it says, it's not saying we should never question the practices and beliefs of others for if their lifestyle or conduct is clearly out of line with scripture, we need to address it. However, in doing so, we can still sin if we do so with a self-righteous attitude of or harshness. We must not degenerate into character assassination. That is what we're seeing so much online is sort of you're seeing, and there are tons of them, right? Like there's some that are a lot more popular than others, but there are a lot of podcasters, commentators, influencers, creators, whatever you want to call them who make like a killing. on addressing what is unbiblical in our culture, addressing different people, calling out different people. And in so doing, in calling out where somebody is wrong, biblically, whatever, as an example, they do so in a way that disparages, that belittles, that is harsh, that is self-righteous, that attacks people's character. And a lot of it comes down to, like I was saying earlier, you could have all the right words, but a lot of it comes down to tone. It comes down to attitude. You know, the Bible talks about the aroma of Christ. Like you will smell like Christ and you know how you can watch a video and you're like, that doesn't smell like Christ, right? Like he has an aroma when you spend time with him and And you know his word. Harshness is the opposite of gentle. And Jesus describes himself as gentle. He is gentle and lowly, right? So the opposite of gentle and lowly, the opposite of Christ's character is harsh. And a lot of these people, and myself included, We can be harsh. We can be crass in the attitude, the tone in which we speak in general, but also in how we communicate towards others, about others. And we might be doing it with the intent to defend scripture or to say what is true. But if what we're saying is If we're saying something that is true, but we're doing so in a way that is harsh or doesn't carry the aroma of Christ or, you know, belittle somebody's character, that's also a sin, you know? And so the problem here is that this, this form of judgment, having a critical spirit damages our witness to the world, whether it's the creators online who are creating content and, you know, being so harsh and judgmental of people that they are off-putting to unbelievers. Or if it's ourself in our small group of friends in our community or the people in our church that we're talking with, if we damage our witness, right? Or the people that we're working, like not because I guess we wouldn't be witnessing people in our church most likely, but the people that we're work with and that we're around who are unbelievers, if we are harsh in our talk, right? That is the opposite of Christ, right? And another point that I want to make here is that we don't need commentators or creators or influencers or podcasts or whatever. We don't need people who are constantly criticizing and critiquing other people or other organizations in order to know and discern right from wrong. We just don't. Also, the more and more and more we rely on these sort of creators and people for discernment, we're not going to be able to flex that muscle or build that skill ourselves because we're just relying on secondhand help from people on social media telling us what to believe. We grow in discernment by actually taking a large chunks of time, breaks off of line, off of social media, and pausing and silencing all the noise and sitting with God and his word and leaning on his spirit and being with his church. Jackie O'Perry once said, you don't need a constant diet of someone tearing down the body to teach you how to contend for the faith. And it's true. And so I would just say, this is sort of an exhortation and it's, I've, I've put this into practice in my own life. I've really, if I'm watching somebody online, on YouTube, on Instagram, whatever, whatever creator it is, and if they are, like most of their content is talking about other people or tearing down other people or constantly tearing, causing division and conflict and, you know, kind of answering the question like, is this biblical or... whatever, but they're doing it in a way where there's no grace or charity or even communication of the gospel, I would just steer clear of them because there are plenty of people out there. There are plenty of podcasts and creators and teachers that can help you understand right from wrong and discern the truth that do so well. with a ton of grace and a ton of charity and a ton of love and who are going to point you to Christ and who are also going to do it, all of that with humility. So I wonder when we look at the culture at large, when we look at our own lives and when we really see this common thread of critical thinking Christians, of critical Christianity, of critical spirits, I wonder if Jesus would give us our own set of woes. You know, I was thinking about the Pharisees when I was doing research for this episode and how they, the religious leaders who were all about contending for the faith, all about, you know, upholding the laws and the scriptures, were the most... criticized by Jesus in a sense. Like Jesus, we know how he felt about the Pharisees. And they often had entire books of the Bible memorized, but Jesus describes them as blind guides. And their religiosity was burdensome. It was legalistic. It was divisive. Their hearts were prideful and egotistical. And we see In Matthew 23, 13, Jesus says, And then he says a little further along, You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former. You blind guides, you strain out a gnat, but swallow a camel. Essentially he's saying you're so focused on the minor unimportant things that you miss the major sin in your life of lovelessness in a way, right? And pride. You know, Ephesians 4.29 says, do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. And this is where, this is one of the big takeaways that I got from Lisa Harper's podcast episode that I mentioned at the beginning that was extremely convicting and kind of made me think about my own self with mothering. you know, because that's the season of life that I'm in right now. But our words, our talk should not be harsh. Like I mentioned, it should be gentle, but it should, everything that we say, it should be edifying. Like nothing that we should say, whether in tone or in what we're actually saying should tear down. It should always build up. It shouldn't attack character. It should extend grace. And so my mom, at the beginning of the episode, I talked about how she asked the question, whose side are you on? Whose side do you land on? It really gets to the heart of my point in all of this. There should be no other, there should be no side other than us and God against the ultimate enemy, Satan. Because Satan loves us. a divided church. And he loves when people who are caught up in disputes and debates and disagreements, and it only helps his cause by keeping us distracted with things that don't ultimately matter in the grand scheme of, you know, the kingdom economy, right? Satan loves when when our hearts are hardened. And he wants us to get into arguments in the comment section. Like, he wants us to waste an hour getting caught up in a Twitter war. He wants us to make that snide remark to a friend or a family member. And he wants us to grow in our pride. Because he knows it's the pathway to sin and destruction. Because pride is the root of all sin. It's the root of all evil. But he hates... When we have become so filled with God's love and his grace that that same love and grace gets poured out towards others. Like, here's a question. Like, if you leave this episode with anything on your mind, here's my question. Are you quick to extend critique? Or are you quick to extend grace? Are you quick... to call out someone else's sin or to notice someone else's sin before noticing your own. Let's be people who, like Jesus, extend grace upon grace upon grace. Let's be Christians who, rather than gatekeeping heaven with this sort of legalistic whatever, let's reveal heaven to everybody. through our words and our attitudes and hearts. Like let's be people who don't just speak the words of Christ, but be people who smell like him, right? He has his own way, right? He is gentle and humble. He is kind. He is compassionate. He is loving. Like, yes, he is truth, right? Like he is truth, but he is also grace and grace. There's tension, right? Like how do we still defend the truth? How do we contend for the faith? How do we not budge on what is true, right? And how do we call out false teaching? And how do we rebuke a brother and a sister in love? Well, that takes a lot of careful discernment and prayer and slow moving. That's what I have found. I think where we get in trouble is when we don't hold our tongue. When we are quick to be angry, when we are quick to speak and not slow to listen, as James talks about. And that, you know, taming the tongue is extremely hard. Like it's the first to go for me when I'm having a hard day. And isn't that just unfortunate? But, you know, Colossians 4, 6 says, let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Proverbs 16, 24, gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body. We want to have the aroma of Christ, right? And so last exhortation for you and just this topic of having a critical spirit, let's get into the habit of checking ourselves, right? Before we check those around us, let's get into the habit of praying the Lord would search us and know us and reveal the grievous way in us so that we can see the pride in our hearts. Before we start looking around and seeing it in other people, let's practice taking the plank out of our own eye before we pull the speck out of our brothers. But also let's be aware. You know, I think we have to be acutely aware of of where we can be harsh and and not reflect that gentleness towards not just you know the people who are hard to love but towards our kids you know when we're having a private conversation with a friend and we've got an opinion that we feel needs to be said about so and so because they did something we didn't agree with right like that's for me those that's hard you know It's extremely hard to put into practice. And finally, we can uphold the truth of Scripture and defend the faith and contend for what is right, but let's do it with utmost charity and grace and love, just like Jesus did. Okay. That is all I have for you guys today. If you got something out of this episode, if something resonated with you, please take time to leave a review, share the episode on social media, reach out to me. Let me know how I encouraged you or how this encouraged you. Share it with a friend, text it to a friend. That is how this episode is going to grow. If you have any Lingering thoughts or questions, please don't hesitate to reach out via email or on social media. Thank you guys so much for listening, and I will catch up with you again in next week's episode.