Increasingly, while looking up information to make a purchase, after reading the promotional material provided by the seller, I go to the comment section. It is there I can discover a customers real life experience and opinion about a product. I experienced this firsthand this week while trying to help my son find a reliable used car.
In all the comments and reviews we read, it’s wise to toss out the overly emotional ones that are typically the expression of a bias, a one-off negative experience, or a comment from someone who simply wants to use a social media platform to rant. Somewhere in all the comments is the kind of information that actually helps provide the honest insight we need before we shell out our hard-earned money. We don’t get that kind of information from the promoter of a product who simply wants to sell us something or the ranters and ravers who move through social media like an unrestrained wildfire.
The same holds truth for matters of faith. I don’t take criticism about a particular church as fact just because someone had a negative experience and then posted a YouTube video as an all-inclusive review for the world to watch. The same holds true for criticizing pastors. The overwhelming majority of our pastors are Godly men and women who love the Lord and the people they serve. Like the rest of us, none are perfect. I’ve seen this take place regarding the worthiness of a Bible translation someone prefers to read. Some of the comments offered seem to equate human opinion about someone’s choice to read a particular translation with a value akin to the salvation of someone’s soul. In the smorgasbord of negative reviews on a wide variety of spiritual opinions, we are left with the impression that if we don’t agree with the critics, we have somehow abandoned the faith.
Don’t believe everything you watch or read that offers itself as the final word on any subject. There is more going on than the simplistic comments we are asked to believe that discredits a person or a ministry. We need to be mature and measured in how we determine whether an individual or group is shun-worthy. That was a rare occurrence in Scripture and should be equally rare in our present context.
Thank you Garris. We are called to be measured and wise, slow to express our opinions. James reminds us of the destructive power of the tongue- we would be wise to pay head to his warning, and instead seek to bless and encourage.
A puzzling verse in Is 11 is the key to many of life’s confusing situations. The one with the 7-fold spirit of God promises to make righteous judgments for the poor, meek and oppressed. But the preamble to this claim is translated “his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord” or “he will be of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord”
The hebrew phrase is based on “ruach” – often translated breath, wind or spirit – but in the form used in IS 11.3, “ruach” means to “Smell, sniff.”
IS 11.4ff declares that he will not depend on what he sees or hears to make these decisions.
To be good followers of Jesus, we need to often set aside the “evidence” of what we see and hear in favor of doing the “smell test” – seeking to know whether anyone fears the Lord.