(upbeat music) - Today we address a critical spirit. The question comes in from a listener named Alan. Here's his email. Pastor John, thank you for your insight on many topics in this podcast. My question for you is this. What does the Bible say about a critical spirit? What is a critical spirit?

I assume holding high expectations is not the same thing as having a critical spirit. So when do high expectations become sinful judgmentalism? And how can I fight against this tendency inside of me to focus mostly on the failures of others? - That last question is exactly the right question to ask for all of us.

And I include myself here, who am, John Piper is wired to be critical. I remember taking a personality test, and I think it was Myers-Briggs ages ago. And my letters came back, I can't remember. I think it was INTJ or something like that. This is not the kind of person you want to live with.

(both laughing) I remember, you know, they said, "Okay, here's your number, Piper. And here's the narration of what that personality type is like." And you know what one of the mottos was? The motto was, "There's always room for improvement." - Oh, wow. (both laughing) - Now, it's good to know that about yourself because it means that you're a hard person to live with.

Nobody likes to be under an incessantly scrupulous eye that basically says, "Well, no matter how hard and how well you do your job, it could have been done better." I mean, that makes for a pretty oppressive marriage or Sunday school class or church. So I had to be really on top of the sinful proclivities of this way that I was just born, right?

No excuses here. I'm not trying to make anything easy. So this question, therefore, that's why I say this last question is so right. That is, what can we do or how can we think or are there steps we can take so that we do not become hypercritical people? And if we're wired that way, we can be changed or exercise self-control to channel it into properly analytical efforts and not people ruining.

So what are the strategies that I have found in the Bible and in my own life that might be helpful here not to be hypercritical or judgmental person? You'd have to ask my wife how successful I've been at this, but I'm sure bent on being better. Number one, let's zero in on the word judgmental just because Alan referred to it and Jesus addresses it directly.

Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye? In other words, I'm a super hypercritical person. I see specks everywhere.

So what can I do to take the speck out of your eye? When you've got a log hanging out of your eye, Jesus says, you hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye. Then you will see clearly to be a good eye surgeon and take the speck out of your brother's eye.

So Jesus' answer to the question, how not to be hypercritical about the speck in your brother's eye is to be deeply aware of the log in your own. Now, I don't think that means that the very thing you spot in the other person that you think is a speck is worse in you than in him.

I don't think it means that. That's not, that doesn't work. But what it means is there's plenty about me before God and man that should disincline me to be quick to judge others for specks because if I got the just judgment that I deserved, it would be devastating. That's, I think, the gist of what it means.

And it really, really works. I mean, that has a deep effect on slowing down your criticism of others, at least de-intensifying it because you know that if God were to treat you with the same rigor that you're now treating him, you'd be undone. Number two, and this is really an extension of the first point, never lose sight of what you have been saved from or how much it cost and how much remaining corruption there is still in you.

And I base this on Ephesians 4:32. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. Forgiving as you have been forgiven carries an implication. And the implication is being ready to treat people way better than they deserve because we have been treated so much better than we deserve.

So even though we don't call it forgiveness when we are less critical at the front end of a relationship, we're less critical, the root is the same. We treat people better than they deserve because God treats us better than we deserve. And it cost Christ his life for God to treat us that way.

That's number two. Number three, fill your heart and mouth with thanksgiving for everything, Ephesians 5:20. Give thanks always and for everything. Be an amazingly, overflowingly thankful person. In other words, be radically, radically grateful. Practice waking up in the morning with thankfulness, walking through the day with thankfulness, going to bed at night with thankfulness because a thankful spirit pushes out a critical spirit.

Number four, meditate on what love is and how essential love is to the Christian. What does it mean to love people? And I think most of us should memorize all of 1 Corinthians 13. That chapter is only 13 verses long. It's the most important chapter on love in the Bible.

And you can memorize it in a week, if you put your mind to it, and then say it to yourself over and over again for a year or so, see what happens. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. Love is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way.

It's not irritable. Oh my goodness. It's not resentful, that it doesn't keep an account of wrongs. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Good night. Memorize that, say it and say it, pray it and pray it until it's you, and God will heal you of much of your hypercritical spirit.

Number five, this is real pragmatic and people doubt the value of this, and I'll explain why they shouldn't. Ask yourself this, what good is it going to do for anyone for me to constantly feel so critical of others? What good is it going to do anybody, me or them?

Now, you may think a question like that is emotionally useless. Like, so what? I mean, that doesn't change me. Asking that question doesn't change me, it doesn't help me. Well, if that were true, if that question were useless, why did Jesus say when he was trying to help us overcome anxiety, which is just as hard to get rid of as a critical spirit, why did he say this?

And which of you, by being anxious, can add a single hour to his span of life? So here's my paraphrase. It doesn't do any good to be anxious. It's just, it's pointless. You know, nothing happens, right? Well, why are you anxious? You're accomplishing nothing. And I know a lot of people hear that and say, well, how does that help?

So say that about being hypercritical. It just doesn't do any good. Now, that's not the only strategy, but add that to your arsenal of weapons, because Jesus said, that's a good question to ask when it comes to lots of sins. What good do they do it? How are you helping anybody with that particular bent?

Number six, cultivate a view of life, hour by hour, that is more expansive, bigger heart, global, universal, all-encompassing, God-entranced. Look at the whole of life. Look at the whole of the universe. Look at the whole of nature. Look how big it is, and look at all of its dazzling wonders, and be amazed at the world you're walking through.

So my favorite lit teacher in college, Clyde Kilby, put it like this. This is one of his resolutions for mental health. I shall open my eyes and ears. Once every day, I shall simply stare at a tree, a flower, a cloud, or a person. I shall not then be concerned at all to ask what they are, but simply be glad that they are.

I shall joyfully allow them the mystery of what Lewis calls their, quote, "Divine, magical, terrifying, and ecstatic existence." So this afternoon, I'm walking back after chapel across my revelatory bridge, listening on my phone to the history of the Baptists, and it hit me, turn that thing off. You can listen to that while you're brushing your teeth.

You are walking under God's blue sky. Look up. Look at those clouds, John. Just look at 'em. Let 'em minister to you. You're inside all day long. You get 10 minutes under God's glory, and you're gonna listen to a book? Much of our hypercritical bent is owing to the fact that our world has shrunk down to the tiny little situation where this molehill of a speck in a person's eye, this molehill of a problem looks 100 times bigger than it really is because we have made our world so small that this feels big.

We have focused our lens so narrowly that we can't see the glories all around us. So that's number six. Finally, number seven, fill your mind and your heart and your mouth with praise. That's very much like thanks, but not quite the same. Decades ago, I read this quote from C.S.

Lewis. Tony knows it. Lots of you probably who are listening have heard this. Let me say it again just 'cause it's so healing. Oh my goodness, when I first read this, it just washed over me like a cleansing flood for how not to be a cranky person. Here's what Lewis said about praise.

"The most obvious fact about praise strangely escaped me. I thought of it in terms of compliment, approval, the giving of honor. I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows in praise. The world rings with praise. Lovers praising their mistresses, readers, their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game, praise of weather, wines, dishes, actors, motors, horses, colleges, countries, historical personages, children, flowers, mountains, rare stamps, rare beetles, even sometimes politicians and scholars.

I had not noticed how the humblest and at the same time most balanced and capacious minds praised most while the cranks and the misfits and malcontents and may I add hypercritical types, INTJ types praised least." So there it is. The remedy to not be a cranky, hypercritical misfit is to be full of praise.

So fix your eyes on God and the wonders of his creation and redemption and be filled with praise. - Thank you, Pastor John. Excellent question, Alan. Thank you for that. And thank you for joining us today. You can ask a question of your own. You can search our growing archive or subscribe to the podcast, all at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

Well, God can prevent every trial from entering our lives. He can and he doesn't. Why not? That's the question every believer must eventually answer, especially if you believe that God is all-powerful. If he is, why does he allow trials into our lives? That's on the table next time. I'm your host, Tony Rehnke.

We'll see you back here on Wednesday. Thanks for listening. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)