Speaking the Truth in Love

I read too many Christian blogs this weekend. It was quite depressing. First of all, I am a glutton for sensationalism. I admit it. If someone blogs about a controversy in the church, I'm likely to read every detail I can find. I realize how often Christians sin by repeating gossip and slandering their brother in Christ on these blogs, and yet I read it anyway. I've vowed not to entertain such gossip on this blog, but I still watch it happen on others and then wrestle with God and myself on my motives and responses. I've done a lot of thinking lately about this trend--I've watched it repetively over the last few years I've been reading Christian blogs. And for the purposes of this post, please don't try to attach a particular target to it. This is about principles of Christian communication and confrontation in general, not about targeting any one blog in particular. I think of this blog as a lecture to myself, though others are welcome to read along, and if anyone is the target, it is me.

I read a comment on one blog after a particularly blistering post against another Christian. The commenter said something along the lines that the fact that the blogger voiced her concerns was evidence of her love for the one she criticised. The problem is that Biblical love is not a subjective concept. The Bible defines it explicitly, and the author of the post didn't evidence any of the objective attributes of love given in I Corinthians 13.

4Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not proud, 5 love is not rude; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, 6 does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; 7 bears all things, believes all things (is ever ready to give the benefit of the doubt), hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never fails;

The author wasn't kind, wasn't humble, was rude, and did not give the benefit of the doubt. They may have spoken truth, but they violated the greatest command. That's not good.

In his discourse on unity in the Church in Ephesians 4, I appreciate that the Apostle Paul clears up a lot for us with the simple summary phrase, "speaking the truth in love". Do you see? It is so clear. Speaking the truth is not necessarily loving. Speaking the truth is not synonymous with love. YOU MUST DO BOTH! Here's a great quote from John Stott's Message of Ephesians.

Thank God there are those in the contemporary church who are determined at all costs to defend and uphold God’s revealed truth. But sometimes they are conspicuously lacking in love. When they think they smell heresy, their nose begins to twitch, their muscles ripple, and the light of battle enters their eye. They seem to enjoy nothing more than a fight. Others make the opposite mistake. They are determined at all costs to maintain and exhibit brotherly love, but in order to do so are prepared even to sacrifice the central truths of revelation. Both these tendencies are unbalanced and unbiblical. Truth becomes hard if it is not softened by love; love becomes soft if it is not strengthened by truth. The apostle calls us to hold the two together, which should not be difficult for Spirit-filled believers, since the Holy Spirit is himself ‘the Spirit of truth’ (John 14:17), and his firstfruit is “love” (Galatians 5:22). There is no other route than this to a fully mature Christian unity.

Speaking the truth in love. May it ever be our goal in the Christian blogosphere.