Gloria Dei Lutheran Church | Urbandale, Iowa

Breaking Down Barriers:
Overcoming Criticism

Pastor Burcham ’s Sermon

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

In the 1950's, we had Ozzie and Harriet and we had Father Knows Best. In the 1960's, we moved up to the Cleavers with Leave it to Beaver and plus we had Rob and Laura Petrie in the Dick Van Dyke Show. The 70's gave us The Brady Bunch and we could watch them. In the 80's and the early 90's, we had the Huxtables with The Cosby Show. Each one of them wanted to show us what was the ideal family home. What was the average American home supposed to look like? Each one wanted to make it just a little bit more realistic. Well, now finally, my friends, it has come. There is a new show, a new show that accurately depicts what the average Christian home really should look like. Join me in previewing The Perfects.

[Video] “More steak and eggs, Dear?” “Oh, no, I couldn’t eat another bite. It was delicious.” “Sure was, Mom. I love everything you cook.” “Ah, thanks, Honey.” “Dear, what time would you like to leave for church this morning?” “Well, I was thinking at about 20 until 9:00 if that would work for you.” “That would be perfect. That’s exactly the time that I was thinking of. Oh, hug.” “Say, Mom, we still have about 45 minutes before it’s time to go. We could clean up the dishes while you go have some quiet time.” “Thanks, Honey, I think I will. I think I will.” “Okay, kids, let’s see who can get the most work done in the least amount of time.”

“Uh oh, there’s only one game back here, Sis. Here, you play first. I’ll play when you finish.” “Thanks. I’m so blessed to have you around.” “Not as blessed as I am to have you.” “Hug.”

[Singing] “I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart. Where? Down in my heart. Where? Down in my heart. I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart. Where?” “Oh, silly me, I have my NIV bible and my new American Standard but I left my new King James in the car. What if the pastor reads from that one and I don’t have it?” “Don’t worry, Mom, I’ll get it for you.” “Ah, thanks, Honey.” “Yikes.” “What is it, Dear?” “I just got mud on my dress.” “Well, that’s alright. I’m sure that if we all close our eyes and think a happy thought, it will be fine.” “See, I told you.” “You’re so smart, Dad. You’re the wisest man I know.” “Oh.” “Hey, maybe over lunch, we can all share what our happy thought was.” “Great idea, Mom.” “Well, we better get going. We want to have enough time to read the bulletin before the service starts.”

So all the moms who enjoyed that 45 minutes of quiet time before service this morning, raise your hands. You mean that doesn’t happen in your home? That’s not how it is? Isn’t that what we set ourselves up for? We’ve come up with 50 years now of watching what the ideal perfect family is. It’s where Mom and Dad rarely make a mistake. The children are loving. They always do well in school. Oh, sure, they have problems but those problems are fixed in 30 minutes or less, right? That’s the ideal we’ve set up there of what family life is supposed to be. And the question I have this morning is how are you handling that?

And maybe specifically since it’s Mother’s Day and moms seem to take more responsibility for the family than what they should, how are you dealing with that? How do you deal with it, Moms, when your family doesn’t look like the Nelsons? How do you deal with it when it doesn’t look like the Huxtables or it doesn’t look like the Perfects? How do you handle it when the criticism comes your way that says things aren’t how they should be? You all have people who have walked up to you at one time or another in your lifetime and said, “You know, when I was raising my children, they never did _______” you fill in the blank. And maybe even more cutting than that is your self criticism because you know yourself better than anyone else and you know all of your shortcomings. You know all the areas where you could be improving on. So how do you deal with your own self criticism as you look at what you think should be the ideal home and what it really means to be the perfect mom. How do you live up to those expectations and how do you handle your own criticism? I’m talking about the mom who works full time outside of the home and she feels guilty as she drops her son and daughter off because she’s not going on the field trip. I’m talking about the mom who stays home full time and feels guilty because she’s not contributing to the family budget and the neighbors are going to Disneyland again. How do you handle the criticism that can come at you from any different angle?

That’s the question we want to get answered this morning. And not only for moms but for all of us. All of us have to deal with criticism in our lives because it always seems there’s someone who’s willing to give us their opinion, willing to give us their critique on every aspect of our life so how do we deal with those criticisms when they come our way and how do we overcome them?

Well, this morning we’re going to use the text from Nehemiah kind of as our springboard and we’ll rely a little bit on the wisdom literature of scripture also to give us some hints on how we can handle criticism. Before we get into that, I think we probably need to explain a little bit of the Nehemiah text. Unless you’ve read the book, you probably were scratching your head as Pastor Tim read that lesson. A little insight of this is Nehemiah lived at a time that was probably one of the darkest days of Israel’s history. Most of Israel had been taken off into captivity and to Babylon. A small remnant was allowed to return to Jerusalem. Jerusalem is the capital city. Jerusalem is where the temple is. That is the center of cultural life for the Hebrew people, for the Israelite nation. Well, Nehemiah comes back there and he sees the city is in ruins and the wall, the only defense they really have, has been all tattered down from various battles and that. And so he comes back with permission from the king to rebuild the wall. The problem is the neighbors aren’t real keen on this idea. They don’t like it at all. And that’s when we stepped in at Chapter 4 this morning. We have Sanballat. We have Tobiah who is ridiculing, making fun of and, if you will, criticizing the people every step along the way. They have this monumental task to do and they are kind of wondering whether they’re going to be able to do it anyway and now you have these yahoos coming in criticizing them every step along the way. It kind of sounds a lot like life to me these days. We have monumental paths and we always have people wanting to criticize us. So I think we can learn from Nehemiah how it is we handle criticism.

The first thing I would suggest is this. We need to learn how to grow from constructive criticism. Not all criticism is bad. There’s destructive criticism. There’s constructive criticism and we need to know the difference between the two and also to be able to grow from constructive criticism. The way we do that is we need to depersonalize any criticism that comes our way. We tend to make it personal when somebody says something to us and there’s always going to be someone. Someone will always have an opinion on how you should raise your children, how you should keep your home, how you should be a good father, how you should be a good employee, what it really means to be a good friend. It seems every aspect of our life, you’re sure to find someone who will offer you a critique, who will offer you some criticism, some helpful hints on how you can do it better.

The first thing we need to do is we need to depersonalize what they say. Otherwise, we become defensive. As soon as somebody offers a word of criticism to us, they offer a suggestion, normally we become defensive, that is, we want to start to mount a counter attack to prove to them they’re wrong, that you don’t need to change at all. We need to depersonalize it so we don’t take offense, so all of a sudden we’re not offended when somebody says something. We sort of take the sting out of it. They’re probably not saying you’re a rotten mother. They’re not saying you’re a terrible father, that you’re an irresponsible employee. We need to sort of take that out and then hear what they have to say. Otherwise, we could miss it. We could miss an opportunity for us to learn and grow. Proverbs has an insight into that. Proverbs, a collection of wisdom sayings from the Old Testament, Proverbs 15 says, “If you listen to constructive criticism, you’ll be at home among the wise.” And then it says this, “If you reject criticism, you only harm yourself.” If you reject criticism, you only harm yourself. You miss an opportunity to learn and grow from the experience so the trick is to ask yourself, “Is it constructive criticism?” and if you depersonalize it, you can see that. Constructive criticism always has an element of truth to it. It’s always valid because you know there’s some basis for it. And I would dare say you probably know immediately whether it’s constructive or whether it’s true or not. You may not like it but yet it may be something you need to hear. We can go to the book of Ecclesiastes. The book of Ecclesiastes says this, “It’s better to be criticized by a wise person than to be praised by a fool.” You know, the simple fact of the matter is we can always find somebody to tell us what we want to hear. I mean, the mark of a true friend, as far as I’m concerned, is someone to tell you what you need to hear and not necessarily what you want to hear. So the words of a wise man, the criticism of a wise person is much better than praise of a fool. Or even maybe more telling than that is the book of Job when he says, “Honest words are painful.” Maybe that’s why we don’t like criticism, even valid criticism. Honest words are painful. Sometimes we don’t want to hear what the person has to say because we know it’s true. We need to get past that, to take our ego out of the equation. The fact of the matter is all of us can do better. None of us get it right all the time. None of us have all the answers all of the time. You know, maybe there is a way you can be a better employee. Maybe there is a way you can be a more caring husband. Maybe there is a different way in which you can discipline your children. Maybe there is a way you can be a better student. There is a way you can learn from criticism. If it’s constructive criticism and we depersonalize it, then we need to learn from it and then we grow from it.

But the second thing we need to do is we need to get rid of all the destructive criticism and I sometimes think there is more destructive criticism in the world than there is constructive criticism. Destructive criticism is just like it sounds. It’s not meant to build us up. It doesn’t have our best interest at heart. It only means to harm us. It only means to hurt us. We have the prime example in Nehemiah. Nehemiah has this monumental task. He’s trying to rebuild the wall. He’s rallied the people around and they’re working diligently at it. The neighbors don’t like it so they come up. You have Sanballat and you have Tobiah. What do they have? Do they have words of encouragement? Hardly. Do they have words of criticism? Yeah. Is that criticism aimed at them so they can build the wall stronger, they can build it better, do a good job? No. They ridicule them. They make fun of them. They say, “Are you going to use those charred stones, all that burnt up lumber? Do you remember when we attacked the city and did that one? Yeah. They’re going to use all that junk and try to rebuild the wall?” Then Tobiah comes in as comic relief. He says, “Yeah. Look at that thing. If a fox jumps on it, the whole thing is going to collapse.” That’s destructive criticism. It’s not meant to help by any way, shape, or form. He just wants to degrade the people and make them feel defeated. How does Nehemiah handle that? He pays no attention. He pays no attention to the negative, to the destructive criticism. The most he does is he prays to God and he says, “All the insults they’re hurling at us, God, why don’t you put them back on their own head, give them a dose of their own message.” And then they continue back on their work. Otherwise, it could have demoralized all of the people. But destructive criticism has no basis in truth.

Destructive criticism can come at us from any number of angles. You probably know somebody. Maybe it’s someone in your family. Maybe it’s a close friend. No matter what you do, they have a word of criticism for you. You can never get it right. And it changes each time you see them. One time it’s criticism about your family. Next it’s criticism about your cooking. Then it’s criticism about your lawn. Then it’s criticism about your car. Then it’s about your job. Every time you see them, it’s something new. It’s kind of like “Criticism of the Day” for them. It’s not meant to build you up. It’s not meant for constructive purposes. It’s destructive and we have to stop paying attention to that because all it does is wear us down and all it does is make us feel defeated. It convinces us, indeed, we’re not a good parent, we’re not a good worker, we’re not a good friend.

Destructive criticism does no good in our lives and we need to get rid of it. But unfortunately, maybe the primary source of destructive criticism comes from ourselves. Are you not your own worst critic? Aren’t you your own worst enemy? You know yourself better than anyone else. You know every aspect of your life. You know every part of your life that needs improvement. Don’t you end up becoming your own worst critic? And at least it’s been my experience that usually the most destructive criticism we lay upon ourselves is usually when we take responsibility for something that’s completely out of our control. We claim responsibility and we feel guilty for things that are completely out of our control. And I’m not sure about this, but I think, Parents, we are the Number 1 offender and maybe even moms a little bit more than dads, to be honest. Don’t we take responsibility for everything and anything our children do? From the time they’re infants until they’re well grown and maybe they’re even in their retirement years, don’t you end up feeling responsible for everything they do? Somehow, it’s a reflection upon you. Take the test. How many of you have felt guilty or responsible when your children, when they were babies, cried when it was the most quiet moment in church? Right? Do you really think you had control over that? I don’t. I think it’s built instinctively. When the room goes quiet, whether it’s at church, whether it’s at a restaurant, whether it’s in the theater, at that moment, I think God has fun with us because that’s the moment they decide they’re going to burp. That’s the moment they decide they’re going to coo or giggle or cry or do whatever. See, it makes us not take life so seriously. And yet, as parents, we’re horrified at the fact that the child is making noise and I watch you rush out the doors as they’re crying or gurgling or something as if it’s your fault, as if you’re responsible for that. What parent has not felt responsible when their child got in trouble, when they get rebellious in Junior High or they do dumb things in High School? And parents walk around saying, “What did I do wrong? What could I have done differently?” As if you can control the actions of your children. We end up taking responsibility for something that’s completely out of our control.

Parents aren’t the only ones who do that. People often do that in relationships. A relationship comes to an end because maybe one of the parties is cheating on the other party but the one who was cheated on, they feel responsible. “What did I do wrong? I wonder what I could have done differently?” Hello. You’re taking responsibility for the wrong actions of somebody else. We end up heaping this unfair, unjust destructive criticism upon ourselves. And if we keep it going, the devil’s going to have a great time because he’s going to keep accusing us and keep reminding us and telling us that we are a terrible parent, that we are a rotten husband, that we’re a poor employee, that we’re a terrible son or daughter. Finally, he’s going to grind it down to the point where we feel completely useless, we feel completely unlovable and if he’s successful, he’ll make you believe you’re useless and unlovable to God because that’s his ultimate goal in your life. You see, destructive criticism has nothing good about it. All it does is tear us down and make us feel defeated. We have to get rid of it. We have to simply pay no attention to it at all. Once we determine it is not constructive, we don’t give it another thought. We take it out of our mind and we stop taking responsibility for things we can’t control.

In the end, though, what we really do is depend upon God. In dealing with criticism, we have to depend upon God to give us the things and the strength to do what we can’t do. That’s really what it comes down to. That’s what it came down to for Nehemiah. Nehemiah has this monumental task in front of him. It’s really insurmountable but if you look through the book of Nehemiah from Chapter 1 all the way to the end, there’s one common thread there and that’s Nehemiah relying on God. He starts already in Chapter 1. He spends several days in prayer to God, taking it before Him, asking Him for forgiveness, asking Him for help, asking Him for wisdom, asking Him for strength. He puts all of this dependence upon God. We have to do the same. We have to depend upon God if we’re going to make it through and overcome the criticism in our lives. We have to depend upon God to forgive us sometimes. The fact of the matter is you’re not always the moms you should be. The fact of the matter is we’re not always the dads we should be. We’re not always the employees we should be. We’re not always the son or the daughter or the student we should be. There are times we fail. There are times there are things we should do that we don’t do. There are things we shouldn’t do that we do. And at those times, we just have to come back to God to confess to Him all of our failures, all the times we’ve fallen short and have God come in and give us a fresh start. Have God come in and remind us of the forgiveness we have in His Son, remind us we’ve been washed clean in the blood of Jesus, and to set us back up on our feet and to set us down the path once again. We have to depend upon God to help us, to help us grow and to be able to discern what criticism is valid criticism, to help us depersonalize it, and to grow from the constructive criticism. We have to depend upon God to help us throw out that destructive criticism and to stop dwelling on it, to stop taking responsibility for things we can’t be responsible for. We have to depend upon God to come into our homes and make them a realistic home.

You see, we’re never going to be the Nelsons, the Cleavers, the Bradys, the Huxtables, or the Perfects because they’re unreal. What we can be is a family and a home that is centered upon God, a God who helps us to understand sometimes that criticism comes and we can grow from it, a God who helps us to throw out the destructive stuff, a God who helps us and builds us up so we can face each day fresh and new. Amen.