Series: October 2024
Speaker: Rob McClellan
Today's Sermon
"Speak the Truth in Love: Who We Are Series"
Zechariah 8:16-17
16These are the things that you shall do: Speak the truth to one another, render in your gates judgements that are true and make for peace, 17do not devise evil in your hearts against one another, and love no false oath; for all these are things that I hate, says the Lord.
Ephesians 4:11-16
11The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, 12to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. 14We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. 15But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16from whom the whole body, joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.
Speak the Truth in Love: Who We Are Series
We continue our series building a vocabulary of who we are in this beyond simply who we are not. My guess is if you asked people in our demographic, “What should a Christian be?” what we should teach our children, we would hear things like kind, helpful, and most of all nice.
These are great qualities. Include them on your list of who we are. It doesn’t stop there, however, with those noncontroversial qualities. Who we are also those who believe we are to speak the truth in love. You have probably heard that phrase before, but you may not have known until today that it comes from the Bible. Our scriptures guide us to speak the truth in love, and we are people who are guided by scripture. We tend to focus on the love part, a soft love, a love that does not shake the boat, except in extreme or obvious instances. We are to be good boys and girls. There is value in respecting the rules and those in positions of leadership, but sometimes speaking the truth means challenging the way things are and challenging others. Sometimes telling the truth has a sharpness to it that love alone doesn’t carry. To that end, Jesus uses the metaphor of the sword. I would contend love doesn’t get us very far if not accompanied by the truth.
Take the dramatic example of the end of Apartheid in South Africa. What made that transition possible was the process of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Truth is the first word in that name. Those who had lost loved ones, those who had suffered untold atrocities were given the platform to tell the truth in the presence of those who were behind the oppression. There could be no real reconciliation without the truth.
Have we turned our backs on the truth and its centrality in functional, just, and joyful communal life?
Telling the truth can be hard because it often involves confrontation, and I’m no fan of confrontation. If you have a meeting with me and you have food in your teeth, you will find out…as soon as you get home and look in the mirror. I don’t like bringing up uncomfortable things. Early in ministry I had to read the book Difficult Conversations written by those out of the Harvard Negotiation Project.[1] I didn’t even want to read the book, much less have the conversations it detailed, but over time I have learned to have them. I got into ministry to help people, help them feel loved and help them love. What I had to learn is sometimes that love is best realized through the telling of hard truths.
Being a Christian may be about more than you first thought as well. I included an earlier qualifier about demographics, because some of our beliefs about faith and conflict is indeed cultural. I interned at a biracial congregation, about 60/40 white/black. The pastor was white and his spouse black, which well-mirrored those who sat in the pews. His spouse used to say it took her a long time to get used to what she called “white church” because she said the message from the pulpit was always so nice. I’ll never forget she said in the churches in which she grew up, predominately black Protestant churches, you wouldn’t feel like you got your money’s worth if the pastor didn’t challenge you, come at you, confront you with a truthful word that might also be a convicting word. Their job was not just to tell you that you were loved, it was to tell you the truth in love.
Just like the ancestors said. The prophet Zechariah lays the foundation for life together. “These are the things that you shall do,” he says, “Speak the truth to one another, render in your gates judgments that are true and make for peace…love no false oath” (Zech 8:16-17). This is practical, on the ground advice for living with others in an organized society. Ephesians makes the link between truth-telling and values as followers of Christ. The people are not to be “blown about by every wind of doctrine” (Eph. 4:14). In other words, all teachings are not created equal. Be careful of “trickery…craftiness in deceitful scheming” (v. 14). The antidote to these things is “speaking the truth in love” (v. 15). That’s how we grow up in Christ and stop behaving childishly. We have a lot of people who claim to be Christians but are not grown up. It is only in truth that the whole body functions together, to pick up on a Pauline image.
It is easy to talk about speaking the truth in love, much tougher to do it. The moments for speaking up sneak up on us. They’re not all grand occasions like the kind we learned about in school. It’s not as often integrating a school as it is intervening when an off-color joke or comment is made by a colleague or acquaintance. It’s learning to recognize when while you’re telling yourself you’re giving someone the benefit of the doubt, you’re really excusing the inexcusable. The Peter Bromberg quote on your bulletin captures it well, “When we avoid difficult conversations, we trade short-term discomfort for long-term dysfunction.”
Here’s an example that is dramatic to illustrate the point: I once witnessed someone get attacked. It turned out okay, but due to no help from me. I was in another country, an unfamiliar setting—see how easy we rationalize our inaction? I was checking into a hotel late at night when a person entered the lobby on drugs, acting erratically, then suddenly jumped the counter to get to the woman behind it. I always thought I’d be heroic if I ever encountered something like that. Instead, I squeaked out a weak, “Hey!” and froze. Thankfully, she had called for help, and help arrived. It is hard to step up in the moment.
Again, speaking the truth, standing up for what’s right, will not always be that dramatic, but no matter the scale, the consequences are real. Thus, learning the craft of speaking the truth in love is part of our calling as Christians. It is who we are. The good news there are mountains of material about how to have difficult conversations well, how to speak up, and how to foster spaces where truth-telling is encouraged, practiced, and rewarded. From books on leadership to organizational culture to psychology and beyond, there are tons of resources. I became overwhelmed sampling it in preparation for this sermon. I’ve taken to following an online presence, a guy by the name of Jefferson Fisher, who provides interpersonal communication advice. I have looked him up and his training is in law, not psychology or communications per se, but I have found his teachings to be practical, effective, and though he doesn’t use these words, loving. He teaches people how to be really clean in their communication—straightforward, direct, unhooked.
Fisher released a short teaching on difficult conversations the day I drafted this sermon. This is what he said: When you have scheduled a difficult conversation with someone—and you should schedule it by the way—don’t start with small talk. It’s not the time. Say, “Thank you for making time to talk to me.” Begin with appreciation. The next sentence should be, “I need your help with X” either a problem, a question you have about an action or inaction, or a feeling you’re having about a situation. It immediately positions you on the same team. When you’re ready to wrap up, say, “I feel more settled about his now. How about you?” You’ve shown their showing up has helped and you’ve made room for them. You’ve given them to the space to speak the truth in love to you. What they do with that space is not in your control.[2] There are good people out there who help us live into our calling to speak the truth in love, whether they use that religious language or not. As we say in our tradition, the proof is in the fruit we bear.
Here’s more good news: as with so many unpleasant things, the anticipation is almost always far worse than the act. I remember having to fire someone once—not here. I was so nervous. I knew it had to be done. The problem had been raised plenty of times with this person, there was ample documentation and opportunity for course correction, and it just wasn’t working. So, we sit down and I barely get the words before they chime in, “I know. I know.” They knew. They were almost relieved. It often goes that way, and even when it doesn’t, there is a relief that in finally saying your piece, telling the truth. The worst they can happen is it gets rejected, you get rejected, but when you don’t speak up, you have rejected yourself. The rift is there whether you surface it or not. You want to know that you did your part in the truth and reconciliation process no matter how big or small.
Ah, I wish faithful life were just about being nice. Wouldn’t that be nice. Well, maybe the spiritual life, and not just exclusively the Christian one, is but in a deeper way. Last Sunday, I accompanied the youth to the Green Gulch Zen Center for the annual interfaith gleaning event. Teens from different traditions gather to learn a little about Buddhist practice and then harvest the food from their organic farm, much of which will go to feed the hungry. I went as a dad of a middle schooler more than a pastor. When we arrived, a little late because I was wrapping up here, and the monk/farmer was teaching in the zendo. We missed much of what he had said, but it took almost no time to get a sense of him. He projected calm, gentleness, and peace. In fact, I should back up. There’s a long walk from the parking lot to the main center, and as we walked, my son, without prompting, just started whispering. He picked up on the energy of the place that the community there had created. It pulls a deep quiet out of you.
This monk/farmer was, you could say, nice, and yet, interestingly what we did hear of his talk was how his Buddhist practice helped him deal with difficult people and difficult interactions. This calm man talked about times when he was frustrated with people over everyday things around the farm. What held it altogether, he said, was not being nice, but a commitment to being committed to one another. They knew they were invested in one another and part of that investment meant, in so many words, practicing speaking the truth in love and listening in love. The community makes those promises to each other and the individuals do the work of cultivating love and compassion within. All of that increases the likelihood of difficult conversations, truth-telling, going well.
In the end, it is nice, but niceness isn’t what you achieve by avoiding speaking the truth. Nice is the byproduct of speaking the truth in love. It’s what you cultivate. It’s the fruit. Who are we? We are ones who believe a garden made by speaking the truth in love can feed the world.
Amen.
[1]Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Mostby Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen.
[2]Search for Jefferson Fisher on social media platforms for this and other teachings on communication.