Watch Out for Criticism

Are you a critical person? “Do other people enjoy being around you?” Think about it for a second. Would you say that others look forward to seeing and taking to you? More importantly do you think that your attitude reflects accurately on the goodness of God?

We have all met folks that are hyper-critical. If you comment on the beauty of the sky they respond with, “well it is a bit smoggy out today.” Critical people are generally unhappy people. Their view of happiness is skewed. They are not happy unless they are miserable—and others are miserable with them. They are noted for complaining about all sorts of things and are ready and willing to share their complaints with others.

With a critical person you often feel as if you are walking on thin ice. One misunderstood comment and you crash into the icy waters of their displeasure. There is no way to win with such a person. The rose on their rose colored glasses has decayed and they view life through the lens of dead flowers.

Perhaps you have seen the movie, “Christmas Vacation.” There are many hilarious scenes in that movie. At one point the character Clark (played by Chevy Chase) is finally able to celebrate that the thousands of Christmas lights on his house are glowing brightly. He has worked for hours and experienced much frustration. When finally his mission is accomplished he celebrates on the front lawn with his immediate and extended family. He goes down the line hugging everyone and offering some sentimental comments. When Clark gets to his father-in law- his father-in-law says, “Clark, a bulb is out on the end of the house.” Clark responds, “Thanks for noticing dad.”

Isn’t that just like the critic? A thousand lights are shining brightly and the critic finds the one that isn’t working and must point out the failure.

Many children grow up in homes where criticism abounds. Whatever the child does is never enough. They just can’t please their perfectionist parents. How sad. The Bible teaches parents “do not provoke your children to wrath…” (Ephesians 6:4). One of the quickest ways to distant your children from you and to stir up anger in their hearts is to constantly criticize their efforts.


The fruit of God’s Spirit is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control…” (Galatians 5:23). The Bible teaches that all Christians have the Holy Spirit living inside of them and therefore the fruit of God’s Spirit will be evident.

Christian still struggle with sin. This sin often shows up in unloving thoughts or deeds, discontentment instead of joy, unrighteous anger instead of peace, impatience rather than patience and laziness rather than faithfulness. However, the true Christian is not characterized by sin. He wars against sin. He wars against the sin of discontent. Discontentment is the root of all complaining.

I heard the humorist Charles Lowery speak of teaching his daughter to ride her bicycle. He took her to a big empty parking lot. She focused on a pole off in the distance. She kept telling her daddy that she was going to hit the pole. He encouraged her with the openness of the parking lot. Well…she hit what she was focused on…the pole.

The little girl is like so many of us. Our lives are surrounded by great blessings and opportunities. What do we do? We tend to focus on the problems of life and miss out on the opportunities. The wise person must deal with their problems. There is no doubt about that. Being a Christian does not mean putting your head in the sand and ignoring the difficulties of this world. We are surrounded, however, by countless evidence of the goodness of God. Even the problems that we face have been ordained by God for our good. Therefore we cannot lose. God is eternally for His people. Complaining and being a hyper-critic is a very atheistic thing to do. Let Christians learn to “rejoice in the Lord always.”
Ray Rhodes, Jr. is Pastor of Grace Community Church and author of the new book, “Family Worship for the Reformation Season.” You may contact Ray at www.gracechurchdawsonville.org