Tim Keller is familiar with the temptations that come with personal criticism. He writes,
The biggest danger of receiving criticism is not to your reputation, but to your heart. You feel the injustice of it and feel sorry for yourself, and it tempts you to despise the critic.David Powlison shares Tim’s familiarity with these temptations. At one point in David’s life, a man began publishing criticism of him and his ministry. During this time David grew preoccupied with the personal criticism. He says it exposed many sins in his heart—a love of reputation, his desire to be thought well of, a desire to be treated fairly, a certain idealism and a romantic idea of the unity of the Body. “This man was a professing Christian,” David said. “So why couldn’t we be able to all get along? Why does this keep happening?”
David further explains how the Lord used this criticism to expose the idols in his heart and how Psalm 31 served his soul in the process, in his excellent message at our 2007 Pastors Conference.
I am all too familiar with these temptations myself. Criticism can uniquely reveal my heart, and often what I see isn’t pretty.
I feel sorry for myself in the face of the “injustice.” Bill Farley, in his excellent article, “The Poison of Self-Pity,” writes that “the roots of self-pity are ‘pride-in-action.’ It is the propensity to feel sorry for yourself because you are not getting what you think you deserve.” The pastor will be tempted to think, “I deserve encouragement, and this person does not seem to understand or notice or pay attention to the countless ways I am serving!” [1]. And through dwelling on what seems to be the critic’s ignorance of the pastor’s service and his withholding of encouragement, the pastor’s heart quickly moves towards self pity. This is pride, and I’ve seen it in my own heart.
I am tempted to despise the critic. I sinfully judge the motive of the one criticizing me, wondering if they’re offended with me, rather than focusing on the content of their communication. Worse, I am tempted to dismiss the content if it is imprecisely communicated or if the illustrations are not completely accurate. I did this just yesterday when someone kindly corrected me. This is pride, and I’ve seen it in my own heart.
When criticism arrives, temptations to sin come fast and furious in the heart of the pastor. And if a pastor isn’t prepared for criticisms, if he doesn’t prize growth in godliness, he will despise criticism rather than embrace it. Sadly I have many times.
But by God’s grace, there is an alternative. We can view personal criticism as a God-appointed means to produce humility in our lives, even if the criticism isn’t accurate. As John Newton wrote,
The Lord abhors pride and self-importance. The seeds of these evils are in the hearts of his own children; but rather than suffer that which He hates to remain in those He loves, He will in mercy pound them as in a mortar, to beat it out of them, or to prevent its growth.[2]Criticism is just one of the many ways God will pound the pride out of a pastor. But only when we have this perspective, will we humbly embrace—rather than proudly react to—the criticism when (not if) it arrives.
(C.J. Mahaney's - View from the Cheap Seats - January 27, 2011)
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[1] William P. Farley, “The Poison of Self-Pity,” The Journal of Biblical Counseling (Summer 2007), 17.
[2] Letters of John Newton (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1869/2007), 377.
