Many years ago, a young man was transferred to my department. During his first annual review with me, he asked why his raises had been consistently lower than the company average. I said, “Well, you’re kind of a jerk.”
And he was. If a colleague asked for help with our software, he’d sigh, look at his watch, and then bark, “Don’t you know that by now?” If a client asked how a software feature worked, he’d huff, “Didn’t I explain that last month?”
But he was smart. He dissected software bugs with scalpel-like sharpness. His technical keenness took the edge off his social rudeness. But just barely. His low annual raises reflected the mixed feelings his previous boss had toward him.
When I told him he was a jerk, he seemed stunned and simply squeaked, “Really?” Then he read several books on human relationships, and he began to change. Something really seemed different.
Different enough, that he got a huge raise the following year. He then asked his former boss (a Christian) why the boss hadn’t been honest and direct. The boss admitted, “I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.” My new employee retorted,
“Damn it! Your cowardly Christian niceness cost me thousands of dollars. Thanks for nothing.” (Hey, he was a recovering jerk; I never said he was cured.)
Christian Cowardice
You see, most of us Christians are cowards. I mean nail-biting, knee-knocking, lily-livered, chicken-hearted, spineless, yeller, scaredy cats. If we were angels, we’d be Rubens’ chubby cherubs. If we were spirits, we’d be Casper the friendly ghost.
Nowhere in scripture will you find the command: “Go ye into all the world and be nice.”
As Grape Nuts are neither grape nor nuts, so Christian niceness is neither Christian nor nice. Jesus showed no hint of spineless, “I don’t want to hurt your feelings,” niceness. To the woman caught in adultery, he said she had sinned. Black and white. Unambiguous.
But he also spoke with grace. He said to the same woman, “Neither do I condemn you.”
We All Share the Same Longing
Everyone you meet deeply desires real friendships with real people. We are unsatisfied by sanctuaries populated with mannequins wearing plastic smiles. We want real heart-connected friendships, not artificial acquaintances.
We also have to be authentic.
However, we express our authenticity with grace. My former employee’s boss could have said,
“I’m really a little nervous to say this, I don’t want to hurt your feelings … but it seems to me you are often rude with clients and colleagues. Your career would advance quicker if you weren’t. But perhaps I’m missing something.”
Both would have gained a friend. And the employee would have made more money.
It Takes Inner Strength
The greatest offense ever given to anyone in history was given by Jesus. His death says that we have all been such jerks, that a little advice at our annual review cannot fix it. His death is offensive. If we don’t feel that offense—really feel it—we miss the heart of the gospel. If we don’t gulp in astonishment and say, “Really, me?,” we miss the cure.
If anything, Christians should be the most real. We should have the courage to let people see beyond our fake niceness to our real inner-jerkness. We’ll have friends who see us to the bottom and still love us.
How do we get this boldness?
The cure for our cowardice is this: He swallowed agonizing death because of the great joy he had in giving us life. He so deeply wanted a true relationship with us, he became ultimately vulnerable and real, vulnerable to death, and ultimately real to new life.
If we really know this, we can quit hiding behind the fig-leaves of cowardly niceness (or behind the fig-leaves of insensitive jerk-ness). And if Christians lived humble, authentic, grace-filled lives, it would be a far better world.
And wouldn’t that be … nice?
Sam
For more information about connecting with God in normal conversation, read my book, Hearing God in Conversation. It is written for personal connection with God.
Try Confession Without Repentance
What a great point and a perfect example. That is convicting to this people-pleaser!
Thanks!
Steve Adams (by the way) was almost a customer of my company. He and I became friends through our business connection, only later to find out we were brothers in the Lord.
Sam
I was going to tell you that I thought this article was stupid, but I didn’t want to hurt your feelings .
Thanks, Sam. Center of target, as usual.
You say that only because you know I’ll appreciate your humor.
Which I do. Great minds (and all that)
Sam
Ironic that us Chicken Christians are not stepping out with the truth when we have the backing of the Lord – and maybe we are showing a weakness in our faith? Besides the error of withholding an opinion because of “niceness” there’s the fear that the comeback will be “who are you to judge me?” No one wants to hear that – and the further irony is that my self doubt “Oh, I should have said something different!” is ultimately more distressing that any negative reaction from those to whom you tell the truth to would be in the first place. I’ll stop here before I say something offensive.
Yes, I was hit with that exact same retort when I confronted (in a very loving manner, imho) a fellow believer with something they posted that was an outright lie and offensive. Their comeback to me, “You are so judgmental and the LORD said don’t judge lest you be judged!” She still is praying about forgiving me. But as to the point of this article – – I whole-heartedly agree. In a work situation I had to confront a co-worker with her abrasive demeanor. (Not to toot my own horn) I relayed an epiphany I had a few years earlier in regard to the work and how to thrive in the midst of criticism. She took my words very deeply and said THANK YOU — that makes such sense. It convinced me speaking truth – in LOVE — is important not only for the listener but the speaker – you grow in humility and mature.
I think we are bipolar. We either say nothing, or we say everything with extreme offense.
God save us from ourselves.
Hey Lyman,
And you make me laught.
Love it. Well said Sam. Now to do it. That is another problem.
Yup, and God asks us simply to lean into him.
He asks us to let Him do it through us. Works for me 🙂
Yes, yes, yes!!!! Excellent article Sam! Already sharing with others.
Thanks!
Now … if we could just live it like Christ did.
This is a favorite Sam. I’m writing a D.Min. dissertation for Westminster Theo Sem. on “relational disengagement” in men (not merely a synonym for passivity, but don’t want to waste spce parsing it out here). I’ve cited you from your great book is ‘Sunday School Destroying Our Kids” and have appreciated your insight on this topic. By the way, the response from the young employee toward his boss’s “nice” comment is a gem- like a punch from a parable.
Hi Bill,
John Hard speaks highly of you and your friendship.
And I loved that employee’s response too; we should get punched like that once a year (twice on leap years) to wake us up.
Thanks
Super incites! The sentence that most grabbed me was, ‘The cure of our cowardice is this:
He swallowed agonizing death because of the great joy He had in giving us life.’
I’m so glad you like that line. I really do think they only hope for our cowardice is to see his bravery FOR us (and not just as an example).
While this article is great, at the risk of offending people, I think a lot of Christians are anything but “Nice” on Social Media. Some wonderful people become total jerks if you offer up an honest comment about how you are feeling about some topic. Reminds me of road rage. The antidote for this is the same though. Grace and courage to make your words honest and truthful but not into ninja stars.
Tom,
You make a great point. Maybe I should have titled this, “A Tale of Two Jerks” (the jerk who says the harshest things and the jerk who is a coward).
Thanks
Hm. I call myself a christian ( I wonder about that sometimes) But I have a totally different reason for not being honest and real with people about their mistakes. The reason ironically is that I am a jerk. Not even sure I am a recovering one. So I always think that how can I say something when I am so much worse….sure, it is easy for Jesus to say those things, as He himself was sinless. I am not.
So my way is usually putting up with stuff until I cannot anymore and then I explode with all the rudeness and condemnation. And then I forgive. And repent. Not sure why I am posting this,as it makes no sence…
Well, Cris – a real jerk would not worry about being a hypocrite.
I think we should all admit we are jerks.
I don’t know what it is with the Christian world today; we are so convinced that our greatest need is self-esteem that we completely forget that it is the “poor in spirit” who get the Kingdom.
As you say, “Everyone you meet deeply desires real friendships with real people.” And yet, according to a podcast that I listened to several months ago (https://www.kut.org/post/honesty-and-happiness), the average American believes that being nice builds better relationships than being honest.
The podcast was about recent research on honesty vs. kindness. The researchers put the participants into groups and had each group practice either honesty or kindness with the people they encountered over several weeks. The “surprising” result was that those who focused on honesty felt closer to the people they interacted with than those who focused on kindness.
One factor that they didn’t discuss in the podcast was the nonverbal cues that we all pick up on. I suspect that we can tell, if only on a subconscious level, when someone is not being authentic with us. We draw back a bit and become less willing to trust them, which prevents us from developing greater intimacy with them. Intimacy requires trust.
When I wrote about this in my blog (https://thosewhoweep.blogspot.com/2019/09/intimacy-and-honesty.html), my question at the end was: If honesty really is the best policy, if intimacy develops with truth rather than with attempts at deceitful kindness, what happens when a culture strives to protect its members from any words that might be deemed hurtful? That’s the culture we’re living in right now. If we, as Christians, can be countercultural and speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15), others will see that we have real friendships with real people and be drawn to Christ.
By the way, the podcasters agreed with you and recognized our lack of truthfulness as cowardice.
Ann
“Speaking the truth in love” is a great spiritual mystery; and if we ever learn it, we shall amaze and humble the world.
Thanks
Excellent, thank you
Thanks!
Sam-cut to the quick again! There immediately came to mind several folks in my life I should of corrected…and didn’t. Rats. Time to right that ship.
It’s funny, the Lord has spoken to me recently about courage in dealing with my various heart stuff. And that is good. However, I think sometimes it takes a hell of a lot more courage to correct someone than even to face up to health issues. Thanks, again, for making me think, leading me back to prayer; hopefully action will be the result.
God bless, John
We all need courage, in parenting, health, employment, and marriage.
We fool ourselves when we think we are the brave ones.
I’m thinking that this supervisor’s issue had less to do with being a Christian then you imply here. I haven’t done any research on this but I suspect there are lots of supervisors who are not Christian that have and do still withhold corrective criticism. My suspicion is that his is not a “Christian” issue but rather a human issue.
Hi Dan,
Yeah, I agree that cowardice isn’t restricted to Christianity (nor is rudeness 🙂 ). It’s just that Christians should be the most courageous: because our greatest enemy has been slain.
Thanks
Well said Sam. And I would say, the niceness leads to Christians be part of the silent majority in this country. Problem is, being silent with things as they are is not working very well.
11 Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.
12 For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret.
13 But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible,
14 for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise,
16 making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. – Ephesians 5:11-16
Being silent IS one of our biggest problems, but (alas) so is Christian Jerkness 🙂
I think God is calling some of us to speak up, and some of us to shut-up.
What is God saying to each of us now in particular?
WOW! Very uplifting and accurate post, Sam.
I know many Christians who would not intervene… because of a fear to offend. Frankly in our present circumstance, where the truth has been bent so many different ways, we should ALL be writing our congressmen and women to insist something be done to restore order to our cities and to return to economic blessing, instead of tolerating shutdowns… in fear of what?
Truthfully, the COVID-19 is just another seasonal Corona Virus. It is related to the common cold; it is related to SARS, it is related to the “Swine Flu” – all of which have struck American in the past without causing massive shutdowns. What’s different? It’s an election year. The enemy is trying to get as many as possible of us to take our eyes off Jesus and focus on fear and uncertainty.
Folks… can’t you see the enemy’s plan here? Do the events of this year make sense to us? Why do we so easily believe a lie? As Pontius Pilate once said,”What is Truth”?
We should all be answering that question immediately. The evidence is there, if we look to the Bible and look to non-mainstream news media.
I hope you will agree this response was direct and encouraging. I know, it won’t offend you, Sam. I am hoping that others might get out of their seats and work for real Shalom Peace in this Nation. We risk a lot if we don’t stand up for what’s right his year. AMEN?!?!?
As long as we learn gracious speech.
On the flip side, the emperor does not always like to hear that he’s naked.
Emperors hate the truth; at least the naked ones.
An excellent challenge and word for the ‘good churches’ of today, and perhaps even, THE root problem of our post-modern ‘good churches’(not talking about the dead churches here.)
I can imagine the lost saying this to us at the end:
“Damn it! Your cowardly Christian niceness cost me eternity in hell. What kind of love is that supposed to be, Christian? Thanks for nothing coward.”
We are cursed with the lie of niceness.
Pastors – shepherds, are cowards, making every excuse for not preaching as Christ did. Jesus exposed any wrong thinking or tradition that ‘annulled the Scriptures.’
Good Christians are cowards, eagerly following suit, conveniently parroting the same excuses in order to not speak and think as Christ did. To evade telling sinners that they are jerks for staying in sin (Luke 13:32; Luke 3:19, Acts 13:11). As Paul did. As John did.
We can only get to 5% into a discussion about this common sin of niceness and weak Christianity before a cowardly bright spark cautions one and all, that we need to keep it in balance. And all the little cowards are stumped by such blinding ‘righteousness’ and forget everything the Bible says about being an offense to a sinful world. This apparent great wisdom has once again silenced the rightful discussion. Somehow, only being four sentences into a desperately needed truth, is judging or too critical.
We far from getting the problem right out into the light to expose it thoroughly, where it can be fully discussed, compared with Scripture, measured against what Jesus actually did, what Paul did, what John did. No, there is no opportunity to dissect it like we do a comment from a false teacher. We cowardly shut it down, nip it in the bud, lest it force a massive shift in our paradigms and find that we have not been as right as we thought we were. After all, to discover we have been wrong about this for decades is humiliating and it might cause a humiliating revival of holiness and self-sacrificing.
We do not even know the God we claim to serve.
We do not know the Jesus that we try to out-compassion.
We aimlessly keep trying to build up, encourage, to excite, to take the victory for the Kingdom, but God is not.
God in His wisdom and truth, has been calling for a de-construction, a ‘destroying of every lofty idea’ from our post-modern tradition of men.
He has little interest in our noisy, empty, ‘high’ worship times, that makes us feel special and spiritual. That again and again, reaffirm us and the way we do Christianity, but never change our practices or our mind.
He has little interest in our ‘right’ theology and empty passion, that never liberates us, to break free of our post-modern traditions of men.
He hates our extreme ‘love’ of the people of the world, that makes every excuse not to unapologetically condemn sin.
He hates our cravenly weak ‘gospel of love’, our superior ‘Sola Tenere’ (only tender). Such leaven thoroughly mixed to the core, puffing up proud hearts in a false ‘good’ church.
He hates our double-minded hearts, second-guessing every stern warning against sin and a sinful world.
We were called to preach “repent ye” not ‘God loves thee’. But today, one’s self-esteem trumps that. Man’s pitiful, sniveling feelings trump the Most Holy God.
“Dear God Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, you will NOT interrupt the ideas and plans of the pastor and good ideas marketing team, I mean elders. Please refrain from challenging our glorious ideas that curse and ensure that many go willing into hell, thinking that they are saved, spiritual, and right.”
No! We do not know and believe that He is the Lord God Almighty, deep down, we think we are favourite children and little gods.
And if we have not the stomach for the tough truth, for tough love, (which are prerequisites for disciples of Christ) then we still, have not counted the cost of following Christ the Lord.
I love your imagined line of what non-believers might say in the judgment:
“Damn it! Your cowardly Christian niceness cost me eternity in hell. What kind of love is that supposed to be, Christian? Thanks for nothing coward.”
YIKES!
Andrew, this is right on! I totally agree and this is very convicting. I am a big coward. I love what you say but I would ask you: How? Nobody wants to be attacked. For instance the morons that go to gay pride parades and scream at them : all fags go to hell” and things like that. How to bring up difficult things without being cruel or nasty or on the other hand too wishy washy. Any insight into that?
♡
Definitely true. In fact, I said much the same thing a couple of years ago: https://youtu.be/8Q-H2WE-faU
I don’t know. When I speak the truth I usually get in trouble. Hope I’m not like the person you called a jerk.
You are so funny.
The truth SHOULD get us into trouble. If we aren’t displeasing someone, we are probably compromising something.
Someone once said:
Sam