We need...

We need loving listeners who are ALSO truth tellers...

Too often, we offer limp friendship. Yes, our friends need listening to, but our friends don't need lying to. When we fail to speak truth into our friends' false notions, complaints, opinions, and issues, we might as well be telling an outright lie.

A real friend loves by listening, but a real friend also speaks truth that leads a friend up to Jesus, not just on into frustration. We need to lament, and a good friend should be there to listen. However, we also need to come under the truth, so a real friend pushes us to God. They push us to lay our frustrations at the altar of God's goodness, yes, but also to receive the life of Jesus in addressing those frustrations.

Too many times we urge our friends on in their lamenting and venting, or even add fuel to their fire, when what we need to be doing is directing one another in wisdom and peacemaking. 

We don't always want to hear truth, nor do we always want to tell it. We want people on our side; we want people to feel our pain and affirm our frustrations. A loving listener will consider the person they give ear to, but they will consider God too. More so, they will not only consider their friend in the moment, but also in the light of heaven. A loving listener lets us say whatever we need to say in whatever way we want to say it, but they also speak the truth of God and doctrines of faith to us.

Proverbs 27:6 says, "Wounds from a sincere friend are better than many kisses from an enemy." (NLT) That's profoundly accurate; it can FEEL like a wound when a friend speaks needed-to-hear-that-truth to us.

We especially need loving listeners who love listening to Jesus. We need people to tell us we are wrong when we are wrong. We need people who will push to believe and behave in ways that honor God. It is actually a GOOD THING to be rebuked in ways that push us to God. The Psalmist said, "Let a righteous man strike me—it is a kindness; let him rebuke me—it is oil for my head; let my head not refuse it." (141:5a NLT)

Are you a loving listener? Are you a truth teller? Do you have loving listeners in your circle? Are they also truth tellers? 

Let us not surround ourselves with people who treat us like pigs, encouraging us to wallow in our self-centered mud piles. Let be brave and find friends who will call us to lift our eyes above the horizon of self. 

We especially need loving listeners who love listening to Jesus. We need people to tell us we are wrong when we are wrong. We need people who will push to believe and behave in ways that honor God. It is actually a GOOD THING to be rebuked in ways that push us to God. The Psalmist said, "Let a righteous man strike me—it is a kindness; let him rebuke me—it is oil for my head; let my head not refuse it." (141:5a NLT)?