Prioritizing the Truth

Josiah: 0:0

Well, welcome to Praxis, a podcast where we explore how to practice and embody the way of Jesus in our everyday lives. Thanks so much for taking the time to listen. We're in a series right now focused on cultivating a healthy church culture. Every church has a culture, whether they realize it or not. Some cultures are reasonably healthy, while others are not, and, of course, no church is perfect. But part of the work every church needs to engage in is to intentionally work to close whatever gap exists between being healthy and where they currently are. So in this series, that's what we're doing.

We're seeking to close the gap, and this involves not only talking about the marks of an unhealthy church culture, but casting vision for how we, as the church, can embody a way of life together that, while it may not be perfect, is oriented towards goodness and kindness and love. So, after several episodes of naming some of the major toxins in the American church soil, we have turned the corner and are now discussing some of the healthy nutrients we can put into the soil to help create a healthy church culture. And today we want to discuss the importance of trafficking in the truth. What does it mean to be a church where we tell the truth. How do we see Jesus speaking truth and how can we do the same? So that's where we're headed. We hope you enjoy today's conversation.

Mac: 1:32

Well, welcome. Welcome everyone. My name is Mac.

Katie: 1:36

I'm Katie.

Josiah: 1:37

And I'm Josiah

Mac: 1:39

Al right. So the 4th of July is right around the corner, at least at the time of this recording, yep, and it got me thinking something I'm curious about. How do you all feel about parades?

Katie: 1:53

Parades with candy or without candy, or just in general?

Mac: 1:58

Yeah, I was just thinking in general.

Mac: 2:00

Maybe I could just provoke us a little bit. I can't stand parades, and we're living in a community where it feels like they're having one literally every other week. If you notice this.

Josiah: 2:09

Wh at don't you like about parades?

Mac: 2:13

Oh well, the 4th of July, we'll start with that one. Actually, my family historically goes to the one in Della field. I don't know why, but it's hot. You do get hit in the face with candy, it's like. And then it's just boring. It's like why are we sitting here watching? I don't know, I just don't get a lot out of it.

Katie: 2:32

Yeah, I like them, okay, I really like them. I like seeing people, I like going downtown. We did the Oconomowoc one.

Mac: 2:41

Well, you're a local, so you know everyone.

Katie: 2:43

Yeah, yeah, I like running around the kids. You know I have young kids and they like it, assuming there is candy. We did go to the memorial day parade, which did not have candy and it was very short, so they were. They were a little bummed yeah, that was interesting yeah you were at that parade as well?

Josiah: 2:58

yeah, it was 12 minutes long, maybe yeah 15 maybe.

Katie: 3:03

Well, I think I figured out after the fact that it was because they have the big ceremony at the band show before it and then the different groups like the band and stuff from the ceremony just kind of paraded. Anyways, that's fine. Yeah, I think I like them.

Adam: 3:16

Okay.

Josiah: 3:18

Yeah, I don't know if you're the primary demographic they're trying to go for yeah, because I think kids usually like it. You're with people, it's loud and people are there to see people they know. I don't know.

Mac: 3:36

Adam, how do you feel?

Adam: 3:38

I only go to parades if they're Wizard of Oz themed. And luckily we live in a community that has one of those. Our town's a little obsessed with the Wizard of Oz themed and luckily we live in a community that has one of those every year too.

Josiah: 3:47

Our town's a little obsessed with the Wizard of Oz.

Mac: 3:49

Yes, for those who may not I mean those in our community will understand the joke, but for those who are listening, that may not be. Oconomowoc, where we live, premiered is a location of the premiere of the Wizard of. Oz, one of the premiere sites, and so that's I know.

Katie: 4:05

Let's not diminish it.

Mac: 4:07

It was the best premier site. Clearly it's become like the claim to fame.

Katie: 4:13

It has recently become a claim. I grew up here and I don't ever remember this Wizard of Oz craze as a kid. This started maybe 10 years ago, maybe 15.

Mac: 4:24

Maybe part of my resistance to parades again is just how many there are. If it was just like a once every, then fine, but it's like almost every month you're being invited to some sort of a parade for some reason.

Katie: 4:35

Yeah.

Mac: 4:36

It's like didn't we just do that? I don't know.

Katie: 4:39

There's like excitement, like think about the homecoming parade.

Mac: 4:41

You got the high school the marching band, like there's the whole Maybe it's what we're celebrating matters to me, sure, I don't know. Well, speaking of parades, we're gonna have a verbal parade today, aren't we?

Katie: 4:58

Yes, let's do that. Okay, we're in a series right now where we're talking about healthy church cultures and we keep coming back to this word called tov, which tov is the Hebrew word for good. It's good, thanks, now, when I say that, every time, I'm going to think about you doing that. So tov is the Hebrew word for good and we're talking about it with the idea that we want our church, we want every church, to have a culture of tov, or a culture of goodness. So we've been saying throughout this series that every church has a culture, whether we like to admit it or not, and we've been using a tree metaphor to examine that culture. So if we take a fruit tree, for example, we say the tree has branches that bear fruit, it has a trunk that supports and feeds the branches, and then it has roots that suck up nutrients from the soil. And we've been saying, yes, mac.

Mac: 5:51

I've got a new metaphor that I wanted to try on, oh great, go for it.

Mac: 5:56

Yeah, you guys want to give some feedback on this. Yeah, so culture is sort of like the operating system of a computer. The operating system governs the interactions between hardware and software. So a culture is like an operating system in that it governs the beliefs and values, habits and practices which then informs people's interactions, how they show up in our present. But, as we keep talking about in this series, everybody has some agency and responsibility in how they relate to the operating system, the culture, right. So each person kind of has some responsibility in helping build out the operating system.

Mac: 6:38

And you know how, if you get like an update, like a software update or something, there's a sense in which your culture always needs some tweaking or updating. So some people might be operating on an older system that no longer works or is not helpful, right, um, and there may be bugs or fixes along the way where you're like, oh, that that's creating a glitch. We need to like develop something new to solve that glitch, and then we all need to download it and keep. So what do you guys think? Does it work?

Josiah: 7:08

Adam, you're the techie.

Adam: 7:09

Yeah, I think you can take it a step further too and say that there are there's a lot of people that don't like updates because it changes things for them Something that they were used to. Very deep so yeah, there's an element of like the change is probably for the better, but there's also an element of needing to get used to that new way of working things.

Mac: 7:32

Yeah, and sometimes our frame of reference, like what we're focused on, is just the thing in our hand, like you know what I mean, like what we're seeing, but the deeper work is what's creating the experience as a whole. You know what I mean. In the same way that, going back to the tree metaphor, it's easy just to look at the fruit or the leaves, but we're talking about something that's not as visible, which is the condition of the soil that produces the health of the tree.

Katie: 7:59

Yeah, yeah, yeah, so maybe to extend. Okay, so what we've been saying thus far is if there's toxins in the soil, you get bad fruit. If there's good things in the soil, you get good fruit. Maybe that would be like the difference between a software update and like malware. Does that work?

Mac: 8:15

It works.

Adam: 8:15

Everyone's looking at me. It works.

Katie: 8:18

You're the one who knows computers, adam. So we can talk about updating our operating system if we want to go with that metaphor, also like putting nutrients in the soil. Or we can talk about, like malware or a virus on an operating system that you might not know it when you first get it, but eventually you're going to see the fruit or the implications of that. And so today, if we're talking about a good thing, a nutrient to put in the soil to create a healthy church culture We've talked about so far about nurturing empathy, we've talked about cultivating grace, we've talked about putting people first, and today we want to talk about the importance of telling the truth. So this whole time we've been drawing on Scott and Laura's book, that we've been referencing a church called Tove.

Adam: 9:02

That's good.

Katie: 9:04

And today we want to submit that healthy churches, churches with a culture of goodness, traffic and the truth they're committed to living in and telling the truth about reality.

Josiah: 9:15

Yeah, and just as a reminder I know you've already kind of mentioned culture when we're speaking of culture, we're speaking of how important it is that everyone buys into what's going on. We are all of us are the ones shaping the culture, but we're also being shaped by it. So you know, we've used lots of different metaphors to help describe this, but I guess the way I thought of it is, if you're listening to this and you're hearing us talk about concepts within church leadership, you may sort of tune it out, being like, oh, this is the staff's job, this is the church leadership job to, um, that's their job to make sure everything's great and healthy. Uh, and it is part of their job, of course. But um, if you're listening, this isn't just for the people within church leadership, this is for all of us. If we are a community and we are the body of Christ dwelling with each other, then all of us have a responsibility and a role to help shape that culture in a way that is good.

Mac: 10:21

Yeah, yeah. Maybe one example to get at this like hey, this is the sum total of all of our efforts that creates the culture that exists. I've had this experience before where someone is going through a difficult time and then they feel disappointed about how much care they received from our church and then you begin to like unpack well, what did that care look like? To kind of reflect on how could we have done a better job? And then you discover, oh no, we actually had lots of people from our church checking in, supporting, making meals, doing different things for this individual. They wanted more from, like me or you know, a staff member, and that's to me, captures like timeout. Actually, that's an opportunity to celebrate captures like timeout. Actually, that's an opportunity to celebrate the church being the church. Right, yeah.

Katie: 11:11

Yeah.

Mac: 11:11

Does that make sense? Yeah?

Katie: 11:12

Right. We talk all the time about how healthy churches have broad participation. This is not just like a company or a restaurant where we sort of run the show. A church is the body of believers and I think we get an even clearer picture of that when we look at the early church in the New Testament and see how they functioned.

Mac: 11:29

That's right. So we have a responsibility as a staff, and I have a responsibility as a pastor, to care for people Absolutely, and that's a responsibility everybody has in our church, and so when someone's going through a difficult time, they should experience all of that is at play, not just part of it.

Josiah: 11:47

Yeah, we're not going to be able to reach our full potential as a church community if every bit of care has to funnel through a staff member Right, like in this example specifically. Yeah, if we're going to care for people, it's going to have to be flowing through everybody.

Katie: 12:11

And the people who step into that. That's essential to their discipleship. That's how we grow as disciples is by stepping into those things.

Josiah: 12:20

Yeah.

Mac: 12:39

So all of us are here to contribute, and one of those things that we're contributing towards is sowing good nutrients into the soil, and today the nutrient is trafficking in the truth. They're committed to living and telling the truth about reality. And when we use that phrase trafficking the truth what we're getting at is simply being a truth-telling community, being a community that's committed to living into and telling the truth. So maybe, what does that mean truth-telling? I would just maybe posit a simple definition of saying what is so At its heart. Truth-telling is about saying what's so, what's true. It's about stating the truth, expressing things as they are and without any kind of embellishment or reality distortion. So, like, the opposite of truth-telling is deception, which, interestingly, I just heard like this I was doing a little research on truth telling and they made this individual made the case that at the heart of our problem is actually not sin, it's deception, because deception is what leads to the sin.

Mac: 13:40

I just thought, wow, that's an insightful observation. So truth-telling is the opposite of deception and we tell the truth without adding to or subtracting from it. It's about being honest and straightforward about a situation or set of circumstance. It's about honesty and clarity and authenticity, while resisting deception and deceit.

Adam: 14:01

These are the user agreements of the new software that you just downloaded yes thank you.

Mac: 14:08

Thank you, adam no problem so trafficking in the truth is about being committed to reality, what is really true, and for me, this isn't just about words, it's about being truthful in both what you say and what you do. So there's like a coherence between the two. So far, so good, all right. So I just kind of want to jump right into the mess. Can we do that? If we go? Okay, it's about saying what is so, being committed to reality, and so on and so forth. I think there's two ways that we go wrong when it comes to the truth, and I thought it might be good, just at the front end, to get these on the table, as I imagine we'll continue to build on these as we move forward.

Katie: 14:52

Yeah, let's do it. Rip the bandaid off.

Mac: 14:54

All right, let's just Way. Number one we go wrong with truth telling is hiding the truth, and this is the one that, like the chapter in the book Church Called Tov, focuses on the most, and typically this happens when there's some problem in the church, you know, a moral failure among leadership or something that isn't handled well. Rather than telling the truth of what happened, oftentimes those in charge suppress the truth right of what happened, and sometimes they'll even develop a counter narrative or an alternative narrative that protects their reputation and actually blames the victim. And so then what happens is the victim is further victimized and the community at large either contributes to that right Because they're getting false information or not the whole story, they join the leadership in blaming the victim, or they simply end up being super confused and they don't know what to believe, like what actually happened. Right, you guys follow on this. So I thought this is one way that churches go wrong with truth telling is they hide the truth. Have you guys seen that at all? Like, how have you noticed that?

Katie: 16:01

Yeah, I mean absolutely. Well, I really liked the example in the book, Like there's a scandal and the immediate reaction. This is not unique to churches, this is every organization I mean I worked in politics Like this is everywhere.

Mac: 16:14

They invented this.

Katie: 16:16

Yeah, but something goes wrong. Could be big, could be small, but the immediate default move is to paint a picture that minimizes harm to the church. So just the example in the book was that the pastor was accused of sexual harassment and the immediate move was not to get to the truth of it, it was to hire a PR firm and make sure that they had a good message to tell or story to tell, so that people wouldn't continue to press in and try to find the truth. And every step of the way they continued to build on the story that they were telling, with the goal of protecting the brand, protecting their reputation.

Mac: 16:57

Yeah. So once a story begins that is less than truthful, now you oftentimes have to maintain that, and it can get more. Now you oftentimes have to maintain that and it can get more difficult as you continue to build it out to the point where you end up again, if it's being committed to reality, you end up being very committed to something that's not real, a false reality.

Josiah: 17:19

Yeah, yeah, I think there's. You know, maybe this isn't even just in the realm of scandal. This is just, in general, the way you communicate to your congregation. If the only things we ever say from the stage are making us look really good, that's, you know. We're sort of finding ways to hide, maybe, some of the behind-the-scenes things. And although there is discretion within transparency right, not all the information of everything needs to be known to everybody at all times. Being willing to, you know, get up in front of your people and openly communicate hey, here's some things we're working on, here's some spots that we'd like to grow in as a community, and maybe here's some ways that we failed and we want to grow. I just think being, you know, getting more reps of just being willing to say if things aren't perfect, is just a good practice.

Mac: 18:22

Because that's how we learn and grow. You know, we'd like to just grow from how awesome we are and keep growing more awesome, Because that's how we learn and grow. We'd like to just grow from how awesome we are and keep growing more awesome, but that's not how it works. We often fumble, mess up, make mistakes, and the growth is in attending to that reality and learning from it. And in just this. What's bubbling up for me, you guys, is both of you sort of mentioned the word reputation. So if we're going to traffic in the truth, we have to be very honest about our reputation and how easy it is, maybe individually and collectively as a group, to prioritize that over the truth. And this is also why, when we talk about cleaning up our messes something we've talked about a lot on this podcast the first step is to own that you've created a mess and tell the full truth about it in a way that's not distorting the details or minimizing something, in order to, like you know, protect your reputation.

Katie: 19:13

Telling the truth is often inconvenient. Yeah, at least telling the truth about yourself.

Mac: 19:18

I'm feeling triggered. There was that documentary called the Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore. Do you remember?

Katie: 19:24

that. Oh yeah, like from, was it from like the nineties?

Mac: 19:26

Yeah, and it bothered me. I'll just have a little rant here. It was all about. I watched it, it was about climate change, and so if you're a listener you can have your opinion on that. But here's, what bothered me was the hypocrisy At the end of it. It was kind of like this whole thing about determining your global footprint based on how much energy and resources you're using. So there was a website you go to and like how often do you drive a car, how often do you fly? And then I'm thinking about that stupid documentary and I'm like this guy while he was filming it was on a helicopter, on a submarine numerous planes.

Josiah: 20:02

I'm like what, the what? What was your?

Mac: 20:03

global footprint just making this film? Uh-huh, you know that's funny, I don't know anyway.

Josiah: 20:09

Rant over truth yeah, don't be triggered guys.

Mac: 20:12

I just go on rant sometimes, okay, so if the first thing is hiding the truth, do we need to edit that? Are we gonna make people upset?

Adam: 20:19

I don't think so okay, okay, I think we're good, All right.

Mac: 20:24

Second way we can go wrong with truth telling is we can weaponize the truth right.

Mac: 20:31

So follow this Using the truth against other people right, Primarily by pointing out all the ways that they're wrong or deficient or in need of transformation, so we can actually weaponize the truth, or at least what we think is true whenever we tell the truth in a way that damages another person, so we use the truth in a way that manipulates or harms. It's when we use the truth to exert control or gain power in a situation. We can weaponize the truth whenever we fail to communicate the truth in love. I'd venture to say that if you maybe heard the topic oh, telling the truth, being a truth teller, trafficking in the truth and you immediately got excited because you associated it with telling that group like, ooh, we're gonna tell that group how wrong they are or how badly they need to repent, Well, my guess is, probably you don't struggle with the first one. Maybe you do, but you may definitely struggle with the second one, which is where we can actually leverage the truth in ways that are harmful.

Mac: 21:36

You guys following. What does that?

Katie: 21:42

Yeah, what does that look for you? Yeah, when I hear you know we need to be truth tellers, my mind immediately goes to that second one. Like when I hear, okay, yeah, like, let's tell the truth, my mind the image I get is like, at least in a church context, is like telling the truth about people outside the church in like a sort of condemning or judgmental way.

Mac: 22:06

A really bad evangelism.

Katie: 22:08

Yeah, yeah, and claiming that it's for those people. I think we're doing some very necessary work of either redefining or maybe reprioritizing, telling the truth about ourselves first.

Mac: 22:29

What about you, Josiah?

Josiah: 22:31

Yeah, I have a few thoughts.

Mac: 22:34

You have that face like something's coming.

Josiah: 22:36

I know Well, it's just determining which one to say First off. I would say that the gospel is truth too. The good news of Jesus is truth as well. So when we get hyper-focused on truth and I'm using air quotes as calling out what's bad that is an important part of truth telling. But if you have no reps of speaking good news to the people around you in your life, In a way that sounds like good news.

Josiah: 23:14

Yeah, I'm saying, if you don't, if you have no reps of being able to speak to the way God loves someone, the way like being able to speak out to call out good, like good truths, it's probably gonna diminish your credibility. To call out challenge for people when they're failing.

Mac: 23:37

Yeah, I think I hear what you're saying Like the gospel itself is truth, yes, and yet when it was proclaimed, at least the way Jesus proclaimed it, it was incredibly. At least the way Jesus proclaimed it, it was incredibly good news. And yet when we, if we were to go a step further and actually look at how people share the quote, unquote good news. Oftentimes it's not experienced as good by those who are hearing it. Yes, and it's because truth may be distorted and being delivered in a way that is less than loving Right.

Adam: 24:06

Yeah, right.

Josiah: 24:06

Yeah, because multiple things can be true at the same time. And when we hyper-focus in on the one truth of the fact that like hey, this is wrong and I guess I don't even mean that corporately, I'm saying that more individually we get hyper-focused on that one thing, we lose sight of other truths that are true at the same time.

Katie: 24:29

Yeah, like God loves you and wants to restore you.

Josiah: 24:32

And there is nothing that could separate you. So when we hold on to those things as foundational truths, when we need to traffic in the truth by calling attention to something that needs to be talked about, I mean we have referenced this in past episodes as well that we can be honest because we know that, no matter what we discover when we look below the surface or dig into something that God already knew it was there and he's waiting with grace and kindness and restoration. So if we know all that now, we can traffic in the truth in a way that is full of grace and truth and meaning that we get to experience God's love throughout the process.

Mac: 25:15

Well, maybe we should pivot, because I think we're talking conceptually here, which is great. We've named two ways we can go wrong with the truth. We can hide it out of self-protection or image management, or we can actually leverage it against someone else. We can weaponize it and maybe we could get some handles on how do we do this by looking at Jesus. So maybe we could set it up this way. We've talked a little bit about and I want to circle back to this throughout our conversation that Jesus loved people by calibrating both grace and truth. So he was full of both fully full of both grace and truth. There was never a time that he was deficient in either one. So when we see these high truth moments where he's saying hard things, it's not because he lacks grace, it's just that, contextually, the person in front that's what they need the most, and vice versa. Okay, so how would you say? We see Jesus calibrating truth throughout his life and ministry? How would you fill that out?

Katie: 26:25

Well, jesus, um, jesus calls himself the truth, right. John 14, six says I'm the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me. So Jesus not only speaks the truth, but he actually is the truth, and I think he does this. I think he embodies the truth towards people all over scripture. There's tons of examples, but maybe one or two that stick out to me of exactly how he does this. One is the woman at the well.

Katie: 26:58

Jesus meets a Samaritan woman and in a conversation she admits to not having a husband, which would have been like a source of shame in that culture. And he looks at her and says you're right, you have had five husbands and the man you're with now is not your husband. But he doesn't say this to condemn her. Instead, he says it to dignify her and, I think, to call her into a life of freedom and transformation. So Jesus is in conversation, he's sharing the truth with her in order to expose, maybe, what she thought of as like this deep, dark secret. That's how I imagine this going. But he's exposing not to shame her, not to condemn her, but in fact to say I see you, I know you and I love you, and then to tell her the truth about God, which is that God wants freedom and forgiveness and restoration for you. Another example Time out.

Mac: 27:52

So if this is a significant source of shame for this woman I mean she's at a well in the middle of the day in a very hot climate. That's not when you want to be walking to the well Maybe we could assume this is a source of shame and Jesus doesn't expose it to go ha gotcha. He exposes it so that she can experience his love despite that. Is that what you're saying.

Katie: 28:14

I would say experience his love. Yeah, in the middle of it.

Mac: 28:17

A transforming love.

Katie: 28:18

Yeah, like she wouldn't experience that deep love if it didn't cut right to the core of the deepest part of shame in her life.

Mac: 28:29

And it wasn't ignoring it.

Katie: 28:31

Right, right.

Katie: 28:32

Right, yeah, it was telling the full truth about something that would have been really hard, so that he could meet her there with grace and with love. There you go, yeah. Another one that comes to mind is when Peter denies Jesus. Jesus tells Peter you will deny me three times. Before the rooster crows and Peter's like what are you talking about? In that moment I think Jesus is telling Peter the hard truth about something that's going to happen, but he's doing it because you know we see. Later on he restores Peter. He asks him do you love me three times? Okay, then feed my sheep. So he at first tells him you're going to deny me. He tells him a really hard truth, but again it's aimed towards Peter's ultimate restoration. He affirms him, he affirms his identity as his beloved disciple, and then he commissions him to share the good news of repentance with others. So I think both of these stories to me show that beautiful picture of repentance.

Katie: 29:30

Both of these stories to me show that beautiful picture of repentance. Repentance has to start with the truth about where we actually are. We can't turn from something if we don't first tell the truth about what's actually happening. And when we tell the truth about something that's actually happening, we get to allow God to meet us there. And I think that's what Jesus is doing. He helps them understand the truth and then he shows them the truth about God, which is that God wants to meet us there. And I think that's what Jesus is doing. He helps them understand the truth and then he shows them the truth about God, which is that God wants to meet you in that and he loves you and he wants your wholeness and your healing and your restoration. So there's no shame in that.

Mac: 30:02

Yeah, so let's pick up on this for a moment, josiah. What is the Greek word for truth? Alephia?

Josiah: 30:13

Yeah.

Mac: 30:13

How do you know that?

Josiah: 30:13

Well, because my daughter's name is.

Mac: 30:14

Alephia. That word literally means to unveil or reveal. So the question is when it says you know, jesus is the way, the truth and life, what is it that he's revealing? What is it that he's unveiling? My answer to that question is you know, jesus was fully God and fully human. So he's revealing at the same time who God is and who we are. He's revealing the full truth about here's, who God is, god's character, and he's revealing the truth about who we are and how those two intersect, how God views us.

Mac: 30:51

And what captures my attention in the examples you use with Peter and the woman at the well is that that is the ultimate truth that Jesus is communicating while attending to the brokenness In that moment. The ultimate truth that Jesus is revealing is who God is in that moment and who this woman is and who Peter is. In light of that and this gets at, I think, something you were hinting at before Josiah, which is, which truth takes priority? Right, when you're dealing with someone who has something going on in their life that is quote unquote deeply sinful, let's just say it's sinful. Who has something going on in their life that is quote, unquote deeply sinful, let's just say it's sinful.

Mac: 31:31

Right, what truth matters. It's not just one truth that's at play. Right, you've got tons of truths that are at play. What's the weightier truth that needs to be communicated? That this person's sin is a problem, which, by the way, they probably already know. Right, if you're dealing with an alcoholic, they already know. I would suggest that part of the truth that Jesus is calibrating in those moments and prioritizing is the truth of who God is and how God relates to their value, worth and dignity, despite the mess in their lives. Does that make sense?

Josiah: 32:06

Yeah.

Mac: 32:07

Is this even coherent what I'm saying?

Josiah: 32:09

Yeah, I think of it as trafficking in the truth is more of a means than it is an end in itself. If we are going to unveil, in a way of saying we're going to be fully honest and transparent and even thinking of it as on an individual basis, if I'm going to do that, like with my own kids, what is the purpose? The purpose is to unveil not just what was wrong. More so, we're unveiling so that what like the forgiveness and restoration that needs to be received, can be received, and you can't do that when it's hidden.

Adam: 32:51

Yes.

Josiah: 32:52

So the purpose of dealing in the truth in this way is so that we can be open and exposed to receive God's fullness of love.

Mac: 33:04

Yeah, yes, let me continue to build something out in conjunction of what we're talking about, okay. Yes, let me continue to build something out in conjunction of what we're talking about. Okay, earlier, I mentioned that sin isn't the ultimate problem. What drives sin is deception, right, the antidote to deception is truth. If we look at Genesis 3, how did Adam and Eve end up committing sin? They were deceived, right, and the deception revolved around who God is.

Mac: 33:32

The serpent portrays God as sort of a deity that's withholding something that Adam and Eve could really benefit from. So he's kind of a stingy deity that isn't actually looking out for their best interest. They buy into that portrait of God and then, out of that, reach for the fruit to improve things on their own, okay, so we're seeing those two things. The reality distortion that the serpent brings about is a lie about who God is and a lie about who they are. They don't have enough as they are, right. Yeah, so that's what I'm getting at. I guess, when I say what truth does Jesus prioritize in these moments, I'm getting at, I guess when I say what truth does Jesus prioritize in these moments, he's actually the truth he's prioritizing is getting under the deception itself Instead of just treating the symptom, which is the behavior, he's actually going a layer deeper and revealing the full truth of here's who God is in relationship to you and here's your value and worth as a human being, despite this mess.

Katie: 34:29

It's like a totally different way of experiencing and seeing truth than what I think we often see in our culture and even in our churches. Frankly, I mean, you think about the loudest voices out there on social media or the news or whatever, who are telling the truth. It doesn't sound anything like that. The way that Jesus tells the truth about people and tells the truth about God feels like something just radically different to me, because it's actually for people, it's for their good, it's telling the truth about someone in a way that is aimed at restoring them into loving relationship with God.

Mac: 35:04

That's right and that is what I submit that Jesus embodies. When we say Jesus embodied the truth to all people, he's counteracting that deception of what they believe about God and themselves by revealing who God is and their value, worth and dignity.

Josiah: 35:20

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Another way we see Jesus doing this is that he asked people lots of questions to help them own what is true. So Jesus didn't weaponize the truth right by just speaking it, although he did. You notice that throughout the Gospels he asked tons of questions, often responding to people's questions to him with questions for themselves. That would have been so annoying. Yeah, questions for themselves, that would have been so annoying. Yeah, right.

Josiah: 35:55

And and I think that we can, we can. We can see the value in this because when, when you just speak something to someone and I just tell you what you're supposed to think or believe, how well does that often go over? Not well, no, if you have kids, you notice how well that goes over as well. Like, I have a couple of middle schoolers and it's really easy just to want to meet that with challenge and to speak what is to sort of force it into their brains and you want them to believe it.

Josiah: 36:25

So bad, and you know you're right and you know that it would really benefit them to embody the thing that you're trying to tell them what is right. But it doesn't go over well, and why? Because people are their own agents. Like, I'm not the one controlling those things. But coming back to this idea that Jesus asked questions, he's onto something that asking questions, provoking questions, allows people to own the truth themselves rather than being sort of beat over the head with it and Jesus had something we don't, which is a perfect grasp of reality.

Mac: 37:11

Don't which is a perfect grasp of reality. You know, remember when we were talking?

Mac: 37:14

about like dogmatism and how we're overly certain and I mentioned Renee Magritte and you know this is not a pipe Like all of that's important here, because some of the I would say some of the reasons we do damage when we're so-called trafficking in the truth is because we actually are more confident that we have, we know what this person needs, or you know what I mean and we actually don't. We're assuming, we're way overconfident in thinking, hey, this will fix their problem or they really need to hear this. It may not be actually what they need to hear, it may not be right at all. Yeah, and Jesus still, even though he had perfect insight into knowing the truth of a person's life in ways that we don't we often assume we know people way better than we actually do he still asked questions so they could discover things themselves.

Josiah: 38:00

Yeah.

Mac: 38:01

I mean, he's asking questions that go deep, Like people have to. What is it that you really want?

Josiah: 38:09

You know what I mean. Yeah, even in that scenario, how easy would it be for any of us to walk up to someone who is either blind or paralyzed on the side of the road begging for money to say, like I know exactly what you need. Pretty easy to tell. Like you need to come up with a whole list. Jesus still asks questions to help them.

Mac: 38:35

What do you want me to do for you? What do you want me to do for you? Why are you so afraid? Who do you say that I am? I'm going to tell you who I am. Who do you say that I am?

Katie: 38:46

Yeah, he helps people own the truth about themselves, which I think does a work inside us. That doesn't happen if someone tells us the truth about themselves.

Mac: 38:57

This is such a challenging concept and it's one that I still struggle with daily is, if part of truth-telling is asking questions, then we need to become much better at asking Jesus-like questions. And Jesus asked questions not just to get information from people, but to provoke transformation for people. And I'll just name like I'm on a journey of trying to learn how to do that. If I'm going to be a truth teller, if I'm going to traffic in the truth, I need to learn how to ask insightful questions the way Jesus did.

Josiah: 39:33

Yeah, maybe we need to do a little less diagnosing when people around us either fail or are dealing with or struggling with sin. A little less diagnosing of this is the problem that we can admit our own shortcomings and be humble enough to say I don't know anything for sure of what's, of coming to someone in humility, even though Jesus knew stuff we didn't.

Mac: 40:22

Less diagnosis and more curiosity.

Katie: 40:26

I love that.

Mac: 40:28

Okay. Now I imagine let me share a third way we see Jesus doing that. When Jesus does speak the hard truth, it wasn't with those you'd expect, Okay. So I imagine someone might be listening to this and go well, but I can give you a number of examples where Jesus is speaking the plain hard truth to people in a really direct way. He's not asking questions, he's telling it like it is. What place does that have for us as followers of Jesus? Like, aren't there times when we should be speaking the plain hard truth in a really direct way without asking questions? You know what I mean. Can I say a couple of things about that hypothetical person who just asked me that question?

Katie: 41:12

Yes, Would you like to give them a name?

Mac: 41:15

Yeah, one thing that I've noticed is it really wasn't with the people you'd expect. So, yes, there are times when Jesus says some really direct and confrontational things. Yes, absolutely. But it wasn't with those awful sinners who need to clean up their lives. He didn't drop truth bombs on the prostitute right. He calibrated a high degree of grace with those people because, again, he's revealing the truth of who God is and who they are. In those moments, a higher degree, a different kind of priority, a different truth priority was at play there, but he gives us most.

Mac: 41:55

Those most confrontational moments are with the religious leaders, who are stuck in self-righteousness. I just think that's interesting. And this leads me, maybe, to the second thing. I'll say. This to say about this is that I think a strong case can be made that even in these most confrontational moments with the religious leaders, where Jesus is, boom, direct truth, even there he's not weaponizing the truth, but rather he's motivated by love. He's motivated to wake them up to the truth of who God is and the truth of who they are, so they can better participate in God's story of redemption.

Mac: 42:38

And he's doing it because they're currently self-deceived, right, they're caught in self-righteousness, and what other way than to wake them up to that reality so they can rediscover God's grace and then be part of extending grace to other people. Does that make sense? And I think what happens and this goes to the second way we get truth wrong, we weaponize it is that so many people in the church get this backwards. When we think about speaking the hard truth, we think about speaking it to whatever group of people struggle with a sin that we're really amped up about, rather than realizing that Jesus actually said the most confrontational things to those who were quote unquote religious insiders.

Katie: 43:19

Yeah. So what you're saying is he's actually doing the same thing with both groups of people, which is exposing who God is and who they are. Yep, but he's doing it in different ways.

Mac: 43:32

Yes, because one group is stuck in shame and guilt and another group is stuck in self-righteousness.

Katie: 43:42

And in both cases he's showing them the truth about themselves and the truth about God.

Mac: 43:47

Yes, think about the parable of the prodigal father he goes out to meet both sons.

Katie: 43:55

Yeah.

Mac: 43:55

Right, those speeches go different. What he embodies is different. You know what I mean, but in both cases he's revealing. Here's the truth of who I am related to, who you are Right.

Adam: 44:07

Yeah.

Mac: 44:09

And one group group. The younger son represents the people. Jesus is hanging out with the sinners, the tax collectors, those on the margins.

Josiah: 44:18

The older brother represents the religious leaders yes yeah, both are truth moments and grace moments yeah, and it makes sense, right, If someone is caught in self-righteousness and pride and is deceived into thinking they have it together from a strategic point, you're going to have to point out the ways in which they don't out, the ways in which they don't. But someone who is struggling and knows they're struggling and is living in that the way to like they don't need to be told how terrible they have it. They don't need to be told they're wrong. Most of the time that's already happening. It's very much an internal battle, Like I even think about it with my kids.

Josiah: 45:10

Happening is very much an internal battle, Like I even think about it with my kids. Um, there are times when my, my, my eldest can get pretty stubborn and, uh, can communicate very confidently that they're right. And there are times when our conversations are a little more like high truth and I'm not saying I calibrated perfectly, I don't at all but it does take some challenge to say like no, I've got to like. The point of this is I need to expose there's like some real, like false things that you're believing and now you're trying to treat me that way. So you have to like it's a little harder to get under the surface. And then you have someone else who makes a mistake and is clearly feeling bad about it, Like coming in telling them how terrible they are. It's not going to be the best way to get in in order to expose God's love and and or my love in the case of parenting.

Josiah: 46:03

So I I I feel like strategically that even would make some common sense just for how we relate as humans. But you are right in that we often get it wrong and unfortunately we're known for it, Even within certain statistics. That would be shown that people don't see us as people who tell truth in a way to expose who God is and his character. They see us as people who take truth and beat other people over the heads with it.

Katie: 46:37

Yeah, and one thing I would say I mean Jesus, um, to his benefit. Knew everyone's motives and heart perfectly.

Josiah: 46:42

Right.

Katie: 46:43

Unfortunately we don't have that, but I do think there's a lot of discerning that we can do to determine who hears the truth and in what way.

Mac: 46:51

For some reason, as you're talking, as we're talking um, the image of like martial arts is coming to mind, but a particular form.

Katie: 47:00

Is it because I talk with my hands a lot? That could be. You do karate, chop the air quite a bit when you're making a point and get amped up.

Mac: 47:08

Aikido is that what it's called. It's almost like a judo, where you're not really attacking people but you're using their momentum against themselves. So when they come after you, you're not like doing something offensively, your offense is a defense. And and that's kind of how I see Jesus doing some truth telling with the religious leaders. He's like taking the momentum that they're on and sort of allowing it to flip. It flips them so that they can see the truth of where this is leading. And then, now he's got his attention, he's pointing to a better way.

Josiah: 47:40

Yeah, and if someone has a much more, if they are in a defensive posture as opposed to an offensive one, it would greatly impact your next move. Yes, right, if you're like, if you're someone's coming at you, like in your example you're giving, if someone's coming at you and using their momentum against you, well then the move is going to be quite a bit different than someone who isn't engaged in the fight at all.

Mac: 48:07

Right.

Josiah: 48:07

Someone who really isn't fighting you, but open. Yes, that's right.

Katie: 48:12

Good analogy, I like that.

Mac: 48:16

I don't know what's happening today, guys, I've had several cups of coffee. Well, there you go.

Katie: 48:21

Maybe that's why I struggle sometimes I can't have coffee Okay.

Mac: 48:26

Do you guys know the reference when I say it's good?

Katie: 48:28

Maybe you should explain it.

Mac: 48:29

No, I think it's from Bruce Almighty movie with Jim Carrey. You should know this, katie, you're a huge Jim Carrey fan.

Katie: 48:36

I love Jim Carrey. I just am terrible at memorizing lines. Okay, like I could have seen it 10 times and I still wouldn't recognize it. Okay, so we've started with Jesus. We've had a lengthy conversation about how Jesus embodied the truth and word, and indeed, so why don't we switch gears? Now I want to ask the question so how do we do this as a community Beyond? Just live like Jesus? What would it look like for us, sitting around this table and in our broader church community, to live into trafficking in the truth?

Josiah: 49:07

Yeah Well, I think, first off, as a foundation, we need to start by telling the truth about ourselves. We need to get better at owning the truth about ourselves before we try to own the truth about other people, or tell own the truth about other people or tell others the truth about them.

Josiah: 49:24

Yeah, is that what you're saying? Yes, okay, yes, we own the truth about ourselves and are willing to tell it and be honest. Right, it's like removing the log out of our own eye before we try to pick the speck out of some other Gosh, but it's so much better.

Katie: 49:38

It's so hard, it's so hard.

Josiah: 49:41

Yeah, and I love that picture Jesus created, because just think of how ridiculous it looks if you had a log sticking out of your eye and you're trying to say hey, let me get that out of your eye.

Adam: 49:56

Let me get that eyelash.

Mac: 49:57

That's kind of obstructing your vision. Yeah.

Josiah: 50:00

And here's the thing, not just admitting it to yourself, but being willing to talk about it openly, having, and I don't know. I even think of Paul referring to himself as the chief of sinners when he's writing to people that he is leading. Does that mean Paul lived constantly sinning, all the time? No, but he was willing to. He was aware enough of his own shortcomings and his own humanity that he was, and he was willing to admit it openly. And I think that that's really important. When we start saying what does it look like for us as a church community to traffic in the truth? Well, all of us can start by having a responsibility to owning the truth about ourselves, owning our own shortcomings, our own defaults, and a lot of this is just a way of practicing confession and repentance with other people committing to be open about when hey, I messed up here and it affected you. Right, cleaning up our messes, all of this, all of this is very you know, stuff we've gone over.

Mac: 51:11

It strikes me that one thing that would help people like all of us learn to tell the truth about ourselves in a way that involves confession and repentance is having a safe environment that is shame-free. You know what I mean. Like if we're gonna say, hey, you gotta tell the truth about yourself, that could be really hard if the moment you do that, like someone leverages that against you. You know what I mean. So, man, just the importance I mean. If we're gonna really pursue a truth-telling posture, if we're going to really pursue a truth-telling posture, if we're going to embody this, we've got to be able to create an environment that's safe for people to do that. When they do that, you don't heap on the shame right, you meet them with the posture of Jesus.

Josiah: 51:55

Yeah, I find it. I'm bringing up parenting references and again I just want to like come right out and say that I am not dude, we know you keep saying it we know you're a horrendous parent.

Josiah: 52:08

No, I am sometimes but I do find it creates an openness with my kids when we're having to deal with a topic that they're clearly struggling with, to say, to name for them like yeah, this has been a struggle for me too, um, wow and or. Or. I'll mention like hey, like we're talking about a certain level of emotional awareness and emotional regulation that I was just like. I know a lot of adults who struggle, who who probably will never master this.

Mac: 52:42

Yeah.

Josiah: 52:42

Like Adam, my goodness, so so. So, admitting some of my shortcomings, like hey, I still struggle with this daily Um, um, it creates an openness and a connection with other, with other people. That I think is a really beautiful thing and it plays into just what what you're talking about creating an environment where it's safe to name your shortcomings and they're not going to be used against you, and it creates connection.

Katie: 53:11

Yeah, I just did that last night with my son Charlie. He's kind of like a mini parent and he will boss the other two around and I had to go. I didn't love your tone towards your brother and then I said and I realized where you got that tone, because I have that tone.

Josiah: 53:27

You're mimicking my tone.

Katie: 53:29

Yeah, yeah, and I was like, yeah, I will own that. I don't always have the best tone and sometimes I hear you kind of doing the same thing, so how about we both try to work on that and all of a sudden it's both of us kind of owning the truth together, rather than me just coming down hard on him.

Mac: 53:45

My favorite Charlie moment was we were having a coffee hour Sunday. So like once a month, we just, you know, between services, we have coffee and fruit and people hang out for an hour and just connect and there's just-.

Josiah: 54:00

And donuts. And donuts.

Mac: 54:01

Sorry, why didn't I say that?

Josiah: 54:03

I was like it's not going to be a very good advertisement if you just say we have fruit.

Mac: 54:08

Donuts coffee friends. Well, I look over and Charlie had an apple slice and he drops it on the floor and then he picks it up and puts it on Millie's plate.

Katie: 54:20

That's so great, did he kind of giggle too. He knew we caught him, yeah, we caught him and he chuckled about it. He was not telling the truth in that moment.

Josiah: 54:31

That's right, but, yeah, one thing to add I have here in the notes is there are two different layers to this telling the truth about ourselves. We've been talking about starting individually, that, like I can learn to deal more in the truth, be willing to admit short shortcomings with the people in my life, but there's also a corporate side to this as well. We're talking about within church leadership and in church culture. Being willing to tell the truth on a corporate level is really important, and it's really tempting, when you are formulating language for the weekend service and for mass communication, to only tell the things that are flattering about us, and that is a temptation that we need to ultimately avoid if we want a culture of Tov.

Mac: 55:24

Yeah, I think you're right and it is really hard. I know we want to grow into that as a church staff and leadership team. Maybe one example just to highlight hey, here's an effort to do that. Recently that comes to my mind is our church survey. Recently that comes to my mind is our church survey. We solicited a lot of feedback and of course, we wanted to present that within the dynamics of culture we've been talking about that. We all are responsible for the community that exists here and how we're showing up and being present, and we got a lot to celebrate. That's great, but we also wanted to. We touched on a couple items that it's like, hey, we not just staff and leadership, but we want to grow in these areas. And it was communication. Both giving and receiving goes, communication goes two ways. And community life post COVID how do we become more connected as a community? Of course we have a responsibility for some of that, as staff and leadership and other people have a responsibility to actually take steps to get connected.

Katie: 56:21

Yeah, that's a great example. I am reading a really good book right now, recommended by my friend Mac McCarthy. It's called Kingdom Ethics.

Mac: 56:29

Oh yes.

Katie: 56:32

And I just love it. I was reading it yesterday and the authors were talking about how our witness as a church to the world starts with our repentance. I love that, Like the most important thing we can do to share God's love with the world starts with telling the truth about ourselves and modeling what it looks like to repent when we fall short.

Mac: 56:56

Yeah, and part of it is that, again, if we know the truth of who God is and who we are, it changes how we orient to repentance, Because I think a it is that again, if we know the truth of who God is and who we are, it changes how we orient to repentance, Because I think a lot of people. Again, if we just kind of said, okay, how have you experienced repentance? It's often you know the angry preacher who's demanding you do it right. It's a negative thing rather than in a positive experience, Like if you would have talked to the woman at the well or Peter after he failed right, those weren't negative experiences, they were life-changing positive experiences. And disciples of Jesus don't repent once when they put their hand in the air or pray a prayer, they are committing to a lifetime of repentance, of getting closer to understanding who God is in the relationship with God and who they are as they become more like Jesus.

Josiah: 57:46

Yeah, yeah, sorry, one more parenting reference. I just think it's very it's just a lot of material. It's low hanging fruit, I know. I know not everybody is a parent, so I apologize for that.

Adam: 57:58

They're feeling excluded right now. I apologize for that.

Josiah: 58:01

But you could do the same thing with the other people in your life. If you want to model God's love towards the people in your life, and if we're talking about kids and you never give them any, you never have any opportunities or give yourself any opportunities to demonstrate repentance and forgiveness and restoration. You're having to hide a lot of shortcomings in order to do that. They see them anyways, dude.

Josiah: 58:27

Yeah they see them and they look back and they think of all the times and I don't know. It was really helpful for me in parenting, because it's really easy to beat yourself up when you make mistakes in front of your kids, um, but being able to take a mistake and then be honest about it models an entire side. I'm like I know that we're supposed to model God's love towards people, and so then this assumption comes in in in my mind like oh great, when I mess up, then I didn't model it well, and then there's all kinds of shame built into that, and then you hide it and then you figure out how to like double down and sort of leverage things when in the end, we're not God. And it's really important for the people around us, when they see us make mistakes, to be able to own it.

Mac: 59:16

Yeah, totally Okay. So we're on this question. How can we do this as a community? Josiah, you shared. Hey, we can tell the truth about ourselves, and it seems like most of that is about telling the truth about ourselves when we fall short. And that's individual and collective. Yeah, um, I want to share a second one, which is just learning how to show up honest. Okay, so we talked I've shared a little bit about what we do in our leadership intensives around learning how to love the way Jesus loved, by calibrating grace and truth.

Mac: 59:50

You all know this already, but maybe some of our listeners don't. We spend a lot of time looking at how Jesus calibrates grace and truth in his interactions with various types of people so that we can learn how to do the same. What gets exposed as we do that is realizing that, apart from the redemptive love of Jesus and the empowerment of the spirit, we're not able to calibrate that kind of love. In fact, most of our efforts to love usually fall drastically short and we in our leadership intensives. There's three categories we talk about where we fall short.

Mac: 1:00:23

Our natural human default falls short, okay, one of those is like people who naturally orient to being really high truth or challenge. They tend to weaponize the truth, right, and they need to learn how to extend grace to other people. Okay, there's other people, though, who naturally know how to extend lots of grace to people, but have a much harder time saying what's true, right, so they need to learn how to like be truth tellers. Okay, confession when I first started wading into this, as someone who's more of a truth teller and needs to learn how to extend grace to other people, I've been on a 10 year journey with that it struck me as obviously problematic why people get into trouble.

Mac: 1:01:17

Who are truth tellers, because I've done that my whole life, okay. I'll admit, though, to me I had a much get into trouble who are truth tellers, because I've done that my whole life. Okay. I'll admit, though, to me I had a much harder time seeing how those who were just grace extenders created messes. And now, 10 years later, I will tell you those who don't show up honest create messes everywhere. It's not just those who say more than they should or are too aggressive in asserting themselves or the quote unquote truth. It's those who don't show up honest, who minimize or pretend or fake, even though they're thinking or feeling differently. It creates a massive amount of messes in churches, and I think we're actually spiritually conditioned just to do just that that when something is going, when we don't feel right about something, we've been spiritualized or formed to actually pretend like we're okay when we're not. And what I'm saying is is that's not actually consistent with the way of Jesus?

Katie: 1:02:22

Yeah.

Mac: 1:02:22

You're looking at me with big eyes.

Katie: 1:02:25

No, I think you're onto something and I think there's something unique about church culture and I might even say something unique about like women or girls in church culture. I think that, having grown up as a girl in church culture, it was instilled in me to be nice. Okay, that was like a value, not only like because of my gender, but also just because of Christians are supposed to be nice people and being nice, I don't think I was given a lot of categories or examples of how to tell the truth in a grace-filled, Jesus-centered way, and I think this is really common. I mean, there's books, podcasts that are written on it.

Katie: 1:03:09

Once you start being in positions where it's like, okay, well, then I need to tell the truth. Well, all of a sudden you don't have like a good handle on it and then it either comes out wonky, like you're beating around the bush and not saying what you need to say, or it comes out overly aggressive because you haven't been given good categories for how to tell the truth in a grace filled way. So, um, so yeah, I would just say like this has been instilled in us and in church culture and society to to be nice, which we're calling high grace or cheap grace.

Katie: 1:03:38

It's not it's not Jesus grace, it's. It's a grace that lacks truth, and I can. I totally agree. It does a whole lot of damage, and maybe in a sneakier, more deceptive way.

Mac: 1:03:48

Yeah, and it's not as obvious. I guess what I was trying to name is like when someone you know is super aggressive in telling the truth. That's obvious. I think people who fall into this category often give themselves a pass, which is actually part of the problem, because it's kind of like more of a sin of omission. They show up on the outside as if everything's fine and okay and we're good, when in fact, underneath the surface, they're irritated, they're bothered, they're stewing and there's a gap between what's happening on the inside and the outside. I can think of examples where, despite creating tons of collaborative space for people to show up and be honest and talk about decisions that are being made and so on and so forth, they're showing up and they're nodding in agreement, they're participating, as if they're all on board, and then you find out later like oh, there's all this stuff that was going on underneath the surface and you didn't tell anyone about it, and now we've got this massive mess that could have been solved if you just had showed up honest.

Adam: 1:04:46

Yeah.

Josiah: 1:04:47

Right, yeah, well, I think the reason why I had big eyes is in my mind. I'm thinking, man, we could do a whole episode. We could do a whole episode on relational dynamics in this. We could do a whole episode on relational dynamics in this. I think that so many people struggle with resentment towards people in their lives because they don't have an imagination for, or the safety or, I guess, the yeah, they don't have an imagination for what it looks like to show up honest in their relationships. So this is not just a church leadership matter Like. This is all of life.

Mac: 1:05:27

This is a human life thing and safety is a variable. I'm fully aware of that. Right, we talked about hey, if you're going to tell the truth about yourself, well, we have to cultivate a safe environment where people can do that, can be honest and vulnerable about their mistakes without those mistakes being leveraged against them. Then it's the same thing with showing up honest. Well, then, we need to have a safe environment when people show up honest and it gets messy to be able to deal with that. But I guess what I'm naming is when that safety is there and permission is granted and even encouragement to do so, and people still hide in the shadows, it creates a mess.

Katie: 1:06:04

And a mess that's hard to address, because you don't know, you don't know.

Katie: 1:06:07

You don't know what's there. Yeah, yeah, that's so true. So okay, josiah, you talked about telling the truth about ourselves. Mac mentioned the importance of showing up honest. I would add guarding against gossip. Here I'm going to go out on a limb and say that whenever you're on the receiving end of information or a story about someone else that you're hearing through a third party, I can almost guarantee that it's not the whole story. Like if you're in that place, you are essentially hearing a false narrative or partial truth might be partially true, but it's usually not the whole truth. So anytime you're in that position where you're receiving secondhand information, it's the an opportunity to pause and to take the time to find out the actual truth. If we want to be people of truth and we want to build a culture of truth, then we need to be committed to guarding against gossip, both repeating it but also even being on the receiving end of it, just knowing that there's almost no good that can come out of it.

Mac: 1:07:11

It's like that telephone game. You know where you stand in a circle and someone says something somewhat complicated and then you get to round the end of the circle.

Josiah: 1:07:18

It's like not close to what it was originally said. You have someone in the. If it's youth kids, it's someone in the group who purposefully sabotages it with something.

Adam: 1:07:26

Oh yeah, my kids have started playing it, except they start out with gibberish. If you don't get the gibberish right at the end, then you lost.

Mac: 1:07:37

Okay, so add to the telephone game social media, and what a mess. Because someone can go online and post something they've heard from someone, from someone, from someone that is now distorted. It's distorted the facts, and now it's out there, right, in a way that people are interacting with, commenting on so on and so forth. And I've, I just know many churches who have hiccups. You know they're, they're in a tricky season. Uh, where it gets infinitely more complicated is when people take things online, and so that's very I would just name for our listeners. That's very unhelpful, right? It's very unhelpful for that to be the platform we're trying to work through complicated variables, um, to preserve unity and trust and all the things that we say we value.

Josiah: 1:08:29

Yeah, well, jesus. Jesus also gave pretty specific instructions for some of those things like go to the person directly, yeah, and if you can't go to the person directly? Obviously there are. There are variables in which safety is a concern. Right, it's not like every. The point is that if your, if your aim is to restore a relationship, you're going to go to the person if so and I guess the way I see these things Katie is um is gossip is more of like a symptom that the first part isn't happening.

Katie: 1:09:05

Interesting.

Josiah: 1:09:06

Gossip like. Addressing the gossip is important and guarding against it so that it doesn't grow out of control. But it starts by just being willing to show up honest with the people in your lives. And gossip happens because we don't, because you don't, and you have things that are bothering you and you can't. You don't and you have things that are bothering you and you don't talk to the person about it, but someone who's a little less connected well, they're a lot easier to talk to about it and then, I can say it in a way that I'm not actually having to think through what I'm saying because they're standing in front of me.

Josiah: 1:09:36

I'm saying it in a way that's just venting.

Katie: 1:09:41

In systems theory. That's what triangles are about. I was going to say, see our previous episode on triangles.

Mac: 1:09:45

Right. So we've got an inherently unstable is a one-to-one relationship. When things get turbulent or uncertain there, our natural default and I would say our fallen default is to pull someone else in to relieve our own anxiety. Download our side of the story. So Jesus seems to give positive instructions as to how to keep that one-to-one intact. You go and talk to the person and scripture forbids us to slander or gossip about other people. So there's not only a positive instruction about what we're supposed to do, there's also instruction about what to avoid. And when we don't do that, it creates a mess, a massive mess, and it can be really frustrating. If I'm honest, there's this woman in our community who has posted on social media numerous times that I don't believe the Bible, that I just think it's poetry.

Katie: 1:10:34

That you don't.

Mac: 1:10:35

Yes, okay, I'm just like what. And she keeps it's just like she took, okay. So there's different genres in scripture. You know there's epistles those are letters, right, you've got gospels. Those are the stories of Jesus You've got narrative right. One of the types of literature in the scripture is poetry. It's wisdom literature, like. I literally had to take a class in grad school on the wisdom literature of the Old Testament and the poetic books. So this woman heard me name. This is the genre of literature we're dealing with which you need to name in order to be able to actually interpret it correctly. You're not gonna interpret a narrative the same way you would an encyclopedia. Those are not the same. If you're going to interpret the wisdom literature the way it was supposed to be understood, you need to have some understanding of how it works. Man, this lady took my comment about the genre and assumed that I was saying the entire Bible is just poetry, which is ridiculous. But now it's out there. You know what I mean. In fact, you're the one that told me about it, katie.

Katie: 1:11:42

Really yeah, it was on the women's page or whatever.

Adam: 1:11:46

I was like I don't belong to that group. It's ridiculous.

Mac: 1:11:49

Anyway, rant over yes.

Katie: 1:11:52

Clearly it didn't make a mark in my mind.

Mac: 1:11:55

Well, that's because you believe in the Bible.

Katie: 1:11:57

Yeah, I guess so.

Josiah: 1:11:59

Well, why don't we, as we're landing the plane here, why don't we spend some time talking about what are specific practices we can do in our lives to implement some of the things we've been learning?

Mac: 1:12:15

Okay. So let's first thing and it comes right off this conversation we're having about showing up honest. Let your yes be yes and your no be no. Jesus teaches this in the Sermon on the Mount. His brother James talks about it in his letter, and that involves a congruency and integrity in how you're using your words and it relates to your actions. So when you say yes to something, you're the kind of person where you follow through on what you gave your word to and you clean it up if you don't right. When you can't do something, instead of saying yes because you're afraid of disappointing someone, you learn how to say no, right? There should be an alignment between those two.

Mac: 1:13:05

In addition, I would even say in the Sermon on the Mount, jesus says hey, and don't swear by anything, right? Don't try to add weight to your word by swearing on the temple or this or that, like we don't have a temple to swear on, but we might say, well, I swear on my mother's grave or I swear on a stack of Bibles. It's a way of going. You can't just trust my words and I'm adding something to my words so you'll believe it. The challenge here is simply to become the kind of people who show up honestly so that who we are is truthful and can be trusted. And anytime you have to add weight to your words by pulling in someone else or something, you know what I mean. Then now you're puffing up to kind of make your assertion, or anytime you have to shrink back right. You're not showing up on us, you're not being fully present the way you truly are. You're not letting your yes be yes and your no be no. You're doing something different, yeah.

Josiah: 1:13:57

A way that people often add weight to their words is by saying everybody agrees with me. Maybe, like well, everyone says this, or I know lots of people who are thinking that you're this.

Mac: 1:14:12

Yeah, and maybe one caveat would just be like I'm not saying you lack, like, don't do this in a way that lacks emotional intelligence. When I say show up honest, be truthful, that's not giving license to just kind of be a jerk or wear your emotions on your sleeve. No, there's obviously mature ways you can do this in ways that aren't harmful right.

Katie: 1:14:32

Yeah, practice discernment. Maybe another practice would be to focus on yourself rather than others. We've talked about this quite a bit already, but again, I think it can be easy to say the truth about others and really hard to say the truth about ourselves, and I think that's where our primary work lies, and that's not to say that there will never be an opportunity to tell the truth about someone else. I think there are those times, but I think that those times are when we have been invited in, like when we have the credibility, when we've invested in relationship. So you guys know this, I was a Young Life leader when I was in college and then in my kind of early adult life after college, and the whole premise of Young Life it's a youth ministry and the whole premise is that, like earning the right to be heard, like you love kids where they're at, you get to know them, you show up at their games and invest in their lives and you spend hours upon hours upon hours just investing and getting to know kids and meeting them where they're at and they eventually open up to you within the context of relationship. Okay, so that's the whole idea of once you have credibility with someone, then maybe they will invite you in. They still may not, but then they invite you in and that may be an opportunity to tell the truth to someone not unsolicited truth telling with someone that you don't have the right or the opportunity to be doing that.

Katie: 1:15:56

So, again, going back to the idea of weaponizing the truth versus telling the truth, I think that's an important distinction here. If we don't have the right to be heard in someone's life, we're more likely to be weaponizing the truth, using the truth as a weapon to accomplish something that we want to accomplish which might not be what's actually best for the person. So again, this is about us. We want to focus on ourselves individually and ourselves as a church community and commit to telling the truth, no matter how hard it might be, no matter what harm we think we might do to our reputation, no matter what we think the outcome might be. We want to commit to speaking honestly and transparently as a way of cultivating goodness in the way of Jesus.

Mac: 1:16:38

You ever have those moments in your house where everybody's just kind of snippy.

Mac: 1:16:43

You know, there have been times when, like my strategy, when everybody's snippy is to like, try to get someone else to stop being snippy even though I'm still snippy and it never goes well.

Mac: 1:16:54

But I've noticed that if I'm the one who changes, sometimes other people will get on board. I say sometimes, because not always, but sometimes when you are like, okay, I'm going to stop this pattern, like I'm contributing to it, I'm going to stop, I'm going to focus on myself here. It may be, you know, several days could be a couple hours. But all of a sudden, when there's that charge moment and someone sees you responding differently, it's enough to like, oh, I'm giving a vision for how this could be a couple hours. But all of a sudden, when there's that charge moment and someone sees you responding differently, it's enough to like, oh, I'm giving a vision for how this could be different, you know yeah, katie, I think of the just what we named earlier the avoiding the drive by diagnosis yeah because when you don't have credibility, they're more likely to resist it anyway and the further you are away from yeah because when you don't have credibility, they're more likely to resist it anyway.

Josiah: 1:17:43

And the further you are away from relationship, the less you know about what's actually going on. So how are you supposed to calibrate the truth properly if you don't actually know the situation? So we love to sit in our towers and look down and say, see, well, if they were able to do X, Y and Z, they would be fine. But without a relationship and knowing what's going on in their lives, without asking questions, your judgments are more likely to be wrong.

Katie: 1:18:11

Yes, and even if they are right, they're not going to hear it.

Josiah: 1:18:15

Right, yes, yes, okay. A third practice I would name is just to identify your shadow side. Mack, you talked earlier about calibrating grace and truth and sort of admitting that you tend to gravitate towards living out of high truth or pseudo truth, yep, more than high grace, and how both sides can be damaging. Thanks for drawing attention to that again. Yeah, I just wanted to point it out.

Adam: 1:18:45

I'm just trying to help you own the truth about yourself.

Josiah: 1:18:52

No, so my shadow side is probably a little more on the grace side. I tend to like I don't like love conflict all the time. I'd rather not have any relational tension with anyone, so I'm much more apt to avoid it or to not even see it. Or if I do see it, I'm going to find ways around it. So I know that for me, learning to go directly to people instead of venting to someone else, that is a continual challenge for me. Learning to go directly to people instead of venting to someone else, that is a continual challenge for me. But I have enough reps throughout the years, especially on staff and with people in my life, that when I have to go there with someone, it tends to go well, because I have people in my life that want to meet me in that space and they want a relationship with me, so they're willing to go there with me in order to resolve the issue.

Mac: 1:19:48

Yeah.

Josiah: 1:19:49

So when you have reps, it starts to build on a confidence, and I even think about it within our staff meeting context, or our weekend planning meetings, our, our weekend planning meetings Um, I feel so much more uh, so much more permission now, and so I'm so much more bold to be able to say I don't like that or I don't know about that, um, compared to when it was an issue.

Mac: 1:20:14

Yeah, I've seen you grow into that I've seen you grow into that quite a bit, um, and you and one thing I would say about identifying your shadow side is it does help to have other people you can invite into that.

Mac: 1:20:30

And so when you find yourself in a situation you're uncertain what it looks like to show up with love, maybe someone with an opposite default can help build out your imagination. Does that make sense? So, for instance, if I'm kind of more on the true side, that's not where I need to grow, as like having the courage to name what I think or whatever, but I might need to talk to someone who has a much larger imagination for what grace could look like. So it fills out my posture of love in any given moment. So find some of those people. Find some of those people that have the opposite default that you can trust and go. Man, here's how I think I would approach the situation, but I know that you might have some other defaults that could help me grow.

Josiah: 1:21:15

Yeah, yeah. And if you're a people pleaser, then identify someone in your life who is a little more blunt with their words and being able to say hey, there is actually a lot of value in naming what is so with the people in my lives, instead of beating around the bush and trying to pretend like everything's okay all the time.

Mac: 1:21:34

I just got off a conversation with someone who said I am a lifetime people pleaser and in order to grow that I am a lifetime people pleaser and in order to outgrow that, I do daily experiments that involve courage. And then I realized, as we continue to talk, that in order to outgrow any of this, you need daily experiments of courage, because oftentimes, being blunt and direct, you know you're you're doing so because you feel vulnerable in a different area, like it takes courage to resist that Courage is doing it scared.

Katie: 1:22:10

And would you say? It takes courage, if you're a truth teller, to practice grace.

Mac: 1:22:13

Yes, that's what I'm saying.

Katie: 1:22:14

In a different way.

Mac: 1:22:16

Yeah, people compensate for a vulnerability by being more aggressive.

Katie: 1:22:20

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I vulnerability by being more aggressive.

Mac: 1:22:22

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Katie: 1:22:24

All right, well, good conversation, guys. I think we covered a lot of ground. We've been talking for a while, like an hour and a half maybe.

Mac: 1:22:31

Before we hit record, josiah, I was like I'm not sure I have a lot to say about this one.

Katie: 1:22:34

Yeah, you did great. I certainly had a lot to say. All right, so big picture. If we want to cultivate a culture of tov or goodness, then we need to be committed to trafficking in the truth. And the way we tell the truth is the way that Jesus told the truth, which is always full of love and grace and in a way that pointed people towards the love of God. As followers of Jesus, we're called to be truth tellers telling the truth about ourselves and telling the truth about God.

Mac: 1:23:02

Yeah, Thanks for joining us today. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Next time we've got a bonus episode coming out and I'm excited about. That's all I'm going to say.

Adam: 1:23:15

Just keep people on the edge of their seats or earbuds or whatever Praxis is recorded and produced at Crosspoint Community Church. You can find out more about the show and our church at crosspointwicom. If you have any questions, comments or have any suggestions for future topics, feel free to send us an email. Also, if you enjoy the show, consider leaving a review and if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.