Since we’re talking about critics this week . . .
It’s really hard to know how to handle them sometimes, isn’t it?
If you’re like me, your initial instinct is to fling back with fiery arrows – but when you do, you usually end-up regretting this knee-jerk reaction.
The best way to handle critics is to react to them calmly and with love.
Graham Cooke calls this “moving in the opposite spirit.”
St. Francis said it like this:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
However you want to say it, know this: grace always wins.
Sure, we must also value truth. The best combination is the sweet mix of grace and truth.
But it’s through Jesus’ grace we are saved – and the grace we grant others just might be the catalyst that pushes them to Him.
So, yeah. Grace always wins.
