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“Faultfinding”

Allen Dvorak
12/01/24 - Sun AM

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Some of you are aware that I have a tendency occasionally to get a little emotional.

When I preach and uh.

If I do this morning, I'm blaming it on Alex.

But I'm gonna talk to you about fault finding this morning, so I may not cry too much.

One of the most important traits or abilities that we can develop as we mature in life is the ability to accept correction.

Not a pleasant thing.

And some people will have a good excuse for every flaw or mistake that they make, and others just become angry at any hint of rebuke or correction.

But correction is a form of instruction and that's, I think the way we need to look at it, that it is a thing that is helpful to us.

Proverbs has a great deal to say about correction and our attitude toward correction.

In Proverbs 6:23, for the commandment is a lamp in the teaching of light and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life.

I don't really think the proverb is saying that it's what happens to you all the time.

It's a way of life, but that it produces life, that that's the way that we can enjoy life.

In chapter 15, whoever ignores instruction despises himself, but he who listens to reprove gains intelligence.

So as we're young, we need to learn to accept correction in a gracious way and make use of it so that it can provide us with guidance and help us make good choices as we live our lives.

However, on the other side of the ledger, it is possible, of course, for those who offer correction to become hypercritical of others.

There are some people who are disposed to find fault with nearly everyone and everything, especially uh other people.

We call them fault finders or nitpickers, and we'll talk a little bit more about that in just a few moments.

They were born in the objective uh case and in the kickative mood.

And they kind of characterized, it seems, the people of Israel as they came out of Egypt.

You may recall that they grumbled about everything.

They grumbled about a lack of water, the shortage of food, and the quality of the food, and the presence of enemies.

And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 43:10 that we ought not to grumble like they grumbled, like they complained.

One writer, I think said it well.

He said fault finders are people who are, who obsessively find fault in others and criticize them.

They often complain and harshly judge others based on trivial issues.

Fault finders are constantly telling others what they are doing wrong or what they should be doing.

Well, we want to acknowledge the need for correction, for rebuke from time to time.

That's a way of learning as we've already suggested.

But I want to talk to you this morning about the danger of fault finding and we've defined fault finding in this particular context as being those who are uh finding fault in trivial things.

The two monkeys on the screen.

are not intended to represent anybody in the congregation.

Let me be clear about that.

What they're doing is they're picking knits.

A knit is a word for lice.

And monkeys will pick lice off of each other, and you'll see them sometimes if you've gone to the zoo or see them in their natural habitat, you'll see them searching each other's hair for the just the smallest little piece or lice.

And so, They're called nits, those lies.

And when we talk about someone who's constantly focusing on little faults or flaws and others, we call them nitpickers, or I'll call them this morning fault finders.

And so this morning what I'd like to do.

So I wanna talk a little bit about the problem of fault finding and uh say a little bit about why maybe that seems to be a problem for some folks, but I also want to suggest to us that we need to temper our criticism sometimes and not be fault finders.

Has anybody ever said to you, you know that Church of Christ, those people, they're just too judgmental.

They're all critics of everybody else, uh, in the religious world.

Well, the fact of the matter is everybody's a critic.

The word critic, our English word critic, actually comes, is derived from a Greek adjective rios, which means able to discuss.

That word is derived or is in the same word family as a verb crino, which means to judge.

Vine defines that verb as primarily denoting to separate, to select, to choose.

So if you choose between two alternatives, you just judged in that particular sense of the word.

Word, hence to determine and so to judge to pronounce judgment.

Sometimes when we talk about judge, we think of condemn and that is a meaning, a possible meaning of the word, but the word can simply mean to distinguish between things.

And in that sense, we are all critics.

If we were to talk about the English word critic, there are several definitions or several senses in which we use the word.

Of course, Webster gives at least 3 that I'm gonna suggest to you this morning.

One is that a critic is one who expresses a reasoned opinion on any matter involving a judgment of its value, truth, or just righteousness or an appreciation of its beauty.

Or technique.

And the second definition is similar.

A critic is one skilled in judging the merits of literary or artistic works.

So someone might be a film critic, and so he's going to look at uh a film and he's going to decide, is it good in this sense or bad in that sense or any of those kinds of things.

But the word critic can be used in a negative way also, one given to harsh or captious judgment, a caviler or carver.

I love definitions where at least half of the words I have to then look up to find out what that word meant so I can find out what the initial word meant.

We don't use the word caps or cavaler or carper very much.

How many of you young people know what a carer is?

No, it's a guy who fishes for car.

No, that's not what it is.

But a captious judgment is a judgment that is focused on pickiness, small trivial details.

A cavalry is one who is engaged in that kind of judgment or fault finding and to carp about something is to complain about something or to nitpick about something.

So they're similar synonyms, those two last words.

Well, the fact of the matter is we have to judge.

We have to be critics in the sense of distinguishing between things.

The Bible requires that of Christians.

If we're going to distinguish between true prophets and false prophets or true teachers and false teachers, we're going to be judging them as Jesus said, beware of false prophets.

They're gonna come to you in sheep's clothing.

But he says, you will recognize them by their fruits.

So you have to look at the teaching, their fruits, and distinguish between those who are true teachers who teach the truth, and those who are false teachers.

We're required to pass judgment on the goodness or evil of many things.

In kind of a general statement, Paul says to the Thessalonians, test everything.

Hold fast what is good.

To the Romans, he would write in Romans 12:222, that we should abhor evil, hold fast to what is good.

You're gonna have to decide, aren't you?

What's good and what's evil in order to follow those kinds of instructions.

That's judging, that's being a critic, but in a good sense, in a required way, we have to make distinctions between good and evil, between what's true and what's false.

We are required to do that.

Even to, uh, in the matter of discipline, there is the requirement of measuring individuals against God's standard.

The apostle Paul wrote to the Thessalonians about a problem they were having there where some people were just being lazy.

Apparently, they'd misunderstood Paul's teaching and they were of the opinion that perhaps the Lord was coming back very soon.

If the Lord's gonna come back on Tuesday, why go to work on Monday?

And some Thessalonians apparently had decided that that's what they would do, and Paul corrects that error, and he says, we command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who's walking in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us.

New King James version and says, walking disorderly, which would include not just those who are walking in idleness, but anyone who's not walking according to or in uh Uh, agreement with the standard of Christ's teaching.

In Galatians 215:227, similar uh point to be made.

Paul says, if anyone's caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

How are you gonna know if he's caught unless you are distinguishing between good conduct and bad conduct.

What is good, righteous conduct and what's sinful conduct?

And so just to fulfill our responsibilities as Christians, we're going to have to judge.

We're gonna have to be critics.

And sometimes we're gonna have to correct others.

We're gonna have to rebuke others.

Paul would write to Timothy.

And 27 Timothy 23:21, that Timothy is to preach the word, be ready in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke and exhort with complete patience and teaching.

Someone might say, well, that was for Timothy's uh benefit.

Well, that's true, although there's a lot of things that are written in the pastoral uh epistles, 203 and 220 Timothy and Titus, that are applicable to us as well, whether we're preachers or not.

To rebuke Bag says is to censure, to speak seriously, to warn.

And all of us are going to have to do that at some time when we see that there's a brother or sister uh who needs uh a warning.

It requires the assessment of another's conduct.

And I began by saying this morning that criticism or correction has great value.

It's instruction But I think Norman Vincent Peale said it well when he said the trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined with praise than saved by criticism.

Well praise is much easier to endure than criticism is.

But criticism may be the very thing that is the best for us at a particular time.

Criticism One source said may not be agreeable, but it's necessary.

It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body.

It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.

So here I am.

There's some sort of sin in my life.

And when somebody corrects me, criticizes that criticizes me in that sense.

That's the same function that pain does when it warns me that I'm engaging in an activity or I have some sort of physical problem.

To cite Alex It took quite a bit for Alex apparently to get the message, I guess, but that pain was telling him there's something that needs to be done.

And criticism is like that and it helps us.

To do those things, to make those changes that are necessary for our spiritual health.

But I'll tell you, it's often difficult to be objective about ourselves.

We may be able to benefit from others calling attention to certain matters.

Even if we don't like the criticism, the proverb writer in chapter 21 verse 1 says, faithful are the wounds of a friend, profuse are the kisses of an enemy.

The friend is the one who will correct you, who will rebuke you when you need it, and that's a helpful thing.

Your enemy will kiss you, your enemy will uh flatter you.

He'll do things that aren't all that helpful to you, but faithful are the wounds of a friend.

Wounds, correction is not pleasant.

But if it's for your benefit, for my benefit.

Then it's exactly what we need.

How we react to criticism or the rebukes of others probably says as much about us as it does the person who's offering the correction, maybe more about us.

The Proverbs writer also talks about that, do not reprove a scoffer or he will hate you, reprove a wise man, and he will love you.

How do you respond to correction?

How do you respond, respond to criticism when someone points out something that's legitimate, a legitimate flaw or fault or sin in our lives.

The scoffer hates that.

But the wise man loves the fact that you cared enough.

To criticize or to rebuke.

And he makes the change.

In the 13th chapter of the same book, verse 18, poverty and disgrace come to him who ignores instruction, but whoever heeds, reproof is honored.

My dad can tell you uh he's here this morning and he can tell you that as a, as a young person, I didn't much like criticism.

I didn't take correction very well.

And it would make me angry.

My mom used to call me a bullhead.

I don't know if that, does that phrase mean anything to anybody?

A bullhead?

I'm not sure how she meant it.

I think what she meant was there's, uh, sometimes you'll have a, a, a bull and, and he's decided he's gonna go a certain direction and he's not gonna be changed.

He's got that big strong neck and you can't push him one side or the other.

Mom said that was kind of the way you were, and I would get angry at correction.

But this morning we're also talking about excessive criticism.

Because as much as I might need to criticize or correct or rebuke.

Another person legitimately for sin, it is also quite possible that there is the tendency for me to search for some flaw in others.

So I become Focused on trivial things, things of no consequence.

It's not just that a fault is noticed, it is sought out and it's highlighted as though there was some reward for finding it.

Have you ever known someone?

Who every time you engage them in conversation, Doesn't make any difference what the subject is or who it might be that's mentioned in the conversation.

There's always a negative comment.

You could just, you could just bring up a list of people and this person will tell you what's wrong with that person, what's wrong with that person, what's wrong with that person.

Because the focus is always on the negative, and it could be trivial stuff, but they'll always be something negative.

As often as not, that harsh judgment is based on personal standards or opinions.

The fault finder frequently engages in petty or unreasonable criticism of others.

And what that suggests to me is that before I offer my criticism to another, I need to try to decide whether it's really necessary or not, or whether I'm just expressing my own personal opinion about what you should do or how you should be.

Which is not really my right to con to try to make you be the way I want you to be.

And I will tell you that frequently that kind of harsh judgment involves people in hypocrisy.

That's the point, I think, at least in part of Matthew the 7th chapter, the scripture reading for this morning.

Judge not that you be not judged, for with the judgment you pronounce, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

And Jesus kind of engages in some somewhat of a humorous illustration.

Here's a man with a, a plank or a beam in his eye, and he's trying to pick out the splinter, the speck in the eye of another.

We see that, we think about that illustration, we think how ridiculous that is.

It would be hypocritical for me to be looking for the speck in your eye, when I have this huge problem in my own life.

I want to hasten to point out that Jesus says in verse 5, you hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

Jesus is not saying you can't criticize, you can't correct.

There's no circumstance under which you should uh try to offer a rebuke to somebody else or try to correct somebody else.

But what he is talking about is the fact that so often.

There's a bigger flaw in my own life that I'm not addressing when I'm coming and trying to take the speck out of your eye.

Let me give you a biblical illustration of the very thing that Jesus is talking about.

It's found in John the 12th chapter.

It's the occasion where Jesus is anointed.

The disciples are there together and a woman comes in and anoints Jesus.

And so let's read together uh the discussion.

I'm going to start in verse 3, even though verses 13 and 2 are up there.

Mary, therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made of pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair.

The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples, he who was about to betray him said, why was this ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor?

Wow, how nice of Judas.

He's concerned about the poor and he thought that, or at least said that this ointment, the value of it could have been better spent or used, utilized for the caring of the poor.

But John tells us he said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief and having charge of the money bag, he used, used to help himself to what was put into it.

So here's the beam, he's a thief.

And he's criticizing Mary for what he describes essentially as poor judgment on her part.

You wasted this ointment that could have been sold and used for benevolence when in fact he's a hypocrite because he doesn't care about the poor, he just wants to take money from the disciples treasury.

Why is it that people get involved in fault finding?

I hope at least at this point, I've described these things to the extent that we would say, no, I don't want to be like that.

So why is it that sometimes people do engage in fault finding?

I think sometimes it's to use a technical term, it's an inferiority complex.

By tearing other people down.

If I am a person of low esteem, it may make me feel better about myself.

It's the same motivation for gossip, and gossip frequently is fault finding or involves fault finding.

And so if I can tear you down, then in some way, especially if I think I don't have the same flaw, then I feel superior to you and there's some people that's the only way they can feel good about themselves, it seems, is if they're tearing somebody else down.

They're finding whatever kind of flaws they can.

The next cause I think is kind of similar and it has to do with diversion.

If I'm showing your faults, then I'm Not drawing attention to my own faults or perhaps directing, diverting attention from my own flaws or my own conduct.

Sometimes it's ending.

Somebody else is doing very well and so I want to bring them down a notch or two.

I'm envious of their success or their position.

It's interesting to me how often you see envy among the Pharisees as they interacted with Jesus.

I'm gonna give you 3 illustrations here.

In Matthew 22 and verse 15, the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle Jesus in his words.

You know, they came to him and they would ask him questions.

They would try to test him, to try to trick him into saying something that would make him look bad.

So they were looking for a flaw in Jesus.

After the resurrection of Lazarus, many people believed in Jesus, and they began following Jesus, and that irritated Caiaphas, the high priest, and the others who were leaders of the Jews.

And they say, if we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.

And so they're going to pick and find fault and even plot to kill Jesus because of envy.

A common cause.

A fault finding In Matthew chapter 27, in the context of Jesus appearing before Pontius Pilate, the governor.

The text says, Matthew writes, for he that is Pilate knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up.

Were there other emotions or other things going on?

I think so, but some of it was just envy.

And so they charged Jesus with all kinds of things that were not true.

And then finally, I think sometimes it's just arrogance.

I find fault in others because I believe that I'm qualified to run every aspect of everyone else's life.

And sometimes that leads to fault findings.

So I'm gonna go over and talk to Douglas, and Douglas, you ought to do this and this and this and this.

And so I'll go over and tell Douglas all the things that he needs to change in his life and often fault finders, they, they're the people who are looking for things that are trivial, things that are petty, things that don't make any difference, things that are essentially my opinion.

I'm not talking about sin here, but I'm finding fault with these people. Arrogance.

I believe my way of doing it is always the best way.

You know, I think sometimes it takes a good bit of effort to separate our own opinions from what God's word says.

I've heard people come and talk to me and say, you know, I don't think so and so should do such and such or I don't think this should be done and, and I just ask, well, why not?

What is it about that that bothers you?

Why does it bother you?

Well, and they can't point to scripture because what they're doing is they've got a personal opinion and they're applying it to this other individual.

They're finding fault because that individual is not living the way they want to live or think everybody should live.

But no one has given me or you the right to convict others of sin on the basis of my opinions.

Sin is not the violation of my judgment or my opinions.

It is the violation of God's law.

There are some consequences to fault finding, unpleasant things.

The fruit of fault finding involves the increasing of the harshness of our own judgment.

Hopefully, you didn't miss that in Matthew the 7th chapter.

Where Jesus says, judge not that you be not judged, people often quote verse one.

Because they want to say, don't, don't be telling me that I'm doing something wrong.

That's not at all what Jesus is saying there.

But he does talk about harsh judgment, and he says whatever judgment that we use against others, that's how we're going to be judged.

So we need to be cautious about being Carpers Those who involve ourselves in captious judgments.

finding alienates our friends and brethren.

You like to spend time with people who are constantly picking, constantly finding little things that they don't like about you, things that are petty, things that are really of no material value.

And so what happens is fault finding makes us an undesirable companion.

And people will draw away from us.

We fail to see the good in others.

If my mentality is that I'm constantly looking at the negative in your life.

I can't see the good.

And there's so much good in the lives of Christians.

We cheat ourselves.

When the only thing we can see is some sort of weakness or failure, and we have failures too.

But I think the idea of emphasizing the positive about others.

Is to our benefit.

But fault finding means we can't see that because we're focused on something different, or something negative.

And frankly, for those who are going through life with this negativity, this negative attitude about everything and everybody, they basically robbed themselves of their own unhappiness.

Have you ever known someone who was a fault finder and they just seemed unhappy all the time?

Well, of course, everything in life, everything in the world is negative.

There's no good They focus only on those things.

They're negative.

Well, whatever, it's Original motivation.

The fact of the matter is, we can slowly develop the habit.

of seeking out faults in the lives of others.

It becomes a habit, and habits are formed over time and usually gradually.

We get into The routine of noting some sort of problem with somebody instead of Looking for something good.

The formation of habits can sometimes be pretty subtle.

Uh, the way that we think, the patterns that we follow as we think can sometimes be so subtle that we're not even consciously aware of what we're doing.

And what I'm trying to do this morning, hopefully with some success, is to make us think about the way that we approach people and things.

Whether we're fault finders or whether we're encouragers like Barnabas and others.

How is it that we can overcome the problem of fault finding?

Excessive criticism.

Well, I'm gonna be very brief here.

I'm just gonna offer 3 quick suggestions.

And the first is that we need to develop our proper love for others.

I would suggest to you that fault finding.

Manifests a lack of love for others, a proper love.

I like what John said in 1 John 4:20.

He said, if anyone says I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar.

For he does not love his brother, for he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.

So think about that.

How is it that I feel about you?

How is it that I act toward you?

If I'm saying I love God and yet I fail to love you, John says, how can you love God whom you haven't seen?

You don't even love, you hate the one that you do see.

So we need to develop a proper love for others.

Of course 1 Corinthians 13 talks about the behavior of love, its character.

It's patient, kind, doesn't envy or boasts, not arrogant.

Remember we talked about a couple of reasons that sometimes people are fault finders.

It does not rejoice at wrongdoing.

Rejoices with the truth.

Listen to this last verse.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

That says a great deal about how we ought to treat one another, the approach that we use as we interact with one another.

Do we look for the best?

Do we look for the good in others, or do we focus always on the negative?

I don't think that's love, and so we need to develop a proper love for others.

If you've got a bad habit, The way to break it often is to replace it with a good habit, and good habits are formed just like bad habits are gradually and over time.

We do the same thing over and over again.

If the bad habit is that I'm constantly looking for something negative in other people, then maybe the good habit is I start looking constantly.

For the good in others.

I've known a few people where that would be a difficult task.

You'd have to work at it.

Because there was just a whole lot of undesirable traits.

But you know what, I think you can just about find some good in everybody.

And so replace the bad habit of excessive or harsh criticism.

By replacing it with an acceptable habit.

Of looking for the good and encouraging the good in others.

And then finally practice the golden rule.

That seems so simplistic, so obvious.

And yet, how often do we perhaps forget as we're talking about others or we're treating others, we forget that we would not want to be treated that way ourselves.

And so, when I say something to you or about you.

Would I want to be treated that way myself?

That's the golden rule.

Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the law and the prophets.

It's so comprehensive that Jesus says that's a summary.

Of how to obey the law and the prophets.

I don't want to give the impression that all criticism is bad, or that there's never an occasion where there needs to be rebuke.

And sometimes it needs to be a sharp rebuke.

Paul told Titus that there were some who needed to be rebuked sharply.

But I'm talking about excessive criticism.

I'm talking about criticism on the basis of my personal opinions or judgments.

I'm talking about pettiness.

And we want to try to avoid that.

Sometimes we can't ignore faults in others, but we don't need to concentrate on weaknesses to the extent that we miss the good in people and that we fail to encourage what's positive in other people's lives.

It's interesting thing about bees.

Bees are always going to those fragrant flowers.

And they produce honey.

The buzzard on the other hand, the vulture.

is looking for something dead.

And that's what he finds.

What is it that we're looking for?

When we See our brethren.

Are we seeing the sweetness?

The fragrance, the good.

Or are we focused?

On those things that are negative.

I didn't intend this morning to minimize the need to make corrections in our lives.

I certainly don't want to give that impression or even uh to minimize the need sometimes to correct brethren.

Sometimes we're gonna have to do that as we noted earlier on.

The mirror of God's word, uh, James says, can help us see ourselves as we are, but sometimes others can see us even more clearly than we can see ourselves.

So the correction of brethren, the correction of others is very valuable.

You know, God knows all our faults.

He knows all of our sins.

If God wanted to be a fault finder, he would have no problem with me.

Or perhaps you as well.

But what God decided to do was to save us from the consequences of our sins, of our faults.

And so in his love, he sent his son, not because he's ignoring problems, not because he's ignoring our faults or our sins.

But instead because he wants to save us from the consequences of those sins.

How about you?

Are you taking advantage of the love of God?

Who looks down upon us and says, I want to save this individual, and he's made all these preparations, the death of Jesus, the preaching the gospel.

The guidance and the protection of Christians.

So that you and I can be saved.

If you need to avail yourself of that grace of God, that love of God this morning, we want to encourage you to obey the gospel.

God in His love, wants to save you.

But you have to decide whether you will respond to his invitation.

And so we invite you to do that now as we stand together and sing to.