I was asked by someone lately, "How is the best way, or what is the best question to ask people for them to take responsibility for their part in a bad situation?" They clarified that they want to know precisely the best way to help someone become self-reflective and begin to see and recognize their sin in a conflict or a challenging situation.
This is a great question and goes well with what we have been talking about in recent Thoughts From The Pastor. We have been looking at seeing our blind spots and asking others to help us see and deal with the plank in our own eyes. In seeing what Jesus said in Luke 6:41-42, we talked about the realization that we often can be at a disadvantage because we are so prone to "FAIL TO SEE" what is in our own eye. Yet, we are called by the Lord to deal with the plank we are failing to see. Living life together in Jesus Christ as church allows us as brothers and sisters in God's family to lovingly help each other see and notice our own planks. We can seek others we trust and who will be loving but honest about the planks we need to deal with.
But what do you do if you are in a discipleship relationship or just aiming to love on someone and you notice that they have a huge blind spot in their life to sin or to sin in a particular situation? What is the perfect question to ask to help them begin to do some serious self-reflection and investigation into their own life? How do you help them see they have sin they are blind to that is clearly influencing and feeding their struggle or negative situation?
It's a great question. It is also a question that touches on spiritual discernment. The person I was talking with does very well with spiritual understanding, and I believe the Holy Spirit gifts them in this area. But spiritual discernment is not only for those with the gift from the Holy Spirit. It is for all who walk closely with the Lord and seek His wisdom and understanding. It is for all who focus their attention towards the Lord and lean not on their own understanding but seeking the Lord for His clarity and truth. (2 Peter 1:3-15, Phil 1:9-11, Eph 1:15-23…)
Some thoughts on these questions and topic…
One of the most important things that people who have spiritual discernment and see into other people's lives must recognize is that they need to be very careful to discern what is truly a word or sight from the Holy Spirit and what is just seeing stuff we see when we look at other people's lives. I think that everyone can see other people's blind spots. I believe that just about everyone can more easily see other people's sins and often even determine their "hidden" motivations more easily than seeing their own. I believe this happens because we live with ourselves. What we do and how we do it becomes so second nature we become blind to our inner motives and shifting value scales. Because we don't take time to investigate ourselves, we become blind in many ways to ourselves. It is ironic, but we are often so selfish we are blind to ourselves. We are so self-focused on getting what we want we become blind to seeing the hidden systems and ways we do it and why.
Our sin is blinding but often only to our own eyes. As we look at others, we are not so blind to see the systems of control, manipulation, wanting stuff, and wanting to be needed and loved. I would say we all can see other's sin much more easily than we see our own.
We are a crazy mess. I say all this to warn you. A person can become good (Well... goodish, I guess) at reading people with practice. One can read their body language, reading into the tone of voice and expressions. One can tell a lot about someone just by watching what their body is saying. Remember, 70%-ish of what we communicate is body language, 25%-ish is tonal, and 5%-ish is done with words. But just because one can tell a lot about someone, that does not mean the Holy Spirit is leading them to discern something in their life.
I am starting to believe more and more that if I see something in a person that maybe should be addressed with them, it will be the leading of the Holy Spirit in discernment, not towards what I see but rather more towards what I should say. Many of us often can see things in others, but it is the Holy Spirit that must give us wisdom into what to say, how to say it, and even when to say it. This is often where I have found a strong sense of the Holy Spirit's leading in helping others see and deal with sin. It takes doing little else but focusing on the Lord's will in prayer and waiting on Him to lead.
That is why I shared the idea of not always speaking to what we see so quickly, the last time we talked. The danger is that many people become focused on giving "wise words" everytime they see sin. What happens is that these words often stop being lead by the Lord. Though they are trying to do good, their words of correction or counsel are truly absent of the Holy Spirit's supernatural presence and power, and absent of Christ like grace and truth.
Many wrongly believe that Spiritual discernment is mostly about being able to see sin in others' lives. Not realizing that often the spiritual discernment of the Holy Spirit comes after the sin is seen and is more about discernment in helping the person seeing and confessing their sin and being free of their sin. Again seeing the sin or the sliver is often not something most people need to have the Holy Spirit's help to see. But coming alongside someone and helping them see and then be free of their sin in a way that shows Jesus' love, grace, and truth yet focus on His holiness… That takes the Holy Spirit's presence and discernment.
When we see sin in another Christian's life, we often want to jump in to help them see it. This is why I think Jesus calls the sliver in the other person's eye a sliver. It is crazy, but it's easier often to see slivers in others' eyes than seeing our planks. But when we do aim to help others see this sin, it usually does not go well. Even when people genuinely want to help and even when they use the Word of God as their basis in what they share to help, it often can produce no real change and often hurts the relationship. When this happens, the person receiving the "help" is either offended or seems to be blind to what is being said. So then one needs to depend on the Holy Spirit to see.... But also one needs to rely on the Holy Spirit for space, Word, and method to say...
When talking about this type of discernment, we speak in the realm of the prophetic gifting from the Holy Spirit. And often in the OT, we see that prophets were alone. They saw what God showed them but often in a very isolated way. But in the new testament, we see that the prophetic gifts are to be done or carried out in the same manner as all the other gifts, in community and a relationship of brotherly love. In this sense, we are given some guidelines in the new testament that clarify relational understanding to these gifts.
1 Cor 12:7, 4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.
They are for helping each other.
The prophetic gifting in connection to the discernment of the heart does not just reveal sin in people's lives but hidden evil in their hearts.
1 Corinthians 14:24-25, But if an unbeliever or an inquirer comes in while everyone is prophesying, they are convicted of sin and are brought under judgment by all, 25 as the secrets of their hearts are laid bare. So they will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, "God is really among you!"
Note that it is not the visible sin revealed, but the true secrets of their heart revealed through this act of prophetic speech and sharing. So as I shared, it is not just seeing into the person's life and seeing sin in people's lives. But it's often seeing into the person's secret heart and seeing things you can't just see in their life. It is also speaking about it in a way that the person knows God is in this place.
I often believe that the sin we see in others' lives is often only the symptoms of the more significant and profound sin in their hearts. This is what I mean. A young man or woman caught in the sin of porn and masturbation often aims to deal with this sin directly. The sin is seen as an issue with fleshly pleasure against holiness. But, way more often than not, the sexual sin is only the symptom of the deeper sins of control, demanding their way, wanting, not trusting, anger, jealousy, and loving the things of the world. Even sins like unforgiveness, swearing oaths, bitterness and hatred... These are the deeper secrets of the heart that Holy Spirit-led discernment allows one to see. He also, in His ways, will enable us to speak to in the right moment, with the right words, allowing the person to recognize their own deeper sin.
So, yes, we need to speak boldly to what the Holy Spirit leads us to in discernment. But, we must be careful to discern what He shows us instead of just what we see.
If we are simply seeing sin and have a burden for someone to be free of it, we then don't just go share with them what we think, but we need to use scripture. We use scripture because it's the truth of God, and it as God's Words carries the power. The Words of God are active and pierce the heart cutting through and clarifying what is true and revealing what is hidden... But we need to use it fully, understanding and trusting that it is alive as the Holy Spirit uses it to convict and reveal the truth. Through the Word of God, Jesus Christ by the presence of the Holy Spirit, like standing before a mirror, allows us to see what we really are, who we really are, why we do what we do, and shows us what God desires us to become by a living faith in Jesus Christ.
We don't then shoot off a bunch of scripture to the person but aim to help the person see themselves and genuinely meet with Jesus Christ through scripture. All scripture is used for rebuke, correction, teaching and training in righteousness (2 Tim 3:16). And even more clarifying to our topic are the verse that follows in chapter 4 of 2 Tim, verse 2 & 3... "Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season: correct, rebuke and encourage-- (listen now) with great patience and careful instruction. For a time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to heart..."
Now this passage was for Timothy. A challenge for him to be sharing and preaching the truth of the gospel. But in how Paul calls him to use the Word of God, I believe those who are given the gift of discernment and really all who follow Jesus and use the Word of God to help others must apply the same principles to their ministries. Even as counsellors, shepherds, ones with gifts of discernment and just being loving brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ. We must all have great patience and be careful in our instruction, making sure we don't speak our own thinking, our own words, our own understandings, but properly use the Word of God by the leading of the Holy Spirit.
So, we must always be entirely dependent on God, whether we have the gift of spiritual discernment or want to be good brothers and sisters simply wanting to help others see their blind spots and sin in their life. The one with discernment must lean on the Holy Spirit's leading and make sure they are genuinely speaking words given by Him. Those who don't have the gift of discernment have the Word of God and its powerful truth to help their brother see what they are blind to. In the end, there really isn't a perfect question to help others see their sin and begin to take responsibility for it. But there is the presence of the Spirit of God and His giftings, and there is the Word of God that the Holy Spirit uses to lead and guide us towards lovingly helping others see their sin. It then is not so much about the perfect questions but about being in the right place, leaning entirely on God's presence, timing, and leading. If you are patient and waiting on Him in prayer, Jesus Christ will make it clear through the Holy Spirit when and what is the best course of action and the best words to use to help your brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ to see their sin. And likely, He will even lead you to those who will help you humbly see your sin.
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