Be Curious, Not Judgmental

Haters gonna hate.

But do they have to do it so publicly?  I’m not convinced social media is a good thing.  I love how I can connect with friends and family across the country and even across the world instantaneously.  Sharing pics, telling stories, sending links to things I find interesting is so convenient.  But along with it came cyber bullying, data leaks, and the widespread misinformation and disinformation that floods our feeds.  And if you happen to be unlucky enough to become a target?  It can make your life a living disaster.  When I was on staff at Roswell UMC, we sponsored an event with Kate Gosselin from Jon & Kate Plus 8.  At the time, they were using their celebrity to share their love of Christ with the world, which I thought was pretty cool.  But even then, Kate was a polarizing figure.  People loved her or hated her.  And since I was in charge of the event, I received hate mail from all over the country, telling me I was a horrible person and how could I call myself a pastor?  Some threatened to get me removed as a clergyperson and claimed I was supporting child abuse.  One person went so far as to accuse me of being a horrible parent and how could I live with myself?  I must be an abusive parent, too.  And that was it for me.  You can say a lot of things about me that I will ignore, but you cannot attack my family and especially my children.  It was the one email I responded to, and even though the person was rude and hateful, I tempered my response.  Still, that person cut my email up, misquoted me and took my words out of context, and then blasted it to her Kate Gosselin hate group.  I got even more hate emails after that.  It was awful.  I did learn something valuable from the experience.  Haters gonna hate, but you don’t have to play the game.

What bothered me so much was being judged by people who didn’t know me at all.

They were willing to slander me, to threaten my job, to try and get me removed as a pastor without knowing anything at all about who I was, what I stood for, or what I believed.  Ironically, I wasn’t even  the person who booked the event or decided on it.  I just inherited it from the last pastor, but that didn’t matter.  These attackers lived in their own little world and just made stuff up about me to suit their own narrow point of view and didn’t care about the consequences on my life or how it might affect me. I had never received hate mail in my life and I’ll tell you, it was a horrible experience.  But how easy is it for us to sit on high and make judgements about other people behind the safety of our phones and computers?  Without ever getting to know the people we are critical about or find out their motivations, we pretend to be God and pass judgment on them.  Don’t get me wrong.  There are plenty of people who deserve scrutiny and who do things that are wrong or abhorrent and when those things come to light, we should know about it.  Public figures who put themselves out there at least know this kind of scrutiny comes with the job.  But we all need to take a deep breath before hitting return on our keyboard because once it’s out there, it’s impossible to take back.

Ted Lasso has some thoughts on the subject.

So does the Bible which we will read in a bit.  In the scene below, Ted is competing with Rupert at a local pub in a game of darts.  Rupert, who has already called him a hillbilly to his face, obviously thinks Ted is some hick from America who is gullible and stupid.  As they play the final round, Ted is down by 160 points, a near impossible score to beat, and Rupert is sure he has the game in the bag when Ted tells him this story:

“Be curious, not judgmental.”

I love Ted’s quote. Or more accurately, Ted’s quote of Walt Whitman. It’s a great reminder to us all not to jump to conclusions and to seek out the truth. God asks us to do the same thing.  If you would please rise as you are able, we will read from Proverbs this morning to listen to what God has to say.  Hear now the Word of the Lord.

Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. (Proverbs 18:8)

To answer before listening—that is folly and shame. (Proverbs 18:13)

The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out. (Proverbs 18:15)

My son, if you accept my words
    and store up my commands within you,
² turning your ear to wisdom
    and applying your heart to understanding—
³ indeed, if you call out for insight
    and cry aloud for understanding,
⁴ and if you look for it as for silver
    and search for it as for hidden treasure,
⁵ then you will understand the fear of the Lord
    and find the knowledge of God. – Proverbs 2:1-5

Such beautiful poetry with deep words of wisdom.

King Solomon may be writing this to his literal son, Rehoboam but as with all of the books in the Bible, we can hear for ourselves God’s wisdom being passed down to us.  Reading these words, “…turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding,” is God’s way of imploring us to turn away from gossip and click bait and being discerning about what we hear.  With a loving heart, we should apply Stephen Covey’s fifth habit of highly effective people, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”[1]  I love the next part, “indeed, if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.”  Here, God is calling us to be as earnest and as diligent in searching for truth as we do for treasure because to God the truth IS our greatest treasure.  The truth is what brings us closer to God.  When we do that, we avoid the sensationalism of the moment and instead come to a deeper understanding of what is actually going on.  We avoid getting caught up in our emotions and instead can act with wisdom and compassion.

We need to be a lot more curious and a lot less judgmental.

Our polarized society needs cooler heads to prevail and if we just followed God’s prescription for the answer (or even Ted’s) we would be a lot better off.  When we make assumptions without knowledge, we make faulty decisions that can hurt and harm others. Maybe we should take the advice of one more sage philosopher who also happens to be an actor, Will Rogers.  Will was incredibly famous in his time, making 71 films, writing more than 4000 columns in national newspapers, and performed in the famous Ziegfeld Follies.[2] In the musical based on his life and words, he shared these thoughts, “I guess I met a whole lotta people in my lifetime. I always try to approach ’em the same way my …ancestors would. … you must never judge a man when you’re facing him. You’ve got to go around behind him, …and look at what he’s looking at and then go back and face him and you’ll have a totally different idea of who he is. You’ll be surprised how much easier it is to get along with everybody.”[3]  When you hear something bad or something too good to be true, don’t accept it blindly.  Instead take John’s advice as he wrote to the church in his first letter: “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. (1 John 4:1)” In the past, they may have spoken from the temple or in the streets or in community gathering places.  Today, they speak to you from Instagram and YouTube and Facebook.  That doesn’t mean everyone is lying, but rather we need to be discerning before accepting things as the truth.  Especially things that are sensational and attention grabbing.  Try to be kind.  Try to be forgiving.  And seek the truth. 

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[1] https://www.franklincovey.com/courses/the-7-habits/habit-5/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Rogers   

[3] https://agoodreedreview.com/2019/08/12/the-will-rogers-follies-has-staying-power/