No Grumbling
Have you ever met someone who grumbles a lot? No matter what circumstances they find themselves in they just seem to spend a lot of time complaining? A real “negative Nancy” as they say? All of us know how much of an emotional drain these people can be. Yet did you know that the Bible actually speaks about the grumbler? It’s true!
James 5:9 says, “Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged; behold the judge is standing at the door.” Do not grumble! Boom! There it is, right there. But wait, it doesn’t just say “do not grumble,” but “do not grumble against one another.” How many of us thought of someone when I posed the question to us if we knew somebody who grumbles a lot? My guess is a lot of us. Perhaps we thought of someone in our small group, or someone we see weekly at church, or at one of the other various ministries going on here at LPC. How many of us immediately thought about how much of a bother this person was, how difficult they are, or tiresome? Again, my guess is a lot. Well ironically the command we receive in James 5:9 applies more to us in this scenario than it does to our first person.
In the book of James it is clear he is writing to a church with some relational problems. In chapter 2 we are told that this congregation should avoid the sin of “partiality” (2:1) The wealthy were being given special attention while the poor were being overlooked. In chapter 3 James talks about our words and the power of those words to destroy. In chapter 4 we learn of “quarrels” and “fights” amongst the people of this congregation. Likewise, we see James give the injunction not to “speak evil against one another” (4:11). And then we come to the passage that this blog post will be dealing with “do not grumble against one another” (5:9). Clearly, this is a congregation with some serious relational issues.
However, before we get on our high horse and think that we are better than them we should realize that we too just grumbled in our hearts against a brother or sister in Christ. Did we not just complain about someone in our hearts by thinking that they are difficult, challenging, tiresome? If we are being honest, we certainly did and, thus, we begin to see how easy it is for “grumbling against one another” to seep into our lives and bleed into the church. So, how can we protect ourselves against this? What are some things we should watch out for to avoid this grumbling against one another? Let’s outline a few common ways that we can inadvertently grumble against one another.
1) “Did you hear?”
It is not uncommon for someone to begin their juicy story of gossip with “did you hear?” Did you hear about so and so? Did you hear about what they did? Did you hear about the big news? It may seem innocent enough. In fact, it may even seem like you’re just having a friendly conversation and keeping the ball rolling. But gossip always has the potential to lead towards grumbling.
Just think about this for a moment with me. Imagine someone in the church has heard through someone else that the elders are considering selling all of the churches assets and moving us permanently to a tent. Hopefully this ludicrous scenario doesn’t bring up any COVID PTSD. The person who heard this piece of information then shares it with their small group. After sharing, some members of that small group begin to resent the elders for the decision they have made. Those members then go out and instead of “gossiping” they now grumble against the elders of the church. Soon factions start to form. Some members support the elders in their decision and others are vehemently opposed to the decision grumbling against the elders and those who support the elders. Finally news gets back to the elders of this growing rift in the church which has manifested in grumbling. The elders are shocked! It had never once crossed their minds to sell the church’s assets and move permanently into a tent. Factions, grumbling, and division all resulted from false information spread through gossip.
The above scenario is obviously a little bit farcical. It would be quite something for gossip of that caliber to spread so rapidly and to cause such division so quickly. However, the point of the illustration is intended to show a larger truth. Gossip always has the potential to beget grumbling, and grumbling always has the potential to beget division. Perhaps it won’t be on a scale as large as this, but grumbling is grumbling, and we are commanded in our text today not to grumble. Therefore, beware of the “did you hear?”
2) “I wish they would . . .”
I have served the majority of my ministry life in subordinate roles to the Lead Pastor. Prior to taking on the Associate Pastor role here at Life Pointe I was a Youth Director. Often, being in a subordinate role means that people will come to you with ways they wish things were maybe done differently. It’s not uncommon to hear the phrase, “I wish they would” in reference to someone else when you are in ministry. You’ll hear things like “I wish they would preach more on . . .” or “I wish they would pay more attention to this ministry area” or “I wish they would use their platform for my favorite social cause” and so on.
And this isn’t just true of people in ministry. People can say things like this about their small group leaders, about brothers and sisters in Christ and the way they present themselves, about the way the coffee is made, about what people post on their social media account, or the way the slides are clicked. Anything and everything is a target for the dreaded “I wish they would.”
It is important that we recognize here that this is nothing more than grumbling disguised as benevolence. The language gives off the flavor of a desire for some greater good but in reality, it is just something you dislike about the way another person does things. It is grumbling against someone pure and simple and just like the scenario above it can really cause a lot of division within a church.
None of this is to say that you need to tow the party line on everything that the church thinks. A healthy church should allow a certain amount of theological diversity on issues that are not of primary importance to the church worshiping together (things like the millennium for example). However, to simply go around telling other people that you wish pastors, leaders, or volunteers in the congregation did things a different way without having the appropriate direct conversation with the relevant person is grumbling which leads to division.
3) “They always . . . they never”
When Jodie and I were going through our pre-marital course one of the things the teacher mentioned was avoiding the phrases “you always” and “you never”. Why did they recommend this? Because it universalizes a particular scenario portraying a one-time event as an all-time or a no-time event. For example, if a husband says to his wife, “you never listen to me” what he is doing is universalizing something that she obviously does. Of course she listens sometimes, otherwise they would simply not talk. By using the phrase “you never” this husband universalized something she actually did and spoke something that was untrue of her.
Well this type of language can happen in the church as well. We can grumble against our brothers and sisters in Christ when we say things like “they always” or “they never”. Perhaps we don’t even verbalize these things out loud but think them in our heads. We think things like, “my small group leader never calls me for a one-on-one”. We think things like, “my Pastor always preaches long sermons”. Perhaps we might even think something like, “my church always avoids political talk” or “my church never talks about the dangers of (insert cause here).”
Now, clearly, we can use the words “always” and “never” in ways that do not give off the impression of grumbling. That much is obvious. However, these two phrases—“they always” and “they never”–often reveal a disgruntled grumbling spirit within us. They can quickly lead to a quiet resentment of the church you once loved which can spill out in a vocal resentment and usually a sad, troubled, departure.
Conclusion:
This blog post has been looking at James 5:9 and the topic of not grumbling against one another. To show what this looks like I outlined for us three phrases that can often accompany a grumbling spirit: “did you hear?”, “I wish they would,” and “They always . . . they never”. These phrases often reveal or lead to, grumbling against one another in the church. As you take time to reflect upon this consider in your own life ways that you maybe grumble against your brothers and sisters in Christ. Take time to recognize that this grumbling can easily break forth and cause outright division. take Time to consider that this might be even more pertinent given the events which are about to transpire in our country. Finally, take time to consider the words of James, “Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged” (5:9).