Recieving Correction From Others

Unless you have already become like Jesus, already have been perfected, and already received your crown bearing the inscription “righteous”, then it is good to be corrected. If we are still alive in this world, we are still wrong somewhere in our thinking, actions, and words. The devil works hard to blind us to our faults in hope that they will remain and condemn us when we stand before God. 

God in His wisdom has created people with a keen eye for the faults of others. You might not see your faults however you can be sure that other people are seeing them! Your wife or husband, your children, your friends and coworkers, they see your faults clearly. People around you can even predict when your faults will occur! They are thinking “oh, here comes that same situation, they are going to become angry yet again”. 

Seeing the faults of others doesn’t even require training or even a renewed heart or mind, even unbelievers can see your faults. “He calls himself a Christian, but can’t get a grip on that anger”. You know this is true, you yourself think of a thousand faults of others each day yet when you go before the Lord to confess your own sins you have so few. We are full of pride and unacknowledged sin, yet we maintain our innocence. May the Lord have mercy on us that we would see ourselves and find repentance and forgiveness.

One of the ways the Lord is working to save us from our sin is through our relationships with others. Even though we are struggling to see or acknowledge a sin, our loved ones will see and hopefully warn us. Jesus has even charged each of us with the calling that “if your brother sins against you, go and tell him” (Matt. 18:15). This should always be done in a heart of love and desire to help the other person, however sometimes it has to be done with some real force to get our attention. The question to us is – can we receive correction from others? Are we too proud to lower ourselves and be corrected by another person? Are we so conceited to think that others are wrong in their assessment of us? 

God’s people often rejected the warnings from the prophets and teachers that He placed in their lives. I think that even though God could have spoken to each person individually with a thundering voice, He chose to test people by sending another person, a friend, a neighbor, someone younger, someone not so esteemed, to deliver those warnings as a test of their hearts to see if they would receive it. Being corrected by others indicates that you are still not like Jesus in some ways. Our reaction to those corrections will secure one of two destinations in eternity.

Scriptures

Proverbs 27:5 AMPC
Open rebuke is better than love that is hidden.

Proverbs 12:1 NKJV
Whoever loves instruction loves knowledge, But he who hates correction is stupid.

Proverbs 19:20 AMPC
Hear counsel, receive instruction, and accept correction, that you may be wise in the time to come.

Proverbs 15:5 NKJV
A fool despises his father’s instruction, But he who receives correction is prudent.

Deuteronomy 18:18 TLB
I will raise up from among them a prophet, an Israeli like you. I will tell him what to say, and he shall be my spokesman to the people.

Hebrews 12:8 AMPC
Now if you are exempt from correction and left without discipline in which all [of God’s children] share, then you are illegitimate offspring and not true sons [at all].