Proverbs 28:23
“Whoever rebukes a man will afterward find more favor than he who flatters with his tongue.”
What do you want from your friends? Do you want truth or flattery? Do you want the discomfort of reality or the pain of regret? Good friends speak clearly and candidly. They speak truth into your life. When it is necessary, true friends are not afraid to challenge you, hold you accountable, and rebuke you.
This topic was also addressed earlier in the book of Proverbs:
“Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.” (Proverbs 27.5-6)
When we resist honest and candid feedback from a friend, we are rejecting a valuable gift. And when we resist giving feedback, when we avoid having a necessary but uncomfortable conversation, we aren’t trying to protect the other person’s feelings so much as we are protecting our own feelings.
Failing to speak the truth is a lack of love. Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.
Beware of people who don’t speak truth to you. Beware of people who lack the courage to have difficult conversations. Be especially careful about people who seek to flatter you and “kiss” you, but who are actually hiding animosity toward you.
Our friends “wound” us when they communicate necessary but difficult messages to us. They don’t take any pleasure in wounding us. They see the need for a difficult statement – a correction – a word of warning about something they see in our lives. They say it to prevent problems, not cause pain.
They see that the wound is necessary in the short term because greater damage will result in the long term without it. Because of that motivation, they speak to us knowing that they are risking misunderstanding, risking offense, risking making us angry. Yet they see that not speaking and not wounding would be even worse. In fact, not speaking would be the most unfriendly, unloving thing they could do.
In the authentic Christian life, truth and love are integrated. They work together. As Paul says in Ephesians, “Speak the truth in love.” The authentic Christian withholds neither truth nor love. If we speak the truth without love, we are not being truthful. If we love without speaking the truth, we are not being loving. Truth is harsh and damaging if not tempered by love. Love is weak and damaging if not directed by truth.
Again: Do you want truth or flattery? Do you want the discomfort of reality or the pain of regret? We are wise to distinguish between the wounds of a friend and the kisses of an enemy. We are foolish if we don’t.
