There is a place for artists. There is likewise a place for art critics.

There is a place for athletes. There is likewise a place for sports writers.

There is a place for leaders. There is likewise a place for commentators.

Some folks are quick to denigrate the value of the objective, uninvolved, bystanding observer, arguing that real value is found only in battling it out in the arena. Teddy Roosevelt is often credited as saying exactly this in his famous speech which begins, “It is not the critic who counts, not the [one] who points out how the strong [person] stumbles or the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit goes to the [one] who is actually in the arena…”

I wholeheartedly agree that the world only moves ahead through the exertions of Teddy’s “doers of deeds.” But I also agree those “doers” need to experience the occasional check and/or balance as they forge bravely ahead.

Hence the need for critics.

Jesus was both. Jesus DID. He walked. He preached. He healed. He taught. He reconciled. He resurrected. He fed. He comforted. He persuaded. 

But Jesus was also a vociferous critic. Most of his criticism was aimed at the religious elites of his day, and he regularly let them have it with both barrels. See, for example, his verbal flagellation of the scribes and pharisees in Matthew 23:23-34. Dude was on FIRE!! 

Even his closest disciples were not immune from Jesus’ blazing critique; even they felt the rough edge of his tongue now and then.

This is just one illustration of the part of Jesus’ approach that I most appreciate… his “both/andness.” He came into a world that was deeply “either/or” and demonstrated a better way… 

…A “both/and” way. 

Jesus was God. He was also Man. Jesus was Spirit. He was also Flesh. Jesus was holy. He was also human. Jesus was righteous. He was also grace-full. Jesus was IN the world, but he was not OF the world. Jesus lives beyond time and space, but was also firmly rooted in a specific time and specific place.

For me, John the Evangelist sums it up perfectly in the prologue to his gospel when he writes that Jesus was, “… full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14, NRSVU). Speaking for myself alone (though feel free to chime in if any of this resonates with you), I am continually falling off one side of this teeter-totter or the other. At times I try to lean as fully as I can into the “grace” side and abandon any and all standards. “Anything goes” becomes my motto as I magically transform from human being into a human-shaped doormat.

The pendulum then swings to the other side as I decide to become the Upholder of Truth for any and all issues. “Nope! That’s incorrect!” is my new battle cry as I wage war against all transgressions, from the slightest, most totally trivial (“Uh, sweetheart, that’s not really how we fold the dinner napkins, is it?”) to matters Large and Full of Consequence.

And of course, I am the guy uniquely qualified to judge the standards of rightness and wrongness because… well, never mind. I just am.

But sometimes it is then that I remember the One I am supposed to be following. Jesus. You know… the One who was not EITHER grace OR truth, but rather who was full of both grace AND truth. 

As I look around today, I see a world with a whole lot of “either/or” going on and not much “both/and.” Either/or-ity is rampant in our political spheres for sure. But it also runs virulently through the religious institutions of the land. 

I – and maybe you, too – need to pray that God somehow disabuses me of the ego need to always be right. I need to ask God to help me do a much better job of loving my neighbor as myself and to temper my truth-seeking with some grace-extending.

And vice versa.

Stay tuned. I’ll let you know how that all goes.

Abundant blessings;