08/29/2026
I wrote yesterday about correcting people. How to do it, when, and who's actually qualified to go.
Here's the part nobody wants to talk about.
What do you do when somebody corrects you?
Because we've all got a scripture ready when we're the one bringing the word. We turn into theologians when we're on the giving end. But let somebody come to us, gently, privately, and tell us we're wrong about something, and suddenly we've got a hundred reasons why they had no business saying it.
They don't know my whole situation. They've got their own issues. Who are they to talk to me. That's just their opinion. They came at me wrong. Maybe some of that's even true. Doesn't matter. Look at what scripture says about the man who takes it.
"Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee." Proverbs 9:8.
Read that again. The same words go to two different men, and the only difference is what's inside them. One walks away hating you. The other walks away loving you more than he did before. Same rebuke. Different heart.
That verse has haunted me for sometime, because it means my reaction to correction tells me which one I am. Not my doctrine. Not my calling. Not how long I've been in church. My reaction.
"He that refuseth instruction despiseth his own soul: but he that heareth reproof getteth understanding." Proverbs 15:32.
Despiseth his own soul. That's strong language. God says a man who won't be told anything isn't protecting himself, he's harming himself. He thinks he's guarding his dignity. He's actually starving his own understanding.
"Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful." Proverbs 27:6.
A friend will wound you. That's in the Bible. The person who never says a hard thing to you isn't necessarily kind, and the sting of a true word from somebody who loves you is worth more than a thousand compliments from somebody who doesn't care what becomes of you.
And here's one that ought to settle it for everybody who preaches. Paul, an apostle, was corrected publicly by another apostle. "But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed." Galatians 2:11. That's Peter. The one who preached Pentecost. If Peter could be wrong and could be told about it, then so can I, and so can you.
So let me say the thing I have to preach to myself.
When somebody brings me a word, my first job isn't to evaluate their standing. It's to ask whether the thing is true.
They may have said it clumsily. They may have picked a terrible moment. Their motive might not even be clean. None of that changes whether the thing they said is true. And if it's true, God can send it through a broken vessel just like He sent it through a donkey once, and I'd be a fool to reject the message because I didn't care for the messenger.
I'll be honest with you. I don't take it well every time. Something rises up in me that wants to explain myself before I've even finished hearing them out. I've learned that the rising up is the flesh trying to protect an image, and the image was never worth protecting anyway.
The older I get, the more I've come to see it this way. Every person who has ever loved me enough to tell me a hard truth has cost themselves something to do it. They risked the friendship. They knew I might get cold with them. And they said it anyway, because they wanted me right more than they wanted me comfortable.
That's not an attack. That's a gift, and most of the time it comes wrapped in something that hurts to open.
"Let the righteous smite me; it shall be a kindness: and let him reprove me; it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break my head." Psalm 141:5.
An excellent oil. David called correction an anointing.
So here's my question, and I'll ask myself before I ask you.
When was the last time somebody told you that you were wrong about something, and you actually stopped and considered that they might be right?
If you can't remember, that's worth praying about today.
