Blogging in Christ — Issue 9

Correction, Received

A piece that has gone out does not stay in the writer's hands. Replies come back. Some praise it. Some question it. Some strike at it. The writer who has learned to send the word must now learn to receive what returns, because the reply is part of the work, not an interruption of it. The question is not whether correction will come. It will. The question is whether the writer can tell a wound from a kiss, and whether he will let a true wound do its work.

The anchor stands at the threshold. "The wounds of a friend are faithful, although the kisses of an enemy are profuse." (Prov 27:6) A wound and a kiss are both acts upon the writer, yet the proverb reverses the instinctive judgment. The wound is faithful. The kiss is profuse. Faithfulness is measured by truth, not by tenderness. Profusion is measured by abundance, not by love. A friend wounds because he will not leave an error standing. An enemy kisses because smooth words cost him nothing. The writer who judges a reply by how it feels has already misjudged it. He must judge it by whether it is true.

Therefore the open wound is better than the hidden kindness that says nothing. "Better is open rebuke than hidden love." (Prov 27:5) Hidden love keeps its counsel and lets the piece go on misquoting or softening the text. It spares the writer's feelings and sacrifices the reader's trust. Open rebuke costs the rebuker something, and that cost is itself evidence. The herald does not need protectors of his feelings. He needs tellers of the truth.

This is why correction, rightly received, is not an insult but an anointing. "Let the righteous strike me, it is kindness; let him reprove me, it is like oil on the head; don't let my head refuse it." (Ps 141:5) The psalmist does not pray that no one will strike him. He prays that his head will not refuse the strike. Refusal is the danger: the ear closes, the reply is filed unread, and the error survives because the writer protected himself from the very thing that would have healed him. A herald who refuses correction has defended his pride at the text's expense.

The first discipline of receiving, then, is slowness. "Let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger." (Jas 1:19) Swift to hear comes first, and it is a command, not a temperament. The writer's first reply must not be a defense written in the first heat, which defends the writer rather than the text. Read the correction twice: once for what it says, and once for what it might be saying beneath its tone. A harsh letter may carry a true charge. A gentle letter may carry a false one. Tone is not truth.

The second discipline is the return to the text. Every correction must be carried back to the passage it touches, and judged there. "Every Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness, that each person who belongs to God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work." (2 Tim 3:16-17) Scripture is profitable for correction: the text itself corrects. When a reply says, "You quoted this wrongly," the answer is not, "I meant well." The answer is the verse, opened again, word by word. When a reply says nothing the text can support, the writer is free to let it go, because the text has already judged it. The standard is never the writer's intention, and never the corrector's confidence. The standard is the passage.

This test protects the writer in both directions. It keeps him from swallowing every charge, and it keeps him from dismissing every charge. "Don't reprove a scoffer, lest he hate you. Reprove a wise person, and he will love you." (Prov 9:8) The difference is not in the reproof. It is in the hearer. The scoffer hates reproof because it threatens the self he has built. The wise man loves it because it threatens only the error he has made, and he would rather lose the error than keep it. Yet the writer must not use the proverb as a shield, calling every critic a scoffer so that he never has to answer. That trick turns the proverb against itself. The honest question is narrower: does this correction name a real fault in my piece, whether in quotation, in context, in connection, or in tone? If it does, the name of the corrector does not matter. The fault does.

The apostles themselves stand under this rule. "But when Peter came to Antioch, I resisted him to his face, because he stood condemned." (Gal 2:11) Peter was corrected to his face for conduct that contradicted the gospel he preached, and the record does not hide it. The telling was part of the gospel's guarding, not a breach of fellowship. A writer who thinks himself above correction has placed himself above Peter. A writer who receives correction has placed himself beside him.

Likewise, the manner of correction has its own command. "If your brother sins against you, go, show him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained back your brother." (Matt 18:15) The first showing is private, because the aim is gain, not exposure. "Brothers, even if a man is caught in some fault, you who are spiritual must restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, looking to yourself so that you also aren't tempted." (Gal 6:1) Yet roughness does not cancel a true correction, and gentleness does not make a false one true. The writer answers the claim, not the manner, and he answers it at the text.

Underneath all of this lies a deeper reading of correction itself. It is not rejection. It is love, exercised by a Father who will not leave His children in error. "My son, don't despise Yahweh's discipline, neither be weary of his correction; for whom Yahweh loves, he corrects, even as a father reproves the son in whom he delights." (Prov 3:11-12) Despising says, "This correction is beneath me." Weariness says, "I have heard enough." Both close the ear that the proverb calls the mark of wisdom: "The ear that listens to reproof lives, and will be at home among the wise." (Prov 15:31) "He who refuses correction despises his own soul, but he who listens to reproof gets understanding." (Prov 15:32) Refusal is not self-defense. It is self-despite, because the man who refuses correction keeps the error and calls the keeping wisdom.

So the herald's practice, when a reply arrives, is plain. Let the reply sit until the heat passes. Carry its charge to the passage. If the passage sustains the charge, amend the piece plainly, not in secret as though the error had never stood. If it does not, answer from the passage, briefly, without contempt, and let the matter rest. If the reply is praise, receive it with thanks, without letting it become the editor. "It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools." (Eccl 7:5) The song of fools is pleasant, and it corrects nothing. The rebuke of the wise leaves the piece truer than it found it.

The writer who loves correction loves knowledge, and the writer who hates reproof has already named his own condition. "Whoever loves correction loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid." (Prov 12:1) There is no middle posture in which a man can love knowledge and refuse the means by which knowledge comes. "Listen to counsel and receive instruction, that you may be wise in your latter end." (Prov 19:20) A piece corrected today is a piece that will stand tomorrow. A piece protected from correction today is a piece that will fall when the text is finally opened beside it, as it always is, sooner or later.

Correction, received, is therefore not the end of the herald's work. It is the work, continued by another hand. The herald sends the word, and the word returns to him through the mouth of a brother, sharper than it left. He does not resent the return. He receives it, tests it at the text, amends what is false, holds what is true, and writes again. The increase is still God's. Sometimes He gives it through the sowing, and sometimes He gives it through the wound.