Photo by Adi Goldstein on Unsplash

The balance between being the church's most ardent critic and most enthusiastic booster is the line where authenticity often settles.

As critics, we do so from the inside, where judgment begins in the house of the Lord. We are being self-critical.

Those who speak to the church prophetically are not seeking to tear it down, but to build it up by calling it to be what it can be. This sometimes requires difficult self-examination and a searing process of purification.

I think that one often lost point that we see in the example of Jesus is that He was critical of organized religion principally in the areas where they were most critical of others.

It was their judgmental behavior toward people and their attacks on His ministry where He was most likely to see and charge hypocrisy.

He is brutally honest with His own tribe. In order to stand before Pilate with the authority to assert the power of God's Kingdom over Rome, He must first speak to His own.

While He is clearly a subversive force against all forms of empire and injustice, He only seems harsh when dealing with those with whom He most closely aligns.

That too is subversive and contradictory of the common ways of the world where fingers most often tend to point outward.

If I must be critical, the proper order is me, mine, you, yours, and then, anyone else with deescalating severity and harshness in tone.