Advocate or Accuser
“Bird” - Heather French
I once received an email from a friend who saw something in my life and felt called to point it out to me. It was about how my wife, Gina, and I parent our kids. I am not always good at receiving this kind of feedback. It’s embarrassing. It makes me feel weird to think people are watching, noticing things. This is so often an avenue of judgment and accusation.
Many people don’t understand that the name “Devil” means “Accuser.” It comes (literally) from the idea of throwing stones. On the other hand, both God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are described in the Bible as our Advocate. It is a Trinitarian task to advocate for those who are in Christ.
It really does need to be said that loving people includes a call to engaging in loving confrontation. If I hate my children, I fail to confront them with their rebellion and sin. This is the case even—no, particularly—when what they are doing comes naturally. That’s what sin is, and Christians are called to die to sin in order to live. Failing to correct, refusing to say the same thing God says about our sin, is a way of hating our children, and each other.
That being said, are the fellow-Christians you are letting speak into your life more like Accusers or Advocates?
An Advocate will call you to come clean and do right, but keeps coming back to making an argument on your behalf.
An Accuser can’t see past your sin.
An Advocate can see who you’re becoming.
An Accuser can see the worst of what you’ve done.
An Advocate sees the long story of your life.
An Accuser says, “I know you’re guilty.”
An Advocate says, “I’m on your side.”
That email I mentioned above was from an Advocate. He couldn’t wait to share with me things he saw in our home life that were beautiful to him. He was eager to heap praise and to point out what God was doing.
I needed that. Because, as I wrote to him,
“It’s easy enough to believe only the mess of imperfection that we can see of our lives, and be blind to the good things God is doing. Thanks for seeing that and for taking the time and energy to point it out.”
I don’t want to condone and celebrate sin. I want to avoid hitching a ride on the bandwagon where rebellion and death are celebrated.
But I want to be an advocate for my brothers and sisters in Christ. I want to see more than sin and the sinner, I want eyes also for the emerging (and already-positioned) saint. I want to be a Christ-faithful ally, one who isn’t surprised to see sin in others but is quick to extend grace.
I get that my categories of Advocate and Accuser are not air-tight by any means. But here’s my question.
Would you more easily be described as an Accuser or an Advocate?
I’m not entirely comfortable with how long it takes me to think about how to answer that. So, onward…toward grace.
And a beautiful place to start is in our families.
S.D. Smith
S. D. Smith is the author of The Green Ember Series, a million+ selling adventure saga featuring heroic #RabbitsWithSwords. The Green Ember spent time as the number one bestselling audiobook in the world on Audible. He is also the author of the madcap Mooses with Bazookas: And Other Stories Children Should Never Read. Finally, he has co-authored The Jack Zulu Series with his son J.C. Smith. Smith’s stories are captivating readers across the globe who are hungry for “new stories with an old soul.”
Heather French
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetur adipiscing elit. Quisque faucibus ex sapien vitae pellentesque sem placerat. In id cursus mi pretium tellus duis convallis. Tempus leo eu aenean sed diam urna tempor. Pulvinar vivamus fringilla lacus nec metus bibendum egestas. Iaculis massa nisl malesuada lacinia integer nunc posuere. Ut hendrerit semper vel class aptent taciti sociosqu. Ad litora torquent per conubia nostra inceptos himenaeos.
