Say the Quiet Part Out Loud…

Recently a truck clearly displaying the name and logo of a business on it passed me.  On the back of the truck were these words:  “we under promise and over perform.”

After hearing many athletes, politicians and news reporters saying things they regretted over hot mics, my first thought after reading the back of the truck was that this was another example of saying the quiet part out loud. 

Unfortunately I think many of us have it turned around a little bit and we are quiet about the parts we should be loud about.

·      We are quiet about addictions when we should be confessing them to God and to others we can trust to listen, keep it in confidence and pray for us.

·      We are quiet about bad habits we desperately want to break and that we know we need help to break, but we walk in and out of church on Sunday smiling as if everything is great.

·      We have friends ask how we are and we are quiet about what we should be loud about.

I am not suggesting that talking about those parts of our lives is easy.  Perhaps you were told repeatedly as a kid that you were to be seen and not heard.  Perhaps you believe that trying to put others firsts means you can never talk about yourself and that it’s selfish to talk about yourself.  Perhaps shame has been such a huge part of your life that the thought of sharing your struggles with someone else is nearly inconceivable.  Perhaps it’s because those conversations can feel very embarrassing.  We have many long held and valid reasons that we are quiet about the parts we should be saying out loud.

Please do it anyway.  Please be open with someone you trust.  Little may change in your life if you don’t first change in this area and let yourself be heard.  Sometimes we only feel truly seen when we are truly heard and we can’t be truly heard when we are silent.

Principle Four from Celebrate Recovery’s Road to Recovery encourages us to ‘Openly examine and confess my faults to myself, to God and to someone I trust’ and this passage in James tells us why.

Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise.  Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord.  And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven.  Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.  James 5:13-16

The world is full of people saying the quiet part out loud.  Is it your turn to be open with yourself, with God and with someone you trust about something in your life you've been quiet about?