Cynicism – My Greatest Battle

It was November 2020. I was just entering into another season, yet not an unfamiliar one. It was a season of heartbreak and hurt. Feelings of betrayal, shallow conflict handling, and passionate longings swirled within my heart and psyche—you know that feeling right? You feel like you’re on that one funnel-shaped water slide at the amusement park, never quite knowing when your tube is going to spin, go up, or go down. Such is the description of many of my seasons in life, and I believe all can relate. 

In the wake of this season, I was scheduled to be in North Carolina for a weekend to preach at the church that I was part of during my time in the Army. I was planning to take the weekend to pray, fast, seek the Lord, and quite frankly beg the Lord to redeem and shift the situation that was I in. I wanted to harness the power of the prophets of old and beg God with unwavering fervor and zeal to do a work in someone else’s heart. Little did I know the overwhelming work that had to be done in my own heart that God was beginning and preparing to unveil.

“You’re cynical.” Those were the words that were spoken to me that I did not fully understand. Nevertheless, they reigned true and would set me on a path toward the next self-battle that I would face. I am beyond thankful for people who are willing to speak graceful, confrontational truth into my life because they love me. These people are hard to find, and I don’t mean that cynically (pun intended).

Before moving forward and unveiling the layers of my depraved heart, allow me to impart to you some things that I learned about cynicism and define it for you. Cynicism is generally defined as being distrustful of others; it is having a negative presumption, and therefore assumption, of someone else’s intent. Simply put, you assume the worst possible outcome of a situation and then live in light of that assumption.^2,3 This is a dangerous thing to do because we do not hold that intuition nor power. Kurt Skelly, Pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Fredericksburg, VA once said, “The Bible, unlike any other book, or any other conversations we can have has the authority to tell us what the motive was.”⁴ We must not put upon ourselves the authority of assumption that only Scripture holds.

Let me be clear, I would have never defined myself in this way. I never would have claimed this to be my greatest battle, struggle, or sin. To be transparent, I always considered it to be lust. From the time of middle school, for about a decade I had been engulfed in pornography and an addiction thereof, indulging in sexual immorality at a young age, and learning what the ends thereof were. But to be honest, in my earliest adult years God began a course in my heart that completely broke those chains that I had so long experienced. As I look back on that timeframe of my life, I now believe that those actions and choices were actually an outflow from this issue that I am writing about today—cynicism.

You see, for me, before I heard the word cynicism, I was beginning to notice another tendency in my life that I knew needed to be addressed. That tendency was that I would harden myself to the world around me. The feelings, the emotions, the out-of-control parts of life, the hurts, the pains, the failures, the successes, the victories, the defeats, the high times, and the low times… I could just turn them off—nearly on the brink of numbness. I loved it too, it made me feel powerful and in control. I would do this in situations in the name of temperance (self-control), thinking that I had mastered control over my emotions. I am learning that there is a difference between self-control and self-hardening.

Nevertheless, I didn’t know why I had noticed this at the time, but that was how God began to work me toward this new realization that I was coming to and the next stage of my sanctification. 

I am learning that there is a difference between self-control and self-hardening.

So, what did this look like? How did it come across in my life? Well, I would have appeared to have everything under control. “Cynicism is so undetectable because it is so justifiable. It wears a mask of insight and godliness, but it conceals festering wounds of harbored bitterness against God and neighbor. We need to understand cynicism, because the masks we wear tell us about the wounds we hide, and point us to the Savior who yearns to mend them.”¹ That was me. Bring me a question—here’s your answer. Emotions start rising—turn them off (after all, I am too spiritual to be swayed by such a frivolous concept as emotions). The truth was, I was miserable. Another truth was, I wanted to feel, but was terrified to because of the number of times I had put my emotions into the trust of another and been left in heartache. Alfred Lord Tennyson would speak wisely to this point with his famous words:

“I hold it true, whate’er befall;

I feel it, when I sorrow most;

‘Tis better to have loved and lost

Than never to have loved at all.” 

I thought that my cynicism (even though I wouldn’t have called it that at the time) was biblically justified. After all, is not the heart deceitful and above all things desperately wicked; “who can know it?” Are not mankind and humanity capable of the deepest depravities that have ever been pondered in one’s heart? How could I fully trust someone? Ever? (I will be writing in the near future on “The Risk of Trust”).

I mean truly. 

Deeply. 

Dearly.

How?

The first step that I knew I would have to do (as with all spiritual endeavors) was to understand the issue, understand why I struggled with it, and uproot that system that so deeply coursed throughout the fabric of my being. [To save time, I recommend that you click on the first link at the bottom of this post. It is a post on cynicism by Paul Maxwell and can succinctly summarize much of this search that I set out on.] There is one quote that I wanted to share though because I believe that it summarizes my situation well, “Cynics are cornered sufferers who have turned their shields into blunt swords.”¹ If you know me, this is me.

My mom says, “He’s meaner than a snake.” My dad tells me, “You do tend to just say what you’re thinking even if the other person doesn’t want it.” I have been told that, “I feel like I can’t be who I am around you” and “I have been scared to share my opinion.” This is wrong. This is harmful. This is hurtful. This must be fixed. This is how it comes to fruition in my life and then normally it just explodes whatever sanctity of relation had been built. It may not be just like this for everyone though. Paul Maxwell also points out, “It is easier for a woman to explain her singleness in terms of male immaturity than it is to face the possibility of being unwanted.”¹ All of this is connected, though it may manifest itself in different ways, cynicism has a foundation that thinks, “I can’t possibly be the problem, it has to be them.”

Honestly, truthfully, lovingly, firmly, I believe we are narcissists at our core (even though we are first to accuse others of being such). We are the fulfillment of Paul’s prophetic warning that “men shall be lovers of themselves.” We think ourselves to be the cream of the crop when it comes to what God has to offer by spirituality, wisdom, godliness, and Christlikeness; when in actuality, we are the ones that stand in need of a loving God’s grace, mercy, kindness, and love more than most others.

Let me be vulnerable and clear with you, and then I won’t keep you much longer. This sin of cynicism has cost me relationships. Not just dating relationships with wonderful, godly girls who never deserved my distrust nor the ignorance of this underlying sin in my life, but it has cost me healthy relationships with people in general. Sure, I smile with people, I can have fun, I have close friends, but by and large, I push people away. My hardness, self-righteousness, and ill-placed assumptions have caused pain to many who love me and left a wake of relational shattering. I could sit here and pander on my upbringing and the hand I was dealt in life, but I shall not discredit the hand of the Dealer Who sovereignly saw fit to deal me such a hand. 

{Jeremiah 17:9; 2 Timothy 3:2}

———

If you struggle with this same thing that I am talking about, please feel free to reach out to me. I am presently writing early on in this discovery and newfound battle, but I am always here to stumble alongside anyone who is willing to stumble with me. I do leave you with one concept that I believe shatters our fleshly cynical defaults—agape love. I will post on this down the road, for redemption and restoration are always at hand. Thank you for reading. I love you all, and God is good.

Until we write again…..

                                    In, for, and because of Christ,

                                                               V.S. See

1. https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/putting-off-cynicism – This link seems to no longer be active.

2. https://www.dictionary.com/browse/cynical

3. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cynical

4. http://inthegospel.com/episode32/