The Cost of Silence

Silence rarely looks dramatic. Most days it looks like a friendly smile on Sunday, a quick chat about the weather, then a quiet drive home with the same knot in your stomach and nobody who really knows what’s going on underneath. We start with the famous “bystander effect” story and ask a harder question: where are we staying quiet when someone near us needs truth, help, or presence?

We talk about why so many church relationships become a mile wide and an inch deep, and how a culture of independence trains us to protect a public persona rather than practice honest Christian community. Discipleship, accountability, and spiritual growth are designed to occur within the body of Christ, not in isolation.

Genesis 34 gives a painfully concrete picture of what silence can cost. Jacob “holds his peace,” Dinah’s voice disappears, and the vacuum fills with chaos. From there, we get practical with Hebrews 10:24-25 and the small, brave first steps toward “cruciform community” built on the cross: humility to be approachable, courage to be lovingly honest, and a willingness to say four life-changing words: “We need to talk.” We also make room for listeners carrying church hurt and offer a path of prayer, forgiveness, and real conversations. If this hits home, subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review so more people find the courage to go first.

Transcript

Kitty Genovese And Staying Quiet

SPEAKER_02 0:20

Well, there's a story from 1964 that got embedded in many psychology textbooks, TED Talks, and a fair amount of sermons that I've heard over the years. March 13th, Kew Gardens, Queens, New York. A young woman named Kitty Genovese is attacked outside her apartment building. She was stabbed and sexually assaulted and murdered. And according to the New York Times, 38 witnesses watched from their windows, and not one of them called the police. That story became the most famous case study in social psychology. They called it the bystander effect. And the more people present in a crisis, the less likely any of them is to act, because everyone assumes someone else will handle it. Here's the thing, though. But by then the legend was so embedded in the culture the correction didn't even make the front page.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

You know what I find interesting? Even though the reported story was false, the instinct it described, I feel like is very real. We stay quiet in the face of hard things of evil. We assume someone else will say something. And so nobody does.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

Yeah. And it's not just a social psychology problem. It turns out God has something to say about it way before the textbooks did. Well, welcome to Free Indeed. My name is Rich. I'm here with my wife and co-host Kirsten. Hello. And today we're going deep on what it actually costs us when nobody really knows us and nobody says a word.

SPEAKER_00 2:24

Okay. I have a question for you, dear. How many people would you say actually know you? Like really know you? They know the dirt on you, your strengths, your weaknesses, your struggles, and they're not afraid to tell you the truth when you need to hear it. How many?

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Well, I'd say fewer than I'd like to admit. I am a pastor, which should probably be embarrassing, but I think it just makes me pretty normal to have so few of those kind of people. I mean, we're surrounded by people every day, but most of them have no real idea about what's going on, you know, beneath the surface of us, right?

SPEAKER_00 3:10

Well, today we're talking about knowing and being known, specifically within the body of Christ. And I want to start by naming something I think most of us feel, but rarely say out loud. We're stuck in relationships that are a mile wide and about an inch deep. Even at church, we talk about the Broncos, at least here in Denver we do. We talk about the weather. We might dip our toes into politics if we're feeling brave, but we don't know how that person's marriage is actually doing, or what keeps them up at three in the morning, or what temptation they've been quietly losing to for the last six months. And what does that cost us? What are we actually missing?

SPEAKER_02 4:03

Well, you and I talked about this the other day. Um, Paul David Tripp has this concept that he calls identity amnesia. And it's the idea that we are so prone to forgetting who we are in Christ that we literally need other people around us to remind

Relationships A Mile Wide

SPEAKER_02 4:20

us. I mean, not just a cheesy way, um, just people are who are close enough to know where you actually crack. Because if you don't have that, you're fighting alone, and fighting alone is a losing strategy.

SPEAKER_00 4:35

I like that phrase, identity amnesia, because none of us wake up every morning feeling like we are deeply loved and forever secure in Christ. We wake up with that knot in our stomach, that feeling of dread, the mental checklist of everything that could go sideways today.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

I mean, I know what that morning looks like. It's just that I want to pull the covers back over my head. And if there was just a button to skip the next 24 hours, I'd I'd take it. There, you know, it's usually when there's conversations that I'm dreading, decisions I don't want to make, temptations that I'm exhausted from fighting. But that's all of us every morning. And the question is, who in your life actually knows that?

SPEAKER_00 5:23

Okay, so I I have a question for you. Want your thoughts on this? Why aren't we intentional about building those kinds of relationships? Because it requires intentionality. It's not something that just happens. You know, like I think about little kids. I am always in the toddler class at church. I love our toddlers. And you notice that kids they build relationships easily because they can just play with each other. Um, they're in the same space, they generally have the same feelings about things, and you know, they just connect on the playground or whatever. You make friends easily. But as we become adults, it becomes a lot harder and it takes a lot more intention. So why don't we do that? What keeps us from going there?

SPEAKER_02 6:14

Honestly, I think we've made this culture, or basically it's made a religion out of not needing anybody. And we've we've perfected the art of this public persona that we put on. So by the time that most of us were, you know, eight or nine years old, you know, like you're talking third, fourth grade, we've already learned which things you don't talk about, which version of yourself that you show the world, and and church, I'd say strangely enough, can reinforce that where you're trained uh to show up, to look fine, go home, nobody asks, nobody tells.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah, which is I don't know, that's a great tragedy, I think, because the body of Christ is the one place you should be authentic. You should be able to come as you are, declaring your dependence on the Lord and your need for your brothers and sisters, you know.

SPEAKER_02 7:10

And go deeper than those cocktail party conversations, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:13

Um so this is weird. I don't know if this is true or not, but I heard recently that suburban neighborhoods are often now being built without sidewalks. I don't know what city planner, what neighborhood planner decided that. But because so many of us just want to pull into the garage and close the door behind us before we have to see anyone, interact with anyone. That's weird. That's not just architecture.

SPEAKER_02 7:47

No, that's a worldview with a driveway.

SPEAKER_00 7:51

Yeah, I I heard another podcast recently about the front porch culture that we need to develop as the church, as the body of Christ, to um welcome people. Because the front porch is kind of where people are welcomed, you get to know them, it feels non-threatening, you know, before they enter your house. It's where you, you know, get to know neighbors and all that kind of stuff. So anyway, we've kind of lost the front porch culture, but okay. So earlier we asked the question, what do we lose when we don't have those intentionally deep relationships with people um within the body of Christ? So bear with me. I I want to connect a few dots in scripture. It's something I've kind of been thinking about lately, meditating on. Um, I think the Apostle Paul gives us a framework of why this matters so much, and it it matters more than we understand and realize. So um I've been looking at 2 Corinthians 3, 17 and 18, and I will read it for you. It says, uh, now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom, and we all with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, who is the spirit. So, according to this sanctification, big fancy Bible word.

SPEAKER_02 9:38

Um, it's just I love it when you talk Christian ease.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Oh gosh, it just means becoming more like Christ over time, right? Growing, maturing in the Lord. That happens by the Holy Spirit as we behold the glory of the Lord, as we study and focus on, meditate on the glory of the Lord. But here is where it gets interesting. How exactly do we behold

Persona Religion And Front Porch

SPEAKER_00 10:05

his glory? One way is through scripture, yes, that's a huge way we see Christ in his word, right? But follow me over to 1 John 4 12. This is New Living Translation. It says, No one has ever seen God, but if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 10:35

I see where you're going.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

So without intentional deep community within the body of Christ, really doing life together, loving one another, we can't experience the full expression of God's love. We literally cannot grow in Christ the way we are designed to and meant to, if we're trying to do this alone.

SPEAKER_02 11:00

Yeah. And logging into a live stream from your couch on Sunday morning just doesn't cover it. And I say that as the guy making the live stream every week, um, but completely understand and sympathize with those who don't have any other option, right?

SPEAKER_01 11:16

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:18

Yeah. Well, there's this chapter in Genesis. I've been teaching through Genesis for about a year now. My goodness, going through a series. And uh, we're up to chapter 34, that I think is one of the most uncomfortable passages in the entire Bible, and it's the perfect picture of what we've been talking about here.

SPEAKER_00 11:35

I I was praying for you all week and I was wondering how you were gonna teach this one. Oh man. It's one of those chapters at first glance you think, I wish I could just skip that, but it's the word of God. It's what what does Second Timothy three say about all scripture is um God breathed and useful for instruction, reproof, training, and righteousness, all of that. Anyway, yeah, okay, so set up chapter, uh, Genesis chapter 34 for us, dear.

SPEAKER_02 12:08

Well, Jacob, you know, you've had Father Abraham and uh who was God made a covenant with um to where his descendants would be, as many as the stars and and uh would bring about, you know, basically the Messiah, um, his son Isaac and then his son Jacob. Um Jacob's finally arrived in the in the land that God had promised um them. He builds an altar, he draws this line in the sand that his household now belongs to God. And then in the very next breath, he pitches his tent facing the city of Shechem, uh, which is Canaanite territory. And God already kind of established that that was spiritually compromised ground. And his daughter Dinah uh ends up walking into that city alone. Nobody stopped her, nobody asked whether that was a wise decision, because when you've been pointing your family in that direction long enough, it just starts to feel normal.

SPEAKER_00 13:09

And something terrible happens to Dinah there.

SPEAKER_02 13:13

Yeah, so Dinah's she's violated by the the prince of the city. Jacob finds out, and the text just says that he held his peace. I mean, this is deliberate sil silence. I mean, there's no prayer, no rage, no plan, just nothing. And I don't think that's because Jacob was a bad man. I mean, he wrestled with God, he built the altar, he knew exactly who he was supposed to be. But knowing who you're supposed to be and actually showing up as that person in the in the worst moment of your life, I mean, those are two very different things. And without anyone close enough to

Freedom Grows In Loved Community

SPEAKER_02 13:55

speak into his life, without anyone who actually knew where he was weak, he just went quiet and his family needed him the most.

SPEAKER_00 14:03

Yeah, and that kind of style silence, for anyone who has experienced it, um, that kind of silence doesn't stay neutral.

SPEAKER_02 14:13

No, it never does. His sons have to step into the vacuum and the whole thing just unravels into violence. And when it's over, Jacob's only concern is his reputation. It's not Dinah, it's not God, just what does this cost me? And the chapter ends with a father and his sons just talking past each other in the wreckage, and and God's nowhere in the conversation. Not because he left, but because nobody even thought to include him.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

There's one thing about Dinah in this story. I I don't want us to skip past. She is present in every scene and quoted in exactly none of them. Her story gets told entirely by other people.

SPEAKER_02 15:03

Yeah. But what I pointed out in this sermon was that God wrote her into the text anyway. I mean, he preserved her name. He could have left her out, but he didn't. And that tells me that whatever has been done to you that nobody named, whatever conversation happened happened about you when you weren't in the room, I mean, he saw it and and he sees you, and he's not asking you to stay silent about it either.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

Okay, so what is the connection back to community? Like, why does this story, Genesis 34, Dinah, this whole story, why does it belong in this episode, this about knowing and being known?

SPEAKER_02 15:50

Yeah, I'd say it's because Jacob, he didn't fail in that moment because he was faithless. He failed because he was alone in the way that actually matters, that nobody knew where he was weak. Nobody was close enough to say the hard thing before the crisis hit. I mean, deep community isn't just this nice feature of the Christian life. It's what keeps you from holding your peace when everything in you wants to go quiet.

SPEAKER_00 16:19

Okay, so we've named the problem, which is that we don't really know each other. We stay quiet and it costs the people around us more than we realize. So what do we actually do about it? Because I think it's tricky, especially if you have been kind of isolated, um, whether intentionally or just it just happens, you know, life gets away from you and you're not consistent at church, or even if you are, you don't have deep, meaningful relationships,

Genesis 34 When Silence Spreads

SPEAKER_00 16:55

right? So how do we find our way back?

SPEAKER_02 16:59

I think Hebrews 10, 24, and 25 is where I want to land with that. It says, let me see, I think this is an ESV. Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another. And most pastors preach that, and most people read that and hear go to church on Sunday. And yes, I mean that's in there, but the passage is much bigger than that. I mean, consider how to stir up one another to love and good deeds. That actually requires knowing the other person. You can only stir up someone you actually understand. You have to know where they get stuck, where they go numb, where the lies uh, you know, that they believe about themselves live. You can only minister and counsel to what you know. And I'd say to the degree that we're living in networks of terminally casual relationships, we have almost no capacity to actually do that for each other.

SPEAKER_00 18:11

Yeah. Um going back to one of our favorite biblical counselors and pastors, Paul David Dripp. Oh, yeah. He puts it this way I think this kind of reframes everything. Sunday morning should be the celebration of the deep community that's been happening between Sundays, not the one hour in the week where you get your community fix, so to speak.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

Oh, yeah. And what that tells me is that if Sunday is the only place that you experience real community, then something's off. And I'd say, I mean, I say that as the guy who plans Sunday morning, right?

SPEAKER_00 18:53

I wonder how much of our unwillingness to know people and be known is also just the flesh because we're lazy and we're tired, and it takes a lot of effort to be willing, it takes a lot of unselfishness to be willing to know someone else, to love them, to ask them questions and actually listen when they answer, you know, that kind of thing. It takes effort, it takes time, it takes a willingness to sacrifice for someone else's good. And I think often, uh at least for me, it's just kind of the flesh. I'm tired. Yeah, I'd rather just keep to myself, I'd rather stay home. It's easier. Yeah. So it's one of those things you kind of have to put to death the desires of the flesh and walk in the spirit and be willing to intentionally love other people.

SPEAKER_02 19:49

And walk around your neighborhood.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

And walk around your neighborhood. Find one that has sidewalks. Yeah. Utilize those sidewalks. Okay, so this is all great information, but what does this actually look like in practice? What does intentional deep community look like when it's functioning the way it's supposed to? And and I would add, like, how do we get there? What are the baby steps? You know, because I know we have listeners who, for whatever reason, have been out of community.

SPEAKER_01 20:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:24

And they need to get back. But would do I just show up on Sunday morning? Like, what how how does a person do that?

SPEAKER_02 20:32

I think it should start with identifying someone in your life who can actually know you on that intimate level. You know, that you can let onto the front porch and then let into the house and know kind of where you hit the wall, and someone who knows the the version of you that only comes out when things don't go your way. And you know, someone who knows whether your marriage is actually as solid as it looks on Sunday morning, or whether you and your spouse are running on parallel tracks and calling it fine, you know. Um somebody who knows your temptations who can hold you accountable and and uh knows when you're just doing things in your own strength, when you're getting tired and and weak in the flesh. And uh, you know, those places where you're kind of a mess and somebody you can trust.

SPEAKER_00 21:27

Um, I would say that kind of relationship requires two things that don't really come naturally to us. Um, the humility to be approachable, which means you actually have to let people in, right? You lower the drawbridge, you welcome the intrusion into your private space instead of pulling the garage door shut. And yeah, humility is a good word because that kind of fear that Keeps people out. I feel like that's just a backward form of pride. Pride, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's pride. Um, it also requires the courage to believe to be lovingly honest, which means you're willing to say the hard thing to someone else. Not because you think you're the Holy Spirit, we are not the Holy Spirit, not as like their moral auditor, sniffing out sin in someone else's life, but as someone who genuinely believes that the grace of God is available and and wants to be an instrument of it. Someone who can restore another in the spirit of gentleness, like Galatians tells us.

SPEAKER_02 22:45

Yeah. And I'd say here's where the cross becomes the foundation rather than just the starting point. Because this kind of community, that deep, honest, costly kind, only works if it's built on what Christ has already done. I move towards you not because I trust that this is going to be neat and uncomplicated and easy going. I move towards you because I trust the cross, because Jesus already absorbed the rejection, and that means there's hope for both of us in this, right?

SPEAKER_00 23:20

I can guarantee it's not going to be neat and uncomplicated. Oh my goodness. Just to judge now. But it's worth it. It's it's worth it. And we call that cruciform community, crux being, you know, the cross. Community in the shape of the cross. I go toward you knowing we're both broken and this is potentially messy. I go toward you because Christ is in this and he's not leaving, and he is enough. Right? That is the solid ground we can both stand on. Not our track record of doing this well. It's him, it's Jesus, right?

SPEAKER_02 24:01

Amen.

SPEAKER_00 24:02

So if someone hears all this and they genuinely want it, but they don't know where to start, what is that first step? And maybe I'm throwing impromptu things at you here, but maybe speak a little bit also to someone who has experienced church hurt. Because I think that's a big thing. And I have thoughts on that too.

SPEAKER_02 24:29

Yeah. I mean, where it always starts is I said in the the Genesis 34 sermon is four words we need to talk. And that takes the form of hey, can you grab coffee or let's grab lunch, let's uh let's get together and and uh not coming with a perfect script, you know, no guarantee of outcome, just a decision that the the cost of staying quiet and and uh alone is higher than the the cost of the the conversation. I mean that's whether you're feeling tired and run down and whether you wonder or not, it's just gonna be meaningful and and I mean it. That sentence,

We Need To Talk First Steps

SPEAKER_02 25:10

you know, we need to talk said whether you're scared or or tired, imperfect, it's changed things. It's salvaged marriages that were almost gone when we need to talk. It's caught addictions before they went completely underground. It's been the moment a kid remembered 20 years later when someone asked him who showed up for them. Um so I have to, you know, just ask, you know, our listeners, who are you not saying that to right now? And on the and on the church hurt side, I mean, I think that's the same thing. It's just I don't think enough people have conversations. Either they, you know, there's a lot of misunderstandings, a lot of lack of communication in churches, and and uh I'd say those four words of we need to talk is um pretty applicable to that as well, because if you just sit down with your pastor or sit down with somebody that you might have had a um a difficult time with in the church, I think having sitting down and having a conversation and just prayerfully going into that, being led by the spirit to um to gain understanding and to um just find out what's going on and find out what the root of whatever it is, I think has saved many churches and many relationships too.

SPEAKER_00 26:26

So and honestly when it comes to church hurt, which I know it can be a very legitimate thing in some cases, um because we're we're imperfect people, and as followers of Christ, we're indwelt by his spirit. The power of sin has been broken in our lives, but the presence of sin is still there. So we hurt each other, we sin against each other, whether we mean to or not. Um, and that's why I think Jesus talks so much about forgiveness in the gospels. But one thing I would encourage our listeners, if you have been hurt um within, you know, a church context, is to really take some time to pray and ask the Lord to search your heart and show you why it hurts so much. Whatever that person said or did or didn't say or didn't do, you know, whatever the case, maybe it's legit, maybe it's justified that you were hurt, but also why? Why did that hurt so much? What was I putting my hope in? Where was my identity? Um, what has been ruling my heart, if not Christ, and all this that has allowed this to hurt so much and fester so much. So there's the external part like you just mentioned, dear, about needing to uh, you know, make amends, do what you can to communicate with people and and bring those things out into the light and talk. And then I think there's the internal part between us and the Lord where we we have to let him bring our heart out into the light and expose maybe what we haven't seen that's been going on there.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

Yeah. Um being on the receiving end of that, it's never easy when someone comes to you with something difficult. Yeah. I mean, which it's happened to me many times, it's it's hard to to do, but you have to receive it as, you know, as grace.

SPEAKER_00 28:33

Um that happens within our marriage. Oh my goodness. Yes. We're always calling each other out on stuff.

SPEAKER_02 28:39

Self-awareness isn't always a gi, you know, is always a gift because we have blind spots, and I say the person willing to risk the conversation and say the hard things, you know, usually isn't attacking you. They're they're choosing you, so you kind of got to receive it that way.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

It's it should be, and hopefully is an act of love. Yeah. You know, because they love you and they want to see you grow, they want to see you experience healing in the Lord, and that takes hard conversations. So whether you are on the giving end of that or the receiving end of that, we need to bathe that in prayer and just take hold of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_02 29:21

Yeah. So if you're in a season right now where genuinely nobody knows you like that, I'd encourage you to start small, just find one person, have one honest conversation. I mean, you don't have to fix a decade of surface-level relationships in in a week, you know, you just have to to go first and be the the first one to ask, and then trust God with what comes next.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

Yeah, and just know that it takes time, especially as an adult, it takes time to build friendships. It just does. So maybe you're at a church you've been at forever, maybe you're just trying a new church for the first time. Um just be willing to start conversations, get to know people, try to build friendships and know that it may take time, and that's okay. Just keep praying about it, keep pursuing it, keep showing up and and just trust the Lord.

SPEAKER_02 30:16

That's good. Well, before we wrap up, I do want to say something directly to anyone listening who maybe doesn't have the cross as their foundation yet, because everything we've been talking about today is only sustainably possible from that starting point.

SPEAKER_00 30:34

Amen. So every one of us has lived behind the persona. We've stayed quiet when we should have spoken up, we've kept people at arm's length, we've been our own authority, right? And that has consequences. Separation from

Church Hurt Forgiveness And Receiving Truth

SPEAKER_00 30:55

God now and forever. That's not religious language, that's just the honest diagnosis. That's what the word of God says.

SPEAKER_02 31:05

But thankfully God didn't stay silent about that. I mean, he sent his son to this earth, his only begotten, and Jesus lived the life that we couldn't, and he died absorbing everything that we've done and left undone, every silence that costs someone else, every wound that we caused or carried, and and for anyone who turns from their own way from from their sin and and trusts in him, God doesn't just wipe the record, he puts a spirit inside you, he gives you a new name, he makes you part of a family not built on performance but on grace. And that's the starting pro point. I mean, that's not a that's not a program, that's not trying harder to be a better community member. That's coming to the cross. And if you're not there yet, that's where it all begins.

SPEAKER_00 31:54

And honestly, none of this works without that relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Yeah. You're not gonna get that deep, meaningful community with anyone if you're not, you know, both sharing the same spirit, the same life. So Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:10

So encourage you to to reach out to us if uh if you're ready to do that or or uh you're done trying it on your own and and uh doing it in your own strength. And and uh we'd love to to pray with you and and uh be there with you um and walk you through that. So I want to thank you for for hanging out with us today. If this episode stirred something in you, uh, you know, the conversation you've been putting off, uh a person that you do need to go deeper with, don't just let that feeling pass, you know, say those four words.

SPEAKER_00 32:41

We need to talk.

SPEAKER_02 32:43

Yes, and stay there. And if this was helpful, please share it with someone who needs it. We'll we'll see you next time on Freed Indeed.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

Yes, indeed. We have some interesting interviews coming up in the next few weeks, and I'm excited about that. But if you want to connect with us, if you want to learn more about Gather Church in Inglewood, Colorado, that's our little home church, we would love to hear from you. You can reach us at hello at freedindeed.co.

SPEAKER_02 33:18

Or freedendeed.co the website.

SPEAKER_00 33:21

Or freedindeed.co the website. But reach out to us. We love hearing from you guys. It's cool to see random listeners all over the world tuning in. We just we love it and we thank you for listening.