Matthew 7:1-5, Romans 2:1-4, 2 Corinthians 5:1-10
We are a people who love to sit in judgement, aren’t we? Think about all the TV shows that are on every week that feature people performing in different ways and being judged by celebrities in order to gain their 15 minutes of fame. What I’ve always found funny about those shows is that the judges are typically washed-up celebrities themselves. But that’s another story.
Judging, and being judgmental are well represented themes in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament. In those days, the LORD seemed to be in a never-ending state of judgment towards His people as they would rebel and repent, rebel and repent. Over and over again. And at times it seemed like the more the LORD took Israel to the woodshed, the more obstinate they would become towards Him.
When the Father sent us Jesus, the nature of judgment was changed. In Paul’s second letter to the Corinthian church, chapter 5, verse 10 it says this.
“For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we have done in this earthly body.”
Many Christians struggle with what Paul’s saying here. We live with this concern that when we die, Jesus is going to lead us into a big IMAX theater and play back for us every rotten thing we ever did in our lives. And then, once the movie’s over, Jesus will make a decision as to whether we get to stay in Heaven or not.
Let’s put that notion to rest right here. If you’ve received Jesus as your Savior in this life, when you stand before Him, He’s going to welcome you home. Your Heavenly Father will see you as He sees His Son and you will be justified, sanctified and welcomed home.
So, biblically speaking, the only one who’s really qualified to judge people in a spiritual sense is Jesus. When we take on that job, Jesus warns that we’re on dangerous ground. Look at the Sermon on the Mount. Here we have Jesus basically teaching us how to follow Him and in Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 7 verse 1, he gives us a pretty straightforward command. Take a look.
“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged.”
Let’s drill down into what Jesus is saying here. Many of you who will read this or watch the accompanying sermon (or both!) have been victimized and deeply hurt by the sinful act of another person. Trust has been betrayed; life has been turned upside down. My heart breaks for every relationship out there that suffers that catastrophic setback, especially when we’re talking about marriages.
As victims, it’s very easy for us to judge and then condemn the one who did us wrong. We want them to experience a type of prison sentence. A prison of rejection. A prison of ongoing, humiliation and blame. And look, truth be told it’s a judgment that on the one hand may be well deserved, but on the other goes against everything Jesus teaches.
A little further on in Matthew 7 Jesus talks about how we tend to get so fixated on the speck in someone else’s eye that we completely overlook the log in our own. Think of it this way. Someone has hurt me deeply. I judge and convict them of that hurt in my heart and the sentence I hand down is that says I will never forgive them, I will never let them move past their sin and every chance I get to remind them of the pain they’ve brought to my life, I will.
The problem with that approach is this. When we judge another person that way, we in a sense looking to unseat Jesus from the throne of righteousness and issue a punishment to one of His children that may have nothing to do with His plan for that person’s life. We seek to minimize the power of His grace in order to maximize our desire to pour out wrath.
And when we judge others more often than not it’s for two reasons. We lack the desire to forgive or – the biggie – handing down judgment to someone else deflects attention away from my own less than stellar lifestyle. The log in my eye. We use judgment as a means to ease our personal burdens when in fact all we do is increase the load. Because being a judge is hard work, especially for the unqualified.
So, what do we do? What exactly does Jesus expect from us as we deal with those who have brought so much pain down to our lives? That’s easy. Extend grace. One thing we all have in common is that at some point in our lives we sinned in such a way that we cried out to Jesus for grace and were humbled beyond belief to receive it. Oh, and mercy too. Don’t forget mercy. And what Jesus tells us to do in the light of receiving these precious gifts is to offer them to others. We are not to deny to someone else the grace that has been given to us.
We set aside the desire to sit in judgment and instead we give grace. And then, we may be blessed with the opportunity to stand back and see what good fruit Jesus brings forth from that. Giving up the inclination to sit in judgment is tough, but James in his epistle gives is this wonderful motivation for doing so.
My dear brothers and sisters, if someone among you wanders away from the truth and is brought back, you can be sure that whoever brings the sinner back form wandering will save that person from death and bring about the forgiveness of many sins.
Amen.