Life Ministries

“Judge not lest Ye be judged” - Matthew 7:1-6 

      Jesus, here in the Sermon on the Mount, deals with two different extremes of the problem of human judgment. The first extreme is a harsh, critical spirit…that is always finding fault, and judging or jumping to conclusions by what is seen. The second extreme is permissiveness…The “Well everyone has to do their own thing” attitude.
    "Judge not, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged; and with the same measure you use, it will be measured to you." As Jesus looked at the religious situation of his day, he saw that judging others had become a great religious problem. The Pharisees and scribes sat in the place of the critic. They were quick to pass judgment on those who didn’t live up to their expectations. When Jesus was in the house of Simon the Pharisee and the sinful woman anointed his feet, Simon said, "This man, if he were a prophet, would know who and what manner of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner." (Luke 7:39). The Pharisees, in their self-righteous arrogance, had created a special class of people called "sinners" as if they themselves were not such. Do you think we sometimes do the same?  It’s a self-righteous judgment… So Jesus says that we are not to judge. Now he’s not talking about the judgment in a courtroom. He’s not talking about judging open and obvious sin (we’ll get to that later). He’s not talking about judging false teachers. What he is talking about is a hasty, unloving, "holier than thou" type of attitude. Its that "jumping to conclusions" about what we see attitude.

    The Indians had their way of saying this: "Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his moccasins." And there’s something to that. For example, a person brought up in a Christian home can’t really know the temptations of a teen-ager brought up in a thoroughly sinful environment. The fact is that if we realized what some people have to go through, or have gone through, instead of condemning them, we might tend to give them a break, and maybe even marvel that they have succeeded at being as good as they are.
    There is a story about a newspaper reporter that is one of my favorite examples of what we’re talking about. A reporter was once searching for a story about the laziness that existed throughout the South, when he saw a man in his field, sitting in a chair, hoeing his weeds. This had to be the ultimate in laziness. So he rushed back to his car to get his camera, when he looked back a second time and what he saw changed his entire outlook. He saw that the pants legs on the farmer hung down loose -- the man had no legs. So what seemed at first to be a story of laziness turned into a story of great courage. But that goes to show the limits of what we sometimes see in other people. God once made the point that "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (I Samuel 16:7). That’s why I don’t have the right to sit in judgment on someone else’s motives, for doing what they do or living the way they do…because I don’t know what their motives are. Only the Lord knows all.
    Notice that self-righteous judgment has a boomerang: "For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." In other words: “What goes around, comes around.” If you start throwing out this critical spirit on other people, it’ll come back.  We’ll receive the same kind of treatment that we dish out. If we judge others harshly and jump to the worst conclusions about others, we can be certain that we’ll be treated in the same way, I believe by both others and God. Does it make you mad when you find out that someone has made a judgment about you without knowing all the facts?
    We’re not qualified to sit in judgment on others because it’s impossible to be impartial -- we’re influenced by our own imperfections. Jesus here uses the graphic example of a plank of wood and a speck of dust.  I think Jesus used the illustration of a plank and a speck because he was a carpenter; that was familiar to him and it was familiar to the people around him.
    Have you ever listened to a man watch a football game, especially if his team is losing? He’ll criticize the quarterback for not throwing well, the receivers for not catching the easy passes, and the linemen for not blocking well. Have you ever thought -- If he’s so good at knowing what to do, then why is he sitting in a chair watching the game instead of being out there playing? I’ll tell you why – like me, he couldn’t run around his easy chair without losing his breath! Jesus says, "You’ve got no room to criticize others because of your own ineptitude!"
    But you see, even though we are unqualified, we still judge. And we often do so for selfish reasons; it makes us feel better. If we have a problem with sin in our own lives, it takes a little pressure off to point the finger at others for a while. It makes our sin seem not so bad after all. But, Jesus warns us that we’ve got to clean up our own act before we tamper with the lives of others.  And I don’t think that the plank in our eyes is necessarily a worse sin. I think he’s talking about the sin of self-righteousness, appointing ourselves as the official speck inspectors of the church!
    But, Jesus doesn’t end his discussion of judging with the command "judge not"... He goes on to say, "Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs." If you think verses 1-5 prohibit any kind of discerning in judgment, you are wrong. Because you’ve got to use some kind of criteria to decide who those spiritual dogs and pigs are. First Jesus says, "Don’t judge, don’t condemn." Then, in the same breath he says its okay to make certain judgments concerning people and behavior."
    How can these two positions be reconciled? The two positions actually complement and limit each other perfectly. In the first statement, as we’ve already seen, Jesus condemns the critical, holier-than-thou, jumping to conclusions sort of judgment that the Pharisees were known for. In the second statement, Jesus acknow-ledges the need for making decisions concerning people and behavior that is detrimental to our Christian lives and values. Verse 6 stands as a safeguard against an extreme interpretation of verses 1-5….which is permissiveness. It’s not the case that Jesus condemns all judging. In fact, he demands that we make some judgment.
In John 7:24, Jesus said, "Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment."
In I John 4:1, John tells us not to believe every preacher that comes along, but "test the spirits, whether they     are of God."
In I Corinthians 5:11, Paul tells us not to associate with a brother who is "a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolator, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner." That demands that we make a judgment of some sort.
So what is the message of Matthew 7:1-6? I think it’s a warning for us to avoid the extremes of judgment.
More tomorrow…