Sermon on Mount 9 (1)

Last time we closed with Jesus commanding His followers not to worry about their lives--what they will eat, drink, and wear. Doing away with the uselessness of worry allows us to focus on the kingdom of God.

Beginning with chapter 7, Jesus deals with the subject of judging others. He first lays out the principle that in whatever way we judge, we will ourselves be judged. "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you" (7:1-2).

So the law of sowing and reaping Paul the Apostle gives in Galatians 6:7 is presented here. "Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap." In the same way we judge, we shall be judged.

This works out in two ways. Either we are judged on the spot by our own hypocrisy if we are doing the very things we judge another for. Romans 2:1 speaks of this type. "Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge you condemn yourself, for you who judge practice the same things."

Or, a second way we reap judgment in the same way we dished it out is when others are harsh and judgmental toward us down the road, having remembered the way we judged them, or having watched the way we treated others without mercy. People don't tend to feel compassionate toward people who have not been compassionate and merciful themselves.

This is why Jesus continued to say in verse 2, "For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you." If your measure is to be unforgiving, unmerciful, and unloving, this is the way people will be inclined to treat you as well. If your measure is to show mercy, to forgive, to be patient, and to believe the best of another person, this is generally the measuring stick that will be used by others toward you.

Jesus is really saying, "Don't judge out of wrong, harsh, or unloving motives. The Jews of Jesus' day were the worst at this. Since they were the "chosen of God," and had themselves been the recipients of the Commandments and of God's laws, they had developed a condescending, superior, judgmental attitude toward others---ESPECIALLY the Gentiles. Jesus knew this.

Now I think there are four ways we can judge wrongly that Jesus was aiming at here. First, hastily. We do wrong when we judge a person before we have all the facts. The Bible says, "Spouting off before listening to the facts is both shameful and foolish" (Prov. 18:13). We should always seek to get both sides of an issue before passing a judgment.

The second kind of wrong judging is when we judge with a wrong standard--condemning something the Bible doesn't condemn. Our only true and unfailing standard for judging something is the Bible. God's Word is the ultimate arbiter of all truth. This is where the church gets in trouble with the society in which it lives. If the church decides to judge something wrong out of its own opinion, it comes back to bite us when someone clearly points out that the Bible doesn't agree.

If something is not condemned in Scripture, we as the church have no right to condemn it either. If it's only a matter of personal preference, or a matter of opinion we're talking about, we should offer our own opinion and leave it there.

For instance, eating is a big point of contention with some believers. There are those who believe in a kosher diet. They will not eat pork. Ok, fine. But they shouldn't judge others for not doing so because the New Testament clearly says,

"Since everything God created is good, we should not reject any of it but receive it with thanks. 5 For we know it is made acceptable[b] by the word of God and prayer" (1 Tim. 4:3-5). There you go! So, if you want to observe a kosher diet, go for it. But you shouldn't judge someone who doesn't do so because the Bible isn't with you on it!

Then a third way we can judge wrongly is in our attitude, the spirit in which we judge. We can judge someone in love, which the Bible commands. Or we can judge unmercifully, with meanness, with rejection, in a belittling, cruel way. While we might be right in our judgment, we are wrong in our spirit. When Jesus' disciples wanted to call fire down on a city that had rejected Him, Jesus said to them, "You know not what spirit you are of" (Luke 9:55).

So it behooves us to stop before we judge and check our spirits out. Are we in the flesh? Are we overly angry? Have we jumped to conclusions? Are we reflecting the character of God? Jesus often judged others in the Bible, but it was always measured, never out of control, and was always focused on the thing that was wrong without belittling the one who did the wrong.

A last way we can judge wrongly is hypocritically. And this seems to be the main focus of Jesus' attention. He says, "And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? 4 How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? 5 Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye" (3-5).

Now here the Lord used a bit of humor. You've got two people--one, the judged, the other the judger. The one being judged has a speck in their eye. In other words, there is something that needs to be taken out of their eye, but it's not major. It's enough to irritate the eye, but not enough to blind the eye.

Then you have the judger who sees the speck in the other person's eye and makes a huge deal out of it. In fact, so big a deal that he wants to personally remove the speck instead of letting the poor person do it themselves.

But Jesus says there's a problem. The one wanting to operate has, not a speck in their own eye, but a log! A two by four! In other words, what they have in their own eye is so large that it totally disqualifies them from even being able to see to operate on their brother's eye!

Jesus says, "Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye." The application is clear. We must be certain that our own lives are right with God, that we ourselves have experienced His healing and deliverance, before we can set others free. Freed people free people. Healed people heal people.

Now, the flip side to Jesus' message is this---He NEVER told us not to judge! He only told us not to judge wrongly. But we are indeed called to judge with righteous judgment. Jesus said, "Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly" (John 7:24). He didn't say don't judge at all, He qualified it by saying, Be sure you judge correctly.

In our society of so called "tolerance," we hear all the time from people living in sin that we have no right to judge them. The godless culture of America with it's fraudulent Political Correctness has very successfully muzzled much of the church from ever calling anything sin. We even hear more and more the claim that "Jesus never judged people. He just loved and accepted them."

Then they will immediately quote Matthew 7:1 to back up their claim. No Bible verse has been perverted and twisted like this one to teach that when someone calls the actions of another sinful or wrong, also telling them that to continue in such things will condemn their soul, that the person judging is doing what Jesus said not to do.

This tactic is a lost culture's way of muzzling the church from standing on Bible truth, Bible morality, and from ever being able to confront the culture with the claims of Scripture. This wrong-headed, false message must be rejected out of hand!

If we take the view that judging is completely and totally forbidden, then that would make the doctrinal and moral purity of the church impossible to maintain. How could we ever judge something to be wrong---within the church or out of it?

This would totally neuter our ability to preach the gospel because the opening salvo of a gospel message is that we human beings are in sin and need to repent! But if we can't judge something as being sinful, how can we preach repentance? What is there to repent from if nothing is wrong?

If we were to decide to not judge, how could we correct our children? Or dismiss an employee? Or decide who to vote for based on Biblical standards? How could we uphold the law, hold court, punish criminals, protect ourselves from a dangerous enemy?

Yet the American culture has now fully embraced the mantra of "not judging" because it's just not cool or right to do so. If you're really hip you're good with anything someone does, because if you judge them you're a bigot, or a homophobe, or an extremist, and so on.

Christians aren't the only ones seeing the folly of this Politically Correct mumbo jumbo of not judging. Comedian Adam Carolla (not known for being Christian) nevertheless nails it when he says, “Why is it so evolved not to judge? This notion that we’ve evolved into a species that’s incapable of judging other groups and what they are doing, especially when it’s beheading people or setting people on fire or throwing acid in the face of schoolgirls…I like that kind of judging."

Carolla added that the U.S. “crushing Hitler” in World War II was a “good thing” that would not be possible now because Bill Maher would be “screaming” about tolerance.

Acclaimed Welsh actor John Rhys-Davies, from Raiders of the Lost Ark and other famous movies, is quoted as saying, “This is a unique age. We don’t want to be judgmental. Every other age that’s come before us has believed exactly the opposite. I mean, T.S. Eliot referred to ‘the common pursuit of true judgement.’ Yes, that’s what it’s about. Getting our judgments right, getting them accurate.”

Davies closes by saying rightly, “We have lost our moral compass completely, and unless we find it, we’re going to lose our civilization." Here, here! Because if a nation can't call out evil for what it is, how can we experience anything but destruction by that very evil?

So how do we respond to the ever present pressure of the "thought police" who seem to be lurking in every corner, ready to pounce should you dare to judge what is clearly sinful, wrong, destructive behavior?

You take a stand! My resolve is to stand on Biblical truth, in love, without apology. If God says SOMETHING'S wrong, it's wrong. If God says SOMETHING'S right, it's right. This is the resolve of our church as we confront the culture with the claims of Christ!